Problem Solved.

I've done it. I have figured it out. After so much acrimony surrounding health care town hall meetings, I have found a way to put an end to it all.

The problem with the Obama administration and various members of congress is that they fail to understand the tenor of the debate in which they are embroiled. They are possessed by a self-destructive fetish for pragmatism. Rather than focusing on their ideals and pursuing them to the exclusion of all other considerations, they persist in letting reality cloud their judgment and misguide them.

Opponents of the recently-proposed health care plan are free from such encumbrances. They embody the true American ideal of reaching for one's dreams and not settling for compromise. Their view is crystalline; by force of courage, they sweep aside all facts which might get in the way of their goals.

Nonetheless, I started feeling that I should help out the democrats. Even though their opponents obviously have a monopoly on righteousness, it seemed necessary to maintain a healthy dialogue. So I came up with a line of argument liberals can use which exemplifies the incisive analysis used by opponents of the health care plan in town hall meetings across the country. All it took was the ability to put oneself in the shoes of the average "Joe Six-Pack" conservatives love so much. If there is anything this debate has taught us, it is that true wisdom lies in the hands of the people. This is clearly difficult for Obama to understand because he is such a renowned elitist (He drinks Miller Light. Come on. Take off the monocle and top hat, Barack. What... are you too good for Milwaukee's Best? The word "best" is right there in the name.)

So, here's my counter-argument, custom built to match the level of hard logic and reasoning so adroitly displayed by the sagacious citizens who have patriotically voiced their dissent at recent town halls:

Firstly, any good proponent of the free market knows that universal health care is a basic tenet of socialism. We will take this to be a basic axiom. Who hasn't heard the anecdotes about Soviet Russia and how all the comrades who lived in it were forced to subscribe to diabolically comprehensive health coverage?

From that starting point, it's a fairly obvious argument that the money for such health care was coming from oppressive taxes levied on the average citizen of Russia. That money had to come from somewhere, right?

Luckily, the Soviets were led by a man who acted as the voice of reason. Realizing that this rampant suckling from the teat of big government had to come to an end, Josef Stalin decided to act. He had to starve the beast, and there is no better way to do this than to cut taxes. All that money would just fuel the engine of big government and promote socialized health care.

So, with the utmost expedience, he eliminated the source of so many narcotizing tax dollars. Well...to be specific...he eliminated many tens-of-million sources of tax dollars. Not only that, but he did it permanently. He understood: why eliminate tax policies that can just be re-instated at a later time? You've got to go to the source of the problem. We all know what the real cause of big government is...big populations.

This focus on tax reduction makes Stalin the obvious progenitor of Reaganomics. In fact, it could be argued that no one practiced trickle-down economics as ingeniously as Stalin. He swiped the food from the land and the peasants got whatever grains trickled into their mouths. The ideological link between Uncle Joe and The Gipper is inescapable.

Now, any devotee of a free-market has to agree with Reagan; limiting government controls and regulations on business was his raison d'etre. He lived and breathed to starve the beast that is big government. Conservatives - and, presumably, many of the oppenents of the health care plan - also fight the patriot's battle against socialism and big government.

If such heroes agree with Reagan, it only follows - from the philosophical connection indicated above - that they also agree with Stalin. Stalin was a socialist, and it's only logical to assume that the opponents of health care are, therefore, also socialists. Since they are socialists, they have to stop opposing universal health care and start supporting it because it is one of the central ideals of socialism.

So...there it is...wrapped up with a nice big bow on top - my gift to the Obama administration: a convincing argument couched in the kind of logic town hall ranters can understand. Now those whiney fuckers can shut up and Obama can grant me an honorary speech-writing position. I'll be waiting by the phone.