Posted by
Patrick Henry on Sunday, September 27, 2009 1:49:39 PM
Years ago an obscure singer by the name of Sheb Wooley popularized a nonsensical ditty dubbed
"One=Eyed, One-Horned Flying Purple People Eater." The fantasy creature utilized descriptors
people were familiar with such as "eyes," "horns" and "purple," but it existed only in the songwriter's
vivid imagination, reviving in a silly way the old debate between Plato, the Idealist, and Aristotle, the
Realist. Does something exist in reality just because someone can conceptualize it and talk about it?
And just because something has definable, familar components, do they exist in combination in the
real world?
Barack Obama's utopian vision of healthcare for all Americans is very reminiscent of the "One-Eyed,
One-Horned Flying Purple People Eater." He tells us that a massive increase in the number of Americans
covered by his new health plan will actually drive down medical costs, slash the deficit and improve the
quality of medical services. He says that we will all be able to keep our own doctors and the health plans
we are happy with, even as Democrats hack away at Medicare Advantage funding, thus jeopardizing ten
million seniors in those plans who will NOT be able to keep them because they will no longer exist. He
tells us that the plan will absolutely not cover illegal aliens, nor will government funding cover abortions.
All the while congress stubbornly rejects amendment after amendment designed to plug the obvious loop-
holes that would make such travesties reality. Obama tells Americans that he can slash $500 billion from
Medicare in waste and fraud without negatively impacting senior healthcare, even though he intends to
accomplish this simply by cutting payments to providers and letting them try to find the savuigs, with the
net result that the honest providers trying to work within the system are penalized right along with the
fraudsters and wastrels. He tells us that he can establish government run insurance, the "public option,"
without driving private insurers out of business. Finally, as the crown jewel of his fantasy, he insists that
he will accomplish all this without raising taxes. Yeah, right!
Now Obama communicates all of this with his customary glib, slick charm. He marshals his army of
adoring sycophants to sing songs and paint pictures and write poems praising his vision. Sheb Wooley
sang a nice little song, too, but no one was dumb enough to think his imaginary creature was real. But
Obama is countng on three factors to get his plan passed into law. First, he is banking on the fact that
because Americans believe healthcare needs to be fixed (and it does), they will buy into his unrealistic
plan for fixing it. The "any port in a storm" gambit is alive and well. Second, the components he is
talking about -- stable taxes, insurance for the uninsured and the uninsurable, portability of coverage,
the need to reduce deficit, the elimination of fraud and waste -- are all familiar and important to most
citizens. And the combining of these promises into one vision, however impossible, is bound to have
appeal for the wishful. Third, as a last resort he is banking on the Democrats' "supermajority" ramming
some version of his plan down America's throat, because despite what the polls clearly show about
what Americans do and don't want, he is convinced that he and his party know better. How do you spell
a-r-r-o-g-a-n-c-e?
But the sad fact remains that a healthcare reform that cuts costs, covers everybody, allows freedom
of choice, maintains stable taxes and doesn't negatively affect the quality and quantity of care is, at
present, just like the "One-Eyed, One-Horned Flying Purple People Eater." It's fun to talk about (and just
about everyone is), but it doesn't exist anywhere out there in reality. And the quickest way for Obama to
become yet another Democrat one-term president (remember JimmyCarter) is to promise people the
"One-Eyed, One-Horned Flying Purple People Eater." only to deliver some mutation with a blind eye and
a broken horn that, although purple, eats only tax dollars.
When legislators scurry to meet artificial deadlines, stifle full and fair debate, refuse to publish the full
text of a bill before votoing on it (because they know voters will be outraged), threaten to use paliamentary
tricks like "reconciliation" to force through ill-considered legislation that fundamentally deceives and defrauds
Americans and then concedes that they can't and won't even read the entire bill themselves before voting on it,
the stage is fully set for the irreversible enshrinement of a socialized medical system that will only work
for those who can't afford anything else or those too rich to nned it. Guess who that leaves out. Right, all
the rest of us in the middle. So much for taking care of the middle class. And guess who will end up paying
for it. Right again! Those of us in the middle, because the poor can't and the rich aren't rich enough or
numerous enough to do it.
Have you seen any One-Eyed, One Horned Flying Purple People Eaters today? Neither have I. But
the President of the United States and his corrupt party are promising to show us one. I, for one, am not
holding my breath. Lots of Americans were born at night. But not LAST night!