Lose your job? Need health care? Join the military

By Kevin Horrigan

Times being what they are, I have decided to suck up to Fox News by becoming a conservative commentator.

I know some people will doubt my credibility. But frankly, based on what I've seen and heard, credibility is not the issue. Money is - conservative commentators make a lot more money than I do. Their audiences skew to conservative-leaning older white men. Financially, you can't go wrong by telling people what they want to hear.

Fortunately, thanks to Mark Johnson of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, I've found the perfect vehicle for my transformation into a conservative gasbag: Bill Caudle of Watertown, Wis.

In March, Caudle lost his job as a raw materials coordinator at a plastics company. Did he whine that banks were getting too much money? Did he demand a bailout? No, he got to work beating the bushes for a new job.

But he knew his severance money would run out in September, and the cost for his COBRA health-care benefits would triple. In January, it would triple again. Did he whine that he needed socialistic health care? No.

On the other hand, neither did he purchase a private health-insurance plan. It seems his wife, Michelle Caudle, has ovarian cancer. Talk about your exclusions for preexisting conditions.

So Bill Caudle did what many Americans do when they can't find a job and need health insurance for their families: He joined the Army. On his 39th birthday.

Caudle did what all patriotic Americans who want government-paid health insurance should do: He signed up to carry a rifle and hump a pack in Afghanistan to help extend the blessings to freedom to the Afghan people and their president, Hamid Karzai, who was elected with the same overwhelming popular mandate (absent the U.S. Supreme Court) that elected the great George W. Bush.

I am free to urge poor, unemployed Americans to join the military and risk being blown to bits in a cause they don't understand since I, like so many of my fellow gasbags (Oliver North being a conspicuous exception), did not do so myself.

We find no irony in that, since, like another magnificent American, Dick Cheney, we had other priorities. Personally, my other priorities were finishing college and avoiding Vietnam, not necessarily in that order, but I can't speak for the younger guys.

Besides, this is what the all-volunteer Army is for: Making sure that those born to certain privileges don't have to serve unless they want to. The Army is for people who (a) want to go or (b) don't have a lot of other good options. Now, thanks to Caudle, we'll have to add a (c) category: 39-year-old unemployed men whose wives are suffering from ovarian cancer.

Now the liberals (I wish my future bosses at Fox News could discern my level of disdain as I say the word liberals) will tell you that Caudle's story is not a happy one.

They'll tell you, boo-hoo-hoo, that it's a "tragedy" that a 39-year-old father of three has to leave home for four years so he can pay for cancer treatments for his gravely ill wife. They'll tell you that Michelle Caudle should have a "right" to expensive, taxpayer-paid treatments even if her husband isn't humping a pack for Uncle Sam.

Michelle's prognosis isn't good. She doesn't expect to live. She was too sick to undergo the chemotherapy treatment that was scheduled for Oct. 6, the day before Bill left for basic training. Their 14-year-old daughter is devastated, but fortunately she has an older brother and sister who can help pick up the slack.

That's the way it should be. Families should pitch in to help each other, not expect the government to do it for them. Churches and private charities will help. Besides, if worse comes to worst, the family can move to wherever Bill gets stationed and live in base housing.

This is a hopeful story: Anyone 18 to 42 who's out of work and wants government-paid health care should join the military. There's plenty of money for that.