Saturday, January 17, 2009

Jindal: My faith informs my health care policy

From Lousiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's interview with Cal Thomas:

....viewing the sanctity of life, I believe the reason people are valuable is that they are created in the image of God and there's a dignity there. And that leads me to believe people should have access to health care, not because of policy reasons, but because they're valuable because we are created by God in His image.

The Left frequently wraps its health care proposals in moralistic terms; the Right in fiscal terms. The question for the Left: isn't it terrible that there are people without health care?

The question for the Right: how can we make sure health care coverage remains the best in the world, while retaining our fiscal sanity?

Bobby Jindal takes a slightly different tact, without necessarily conceding a a political view. The driving impetus for him is that all life is precious. But he stops there. He doesn't concede that such a principle will guide him to embrace universal coverage as commonly conceptualized by liberals. He merely mentions "access to health care". Not access to equally sophisticated and frequent health care, but access to some form.

It's a sophisticated political line, because it reveals compassion without necessarily sacrificing economic reality.

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