I want to be a Republican and live forever

After watching the negotiations between the GOP and the Obama administration over the so-called "fiscal cliff," I have to admit: I want to become a Republican. And I want all my family members to become Republicans as well.

Before any reader keels over and my wife and daughter perform a deprogramming intervention, my desire to switch party affiliations is purely a business decision. It's akin to someone taking a job with an organization they're philosophically opposed to (such as a tobacco company or the ACLU) because the benefits are great.

I want to make this change because it's become abundantly clear that Republicans never get sick. If they got sick, they would receive medical bills that would leave them flabbergasted and mulling bankruptcy. And if they ever feared of getting sick, they would have to purchase healthcare insurance whose premiums also would leave them flabbergasted and mulling bankruptcy.

I've come to this conclusion because even though President Obama handily won reelection and Democrats took both House and Senate seats away from the GOP, the latter party is still acting as if it's as hale and hearty as a 19-year-old.

If you never get sick it makes perfect sense to end the fiscal cliff episode by raising the Medicare eligibility age to 67, as House Speaker John Boehner just did. Although the foundries in Boehner's home state of Ohio do not smoke as they once did due to outsourcing, he is apparently delighted to continue lighting up in their place. And since he's a Republican, he will never contract lung cancer or emphysema. So why not raise eligibility to age 77? Or maybe 97?

If you never get sick, it makes perfect sense to oppose the Affordable Care Act every waking moment of your existence, to threaten to repeal it and "replace" it even after it is here to stay. Of course, the replacement for the ACA was never discussed. I'm guessing it was one of those TV test patterns from the 1950s--probably the one with the Indian head. Not only would that be nostalgically pre-Medicare, it also makes the appropriately token nod toward diversity.

If you never get sick, you would believe anyone who did lived in an apartment and could get all their care from an emergency room--as Mitt Romney incredibly asserted during the presidential campaign--much to the shock and horror of the hospital operators who have to shoulder the burden of those patients seeking that care.

And if you never get sick, you would call providing access to healthcare a "gift" to the poor that was used to secure the election--as Mitt Romney incredibly asserted after the presidential campaign.

Just days after he was defeated, a decidedly downcast-looking Romney was seen at the Happiest Place on Earth, no doubt trying to visit every attraction on his home turf of Fantasyland.

What are you going to do next, Mitt? You've already been to Disneyland, for goodness sake.

I know what's next for me--I'm signing up for the GOP. I should do it today, since my daughter woke up this morning with sniffles and a cough. I'm told her symptoms will magically disappear the second I put my signature to paper.

And while the demographic shifts in this country are decidedly ill-favored for Republicans, there truly is nothing but upside. They've got me now, after all. And since Republicans never get sick, it is presumed they will live forever--so long as their SUVs aren't broadsided by a microbus full of hippies on medical marijuana.

Meanwhile, every Democrat will eventually get sick--and die. And now that I'm a conservative, I'm vastly better equipped to play that waiting game. - Ron (@FierceHealth)