If I never hear the words “health care” again it will be OK with me. It’s getting to the point where I would rather curl up and die than endure this endless “debate.” What’s to debate, anyway? People who supposedly live in a civilized society should have health care as a matter of course. That’s the way it is in Jamaica. That’s the way it is in Canada. That’s the way it is in the United Kingdom, France, Russia… That’s the way it is even in remote Bhutan – and probably in the remotest tribal villages in the Amazon basin.

Only in America would anyone consider the arguments being presented against health care reform. Don’t give me that malarkey about the deficit. If our leaders can find trillions of dollars to help out the financial industry and trillions more to blow up foreign countries, then they can find whatever it takes to care for the sick.

So when I read this morning that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has decided she can’t get a “robust public option” passed, I was ready to throw up my hands and run screaming into the woods. If she can’t get a bill with a robust public option, she should call the whole thing quits and try again after the 2010 elections. The polls show a significant majority of Americans want a public option – that’s like offering Medicare to all ages – and I bet they would vote out the stumblebums who are blocking health care reform if given the chance.

Here’s the plan. Scrap this silly nonsense that has been going on for so many months. Forget about “bipartisanship.” Forget about “compromises.” Have President Obama draw up a bill the way he wants it passed and present it to the voters on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. Let the 2010 elections – and the 2012 elections, if necessary – be a referendum on health care reform.

If the voters don’t vent their frustration at the polls, then they deserve whatever they get. And the “debate” over health care reform can be put to rest forever.