Tom Reed Weighs In On Cornell Health Fee

Ithaca area’s Republican congressman Tom Reed published an op-ed in the Cornell Daily Sun Thursday night denouncing Cornell’s $350 student health fee.

Reed writes: 

“By fining students who make the rational decision to remain on their parent’s health coverage or purchase it independently, students are just being set further back. Our bright minds do not need any more burdens. They need opportunity.

Students who sought hope and change are now paying the high price of politics as usual. This is not a cost they should have to face.

They are already being forced to have insurance, why must they pay even more for a catastrophe of social policy thrust on them by their university? This is double jeopardy and frankly, it is simply not fair.”

Reed goes on to challenge “high-paid professors, administrators and contributors who support the idea of universal healthcare to pick up this tab.”

Fantastic idea. Too bad they will have a million-and-one excuses.

Naturally, students erupted in disbelief and outrage at Reed’s op-ed, saying his opposition is misguided or “for the wrong reasons.” Wrong reasons? So now there are right and wrong reasons to oppose the fee?

Well, I guess it is only natural that liberal and progressive students lash out when their hypocrisy is exposed, since pointing out a person’s hypocrisy makes that person extremely uncomfortable.

The one area Reed failed to address is the fact that the fee is not just a redistribution of wealth, it’s an administrative bailout. Due to poor financial planning and decision-making, Gannet is now $4 million in debt, and students are making the interest payments on behalf of the University.

Perhaps Reed and his staff were unaware, in which case they ought to have conducted a little more research. As the Review originally reported, “$150 will go to ‘expansion of health services,’ $130 will go to paying for the increased staffing necessary to provide these services, and $70 will go to paying back a 2-year loan taken out specifically to pay for Gannett’s increased staff.”

At least Reed is demonstrating how conservatives can take the lead against corrupt policies whereby bureaucratic organizations unfairly tax the innocent in order to bail them out time and time again.

Now we’re all waiting on Martha Robertson’s two cents on the health fee.