As the media coverage of the Democratic presidential race continues to focus on lapel pins and pastors, America is ailing. As I travel around the country, I find people are angry and motivated. Like Dr. Rocky White, a physician from a conservative, evangelical background who practices in rural Alamosa, Colo. A tall, gray-haired Westerner in black jeans, a crisp white shirt and a bolo tie, Dr. White is a leading advocate for single-payer health care. He wasn’t always.
He told me in a recent interview: “Here I am, a Republican, thinking about nationalizing health care. It just went against the grain of everything that I stood for. But you have to remember: I didn’t come to those conclusions with lofty ideals of social justice.”
In the early 1990s, his medical group started falling apart. White, a keen student of economics and the business of medicine, determined that it wasn’t just his practice but the system that was broken.
“You’re seeing an ever-increasing number of people starting to support a national health program. In fact, 59 percent of practicing physicians today believe that we need to have a national health program. I mean, that’s unheard of, even 10 years ago. It’s amazing to see a new generation of physicians coming up who are disgusted with our current health-care system. You know, we’re trained to be advocates of patients, we’re trained to save lives, we’re trained to practice medicine. And instead, what we’re doing is we’re practicing Wall Street economics.”
Single-payer is not to be confused with universal coverage, which Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both support. In fact, in a recent debate, when Clinton raised the issue of single-payer, the audience interrupted with applause. She immediately countered, “I know a lot of people favor [it], but for many reasons [it] is difficult to achieve.”
Why? One of the most powerful industries in the country opposes it-the insurance industry. Under universal coverage, insurance profits are preserved. Under single-payer, they are not. Dr. Rocky White, who now sits on the board of the nonprofit Health Care for All Colorado, has switched his political affiliation. He also has updated and reissued Dr. Robert LeBow’s book on single-payer called “Health Care Meltdown: Confronting the Myths and Fixing Our Failing System.”
He described possible solutions: “There are a lot of different types of single-payer systems-you could have purely socialized medicine. That’s kind of like what England has. The government owns the hospitals, the government owns the clinics, the government finances all the health care, and all the doctors work for the government. That is truly socialized medicine, as opposed to the Canadian system, where the financing comes through their Medicare program, but all the doctors are in private practice.”
The economics are complex, but this plain-spoken country doctor explains it clearly:
“You know, this industry is a $2-trillion industry, and the profits in the for-profit insurance industry are so huge and it’s so deeply entrenched into Wall Street … but until we move to a single-payer system and get rid of the profit motive in financing of health care, we will not be able to fix the problems that we have.”
What would it take? Dr. White has spent his life dealing with the high winds on the high plains, from Nebraska to Colorado, and describes the challenge the country faces in familiar terms:
“I think that our current presidential candidates understand that ideally single-payer would be the best, but they don’t have the political will to move that forward. Their job is to feel which way the wind is blowing. Our job is to turn that wind.”
Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on 650 stations in North America.
© 2008 Amy Goodman
I wonder how many insurance company employees don’t have health insurance. If the industry was closed down from a Single Payer program, they would have coverage, and not have to feel sub-human for keeping coverage from everyone, even though it would mean losing their jobs.
Past time ‘WE’ stand up and say we are tired of being taken by the insurance companies. When we get done killing off the Health Insurance companies, how about we start looking at single payer auto insurance, home insurance and the like. I feel the Insurance Companies are sucking the juice out of our lives. When I tally up what I pay every year for my business and my family, I am unpleasantly suprised. Perhaps you would be too? Just like Bush and the Republicans, they control us with fear when we could be doing better for ourselves without them.
Dennis Kucinich is the only Democratic Party presidential contender who consistently supports single-payer. The Democratic Party and AARP both pretended he didn’t exist when they sponsored their respective debates on health care.
McCain’s health care policy is so limp that McCain himself would not qualify for it.
Clinton loves to tout how “universal” her plan is. Unfortunately she defines universal as a legal mandate for everybody to pay lots of money for insurance that will at best be marginal.
Having supported single payer prior to acquiring a taste for corporate money, Obama is drifting to the right.
Although I have dropped out of AARP to protest their support of the 2004 Medicare drug plan and anti- single payer stance, I am not sure who I will vote for for president.
In response to wilhelm: My wife worked for a couple of insurance companies over the years and the employee medical insurance was higher priced with less coverage than other private companies of the same size furnished.
It’s possible to have nonprofit insurance without single payer. Japan, Germany, Switzerland, and others have such a system. The problem I see with single payer is that too much responsibility is concentrated in the national political process, and we know that process is often not at all progressive and almost always slow.
Remove the profit motive by mandating that all health insurance companies become nonprofit. Cut costs with government-set prices for particular medical procedures. Standardize a basic medical package, so that insurance companies compete only on premiums and service. Standardize billing and other paperwork. Cover those who can’t pay with a community insurance group.
Why does it take Republicans like Dr White so long to figure out that everything their party stands for is wrong?
Health and other insurance systems such as they exist in European countries will be difficult to implement in the U.S. because of cultural differences. Namely, individualism is paramount in the U.S.; the downside being lack of shame for acts of self-aggrandizement, whereas in the avove-mentioned countries individualism is subordinate to community welfare and efficiency.
For a basic understanding of why ‘liberals’ and ‘conservatives’ think the way they do, take a look at some of George Lakoff’s books.
Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney support single payer health care system. I agree: it needs to be expanded to all insurances. We need to work hard at making sure so-called “third” party candidates are included in the fall debates, so these issues might get raised and joe q. public will be aware of these ideas. We cannot rely on mainstream media.
wcdevins:
you do realize that the dems are, and have been, wrong on this issue, don’t you? when will they figure it out?
Watch SiCKO and listen to what people say. People in other countries say we all have to help each other; here they say why should I pay for someone else to have health care? Americans have been effectively conditioned away from seeing the advantages of contributing to the common good. And look at the mess we’re in. And guess who’s got all our money!
kathyodat
Cynthia McKinney on health care insurance:
“All too often patients cannot receive the treatment they require because the treatment is blocked by the profit motive of the insurance companies. You have to take the insurance companies out of the health-care equation.
We in the US spend far more money than any other country and we get less. Close to 50 million people are uninsured. Countries that have what others pejoratively call “socialized medicine” are better performing. We need a universal, single-payer health-care system in this country.”
I join Rich Griffin in urging that McKinney, as the likely Green Party presidential nominee, MUST be in this year’s presidential debate to get into the dialogue a view which is that of a majority of the U.S. population.
Sorry Pegrin, many US health insurance companies, hospitals, etc. have been non-profit corporations for years. Although it is a different corporate structure that may result in the CEO driving a Mercedes rather than a Rolls Royce, it does not help the people buying the insurance.
Two trillion can buy a lot of politicians.
We already have a single payer system. And it works very well, indeed. It is called Medicare. Unfortunately it only covers people over 65 like myself. It should be extended to cover all Americans. I get to see a doctor of my choice and Medicare doesn’t question his judgment as to what procedures or prescriptions he chooses for me.
andersdl, do you want the Republicans to run a single-payer health care system? Sooner or later they will, if one exists. They will sabotage it and then say, look, see, we told you that universal health care doesn’t work. In our political system, a Japanese or German model would be less prone to political sabotage.
Indeed, and you’ll never ever hear the Obama Christ speak abt such a solution anymore than Clinton would. Neither Democrat has any sort of healthcare plan that will actually lead to full fair health coverage for all. Neither of them.
common_cracker - Sure I do. I hold no illusions about the Democrats, but at least they have not been totally on the wrong side of humanity since Reagan. Once or twice they sided with the interests of American citizens rather than those of corporate Amerika, didn’t they? So hard to remember…
As a point of information, there is an inaccuracy in the lines “That’s kind of like what England has. The government owns the hospitals, the government owns the clinics, the government finances all the health care, and all the doctors work for the government.”
Every physician in the UK is allowed to see patients privately, and there is private health insurance available for those who desire it. What matters is that a sick person gets medical attention. If some want whistles and bells, by all means let them buy such.
The American public will have to raise holy hell to get any kind of universal health insuramce coverage. Despite the fact that a uniform insurance system would save billions of dollars in administrative costs, not to mention eliminating the huge salaries/bonuses paid to insurance company executives, it was reported today that democrats in congress want nothing to do with developing a national insurance plan.
I would respectfully suggest that every single one of us confront those running for congress this fall regardless of their party affiliation. The democrats should not get an automatic free pass on this issue.
Is there a shortage of Doctor in this country? I don’t know if there is but I do recall reading that somewhere. If so, the fact that a lot of people simply cannot afford to pay for medical care right now may conceal this. If we had single payer national healthcare, more people would be able to seek medical care and this might create problems.
Don’t get me wrong. Single payer is defintely the way for us to go and ASAP. I just wondered if anyone has any thoughts on this.
Insurance companies, the medical industry and Republicans
plan to destroy any candidate who mentions the words “single payer”. And, so far, they are succeeding.
Cynthia, Dennis and Ralph are all RIGHT, and none of them will ever be elected. Hillary or Barack “might” be elected and they’d be wise to hold their tongue on single payer until afterward. THEN IS THE TIME TO TALK ABOUT IT.
And yes, cemmcs, there is a doctor shortage, especially among primary care physicians, who, it seems now have to have about 11 years of formal education after high school in order to be permitted BY THEIR PEERS to practice. In order for us to have more “universal” care, we are going to need more doctors and we need to break the medical CARTEL in order to get them.
Bear in mind that the “corporate” and “AMA” solution to this is to allow some “nurse practitioners” to staff the “Minute Clinic” type stores (where the corporate brand names will dominate and profit unduly) , but to simultaneously keep a separate bar artificially high for anything called a doctor. You’re being “had”.
We long for the days of people like “Doc Baker” from Little House on the Prairie (or “Doc” from Gunsmoke)—but all you’re ever going to get from the corporate world is that over-trained and under-attentive gang from Grey’s Anatomy.
We need for PEOPLE to re-set the standards of who may practice and wrest this away from the AMA, the malpractice carriers and the “networks.” In short, our doctors are too expensive and the only way to get them less so is to broaden the artificial “Standards” set mostly for the purpose of constricting competition.
In response to Pegrin: I don’t want Republicans running a single payer system, and it is unlikely they ever will.
Since any suggestion of any small reduction of medical industry corporate welfare is immediately branded by the Republicans as “socialized medicene”, they will never let single payer see the light of day.
That is why one of the major themes of this article is “Dr. White switching his political affiliation”.
Barack Obama told Ed Schultz that he liked the idea of single payer, and as I recall indicated that he felt it had political problems. That means that if we demand it he will be happy to help it through.
Lets hope that the Republicans (Hillary and McCain), don’t steal this one.
This isn’t a Republican or Democrat issue. Its an American issue and thiose that try and make it partisan simply slow its arrival down.
Great article! You have to have a balance between cost and social justice before anything like this works. We are all paying for everyones coverage now. Most people are getting care, its just too late most of the time and far too expensive.
I’d remind you that republicans get sick too and they are not all neocons. Without their help we can’t get it done and thats truth.
Insurance companies are not needed and as uncommondreamer pointed out we already have a single payer in existance. It just needs to be expanded.
Sicialized medicine is b not the answer, single payer is.
It’s very simple to understand why single-payer gets little traction in American politics: because wealthy and powerful insurance and pharmaceutical interests, pay lobbyists and spin-doctors who work full time to sell the idea that it’s impossible. Meanwhile 70% of Americans believe national health insurance would be preferable, and every other civilized nation on the planet has quietly adopted some form of national health care or health insurance.
“The American public will have to raise holy hell to get any kind of universal health insuramce coverage.”
That’s right. Here’s a place to start: http://www.healthcare-now.org/
Is single payer were to become reality, would I be able to buy insurance? The so called “free” market, that the demopublicans and republicrats love so dearly, won’t even sell me insurance. I guess being a 40 year old smoker with no medical history is too much of a risk for greedy capitalists that seem to be willing to let me get sick and die because I am poor.
FZ,
Glad you asked. You wouldn’t have to buy health insurance under single payer. It would be provided, just like it is under Medicare. Everyone would help pay for it, based on income, just like Medicare. And by the way, those that say Medicare isn’t working would throw the baby away with the bathwater. That tired argument is made by the same folks who say Social Security will go broke so it should be “privatized”. They both can be tweaked and easily be fully funded, forever.
If you are as sick of watching for profit health care kill more and more Americans then read on. Withdraw your consent! It is that easy. No more organ donors, no more blood donors. If you have an organ donor sticker on your license, withdraw your consent. Period! No healthcare for the workers, no body products for the rulers. Yes, it is total class warfare and it has been a long time coming. How many times has a working class family been reduced to begging for money from family and friends in the community through a “benefit”? These benefits are nice gestures but with few exceptions they won’t even pay for the blood draws. The US ruling class has turned health care from a noble profession to a sick joke. Do nothing, don’t co-operate, do not benefit the ruling class. The rulers will pay the price for your healthcare as long as it is tied to them and their family’s survival.
But you have to remember: I didn’t come to those conclusions with lofty ideals of social justice.”
And so yet another prideful capitalist finally hoists the white flag of surrender and reaches the inevitable conclusions that for profit healthcare fails mierably, that single payer healthcare is the only viable system, and that social justice must be the fundamental goal of human activity.
The capitalist came to those conclusions kicking and screaming after decades of colossal failure - doomed to fail before it started. Laissez-faire capitalism was fully discredited in the 18th century by none other than the capitalist’s very own godfather.
How can the capitalist survive his relentless suicidal assaults, decade after decade? He can only achieve this through massive plunder of resources - natural and human. Implication: Starve the capitalist of inputs. How? Demand land, water and food, education, healthcare, shelter, transport security for all. How? Localism, individual initiative.
Regulated public utilities have provided Americans with dependable, low cost services for water & sewers, electricty, natural gas, and (once upon a time) telephones.
Regulated public utilities aren’t “socialism”. They’re as American as the flag on W’s lapel.
Why not provide health care that way too?
In my haste to trash the capitalist I failed to cover healthcare implementations. Single payer is not the only way. The structure of the system matters least really due to miraculous human adaptability. What matters is the INTENT has to be GOOD. The “American Way” has to be reinvented to make way for GOOD INTENTS to once again thrive. This is a cultural task really, and besides practicing localist exchange, the individual may also practice localist association, effective social suppression of greed, corruption, cronyism, and all the rest of the capitalist’s subversions. This is not to shatter any concensus. Single payer might be the structural change that catalyzes the ethical change we need - but it is only the change in ethics that can sustain the reform.
Regarding implementation options, Pegrin offers crucial insight into other SUCCESSFUL systems, worth repeating entirely.
Pegrin:
“It’s possible to have nonprofit insurance without single payer. Japan, Germany, Switzerland, and others have such a system. The problem I see with single payer is that too much responsibility is concentrated in the national political process, and we know that process is often not at all progressive and almost always slow.
Remove the profit motive by mandating that all health insurance companies become nonprofit. Cut costs with government-set prices for particular medical procedures. Standardize a basic medical package, so that insurance companies compete only on premiums and service. Standardize billing and other paperwork. Cover those who can’t pay with a community insurance group.”
I come from a medical family, and have worked for and around surgeons most of my professional life. Today I am on Medicare, so with dumb luck I have made it through a lifetime of zero insurance to a point where most of the catastrophic bills will probably get paid. As the health issues of aging arise, I again see a lot of specialists. More doctors. I hate doctors. With notable exceptions, they are an arrogant tribe of pampered elitists, somewhere between useless and dangerous members of our society. If you don’t aggressively and proactively pursue your own health care needs with the full knowledge that your doctor is trying to kill you, your survival odds in the American system are very poor. The universal health care debate is very depressing to me. Even if we could get everybody insured, we still would not have decent medical care in this country. This pack of pompous slackers is entrenched in a sweet racket, coasting through the day skimming insurance money in exchange for a dreamy routine of standard diagnostics and referring patients around in demented circles. We need to get country club charlatans out of the medical profession and replace them with people who have a professional calling to heal and help people. Solving the insurance problem will not have much effect on our status as the worst health care system in the industrialized world. Americans have developed what George Carlin (probably) called “a life style that doesn’t require our presence.” This works for checkout clerks, but not for doctors.
John Conyers’ bill HR 676 is the single-payer plan supported by Dennis Kucinich (and about 80 other members of the House). Betty McCollum of Minnesota has written legislation urging that the Constitution be amended to declare health care a human right. The only people who don’t want single-payer are right-wing market fundamentalists who see no role for government except the protection of property rights. This myopic faith in the free market (and confidence that “competition” will improve health care”) has harmed our country since Reagan. It is time for them to be OUT of power. Gone. Kaput.
If we elect another hundred Dems and Greens to the House and Senate this year we can see, at last, the will of the people come true.
Right now in this country wither if any of you believe this or not, medical care is a privilege. Right now in this country if you don’t have a job and can’t pay for care up front or don’t have insurance most doctors will refuse treatment.
I have a bone spur in my lower left hip that is causing sever pain at times and I have had to go to an emergency room just to get relief. I have been told to see a doctor by the emergency room doctors. Every doctor I’ve contacted has told me they would not even see me without cash up front and that was just to quote me a price on how much it was going to cost to treat me.
I know another person who was told by a doctor see needed to have her gall bladder removed and the surgeons and the hospital refused to treat her because she couldn’t come up with a large amount of cash up front and her condition wasn’t life threatening enough. About three weeks later her gall bladder failed and they had to rush her to the hospital in an ambulance. She got her treatment but the cost was far higher.
This is something that is happening right now. Right now somewhere in this country someone is being told that if they can’t pay, upfront, right now, they won’t be getting treatment.
Health care should be a basic human right for any ailment but it’s not. I know many people who are suffering because they can’t afford payments much less have the cash to pay up front just to get basic health care. Health care in this country is an insult. The people in this country should be ashamed of them selves. Don’t expect to see any shame from our politicians or the big corporations for they are heartless. I’m beginning to believe most doctors are too.
Even if you do have insurance, it never fails for them to over-bill or claim this or that, and of course claim you owe them more than the agreed price and keep shaking you down. Only until you threaten to take them to court do they back-off… “uh, sorry”, it was an “error” or some other BS. These people need to be NATIONALIZED. Its totally broken and totally corrupt.
Ralph Nader also supports single-payer, universal, not-for-profit health coverage. That issue alone should translate into a landslife victory for him this November. Yet the MSM tells us that either A) he’s marginal or B) he will aid the Republican Party if liberals vote for him, and therefore the corporate media has successfully fooled the general populace by dictating who our ‘realistic’ candidates are.
If all the mainstream candidates (hypothectically) in a country like England, France, Germany or Japan said that they wanted to emulate the U.S. system of health care, the no-name candidate would win by a landslide. However it is very difficult in America to educate the voters on how democracy is actually suppose to work.
I am very lucky in that I have doctors who are genuinely caring people who want nothing more than to heal their patients, are willing to spend time answering my myriad questions and genuinely listen to me when I have something to say or to ask. They don’t treat me like river scum who has no right to ask medical questions. In fact, they are grateful to me for being a proactive patient and wanting to inform myself and take a hand in my own medical care. (FYI, I am a paraprofessional librarian with 25 years experience who reads a LOT of books on the job!)
Now, I am NOT LUCKY in that I can’t see my doctors when I really want and need to, because I cannot afford the co-pays and deductibles that my health insurance provider has foist upon us at my place of employment. I can’t afford preventive care and only see doctors when something becomes acute enough to warrant a visit. By that time, it’s usually more expensive to treat, but since my health insurance refuses to pay for preventive care, they’re stuck paying higher medical bills for sicker patients who could have cost them less had they offered preventive care as a part of our package. Doesn’t make sense to me, but there you have it.
It upsets my doctors to know that I waited so long to see them about things when I could have seen them sooner and gotten things nipped in the bud, but when your co-pays and deductibles are as high as mine are, you have to make choices. I often try to treat myself first with a bit of “alternative medicine” (read that, herbal remedies and others), and if it works, great, but if it doesn’t, then a trip to the doctor becomes an unfortunate - and often expensive - necessity.
Now that gas prices are inching up close to the $4 a gallon mark and will more than likely be there by summertime, doctor visits are going to become a major luxury that I will have to forestall even more. Any allied medical care like physical therapy (which I am going through right now, in fact, for yet another joint injury - they know me really well at the local PT clinic since I am sort of a semi-regular patient there) is also going to become a real luxury as well, because of the high expenses of their co-pays.
I am completely in favor of a single payer, Medicare for all system, but I’m not holding my breath that it will happen anytime soon, because most politicians lack the political will to make it happen, even though if you ask most people, they want it. They get gobs of money from insurance and pharmaceutical lobbyists that they need in order to get elected, since it costs millions upon millions of dollars these days just to win a major political office. So of course they don’t want to eliminate their biggest gravy trains. Single payer is not going to happen unless WE THE PEOPLE demand it so loudly that the pols will have no choice but to listen and act. And it’s going to have to be done by millions upon millions of us - red state and blue state, male and female, old and young, rich and poor, gay and straight, employed and unemployed, black, white, Native American, Asian-American and Latino, Republican and Democrat (and third party members as well) - to make the single payer system a reality. Politicians are not going to do this for us. WE THE PEOPLE are going to have to remember that the power lies in our own hands to change our country and make real our desires and our hopes. And that includes creating a single payer health care plan that will cover everyone, regardless.
Remember:
WE HAVE THE POWER!!!! NOW GO USE IT!!!
I don’t give a damn what system that’s adopted but it should include DENTAL COVERAGE TOO.
It’s like teeth are not a part of the human body. Medicare does not cover dental either. All this talk about health to the exclusion of teeth. Oral health is a sign of a healthy body.
Nothing defines poorness like bad or missing teeth.
WASHINGTON April 24th, 2008 8:40 pm
I don’t give a damn what system that’s adopted but it should include DENTAL COVERAGE TOO.
Right you are. Let’s don’t forget vision and hearing too.
You know seeings as how our so called leaders in Washington can’t seem to hear the American people they should be first in line for hearing test. They probably need new eyeglasses too.
If “they” don’t want everyone to have access to proper health care, “we” should take whatever steps necessary to ensure that “they” can’t get it either.
YES- read between THOSE lines.
$2 trillion per year amount to $10,000 per adult per year. Most do not file a claim so that leaves $100,000 for the unfortunate people that get sick. This is about enough to buy the doctor and the pill sales man a new Mercedes with all the trim.
We need many speakers to support Dr.Rocky White to appear on talk shows, Leno,Letteram, On NPR, ABC,CBS,NBC Fox saturate the airways with the idea , get congressmen,Children’s Defense Fund, to back it up –
Make it happen
Who needs politicians? We the People have the power in the referendum.
The current health system will die with the demise of middle class wealth of the US. With none but the abnormally wealthy to pay a great deal for health insurance, there isn’t enough social wealth pumping through to maintain what is a very expensive set of corporate pimps and minders, and still pay for useful health facilities and professionals. So the income stream is failing, and the management overhead is bleeding it dry. It may be that only executives working for the private health industry will be able to afford private health. How many of their lower paid workers can do so? If it is so bad that the average office worker of a health insurance company cannot afford health cover, the system is broke. And the entire nation is infected with the health of its poorest.
As a steelworker activist in favor of single-payer healthcare in 1993, I was
appalled by Hillary Clinton’s corporate diversion. This left an indelible
impression on me, and, alas, I hold grudges. Should the superdelegates decide on my behalf that Hillary will be the nominee, I will have to abstain
on a vote for the presidency. Hey, Demagogic Losership Cabal: tell me why
Hillary would be any better than McBush. You have run the “Democratic” party
into the ground. Why vote for a candidate for president who lauded WalMart,
maintained silence while her husband tilted the NLRB in favor of Tyson’s
Chicken, supported NAFTA, and voted to invade Iraq?
You can dream on. It’s like this. A bunch of baby boomers are going to be collecting social security and medicare when they turn 65, and the government already spent what was in the trust fund, over 2 trillion and climbing. By not having all of them having insurance in their 50’s and early 60’s, or not being able to afford health care even with insurance, a bunch of them won’t even make it to 65. And when they get to 65, the social security payments will be so low, due to COLAS that track the lie that is CPI, they still won’t be able to afford the drugs under that Medicare Part D scam.
Your government is killing you. They could easily issue their own money for everyones health care. They do not need to borrow it, or get all of it from taxes, they can issue it debt free and regulate the price that they pay to HC providers to avoid abuses. But they choose to do it this way to keep you poor, the international bankers rich, and perhaps to keep themselves alive.
Alive you say? Why is this a concern.
What do Jesus, Honest Abe, and JFK have in common?.
One threw the money changers out of the temple, another issued the greenback, and the last was going to issue his own money and signed an EO authorizing it, which was cancelled by LBJ on the day after his assasination. All of them died young.
Here is another one for you. What do Iran, North Korea, Iraq under Saddam, and Afghanistan under the Taliban have in common. Their banking system was one where government issued it’s own money w/o charging excessive usury, or even any usury. One of only 7 centrals banks that have not adopted the Bank of Englands banking system that was established in 1694, and then spread to the rest of the world when the Rothschilds took control. The last 200 years have been noting but one war after another, since war is profitable under this system.
You will never see change for the better until you throw out the Fed and the WTO/NAFTA and the UN as presently constructed. Probably too late, but thats the reality.
William Casey, as CIA Director, was reported to have said in a staff meeting in 1981 that when everything people believe in is a lie, then we will have done our job.. Well done Mr Casey, may you RIP, for most people do believe the lies.
I once thought we had a Free press in the 1970’s as a result of Watergate. It seemed to me that only way President could be impeached for what seemed like rather obscure reasons at the time, unless you felt expletive deleted was a crime, was with a free Press. Of course, now we know Woodward was a former Naval Intelligence officer, so it is obvious the Nixon was being taken down from the top. At one time I thought he just ticked off the elites, but now I wonder if it was not just a ruse to get people to trust they had a free press when it was in fact it was controlled, so we would roll over during the next 30 years thinking the press would keep the vultures in line. Instead they have been eating us alive, and killing a bunch of others.
It worked. Time to wake up, not much time left according to my reckoning. Truth is like a virus if you have an open mind. One of our elites once said he hoped he could be reincarnated as a virus to eliminate the “humans” who were polluting the planet. Maybe truth will be like a vaccine or anti-viral. Just need some more people willing to believe it.
elmeztisogordo April 25th, 2008 2:59 am
“Should the superdelegates decide on my behalf that Hillary will be the nominee, I will have to abstain on a vote for the presidency.”
If that ends up being what happens I would urge you to at least consider voting third party or independent if you can find a candidate there that is to your liking.
Lobo Gris
Pretty good comments all,imo. Even those with Health Coverage, like mine Kaiser Permanente are at risk because of the nature of a for-profit health care industry. I call Kaiser McKaiser because it is sort of like a fast food window…in and out as fast as possible.
A doctor once told me, on the condition of anonymity, that they were instructed to take no more than 12 minutes with any one patient…WTF?
Mental health, too - my therapist has decided to concentrate on his private practice. I’ve pointed out to him he will only see wealthy clients and he is abandoning his poor clients (I am “allowed” to see him at a community health center; my insurance will not cover private practice). So a working relationship will end and I won’t see any therapist at all. I’m dealing with my sister’s impending death from a rare cancer (don’t get me started on her health care nightmare!). Poor people are second class citizens. Elitists need to understand this.
The medical system is broken. I do not blame people for being so angry and hostile over their experiences with the insurers, physicians, expenses, and general quagmire. The system is so bad, that it will self destruct and a new better model will emerge.
There is something wrong with a free market medical system that looks often to the bottom line instead of first to the ideas of the Hippocratic Oath. It used to be that the first motto was “do no harm” and not how many procedures were performed to boost the practioner’s work units total.
There are still many excellent physicians in the communities, but their numbers are dropping because of burnout. It is sad to see so many negative doctor comments expressed here, maybe someone has a good story or two to tell.
There is plenty of blame to go around. We as a nation need to come to grips with the silly notion that we can have anything we want at any time, and always the best of all the ’stuff’ out there. We need to deal with the ever worsening cavern between the wealthy and the poor. And we need a government to function without the money lenders at the door.
Wall Street is the Root of All Evil
-Housing Bubble
-Internet Bubble
-Health Insurance Industry Profits
-Student Loan Industry Profits
-Biofuel Industry Profits-mass starvation of the developing world
-Etc.
Until we as a people are willing not to buy into Wall Street as a concept and to put an end to speculative gambling for the richest people in this nation (who are not contributing anything) we are stuck with the above problems.
MiMiCcS,
Thanks for another good post. You’re one of the best at CD.
On this health care stuff, it’s true the odds are stacked against citizens. It’s also true that we must “keep trying” to recapture our government from corporations.
This is what the Obama coalition effort is about—even if uphill. We MAY need to settle for a Clinton/Obama ticket in order to prevail this time, though.
cemmcs April 24th, 2008 2:11 pm wrote:
“If we had single payer national healthcare, more people would be able to seek medical care and this might create problems.”
I’m not sure what problems you anticipate - millions of Americans demanding screening colonoscopies? Seems rather unlikely. Here in Canada, government health authorities produce advertising to persuade people to use some of the less pleasant preventive or early diagnostic services. And anyhow, what if millions of Americans who can’t afford them now DID demand such services? Many more cancers would be detected while treatable, saving millions of dollars and incalculable heartache. This is not a problem.
Americans have this odd idea that because a service is “free,” then people who don’t need it will use it irresponsibly. “People will take their kids to the doctor for the sniffles,” they complain. Well, so what? If peopel are so poorly educated that they can’t distinguish between the sniffles and something more serious, or they suffer from irrational health anxiety, then a trusting relationship with a good GP might be exactly they need. Instead, in the States, they all too often get treated like dirt when they show up at the ER, and when they or their kids come down with something more serious, they are understandably reluctant to subject themselves to more humiliation, sometimes with tragic consequences. (This has been known to happen in Canada, too; it just happens a whole lot less.)
Just to be clear: I am in favour of federally-mandated single-payer universal insurance, but I see no reason that it has to be nationally uniform. In Canada, the federal Canada Health Act mandates that the provinces must, to be eligible for federal transfer payments, provide health insurance to all their legal residents that is 1) publicly administered, 2) comprehensive, 3) universal, 4) portable, and 5) accessible. How this is achieved varies from province to province, government to government - and lest anyone think that that’s the Achilles heel of the whole scheme, every province and territory covers far more services than would be required by a strict reading of the CHA. What is or should be covered is an ongoing conversation, and yes, there may come a day when, in order to care adequately for an increasingly elderly population, we may have to adopt a stricter reading of the CHA and delist some of the extras we have come to expect. And yes, various provincial governments (BC’s “Liberals” most notably) have tried in various ways to undermine the CHA, and yes, the feds have often been stingy with the transfer payments, shifting more of the cost onto the provinces. And there are other problems - a shortage of primary care docs and other highly trained personnel, especially in rural areas, is probably the most critical. But virtually no one here thinks that any of these problems would be better addressed by adopting a US-style non-system.
Thank you Amy, I have been waiting for an article like this.
I have been getting angry at both Democratic presidential candidates for pandering to health insurance companies.
Everyone has stress about their health, and the health of their family members, especially as they get older. As a person who lived most of their adult life either without insurance, or underinsured, even though I have worked nearly all of my adult life, I know the stress people go through here. Having friends in other countries, I know how much less anxiety they have regarding their healthcare. At least they know it will be there if they need it.
I think it is time this country wakes up from it’s healthcare coma and begins to accept responsibility for itself in a mature manner. That goes for both, I emphasize both, the Democratic candidates. Neither of them has an acceptable solution now.
I will not be voting for either if they refuse to put single payer or an alternative, non-insurance based plan forward. I would suggest other people who care about the health of all U.S. citizens do the same.
Because nothing else is going to relieve the problem of all the stress and disease currently exacerbated by our system. Other people in nations with universal care have statistically less of this than we do here.
Support independent or Green candidates for all seats who will push for universal healthcare– instead of maintaining a policy of paying trillions to maintain forces in Iraq defending “our interests” for years to come.
It’s time we took our tax money back and put it to use in a way that will benefit everyone in this society. Because right now a huge portion of our money is providing no help for ordinary U.S. citizens at all.
I have to be skeptical of heavily corporate-backed candidates because of who they are beholden to.
Hillary and health care, makes me nuts. I still can’t believe she wants to create a whole new system of penalties and fines for people who DON’T want coverage. That’s her universal coverage, making YOU PAY! As if targeting people who won’t cover their own children is anything CLOSE to the real problems with health care. Anyone on here have that problem? Think the government will force you to take good care of your own kids? Sure.
While relaying stories about people coming up to her to beg for help, she discussed penalties, in the same friggin paragraph. What a joke on us. Universal coverage to HER means targeting the people who DON’T want help. Oh that’s just great. Fines and penalties, and forget all the people who need help. What a gal. What a creep. Yeah, she makes me CRAZY!!!
Such foolishness. Makes us all mentally ill, I think. Too much exposure to professional insanity. I’m so thankful for people like Amy Goodman, but I can’t imagine anymore that anyone can stop the monsters now. I feel like cannon fodder, and honestly, at this point? I don’t even give a damn about my health anymore. What’s the point? All I ever really cared about was my family, and now, there isn’t much of anything I can do to see to their future. Too many cowards let monopolies ruin our nation. Friggin cowards can keep it then, I’ll smoke and drink and hell with the blood pressure and cholesterol, like they even know how to treat it. Doctors are all quacks nowadays anyway. Pills that get recalled. Anyone get a good diagnosis lately? Took me three doctors to get a torn tendon diagnosed, over two years that I limped.
Yeah. Sorry, this isn’t much more than emotional dumping. But, mental health is part of the problem, I don’t believe for a second I’m the only one that feels this way, so maybe my rant has a place. I don’t know. Health care. Christ, I wish someone did care. Don’t EVEN get me started on what the mental health care system did to just one person (me). Mental health. Yeah. F it. Anti-depressants like candy. Health care? Seems like nothing but a smoke screen issue now.
I’m way past bitter on to unstable and I’m REALLY sick of being lied to. No. I’m just really sick. And I should be ashamed? I should be quiet? People like me don’t belong? It doesn’t matter how many people get shut out? It feels like no matter where I’ve gone, my whole life, all I ever was was a dollar sign. I realize it’s all any of us are. You just wait and see. Nation of cowards that sold us out for gadgets and gizmos and nice hair. I guess I’m just still surprised that, no matter how much I really didn’t ask out of life, I didn’t expect much, it was too much to hope for. Like growing up in a small town, realizing the wealthy family in the area is above the law and can do anything they want. That’s all we are, town after town of people run over by the local rich bully.
And a WHOLE lot of people doing their bidding, making it happen, keeping their heads down, like good little Nazis. Quack doctors who prescribe Motrin and discourage expensive medical testing for diagnosis, while they get it wrong again and again. Gee, medical mistakes, who knew? Yeah. Health care? Even for the insured, it’s a crap shoot, all the way around.
Daniel David, Obama’s plan of mandating insurance-based coverage for the poor has already failed in MA. Not sure what exactly you think he is going to do to fix the healthcare situation. That is just more of the same. The poor in Mass. just didn’t pay. Why? Because they don’t HAVE THE MONEY. Get it?
Obama has suggested not mandating the coverage, although he hasn’t exactly clearly committed to that. Nevertheless either way it is private insurance based healthcare, not a federal alternative.
If you will like to see your tax money used for military to stay protecting our embassy and interests in Iraq, while a nice portion of the money you earn as your take-home salary is shelled out monthly to extremely profitable healthcare corporations, his plan is the right plan for you. Because Obama has proposed both.
As much as I admire some things about Obama, that is not for me.
After reading the above post by different people, experiences of other people I know over the last twenty years, and what has happened to me in the last two weeks I don’t believe we have very many real doctors anymore. To me a person becomes a doctor because he wants to help people. Based on what I’ve seen most of the people we have that call them self’s doctors only became doctors for the money.
It’s a sorry state of affairs if you ask me.
There was an excellent PBS-Frontline program on universal healthcare last week. One can also order the program from PBS. Went to 5 different countries and evaluated their systems.
By the way, The United Nations rates countries healthcare systems, and the U.S. ranks 34th or 37th (I can’t remember which, for sure). We also spend more on healthcare than does any other country.
We’ve given the capitalists chance after chance after chance. Not only do they fail to deliver top healthcare value, they continue to allocate resources wrongly against evidence that US healthcare value is one half the value in other countries, and probably one tenth the value in Cuba. The progressive healthcare policy we have to implement now is connected with related policies such as promotion of healthy lifestyles, preventive healthcare, antitrust and anticorruption policies.
The progressive policy is implemented by the people, who delecgate specific tasks to the government. The people decide at the local level to have healthy lifestyles, so they ban the capitalist from tempting them with junk food, tobacco, etc. The people ensure that everyone has access to the best information on preventive healthcare, without the interference, noise and distortion of the profit motive. Big insurance and big pharma to the compost heap. Simply stop doing business with them. The goal is to double healthcare value in two years, then triple it in five.
The information channel is crucial. It allows people to estimate which areas have room for improvement and which have diminishing returns. US healthcare has failed miserably to take full advantage of information technology. A central medical records database would dramatically cut costs while providing a virtual gold mine for research, especially with incentives for regular physical exams including comprehensive testing, and lifestyle documentation. Doctors’ visits should include educational resources for the patient. Elderly patients should receive visits from doctors. It’s up to the people to demand best value. Start by educating yourself, embracing the progressive platform and chucking the capitalist beast in the cage to shut up and take orders.
Thank you, Amy, for another great article. I’m really looking forward to meeting you in Tempe, Arizona on Tuesday.
And for those who say non-profit insurance companies are good, BCBSAZ is a non-profit, and every few months I get either one of two things. Either another rate increase, or a rider to the contract of additional things they will no longer be covering. I recently had bloodwork done. The cost: $1,974.02 What BCBSAZ paid them: $213.71 It’s unbelievable to me that without insurance, this would have cost me close to two thousand dollars. Since the insurance company paid just over two hundred dollars, the lab must be making money on the reduced amount. This is why people without insurance are dying. The costs are, in this one case, nearly 10 times as high for an uninsured person. How can this even be legal, for the lab to charge that much? Our healthcare system is broken on every level. It’s very depressing.
Lobo Gris: You mean Ralph Nader? That would be roughly equivalent to abstaining. I’ll skip the middle man, and just abstain.
toomuchsun, you got it. On Long Island, my dentist was paid $12 to clean my teeth by my insurer, and when I no longer had insurance, I was charged $75. Here in Oregon, I pay $65 and I can guess what the insurers pay. It’s a racket. Add to that all the excuses the insurers come up with to deny coverage, and we’re being screwed at both ends at once.
kathyodat
Thank you for a good article on the health care issue! It is very important to point out that the “universal health care” proposals that the mainstream candidates are proposing are NOT the same as the single payer system that a rapidly growing number of people, including health care professionals, are promoting as the only way to actually GET to universal health care. Too many people I know, even in the healthcare field, who truly want care for everyone support one of the MS candidates because that candidate says “I support universal health care”! They don’t seem to realize that the Clinton/Obama (not to mention McCain) proposals will do nothing more than pad the insurance cos. profits. without delivering the care. Remember how we all snickered at Bush’s “Clear Skies” initiative? Well their plans are pretty much the healthcare version.
Thank you, hamster, for the site reference. It is very good and I recommend it as well. Another site I would recommend is www.pnhp.org. (Physicians for a National Health Plan) - has some good articles and is supported by physicians who might restore a little faith in the medical profession by those here who clearly are unhappy with it.
Thank you, auspiciousbunny, for saying what I was planning on saying and will reinforce. To whit: if all of us who support a single payer/NHP/Medicare for all system will make it clear to candidates at all levels that we will NOT vote for them unless they commit to such a system BEFORE the election, we WILL be able to get it in one or two (maybe three) election cycles.
This is not rocket science if you think about it. Right now they are more afraid of “Harry and Louise” than they are of Qsama bin Laden. But the simple fact is that, to get elected, what they need, EVEN MORE THAN MONEY is votes, no votes no office. It doesn’t matter how much money they have in their coffers, if they don’t have the votes they don’t win. Period. This is the time for maximum leverage, BEFORE the election, and the leverage we have is the gift of our vote. If all of us who know what we need tell them, in clear and no uncertain terms, “No single payer, no vote” and stick to our guns, one of two things will happen: a) they will knuckle under and we will get what we need, or b) they will lose. Once they understand that the cost of abandoning us again to the insurance companies is the loss of an election, they will risk that industry’s ire. The problem up to know is that we keep chickening out, election after election. They shake the “big bad Republican” in our face and tell us we have no choice, even if their programs are essentially worthless. We give them our vote, and get nothing in return. We sell ourselves cheap.
So how do we let them know? Call, e-mail, write. Simple, takes two minutes. And then if they still don’t support it, vote for someone who does so that when they lose because of those lost votes, they will know why. That is key - they must understand why.
People are told that a vote for a third person is a “wasted vote”. Just the opposite - a vote for what you need is the most important vote you can cast. The only time you waste your vote is when you vote for someone who has little or nothing to offer.
This comes to my major complaint with this article and, sadly, with too many others in the “progressive” media . It seems to me to do no real good to point out the glaring deficiencies of a candidate’s position or even to propound a better one if you do not point out that there is, in fact, a candidate who does support that better position and is available for you to vote for. Right now a guy named Nader does indeed support single payer system, so he will get my vote.
I have wasted too many votes in my life on people who “could” win but whose win wasn’t worth the trouble it took to vote. My vote is too important to me to give to anyone who does not represent my and my fellows’ best interest. If we would all have the courage to vote our convictions and, perhaps as importantly, if we make sure the politicians understand that unless they support us, we will not waste our vote on them, then we would win what we really needed. In fact that is the ONLY way we will win it.
.
I’ll say it again…
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2000.
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2004.
We NEED Ralph Nader as President in 2008.
Never before as we do now
http://www.votenader.org/index.html
.
If you doubt it, check out Nader’s profile at the American Academy of Achievement.
If you doubt it, check out the movie Unreasonable Man.
Lobo Gris, Nanny, et al,
I am voting for Nader, and other independents running for congress. I feel bad that so many people in this country are so disempowered they fear even risking even the most minimal move toward real change for the better- which is to vote, significantly, for something other than maintaining the status quo. We need a more diverse base of elected representation. That much is clear. Because we aren’t adequately represented by either party right now.
It’s too bad, as someone said in “Sicko” that so many Americans are “afraid of their own government”. And that we have internalized a message that devalues our own thoughts and convictions and leads us into a feeling of our own futility and helplessness (and to “vote for the lesser evil”…)
I say, anything that’s out there counts. When people hear enough about it. It can work in a positive way.
H20
“They don’t seem to realize that the Clinton/Obama (not to mention McCain) proposals will do nothing more than pad the insurance cos. profits. without delivering the care. Remember how we all snickered at Bush’s “Clear Skies” initiative? Well their plans are pretty much the healthcare version.”
Amen.
You pay for insurance every month and then you worry if the insurance company will actually pay for anything when a claim comes up.
Why do they call it “insurance”, then?
wcdevins:
indeed, it taxes the nmemory.
auspiciousbunny, you have it backwards. Hillary is the one mandating health care and assessing penalties. Obama proposes a voluntary plan, saying a mandatory plan would unfairly force people who can’t afford it to pay. The devil is always in the details, and those are still sketchy, with Hillary not saying how she would enforce the plan, or where the money would come from when costs go up as they will.
kathyodat
collinsa, it’s not insurance, it’s armed robbery.
kathyodat
People pay an extra thousand dollars per year for health insurance and another thousand dollars per year for gasoline, but do not ask them to pay one dime extra to fix roads, bridges and schools….what a country.
Mulling over my extended comment/whine, just in case anyone opined, and I was thinking Amy deserved a better comment for sure.
All I know is that health care is lousy in so many ways, I just hope it doesn’t run us all over. For all my bad experiences, I realize I’ve been plain lucky, and I think that’s what bothers me most. I could be in the grave 5 times over by now, but for blind luck. Health care for which we pay, whether by insurance or in taxes, shouldn’t be a crap shoot. That’s the problem. We don’t have much control as individuals, and I see that as the primary problem.
If we had a choice, we would CHOOSE good doctors and good insurers, and the giant louts would go out of business in a hurry. The fact that their businesses are going strong only proves how crooked the system is. MUST be. The system is NOT working for the buyers. How is that possible? Someone is making a lot of money while we get sicker and sicker, and how is it the insurance companies make money by killing off customers? I guess because they aren’t worried about pleasing or keeping the customers. Hmmm. Must be a captive audience then. Sounds like facism to me.
It was great to see Democracy Now! coming out of St Louis this morning, and I wish I could go meet Amy Goodman
Thanks for being there Amy, and I’m glad we have some sunshine for your visit today!!