Are doctors motivated by high pay or healing patients?

The majority of American doctors are clearly motivated by high pay rather than healing patients. If this weren't the case, this country would at least be closer toward moving toward a system in which health care was affordable and accessible for all people instead of just those who can afford it.

While doctors themselves aren't completely to blame for the fact that we do not have universal health care in this country, they share the blame equally with politicians and the medical lobbying groups which have prevented us from moving toward a system which nearly every other civilized country has.

The arguments have been made for years that if American went to a system of universal health care that the quality of health care would suffer. Tell that to someone with an illness who cannot afford to have it treated at all or to an elderly person living on a fixed income who has to choose between eating and getting the medication they need to survive.

Did Canada lose all its qualified doctors when they switched to the universal health care system? No. Did everyone move away because the health care became so horrible? No. Did people who were unable to afford proper medical treatment in the past become able to get it? Yes. Is it cheaper to import the exact same medicines from Canada than it is to purchase them in the United States? Yes. This clearly indicates that the Canadian system of universal health care is working.

One of the biggest arguments offered against universal health care is a back log in the system and being forced onto waiting lists for medical procedures. I believe a poverty-stricken individual would rather be placed on a waiting list for a medical procedure than to know there was no way they would ever be able to receive it or that, even if they did, they would spend the rest of their life in debt for it. The waiting lists provide everyone an equal opportunity to receive life-saving medical procedures without pushing those with enough money to buy their way into the operating room to the front of the line while pushing those without the money out the door.

There are, of course, American doctors who are motivated more by healing patients and saving lives than they are by money. Those are the ones who are offering their services at free clinics and in similar ways. However, those free clinics are far and few between, especially in rural areas, and are usually painfully understaffed and struggle to stay afloat. This is where a system of universal health care would help out tremendously.

Some say that you would only attract substandard doctors if they didn't receive such high pay, which is basically unlimited income potential as it stands. That may be true, but if money weren't such a consideration, then you might attract more compassionate doctors motivated by what doctors are truly supposed to be all about, which is healing people.

Raise taxes or cut programs?

Unfortunately, the next President will find himself in the position of being forced to both raise taxes and cut programs in order to pay off the national debt. It has gotten so out of control that there are simply no other alternatives.

We cannot continue to spend money we do not have, as anyone who has ever had to balance a checkbook already knows. Unfortunately, as a country, we seem to have never learned this important lesson and have continued spending money that doesn't even exist, leaving us in an unfathomable amount of debt.

If this problem is to be addressed, the President will have to tackle it head on. This will mean a dual approach of both cutting programs to reduce current expenditures as well as raising taxes to pump up income.

Though we're all strapped for cash already, we have to realize that it is our tax dollars that provide the working capitol for our government. Without that money, many of the government programs we rely on would not exist. In order to avoid stumbling blindly into even more increasing debt, we may have to tighten our belts a little more and bite the bullet of increased taxes. Besides, did you really expect that the raise in the minimum wage wouldn't be taken away somehow?

The other option to help reduce the national debt is to cut some government programs. There are a variety of programs that, in my humble opinion, are useless in the first place. Do we really need to pay for a program to teach people how to stay married? Yes, it exists. Cut that out and let people go talk to their pastor or religious leader or their grandmother for free. We don't need to be a nation in debt providing glorified government funded marriage counseling. For more information on this program see the website at http://www.acf.hhs.gov/healthymarriage and decide for yourself whether you think our tax dollars should be going toward these types of programs or if they might be better spent reducing our tremendous, overwhelming debt.

Tough economic times demand sacrifice. Hopefully we will get a President who understands this and we will be strong enough to support him in his efforts to reduce the national debt by whatever means necessary. It is clear that there are wasteful and even idiotic government programs that could very easily stand to be cut. We can also do our parts by coughing up a few more tax dollars. The best we can hope is that the President will find creative ways to cut expenses that don't impede any important or necessary programs and will be moderate and fair with any tax increases so that all people, even the rich, carry their fair share of the burden of keeping our country running smoothly and heading back toward the black.