Health Care - Fight Night

"Iiiin the Red corner, it's the man with the private plan, the carefully coiffured caregiver to the Commonwealth, the mighty Mormon middleweight, Miiiiiiiitttttt Romneeeey!"

[lights flash, random crowd noise, incoherent thunder from the gigantic woofers]

"And in the Blue corner, weighing in at 50 billion bucks, she's the heroine of human services, the diva of discretionary spending, the hyena of the budget subpeona, Czarina Kathaleeena Sebeeeeeeeelius!"

[thunder ramps up, crowd cheers.]

"Let's get ready to rrrrrruuuuuuuummmmmble!"

[brass noises increase in volume and crowd cheers "charge," then hushes.]

"It's an epic fight, wouldn't you say, Chris? Kathy's got the Democratic health care plan, and Mitt, well, he used to legislate this stuff."

"That's right Bob, and she's armed with secret documents. Look at her dance around those voters."

"Free Market Mitt looks a little dragged down out there. I thought he'd been training."

"Well, his platform has taken a few blows, and he's been trying to change his style too much. He doesn't want competition, but he still wants to advocate competition."

"He's going for the mental battle then. A chess master!"

"That's right Bob, if people could afford a government plan, they might actually buy it, and where would that leave his trainers?"

"His plan is to keep private coverage from getting better? A bold move! No wonder they called him... Er, what did they call him in Massachusetts, Chris? Wow, look at that feint!"

[oohs from the crowd.]

"Not even close to her, but she flinched. A Trojan horse! Whoa, pony!"

"Look! Sebelius is back on him. She wants competition. Her boss wants competition. U! S! A!"

"Mitt says there's enough competition!"

"You ever had a choice in yours, Bob?"

"They're going to have to make the plan awfully useless to keep consumers from defecting to it, Chris. The industry doesn't want her throwing any haymakers either. No hitting below the money belt.

"We don't make the rules."

"My God, Mitt might strike a blow! Unbelievable!"

"He hasn't been near a voter in five years, Bob."

"Look, Chris! The employers could defect. They could drop their workers and wash their hands of the whole thing, whatever service they all end up with."

"No wonder Kathy's dodging!"

"You hear that? She said that dismantling private coverage would discourage more employers from coming into the market place."

"Brilliant diversion!"

"It looks like a bad play to me, Chris. What good does insurance do for employers? It just makes hiring people more expensive."

"You're not thinkging about insurance employers"

"Masters. Chess. Masters."

[crowd oohs]

"It sounds rough down there. What's going on?"

[oohs turn to boos]

"It's a heckler! How'd she get in here? Hey Al, think we can get a feed down there?"

[various thumps, screech of feedback]

"...bzzt...ingle pay...crkrk...alf the costs!...sqwawjkivilized world...brrrr...anada and Fr[bleep!]"

"My God, get her out of there!"

"For the folks watching at home, we are aware this is a family-friendly fight, and we run a small time delay to keep it in FCC code."

"Any response from the fighters?"

[dingdingdingding]

"It looks like that's the round. Mitt's wandering back to his corner, maybe one of those other guys will replace him."

"Well, they all have a copy of something in their hands, and they're wearing the same suit.

"It looks like Kathy might have said something to the heckler, but no one seems able to make any sense out of it."

"The crowd's still booing."

"Neither of them look very damaged, Chris, or even particularly interested. Will this fight ever end?"

"It'll go to decision, Bob."

"Right, and hopefully by then, the audience will forget about it."

"Stay healthy, everyone. Stay employed."

"Good night, America"