A conservative Texan explains why “government-run” health care ain’t so bad

I don’t know why so many conservative Republicans like me reflexively flinch away from what their pollsters have told them to call “government-run health care.” Their arguments against it have been around at least since the infancy of the Clinton presidency (back when Monica Lewinsky was a college sophomore), and usually go something like this: “We don’t want health care run like the post office” (or the DMV, Social Security office, or any other traditionally inept government agency).

One of the problems with this faulty logic is that it projects that every “government-run” institution is run poorly, and it assumes that all privately-run enterprises are run properly. We all know this isn’t true. But the biggest problem with this argument is that it rejects the power of individuals—something conservatives like me champion.

There are plenty of non-government institutions that function just as inefficiently as the worst government agencies. Want proof? When’s the last time you stood in a long customer service line at Wal-Mart? Tried to deal with the Best Buy warranty department yet? How about sitting on a JetBlue plane on the tarmac for eight hours? Catch my drift?

Secondly, as hard as it is to admit, the government actually runs some pretty darn good operations. For instance:

Texas, where I live, narrowly loses to Utah every four years in an informal competition to see which state turns red first on the presidential electoral college map. But every fall, the state instinctively turns burnt orange (some Texans say they even bleed the color) when the University of Texas football team takes the field. Texans revere the school like the Bible and cold beer. And no one seems to care that the University of Texas is, to quote the Republican pollsters, “government-run.”

We all support the soldiers and sailors in the military. Texans especially—with the highest number of military personnel per capita in the country. No Chevy Suburban here is complete without a yellow ribbon magnet. And no one complains about the “government-run” military.

In Texas, high schools are the epicenters of any communities. Entire towns show up at Friday night football games. Banks shut down for things like prom and homecoming. Teachers and coaches are local celebrities. And no one ever scorns them for being run by the government.

These government-run outfits succeed not because they’re run by the government, but because of the people running them on the ground.

The University of Texas is revered (U.S. News says it’s a top-tier school, with a top-15 law school and top-18 business school) not because Texas government is so great (we all know that’s not so), but because it’s faculty, staff, and coaches are so good.

The military is honored because its soldiers and sailors are brave and fearless, not because the brass in Washington ink the best no-bid contract deals.

And high schools are the pride of every Texas town because teachers and coaches love kids and take pride in what they do—not because school district administrators make crazy curriculum decisions about Bibles and evolution.

Our present health care “system” (if you can call it that) is run by a part-hydra, part-goliath combination of private insurers, for-profit and non-profit hospitals, physician groups, and government agencies. It’s succeeded in producing the current, as they say in the military bases around here, FUBAR situation we find ourselves in. It’s minted phrases only a lawyer could love like “co-pay,” “pre-existing condition,” and “explanation of benefits.” It charges $28 for a Tylenol and $5,000 for a CT scan, but shafts doctors and hospitals out of billions of dollars every year because almost 50 million uninsured Americans can’t pay. Texas has it worse than anywhere. One-in-four of us—5.4 million Texans—don’t have health insurance. Our hospital emergency rooms are packed with uninsured folks who will never pay for the treatment they get.

So there’s no question the “system” needs fixing. Even Houston right-wing nut jobs and Austin environmental wackos can agree on that.

But the current health care debate has been so wrenched away from the people—the individual doctors, surgeons, and nurses—who actually run it that we ignore their individual greatness. Because politicians, insurance executives, and pollsters have turned health care into talk about dollars and numbers, or maybe because we’re getting too cynical, we won’t let ourselves believe that most of our doctors, surgeons, and nurses are whip smart, love what they do, and want to help us. We won’t believe that good doctors and good nurses and good biochemists will keep treating and curing injury and disease even if the government is paying. We insult them by arguing that—if the government steps in to manage their industry—they will be just as inefficient and inept as the 9:05-to-4:55 timecard punchers at the DMV.

This argument diminishes healthcare providers’ power and worth as individuals. As a conservative, I believe that individuals—not government or corporations—are what make this Country great. It’s wrong to say that the same individuals working for government or corporate organizations will perform worse or better than the other. Regardless of whether we have government-run or corporate-run health care, as conservatives we must have faith in the individuals who will actually do the work.

That’s why I’m not so scared of government-run health care.