The Supreme Court has spoken. Yes, there is still much to worry about, but for now, the religious community can breathe a sigh of relief.
For weeks, we have been waiting for the Court to decide the fate of Obamacare. We have listened to endless fulminating from the Tea Party and from members of Congress on the right. We have heard too many politicians, sitting on their fat health insurance provided by the taxpayers, declare their willingness to return tens of millions of Americans to the all-but-permanent state of anxiety that they were once in about their ability to get the care they need.
But, thank God, that did not happen.
We in the religious community have a special stake in this issue. Historically, health care emerged from the domain of church and synagogue; it was a subset of charity provided by religious institutions and dictated by religious values.
Furthermore, over the last half century we have been profoundly aware of the pain, chaos, and indignity imposed on Americans by our country's deeply flawed system of providing health insurance.
For many Americans, after their family, the first person they talk to following a diagnosis of cancer, heart disease, or diabetes is a rabbi, minister, or imam. We members of the clergy have helped them deal with the profound panic they feel on such occasions, and with their fear of death, suffering, and disability. And then, in far too many cases, we listened to them tell us that they were terrified that their insurance would be inadequate or that it would be cancelled; and not infrequently they told us that because they recently lost their job, they had no insurance at all.
And far too often, we heard them say that they feared the impoverishment of their families as much as they feared the consequences of their illness. And sometimes they wondered aloud if they would be better off dead than allowing the financial ruin of those they love.
We in the religious community have long known that the faces of the underinsured and the uninsured are our own: the small-business owner who just couldn't afford to insure either his employees or himself; the divorced mother trying to support her family on part-time work; the recent college grad who hasn't yet found a job or who is working for minimum wage and without benefits. (Bizarrely, but thankfully, our system provides for the some of the truly poor, while many in the middle class live in fear.)
We know that even as we in the religious world teach, each in our own way, that "God helps those who help themselves," self-reliance has its limits. There are some things that we cannot expect God to do and that people cannot do on their own--and providing a reasonable level of health insurance is one of those things.
We know that the religious values of the matter are clear. The Abrahamic traditions may not dictate any particular system of insurance but they all see baseline care, in the words of Jean Bethke Elshtain, as "a public good consistent with the dignity of human persons and with what it means to care for one's neighbor." And my own Jewish tradition states the community's responsibility to heal in emphatic terms. Thus Joseph Caro, the compiler of the Shulchan Aruch, the authoritative code of Jewish law, writes: "If the physician withholds his services, it is considered as shedding blood" (Yoreh Deah, 336:1).
Now, none of this meant that we in the religious world were always committed to Obamacare. Indeed, initially I favored other approaches to providing health care to Americans. But the fact is that after 60 years of trying, and in the face of ferocious opposition, the President devised and passed a plan that would finally deal with those things that worried the frightened people who came to my office in the Temple. It guaranteed that if you had a diagnosis of leukemia or multiple sclerosis or some other life-threatening or chronic disease, you could be assured of receiving a decent level of care, without being turned away or gouged. And for this I was very thankful.
Yes, many on the right will work hard to disrupt the law and to deny it the financing that it will require. We still have much work to do.
But for now, the law remains in place. We are seeing the end of a pitifully inadequate health insurance system that caused horrors every day so tragic that they could rip the heart out of a stone. The American people no longer need to fear that every one of us could lose our health insurance at any time. They have been given hope. And for this I say again: Thank God.
Howard Fineman: Health Care Law: All Hail The Failure Of Conventional Wisdom
Rabbi Yaacov Behrman: The Need for a Rabbinical Court of Appeals
We need to question all candidates at all levels. That includes local politicians as well as candidates for federal offices. We also need to counter their horror stories that they will present. Limbaugh likes to twist isolated incidents. We need to show success stories. We need to counter the sum zero thinking that is used to scare people. Instead of going broke the health care reform will enlarge our economy as well as improve the health of everyone. Too many who oppose the law do so because they believe the lies put out by the Republicans.
I love the lie about rationing. We have it with uninsured and policy limits that the Republicans propose. We have it by the exemptions the Catholic bishops want.
Does anyone know where we can buy a bumper sticker that says, "Can't trust Republicans with my health!"
Sigh...
Americans are a selfish people to even have such a horrible medical insurance system to last for so long. it is still a far cry from a benefit to all americans.
Those that experience such horrible outcomes from their insurance companies understand the need for a gov program. those that dont care less about those that have experienced such outcomes.
Experiences with karma is the great changer of hearts.
Americans prefer their wars to their desire to have decent health insurance for all. interesting aspect of a nation that follows the teachings of jesus.
I don't even attempt to comprehend the healthcare battle -- and ironically in Europe there has been a blatant swing to the right regarding their social benefits because of immigrants (ex. Holland). (Which, btw, I don't agree with, but this is the social reality.)
Short of marching down DC on horses with guns waved in the air the overthrow the government, it is very difficult to make change anything instantaneously. I have less faith in politics than I do in NGO's and groups that try to mobilize people to change the system - bottom up. And Americans are not all happy with the system as it stands now. But what can they do? Overthrow it with machetes, balloons and whistles? That said, they are not a nation short of protests. NGO's do a lot, state by state. Everyone is trying.
They have to work with what they've got. The media tries to assess the views of Americans over a 3 thousand mile territory. And yet, the French take the piss out of the English, the English make fun of the Germans, the Germans make fun of the Italians. If you want to talk the long walk from California to New York, it would resemble the walk from the UK to the Ukraine.
It's just an uninformed generalization to make. American politics is complicated. Too complicated for me. Too complicated for you.
Why not? Better you should be informed before you try to argue about politics.
http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/columns/2010/may/050610capretta.aspx
Thank God for who ever will pay the new cost?
Thank God the working class will now have less money in their pocket which will lead to less charitable giving?
Thank God the cost of insurance will rise?
Thank God for the penalties for those that can not pay the opt out penalty?
Thank God for a system that is about to be overwhelmed with the infux of new patients?
This is the worst thought out system to be introduced in a long time.
Should everyone have health care? Yes.
Is the system Obama came up with the right plan? No.
The problem with agenda mongers is their thought processes stop at the agenda won.
They never seem to be able to think past that point.
The "right plan" would not be elevating the scale over time to force people into purchasing health insurance. It may start at under a $300.00 penalty but zooms to over $2000.00 over time.
The "right plan" would require the AMA to train more doctors. Today hundreds of well qualified individuals are turned away.
The "right plan" would disclose the cost of insurance will go up. You can not require insurance companies to provide coverage for children past the age of 18 without compensation.
The "right plan" would be read and disclosed to the public before it's passed.
Read the ACA and get educated. You've been watching too much FOX News. This Health Care Law is the greatest thing passed since Medicare in the 1960s and Social Security in the 1930s. There were haters speaking out against those programs back then as well. Get a life and start supporting the poor rather than the agenda of millionaires and billionaires. God bless President Obama. Thank you, President Obama for caring about people less fortunate than you. You are following the Christ. Thank you. Ignore these folks who do not support your noble efforts. God bless you, President Obama. Thank you.
I'm glad "obamacare" was upheld as constitutional, but I never considered the issue as a moral argument. The fact that obamacare offered important benefits that help people, does not magically make it constitutional. It is irrelevant to the question.
And while prayer has been vilified by many, if it is properly applied and specifically targeted then it can do wonders. I am going to be posting on prayer (or what I more generally call "mental prescriptions"), which I have used successfully to treat cancer with 100% satisfactory results. From this post onwards.. http://kyrani99.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/necessary-background-issues-for-a-deeper-understanding-why-cancer-forms-part-3/
Oh, holy Foo-Foo - you who livest inside det Great Tree and createst de Heaven and Earth out
of nutin' - ve thankest you for CITIZENS UNITED!
Mark Gendala on Kindle
If this is the case, I thank God as well.
Now the American people need to fear that we can be denied health insurance coverage for certain conditions if a panel of unqualified govenment politicians decide if we need that treatment or not. Yes, I said politician….NOT medical doctors.
I am talking about the socialist's plan in ObamaCare that gives even greater powers to the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), better known as THE DEATH TRIBUNAL - a panel created by the new health law to contain Medicare spending at the whims of unqualified government employees.
This gives me little hope considering it is a plan predicted on the evils of socialism/Marxism. We are back to the same government control tactics that was always the chief goal of the Obama cabal.
Your rhetoric is obviously Fox News/Religious Right Republican. Your complaint seems to be that people should have unlimited access to health care with no government oversight.
Can you describe the plan by which people do NOT have to be insured but by which everybody as limitless health care?
If you have the resources you can buy whatever you like. If you don't and you don't have insurance, you get no care. If you have government supplied insurance, there must be some limitations, unless you are proposing that we spend 10 million dollars on every single person to sustain their life for two more months at the end.
Or perhaps you are proposing the Republican plan "Don't get sick and if you do, die quickly.
Secondly, the ridiculously called "death panels" were dropped. However, you need to get your facts straight-there never were "death panels" Read and learn.
And if you do make over $250K a year you're not hurting like most of the rest of us.
And if you are making over $250K a year and you are hurting, please follow the advice of those compassionate Republicans and CUT YOUR SPENDING. Don't blame Obama for your pain.