Thursday, April 19, 2012

SUPREME COURT STUFF

I'm in limbo, wondering and worrying about what our Supreme Court will decide about the Health Care bill.

For years, I've thought of the court as a supremely wise, just, careful bunch of guys in robes, who weighed the pros and cons of every law that they, themselves, decided to evaluate.

The Supreme Court was -- to me as a child -- like the Constitution -- hey, like the flag itself -- an unassailable part of my world.

It was the faces carved in the side of a mountain -- the pledge allegiance words -- one nation, liberty and justice words we said every day.

And I was in the center with my family and friends, surrounded and protected by teachers, preachers, president, congressmen, senators -- and they were surrounded by thousands of men and women in uniform who were watching over them as they were watching over me in my home.

As I grew up I learned that sometimes the golden-iron, unbreakable, impermeable thing of truth and honesty -- the trust I had in the circle of guys,
got shattered -- they quit, did bad things, got jailed, or just disappeared, but the others in the circle always came together and their togetherness took away the fear that nothing was safe.

My child self is just expressing my need for someone to be there, protecting advising, making sure we're safe.

As an adult, I can deal with what might be BAD doings by a Justice -- something in a background check, details about what they voted for previously or opposed, or some political statements they've made that reveal bias or seriously out-of-date ideas.

I close my ears and file it away. I realize my allegiance is pledged to those eight people in black robes, whom the main guys in the circle put there to study the whys and wherefores of the laws, past and present, in our country.

But that's why I'm frustrated, frightened, refusing to contemplate what might happen if the Supreme Court decided to throw out the health care bill, or restrict it in ways that defeat its purpose.

Remember the story of the Dutch boy who saw that the dykes in Holland were leaking, and put his finger in the hole and tried to save his country?

That's how I feel. There are leaks in the dyke and I can't stop the flooding.

Panic doesn't help. Moaning, complaining, arguing -- telling each other, reminding each other again and again how this Justice or that Justice did something bad or wrong doesn't help.

I think we have to sit tight and wait for the Supreme Court's rulings on health care are announced. Then see what the man we trusted and pledged allegiance to when we elected him, the President, the guy who got us healthcare -- see what he says and does, and go along with him as he handles what needs to be handled and moves ahead.

That's what I'm going to do so I won't go crazy with worrying.

6 comments:

Carola said...

I'm very worried about the fate of the health care law in the Supreme Court. But I'm even more worried about the Republicans winning the presidency and the Senate and putting more conservative Justices onto the court.

Anonymous said...

This Supreme Court ruling will be far reaching to the American people. It maybe life changing to us. I keep thinking of our Constitution and the part that says, by the people and FOR the people. There hasn't been much FOR the people in a long time...kam

Unknown said...

Emily Frankel, you are such an intellectual. I'm not. I appreciate your brains a lot!
* * *
These are the things I think I know. I believe the Obama Health Care plan was put together and enacted in the first place to help folks like me and my own family. I believe it was put into place so needs could be met for many who need their needs met without getting eaten by the sharks of what I see as a whole lotta of corporate greed in the insurance/medical businesses.
* * *
The cynical old lady inside my head says hope for the best, but always expect the worse. Me and my family still have 'the dignity' (not false pride) of having once been middle-class. Today, we are considered 'low-income'. (I'm retired and my daughter works full time.) Many folks look down their noses upon 'low-income' even 'we' ~ 'the working poor'.

Those 'look down their noses' folks don't seem to want to do anything to help us out, and many of them blatantly express, the reason is it 'takes away from them' ~ along with tirades of how lazy the 'low-income' are.
* * *
As the 'middle-class' diminishes in size, more of them heading into the same 'low-income' as we currently are, the gap continues to widen between the rich and the poor.
* * *
With all my heart I believe it was the 'middle-class' all these years that have reached out with helping hands, hands to lift up the 'low-income' more than most very wealthy folks that I know. The 'middle-class' is what made America the greatest nation in the world. Basic world history shows me nations of either rich or poor and few in-between and that's a basic and vital part of why and how America became to be founded. Regular folks came here to have better. There seems to be a disconnect where 'better' in the American dream has become want and get more and more and more and some of those who really have are now trying TO HAVE IT ALL and to heck with everybody else.
* * *
In today's America, the cynical old lady inside my brain expects to be swatted like a fly. Whatever and however things happen, no matter how little in my personal bank account, no one has the power to take away my mind or my heart. I may be cynical, but I won't let that happen. If my one little vote at any election is available to not let that happen, I'll be casting it.
* * *
I'm @grammakaye on twitter. Much love to you Ms. EM, your John Cullum and your FAMILY.

Linda Phillips said...

Well Em, I am sort of with you on this in that I refuse to obsess about the decision, but I suspect that our right leaning Supremes will outnumber our more liberal ones.

Poet_Carl_Watts said...

My perspective of obamacare is that it has nothing to do with "health" at all. It is a document, passed unread. It was written by the pharmaceutical industry which ONLY deal in profits, never in health or cures. Drugs never heal, drugs are all poisons. In an emergency, sure they have use but not in life.

Those that abdicate responsibility for their health will be controlled and dispatched on schedule by govt.

I don't know what the Court will do. I believe the insanities so prevalent today have creeped into their chambers and they are not unbiased nor uncontrolled.

Anonymous said...

I agree it is so hard to trust the process when this process proves to be more and more corrupt and broken by the day. In my humble opinion our elected officials need to go back to the notion of being public servants and less of the egomaniacal pontificaters that the have become. Their hidden selfish agendas are ruining what are founding fathers have established for us. I am with you, we cannot worry about what may come tomorrow but we must trust that whatever the outcome, it will be handled efficiently and fairly.