BY RUSSELL TURNER
PREPARING FOR THE LONG HAUL
All of us at one time or the other has had to make decisions that will directly impact our lives. When I was a young man I can remember having an old pickup truck that wasn’t very reliable, the tires were thin and the motor used quite a bit of oil. As long as I stayed close to home I knew that I could call someone to tow me in if the truck quit me beside the road. Fortunately I had enough sense to not even try to make a long trip until I was able to do the necessary repairs to make the vehicle more reliable. While it was aggravating having to make do with an old pickup, it did give me the perspective on the need to being prepared for the long journey. I only wish that some of our elected officials would have had an old truck like mine, maybe they could have used that experience when it comes to the new health care law.
Over the past few weeks there has been much discussion on the Medicaid expansion in the states under Obamacare. When you take an objective look at all of the government programs such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, each and every one of them are on the verge of failure because of politicians making unrealistic promises and poor management. All of the cost projections of these programs were far less than the final cost; I challenge anyone to come up with a program that the final cost was the same as the projection. Fortunately here in Oklahoma our state legislature and our governor have refused to expand Medicaid.
Past history has proven that the current system is not managed well; before any logical person would even consider expanding such a system the fraud and waste needs to be corrected. For far too long our government has just borrowed more money and thrown it at the problem instead of fixing it. The federal government has made the promise that it will fund the majority of the expansion, but there will come a time when our federal government cannot continue to borrow more money; when that happens the states will be stuck with a huge entitlement program that they cannot afford. Money will not be available for other things such as education, public safety, roads, etc. If the Medicaid expansion were implemented here in Oklahoma, by some estimates one in three Oklahomans would be on the Medicaid program.
Many Americans have gotten into a bad habit of only looking at the short term trip. From what I have seen our elected leaders have not done the work necessary for the long haul. When they were younger, if they had an old truck to deal with they might have a better perspective to deal with other things such as healthcare.
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