A video recently surfaced of Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul discussing healthcare. Paul attempts to make the argument that his idea of universal healthcare amounts to slavery for doctors.
Rand Paul recently did a bit of his patented grandstanding by challenging Bernie Sanders to a debate that Rand knows he would lose handily, and that he further knows Bernie can’t accept without forfeiting his right to continue in the Democratic debates. Nonetheless, as a preview of what such a debate might have looked like, here is one example of Rand building a strawman about the horrors of socialized medicine before sending it down the slippery slope of his Right-wing libertarian fantasies. Luckily, Mr. Sanders is there to Bern Rand’s outlandish abstractions down as he drags Mr. Paul back to the reality based universe. You know, the one where Canada, Australia, the UK, France, and all the other single-countries in the world are just as free as the health for debt-slavery system that the U.S. “enjoys”.
First of all, Paul is saying healthcare is not a right – which it’s not. He makes a very good fundamental point that you have many rights, but you do not have the right to other people’s goods and services. Doctors are skilled labor like anyone else and you can’t force someone to provide a service for free. However, Lawyers are skilled workers & yet they are provided free of charge. Police & fire services, the military, etc. provide services for free. Why are these “free”? They aren’t. We already pay for them. We also pay more (and get less) for our healthcare than any other industrialized country in the world.
The main difference of course is that national defense and our justice system were written into the constitution. In fact, some could argue that the only real purpose of the federal government is to provide for the common defense of the nation and uphold the constitution. Healthcare was not part of the deal along with a lot of other things we now provide. If a state or town wants its citizens to have free healthcare via a tax and set up their own government run hospitals locally then that’s great, but many don’t think it should become a federally mandated law.
However, many also believe that healthcare should be a right. Our Constitution was not meant to be the be-all-end-all: Civilization evolves & changes. That’s why there are amendments. The real point is that people need healthcare, and while our system can’t guarantee good health, it should offer assistance to avoid unnecessary human suffering.
“Justice and common defense” are covered in the Constitution, but so are “domestic tranquility” and “the general welfare”. We already have Medicare in our society because we obviously felt it was necessary to meet the needs of at least some of the people. Universal healthcare is simply another step toward including all civilians. It could be argued that it is in the constitution, but medicine as we know it now didn’t exist when the constitution was written.
Despite the fact that many point out the expense of covering everyone, this simply isn’t true. According to an independent study by RAND (http://www.modernhealthcare.com/article/20130603/NEWS/306039947), “the cost of expanding Medicaid under this reform would be lower than the cost of providing uncompensated care to their uninsured residents.” In other words, total healthcare costs are greater when people go without coverage. Medicaid saves taxpayers money.
Aside from the economic benefit, Bernie is quick to point out that he also believes it’s simply the right thing to do.
To find out more about Bernie Sanders position on health care click here http://feelthebern.org/bernie-sanders-on-healthcare/
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