You know, I always wondered why my family ate lots of Chinese.
Well, the New Year has arrived. I hope everyone enjoyed themselves and didn�t suffer too many ill after-effects. Now that the holiday season is over, we can turn our attention to more pleasant things like war and ballooning state deficits. Our own boyish governor-elect is proposing cuts in our state�s Medicaid program. As someone who depends on this program for every aspect of daily life, such talk makes me cringe a little. But I�m more concerned for people who are working minimum-wage jobs and don�t have any access to affordable insurance. They�re always easy targets because they don�t evoke the same degree of (let�s be honest) pity as do people with visible disabilities or the elderly. My mom, who�s from Germany, always marveled at how this country treats health care as a privilege rather than a right. Just utter the phrase �national health care� and you�re accused of being a socialist. I wonder if these people would be happier living in a country that practices a purer form of laissez-faire capitalism, like Somalia.
