I think I finally understand objections to the idea of government bureaucrats taking control of your health care away from private insurance bureaucrats (aside from the 70 million Americans who already get some form of government health care).
Not only will they make you kill grandma* to get your blood pressure check up, but they will also make you bring in an American flag to burn and agree to appear in an al-Qaeda video** with old chums Osama and Obama.
(*-Disabled children, fetuses or puppies can be also be sacrificed if you already killed grandma to get your wisdom teeth pulled)
(**-You can also burn the Bible or use a Cross for kindling)
Note: This information may have been provided to me by the Tea Bagger leader and ObamaCare opponent who informed us that the "government of the people, by the people and for the people" appears in the US Constitution. So it must be completely accurate.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Friday, August 21, 2009
Don't belong to the Party of No
One of the things I've learned as a political junkie and wannabe-activist is that you can simply say No, No, No all the time. You have to offer people something to say Yes to.
In a previous essay, I took issue with some comments made by my friend PCS at Adirondack Musing blog. He promptly offered a response of his own. In it, he "asked [me] to give [him] the secret plans of how the Green Party is going to gain control of our government...."
I explained to him a little about American history; history which has repeatedly shown that organizations can have a huge influence on the direction of policy even without a majority of seats in a legislative body or none at all. In the early 20th century, the Progressive Party had a major influence in pushing progressive items, like anti-child labor laws and the health and safety labor regulations, that are now considered basic in any civilized society. They never controlled the presidency and I don't believe they ever controlled any governorship or state legislative chamber. Movements like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, NAACP, abolitionists and women's suffrage organizations weren't political parties at all.
All of these movements and parties succeeded not by crossing their fingers and wishing for the best for years upon years upon decades. They demanded not Hope but action. They succeeded by putting pressure on elected officials, without regard to party. Pressure that included threatening to withhold votes, support and money... and the willingness to follow through.
They weren't timid and meek. And most importantly, they weren't in hoc to any one particular party or individual (a key principle which the US labor movement singularly failed to learn, with results we can all see). Their responsibility was to their beliefs. As the political axiom goes, "There are no permanent allies, only permanent interests."
Politicians and parties worry about getting elected. Citizens must be more concerned with what's done once elected.
All citizens should be responsible to their beliefs, not their political party or any particular politician. The party and the candidates need to be servants, not masters.
I did point out to PCS that the first step in the Greens not-so-secret plan is to persuade people like him who clearly have sympathy with the Green agenda to actually vote for the party or, at the very least, consider it.
But none of this seemed to persuade my friend. He clearly thinks that the idea of the Greens or any other so-called third party making a difference is not pragmatic, is unrealistic.
So be it.
But in terms of how to the citizens can take back the government from the corporations, I've never heard from him or anyone else a realistic, viable alternative to real multipartyism.
So I will throw his challenge back at him.
If multipartyism is not his answer, then what is HIS illuminating secret plan to reinvigorate and render effective the progressive movement in the United States?
Any readers are invited to share their suggestions too.
Don't belong to the Party of No.
In a previous essay, I took issue with some comments made by my friend PCS at Adirondack Musing blog. He promptly offered a response of his own. In it, he "asked [me] to give [him] the secret plans of how the Green Party is going to gain control of our government...."
I explained to him a little about American history; history which has repeatedly shown that organizations can have a huge influence on the direction of policy even without a majority of seats in a legislative body or none at all. In the early 20th century, the Progressive Party had a major influence in pushing progressive items, like anti-child labor laws and the health and safety labor regulations, that are now considered basic in any civilized society. They never controlled the presidency and I don't believe they ever controlled any governorship or state legislative chamber. Movements like the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, NAACP, abolitionists and women's suffrage organizations weren't political parties at all.
All of these movements and parties succeeded not by crossing their fingers and wishing for the best for years upon years upon decades. They demanded not Hope but action. They succeeded by putting pressure on elected officials, without regard to party. Pressure that included threatening to withhold votes, support and money... and the willingness to follow through.
They weren't timid and meek. And most importantly, they weren't in hoc to any one particular party or individual (a key principle which the US labor movement singularly failed to learn, with results we can all see). Their responsibility was to their beliefs. As the political axiom goes, "There are no permanent allies, only permanent interests."
Politicians and parties worry about getting elected. Citizens must be more concerned with what's done once elected.
All citizens should be responsible to their beliefs, not their political party or any particular politician. The party and the candidates need to be servants, not masters.
I did point out to PCS that the first step in the Greens not-so-secret plan is to persuade people like him who clearly have sympathy with the Green agenda to actually vote for the party or, at the very least, consider it.
But none of this seemed to persuade my friend. He clearly thinks that the idea of the Greens or any other so-called third party making a difference is not pragmatic, is unrealistic.
So be it.
But in terms of how to the citizens can take back the government from the corporations, I've never heard from him or anyone else a realistic, viable alternative to real multipartyism.
So I will throw his challenge back at him.
If multipartyism is not his answer, then what is HIS illuminating secret plan to reinvigorate and render effective the progressive movement in the United States?
Any readers are invited to share their suggestions too.
Don't belong to the Party of No.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
The heroes of the world
This essay is part of an occasional feature on this blog that presents compelling stories from elsewhere in the world, particularly Africa, that are little reported in the American media. It's part of my campaign to get people to realize there is a lot going on in the world outside the US, IsraelStine and the Trumped Up Enemy of the Month. A list of all pieces in this series can be found found here..
Yesterday marked the first celebration of World Humanitarian Day. The date was chosen because it marked the sixth anniversary of the homicide bombing of the UN compound in Baghdad which killed 22 UN workers including former Human Rights Commissioner Sergio Vieria de Mello.
Humanitarian aid workers have always been in harm's way but they are suffering greater and greater numbers of casualties in recent years. This is not down to bad luck but rather to an intentional strategy by warring parties.
When I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guinea, which at the time hosted one of the largest refugee populations in the world, I came in contact with and made the acquaintance of many humanitarian aid workers. I visited a refugee camp and it gave me some idea of the absolutely miserable conditions these aid workers labor under.
I've come to consider these people the heroes of Humanity. The majority of western aid workers are people who could easily have remained at home in comfortable, air-conditioned apartments in London or New York but have chosen of their own free will to go to the worst places in the world in order to feed the starving and heal the sick.
It's also worth remembering that most big aid organizations also rely heavily on domestic staff from the countries in question. These are people who could very easily and understandably flee the conflict in their land but choose to stick around and help people who would otherwise suffer in misery or die.
I can think of no more noble calling.
Yesterday marked the first celebration of World Humanitarian Day. The date was chosen because it marked the sixth anniversary of the homicide bombing of the UN compound in Baghdad which killed 22 UN workers including former Human Rights Commissioner Sergio Vieria de Mello.
Humanitarian aid workers have always been in harm's way but they are suffering greater and greater numbers of casualties in recent years. This is not down to bad luck but rather to an intentional strategy by warring parties.
When I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guinea, which at the time hosted one of the largest refugee populations in the world, I came in contact with and made the acquaintance of many humanitarian aid workers. I visited a refugee camp and it gave me some idea of the absolutely miserable conditions these aid workers labor under.
I've come to consider these people the heroes of Humanity. The majority of western aid workers are people who could easily have remained at home in comfortable, air-conditioned apartments in London or New York but have chosen of their own free will to go to the worst places in the world in order to feed the starving and heal the sick.
It's also worth remembering that most big aid organizations also rely heavily on domestic staff from the countries in question. These are people who could very easily and understandably flee the conflict in their land but choose to stick around and help people who would otherwise suffer in misery or die.
I can think of no more noble calling.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Screw the pedestrians!
I've written before about problems with the president's 'Stimulus' package, particularly its emphasis on wasting the $800,000,000,000 on what can be done quickly rather than doing things right or doing what's needed.
I wrote: This crystallized for me some months ago when I heard New York Gov. David Paterson's remarks while inaugurating some road project in the Albany suburbs. He was asked by a reporter why the road did not include a bike path. You have to remember this is Stimulus money, the governor insisted. It's Stimulus money. It's Stimulus money.
[...]
Basically, Paterson said that because the project was being paid for with Stimulus money, the most important thing was that it be done quickly -- not that it be done well, not that it be done efficiently or in a beneficial way, but that it be done as fast as possible.
So paying for some suburban road project that will only stimulate more traffic congestion is an acceptable use of funds, but building a sidewalk so schoolchildren don't have walk along the shoulder of a major state highway was denied.
I know public policy in this country is generally hell-bent on subsidizing the least efficient, most environmentally damaging form of transportation, the private, single-person automobile. But with $800,000,000,000 floating around, you'd think they'd at least be able to throw the occasional bone to bicyclists and schoolchildren.
I wrote: This crystallized for me some months ago when I heard New York Gov. David Paterson's remarks while inaugurating some road project in the Albany suburbs. He was asked by a reporter why the road did not include a bike path. You have to remember this is Stimulus money, the governor insisted. It's Stimulus money. It's Stimulus money.
[...]
Basically, Paterson said that because the project was being paid for with Stimulus money, the most important thing was that it be done quickly -- not that it be done well, not that it be done efficiently or in a beneficial way, but that it be done as fast as possible.
So paying for some suburban road project that will only stimulate more traffic congestion is an acceptable use of funds, but building a sidewalk so schoolchildren don't have walk along the shoulder of a major state highway was denied.
I know public policy in this country is generally hell-bent on subsidizing the least efficient, most environmentally damaging form of transportation, the private, single-person automobile. But with $800,000,000,000 floating around, you'd think they'd at least be able to throw the occasional bone to bicyclists and schoolchildren.
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
"The definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." -Albert Einstein
Adirondack Musing blog is written by a self-described liberal. Its author seems like an eminently decent guy, no clown or joker he. But he seems to fall prey to the same disease that affects far too much of society. Too many Americans, including lots of otherwise decent ones, seem to define themselves more strongly by what and whom they are against rather than what and whom they are for. What this unfortunately means is that too many Americans are more interested in opposing than in doing.
His blog devoted primarily to taking shots at conservatives and this entry is no exception. He approvingly quotes a conservative economist who declared, "Until conservatives once again hold Republicans to the same standard they hold Democrats, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect."
Yet I contend that liberals are guilty of the same thing.
Until liberals once again hold Democrats to the same standard they hold Republicans, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect.
I concluded this over a decade ago, which is why I switched my party registration from Democrat to Green. The intervening ten years has only strengthened my belief that I was right to do so.
For example, President Obama is about to abandon the "public option" of his so-called health care reform bill. This isn't a compromise. It's a capitulation. It's not sacrificing something good to get something decent. He's abandoning the only semi-redeeming feature of his vastly inadequate plan.
And whose fault is that?
According to liberal Democrats, it's the fault of the Republicans, the Party of No, the "mobs" and "hooligans" trying to shut down town halls, the far right wing nuts tilting at windmills.
All worthy of scorn no doubt, but mere scapegoats.
Why isn't it the fault of the party that has 60 pct. majorities in both houses of Congress?
Why isn't it the fault of the Messiah who promised Change We Can Believe In and consistently failed/refused to deliver, on issues from Guantanamo to the War Against Civil Liberties to, now, health care.
The last time the Democrats controlled the presidency and had Congressional majorities of this size, they passed Medicare and Medicaid. This time, they can't even pass a modest 'public option.'
The Democrats promised us that things would be so much different if we simply gave them all the power. Liberals crossed their hearts and promised us they would hold Obama's feet to the fire.
I knew that was b.s. and I didn't believe it for a second. Now we're seeing it clear as day with his capitulation on the only semi-worthy part of what should be the most important bill of his presidency.
The truth is that neither the public option nor the sensible option (Medicare For All/single payer) were killed by the evil, minority Republicans. They were killed by sainted DEMOCRATS. I'd say Adirondack Musing's rage and those of other liberals is just as misdirected as the conservatives they vilify.
So here's my question: when will these self-described liberals hold Democrats accountable to the same degree they did so for BushCheney and the Republicans?
Democrats are beholden to corporate interests to more or less the same degree as Republicans. If this fiasco doesn't make that clear, nothing will.
If you really want change to believe in, start voting for smaller party and independent candidates not bought and paid for by corporate America. It may not bring change instantly, but there is no way forward without real multipartyism.
Update: Adirondack Musing offers his retort.
Adirondack Musing blog is written by a self-described liberal. Its author seems like an eminently decent guy, no clown or joker he. But he seems to fall prey to the same disease that affects far too much of society. Too many Americans, including lots of otherwise decent ones, seem to define themselves more strongly by what and whom they are against rather than what and whom they are for. What this unfortunately means is that too many Americans are more interested in opposing than in doing.
His blog devoted primarily to taking shots at conservatives and this entry is no exception. He approvingly quotes a conservative economist who declared, "Until conservatives once again hold Republicans to the same standard they hold Democrats, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect."
Yet I contend that liberals are guilty of the same thing.
Until liberals once again hold Democrats to the same standard they hold Republicans, they will have no credibility and deserve no respect.
I concluded this over a decade ago, which is why I switched my party registration from Democrat to Green. The intervening ten years has only strengthened my belief that I was right to do so.
For example, President Obama is about to abandon the "public option" of his so-called health care reform bill. This isn't a compromise. It's a capitulation. It's not sacrificing something good to get something decent. He's abandoning the only semi-redeeming feature of his vastly inadequate plan.
And whose fault is that?
According to liberal Democrats, it's the fault of the Republicans, the Party of No, the "mobs" and "hooligans" trying to shut down town halls, the far right wing nuts tilting at windmills.
All worthy of scorn no doubt, but mere scapegoats.
Why isn't it the fault of the party that has 60 pct. majorities in both houses of Congress?
Why isn't it the fault of the Messiah who promised Change We Can Believe In and consistently failed/refused to deliver, on issues from Guantanamo to the War Against Civil Liberties to, now, health care.
The last time the Democrats controlled the presidency and had Congressional majorities of this size, they passed Medicare and Medicaid. This time, they can't even pass a modest 'public option.'
The Democrats promised us that things would be so much different if we simply gave them all the power. Liberals crossed their hearts and promised us they would hold Obama's feet to the fire.
I knew that was b.s. and I didn't believe it for a second. Now we're seeing it clear as day with his capitulation on the only semi-worthy part of what should be the most important bill of his presidency.
The truth is that neither the public option nor the sensible option (Medicare For All/single payer) were killed by the evil, minority Republicans. They were killed by sainted DEMOCRATS. I'd say Adirondack Musing's rage and those of other liberals is just as misdirected as the conservatives they vilify.
So here's my question: when will these self-described liberals hold Democrats accountable to the same degree they did so for BushCheney and the Republicans?
Democrats are beholden to corporate interests to more or less the same degree as Republicans. If this fiasco doesn't make that clear, nothing will.
If you really want change to believe in, start voting for smaller party and independent candidates not bought and paid for by corporate America. It may not bring change instantly, but there is no way forward without real multipartyism.
Update: Adirondack Musing offers his retort.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
"We Have Talked The Problem To Death" (guest essay)
Editor's note: During the current health care debate, Canada's national health insurance program known as medicare has come under attack from opponents of real reform. The program provides health insurance to all Canadians and does so quite a bit less expensively per capita than our own system. Quite a bit of misinformation and outright lies have been told about the Canadian medicare system. A local businessman, who actually lived in Canada and knows the system first hand, shares his thoughts about how the Canadian system really works.
"We Have Talked The Problem To Death"
by Matt Funiciello
Regarding health insurance reform, Barack Obama was quoted today as saying, "We have talked this problem to death." It's enough to make a reasonably-informed, active citizen run screaming into the woods.
As someone without health insurance, as someone who spent more than a dozen school years living in Canada with its fantastic health care system, and as a small business owner tasked with providing HMO coverage for my fellow employees, I am very upset at this latest betrayal by the Democratic Party and its leadership. If I was a Democrat or if I had voted for Obama, I would be absolutely enraged! He is touting mandatory, overpriced heath insurance in place of meaningful, universal health care reform.
The folks who run the faux-left corporate lobby group known as the Democratic Party are now responsible for all kinds of terrible policies, both foreign and domestic and they simply can't blame Bush anymore. For Obama to now pretend that he and his party care about the 100 million Americans who lack appropriate access to health care transcends the corrupt and enters the realm of the criminal. Lack of access health care kills 22,000 people in this country every year. That’s seven and a half 9/11s! Think about that. Let that sink in for a moment.
I have written about the answer to this problem frequently. I have spoken at rallies in support of what I know to be the right answer. I have supported political candidates who support that answer and would use it to save 22,000 American lives every single year (along with barrels of money).
The "answer" I am referring to is Single-Payer Health Care (Improved Medicare For All - H.R. 676). Every American would be completely covered and it would actually cost less than we are already spending for unconscionably bad, non-universal, heath insurance. There are currently 50 million Americans totally without health insurance but there are also 40-50 million more who are considered "undercovered." Our profit-driven, criminal, health care system is currently ranked 38th in the world.
Canada has a single-payer system and they don’t have any cases of people losing their homes due to medical bills... because there are no medical bills. Progressive taxation pays all the costs.
Canadians don’t build two hospitals ten miles apart from each other in small towns and then wonder why their health care costs are so high. They build and support one hospital and figure out how to most effectively transport patients to said hospital. It' a system based entirely on patient care and efficiency, not on profit.
Canadians live THREE YEARS longer than we do! If their system is so damned terrible (as Fox TV and the NY Times tell us on an almost daily basis), how is it possible that they are healthier than we are? How could their infant mortality rate be almost half what ours is?
In Canada, no one waits 3 hours to have a broken arm looked at nor do they wait ridiculously long periods for necessary surgeries. The insurance companies and the corporate media are LYING TO US. They are LIARS! It's really just that simple. They are keeping as much as 35 cents of every single one of your health care dollars for themselves. If profit margins are a corporation's sole motivation, 35% of the 2 TRILLION dollars spent annually on health care would be a fairly compelling reason to lie, wouldn't it?
There is no profit in Canadian health care. This means that while doctors and nurses make a good living there, they are, by and large, people truly motivated to help their patients, first and foremost. Although their are many doctors who play golf in Canada, I would hazard a guess that very few Canadian doctors go into medicine specifically to support their golf habit. I actually know doctors here for whom golf is the center of their existence rather than the healing arts.
Collectively, Americans spend about $7900 per person per year on health care (private insurance, private bills, Medicare and other subsidized programs). Eliminating all that redundancy and removing profit from the equation allows Canadians to save about $2300 per person while covering EVERY single Canadian. Again, our system leaves about 100 million people in fear that if something goes wrong with a family member's health, they may go bankrupt (and they should be scared because it happens every single day and often to people who think they're more than adequately covered).
I know the popular mythology, oft-repeated, is that Slick Willy (Bill Clinton) and his wife, Hillary, tried "really, really, really hard" to get us real health care back in 1994 but we "just weren’t ready for it as a country."
We really need to stop supporting this kind of nonsensical propaganda. If Bill Clinton had really wanted to pass a national health care plan, he would have done exactly that. He had no more excuse then than Obama has now. To so clearly ignore what a majority of Americans so clearly want is, again, for lack of a better word, criminal.
Clinton had a Democratic congress and the American people behind him and instead of championing the very issue that most likely got him elected, he withdrew from it entirely and left his wife, who had never held a political office, to "fight" for this much-needed change all by her lonesome.
Mrs. Clinton got some great television exposure, playing the role perfectly of proud defender of the people and gaining national attention. Then, just as if everyone inside the beltway knew it was pre-ordained, Congress refused to pass it and it just "went away" for 15 years.
Bill Clinton then went on to do more long-term damage to our economy than, perhaps, any other president in American history. He passed NAFTA, selling our manufacturing base to China, India and Mexico for about twelve dollars and sixty three cents. We will likely never recover and, for this, the Democrats love him and speak nostalgically of the "Clinton era."
Later, when Hillary ran for Senate, she had strangely become the darling of the very same HMOs and the pharmaceutical industry that she had so bravely "fought" earlier on. They supported her campaign with historic levels of donation. Those who refuse to see that the Clintons played us all like a violin are just being willfully ignorant because that's precisely what they did.
The same is true with Barack Obama today. This totally fake progressive (who has far more in common with George Bush Jr. than with JFK) comes to the and says, "We’ve talked this problem to death."
While we may well have talked the "problem"to death, Obama and his ilk have refused to even mention once the "answer" that would resolve the problem instantly.
The insurance companies have invaded Washington in massive numbers, spreading their propaganda like evil seed and infecting our "leaders" with the kind of weak will that only sizable donations can secure. When single-payer advocates arrived at the hearings on health care reform asking why single-payer was not even being discussed, Obama’s idiot henchman, Senator Max Baucus, had them all arrested.
This is "progressive" politics? This is "socialism"? Lets call it "corporatism" instead because that’s exactly what it is. There are few better examples out there of our puppets and puppet-masters at work than our government's absolute insistence, not even discussing the health care answer a clear majority of Americans say they want to see made into policy.
For Obama to say that we’ve "talked it to death" is the worst kind of lie. It is reminiscent to me of Gee Dubya’s "You’re either with us or against us!" rhetoric. It is to suggest that we have exhausted all possibilities and that it is time for action when, in fact, one terrible plan is being sold at the expense of altruism, health and sanity.
Obama’s corporate health care plan will simply force every American to buy bad, overpriced, insurance from the very same weasels who engineered the criminal health care nightmare we currently call "a system." The parallels between this and our bailouts of all of the "financial wizards" who brought us "Depression Part II" are simply astounding.
But, I am not mad at Barack Obama. I knew he was a total sellout from the moment the Democrats gave him that national TV spotlight in 2004.
I am mad instead at all the Democrats who lied to us, promising that they would "hold Obama’s feet to the fire."
They told us that while Obama was far less than ideal as a candidate and that he was far too corporate to be real that we all needed to "Wait. Just wait. Give him a chance. You’ll see. We can do things with him in office. We can move him. We can do it! You’ll see. This is a movement for change."
Where did you all go?
"We Have Talked The Problem To Death"
by Matt Funiciello
Regarding health insurance reform, Barack Obama was quoted today as saying, "We have talked this problem to death." It's enough to make a reasonably-informed, active citizen run screaming into the woods.
As someone without health insurance, as someone who spent more than a dozen school years living in Canada with its fantastic health care system, and as a small business owner tasked with providing HMO coverage for my fellow employees, I am very upset at this latest betrayal by the Democratic Party and its leadership. If I was a Democrat or if I had voted for Obama, I would be absolutely enraged! He is touting mandatory, overpriced heath insurance in place of meaningful, universal health care reform.
The folks who run the faux-left corporate lobby group known as the Democratic Party are now responsible for all kinds of terrible policies, both foreign and domestic and they simply can't blame Bush anymore. For Obama to now pretend that he and his party care about the 100 million Americans who lack appropriate access to health care transcends the corrupt and enters the realm of the criminal. Lack of access health care kills 22,000 people in this country every year. That’s seven and a half 9/11s! Think about that. Let that sink in for a moment.
I have written about the answer to this problem frequently. I have spoken at rallies in support of what I know to be the right answer. I have supported political candidates who support that answer and would use it to save 22,000 American lives every single year (along with barrels of money).
The "answer" I am referring to is Single-Payer Health Care (Improved Medicare For All - H.R. 676). Every American would be completely covered and it would actually cost less than we are already spending for unconscionably bad, non-universal, heath insurance. There are currently 50 million Americans totally without health insurance but there are also 40-50 million more who are considered "undercovered." Our profit-driven, criminal, health care system is currently ranked 38th in the world.
Canada has a single-payer system and they don’t have any cases of people losing their homes due to medical bills... because there are no medical bills. Progressive taxation pays all the costs.
Canadians don’t build two hospitals ten miles apart from each other in small towns and then wonder why their health care costs are so high. They build and support one hospital and figure out how to most effectively transport patients to said hospital. It' a system based entirely on patient care and efficiency, not on profit.
Canadians live THREE YEARS longer than we do! If their system is so damned terrible (as Fox TV and the NY Times tell us on an almost daily basis), how is it possible that they are healthier than we are? How could their infant mortality rate be almost half what ours is?
In Canada, no one waits 3 hours to have a broken arm looked at nor do they wait ridiculously long periods for necessary surgeries. The insurance companies and the corporate media are LYING TO US. They are LIARS! It's really just that simple. They are keeping as much as 35 cents of every single one of your health care dollars for themselves. If profit margins are a corporation's sole motivation, 35% of the 2 TRILLION dollars spent annually on health care would be a fairly compelling reason to lie, wouldn't it?
There is no profit in Canadian health care. This means that while doctors and nurses make a good living there, they are, by and large, people truly motivated to help their patients, first and foremost. Although their are many doctors who play golf in Canada, I would hazard a guess that very few Canadian doctors go into medicine specifically to support their golf habit. I actually know doctors here for whom golf is the center of their existence rather than the healing arts.
Collectively, Americans spend about $7900 per person per year on health care (private insurance, private bills, Medicare and other subsidized programs). Eliminating all that redundancy and removing profit from the equation allows Canadians to save about $2300 per person while covering EVERY single Canadian. Again, our system leaves about 100 million people in fear that if something goes wrong with a family member's health, they may go bankrupt (and they should be scared because it happens every single day and often to people who think they're more than adequately covered).
I know the popular mythology, oft-repeated, is that Slick Willy (Bill Clinton) and his wife, Hillary, tried "really, really, really hard" to get us real health care back in 1994 but we "just weren’t ready for it as a country."
We really need to stop supporting this kind of nonsensical propaganda. If Bill Clinton had really wanted to pass a national health care plan, he would have done exactly that. He had no more excuse then than Obama has now. To so clearly ignore what a majority of Americans so clearly want is, again, for lack of a better word, criminal.
Clinton had a Democratic congress and the American people behind him and instead of championing the very issue that most likely got him elected, he withdrew from it entirely and left his wife, who had never held a political office, to "fight" for this much-needed change all by her lonesome.
Mrs. Clinton got some great television exposure, playing the role perfectly of proud defender of the people and gaining national attention. Then, just as if everyone inside the beltway knew it was pre-ordained, Congress refused to pass it and it just "went away" for 15 years.
Bill Clinton then went on to do more long-term damage to our economy than, perhaps, any other president in American history. He passed NAFTA, selling our manufacturing base to China, India and Mexico for about twelve dollars and sixty three cents. We will likely never recover and, for this, the Democrats love him and speak nostalgically of the "Clinton era."
Later, when Hillary ran for Senate, she had strangely become the darling of the very same HMOs and the pharmaceutical industry that she had so bravely "fought" earlier on. They supported her campaign with historic levels of donation. Those who refuse to see that the Clintons played us all like a violin are just being willfully ignorant because that's precisely what they did.
The same is true with Barack Obama today. This totally fake progressive (who has far more in common with George Bush Jr. than with JFK) comes to the and says, "We’ve talked this problem to death."
While we may well have talked the "problem"to death, Obama and his ilk have refused to even mention once the "answer" that would resolve the problem instantly.
The insurance companies have invaded Washington in massive numbers, spreading their propaganda like evil seed and infecting our "leaders" with the kind of weak will that only sizable donations can secure. When single-payer advocates arrived at the hearings on health care reform asking why single-payer was not even being discussed, Obama’s idiot henchman, Senator Max Baucus, had them all arrested.
This is "progressive" politics? This is "socialism"? Lets call it "corporatism" instead because that’s exactly what it is. There are few better examples out there of our puppets and puppet-masters at work than our government's absolute insistence, not even discussing the health care answer a clear majority of Americans say they want to see made into policy.
For Obama to say that we’ve "talked it to death" is the worst kind of lie. It is reminiscent to me of Gee Dubya’s "You’re either with us or against us!" rhetoric. It is to suggest that we have exhausted all possibilities and that it is time for action when, in fact, one terrible plan is being sold at the expense of altruism, health and sanity.
Obama’s corporate health care plan will simply force every American to buy bad, overpriced, insurance from the very same weasels who engineered the criminal health care nightmare we currently call "a system." The parallels between this and our bailouts of all of the "financial wizards" who brought us "Depression Part II" are simply astounding.
But, I am not mad at Barack Obama. I knew he was a total sellout from the moment the Democrats gave him that national TV spotlight in 2004.
I am mad instead at all the Democrats who lied to us, promising that they would "hold Obama’s feet to the fire."
They told us that while Obama was far less than ideal as a candidate and that he was far too corporate to be real that we all needed to "Wait. Just wait. Give him a chance. You’ll see. We can do things with him in office. We can move him. We can do it! You’ll see. This is a movement for change."
Where did you all go?
Saturday, August 15, 2009
America's Great Healthcare Denial of Service (guest essay)
Editor's note: During the current health care debate, some have claimed that government run health care or health insurance would result in a bureaucratic nightmare where needed treatment would be denied by bean counters. The reality of Medicare for All (single payer) is a topic for tomorrow's guest essay. But today's essay is just one of many examples of how the present system is, for too many, already a bureaucratic nightmare where needed treatment is being denied by bean counters. Here is one local man's Kafkaesque story with our private health insurance system.
America's Great Healthcare Denial of Service
by Ben L.
In October of 2008, I began trying to verify with United Health Care
(UHC) what my out-of-pocket expenses would be for covering Remicade
infusions (for treatment of Crohn's Disease). After many phone calls, I
received assurances in January of 2009 that the procedure would be coded
and billed as an office visit and I would be responsible only for the
$25 co-pay. At this time, I was coordinating services through my doctor
as well as the hospital.
In April, I received a bill from Glens Falls Hospital for $1,677.09.
This was for my first Remicade infusion for the year.
I called customer service on at least four occasions from April through
June being told on one instance that the claim dispute had become a
"project" and someone would get back to me. I was directed on June 2 to
submit this as an appeal (no word on what became of the "project").
When asked what to include in the appeal, I was told only write a letter
and send it to the address for appeals that they provided.
On Saturday, June 20 I received a letter denying my first level appeal.
I never talked to anyone from United Health Care about my appeal. I want
to reiterate that the assurances I received about coding and billing
these Remicade infusions as office visit co-pay were out of a
three-month long process of multiple phone calls and questions about my
Remicade infusion. In fact, the hospital will not even give me the
infusion without first receiving pre-approval.
The facts related to this pre-approval process were never addressed in my
initial appeal or secondary appeal. Instead, they made it sound like this
pre-approval process and statement of their coding and billing process
is based solely upon the whim of a customer service representative and
that "information given by Customer Service Representatives is not a
guarantee of payment."
What is the point of pre-approval and the months I spent trying to
coordinate between the hospital, my doctor's office and my insurer if
the insurer can decide to choose different terms than what it states
before services are provided?
While spinning my wheels with getting this issue addressed (it still
remains open as you will see later), I received another bill for a
colonoscopy that I had to have in April. This time, I was being billed
because my doctor is not "in-network" (a point that was never addressed
during the pre-approval process). I called and said that I thought that
I would be eligible for a waiver as there are no in-network
gastroenterologists in my area. UHC said that while this is true, the
waiver can only be given before the procedure. Why would it make any
difference before the procedure or after the procedure?
It is a waiver for crying out loud! They denied this twice as well.
Meanwhile, I also sent in some complaints to the New York State Insurance Deptartment. After several weeks, they notified me that my company's plan is out of
their jurisdiction because my company is self-insured and UHC is merely
administering that self-insurance. If I had complaints, the appropriate
agency would be the United States Department of Labor.
About that same time, I also was pointed by UHC to address subsequent appeals to the company's employee benefits committee. I have forwarded on more words to these people as well.
Since then, I have been hit by another $600+ bill to bring my total
in-network responsibility to $2400 while also keeping that out-of-network expense for the doctor for whom I didn't get the timely waiver at another $645. I have a thick folder at my desk from different letters I've sent to different people all around the country for these bills. I still feel like I haven't even spoken to a person who has a clue on how to address the discrepancy between what I was told I would be responsible for and what I have been billed (bilked?).
Universal health care anyone?
America's Great Healthcare Denial of Service
by Ben L.
In October of 2008, I began trying to verify with United Health Care
(UHC) what my out-of-pocket expenses would be for covering Remicade
infusions (for treatment of Crohn's Disease). After many phone calls, I
received assurances in January of 2009 that the procedure would be coded
and billed as an office visit and I would be responsible only for the
$25 co-pay. At this time, I was coordinating services through my doctor
as well as the hospital.
In April, I received a bill from Glens Falls Hospital for $1,677.09.
This was for my first Remicade infusion for the year.
I called customer service on at least four occasions from April through
June being told on one instance that the claim dispute had become a
"project" and someone would get back to me. I was directed on June 2 to
submit this as an appeal (no word on what became of the "project").
When asked what to include in the appeal, I was told only write a letter
and send it to the address for appeals that they provided.
On Saturday, June 20 I received a letter denying my first level appeal.
I never talked to anyone from United Health Care about my appeal. I want
to reiterate that the assurances I received about coding and billing
these Remicade infusions as office visit co-pay were out of a
three-month long process of multiple phone calls and questions about my
Remicade infusion. In fact, the hospital will not even give me the
infusion without first receiving pre-approval.
The facts related to this pre-approval process were never addressed in my
initial appeal or secondary appeal. Instead, they made it sound like this
pre-approval process and statement of their coding and billing process
is based solely upon the whim of a customer service representative and
that "information given by Customer Service Representatives is not a
guarantee of payment."
What is the point of pre-approval and the months I spent trying to
coordinate between the hospital, my doctor's office and my insurer if
the insurer can decide to choose different terms than what it states
before services are provided?
While spinning my wheels with getting this issue addressed (it still
remains open as you will see later), I received another bill for a
colonoscopy that I had to have in April. This time, I was being billed
because my doctor is not "in-network" (a point that was never addressed
during the pre-approval process). I called and said that I thought that
I would be eligible for a waiver as there are no in-network
gastroenterologists in my area. UHC said that while this is true, the
waiver can only be given before the procedure. Why would it make any
difference before the procedure or after the procedure?
It is a waiver for crying out loud! They denied this twice as well.
Meanwhile, I also sent in some complaints to the New York State Insurance Deptartment. After several weeks, they notified me that my company's plan is out of
their jurisdiction because my company is self-insured and UHC is merely
administering that self-insurance. If I had complaints, the appropriate
agency would be the United States Department of Labor.
About that same time, I also was pointed by UHC to address subsequent appeals to the company's employee benefits committee. I have forwarded on more words to these people as well.
Since then, I have been hit by another $600+ bill to bring my total
in-network responsibility to $2400 while also keeping that out-of-network expense for the doctor for whom I didn't get the timely waiver at another $645. I have a thick folder at my desk from different letters I've sent to different people all around the country for these bills. I still feel like I haven't even spoken to a person who has a clue on how to address the discrepancy between what I was told I would be responsible for and what I have been billed (bilked?).
Universal health care anyone?
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