I watched with dismay this video of a woman at a town hall meeting in Oklahoma asking Sen. Tom Coburn if he can help with her husband's catastrophic illness since he lost his job and no longer has insurance to cover his care. Sen. Coburn replied that the government wasn't the solution (though oddly he offered the help of his office: isn't he the government, too?), and that the neighbors ought to be helping out. I'll avoid some of the snarkier comments I've heard about neighbors coming over to change this man's bedpans or whatever. What disturbed me was the applause Sen. Coburn got when he made his anti-government remark.
To those of you who applauded at the meeting, and to those of you who agree with the anti-government ideology of the right wing, let me whisper a little something in your ear: I'm your neighbor, too.
Sure, I live in Chicago. I love my adopted home town and I love living in cities in general. And I know you all love living in Oklahoma, whether in a city or out in the country. And while I wouldn't necessarily want to live there, I want you to know that the things I want for me: a job to support myself, a safe neighborhood, streets to walk on, roads to drive on (on those occasions where I want to drive, I'm more of a public transportation person myself), electricity, good schools for our children (and for adults who want to learn a trade or earn a degree later in life), and of course, affordable health care, I also want for you as well. And I will do what I can to make sure that you can all live the kinds of lives you want to live. In short, I want you to be happy and prosperous.
Now, it's true that some of these things are best handled at the community level. I am not against that, and why you think I would be, I don't know. But some things really are best handled by something bigger than that. Imagine what Oklahoma would be like without electricity or highways. Oklahoma has always been a relatively poor state, it's quite possible that, on its own, it wouldn't be able to build highways or bring electricity out to everyone. Certainly no private business would do anything on such a massive scale: even if could afford to do so, where would be the profit? Just as there's no real profit for an insurance company to pay for expensive care for the husband of that lady at the town hall meeting. Some things have to be done by the federal government and that means that it has to include all of its citizens, not just the ones you want it to include. And I'm sorry that you can't find it in you to understand that. I just wanted you to know that you don't have to do it on your own.
But I know I'm wasting my words here. You won't listen to me. You've made up your minds that anybody who doesn't live in your little world, whether that means someone who's not a family member or who isn't part of your immediate community or outside your state or even someone who lives in a city as opposed to living out in the country, is somehow your enemy. And you have been working very hard over the last few years to disassociate yourself with the idea of America as a community, accentuating the differences between us while minimizing the things we have in common. To your credit, for the most part, you have succeeded, and it's quite possible that the country will continue to move in the direction you are pushing it in.
But as the saying goes, be careful of what you wish for, you may get it. Oklahoma would be a much poorer place if it was on its own rather than being part of the larger community that is America. Because you choose to distance yourself from anyone or any place outside of Oklahoma, you have made your lives harder and you have made it easier for the ones who are exploiting you to continue to do so. Perhaps the day will come when you or your grandchildren or your great-grandchildren will understand that and try to make Oklahoma a great state within a great nation, part of a great nation among other great nations in a global community of different cultures and histories but with a common humanity linking us together. But until that time, there's very little anyone can do for you. This is one case, it seems, where it really is all up to you.