Last few days of freedom

I generally refrain from making political comments on this blog, since I'm not a terribly partisan guy. I cut my political teeth working for Democratic candidates for statewide office. I had a lot of fun and every campaign I've worked on has ended victorious. I've voted for several political parties.

But this health care bill will be a disaster for the United States. It's not so much this bill, though it raises taxes and 'front ends' those tax receipts for years before they are spent giving health care for millions of people who don't want to pay for health insurance until they need it. It will soon run a deficit.

The socialist left just wants a foot in the door. Once they get their vast bureaucratic agency, they will just add, add, and add to the socialized medicine system. Eventually, it will be government-run health care, a single-payer system.

You want to see how that works? Look at the UK health care system. Health care becomes part of the federal budget, competing with defense, education, social security, highway funding and everything else. There won't be enough money to keep care at the present level of excellence.

In the UK, there is an agency that was created to cut funding for cancer and other drugs. It's called NICE, and it's anything but. NICE has refused to fund scores of cancer drugs, because they are 'too expensive'. These drugs (which up until now have included Rituxan)are saving lives in the US. They are not saving lives in the UK, because the government can't afford to pay for them.

Don't believe me? Search on 'NICE denies cancer drugs'. Now, that doesn't affect me, because up until now, the US has a private health insurance system that spreads risk around, and doesn't have to pay for a vast bureaucracy that will be so inefficient it will make the DMV look like a paragon of efficiency.

But what do I care? I have a fatal disease, and I am likely to die before the socialists totally destroy health care.

I suppose it's because I care about my fellow cancer patients. I have relatives who will suffer once the federal government swallows health care. They will not have the same excellent coverage as I do now.

I suspect the first thing to go for CLL patients is IvIG, intravenous immunoglobulin injections. They are valuable to CLL patients with there terrible immune systems, but they are expensive and have not been shown to prolong survival. It's a quality of life issue, but don't count on it being there in a few years.

One funny thing? The pharmaceutical companies, who got Obama to promise to not negotiate lower prices for drugs, in exchange for their support. What are they going to do when they won't be able to sell their ridiculously expensive drugs at all?

Serves them right.

Combine this with the government seizure of GM, Chrysler, the student loan program, providing internet access to all Americans (at taxpayer expense, of course), and you have a road map to socialist nirvana. Everyone will be beggars at the government teat. And, once the government says no, you have no place to go.

I will leave you with a quote, and see if you know it:

"Still one thing more, fellow-citizens—a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities."

It was the good and wise third president of the United States. He mentioned a 'frugal government' twice.

Boy, that isn't the case now, is it?