Even with its imperfections, the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) is a lifeline for people like me and my family, and it's worth giving credit to the Democrats and the President for getting it done. Every time I hear one of the Republicans in the primary clown car talk about repealing it, my resolve to re-elect the President and save Obamacare and Dodd-Frank strengthens.

It's all about the pre-existing conditions. It always has been and it always will be. Like the young mother who was told most people with pre-existing conditions brought them on themselves, I also have a son with pre-existing conditions, and those conditions would, under the system we have today, make it impossible for him to pursue his chosen career or possibly even to function.

The Past

In the summer of 2009, our college-age son suddenly became ill. At first we thought it was just a case of the flu, but it went on for weeks, and came with rapid weight loss. He's not really a towering giant to begin with and always had difficulty keeping weight on, but he lost nearly 40 pounds in six weeks. I had been laid off from my job in December, 2008 and our COBRA payments were $1700 per month for our family. My husband was self-employed and we were unable to get any insurance from any insurer anywhere. It was then that our COBRA administrator notified us that our coverage was canceled, claiming they'd received my payment one day late.

There we were with no insurance, a very sick son, and little in the way of resources to help him.

After draining a chunk of my 401k for doctor bills, he was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. It's a horrible disease with genetic causes. There is no lifestyle change he made that "brought it on himself." It's autoimmune and genetic. Worse yet, the medications for ulcerative colitis caused him to become diabetic. While it's likely that he may have already had unknown glucose tolerance issues, the medications exacerbated it to the point where he was forced to inject insulin to keep his glucose levels in check. He was nineteen years old, a musician majoring in jazz studies with hopes to move on to a career in music education and performance once he finished school, wrestling with life-threatening chronic conditions.

Musicians are self-employed as a general rule. His medications were $600 per month, plus test strips and syringes for the insulin. And no hope for insurance.

That was 2009. Since January of 2010, the ulcerative colitis has been in remission, he's regained his lost weight and managed to wean off the colitis medications and with it, the insulin injections. Also, my spouse had gotten a job with health insurance that would at least cover catastrophic illness with an attached health savings account.

Because of the Affordable Care Act, we were able to keep our son on our policy and are grateful that we'll be able to through 2014, when he will be able to get his own insurance. But it doesn't end there.

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Fox News has been in full-blown Mitt Romney rehabilitation mode Tuesday. Beginning with Gretchen Carlson through every hour up to this segment on Megyn Kelly's show, they've worked very hard to convince viewers that Mitt Romney's gaffe, "I like to fire people," was taken out of context and unfairly depicts what he said.

We could simply say that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. It's fair game, right? After all, he said those words in that order. Yes, he did, and even in context, he could have said "I like to choose service providers," or something similar. Instead he chose to employ CEO-speak; that is, authoritarian, emperious words that no one likes to think about, much less experience. Being fired sucks. As one who spent a long time in a career as a service provider, I'll vouch for that. Whether it's a client leaving or a boss firing, it's a rotten thing. Still, I believe it's fair to put his remarks in context, and even inside that context, he's wrong. Very wrong, very cynical, and it's actually worse when placed into the context he intended it.

Before I continue, let's stipulate that the very best way to handle health care costs would be single payer. I agree with all of you who say that. But this post is not about that. It is about what we have or are about to have and what Mitt Romney thinks we should have. And firing people.

As the clip at the top shows, Romney was talking about health care, and presumably about how he would change Obamacare after he repealed it, as he has promised to do. Here's the full quote:

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