WHEN PENGUINS FLEW AND WATER BURNED This is the true memoir of one US Air Force navigator’s journey from the schoolhouses of Air Training Command to the nuclear alerts of the Cold War to combat in a 35-year-old anachronism called the B-52. It is a first-hand account of life during the last days of Strategic Air Command, the early days of Air Combat Command and the ensuing military drawdown of the 1990s. From peacetime training exercises across the globe to combat operations in Desert Storm, Jim Clonts takes the reader inside the cockpit where life and death are seconds apart. Often comical, sometimes heart-pounding, other times tragic, WHEN PENGUINS FLEW AND WATER BURNED takes you into the world of military aviation, a crucible where warriors learn the true nature of character, conscience and mortality.

Friends of Liberty VOL 24
by Jim Clonts, 2009

09/22/2009

The Language of Healthcare Reform

Have you noticed the words the Democrats are using to describe their plan for healthcare? I have heard the following phrases used repeatedly:

"Everyone is entitled to decent healthcare."
"Our plan will provide basic healthcare to all Americans."
"Everyone has a right to good healthcare."

Decent, basic, good. Let's look at this language for a moment. How do we use these words? Here are examples of how I use them:

"How did your son's football team do Saturday?"
"Well, they lost, but they're still a decent team."

Or how about this:
"You want the full service oil change?"
"No, just give me the basic service."

Or this:
"How was that new restaurant?"
"It was good."
"Not great?"
"Nope. Just good."

Is this what we really want? Basic service? Decent medical care? Good results?

Personally, I'd like superb healthcare providers, providing exemplary service, with great results. Good God, people! This is America! We have the finest physicians and healthcare technology in the world and we should settle for decent?

The very language of their proposal indicates we should have reduced expectations. The care won't be great anymore, but by our sacrifice, others will get basic care, not great care, but decent care. In his speech last Wednesday, President Obama said the Democrats' plan will provide the coverage we need. He did not say the plan would provide coverage we want or desire. Our wants and desires have no place in our own healthcare. He went on to say our "basic" needs will be determined by a special commission of physicians. Is a commission similar to a panel? A panel of physicians? A panel that determines what care we get or don't get? Whether we live or die? What should we call that panel? Hmmm.

One of my colleagues told me Obama must be truly omnipotent, since the number of people without healthcare insurance went from 47 million to 30 million in one day. That happened to be the day he had to assure us illegal immigrants would not be covered by his plan, even though there are still loopholes that would allow for it in the House bill. I'm not sure Obama was lying in his speech. He may have just been ignorant of the House Bill. Perhaps Rep. Joe Wilson should have shouted "you're ignorant" instead of "you lie." At least that gives Obama the benefit of the doubt.

Words are powerful and the Liberals are usually very adept at using them to convince their constituents into believing them rather than their own lying eyes. However, words seem to be failing them in this healthcare debate. Congressional Democrats continually contradict each other in the media and every time Obama opens his mouth they never know what wrench he'll throw into the gears. Even within his own speech, he contradicts himself. He speaks as though his plan is the one Congress is debating, but HR 3200 is not the Obama plan and it contains provisions contrary to his statements. He also says they will cut Medicare by $500 billion, the savings coming from reducing the waste and fraud in Medicare. Think of what he's actually saying. Cutting the waste and fraud in a large, bankrupt Government program will allow them to build an even larger, far more complex Government program. Really?

Even the very name of HR 3200 is an oxymoron:

America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009

Choices? Affordable? Really? I guess after all these years, it still boils down to what "is" is, right?

Slightly off-topic rant: I'm sick of hearing Liberals use the term "reproductive services" to describe abortion. That is also an oxymoron. There is no reproduction in an abortion. Can't they just call it abortion services...or maybe "life prevention services" or just "fetus elimination." If it's a basic human right protected by law and our Constitution, and...it's only a non-viable tissue mass,anyway, right?...then why not call it what it is?

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