chriscantwell:

So after the Barney Frank town hall meeting in which a woman defaced Obama’s picture to look like Hitler, and the Las Vegas town hall meeting in which a woman shouted “Heil, Hitler!” at an Israeli Jew in order to silence his argument for health care reform, I’m confused. Are the Nazis for health care reform, or are Nazis so vehemently against health care reform that they seek to exterminate everyone in support of it? Would this new health care plan be a Nazi policy, or would a slip deeper into capitated care devolve into Nazism?

Well, what was Nazi health care like? From what I’ve found through hours of extensive online research, they operated under three laws: The Health Insurance Bill of 1883, the Accident Insurance Bill Amendment of 1884, and the Old Age and Disability Bill of 1889. All put in place by Kaiser Otto von Bismarck (pre-Nazi). The Health Insurance Bill specified that an employer paid one third of medical costs, while two thirds was paid by the employee. The Accident Insurance Bill, a proto-workers’ compensation, fully covered an individual after 14 weeks, I’m assuming if medical expenses were incurred due to an accident or during work, and provided 2/3 wages as pension if that person was permanently disabled. The last bill granted full pension for all workers over 70 years of age (unlikely to be given, as the average lifespan of a Prussian was 45), and gave insurance to the permanently disabled. The bills first covered low-wage workers and government employees, then expanded to everyone. All of them were at least partially funded by the government.

The 1883 bill was one of the first compulsory health care bills of its kind in the world and is listed here as the first milestone in the history of Medicare.  The bills remained largely untouched and unchanged by the Nazis when they came to power. Of course, they were very busy ordering unspeakable atrocities.

So that brings me back to the original question: what side would the Nazis be on in this argument? From what I can tell, the three bills they resided under while waging a campaign of evil essentially amounted to variations of Social Security, Workers’ Compensation (check out automated CompBob’s joke of the week), Medicare, and Medicaid.

So if we’re talking about what a Nazi Health Care system would look like, the answer is we sort of already have one.

The difference between us and them is that we have the ability to seek more information, educate ourselves, debate publicly and respectfully, and vote democratically (or support / elect public officials who will vote on our behalf) based on our opinion / belief / best guess / favorite TV channel. There are no Nazis here, unless you call yourself one by yelling “Heil, Hitler!” at an Israeli Jew. Although, most likely, if you do that, you’re just an idiot.

So please, everyone, let’s study up, and fact check. By no means do I claim to have any of the answers. All I know is I am sad and disappointed by most of what I see and read about this issue. It makes me want to learn more. I hope it does the same for you.

And if you still need answers, you can consult the situation of the Illinois Nazis - thousands of dollars in medical expenses, citing injury from that fall and illness from industrially polluted Skokie river water.

Who’s going to pay for that?