No, I’m not advocating you take the fight against socialism to your nearest town hall meeting with the rest of the mob with torches and pitch forks (and assault rifles). I’m advocating you stop using the word itself; try to completely remove the word ‘socialism’ from your vocabulary. Why?

If you remember, I discussed this word shortly after President Obama’s inauguration. The word has forever lost all usefulness in intelligent conversation. Since McCarthy somehow linked the word to godless commie bastards, Americans have feared the very word to the most evil uprisings in world history. In fact, America is probably the only place in the world where ‘socialism’ has negative connotation.

This recent red scare is fueled by the flames of national health care reform. Conservative pundits are arguing against such reform, most simply, because it will raise the federal deficit. Something they didn’t seem to mind in George W. Bush’s eight year administration, but I digress.

But I don’t want to discuss the logistics of the actual debate, I just want to tell people to start behaving like adults instead of bickering children. We can have an intelligent national debate on what the future of health coverage can be in America without calling Obama ‘Hitler’ and without disrupting our elected representatives with silly nonsense. I wish more of our representatives would be so blunt as Barney Frank is with this woman.

I know going political will get me nowhere, but think about this, in 2003 liberals marched peacefully in Washington to protest an unjustified American war. In 2009, Republicans are encouraging bringing guns to town hall debates on health care reform. Democrats are encouraging town halls as part of the democratic process of such possible reform, where conservatives went straight to war without public consensus. And the difference? Democrats are trying to give health care to OUR citizens, whereas conservatives were sending OUR citizens to possibly die in battle overseas. Does that sound extreme? Sure it does, but it isn’t a fabrication of the facts.

Now we have people like Glenn Beck telling you that the “best healthcare system in the world will be destroyed” with this reform, when just shortly ago during his hospital stay, he complained that our healthcare system was a mess (Full coverage of this lying propaganda here).

My belief is that our country should be open to extensive health care reform. And I think it really should be discussed with more than a dollars and cents approach. The leading cause of personal bankruptcy in this country is medical bills, even for those with health care insurance. Both of my parents have undergone treatment for cancer in the past couple of years and their medical bills are astronomically high. Thankfully, we are lucky enough to have excellent medical coverage and our side of the bills have been manageable.

There are millions upon millions of people that are uninsured right now in this country. Our neighbors, family, and friends included therein. That number increases with continuing unemployment across the nation and as corporations cut employee coverage to manage expenses and appease stockholders. Small businesses are already struggling to stay afloat as it is in this economic climate and can’t even think of expanding health coverage for employees because the cost is simply too high.

So to me, the issue isn’t simply fiscal, it is a moral dilemma. In my head, I can’t understand why so many people are against expanding coverage for our fellow man? Our country was built on the equally balancing principles of individuality and community for all citizens. I really believe a successful nation must be a mutual undertaking to remain sustainable. And I also believe there can be efforts toward the benefit of the commonwealth without inhibiting individual success and accomplishment.

So okay, fine it is ‘socialism’, or socialized medicine anyway. Our entire society will share the cost. Is that enough for you to be okay with Americans having to choose between a mortgage payment or a needed surgery? You will still be able to choose your private doctors and choose your own insurance policies, so why the hate people? Selflessness is often preached but not practiced in today’s world. Give a little bit of your positive doing back to the world around you without asking for anything in return.

So stop spreading the lies about health care reform, and for the hope of sanity, stop screaming the word ‘socialism’. Because guess what? We are already a highly socialist country when you pay attention to your daily life.

We wake up to an alarm clock powered by a public energy monopoly, shower and shave with water provided by the municipal water authority, turn on the television to FCC monitored stations to see the weather forecast from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration from satellites designed, built, and launched by NASA, then eat your breakfast of US Department of Agriculture inspected food, and take your drugs regulated by the Food and Drug Administration.

Then you get into your National Highway Traffic Safety Administration approved vehicle and set out to work on roads built by local, state, and federal Departments of Transportation, possibly stopping to buy fuel overseen by the Environmental Protection Agency, using publicly issued legal currency from the fed, and dropping off the days mail at the US Postal Service and then your kids at public schools.

Then you return to your home that remains safe and intact due to fire marshall codes, building inspections, and your local police department, before finally logging on to the internet (developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration) to Fox News’ message forums to yell that we’re all screwed if government interferes in medicine because the government can’t do anything right.

So stop claiming that government ruins all that it touches and that socialism will take us to the Third Reich. Use reason folks.