The Senate is writing a health-care bill in secret because they are ashamed or should be ashamed of a bill that is simply inhumane.
In their heart of hearts if they pretend to care about their fellow man, which at this point, is in serious doubt, this travesty would never see the light of day.
Shame on all you guys; note that a bunch of men only are concocting this unprincipled bill.
And defunding Planned Parenthood just adds to the irony.
Let us go back to basics; you should grow up and admit that health care should not be a business.
Of course by this time you are laughing up your sleeves at my naivety. None of you has evolved in your thinking enough to agree to that.
Now stop laughing a little, and start thinking about the reality that we have to take care of the people we are living with and then perhaps you will start over and entertain the notion.
Try to stop and think about how it feels to be ill and suffering. In that state we are all equal.
Our founding fathers created this nation declaring that we were all equal in the hope for life, liberty and happiness.
How distressingly have we fallen from that basic aim!
Now we are stuck.
With the exception of many progressives, you have tied yourselves into knots and with the exception of those in the states of New York and California, do we entertain the notion of a single payer system to make it possible to prevent the suffering of our fellow man.
The stupendous irony of this notion is that it would cost so much less of the GDP, which in this country is one-sixth of our economy, versus in the economies of every other industrialized nation in the world that have adopted universal coverage in which the portion of the GDP ranges from perhaps one-tenth down to 4 percent.
And for those who stop to read the statistics, with much better results.
We are stuck looking stupid and greedy, especially when we plan to reduce Medicaid so that those who have not asked us for reductions in taxes will get the money anyway, so that Republicans can fulfill their promise for the wealthy and comfortable.
If those who are supposed to represent us would talk to single payer advocates in New York and California who have viable plans, we could be proud of our country again.
I note at this late hour that some are beginning to have doubts about the bill. Let us hope for much more improvement.
Esther Confino
New Hyde Park
