Opinion: A Doctor's Opinion Of Obamacare
Last evening as I was just about to watch the local fireworks in our Chicago-area community, I ended up talking to two pro-Obamacare persons. As I recall, I didn’t bring up the topic. The pro Obamacare people did.
As diplomatic as I could, I started by saying that there are good points and bad points to the law, and I was disappointed that the Supreme Court wasn’t more discretionary in what they allowed to become the law of the land and what they didn’t allow to pass.
The main argument of the persons defending Obama’s health care reform was that we’re paying for it already – so why not do it this way, via Obamacare. I maintained that there’s nothing wrong with helping people who actually need assistance who can’t afford it in our society, but too many people are getting away with abusing the system. I feel that Obamacare makes it even easier for people to abuse the system. People abusing the government’s “handouts” are not the people I want my – or anyone else’s – hard-earned taxes going toward.
When those oral “fireworks” ended, it was time to regroup to watch the Fourth of July fireworks. As luck would have it, I ended up within earshot of a well-respected physician from the area.
I couldn’t help but ask him: “In a word, what do you think of Obamacare, Doctor? Good, bad, or indifferent?”
The doctor thought for a moment and hesitantly – nearly reluctantly said, in a very unenthusiastic tone: “It’s – it’s just OK.”
Hoping he’d explain, he did. He went on to say that something has to be done about the insurance companies and the prescription companies. Of course, he meant the horrendous profits the two are making at the expense of American citizens in need of medical insurance and medications.
He went on to say that, basically, the many other things related to the system aren’t positive. In fact, they are negative. He knows that if he continues to service Medicaid patients, he is going to be swamped. While he says he scarcely has enough time to see all of the patients he has to see now, the number of patients he now services is practically nothing to what the future holds for him – should he decide to continue servicing Medicaid patients. And, he sincerely hopes to continue helping this sector of society. The doctor indicated that he knows there are many people in his profession who simply will not deal with Medicaid patients from here on out due to the Obama legislation.
This, of course, is what many in the medical profession have said all along and which the pro-Obamacare government has ignored.
The doctor and I compared what’s happening to doctors and others in the medical profession to what has happened to persons in the teaching and related-educational fields. Through the years, the government’s role has messed things up to the point where good people who care about other people are being convinced that teaching isn’t a very good profession to enter anymore. It’s a travesty that “born teachers” are being led to feel this way via constantly growing governmental intrusions.
Professionals who have been honorable in helping other people throughout our nation’s history have – and are – being dishonored as the government demands more of these good people while expecting them to achieve less and less of their personal American dream.
Why dishonored? It’s all negative publicity for teachers and their pensions right now. But why are the pensions in such disarray? It’s because of the government – not because of the teachers. Teachers put into the system loyally for decades while the government – yes the state and federal governments – “borrowed” the money for other things. Call it theft if you choose. Yet, teachers are blamed for the horrendous pension plans throughout the country now when it’s the elected officials who spent that money on other things.
Be forewarned, now that government is taking over the health profession, disaster lurks for that profession in many ways as well.
By having government regulate the jobs of the people who do the extreme good for society more and more, those good people of the past are saying “forget it”. They are saying that they will do something else with their time and effort to get a decent living out of it. It’s to the point that the only ones who are happy with the government’s intervention of their jobs are the politicians. They set their pay, their health care plans, their guaranteed pensions and more. They go through the hell of a political campaign to keep their government jobs. Why wouldn’t they? They love their jobs - they’ve got it made. After all, they get to dictate what the people with necessary jobs in society should do and how they should be compensated for what they do. Politicians have it all.
Good people are running away from the necessary jobs in society – primarily health care and teaching – as the government controls them more and more with their requirements and laws.
Yes, they are very good people – often the best our society has. But when given the option to invest their skills, talents, and training in a job in the private sector or one being strangled by the government, these professionals are often making the right choice for themselves and their families – the choice of getting out of a governmentally-controlled field.
Good, hard-working Americans shouldn’t be forced to contemplate leaving their chosen profession as they are with federal laws such as Obamacare. But they are.
That slippery slope that the media keeps talking about these days is going to be crowded with lots of health care professionals very soon – slipping away from their government-controlled jobs – just as we have seen people turn away from teaching in recent decades. The government is to blame for it. The U.S. needs to stop giving the federal government controls over our most-needed and most-honored professions.
About Scott Paulson
Scott Paulson writes political commentary for Examiner.com and teaches English at a community college in the Chicago area. The views and opinions expressed in this post are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of CBS Local.
