(220-215)
]]>THEY WANT THEIR COUNTRY BACK!
]]>This summer, at a town hall, I shared my mom's story with my congressman, after he'd spent two hours listening to arguments against the public option. She's one of those lack of insurance casualties. Her death took 15 years, once it started. And without insurance, she and my dad lost everything they worked their whole lives to save. I took less than 60 seconds to say that to my congressman, got a little emotional--since she'd been dead about a month at that point--and took a deep breath to steady myself before telling him why I thought the public option was so important. Do you know what he did while I took a breath? He turned away to talk to somebody else and left me standing in the middle of a room filled with people, with tears rolling down my cheeks.
At that moment, I checked out of the healthcare debate. Why should I waste another second of my time writing a letter or making a phone call? It's not as if my letter convinces an elected official to do the right thing. It's only when they get enough letters to see which side can better protect their seats that they do anything about it.
If only half of our representatives had the courage to speak the truth like Grayson does, we'd be in a much better position. He should have read out the stats for the Democratically-controlled districts too. How many people have died or lost their savings in the last 50 years because of our ridiculous health care system? They are all culpable.
]]>These are very tricky issues. How can we determine definitely what someone's quality of life is? How can anyone judge when someone else should die. They're unanswerable questions, really, which is why I think we avoid them.
I say this as someone who very recently gave the ok to deny care to a terminally ill and fiercely loved family member. But it wasn't my decision. There was an advance directive in place decades ago, so there was really no other option. Short of a crystal clear decision by the holder of the life, how can we make a decision to end it?
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