Friday, January 9, 2009

Morality The Megan Way

First we get this, from a long bit of rental advice for newcomers to the Quaint & Sleepy Village By The Potomac:

The inauguration rental ads in the wrong place on Craigslist are still going strong, but they've been supplemented by clearly fraudulent ads aimed at the Obama folks.  I came across this myself during our house hunt, when I randomly discovered that someone was advertising my mother's place for rent, at a ridiculously low price.  A friend suggested we try to play the scammers, which would have been fun and instructive, but immoral, given that other people on Craigslist might be taken in by the ad.
I have no idea what she means by "rental ads in the wrong place" or "play the scammers," but wouldn't one want to stop whatever scam is going on? Wouldn't that be "moral?" How would "playing the scammers" be "immoral?"

The morality of scamming the government is, of course, another matter to Megan.
* One of my favorite doctors was running a Medicaid mill, which I faithfully patronized when I was uninsured.  She was charming, caring, and merrily full of ways to help me milk the system, which I had to politely turn down and pay her in cash.  Given the reimbursement schedule Medicaid offers, I couldn't blame her a bit.
No moral question of turning in the "milk the system" doctor? Well, doctors are special people. 

Here, she reverses her usual "poor people are dirt who deserve what they get (or don't deserve what they don't get)" shtick:
It seems to me that there is no good reason for Medicare and Medicaid to be two separate programs. Housecleaners are surely no less deserving of decent medical care than Palm Beach retirees, yet we arduously separate the two programs so as to lavish extra care on the more affluent class of beneficiaries. It's no good saying that the Medicare recipient earned theirs through contributions, because they didn't--people in the system now are net beneficiaries, not contributors. It's just that on average they're whiter, they speak better English and their subsidized lifestyles are considerably better upholstered. I'm not sure why any of these entitles them to a better grade of publicly provided healthcare.
I'm in complete agreement w/ this "merger" idea (as a wig job on the gummint dole, I'm not even sure if I have Medicare or California's version of Medicaid, MediCal) except for the "people in the system now are net beneficiaries, not contributors" bit. Like, whatever. Are they paying? Have they paid? Just because they're getting health care out of the system now doesn't mean they haven't paid in. 

Spare me your fucking economics trickery. And your bogus, bourgeois "morality."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The rental scam post is one of Megan's least coherent--I have almost know idea what she's talking about. But it does look like some one's trying to pull a scam that involves Megan's mother and/or her apartment. So what does Megan do? Nothing. That's because it offends her sense of personal morality--for reasons unknown. I guess, once again, mom's on her own.