So many things confuse me about right wing republicans.  Take for example the way they kick and holler and scream SOCIALISM about the proposed national health care system.  And yet, they are such great fans of the military. 

How is the military - a public resource which is funded by the taxpayers - not socialism?  What about the public school system?  Why does no one cry SOCIALISM over the interstate highway system?  Or the FAA?  Or the NTSB?
One purpose of a government is to take a little bit of money from everyone, and spend it on things that everyone benefits from.  Like repairing interstate highways, or building new stealth bombers.  Republicans always want "less government" until we get to the topic of military spending, have you ever noticed that?  The military is one aspect of government spending which Republicans are staunchly, rabidly in favor of.  Go figure.

As part of the "death panels" conversation (and although Rush didn't coin the term, he has used it liberally) Rush said:

    "What the hell ever happened to people paying for their own stuff?  Whatever happened to that concept?"

That's an interesting quote, and it's one that every Rush Limbaugh fan should sit back and ponder for a while.  That quote is the distilled essence of the Republican ethos.  Republicans believe that it's every man for himself.  That if you can't afford something (like an x-ray for a broken arm) then the government shouldn't hand it to you.  

According to Republican mythology, poor people deserve everything they get.  And it's their own damned fault for being poor in the first place.

Well, that's one thing.  But when you're talking about a national health care plan, things start to break down a little.  We are all well aware of what a financial disaster it can be to lose your health insurance.  (Insert sad story of personal bankruptcy and emotional trauma here.)  But this isn't the kind of thing that only happens to bad people, like getting a DUI conviction, or being sent to prison.

Everyone is just a hair's breadth away from losing their health insurance.  That's you, that's me, that's every single one of Rush's listeners.  

For one thing, you could lose your job.  That would be fairly catastrophic.  And have you looked into the price of COBRA lately?  Not pretty.

For another thing, your employer could decide to cut their costs (in order to perform better in Today's Economy) by switching to a cheaper health care plan.  Hello, $1,000 annual deductible, with 80/20 coverage after that up to the first $20,000!  I hope you don't have children or a chronic medical condition, because you're going to suddenly start shoveling money at your medical bills like there's no tomorrow.

Speaking of chronic medical conditions, that's the third thing: your insurance company could drop you.  It's called "rescission," and it happens a LOT.  And once your insurance company drops you, no other insurance company will take you on.  You are, in a word, screwed.

And how does Rush feel about this?  Does he think the current health care situation is broken, or does he have an opinion on how we should fix it?  No.  Rush just wants to know:

"What the hell ever happened to people paying for their own stuff?  Whatever happened to that concept?"