Health, Terror, Belief.

What is the greater likelihood: that Al Qaida will target your home or that you will be refused medical care?
We have spent the almost eight years being told we should be afraid of Al Qaida coming to get us. Al Qaida has struck no American school, no American home. Refusal to cover basic medical procedures has struck millions. Bankruptcy caused by medical bills strikes more people, more families, everyday. The youngest victim of 9/11 was two, the oldest was 85. Lack of healthcare strikes Americans of every age.
There is no way to absolutely stop terrorism. If some faction, somewhere in the world, decides to strike us there is no way to stop them from driving a car into a gas station, damaging the piers of the bridge you travel most frequently, possibly spreading a silent, invisible disease. These people, filled with hate, can strike you or me.
But you can save me from not having healthcare. You can take preventative measures to protect yourself should you or your spouse lose their jobs and thus lose their health benefits or, at least as common, finding out that the insurance you have paid for year after year just flat refuses to cover a needed procedure or treatment. And it will not slow you down at the airport or keep you from travelling freely. How about we create universal health insurance through the group that has the lowest overhead for such service?
Is any percentage of your income more important than humanitarian care? Does your religion not tell you that you are, indeed, responsible for caring for others? Is your greed for 300 cable channels, a bigger car and another vacation so great that a child should die for it?
You pay for roads and education for others and these things will not prevent an untreated illness form mutating into something that kills a member of your family. Are you so secure in your income and absolute marketability that you are positive you will never need this care? IS your position in life permanent? If it is, feel blessed…and responsible for helping another.
If you are a Christian can you not spare a few more dollars, even a lot more of your paycheck, for others after someone else died for you? Did Christ not compel you to charity? (Matthew 25:31-46) If you are a Muslim does the Zakat not compel you to care for your brother and sister?
I hear a lot that the current proposal is being rushed, but universal healthcare has been near the forefront of political debate since Clinton took office in 1992. That is 17 years, far more time than we have debated our right to start any war. I hear people stating that they support reform but it must be done better than the current plans aims. Does this mean we cannot impose this plan to protect ourselves until you come up with a better one?
Think on it. Think on it without outside influence. Pretend you mother is watching. Know your God is watching.