Of health care, taxes, unemployment, and so much more

First, I would like to start off by saying there is more to my views than meet the eye. Yes, I believe the way the health care bill is written (and thank God it will not be passed before the August recess), our government will completely destroy whatever is left of our country. Paperwork and huge taxes are just the start of what this bill will bring. But no, I do not believe the system is perfect the way it is now. That said, here are a some things to think about with the new health care bill. In the current House of Representatives bill, it would cost about $900 billion to cover 95% of people in America over the next 6 years, but how many people are without insurance today that truly cannot get it AND truly deserve it?

The Census Bureau report “Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2005,” puts the initial number of uninsured people living in the country at 46.577 million.

A closer look at that report reveals the Census data include 9.487 million people who are “not a citizen.” Subtracting the 10 million non-Americans, the number of uninsured Americans falls to roughly 37 million.

According to the same Census report, there are 8.3 million uninsured people who make between $50,000 and $74,999 per year and 8.74 million who make more than $75,000 a year. That’s roughly 17 million people who ought to be able to “afford” health insurance because they make substantially more than the median household income of $46,326.
Subtracting non-citizens and those who can afford their own insurance but choose not to purchase it, about 20 million people are left – less than 7 percent of the population.
The Kaiser Family Foundation, a liberal non-profit frequently quoted by the media, puts the number of uninsured Americans who do not qualify for current government programs and make less than $50,000 a year between 13.9 million and 8.2 million. That is a much smaller figure than the media report.

Kaiser’s 8.2 million figure for the chronically uninsured only includes those uninsured for two years or more. It is also worth noting, that, 45 percent of uninsured people will be uninsured for less than four months according to the Congressional Budget Office.

So the number of truly uninsured people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the same place showing 47 million people as uninsured, only about 11 million (if you go right in the middle of the liberal stat mentioned above) are what we truly need to worry about. So why are we spending $900 billion dollars to try to provide health care for them?

That translates to $100,000 dollars per person that cannot obtain health care. You think if you were uninsured an unable to obtain health care $100,000 dollars would get you that health care? I bet it would, considering “Cadillac” plans are around $25,000. Well now look at the bill as it is written even further. It plans to provide health care to every person in America, no matter if they are citzen, legal alien, or very strangely, illegal aliens. So at 300 million people, that bill translates to $3000 per person in America (including illegal aliens!). Now for average health care, that is more than enough. My family pays less than that each year for health care for 4 people. So for one person $3000 should be plenty. But the best part? About $500 billion of that is coming from the wealthy! Taxes will be raised on the rich to pay for this. Why is this important? Well how many lower or middle class families or individuals would be able to invest in new research for breakthrough medical treatments, startup companies like Apple, Dell, Microsoft and HP once were, put money into our higher education to provide scholarships, etc.? Not nearly enough. There may be enough people in those classes, but how many of them would take risks with their money and take a chance that may cause them to not be able to provide for their families?

Now, on to taxes. For anyone that considers taxes a necessary evil please look at the way taxes work today. Oh wait, can you even understand it? All 1,000 pages of the tax code? If you can understand it, please get back to me on that. I have no idea what it means other than I don’t get all the money I earn. Some of it goes towards social security, medicare, and towards the general federal budget (that they have not been able to balance since the republican congress during the Clinton administration). It goes towards public schooling, which doesn’t have to be a bad thing. But it can be very very quickly. My parents paid into the public school system for 14 years before they used it, and even then they only used it for just 4 years. Others like Chuck Norris, who also homeschools his children, also pay into this system despite not using it, and others still pay into it despite sending their children to private schools. Let our taxes go towards what we will use.
For those sending their children to private schools, allow their tax dollars to go towards vouchers that are sent directly to the private school their children attend. For those that choose to homeschool their children, allow them to take their textbooks and necessary school supplies, the same things used in schools (calculators, low end computer or a portion of them, pencils, notebooks, etc) off their taxes, which is currently not done. Give us tax breaks to use specifically towards buying health insurance. And if you want to help lower the deficit, create an agency to look over fraud.
Fraud in government programs like medicare, Medicaid, and many other programs from the government have a fraud rate of 3%. That seems ok right? I mean, 97% then is going to where it is supposed to. That’s pretty good. Well consider this. The $100 million in budget cuts the federal government came up with is just 0.006% of the budget. And that is about the same percentage that credit card companies have fraud. You know why credit card companies have such a low fraud percentage? They protect their money, just as the government should. Imagine, 3% of the money spent in the stimulus bill, part of the budget. That 3% is about $24 billion dollars. Imagine if that was cut down to less than half a percent. Imagine if it was cut to zero. Imagine if our tax dollars actually went where they were supposed to.
Next, I want to move on to unemployment alongside taxes, technological innovation, investing, and so much more.
As taxes go up on the rich, jobs are lost, the stock market loses its value because less money is being put into it, and in turn, companies are not invested in enough to get off the ground. In 1976, Apple got off the ground. In 1984, Dell was founded. In 1975, Microsoft was founded. Why do I list these? Because during the Reagan Era, these companies were relatively young. In the Reagan Era, taxes were drastically cut, and these companies, along with many many others, saw the benefits. Now they are household names. But with huge tax raises and what is used by the government is wasted with fraud and funding for things that should be left to the states, how many relatively new companies and ideas will live to see tomorrow? In the 1980’s, the rich and upper-middle class were able to invest in those companies and we are now seeing the benefits today. Computer technology has grown in the past 20 years more than many technologies ever did. I am typing this note on a machine with the power of a computer the size of the white house 20 to 25 years ago. Without money going into companies to look into microprocessors and the type of technology we use today, we may still not have it, or if we did it would be much more expensive. So if the rich have less money to invest, I can guarantee you that any innovations we see here in the next few years, hydrogen or electric cars, biotechnology, whatever it could be, it will be much more expensive than if people with money were to invest in them.
And when they have money to invest in companies and they grow, those same companies have more jobs to give to people. Imagine that! More money in companies hands means more jobs! That Why the Reagan Era had just 5.5% unemployment, the Calvin Coolidge years had just 3.9% unemployment. And more jobs means lower poverty rates. After just over two years in office, poverty during the Reagan years reached its height at 15.2% in 1982 only to drop down to 12.8% by the time Reagan left office. Over 20 million new jobs were created during the Reagan years. Tax cuts worked. The only administration to create more jobs was the Clinton administration. But What did he have that worked? A republican congress that balanced the budget and turned over $400 billion in deficits into over $230 billion surplus in the year 2000. That republican congress cut taxes and balanced the budget. Today, our federal government is working further in the red than ever before and it only looks to get worse. With 1,000 page bills being passed multiple times in the last six months. All without our legislatures even reading the bills. Look at this. Democratic Representative John Conyers, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has raised some eyebrows with his blatantly undemocratic statement. Responding to criticism about Congress passing bills they don’t take the time to read, he said, “I love these members that get up and say, ‘read the bill!’ Well, what good is reading the bill if it’s a thousand pages and you don’t have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you’ve read the bill?” That excuse wouldn’t even fly in high school.

Why are we paying them 6 figures if they won’t do their jobs?! I understand that bills may be edited in the future, but if they are passed without ever being read, we can’t even imagine the damage they are doing! Please, look at what is going on. I honestly pray that I am wrong, honestly. But I do not believe that this nation can survive as a republic with the direction our elected officials are leading us, especially our president, who said while he was a state legislature “If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeded was to vest formal rights in previously disposed peoples. So that I would now have the right to vote, I would now be able to sit a a lunch counter and as long as I could pay for it, it would be OK. But the Supreme Court NEVER VENTURED INTO THE ISSUES OF REDISTRIBUTION OF WEALTH AND MORE BASIC ISSUES OF POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC JUSTICE IN THIS SOCIETY.”

“And to that extent as radical as I think people try to radicalize the Warren Court it wasn’t that radical it didn’t BREAK FREE FROM THE ESSENTIAL CONSTRAINTS BY THE FOUNDING FATHERS IN THE CONSTITUTION, at least as its been interpreted and the Warren Court interpreted it in the same way that generally the CONSTITUTION IS A CHARTER OF NEGATIVE LIBERTIES SAYS WHAT THE STATE CAN’T DO TO YOU. WHAT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CAN’T DO TO YOU. BUT DOESN’T SAY WHAT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT OR STATE GOVERNMENT MUST DO ON YOUR BEHALF.“

I am honestly scared for my future as an American. Please, pray with me that our officials can wake up and do their jobs and treat our most important documents the way they should be treated, with dignity and respect. They should be defended at all costs. Thank you for reading. And please, do not call me out just because I am a conservative. I am a concerned citizen. I am for health care reform, just not the way it is currently written. I know the economy needs a stimulus, but not more government spending. I do research and analyze my facts and sources before I post them. I would not want you to think I am an idiot or ignorant. Please, if you post any comments here, research them first. I have struggled writing this note for days. I have wanted so badly to be wrong with this, but I do not think I am. Please know I am not just calling out democrats, but also republicans that voted yes for the stimulus, for cap and trade, and those even that voted no without reading the bills. They should not vote until they are given adequate time to read and comprehend the bills they vote on. I am not calling out for everything in the government to go republican, I am calling out for all government officials to do the job we elected them to do.