R.P. Barr

Veterans Day 2009

There are many threads running through this Veterans Day.  One is that the holiday was originally declared to be "a day to be dedicated to the cause of world peace and to be thereafter celebrated and known as 'Armistice Day'."  In 1954 it was altered to be a day of remembrance for all veterans, thus expanded beyond the First World War and narrowed to honoring uniformed service members only.

 The Fort Hood shooting demonstrates how that change has skewed our thinking.  I have been reading some blogs and the comments by readers.  One of the heroes of the shooting was a female federal civilian police sergeant named Kimberly Munley, 34.  She and her partner responded to the shooting.  Sgt. Munley took two bullets, in the hand and in the leg, and took down the assailant with four shots of her own.  Yet, some blog comments complain that she should not be considered a hero because she was only doing what she was paid to do.  She was also a union member, and AFGE was criticized for pointing that out. 

Under the logic of the first argument, we should not give awards to anyone who performs outstandingly well at her or his job.  No medals for soldiers, no Oscars for actors, no bonuses for doing anything.  Pay should be its own reward.

When I lived and worked in New York City, I came in regular contact with the police.  There was a motto among them that “a good cop is never cold or wet.”  I also heard more than one explain that I would never see a cop breaking up a fight.  Why take the risk when the pay was the same for arriving later for clean up?  Which is not to say that there aren’t heroes in the NYPD, but they’re special, like anywhere else.

 The other argument says that no-one should be proud of their association with a hero.  There should not be ticker-tape parades, no-one who sits on the sidelines should cheer on a sports team, even families might want to consider bragging about their kids.

The fact is that some people have already pre-selected their heroes, and a female, civilian cop doesn’t qualify.  How poor we are if our views become so restricted. 

 The other thread I want to discuss is the situation in Afghanistan and what the President should do. 

Too many times, we have sent just enough troops to do the job under optimum circumstances, and then watched it all go wrong.  Somalia is a case in point.  Iraq is another.  Guerrilla wars don’t stop when a conventional army captures the capitol or takes down the leader.  To end a guerrilla war—a people’s war—you have to stomp out all vestiges of the rebellion and replace the old idea with a new, more appealing one.  That takes overwhelming force for the first part and vigorous nation building for the second.

 On the other side of the issue is a barely functioning, corrupt Afghan government that lacks widespread support.  There does not have to be support for the regime in power, only for the institutions of government, together with a reasonable expectation for change.

 As for building up the Afghan army—it takes time.  When I was drafted, I spent 8 weeks in basic training.  Very basic training.  I remember spending more than two hours trying to teach a fellow trainee his left from his right.  He still didn’t get it.  Then, there was another 8 weeks of advanced training—more for the technical jobs like radio operator.  That is just to put a warm body on the field.  You can’t win anything with an army of privates.  It takes years to build a good sergeant or an officer.  Units have to train together to work effectively.

And, if we just go home, al-Qaeda will have a green light to follow us.  Remember that their goal is to show how strong they are in order to gain enough strength to kick the foreigners AND the secular governments out of the Middle East.  The best way to do that is to show that they are not afraid of the most powerful country in the world.  A bomb here and a bomb there is wonderful advertising.

 This is a new world, and a lot more men and women are going to become veterans.  What the rest of us have to remember is that those who serve in the military do not make this a great country.  The country must be made great by the efforts of rest of us to keep it worth their service.  We must work to deserve heroes.

Backstabbing in Virginia: the governor's race

We just had an election here in Virginia, and I hear pundits all over the news babbling about the meaning of it all.  So far, everything I've heard is wrong.

 Democrat Creigh Deeds was not properly supported by the Democratic Party.  It is possible that Mr. Deeds does not know how to run a statewide campaign.  If that is so, the party should have provided him with advisors who could show him. 

 The fact is that most voters today make up their minds by watching television.  Newspapers are a dying media.  The internet and Twitter is not a good news source for state campaigns. One has to dig too much to find real news.  And only the faithful read the candidate's web sites.

 Republican McDonnell had at least three times the television ads that Deeds had.  And they were better.  McDonnell looked right into the camera surrounded by his family and said what a fine fellow he was.  Deeds had a couple anti-McDonnell ads, and one that showed newspaper editorials endorsing him.  Deeds never looked the voters in the eye.  He never talked about his vision for Virginia.

 He may have done that in stump speeches or in the debate, but I didn’t see those, and most other voters didn’t either. 

 I suspect that either during his long career of public service, or during the primary, Mr. Deeds ran afoul of some powerful Democrats.  The outgoing governor, Tim Kaine is Chairman of the Democratic National Committee and surely in a position to steer money toward one of the only two governors races that were held this year.  He should have matched the Republicans and seen to it that the standard bearer had at least an even chance.  He didn’t.

 Or else, the same idiots who planned Hillary Clinton’s campaign for the presidential nomination are now designing Democratic strategy.  Clinton lost because her campaign targeted major states and skipped over the smaller ones.  Obama won because he executed a full-on charge to get every vote he could, everywhere he could.  Maybe the general urban prejudice against someone from western, rural Virginia convinced the powers that be that Deeds couldn’t win, so they held on to their money and let him go down.

 That is cynical and unworthy of a party that is supposed to be big-tent inclusive.  By not providing a strong campaign, they’ve let down the voters.  And by letting McDonnell sweep the election, they’ve screwed over all of us here in Virginia and given the Republicans momentum for 2010.  Kaine and the rest of the Democratic leadership should be ashamed of themselves.

Scary films

In honor of Halloween, let’s talk about scary movies.  I think that the original Psycho still deserves the top spot.  I haven’t seen much in recent years that has the punch of the films from mid-20^th century.  It’s true that I don’t get out as much as I did back then, but there is more to it than that. 

  Earlier eras stressed characterization, plot and usually built around a theme or moral.  Today, many of these older flicks seem to have too much dialogue and exposition.  Plus, the special effects often seemed artificial and cheesy.  So did much of the acting.

 I just rewatched the original version of  The Blob.   The basic idea that teens are worth listening to, was what made the film tick—and click with young audiences.  The ravenous raspberry ooze was less interesting than the performance of Steven McQueen.  (It’s the only time he didn’t bill himself as “Steve.”)  McQueen played a cool nerd, something even more rare than pie filling that bites back.  He was an astronomy hobbyist, awkward with girls, tongue-tied around adults, and yet cool enough to beat the high school hot shots in a backwards drag race and then rally all of the town teens to fight the blob.  The scariest part was when the frozen blob was airlifted to the North Pole and McQueen asked the General if it was dead.  “No,” he said.  “I don’t think we can kill it.  But, we’ll be safe as long as the arctic stays frozen.”

 Today’s films are faster paced, packed with computerized effects and mistake shock and disgust for scary, but we don’t care about the people who are killed along the way.  Well, we may want to watch the pretty people a little longer before they’re sliced and diced, but when they go, we think “Euwww, that’s nasty,” and then look forward to the next murder.  In the end, that’s all there is.  The scripts are designed around a quest for shocks.  Monsters kill without reason and pursue the principal actors when other quarry is easier to get to.  Monster animals eat without ever getting full.  The worst are the monsters that can’t be killed.  Halloween lost me at the end when Michael Myers is shot several times, falls out a second story window and then disappears.  Real psychopaths are mortal.

 Meanwhile, the only two films in all the world that I would have censored, if I’d had the authority, are The Exorcist, and Natural Born Killers.  The first because it can stimulate dangerous delusions in those who are susceptible, and the latter because it is a pornography of violence that has caused real-life murders—something that others besides myself predicted.

 Japanese horror flicks are stylish and have disturbing images, but make no more sense than Hollywood schlock.

 The independent Open Water was a good, relatively recent, scary film, about the inevitability of drowning or succumbing to sharks when left out in the ocean.  The original Manchurian Candidate dealt with the idea of brain-washing and mind control in a way that seemed realistic at the time.  It also changed the way we looked at politicians and demagogues.  Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the original, involved the concept of being replaced, and that the people you know are not the people you know. 

 Among my recommendations for good, non-scary monster entertainment are the first and last King Kong’s and The Day of the Triffids.  Several Dracula films, including the original, are also good fun.

 A little film fear is healthy. It keeps us on our toes, and prepares us for the suspense of our own lives.  Repetitious on-screen blood and gore, however, only inure us against compassion for real victims in the real world.

Dependency

The facility where I work supports and provides for people with profound physical and mental disabilities.  I am in the admin side of the house, but I went to the Halloween party to feel like a part of the things.  Watching our clients having a good time was a remarkable tonic for me, for the staff, and for the volunteers who came to help out.  Not all of our folks are capable of smiling or laughing, but by having seen those individuals in their daily routines, I could tell by their posture—either more alert or more relaxed—and by their movements--in time with the music, etc.--that they were enjoying the evening.  Some of them had selected and worn costumes.  It was magical.  While I am speaking in the aggregate—for the sake of privacy—I remember the individuals.  There was the woman dressed like a princess who strutted around so proudly, the flapper who just liked being dressed up and told how pretty she looked, the guy in the sorcerer’s robe who proudly introduced himself to everyone—their personalities were as much on display as their costumes.

The evening brought to mind a recent letter-to-the-editor I saw online.  The writer complained about being “obligated” to pay his hard-earned money to provide care for other people.  The people in my facility depend on tax dollars for their survival, and they put as much effort into their activities as anyone who is paid a wage.  But, that’s not the point.  The disabled require more hands-on, up-close-and-personal care, but they are not the only ones in need of public services that they cannot afford on their own.

I wake up in the morning in time to get to work because my clock radio turns on automatically.  And, it does that because electricity comes to my home 24-hours.  I can rely on it, and not just because I pay my bill.  In other countries, electricity customers also pay their bills, but without government regulation and support, the power isn’t guaranteed.

 I crawl out of bed on my own, and go to the bathroom where the water comes out of the tap and will not inflict a horrible disease if I brush my teeth with it.  When I get dressed, I know that my cottons are really cotton, the wool is really wool and if I ever buy anything with a designer label, I can be sure that it is not counterfeit.  Why?  Because I pay taxes and my neighbor does, too.  We take care of each other.

 My house did not fall down in last night’s storm because the builders adhered to government standards that were backed up with inspections.  I can afford my house because I have a government-backed mortgage. 

 My car is where I left it the night before, in part because I don’t buy cars that anyone wants to steal, and in part, because there are multiple layers of law enforcement that ensure my safety.  If you don’t want to pay taxes for my security, go to Mexico where you only have to pay for your own.  See which is cheaper.

 The air I breathe is as clean as it is because of government regulation and enforcement.  Visit a country without air quality regulations, someplace where you can feel the grease in the air, and then tell me that you don’t need the government to take care of you.

 We are all dependent.  There are places where taxes are low and services are non-existent.  Life expectancy is around 50 years and you have to hire guards to sit in front of your house at night.  Self-sufficiency and independence is a myth, and those who are the richest are the most dependent on government protections.

Every breath we take, every bite we eat, every mile we walk, drive or ride is made safer by government workers and tax dollars.  And, when an agency fails to meet expectations, we complain about it—vigorously.  That’s how dependent we are.

 So, why do we pay more for health care than any other country and still rank below the rest of the developed world in life expectancy and infant mortality?  Which agency is responsible for that? 

 Oh, wait, health care is provided by the private sector.  On a fee-for-service basis which means the more things a doctor can do to you the more he gets paid.  As long as he stays within the insurance company guidelines.  And, if you get better, that’s nice, too.

Supporting Those Who Abuse Those Who Serve

 In the modern version of American warfare, there are as many government contractors in the field as there are military personnel.  That wasn’t always true.  When I was drafted back in ’68, I was worried about my chances of survival until I learned that only 1 in 11 military personnel in Vietnam were actually engaged in combat.  The rest were in support positions.  I decided the odds were in my favor.

When the decision was made to go all volunteer, it was also decided to privatize a lot of those support jobs.  The military would need fewer enlistees and those it recruited would not be burdened with KP and other unpopular duties.  And then, look at all those contracts that could be issued to companies who show their appreciation with campaign contributions.  What a windfall for legislators.  End the unpopular draft and create a goldmine.

The government has yet to figure out how to properly manage contractors.  The official who signs the contracts must be of high rank, but the person who oversees the contractor is not.  Any time the overseer has a dispute with the contractor, he must send his complaint up the chain of command.  That means that a series of managers have to champion the cause of an underling to their superiors with sufficient vigor that each succeeding superior will champion the cause to his boss.  Meanwhile, the contractor goes directly to the top of the chain with his complaints about the lowly overseer.  Who do you think wins?

Aside from the general inefficiency of such a system, it accounts for a series of abuses, including contracts with contractor employees that include a clause prohibiting the employee from suing the contractor for anything.  All disputes are to go to arbitration.

In a union shop, this is not a terrible thing.  The arbitrator must be agreed to by both sides.  And, even though the company pays the arbitrator, he knows that if he leans too much toward the company’s side, the union will never agree to use him again.  In the non-union world, the arbitrator knows that the company will use him again and again, while the hapless employee will not.  No wonder that companies love arbitrators.

That’s why I can’t understand the people who say unions are unnecessary today.  They say that if a worker is wronged he can run to a lawyer and sue.  The big corporations with arbitration clauses encourage this argument.

Of course, we assume that a really dreadful wrong would still be righted in the courts somehow.  Try telling that to Jamie Leigh Jones who was gang raped by her Halliburton/KBR colleagues in Iraq.  The Department of Defense under Bush/Cheney leadership denied that they had jurisdiction to prosecute, although they did.  The Justice Department did not prosecute either.  And, Ms Jones could not even sue for damages because of the arbitration clause in her contract.

Was this a case of one exception slipping through the system?  No, according to a story  last year in The Nation, there have been 742 sexual assaults against military and civilians serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Of the cases against civilians, the Department of Justice had prosecuted 4—or maybe 6.  The DOJ spokesperson who testified before Congress wasn’t sure of the exact number.

It is news now because the fledgling Senator from Minnesota, Al Franken--inspired by Ms Jones plight--has proposed his first legislation.  It’s not a whole bill, just an amendment to a Defense spending bill.  His amendment [S.Amdt. 2588 to H.R. 3326 (Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2010)] reads:

To prohibit the use of funds for any Federal contract with Halliburton Company, KBR, Inc., any of their subsidiaries or affiliates, or any other contracting party if such contractor or a subcontractor at any tier under such contract requires that employees or independent contractors sign mandatory arbitration clauses regarding certain claims.

Of course the amendment passed overwhelmingly with bipartisan support, 68 to 30 with two not voting.

I was interested in the 30 pro-rape Senators who voted against the amendment.  They are all Republicans.  Men who voted to cut off funding to Acorn for counseling pseudo-pimps and prostitutes, which is apparently a worse offense than the sexual assault of women in war zones by their colleagues.

I checked the U.S. Senate web site and found that these are the pro-rape Senators.  I hope their opponents remember this vote the next time they come up for re-election.

From Alabama: both Jeff Sessions and Richard Shelby

From Arizona: both Jon Kyl and John McCain

From Georgia:  both Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson

From Idaho: both Mike Crapo and James Risch

From Kansas: both Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts

From Kentucky: both Jim Bunning and Mitch McConnell

From Louisiana: David Vitter

From Mississippi: both Thad Cochran and Roger Wicker

From Missouri: Christopher Bond

From Nebraska: Mike Johanns

From Nevada: John Ensign

From New Hampshire: Judd Gregg

From North Carolina: Richard Burr

From Oklahoma: both Tom Coburn and James Inhofe

From South Carolina: both Jim DeMint and Lindsey Graham

From South Dakota: John Thune

From Tennessee: both Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker

From Texas: John Cornyn

From Wyoming: both John Barrasso and Michael Enzi

Quote: The Ideal Religious Fanatic

Speaking of Rhode Island founder Roger Williams—the subject of her recent book, The Wordy Shipmates--on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, author Sarah Vowell said:

 "He’s the sort of ideal religious fanatic.  He believed that everyone who disagreed with him over his puritan views were going to burn eternally in Hell.  And, he thought that was punishment enough, and so, on earth, we could all live together….I thought if there were more religious fanatics like that nowadays, there might be fewer car bombs.”

Non-Governmental Taxes

Some people are crying about taxes and the fear of new programs.  I would just like a word about the taxes we pay to corporations.  In 2001, I paid about $86.00 per month for my family-plan health insurance.  That was my share.  My employer, the government, paid a larger part.  Today, for the same coverage with the same provider, I am paying $323.00 and change.  My share.  Deducted from my retirement.  I’m pretty healthy overall, so most of what I pay goes to cover the illnesses of other people who have the same insurance carrier—and for the HMO’s administration and profit.  The medical care that I do receive is not between my doctor and myself.  I have asked for tests for ailments and been told that the diagnostic tests are not covered while the doctors try one prescription after another to see what works.  Good thing that my condition is not serious.  But, how would I know?

 I pay another thousand or more for life insurance.  If I live past age 70, the policies will only pay half.  Or less.  So, am I buying a future benefit or paying a tax?  True, I could cancel the policies and pocket the money.  Then my wife would have to sell the house when I die, and live where? 

 When I was a kid, my father paid monthly gas, electric, water and telephone bills.  I pay those—actually, I pay three phone bills to include my cell phones and internet connection.  Then, I pay for television connection and garbage collection.  Ah, those are fees for services, you say.  Except when I am out of town and don’t use the phone, watch TV, or throw out garbage.  I still have to pay.  How is that not a tax?

The fact is that most of these private taxes have gone up faster than inflation, and faster than government taxes.  And, these companies can change their terms whenever they like.  I can accept the new terms or lose the service—such as it is.  None of the people who set these rates are answerable to me.  I can’t campaign or vote to replace them with a CEO that I like better.

I favor a public option for health care.  If it puts the private insurance companies out of business, good.  That’s not my goal, but I won’t mind if it happens.  Get rid of fee-for-service and pay doctors a salary.  A good salary, but a salary with bonuses and increases based on patient outcomes.  Take the profit incentive from between the patient and his caregiver.  Costs will go down.  Outcomes will improve.  

Strict Constitutionalism

Listening to a news commentary the other day, I heard someone say that Glenn Beck and some of his fellow travelers were using the Constitution to condemn Obama’s health care overhaul.  Health care is not mentioned in the Constitution, therefore, the government should not propose it.  These talking heads want us to become a nation of secular Amish.  Anything not specifically mentioned by the founding fathers is heresy.

I don’t consider myself a Constitutional expert, but I have been carrying a copy around with me for the last two or three decades, and have read through it several times.  In fact, on at least three occasions, I have taken an oath to defend and protect the Constitution.  While not everyone who takes that oath honors it, I tend to trust those who have more than those who have not.

 Once I was asked to respond to a letter sent to my agency by a concerned citizen.  He had just seen one of our forms that referred to him as a “citizen of the United States.”  The writer asserted that he was an “American,” proud of it, and government forms should use the correct term.  In reply, I pointed out that  the Constitution refers three times to the term “citizen of the United States” and not at all to “American” which is a geographical term.  Both Canadians and Mexicans can equally claim to be Americans.  The point being that the people who shout the loudest often know the least.

 Getting back to health care, Beck is right.  Health care is not in the Constitution.  Neither is “corporation.”  Presumably the government has no right to support or protect this unconstitutional entity.   “Czar” is not in the constitutional lexicon, and neither is “bank.”

I am sure that someone has noticed that “gay marriage” in not in our bedrock document.  As a matter of fact, “marriage” is not mentioned in any form.  The founding fathers must have been advocates of free love.  Or, that is what I thought until I realized that “love” and “sex” are also omitted—except for that 19^th Amendment thing about not denying rights due to sex.  (Presumably they were referring to sex as an identifier as opposed to an activity.)  When I found that neither pregnancy nor children were cited, I realized that the intent of the Constitution was to represent a nation of celibates that would not outlast the first generation.  What other explanation is there?

Detecting racism

Are attacks on the president’s health care proposal racist?  Of course, but that is not the whole story.  There are those who are legitimately concerned about features of the plan.  The way to tell the difference between the racists and those who are issue-driven is to measure the volume, the inflammatory words they use and whether they disseminate disinformation.

 For example, would Joe Wilson have heckled Bill Clinton addressing a joint session of Congress?  God—and everybody else--knows that Clinton was vilified by Republicans at a level beyond anything before seen in the modern era, but no-one shouted back at him when he addressed Congress.  Race may not have motivated Wilson’s opposition to health care reform, but it gave him that extra little push when Obama was speaking.

 Similarly, would Kanye West have taken the microphone away from Rihanna or Janet Jackson?  Of course not, but a white country singer did not deserve the same respect.  Racism is all around, and does not even have to be in the front of our minds. 

 I learned about the subtleties of discrimination in high school.  Ours was a consolidated school that drew students from three towns.  It was also all white until the school accepted a couple black students in my senior year.  My government class was all white.  This was the situation when my teacher asked me to select students from the class for parts in a role-playing exercise.  I studied the class roster and very carefully picked those individuals that I thought would do the best jobs.  When I handed in the list, my teacher glanced at it and asked me if I was aware that all of the people I had selected were from my town.  I had not realized that.  Where they were from had even entered my mind.  There had been no discrimination in my heart, but by picking those whose virtues I knew best, I had in fact discriminated.  So, I made up a new list, and was gratified at how good the people were whom I had inadvertently slighted before.  The moral is that discrimination is proven by the results of an action, not by the stated intent.

Racism has become a very nasty charge.  For instance, I continue to be confused by those who deny the holocaust.  Denial is not only an offence to those who perished, but also to those who worked so hard for their extermination.  I would think that those who hate the Jews, the Gypsies and the assorted other targets of the holocaust would claim that the millions who were murdered was a good start, a splendid effort that was stopped too soon.  But, look, the anti-Semites who speak out do not praise the Nazis for their efforts, they claim that the Third Reich is misunderstood and blamed for things that did not occur.  That is how ugly the charge has become, that even those who promote and plot the murder of other races and ethnicities today deny the achievements of the most successful pogromists of all time.

 The people who do not want illegal immigrants to be benefited by the health care bill aren’t really worried  about the expense.  Down deep, they do not want non-English-speaking, dark-skinned people to receive health care at all.  Shut them out of our hospitals and let them die on the sidewalks, or go back where they came from and starve there.  Even the most vocal of the health care opponents will deny that that is their intent, but it is the effect they seek.

 Not all conservatives are racist.  Neither are all liberals.  Not all whites and not all blacks.  But, look at the downstream effects of what people promote.  As I learned in art school, your work is what you intend it to be, and it must stand on its own without explanation or excuse.

Breeding will tell

As a former South Carolinian, I have to say a word about Joe Wilson.  There is a favorite down home saying that sums up my attitude.  “A man can burn down your house, rape your sister and run over your dog, and you may have to shoot him, but there’s no call to be rude.”  Rudeness is the ultimate social offense, and proof of poor breeding.  A little generalized booing has a long tradition in Congress, and criticism of a speaker in a press conference later is almost a requirement for the opposition.  But, shouting rude comments is not acceptable.  The United States Congress is not the British Parliament.  If we are not going to adopt the humanity of the British medical care system, we should not emulate the catcalls and partisan insults of the their legislature. 

 As for what Wilson thought was a lie, the Republicans had offered two amendments to one or another health care bill that said public health care benefits would only be provided to those who could prove their legal status.  Both were defeated.  Their position sounds reasonable, unless you’re in the emergency room with chest pains, or a bleeding wound.  Look in your wallet or purse—can you prove that you are a legal resident of the United States?  If you’re lucky, you have insurance and your status won’t be an issue.  If you lose your insurance, however, what have you got?  A driver’s license?  That’s not proof.  Neither is a Social Security card.  Do you have a passport?  Most Americans don’t, and those who do, don’t carry them everywhere within the U.S.

 Okay, you’re in the emergency room with no acceptable proof of legal residency.  Just sit in the corner and keep pressure on that wound while an admitting clerk takes your fingerprints and waits for them to be verified.  And, if your prints are not on file somewhere?  There’s a drug store on the corner.  Good luck.

 Wait a minute, you look and sound American.  That should be enough.  Well, are we going to say that people who look Mexican have to prove residency while those who look Canadian do not?  There were Spanish-speaking people in this country before the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock.  And, there are U.S.-born citizens of many ethnicities for whom English is not a first language.  And what about foreign visitors whose passports are back at the hotel?

 Maybe, the proposals had a universal health card in mind, and legal status had to be proven to obtain that.  I think that is what Obama meant when he said that public health care benefits would not be provided to illegal residents.  No health card.

What does a hospital do when someone without a health care card shows up at the emergency room with a bleeding stump where his arm used to be?  He says that he left the card at home.  Does the hospital send him home for it?  Of course not.  The wound is treated.  The arm is reattached, if possible.  If the patient turns out to be an illegal and cannot pay, then the hospital passes along the cost to everyone with insurance.

So, with or without contributions from illegal residents, we are going to pay for their medical care, just like we do now for all the uninsured patients who go to the emergency room because they cannot afford a family doctor.

 However, whether we pay for the treatment of undocumented aliens or not, the difference in overall health care costs will be negligible.  It is much more important that we address runaway health care inflation.

 And, if you’ve read this far and disagree with me, feel free to tell me, and I will read your views.  We may not change each other’s minds, but we can disagree respectfully. It shows that we’re well bred.