Some mornings

I woke up this morning with a profound feeling of something being wrong in America. I've woken up with this feeling before, but it was most powerful this morning. The likely reason is that last Monday my child is to be placed on her dad's medical insurance plan at work which means she will no longer have dental or vision as she had with the state's medical assistance HMO program UCare. [Update: she'll get dental but of course this will add yet another expense on top of adding her onto his medical plan.]

The only thing the judge cared about was that she was receiving the benefit of taxpayer funded medical care instead of her dad paying directly into the insurance provided by his work, which is already too expensive for himself and now he will have even less to take home.

There is nothing specific that I can point to that makes what this "activist judge" did wrong, except that his ruling has nothing to do with promoting a "culture of life" let alone any sense of fairness or justice. It especially has nothing to do with what is in fact best for the child. Her teeth and her eyes are as important for her well-being as is medical care for when she is sick. Other than the occasional cold that sometimes leads to an ear infection, her greatest needs are being able to the see the blackboard and keeping her teeth healthy--which are under constant assault by the high fructose corn syrup used in practically everything we consume, not to mention all the candy that is strewn in the streets during summer parades.

I know that what galls me most is the doctrine of social Darwninism that is inherent in the view that anyone not rich enough to be financially self-sufficient is less worthy of respect and dignity. It doesn't matter that the rich are enormously bloated parasites on the backs of every working person.

I think what bothers me is the reversal of roles where this judge treats people who are at the complete mercy of the system as parasites and yet it is him and his ilk who are the real parasites. He has no clue that what he has done is wholly immoral in a spiritual way. He only knows that business has some sort of entitlement or even a right to profit. He does not realize that this is done at the expense of the people's inherent rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

I think what keeps me thinking about this is the desire to find a checkmate move to this line of thinking, one that will trap them in the inherent inconsistency of their ideology and make them realize that an injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. The problem is that they see themselves as special, as superior to others, when in fact they are simply another member of the human family whose ultimate fate is tied to the fate of all others.

I do not know the antidote to greed and selfishness. I only know that people without empathy who have no feelings of commiseration are not fully human for it opens the door to indifference and allows the commission of cruelty and atrocity.