The government has issued a lot of policies in the past years so far. One of the major moves of the Obama administration as far as policymaking is concerned was the issuance of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. What this policy is all about is overhauling the entire American healthcare system so that the focus would be placed on the affordability of healthcare for patients . Prior to its ratification, the focus of the American healthcare system was on the insurance companies and healthcare providers and institutions, at least based on theory as well as the preliminary research conducted by the working committee who proposed the case and saw its progress during the voting process. This should not be the case, they argued. If there is going to be a population group which should be the focus in the American healthcare system that should be the patients . After all, they are the ones who need to be cared for.
One of the major concerns about the American healthcare system is its costs. Healthcare costs in the United States are among the highest in the planet. Sure, the quality of the care and services available to the patients are high when compared to that of other countries. However, politicians, especially those who have a populist but not a realistic mindset, believe and argue that this should not be the case. According to them, the masses should be burdened by the low level of healthcare and medical services’ affordability despite the fact that what they are essentially receiving is an inversely proportional level of service quality .
If one is going to follow the concept of consumerism instead of populist politics, one should be able to realize that a citizen gets what he pays for. Therefore, a higher level of healthcare costs should translate to a higher level of healthcare cost (i.e. low level of affordability) and then vice versa. This is completely normal because the same law applies to all other countries, even the developing ones. The only way to break this truth would be to remove the burden that one population group experiences and transfer it to another group. In the case of the Affordable Care Act, its proponents believe that it is the American people (i.e. the patients) who are being burdened . Therefore, the burden (i.e. paying for unnecessarily, allegedly, high costs of healthcare) would be removed from them and then transferred to their insurance companies and employers. That is, essentially what the Affordable Care Act is all about when seen from the bigger picture. Based on what the act is all about, it would be a valid point to suggest that the ACA is basically a step to socialize the United States’ healthcare system, an idea which members of the right wing political ideological systems do not appreciate.
In order to understand the act better, it would be beneficial to dissect it based on the provisions that it provide. Majority of the provisions of the act should take effect between the years 2010 and 2020. However, their effects are expected to last for a long time. One of the major provisions of the law is the guaranteed issue clause. Prior to the act’s implementation, people who have preexisting health conditions when they applied for a health insurance coverage benefit from a health management organization (HMO) for example, would most likely not be treated by hospitals—if the services would be used for the said preexisting condition. The American healthcare system was that restrictive at that time. With the ACA, all individuals conditions, be it preexisting or not, would be covered by their healthcare and medical insurance policies for the same premium price (Tanner 01). Additionally, the act establishes a federal government-mandated set of health insurance policies. These standards serve as lower limits that health insurance companies should strictly abide with. Prior to the act’s implementation, for example, health insurance companies could offer plan packages depending on what they think is the most profitable for the company.
Now, there is already a list of essential health and medical coverage benefits that they must be able to provide in order to be legally allowed to offer medical and healthcare cost coverage to patients . Low income families and individuals would also be entitled to receive federal government-sponsored subsidies for their healthcare expenses, just so their medical and healthcare needs can be covered. The level and amount of subsidy that one family or member can receive depends on poverty level based on the federal government’s standards. The more poverty-stricken a family is the higher level of subsidization they would receive. So far, all of the major provisions of the ACA that were mentioned favor the patients and the U.S. citizens (Tanner 01). This is why it is only valid to suggest that this move can be interpreted as a way to socialize the American healthcare system.
As far as the government’s military is concerned, it would be hard to argue that it was strengthened. If anything, it would be more accurate to suggest that the U.S. military is on a downsizing mode. This is what the trends in U.S. military spending shows. The lower the level of spending on defense and military expenditures is, the less capable the country’s military becomes. And in the case of the U.S. the trend that the military and defense spending follows is downward, according to a report published in the Council on Financial Relations .
Classical liberalism centers on the principles of individualism and capitalism—at least at some point. For example, it promotes the use of political and government structures that support and uphold private ownership of assets and properties, free market economy, and a relatively small and decentralized form of government that only has a low level of authority. This is opposed to what socialist and communist governments do. In the case of the ACA, it can be viewed as an act that is against classical liberalism. The downsizing of the U.S. military, on the other hand, somehow shows that the U.S. is trying to limit its power and authority, which supports the main principles of classical liberalism.
Hillary Clinton, one of the current American presidential race’s candidates, is expected to support and defend the Affordable Care Act. This is because she believes that affordable care is a basic human right . This only makes sense because Hillary Clinton is technically a member of the current administration and so she is expected to mirror a lot of the administration’s positions on political concerns, including the ones on healthcare. In terms of the U.S. military, Clinton believes that it would be more appropriate for the country to bolster its military so that it would be able to protect itself and its allies on the rising levels of threat of insurgency and terrorism. Marco Rubio, on the other hand, is does not support the ACA. He basically wants to rebuild it because for him, it is not economically and morally sustainable. This only makes sense because Rubio is a realist, at least based on his actions and decisions. He also is for the further development of the military just like Clinton. However, he wants to focus more on its rebuilding and modernization rather than just the injection of more capital to bolster its budget. One presidential candidate who supports both of the two policies mentioned would be Ted Cruz. This makes him a good alternative as a presidential candidate for those who are against classical liberalism.
Works Cited
Barone, M. "Why Hillary Clinton is embracing Barack Obama." American Enterprise Institute (2016): http://www.aei.org/publication/why-hillary-clinton-is-embracing-barack-obama/. 01. Web.
Cannon, M. "The ACA is Dead - Long Live Obamacare Commentary." Cato institute Press (2015): http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/aca-dead-long-live-obamacare. 01. Web.
Talbott, S. "Is the American World Order Sustainable and Necessary in the 21st Century? An Address by Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.)." The Brookings Institution Press (2016): http://www.brookings.edu/events/2012/04/25-rubio. 01. Web.
Tanner, M. "Obamacare: What we Know Now." Cato Institute Press (2014): http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/obamacare-what-we-know-now. 01. Web.
Walker, D. "Trends in U.S. Military Spending." Council on Financial Relations (2014): http://www.cfr.org/defense-budget/trends-us-military-spending/p28855. 01. Web.
