Jay Tea To Silky Pony: MYOFB And Go Pound Sand

Well, John Edwards has announced his plan for universal health care coverage, and it ain’t pretty. Lemme sum it up for you:

You VILL haff insurance. You VILL offer proof to the IRS every year that you haff insurance, or ve VILL make sure you do. Ve VILL see if you qualify for Medicare or Medicaid or S-CHIP, and if you do ve VILL sign you up for them. And if you do not qualify for them, then ve VILL sign you up for the cheapest coverage ve can find, and then ve VILL garnish your wages to pay for it if you don’t fork it over yourself.

In clearer terms: “You are legally obligated to have health insurance. If you cannot prove you have health insurance, we will see if you qualify for free health insurance. If you do not, we will pick your insurance plan for you and take your money to pay for it.”

I have insurance through my employer. And I say now, with absolute conviction, that should John Edwards’ plan come to pass, there is no way in HELL I will give any details of my coverage to the Internal Revenue Service. I’m sure my insurance company will send me the requisite letter; I will simply toss it in the back of a drawer and ignore it. I’m less than thrilled with the IRS already knowing far too much about my personal finances, and taking far too much of my money; I will NOT be aiding and abetting the Infernal Revenuers to become John Edwards’ leg-breakers in his quest to control and micromanage as intimate and personal detail of my life as my health insurance.

We’ve seen in the past how readily the IRS can be used for political vendettas. It’s a bipartisan thing — both Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton’s political enemies found themselves to audits and other IRS scrutiny. Anyone who thinks that it’s a great idea to put the IRS in charge of enforcing a whole new government policy — that does NOT have anything to do with revenue — is crazier than that whackjob who duct-taped road flares to himself and commandeered Hillary Clinton’s campaign office over in Rochester yesterday.

We’ve seen what happens to health care when the government gets involved too much — look at Massachusetts. And we’ve seen what happens to health care when John Edwards gets his dander up — check out what happens to OB-GYNs in his home state after he started going after them.

(I probably shouldn’t refer to John Edwards’ “dander,” considering how much care he gives his hair, but “ire” just doesn’t fit with his image.)

I do appreciate one thing about Edwards’ plan, though. He’s up-front about it. It makes it a hell of a lot easier to send him back home to sue some more doctors, maybe even channel some more dead children’s words for gullible jurors.

I can’t BELIEVE America is at the point where an ambulance-chasing, nanny-stater, vapid, egotistical twit like John Edwards is a serious candidate for president. God help us all.