A Bill Will not be Paid, Unless Their is Someone Rich Enough to Pay it

   If health costs are high, insurance is the enabler. A large bill will not be charged unless there is someone rich enough to pay it. And, it is the insurance companies -- not the patients -- who can afford to pay.
   If we didn't have an insurance system, and if patients had to pay their own bills, we would not be paying such outlandish sums for these visits to the hospital. It is the principle of supply and demand at work: However much money someone can supply, there will be someone demanding that they do.
   So, not only are insurance companies enablers, they are victims. Simply by being rich, and by being the ones paying the bills, they become the victims. It is an old principle at work: If someone has a lot, there will be someone seeking to take it from them.
   So, how do we fix our broken health care system? How do we bring down health care costs? As much as anything, the answer lies in lowering the supply of money available. Either get rid of the insurance companies, or see to it that they are not so rich.
   Those are not things you do overnight. If we just outlawed insurance companies of a sudden, the system built upon them would collapse. Reduce their incomes too rapidly, too, and that might cause our health care system to take a hard tumble.
   How do we go about either weaning ourselves from the insurance companies, or separating them from so much money? I confess I do not know. I have a thought or two, but it is late and I shall not stay up to think them out.

Voting Festivals Could Spark Meaningful Voter Involvement

   President Obama has suggested mandatory voting, and Oregon has passed legislation making everyone a registered voter unless they opt out.
   If the idea is to connect more people to the election process, both ideas will get more people there. But, neither idea brings people to the polls more educated. Getting voters to vote doesn't mean much if they don't know what they are voting for.
   You might as well give them all a stick of bubble gum and ask them to blow a bubble when they get to the polls. That is as meaningful as having them look down a list of candidates they know nothing about. If they aren't informed, it's just an exercise.
   A better idea, one that will help educate them? I like the idea of making election day a holiday, and hosting voter festivals, where the voters meet the candidates, hear the issues, join in the festivities, and then vote. President Obama suggested mandatory voting would curb the influence of money. I'm not so sure it would. But, this would. The candidates would be right there, front and center, giving their speeches, talking to voters, and the voters would be influenced by this regardless how much money the candidates had previously spent.

Clearly the Unborn are Humans, and Clearly They are Living Creatures

   If they are not human, what are they? The unborn, if we were to pull out our biology charts, charting all the creatures of the world, how would the unborn offspring of humans be classed? As humans, of course, unless we create a new species in order to not classify them as humans.
   And, if you suggest they are even alive that they should be classed as any species, then how shall we class them in terms of how alive they are? Living? Is there another description for something that has blood coursing through its veins, pushed by a heart that beats? Shall we create a new word, say, "Mxlbttl," to classify them as having some of the characteristics of the living, but not enough.
   About the only two characteristics they don't have, are that they haven't been born, and they cannot emit vocal sounds. Still, if they are not to be considered living, there ought to be a word to cover what they are.
   I jest, of course. To me, clearly, they are living. Undeniably.
   So, here we have it: They are clearly humans, and they are clearly living. If we take their lives, then, yes, we are killing them.

They are Unwanted, So We Abort Them

  These are the unwanted. Their very mothers protest that they ever should have had to have had them. In fact, the diswant of their mother (and often their father) defines who they are, for the diswant of the parent leads to the abortion of the child.
   There are some who are wanted, yet the abortion takes place anyway. But far and away, by large, these are beings who are aborted because they simply are not wanted. Can I call them people?  These are people who would be an incumbrance, or an inconvenience, or a burden. So, we abort them.

If We Could Communicate With Them, Maybe We'd Keep Them All

    One wishes there could be a conversation between the aborted and their mothers prior to the abortion.
   "Hello? Mother? I hear you are going to cut my life short before it even has a chance to begin."
   For a while, there is no reply on the other side, as the mother is a little shook up at hearing a voice from her stomach. Then,
   "Son?"
   "Mother, yes, it's me."
   "Then, you really are alive?"
   "Yes, Mom, I'm here."
   "Oh, son, I was about to abort you!"
   "Don't, Mom. Please don't."
    The mom bursts into sobs, and again there is a pause before,
   "Oh, son, I will have you! I will have you! Please forgive me!"
   And with that, and the passage of a few months, Cameron is born, 7 pounds, 3 ounces.
   It would be easy to keep them all, if we could just find a way to communicate with them.
 

The Unborn Children We Abort: Theirs are Deaths of Our Choosing

   These are deaths of our choosing. We are given the discretion of letting them live, or letting them die, and we choose death.
   I speak of the unborn. I speak of abortions.
   A million times each year, we choose death. We choose it not for ourselves, but for others. Sometimes we justify our decision by saying we are doing what is best for them, that it would be wrong to bring them into a cruel world where parents do not want them, or where the parents don not have the resources to care for them.
   I ask, in reply, what of those already born? What do we do with them when they are in the same situation? What do we do with those who are bullied, or who live on skid row? Do, we say, You would be better off dead? Either commit suicide or let us kill you, for your own sake.
   Would we make that choice on their behalf?
   We make other decisions on behalf of the unborn, as well. It is us who decide whether they shall be considered persons. It is us who decide whether they shall be considered real, bonafide living beings. It is us who decide if our considerations are more important than their being born. It is us who decide if what is done is considered right or wrong.
   We make the choices, and it is they who either live or die with the consequences.

if We do Nothing, the Most Silent of Deaths will Continue

   If we remain silent, the unborn will continue to go to silent graves. As Edmund Burke put it, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
   I think of the unborn, of the estimate 1.2 million of them whose lives are taken each year (just in America). I think of a meme pointing out that since they cannot speak, we must speak for them. I think of the protests across America for blacks and against police brutality, and wish America were also so resolute about  stopping the loss of lives of the unborn.
   Surely, there can be no more silent of graves than those of the unborn. They are put in medical wastebaskets, taken out with medical trash, and buried as medical trash. And, they go there without funerals, without obituaries, without headstones, without tears from their families -- and without any expression of love towards them.
   Miss them? Who misses them?
   But, it is time that we do. And, since this cause, it is just, if we do rise to our feet, pickets and signs in hand, if we do march and protest -- all across America -- if we do rise up and demand an end to this mass injustice, our voices will be heard and change will be wrought.
   No question.
   When a nation rises in protest, the powers that be will bend. It has ever been so. We need but heed Edmund Burke's suggestion to not do nothing, and change will come.
   But, if we do nothing, the most silent of deaths will continue,