Pastures A Plenty

Health care reform is, of course, critical to us farmers. We must buy individual policies at well above the group rate, or we must sponsor our own doctor visits and hospitalizations at rates fifty percent higher than are charged to insurance companies.

Most farmers, and I would be one of these, do not think much of insurance anyway, because we pay far too much of our incomes out in insurance to cover vehicles, crops, livestock, farm liability, fire, wind and on and on. This most often without seeing any payout. That is why this "reform" effort puzzles me. Without government involvement in paying for health care, we are left with the promises of a bunch of insurance and drug companies that they will not jack up prices too much, they will not kick us off when we are sick, they will not disallow payment for necessary care and so forth. Government supposedly will regulate this. Regulation didn't work very well on Wall Street, did it?

I don't think government will be able to decently regulate anything until we the people develop some pride in aspects of our character that don't have to do with accumulation of wealth and power. Then we can encourage and honor honest behavior in jour public servants and thus encourage a job well done.

Jim