Here are all the medications I take every day to breathe.

Longtime readers may remember my fitful efforts over the past few years to try to get back into shape, as well as some trips to the hospital.  Turns out I have exercise-induced asthma, which sounds like a thing that's made up specifically for Americans like me, but is an actual thing in that I can get out of breath just walking up our three stairs to the next level. Jogging, swimming, even yoga have set off asthma attacks in me.

So to help control it, here's everything I take each day:

That's morning and night. The antacid is to help with the heartburn all those steroids cause.  With this stuff, I can even take the boys sledding, provided I have my rescue inhaler with me to use before each walk up the hill.

Each of those things costs about $70-$300 per month; I have insurance that helps pay for it, of course, but the out-of-pocket cost -- to breathe-- is $4,000 a year.  OBAMACARE FIXED EVERYTHING. Thank god we never need to do anything about health care again for the remainder of time, except repeal that law, of course, to replace it with the old system where insurance was even more expensive.

I bring this up because after we pay the $4,000 per year -- our 'high deductible' that means that health care is FIXED FOREVER EVERYONE OKAY -- we don't have to pay anything else for health insurance for the rest of the calendar year (other than the roughly $2000 per month premium I also pay because I am essentially self-insured). So we are in the free period right now where all my medicines can be picked up even if I have no cash. But on January 1, I have to start writing (even more) checks until I burn through the deductible again.

So it costs me about $28,000 per year to breathe enough to walk across Capitol Square in Madison (slowly, and with one break).

Things Americans are okay with providing free to people no matter what:

1. Education (so long as they don't teach dangerous things like science)

2. Houses to middle class people (the mortgage interest deduction is a dollar-for-dollar deduction from income. It primarily benefits people making $200,000 or more a year because those people save about $5,000 a year on taxes, while low-income earners save only about $51 a month.)

3. Money. (Remember George W. "Worst President Ever" Bush's tax rebates where the government just sent you money?)


Things Americans don't want other Americans to have unless they can afford it:

1. Breath.