By The River

If liberals have learned anything in the last 25 years, it is they must beware of sneak attacks from the right that aim through lies and trickery to make it impossible to create the government programs we know are necessary to help the majority of Americans. Like national healthcare.

One such maneuver in Arizona, almost unnoticed until Washington Post columnist George Will wrote an article praising it, would make it illegal under Arizona law to require state residents to participate in a comprehensive health insurance program on the order of those in France or Canada, let alone a much more modest program like that in Massachusetts. Proposition 101 would, in effect, lock the current healthcare mess in place under high-flying rhetoric about "freedom of choice."

If your employer provides you with good health insurance, charges you nothing, or a modest amount for it, or you have the means to buy your own good plan, you'll have "freedom of choice." If you're in the working poor, unemployed, or your employer provides no health insurance, your "freedom" won't get you any health insurance. How many people can on their own afford a typical family health insurance plan costing $12,000 to $15,000 a year or more?

Here's how Proposition 101 is worded: "Because all people should have the right to make decisions about their health care, no law shall be passed that restricts a person's freedom of choice of private health care systems or private plans of any type. No law shall interfere with a person's or entity's right to pay directly for lawful medical services, nor shall any law impose a penalty or fine, of any type, for choosing to obtain or decline health care coverage or for participation in any particular health care system or plan."

This reminds me of U.S. Supreme Court rulings during the so-called "Lochner Era" around the turn of the 20th century. The Court regularly struck down state worker protection laws, including child labor laws, on the grounds that they violated "right of contract." In other words, they stopped you from contracting with an employer to work a low-paid, dangerous job. They stopped 8-year-olds from working in mills. You get the idea.

I've made no secret of my admiration for France's national health insurance model, which provides timely, comprehensive, no-questions-asked health care to all residents of that country in return for a modest payment of about $1,500 per year. If you are poor or unemployed, even that co-pay is waived as I understand it. Treatment delays--the great bugaboo of U.S. national healthcare opponents--are minimal to none. The French government pays for most of this through taxation. Yes, French taxes are higher than American taxes, but you get something for them other than senseless wars of choice.

Proposition 101 would bar even efforts by the state of Arizona to place reasonable regulations on health insurance plans. The key words are "private plans of any types." So if a health insurance company wants to offer a plan with crappy coverage and lots of trick clauses that allow them to deny coverage if you get sick, that would be its right under Proposition 101. You have complete freedom to be deceived or cheated.

I'm sure the proponents of Proposition 101 are counting on cheap rhetoric, widespread public misunderstanding about the French and Canadian healthcare systems, and outright deception to get this benighted proposal past voter scrutiny. Those who benefit financially from the current health care mess are desperate to stop likely President Obama and a strongly Democratic Congress from finally ending their gravy train.

Don't be deceived.