Jimmy Kimmel seems like a really nice guy and compared to many other people working the late night circuit, he seems to have a high degree of integrity. On May 1st, Mr. Kimmel went public with the story of his newborn son who was born with a heart defect that was surgically repaired. His son’s prognosis thankfully looks great. But during Kimmel’s emotional monologue detailing the ordeal he took a turn into politics, while trying to sound apolitical. His motives were pure but his actions were not.
…before 2014 if you were born with congenital heart disease like my son was, there was a good chance you’d never be able to get health insurance…
…if your baby is going to die and it doesn’t have to, it shouldn’t matter how much money you make…
…don’t let their partisan squabbles divide us on something every decent person wants…
This sounds reasonable, but is it? Mr. Kimmel unintentionally employed an age-old trick used by seasoned politicians. This maneuver is not different from the countless times Donald Trump showcases families of people with loved-ones murdered by illegal immigrants to make his point on illegal immigration. These arguments are hard to oppose because they rely on emotion overtaking logic. We should all be wary of any issue portrayed in this way. It is rare to have a nationwide argument, with one side angelic and the other side monstrous, it’s never that simple.
These matters are more complex. There is a valid argument that the United States of America should adopt universal government-provided healthcare, but that is not the issue at hand. Obamacare does not guarantee everyone health care.
So… Jimmy created an argument where his side is demanding all Americans receive medical care and the other side only offers care to rich people. This was not unlike how Meryl Streep argued against kicking every person, born outside America, out of the county. Both celebrities are fighting fights that are not based in reality. The two of them made up imaginary arguments in lieu of the complicated arguments we actually have.
If we keep Obamacare, premiums will rise, and more young healthy people will be unable to afford their insurance payments. Some of these young-ins will drop out of coverage while the sick remain in the insurance pool. This will lead to insurance companies profits dropping and in turn, will cause premiums to rise yet again. Then more healthy people drop coverage. And so it goes. Most experts do not deny this is where we are heading. This cycle was labeled the “death spiral,” and it is the rationale that stands against Kimmel’s Obamacare endorsement.
Now, anyone can also pull on our heart-strings to explain this half of the debate.. like so; with rising premiums the family of five in Iowa, making fifty thousand dollars a year, can no longer afford insurance and when their baby gets sick and they don’t go to the doctor, their baby dies; so we must end Obamacare.
If we lived in an age where we had journalism, the public would hear both sides and form an opinion. We don’t, today, all you will hear on CNN is that Trump wants 24 million people to lose insurance so you should go join a protest. The main-stream-media presents only one side of the issue to their audience and so did Mr. Kimmel.
So please, let’s pray for Jimmy’s baby but not ignore what problems we have in this country with our health system. We need to solve these problems and carrying anti-Trump signs does not solve them.
The full video of Jimmy Kimmel’s monologue is here.