ObamaCare

President Obama has moved onto two issues which have been a part of political dialogue for at least thirty years: health care and education. It seems we have been debating these issues for ions. I am beginning to feel we are in an Orwellian "forever crisis" in education and health care. And I actually wonder if there is a crisis in either.

There is no doubt that the cost of health insurance has increased. Dramatically. I have been a consumer of private health insurance for many years, juggling the costs, squinting at computer screens trying to find lower premiums and still have care when/if I need it. I am extremely healthy. I do all the things this current Administration wants to "nudge" us into doing: I have never smoked, exercise like crazy, keep my weight in check. I don't eat a lot of sweets, drink a lot of coffee, and don't visit the doctor often! But my premiums kept going up. Somewhere in this scenario, someone was making a lot of money off of my monthly payments.

On the other hand I am of the age where the medical profession likes to recommend lots of tests. Going to the doctor is no longer an hourly visit, it's days and days of hourly tests: mammograms, colonoscopies, bone densities. And when I sat down with the doctor for my "pre-surgery" exam for the colonoscopy, I realized all of this had become way overblown. I mean, millions of people before me had lived great lives without having some doctor stick a laser down their colon. But this doctor went through this draconian lecture about how often people get colon cancer, and oh, you're co-pay is $15 and the surgery is over $2000! Yikes!

While I have been supportive of addressing the costs of health care, I think we are still not ready, as a society, to deal with this issue full on. Just as other sensitive problems have taken years, sometimes decades, to solve, this one may just need more seasoning. It's personal, whether it is should Medicare cover hip replacements for our parents or whether a private insurer can decide not to allow a defibrillator. In the abstract we all "get it," but at the moment, when it's our mother, our brother, our child, we want what is best and available. We need time to have a longer national discussion. And frankly, our minds have been on the economy. On our neighbor's foreclosure, our bills, our friend's job.

And then there is education. I have also been an avid consumer of education. I've been to elite private universities and state schools. I have taught at both. I have lectured at elementary schools deep in the ghettos and private elite schools that have graduated some of our country's finest minds. While I am not a professional educator, it seems to me our education system is doing just fine. We're producing great kids who are smart, motivated, committed. Cranky up the education system to rely on "indicators," such as test scores or other quantifiable measurables always seems regressive to me. Measuring doesn't account for learning and the multiple ways we absorb life.

I am wondering about President Obama right now. He has mis-stepped on these two issues. And seems to have lost focus on financial industry reform, the economy, and other front burner issues. We need Obama to care, every moment, about those kinds of things rather than get bogged down in "problems" that seem to have been around for a very long time and are dug out of the closet by every single politician when they want easy votes.