Happy Obamacare Day!

The day I’ve been waiting for is finally here, the day I can go to the Cover Oregon site and, lo and behold, actually shop around for health insurance. Huzzah! This means that I might have a chance of no longer having to pay $780/month for coverage alone, aside from prescriptions, co-pays, all that other crap. Which is really kind of a moot point these days, since I don’t go to the doctor, but that’s another issue.

But what I really want to say today is reserved for all of those so vehemently against Obamacare, including asshat Republicans willing to shut down the government because they haven’t gotten their way. (Hint: the ACA has been signed into law. Done deal. Get that? Done. Fucking. Deal. It’s the fucking law.) To all of you and to those who just don’t get what it’s about and don’t care to find out, because as long as you like what you have, that’s good enough, dadgummit! To you I say – you can all just go fuck off. Really.

Because what I’m realizing as I read more and more coverage is that most people are too stupid to actually try to figure out what the law DOES, so rallying against it is a knee-jerk reaction. Get that gubmint outta my health care! Umm, the government isn’t in your health care.  Let’s sum up a bit.

To those who read that the companies in the exchanges are in some cases limiting the doctors you can see, and are thus screeching about how “we were told we could still see the same doctors we always have!” You’re all idiots, because if you HAVE insurance and have a job, you won’t be getting insurance through the exchanges. Your plan won’t change. Those going through the exchanges are the uninsured or underinsured or those like me, paying ridiculous amounts of money for independent insurance. I guarantee that most of the people in those groups will be happy to have A doctor to see, not necessarily a specific one. Oh, your premium might go up $10 or $20? Boo fucking hoo. Pretty sure that would have happened anyway.

To those who rail against how expensive the plans through the exchanges will be. AGAIN, repeat after me – unless you’re uninsured, etc., it doesn’t matter to you. You already have insurance. For those who need to go through the exchange and find that insurance is still expensive, there are subsidies depending on your income. If your income is too high to get a subsidy, then you don’t need it.

To those who have been on state plans and are bitterly railing against Obamacare because your plans are going away: fuck you all. The only reason your plans existed is because they were high-risk plans for those who were uninsurable on the private market. That will no longer be the case, so the state plans aren’t needed. But what really galls me about this group of people is the “I got mine” mentality. Because most people can’t get on those state plans. The one for Oregon? Yeah, it was full in February and not accepting new applicants. I know people in this group who are concerned and wondering what the new plans will look like, and I get that - but those who want to deny other people the chance to get healthcare because you’ve already got your government-run plan? That’s just selfish.

To those of you right-wingers who follow party lines and are against Obamacare because of stories floating around about ER doctors pointing to blinged-out so-called welfare queens as “what’s really wrong with the healthcare system” – yeah, I hope when you get insurance at a reasonable price through the ACA that you actually admit how wrong you all were. Don’t get me wrong – people who abuse the system clearly ARE a problem, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need serious, major reform to healthcare.

To people of all walks of life who don’t bother with health insurance because you don’t want to “waste” money on it – suck it up. Everyone will get sick or have some kind of ailment at some point in their lives. Everyone. When that’s you, I don’t want to pay for it because you have no insurance and rack up huge bills. And these are not just the stereotypical po’ folks that most people seem to reference in discussions about this. The WSJ has run a number of articles over the years, and one in particular I recall, that wrote about yuppies Bill and Jane, or whatever the hell their names were. They didn’t want to “waste” money on health insurance because they were young and healthy, doncha know, and that was money that could be better spent on their 2^nd Escalade. Idiots.

To those of you who have employer-provided insurance and want to know what’s in it for you, guess what? There’s actual stuff for you too! Here’s a summary, from Slate: “About half of all Americans—about 160 million people—already have private health insurance, mostly bought by employers. If this applies to you, Obamacare matters only if your plan was stingy. Under the law, insurers must now pay for many things that used to be optional, like prescription drugs, having a baby, and mental health care, among other services. The law also blocks any extra charges for routine checkups, cancer screening, and some other stuff. Obamacare also limits your yearly out-of-pocket fees, such as co-pays for going to the hospital. It also forbids insurers from kicking you out if you get sick.”

I could go on, because there are so many people to rant about in all of this, but I’ll start to bore even myself. I won't even go into how the rest of the world thinks we're crazy and selfish for not thinking that everyone should have access to health care. Or the fact that if you don't have insurance, no you do NOT get health care - you get to go to the ER for stop-gap treatment. 

But since everyone else has been looking at the ACA through a lens of “what’s in it for ME?”, I’ll do the same. And since right now healthcare/insurance is THE biggest item in my budget – yes, more than housing or anything else – you can damn well bet I’ll be toasting my man Obama tonight. In spades.

Cheers!

Update: Just went to the BCBSIL site to use their tool to see what new insurance through them would cost, exact same plan using my current stats. It would go from my current $780 to...........wait for it.......$322.  A whopping $322 fucking dollars, without any subsidy from the government. Gee, price-gouging much right now?