Actually, can I take those words you put in my mouth about health care out ?

I was driving home and listening to NPR when I heard Senator, Mitch McConnell, the minority leader, say the following: "I think we can all agree that we'd like to see universal access to affordable health care insurance."

Um, no.

Mr. McConnell is a bright man, but I have a feeling he thinks his listeners are not. I'm not going to get into the deeper politics of the issue, or mention how the social security versus private retirement accounts debate made it clear that people are not necessarily of the same mind as conservative republicans regarding private choice. Or how conservative republicans are sticking to their 'no problem can't be solved by the free market' philosophy in this time, when, well, the old invisible hand had guided us to the teetering edge of a fatal fall.

The short of it ? If you are unemployed- and the real number of unemployed is well above 10% now- there's no such thing as affordable health insurance. This is similar to the idea of cutting taxes. If you don't have a job, a ten percent tax cut, at best, is going to have a miniscule affect on your income, and improving the affordability of health care insurance would have a similar effect.

No, what I favor is universal access to health care.

So close, Mr. McConnell. What a difference a word makes.

Notes from the Treadmill

CNN: Universal Health Care Surveys
Indiana School of Medicine did a survey which indicates 59% of doctors support universal health care and 32% oppose it. Disturbing in two ways- first, apparently 9% of doctors can't answer a yes or no question yes or no, and second, 32% of doctors don't think people should have access to health care.

I know, that's a massive oversimplification, and yes, we need to end medical students getting slammed by debt before they even leave school, unreasonable malpractice, etc. But come on, everyone doesn't deserve health care ? If we can't sell the idea to doctors...