Health care. A seemingly unimportant thing made important by the upcoming presidential election. Pardon me while I get political.

Let me start off by saying that strictly from a mental health perspective, I think a Democrat should be president. The last time our country trusted a Republican to take care of mental health issues, literally thousands of patients were kicked out on the streets when a good number of the psychiatric wards were shut down across the country. And since these people have such debilitating illnesses, they can’t work and therefore don’t have health insurance to pay for their meds. And that, my friends, is why you see so many crazy people walking around talking to themselves. The government no longer spews funding to take care of them.

As a fellow American living with a mental illness it worries me that, since there is no cure for mental illnesses, I’m going to have to pay for medication monthly until the day that I die. And the last time I checked psychiatric medicine is ridiculously expensive if it’s not covered by insurance. Which means I – and every other American living with a mental illness – have to guarantee that our employer offers good health insurance or we’re stuck having to pay for everything straight out of our own pocket. Considering over 45 million Americans lack health insurance, there’s a pretty good chance that a good portion of people with mental illnesses don’t have health insurance that covers their meds. It is for reasons like this that I support Barack Obama.

Under his plan, Obama wants will offer affordable health care to every U.S. citizen. Everyone will be eligible regardless of his or her medical history. This new plans ensures that our co-pays will go down and our deductibles will be lower. Now to some this may seem like a gimmick that a politician can’t live up to. But let me explain how it will work.

Currently, drug manufacturers are paying off generic drug makers to make sure they don’t offer cheaper drugs to Americans. Obama wants to prohibit these large drug companies from keeping generics out of markets and wants to increase the use of generic drugs in the new public plan, Medicare, Medicaid and Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan.

Secondly, Obama wants to allow consumers to import safe drugs from other countries so that drug costs are cheaper. In addition to lower drug costs, Obama wants to insure that you can move from job to job without jeopardizing your pre-existing health care plan. And if employers do not offer coverage or contribution to health care, they will be required to contribute a percentage of their payroll toward the costs of the national plan. I don’t know about you but that sounds like a damn good idea to me.

Now the majority of us are fortunate enough to already have health insurance either paid for by the school or paid for by our parents. But that’s only because we’re privileged enough to go to the wealthiest UC in the state. So let’s put this into perspective here. Our eligibility for our parents’ insurance is almost up. The economy is going down. The job market we’re going into probably isn’t going to be as fruitful as we would hope. Therefore, the amount of jobs offered with health insurance are probably going to decrease. You understand where I’m going with this?

So, yeah. I support Barack Obama every step of the way. Not just because he’s intelligent and knows how to fix this country, but because when the day comes that I can’t pay for my medication to keep me sane, I want to know that I voted for a president who was smart enough to help me out.