Stop Whining About Healthcare

So anyone who's gone to university or has been on Facebook knows that administrations make decisions that even the majority dislikes. But, soon enough, the majority either changes (with a turnover of four years, don't expect your college to do anything for your unique class type after first year), or they just give up.

I've been thinking, how does this apply to a country? Rather, does it apply to a country?

America has a greater turnover of political parties than many other places--specifically because, with a two party system, things tend to be a little more extreme. Thirty parties and loose coalitions are always shifting, you don't know what's going to happen next; and then at some point the opposition rallies here and you end up with a supermajority. Control of Congress, the presidency, and maybe even the judiciary.

Democrats hated the Bush administration. Republicans hate the Obama administration.

Why?

Because both sides managed to do more than previous administrations. Bush preemptively struck all sorts of non-WMD holding countries and turned how we handle immigration on its head. Obama's pushed healthcare reform, lobbyist controls, and has all sorts of big plans ahead that I'm wary of committing to--change happens, but not that fast....

Anyway, there's a lot of (disappointingly uncontrolled) flak about the whole healthcare thing. And people will get used to it in the next five years...but expect future waves of caring/whining (depending on your side).

Why?

One, the media. They've got this thing about emphasizing whatever sells; I can't imagine why, might it have something to do with the fact that they're responsible for their own funding (and, one suspects, little else)? Anyway, propaganda machines like Fox in popular will beat the dead horse to a pulp, and there'll always be interested viewers.

Two, fringe groups. It's one thing to make a group on Facebook threatening to ditch FB forever unless News Feed goes away; it's another thing to refuse to use a zip code. Making the lifestyle choice is much more tangible and impactful. People don't need to recruit for a lifestyle, they can just put it on display or, you know, make babies and then indoctrinate said babies. (I still secretly expect Tim Burton and Helena Bonham Carter's child to rebel against them by becoming a Lutheran, though.)

Three, real issues. Internet time vs. real time are very different things. On the 'Net, waiting a whole day for a response is, like, totally forever; but the donut hole in Medicare isn't going to be touched 'till 2020, there's plans to withdraw troops late this year...as soon as people start forgetting, something new is going to happen.


But then there's the whole adaptation business. It's not that the more things change, the more they stay the same; it's that the more things change, the more our minds are malleable. Plasticity is a very real thing, not just for everyday stuff but also for big lifestyle stuff. (For really unbelievable examples of what people are willing to put up with, read 'Nickel and Dimed.')

So, even though real world issues are long term, people will squawk as uselessly as they do about anything online, and then just deal with it until the issue comes back up, in which case they'll whine a little but not as much. Over time, it'll all fade to familiarity...because who's willing to go find an alternative?