To the editor:

This is a response to Tom Mach’s letter to the editor printed in Tuesday’s Journal-World. In his letter Mr. Mach says, “We simply don’t want an expensive and unnecessary government run, i.e., public option, health care program.” Mr. Mach then goes on to list the post office and Medicare as examples of poorly run government programs.

He contends that we should provide government health care “ONLY (his caps, not mine) to the people who can’t afford health care.” Well, who does he think would benefit most from the public option? It’s exactly the people who can’t afford health care. Furthermore, what exactly is your definition of “afford,” Mr. Mach? So many people in this country are crippled by debt because the very health insurance they can “afford” to have taken out of their paychecks does not end up covering quite as well as they’ve advertised.

And this is more to the point: If everything the government oversees becomes poor, in your opinion, Mr. Mach, why then are the health insurance companies so against the existence of a public option? Could it be that the comically crooked private health industry knows that the American people are sick and tired of them and can no longer “afford” to be financially exploited for getting sick or injured?