NBA and ObamaCare

    I am an avid sports fan.  I love watching football (New England Patriots... of course!) , baseball (Red Sox and Cardinals), hockey (Bruins and Blues) and occasionally tennis.  I grew up playing these sports and enjoy watching teams compete at all levels (high school, college, professional).  To many sports are often metaphoric.  They are "the world in micro".   The weak verses the strong.  The little against the big.  The good vs the bad.   The fast against the not-so-fast.   The rich against the not-so-rich.  The under-dog against the big-dog.

   For a few years I even enjoyed watching the NBA.  Living in Sacramento, there wasn't much to celebrate for a long time.   Then in 2000, things changed and the Kings began to have winning seasons and I like many took notice and began to watch.  It was exciting and my kids and I would watch every game we could.   My son and his friends got tickets that allowed them to sit 3 rows up from the teams bench.  My daughter and I even got to see the a playoff game with Utah.   But then 2002 Game 6 with the LA Lakers happened.   We watched in horror as the Lakers were sent to the free throw line 40 times compared to the Kings 25 times.  We gasped as Mike Bibby of the Kings was smashed in the face by Kobi Bryant with a forearm right in front of a referee standing 10 ft away and no foul was called even though Bibby was lying on the floor with blood coming out of his nose.  We cried out when we would see Shaquille stand in the 3 second zone for 5,6 even 7 seconds with no lane violation called.   Webber and Divak were called for fouls that one could only say were because they got in the way of the Lakers movement to the basket. 

    In the end, the Kings lost to the Lakers 106-102 and for days afterward, sports casters and sports writers (many not connected to the Kings) excoriated the NBA for having a playoff game so poorly officiated one can only assume that it was rigged from the top.  It angered not only Kings fans, but also fans across the nation who demanded an investigation be done to see what could be done to prevent such a travesty from occurring again. 

    Clearly the NBA Commissioner, David Stern, wanted to see a Game 7 between the two teams because it would be one of the most watched games ever for the NBA.  But his vision was too short sighted.  While, yes, he did get his Game 7 match-up (the Lakers won and went on to easily win the Championship), he lost the belief of NBA fans in the game.   For a long time many suspected that the league was not officiated fairly, (even during the regular season) and now they had visible hard proof that solidified their views.  

    I was one of those people.

    I never watched another NBA game after that season.  I could not watch "star players" go on being treated differently than "non-start players".   I told my son once, "they should put a big gold star on the front and back of their jersey so the refs, fans and other players know that certain rules don't apply to them".  And I wasn't alone either.   The NBA after that season began to see a slow and steady decline in viewers and fans.  In 2002, the Championship game had a Nielson Rating of 10.2 but the 2003 Championship only garnered a lowly 6.5 rating (second lowest in history).   

    We as Americans love sports.  But what we demand even more than good players is good referees and fairness during the play.  Without fairness and equal application of the rules, the sport turns into nothing more than another version of the WWE were the winner is already known and everything we see is just theater.

    So how does this apply to ObamaCare (AHA) you ask.  Well just like the NBA is playing favorites to some players and giving them different rules to follow, so also our government is picking winners and losers in how it applies to AHA.  No sooner than the law was signed into affect, the President began giving "waivers" to companies who were favorable to him and helped him get elected. Later, when it was found out that government workers were not shielded from the law and would be paying through the nose for their healthcare, the President swooped in to give them an exception. When Union workers saw that they were going to pay more the cried out for an exception too and given their support for the President to win his last election they will most likely get one.  GE also saw they were going to have to pay more because of the medical-device-tax and so they have lobbied Congress hard to make an exception for them as well to protect them from this tax.

    Is this fair?  Is this right?

    Of course not! This defies what we believe in.   We believe in equal-protection-under-the-law.   We believe laws are to be administered equally and justly (like rules on a basketball court) and we are angered when the rich or the politically connected get off with no jail and little or no fines.  Obama ran on being for the little-guy but his last 5 years have shown just the opposite.  

    I don't believe the American people will take this much longer.  I believe (and hope) they will grow tired of watching this game and demand things be changed.  But maybe I am just an optimist.   After all, it's been over 10 years since the 2002 NBA playoffs and people are still wasting their time watching basketball even though "stars" will charge without being called, stand in the lane for what seems like an eternity and move around the court without even trying to dribble the ball.