Health Care For All!

Love is but a song to sing

Fear's the way we die

You can make the mountains ring

Or make the angels cry

Though the bird is on the wing

And you may not know why

Come on people now

Smile on your brother

Everybody get together

Try to love one another

Right now

~~ “Get Together” by The Youngbloods

I’ve been laying low lately. We spent a fun week in Vegas, I’ve been reading a lot, and with the shit show going on in the Yamistration, I just haven’t felt like writing much. Some days it’s all I can do to not Hulk-smash everything in sight. Sometimes it is best to just hunker down, and as REO Speedwagon says, I’ve been riding the storm out. As much as I can, anyway.

Today was a lesson in how engagement can energize, inspire, and strengthen our resolve.

I headed to downtown Mishawaka with Shane and Matt to join a protest outside of the office of our so-called representative, Jackie Walorski. I say ‘so-called’ because she doesn’t really spend a whole lot of time with her constituents, especially the ones who didn’t vote for her, so I guess she only wants to represent part of us. Hmph.

Anyway, this was a protest organized by Indivisible Indiana District 2 and the Northern Indiana Community Coalition for Health Care. The latter organized the recent town hall meeting concerning the Affordable Care Act and the so-called American Health Care Act, and although Jackie was invited numerous times, she didn’t show up and didn’t even bother to respond yes or no if she would be attending. I don’t think she understands the meaning of the word ‘representative.’ But we had the town hall without her.

Today’s protest was termed a “Die-In.” The goal was to get at least 80 people to show up, with 80 representing the number of people in Indiana District 2 who would die each year without the guarantees of coverage by the ACA. We all held signs shaped like tombstones with various slogans about who would suffer if the ACA is repealed and the AHCA takes its place. The last time I looked at the sign-up sheet, we had around 60 people, but the turnout surpassed the goal. We had over 100 people there! Not bad for 4:30 on an overcast weekday afternoon. (The rain even held off until we were done!)

We were all fired up and happy to be there. Everyone was friendly and peaceful. The overwhelming majority of people driving by honked and gave us the thumbs up. (Yes, those were thumbs, not another digit.) A couple of people drove by and gave us some grief, but they were definitely in the minority.

The most memorable of those was when a guy in a blue car pulled up directly in front of where I was standing with Shane and Matt, and stopped because of a red light. The guy turned to us and started saying “Trump for America! Trump for America!” I don’t know what came over me, but I started yelling back, “Health care for all! Health care for all!” Me and the guy kept at this for a few moments, and then a lady behind me took up my chant. Shane and Matt joined in, and soon our entire group of over one hundred people was chanting “Health care for all!” at this guy. He tried keeping up his chant for a bit but we kept chanting louder and louder...and then here was the best moment. He finally turned away, put his hands on his steering wheel, shut his mouth, and faced straight ahead. But he couldn’t go anywhere...because the light was still red.

[falling over laughing]

So he had to sit there with all of us chanting “Health care for all!” at him, probably thinking, “When is this fucking light going to turn green?” When it finally did, you can probably guess what he did. Yep, he flipped us the bird as he drove off. We all cracked up.

Somebody got owned! Man, what a douchebag.

Our organizer gave a rousing speech, we sang a song, and then we all filed into Jackie’s office to drop off our postcards that stated why we are against the AHCA or support the ACA. We weren’t there long, but we made our presence known, and we had plenty of traffic driving by and seeing us. On the way back to the car, we stopped off at Smith’s for a beer and a bite to eat and discussed things and had some laughs. It was a good day!

I feel reenergized. It is very easy to insulate ourselves against what is going on and to withdraw. That holds especially true for introverts like me. (I know that Shane is, too. Matt? Maybe a bit, but not to the extent that Shane and I are.) I think it is important to make an effort to get out every once in a while, connect with others, and affirm our commitment to resist and change the current administration, locally and nationally.

Being a part of this peaceful protest and talking with others who are committed to this cause really gave me a boost and made me want to continue to be involved to the extent that I can. I also enjoyed learning that I could confront others peacefully but forcefully. I didn’t flip the dude in the car off or call him names and I didn’t call his candidate names. I just affirmed my support for health care for all. And I’ll be damned if others didn’t join in and we got him to shut up. 

That is empowering as fuck.

I encourage others to get out as much as they can and check into local groups who are involved in protests and activism. Things are popping up everywhere and there are plenty of things you can do, big and small.

We are all in this together and we will help each other get through it!

Nation, if you’ll just come home

When a Nation cries

His tears fall down like missiles from the skies

Justice looked into Independence's eyes

Can you make everything all right?

Can you keep your Nation warm tonight?

~~ “Justice and Independence ‘85” by John Mellencamp

Today the Congressional Budget Office released its report on the AHCA, AKA Trumpcare. (You own it, pal.)

It is even worse than anyone expected, and no one expected it to be a positive report. No, no one expects the CBO estimates to be perfect. Yes, we understand that there are always caveats. But based on what the bill said, this horrible report is not all that surprising. We knew that a number of people would lose their health insurance, we knew that Medicaid would be drastically cut, we knew that it would give a big freakin’ tax cut to the wealthiest amongst us.

What we didn’t know was just how drastic the changes would be, how many people would be harmed, and which people would be harmed the most.

It’s not just bad, it’s Dark Ages bad. It’s serfdom bad. It’s “let them eat cake” bad.

I’m sure you’ve seen the numbers already. 14 million people losing their health insurance in the first year. 24 million in ten years. Older, poor Americans having their premiums go up 750%. 750%! Medicaid cut drastically, by about the same amount as the tax cuts for the wealthy. But hey, the CBO estimates that it will cut the federal deficit by over $300 billion in ten years, so there’s that. Who cares about those old poors? They were going to die soon, anyway. Priorities!

Of course, that cut in the deficit is what creepy Paul Ryan is focusing on. That’s what he’s so proud of and the rest of the CBO’s numbers are way off. Isn’t Paul Ryan supposed to be some kind of devout Catholic? I’m not seeing much altruism in your little bill, Speaker Ryan.

It took me a few hours to calm down before I wrote this because it made me so angry that I felt ill. I’m not sure when I’ve seen such a horrid, hateful, misanthropic piece of legislative bullshit as this bill. In fact, I’m sure I’ve never seen such an unrepentant, unmitigated, loathsome endeavor as this shitshow. I very rarely toss this word around because I feel that it is a relative concept and a little too tied up with biblical references, but this is downright EVIL.

When I was posting about some of this on Facebook this evening, a friend of mine on there who happens to be a founding member of The B-52s weighed in and agreed with me that it was horrible and evil. When a B-52 who is kind, gentle, and even Zen-like says you’re being awful, you are pretty dang awful!

You know what’s really stupid? The people who are going to be hurt the worst are poor rural dwellers. You know...the ones who overwhelmingly voted for the Yam. That’s right, yahoos. That guy who swore he had your back and told you that you are not forgotten? That guy is screwing you over in a big way. One might even say he’s screwing you over “big league.” And all those rich city folk are going to get one big motherfucking tax cut and they’re going to laugh their asses off about it. They’re going to laugh at YOU, Jethro. Because you were so blinded by your hatred of Obama and Hillary and because you bought into everything that ClusterFox told you, you voted for this plutocratic, vulgar, demagogic sexual predator. But hey, at least you’ll still have your guns so you can blow your brains out—or your wife’s—when you can’t afford any more cancer treatments or when you have to sell your farm in order to pay for dialysis or when your Oxycontin addiction becomes so unbearable that you just don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

Goddamn rubes.

All is not lost, though. It’s still just a bill and hasn’t been voted on by Congress yet. It looks like there might be enough sane Republican Senators who oppose the bill (although some oppose it because they think it doesn’t go far enough in repealing the Affordable Care Act) that they just might save you from yourselves. You’d best hope so because if this passes, you’re going to be in a world of hurt. Quite possibly literally.

Aren’t you glad I calmed down for a few hours before I wrote this?