Baby, it's cold outside

Today’s blizzard marks an important milestone for any Minnesota winter. Heralding the holidays, the snow obscures buildings, covers drab trees, and adds a certain festivity to the chill that has by now invaded the air. Those of us who are fortunate can enjoy the beauty of the crystalline flakes from inside our warm homes, wrapped in a blanket, sipping hot tea.

In the midst of this 35K GAMC crisis, however, I feel worries swirling around me that are even thicker than the snowflakes pouring down from the heavy grey sky. As winter deepens around the state, so does Minnesotans’ need for the basic sustaining needs of life: shelter, warmth, food, family, health.

Yet it is the very people who lack these basic needs who will end up with even less this winter. The funds for GAMC are projected to run out on March 1, 2010 if not sometime in February – in a Minnesota winter, this is still months away from the promise of warm weather. Our miserable state budget, combined with still-rising unemployment and the inadequacy of MinnesotaCare for the GAMC population, means that more people than ever may need the safety net that Minnesota has traditionally provided its citizens.

Last night at the Winona Community Meeting on GAMC, Representative Drazkowski suggested that Minnesota is the only state in fifty that provides such a generous healthcare system for our citizens. However, he utilized this fact as a criticism of Minnesota: if no one else does it, why should we?

What kind of reasoning is this, that instead of setting an example of compassionate values and equanimity of care for the rest of the country, Minnesota should follow the example of states that look the other way when human life is threatened? Are homeless people no less human, no less deserving of medical care than people with homes? Will Minnesota really become a place where we favor new stadiums over the health of the poorest of the poor?

And the snow keeps pouring down.

As winter descends upon Minnesota, we must remind ourselves that there is more to the holiday season than buying gifts for family and breaking bread with friends. Community must be more than the people who directly touch our lives, and lending a hand to one another isn’t as hard as we sometimes make it out to be. The people who receive GAMC as their medical insurance need our help. So, attend a meeting. Call your legislators. Honor the lives of those who have already passed.

And the snow piles up. Won’t you grab a shovel?

By Alison Killeen
Statewide Organizer