Our
View: Senate Bill 2, good for you
Two
days before the recall Gov. Gray Davis signed
Senate Bill 2, a health care initiative
that would require small business owners
who employ 20 or more workers to provide
health insurance for them. Immediately causing
an uproar, it was said that this bill was
simply a boon to the powerful California
labor organizations who had vowed to support
Davis.
Then
in utero Governator's campaign denounced
the law, among others passed by Davis. Since
then the bill has been under fire from many
sources, and some have claimed that it will
push the already unfriendly business climate
over into a downright hostile one. And now
the Californians Against Government Run
Health care are gathering signatures in
a grab to get a referendum on the March
ballot to revoke the law.
The
business coalition is taking on the job
of depriving Californians of the right to
have medical care. Whether the coalition
says that it puts an unfair burden on business
owners or not, whether or not they're for
or against government run health care, these
are human beings they are talking about.
Not just a few people, the unemployed or
the poor, but an estimated 3. million that
were without health care for the entirety
of 2001, and the 6 million who were without
health care at some point.
Just
how do these people who do not have government
run or enforced health care get health insurance
then? These same business people who will
not provide health care for their own workers,
apparently also don't pay them enough to
afford it for themselves. And since the
whole system is in place simply to line
the pockets of the insurance industry and
hospital boards, the only people who can
possibly lose out is the workers themselves.
This,
of course, is a party issue. Because we
all know that only the Democrats want health
insurance. Republicans have no need for
that kind of base government service; they
are entirely self-sufficient and depend
on nothing from the government or other
people for that matter. As ridiculous as
it sounds, this is how it seems to be. Even
in the Senate, which has 25 Democratic seats
and 15 Republican seats, it seemed to be
a black and white issue. When it went through
the Senate floor it received 25 ayes, and
15 noes. Imagine that. We wonder who voted
for what.
Admittedly,
SB 2 would probably not provide the utopian
ideal for California. Someone will lose
out and someone will be unhappy. But should
it be those 6 million working people and
their families? Shouldn't the people who
are making a profit off of their labor be
slightly responsible for their well-being?
We guess not.
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