A Plea for Honesty and Integrity

I had the opportunity to meet with my congressional representative at the Blueberry Festival a few weeks ago. He came up to me quickly with a big guy by his side, whom I presumed was a friend of his, but who was never introduced to me. Only afterward did I realize that this big guy was watching my every move, and also scanning the crowd to make sure none of the folks at the festival were getting too close or aggressive, and therefore, since I was very close and very upset, could have been in grave danger..

Be that as it may, I expressed some important concerns: about the importance of health care for everybody, and that the ACA must be supported, and if there are problems, then amend the act; about the attitude in congress- "my way or the highway"- was not a way to make progress; that congress should do its job, instead of just running for office continually. There are other points I wish I could have made, but I wanted him to hear my plea for health care that works for America.

His only retort, between his smiling teeth was: "Did you read the health care act?", to which I proudly responded, yes, and he said something about $44,000 being a cut off for health care. That was not something that I understood was there. And so I Googled that figure and the affordable care act. and I came upon this link:
http://www.aje-dc.org/programs/dchic/affordable-care-act-2

I found it a helpful description of the ACA, and an antidote to the poisonous misinformation that comes about in debates over the health care act. $44,000 is significant, true, but it is not a deal buster. After that salary, some wrinkles to health care insurance costs do kick in, but not entirely unmanageable, and probably represents a fair approach to funding our insurance.

Most politicians give only a smattering of the law so they can argue a  few points that may help them out. (My bet would be that most of them have not read the law, but have assumed the talking points of certain influential people who have an agenda that is not necessarily great for all of America.) They assume ignorance or blind allegiance from their constituents, and favor the constituency of the monied and the lobbies.And there are a lot of both of these who would like to "repeal" the ACA to the detriment of real progress on health care to benefit all citizens.  I think almost everyone agrees that something must be done to assure coverage and to bring down health care costs.

To add to the confusion of all this, you have a company like Papa John's Pizza which I probably will never buy again, stating that they are raising the cost of pizzas by 14 cents a pie. Pure rubbish (the concept...the pizzas aren't bad). The honchos at Papa John's ought to read the link that I posted above, and be honest about why they are raising the price....to make more money; perhaps to contribute to the political cacophony, to confuse people, to take advantage of the gullible and the gluttonous. (An odd aside here is that Bain Capital used its skills to put Domino's Pizza, a rival of Papa John's,on a profitable footing.)

I just wish we could understand all of it in simpler terms, aside from the rhetoric, apart from our appetites. I would  like truth, in real rather than fabricated context. I would like to see actual  pluses and minuses, and how the minuses might be less of a problem. I would like our statesmen to work together to make America better as the compromisers of other times did to move forward. And most of all our elected officials should stop running for office long enough to do the people's business.