No Deficit Spending, No Money, No Health

Neal Halfon and Peter Long decry the cutbacks in health care, especially in the children’s health insurance programs (“Society Will Pay the Price of Cutbacks,” Opinion, March 3). I deplore the cutbacks that seriously affect those most in need. But the simple fact is that the money just isn’t there. The state is facing a large deficit and is cutting funding to counties that administer the programs. The counties don’t have the money either.

So what is the solution? Obviously money. But where is it going to come from? Neither the state nor the counties can run deficits. The federal government isn’t going to be of much help either. What it boils down to is a lose-lose situation that, however deplorable, just happens to be a fact of life. I’d like to have a beach house, a convertible and an SUV, but the money just isn’t there for me either. Sometimes we just have to bite the bullet and admit there are no readily available solutions.

Burl Estes

Mission Viejo