I don't have cable. Never have. It might be a money thing. But I think even if I could afford it, I'd probably pass. I have one TV. And the TV is never ever in my bedroom. And even before the days of digital, when rabbit ears or a huge outdoor antenna could bring hissing shapes and sounds into your home, I never turned the TV on for company. So, when the date neared and I was warned in apocalyptic terms that very soon all I would see on my screen was a big fat nothing, I began to feel like Kramer in that episode of Seinfeld (yeah, I kinda miss Seinfeld) when he is driving an un-bought car with the car salesman and they decide to see how far a tank of gas will get them even when the needle is diving dramatically into the 'Empty' zone. I had my $40 plastic redemption card, and my government instructions about how to buy my converter box, and I just drove right by the changeover date and into the dead blue screen as the signal fell silent and the channels faded from my life and the car rolled to a stop on analog day.
Ahem. I have a question. Why did the government subsidise the changeover by sending out millions of dollars to people like me in the form of a credit to be given back to private electronic corporations and superstore retailers? The government didn't give us money to buy our TV's in the first place. Why now?
This is becoming eerily familiar as Obama, the man who appears to have succumbed to Washington faster than most, now seems to favor a health care option where the government will give you money if you can't afford to buy in to the half baked reform they come up with, so that you can buy from the private insurers. The government will give you money to buy from a private source what at least 70% of the country says we want government to provide and that we would be willing to pay for it. Another Seinfeld episode comes to mind, when Jerry and Elaine are trying to rationalise getting back in the sack together even though they both think their friendship will suffer if they do. Elaine says 'we have to do that' as she points to the bedroom, 'to save this' pointing to the two of them. Jerry, a gleam in his eyes 'do that to save this' and rips off his shirt as they head off to the bedroom.
Democrats seem willing to make that pact. We have to do that, they seem to be saying, to save this. But the THIS appears to be the support of large corporate money, health insurance money, drug company money, banking money, automobile money and the terrific benefits and health insurance package members of Congress enjoy.
Bank bailouts, car manufacturer bailouts, now the biggest bailout of all is on the way. The populace will be forced to buy into a health care plan, and the government will be involved, but only to subsidise those of us who currently can't afford the usury like terms of health care so that we can fatten the coffers of insurers. And Clueless Joe (d'ya like my baseball analogy, do you?) says 'we didn't realise quite how bad things were'. You don't say.
But back to the beginning. My TV sits, dark now, brooding over its' loss of influence, used only as a medium to watch movies, unable to reach out, unable to beam the All MJ News channel into my living room. I still know SP quit, I now know Steve McNair's dirty little secret, and I definitely still know how corporate America, Washington lobbyists, Goldman Sachs and Chicago politics all share the same steak house in Georgetown. What else is there to know?
I have a TV and cable but I have it programmed to skip over the broadcast news stations. I wouldn't have even known about Steve McNair except that I had to drive five hours across Iowa and switched to a sports news station to keep myself awake. It was that or country music...
Posted by: Deb in Minnesota | July 08, 2009 at 01:45 PM
You coulda listened to the country station and they would also have told you about McNair. Wait a minute Deb! Are you saying you DON'T LIKE COUNTRY MUSIC???
Posted by: JP | July 08, 2009 at 03:38 PM