Health care, and...

CNN.com - State of the Union address will focus on health care frustrations - Jan 19, 2006

Some comments on this article:

Democrats are challenging Bush's intentions and point to the billions of dollars in proposed cuts to Medicaid...

$5 billion to be precise. Out of hundreds of billions ($250 I believe...I have a link from an earlier post). They make it sound like Bush is gutting Medicaid. Maybe he is. But let's state the actual amounts, please.

Hubbard said Bush's proposals arise from a belief that controlling health care costs requires choices to be driven more directly by a price-conscious, informed patient-shopper than by employers, insurers and others. The hope is that consumer demands will then drive the market into providing better and cheaper services.

So...Bush believes in personal self-responsibility (self-responsibility?? whassat??), while Democrats (it seems to me) believe that the average American citizen is too stupid to decide for itself and should have the government do all the work.

I believe this is a fundamental contention in a particular plank for both parties: the whole small government/big government argument.

I find it more and more interesting that as I actually research some of these issues, I find myself supporting Bush just a little more. Not totally, for sure...but he (or at least his advisors) are thinking.

Case 1 for today is the above argument in health care. If anyone who is anyone has been reading my blog, you'll know I'm big on self-responsibility and independence, which this aspect of Bush's ideas on healthcare seem to support.

Case 2 for today is my previous post on "Proportional Response" from the West Wing. Americans SHOULD be able to walk across the face of the Earth, safe in knowing what retribution will (not may, but WILL) befall anyone who chooses to molest our citizens. Otherwise, what's the point in being a superpower? ... Frankly, ANYONE should be able to go through life unmolested, but that's another story.

Case 3 is in this quote from the article relevant to this post: "An effort [by the Bush administration] to simplify tax laws, already pushed into 2006 by the Social Security drive, has been postponed again until 2007 to avoid a potentially explosive debate in an election year." Why should this be a problem? Simplifying tax laws is BAD!? Hell, if Bush pushed this issue, with the backing of Republicans, I'd imagine the Republicans would not only manage to hold on to Congress, but even increase its presence there.

But that's just my opinion.