In this great country, when extremists crash jets into office towers, our government responds. When an innocent woman is raped and killed, our courts respond. When raging fires threaten homes on hillsides in California, fire departments respond. When a child needs to learn to read and write, a public school teacher responds. When the financial market teeters on collapse, the Treasury responds.

But when a poor woman develops breast cancer and cannot afford health insurance, or the insurance does not cover the exorbitant coasts, no one responds. When a man without health insurance has a heart attack, receives the emergency care required and is discharged, no one responds to care for him so another attack doesn’t quickly follow. When a mental illness suddenly strikes and leaves a person homeless and hungry no one responds to treat the disease.

This is the unfathomable irony of our great country. We have a chance, right now, to right this tragic wrong that tarnishes our nation. We came together in the civil rights movement and we can come together in the health care movement. If we have a right to be defended against extremists who attack us, if we have a right to a court system to bring us justice, if we have a right to fire protection, police protection, a public education, a stable financial system and unemployment protection, don’t we have a right to heath care?

Sickness can and will happen to us all. When we are sick we cannot fulfill the American dream. To keep the American dream alive, we must ensure that no American has anything less than the best quality health care available. This is not Communism or socialism. This is basic human decency. This is basic Christianity. This is basic American values. One cannot experience life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness when one is sick and not cared for.

Universal health care for all will not bankrupt this country. It may lower the obscene profits now being made on the backs of the sick, but it will not bankrupt this country. In the marvelous complexity of the human condition, at any given point in time, most people are NOT sick. This is an incredible gift, whether you see it coming from your God, or simply the result of biologic evolution. But what this means is that health care for all when they are sick is doable.

A universal government insurance plan could not work if most people were sick. But with most people not sick, it can work, if inefficiency and fraud are kept in check. The savings realized from eliminating the absurd waste engendered by myriad separate health plans, all with their own co-pays, deductibles, co-insurance, lifetime caps, coverage exclusions and billing systems is obvious to a grade-schooler. A universal insurance pot, contributed to by all Americans in small amounts, either directly or through government aid, could pay your doctor, without corporate interests profiting off the transaction and wasteful duplications eroding its value.

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