Rush meet Lola

Rush Limbaugh has been dismissed from a hospital in Hawaii saying he did not have a heart attack. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. I am glad that he seems to be on the mend. But this recent scare doesn’t seem to have changed his attitude. He proclaimed: “I got the best health treatment in the world right here in the United States.” He went on to say: “I don’t think there’s one thing wrong with the American health care system. I got no more special treatment than anybody else…” This is true Rush, if you happen to be rich and famous.

But I wish he could meet Lola. She called me the day after Christmas to wish me a happy holiday. We hadn’t talked lately. She works in a framing shop and we struck up a friendship years ago. She is a great framer—and I always asked for Lola when I had my pictures framed. Her life has always been hard. She has helped her daughter and son and Mama keep going. She has raised her grandson. She has been the glue that has held her family together. She told me on the phone that they had cut her back to half-time at work. Lola has been there for over 15 years and worked faithfully. I asked her about her benefits. “They been cut off,” she said. “I don’t have no health insurance at all. That went when they cut me back.” She went on to say, “I can’t drive anymore because I am about blind in one eye. I need cataract surgery and it would be OK—but without insurance I can’t afford it. If I go anywhere my kids have to drive me now. I hate it.” Standing on her feet everyday, she said, she has terrible back pains and needed to go to the Doctor and see what is wrong. But, like so many without insurance, she just suffers. She is in that great number of 46 million without insurance. Sure, Rush, we do have the greatest health care system in the world if you can write the checks. If you can’t you just shuffle along and suffer. Maybe this new Health Care bill will do something for Lola and her family and all the other Lola’s out there.