Is the debate really about health or lifestyle?

It's a known fact that in the United States people are more easily controlled through their pocketbooks than through brute force. And what is more important and less cost-controllable than health care? Even without the "public option," it appears that the government will be setting billing guidelines, so it will have a direct impact on your pocketbook. With the public option or even the single-payer process, it would have complete control over your costs, and therefore much of your lifestyle.

Has anyone noticed the heightened concern over "obesity" becoming a "national health-care issue"? If you're overweight, you may have to pay more for your health care. But then there is the issue of how much red meat you eat, or if you smoke, or drink whole milk instead of soy milk, or if you own a gun, or the horsepower in your car, or even how many cars you own. Each of these (and an unlimited number of other factors) can certainly become a "health-care issue," and therefore a means to control your actions.

For many years, taxes have been used to control actions, like taxing cigarettes -- or, more recently, we see proposals to tax juices and sodas. Taxes are obvious to many people, but changing your health-care rates if you smoke is much more subtle.

Everyone seems to wonder why the administration isn't just working on the millions who don't have health care and is focusing on the entire population.

WAYNE CLIFTON
Mount Washington

Fix-it logic

Here is a simple analogy to ponder: If you lived on a street where 80 percent of the houses were affordable, were well-kept and satisfied the owners' family needs, and the other 20 percent were poorly kept, a shambles, unaffordable or had little value and needed a lot of attention, would there be a need to tear down and rebuild the entire neighborhood, just for the sake of uniformity, to satisfy the 20 percent of the owners who paid little or no attention to the ongoing needs or their problem?

I think not and would hope not.

So then why apply some similar misguided logic to what is labeled as a health-care problem? If a problem exists, fix that problem in a manner suitable to the circumstances that prevail, and leave intact that which requires no repair.

All Congress members and state legislators should hear this from citizens, and heed it.

E. ROBERT HASIS
Pleasant Hills

Irrational system

Health-care insurer Highmark will raise SecurityBlue premiums 26 percent in 2010, demonstrating clearly that President Barack Obama's prediction that premiums will continue to rise unless comprehensive reform is instituted is correct.

It is clear to me that this large increase demonstrates that our insurance model -- people pay premiums and insurance companies pay bills -- is incapable of reducing costs or improving medical outcomes. The current system means spiraling premiums for years to come.

I think a public option makes sense since it will provide robust competition for the Highmarks of the world and focus their operations on where it must be: on containing costs and improving outcomes.

At the moment there is absolutely no motivation for insurers to do either.

Another positive step would be removing the anti-trust exemption that health insurers enjoy. How can you have a free market when major providers don't have to live up to anti-trust laws? And is there any rationale for limiting insurance companies' operations to within state borders?

If a true free-market system can improve our health-care system, then let's be sure that any new plan promotes aggressive competition. I don't see that happening without a strong new player, be it a public one or a nonprofit cooperative.

I hope Pennsylvania's senators and our region's congressmen recognize that Highmark's actions provide a clear picture into the future if we allow the status quo to continue: big premium increases.

DAN GIOVANNITTI
Mt. Lebanon

Get on with it

I read with interest Gabrielle Banks' Oct. 20 article "Death Penalty No Deterrent, Police Chiefs Say."

Of course it's no deterrent -- it's rarely used. Death row inmates can sometimes languish for 20 years or more awaiting their fate -- I cite the Michael Travaglia and John Lesko cases as prime examples. Actually, getting the death sentence in Pennsylvania is practically akin to a life sentence without parole. They are more likely to die of natural causes than from lethal injection.

I believe journalist H.L. Mencken said it best:

"The real objection to capital punishment doesn't lie against the actual extermination of the condemned but against our brutal American habit of putting it off for so long. After all, every one of us must die soon or late, and a murderer, it must be assumed, is one who makes that sad fact the cornerstone of his metaphysic. But it is one thing to die, and quite another thing to lie for long months and even years under the shadow of death. No sane man would choose such a finish. All of us, despite the Prayer Book, long for a swift and unexpected end. Unhappily, a murderer, under the irrational American system, is tortured for what, to him, must seem a whole series of eternities. For months on end he sits in prison while his lawyers carry on their idiotic buffoonery with writs, injunctions, mandamuses, and appeals. In order to get his money (or that of his friends) they have to feed him with hope. Now and then, by the imbecility of a judge or some trick of juridic science, they actually justify it. But let us say that, his money all gone, they finally throw up their hands. Their client is now ready for the rope or the chair. But he must still wait for months before it fetches him."

I rest my case.

TOM LAPSLEY
Port Vue

Yes, just do it

I read with amusement that the police chiefs consider the death penalty no deterrent to violent crime ("Death Penalty No Deterrent, Police Chiefs Say," Oct. 20). How would they know? It's been a decade since Pennsylvania executed Gary Heidnik.

Currently there are 228 men and women on death row in Pennsylvania. The taxpayers make sure they get three meals a day and free health care. I would bet anything that if you would start executing 15 to 20 a month, you would see a dramatic drop in violent crime. But once again, thanks to the liberal morons and the American Civil Liberties Union, that will never happen.

STEVE HORVATH
Castle Shannon

Credibility at stake

Mark these words: The Afghanistan troop deployment decision will be announced this week after Tuesday's vital elections in Virginia and New Jersey.

If this does occur, this president will have lost all credibility to this citizen. While our forces are suffering heavy losses and the commander chosen gave his recommendation more than two months ago, this president will not make this most difficult decision before tomorrow because of how it will affect these two races.

DAVE BORLAND
Mt. Lebanon

A fun factor

As a lifelong resident of Lawrenceville, I would like to thank the Pittsburgh police department for patrolling our neighborhood streets during the trick-or-treat hours Saturday. Police vehicles with blue and red lights flashing drifted up and down our streets practically bringing traffic to a crawl to help protect the large groups of trick-or-treaters as they joyously ran up and down and across the neighborhood.

When someone does a good job, they should be told about it. Good job to an outstanding police force.

MIKE CEOFFE
Lawrenceville

Pittsburgh has shown the world its greatness in times of tragedy

I believe the recent G-20 summit in Pittsburgh was a better way to market our city to more people around the world than any other venue. Our fantastic transition from industrial output to medical and high technology was a real draw for decision making by the Obama administration.

There are other aspects of our great community which I feel need to be addressed. Besides our celebrations of the Super Bowl and Stanley Cup, which put our city in the limelight, our city unified in times of adversity this year. Our city really came together after the Stanton Heights tragedy and the shootings at the Collier fitness center. The sensitive and caring way many different groups came together showed a great side of Pittsburgh.

This could have had some influence on how the nation and the world viewed Pittsburgh.

DAVID ZUMOFF
Squirrel Hill

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