Sicko

Spent the afternoon watching Michael Moore's, Sicko with my father, my sister, Laura and some friends. It made me laugh, come to the verge of tears and then left me feeling empty and distantly hopeful.

I've had no illusions about how fucked up HMO's are and always just assume that I'll never get any coverage for anything. I have never, ever been totally honest with any doctor I have ever had for fear of having my honesty come back to haunt me. No doctor of mine has or will ever know that I used to smoke cigarettes, how much I drink, past drug use etc. I feel that I am always trying to game a system that would like nothing more than to game me.

For the last two and a half years, health insurance has been a mounting issue in my life, my work and my family. I kept my dangerous job as a part time bike messenger in New York primarily because of the health insurance it offered. My grandfather had a religious, but not a civil ceremony in order for them to preserve their health care coverage. Laura and I had a civil ceremony long before our wedding in case either one of us lost our job and insurance before our wedding. Laura and I have had several worried discussions about what in the hell we would do if she got pregnant during a lapse in coverage or what we would do should she lost her job and we couldn't afford the Cobra payments. We've also had pretty hardcore questions about the nature of our coverage and what we could possibly do if we got into a jam. "Sicko" seemed to propose a solution to a predicament like that: get the fuck out of the country!

The part of the movie that took place in France actually got me to involuntarily start having expatriation daydreams.

"How bad could it be? I could pick the language back up again in a matter of months, the kid would grow up bilingual, healthy and live three years longer than had we stayed in the U.S. Ahhh, but Laura would never do that." After the movie of course, she was quick to ask me what it would take to move to Paris. We talked about the prospect of flying to France in her third trimester, having the kid in a free Parisian hospital and getting French citizenship through our healthy, French-born child.

That fantasy is only about 25% fucked up! I spent close to a year of my life working on the Dean campaign with the idea that my service could possibly ensure health insurance for my unborn children, what Josh like so call "Investment Activism". That, of course didn't pan out like I had hoped. If the health care mess isn't cleared up in the next election, the economy tanks, and the war keeps cluster-fucking along, I don't really know what in the hell Americans will think they're getting back from their tax dollar investment.