Prepare for Further Health Care Battle with Satire

The last week before the August recess is upon us, and you know that the health care reform stupidity shall be thick. Gird your loins with some satire, my darlings:

Newsweek's Jonathan Alter writes that when it comes to our health care system, "everything is just fine the way it is." He added, "I've got health insurance and I don't give a damn about the 47 million suckers who don't."

Fortunately, Alter was not only kidding, he was also offering a striking takedown of those who are fighting to kill reform.

I had cancer a few years ago. I like the fact that if I lose my job, I won't be able to get any insurance because of my illness. It reminds me of my homeowners' insurance, which gets canceled after a break-in. I like the choice I'd face if, God forbid, the cancer recurs -- sell my house to pay for the hundreds of thousands of dollars in treatment, or die. That's what you call a "post-existing condition."

I like the absence of catastrophic insurance today. It meant that my health-insurance plan (one of the better ones, by the way) only covered about 75 percent of the cost of my cutting-edge treatment. That's as it should be -- face cancer and shell out huge amounts of money at the same time. Nice.

[snip]

The concerns that Alter skewer so effectively are exactly the kind of changes Democratic reform proposals would address. The more proponents remind Americans of that, the better.

Indeed.