lisa3210peace August 12th, 2008 9:33 am
Can you please explain why your Democratic Party:
1. Refuses to end the immoral and illegal war/occupations
2. Refuses to impeach Bush.
3. Voted to grant immunity to Bush and the Telecoms for breaking the law.

A) Can you give any reasons to vote for Democrats that aren't reasons to vote against Republicans?

B) Can you make a little list of all the great accomplishments of your Democratic Party in say the last 2 yrs? 4 yrs? 8 yrs?

C) Can you name a few instances in which the Democrats were successful in stopping the Republicans?

Run Lisa, RUN!

Gotcha Rich. Yea, the flat Earth people were once a majority too.

Oh, fucking, puleeeze ! The party said that same shit before and look what they actually did right after they got in. Remember that "partial birth abortion" ban the Democrats joined the GOP on back in 2003? It was really nothing but a ploy to outlaw women's reproductive rights and yet like the GOP the Democrats LIE their teeth off and once again give EMPTY "promises" which they know they'll never do. Party hacks such as Daniel FUCKING David, kernel, etc ... don't want you to question the cowardly and backstabbing behavior of the supposed "party of the people".

RALPH NADER FOR PRESIDENT !!!!

VOTENADER.ORG !!!!

Dumbocrats unite behind a commitment that every American man, woman and child be guaranteed to have "affordable", comprehensive health care..

Now define "Affordable"....is affordable where Big Pharma only takes 50% of your paycheck, or 45%

RichM August 12th, 2008 10:44 am
lisa3210peace (9:33 am) displays her pathetic lack of brains:
-Rich if cornered Lisa will admit that Obama and the traitorous Democrats SUCK and her only rationale is plain and simple lesser-evilism. When hammered with the facts most Democrats will concede that the only reason to vote for Democrats is that they are SLIGHTLY less evil then Republicans.

Right after that they jump on Nader and cry wolf. Watch.

Aren't Democrats supposed to be democratic? The vast majority of Americans (not just Dems) want single payer health insurance. Quit taking bribes, Dems-- do your duty and support the view of the majority of Americans. Enact single payer, universal health care now!

The ruling class will guarantee every american the right to buy health insurance. Falls SHORT guys.

Hillary's plan and this plan seek to do the same thing:

Reward the health insurance companies by forcing people to buy their insurance!

How is that going to lower health care costs? Look at the Medicare drug benefit recently added. Pharmaceutical companies just announced price increases of over 1000% on some drugs. Why? Because they could! Medicare is paying the tab.

Dave

"There was little dissent - or room for it - in the day's meeting..."
"Party platforms are a statement of principles that are not binding on the candidates or the next president and they are typically given little attention after they are adopted."
Conclusion: We will have to fight long and hard to enact anything resembling a progressive agenda.

As long as Insurance Companies, Pharmacuitical Companies, HMOs and other businesses control how doctors treat patients (and they do) - You will still be discriminated against depending how well insured you are.
We need Health CARE, not insurance. Why pay the middle man?

Insurance should be for things - NOT people.

"Under any system in play, most people would still put out money for health insurance as they do now, but they would get help when needed."

In plain English, more of your tax dollars will be handed to the multiple existing insurance companies. That means you get none of the efficiencies from single payer and the help received will hardly be enough for all the people that currently can't come close to affording the inflated cost of the current profit driven system.

Compare the Democrats' plan with single payer universal coverage where costs are cut in half and every single solitary citizen has gold plated coverage.

If Obama is on your side, why is he proposing to charge taxpayers double the going rate only to still leave millions of people without health care? Oh yeah…"off the table", I forgot.

Smell the coffee. They're going to do "Mandates". Tax liens. Garnishments. State enforcement. Steam Shovel $$$ from us to Billionairefilth Animals for their palatial wealth and private law over us until we have nothing left and then they tell us to just fucking die. Six vultures rip at our flesh: Health Care; Energy; Food; Housing; Education; Transportation. It is a contest among them to see who can devour the most from our body before we are rendered carrion. That is what Overseers do for their Masters on this fucking Plantation. BHO is just one guy who wants to hold the whip for Master. He knows what it means to serve and whom.

You folks are very polite about people who would subject your children to public vivisection and dine on the bloody remains if Master ordered it. You know this is true.

Absolutely right. Forced payments to insurance companies benefits only one side - and it's not ours.

Insurance companies look at 43,000,000 uninsured Americans and see immense profits to be had - if only they had the backing of the federal government to force blood out of turnips. With Obama, they will. A Republican couldn't do it, because they have to pay lip service to free choice. A Democrat doesn't have to. That's why you can expect the draft to resurface under Obama, also.

The Green Party platform calls for single payer health care. But, of course, liberals can't vote for that! They can only vote for forced insurance payments and then hope that they can "pressure" for more.

Good luck with that, DD and the rest.

Why is it that a Dem compromise always gives their big contributors what they want and shafts the rest of us?

"Conclusion: We will have to fight long and hard to enact anything resembling a progressive agenda."

And the place to start is to stop voting for politicians that oppose a progressive agenda. Which by and large means to stop voting Democrat.

Now that we've entered the Gilded Age Part II, the deregulators who came to power during Reagan's administration have succeeded in rigging the deck. The poor and middle class work their entire lives saving money in retirement plans that get stolen from them by either the CEOs who run the companies into the ground (Enron) or by the health care industry that fucks them out of their insurance premiums and never pays off their claims when the workers get sick. They've enhanced the illusion that poor people "could" become rich if they toe the line and do what their oppressors dictate. Once in a while, just as in Las Vegas, one of the poor hits the jackpot, achieving the American Dream. It's just enough to keep blue collar workers voting for the likes of McCain and Obama and never uniting with real progressives like Kucinich or Nader to effect real change.

revengegirl: It actually IS as simple as that, isn't it? You hit the nail on the head. If my monthly insurance premium, along with everyone else's monthly premium, was paid into a "single" healthcare fund, not an insurance company, the health CARE in this country would be sailing along.

My mother just had a heart attack and subsequent open heart surgery. The ambulence ride from the retirement community to the hospital cost $1900. You read that right, nineteen hundred dollars. The cost of the entire hospital stay was close to $200,000. In my opinion, it's because of insurance that those costs are so absolutely insane. The insurance companies charge so much because they CAN and subsequently THEY are allowing healthcare costs to soar to such obscene levels. Same with the big pharmas.

As long as the insurance companies exist as they are today, nothing will change.

I am really, really, really disappointed to see the Dems won't even TRY to get a single payer health care reform package passed! I thought I had understood that the "health care for all" would be accomplished through a two part program. First, anyone who CHOOSES to keep their health insurance as is (controlled by the insurance companies) can do so, but as an alternative, anyone who would prefer a Medicare for All single payer package could choose that option instead. Our out-of-pocket expenses will never go down significantly as long as the insurance companies are in control.

"Guaranteed Health Care" = guaranteed health insurance for insurance corporations.

PS: "An extensive section on women's rights is included and the votes she received in the primaries are described as '18 million cracks in the highest glass ceiling'."

18 million "cracks", eh? Sounds kind of sexist, if you think about it.

What's the difference?
Americans are being fed to the Oligarchs as well as the Oilgarchs.

This so-called "insurance guarantee" is similar to the same smoke blown by Clinton in 1992/93, although the giveaway to Big Insurance is more straightforward, and just as reprehensible. It will be intresting to read why the cave by PDA on this issue. The overall Platform looks like another good reason to vote Green. The only thing it provides working people is more fleecing and lying.

Well all you Dem bashers... when you get your man, McCain, in the white house he will see that your medical care is much more affordable...then you can march in the streets (Whoopee) and he will give you what you need... a lesson in how to win wars and keep the people down.

You will all deserve McCain. Good Luck!

OK, class, here's your next question. ...

What's wrong with the following?
*********************************************

-- Ralph Nader supports a single-payer health insurance plan.

-- Single-payer would be a tremendous benefit to the overwhelming majority of Americans. At least 85% of the population.

-- The overwhelming majority of voting Americans will vote for either Barack Obama or John McCain -- NEITHER OF WHOM SUPPORTS SINGLE-PAYER.

*********************************************

Oh, and class, don't forget, we will be having similar questions on *other* issues.

(Hint: All the other questions have the same answer as this one.)

I agree with wsws. The Democrats and the Republicans are the same in that they represent and work for the ruling class. For meaningful change, support candidates that represent working people.

I knew there would be some pathetic attempt by a Democrat to fall back on their last argument for Plan B Corporate party- the bogeyman! Used to be Bush, now it's McCain.

Speaking of pathetic, there are still wretched "moderates" around contending that while single-payer is the obvious and sensible alternative to the present lethal quagmire of the status quo, it's still not politically feasible.

The last time I checked, Paul Krugman was one of these-- in fact, his position clued me in to the fact that he IS at best a moderate. (I'd been fooled by visiting a site in which he was admired as a John Pilger or Howard Zinn in economist's clothing.)

Not unsurprisingly, such moderates, IMO, are well behind the curve of public opinion-- they presume that most people are still hung up on the idea that single-payer is "socialism". I don't think that's the sticking point it once was. And moreover, there's a definite self-confirming or self-perpetuating quality to this argument.

Political leaders and the commentariat who argue that the time isn't ripe for crawling out of the muck onto the dry land of single-payer are actually reinforcing and sustaining the status quo. Of course, in the Democrats' case, it's because they place a higher value on the health of the insurance corporations than they do on the health of the citizens they aspire to rule.

The eggs, the insurance companies, will not be broken until we have a government that serves the interests of the people--not that of their corporate masters. When will this occur? When the failure of our system becomes so deep that we experience some sort of a revolution.

www.StudentsForTheEarth.org

If the lesser of two evils (Obama) NEEDS my vote he will get it. Otherwise I'll vote third party.

Here's how the great "insurance" scam works for let's say, Joe, a 55yr old self-employed plumber:

1) Pay $700/per month (in after tax dollars)

2) Have a copay of 30%...of what Healthscam Insurance Co will designate as eligible for coverage

3) That's only after you've met a $500 deductible

WOW!!!

That means Joe who barely makes enough to cover his bills---including insurance---will never, never walk into a doctor's office for fear that the bill for a nurse taking his temperature and drawing blood for a diabetes test will cost $1500---of which he will be responsible for $500 + 30% of $1000 = $800.

Most of the time, he does not know what it will cost up front and when he gets the bill the explanation of charges will be so convoluted that he will have no way of understanding it, let alone fight it.

In other words, Healthscam Inc can hold its "insured" Joe in perpetual terror of seeking medical care, which in turns means that that insured premium is RISK FREE! TOTAL PROFIT! Just think, keeping the COSTS HIGH will make the CO-PAYS UNAFFORDABLE!
It is an ingenious $ytem of extortion and trap$. So the last thing in the world is for the Healthscam Inc to fight for lower price for basic care, prescriptions, or $2000 ambulances!

THE CRISIS IS ABOUT HEALTH CARE....not affordable insurance.

Congratulations true believers! Your Demok "can win" masters are working toward guaranteed slavery for you! Expect to pay for healthcare not twice what other countries pay per capita, but THREE TIMES!!

God Bless the United States of America!!!

The Cowards bent over for Big Pharma and the Insurance Parasites. We need to elect Democrats rather than these republican-lite DLC and Blue Dogs.

Here is an organization dedicated to doing the right thing!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Citizens Alliance for National Health Insurance
http://www.hr676.org/

THE PRIMARY PURPOSE OF HR676.ORG, INC. IS TO RAISE FUNDS FOR A NATIONAL MULTI-MEDIA ADVERTISING CAMPAIGN TO PROMOTE THE PASSAGE OF...

House Resolution (H.R.) 676
The United States National Health Insurance Act

Affordable Single-Payer National Health Insurance for All!

What Is National Health Insurance (NHI)?

More......

"Why is it that a Dem compromise always gives their big contributors what they want and shafts the rest of us?" You have to ask? Democrats = S.O.S. When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?

Heaven forbid the Dems take on their Health Insurance masters and do what is best for all of us! Strap each Dem. politician into a chair and force them to watch SiCKO, then strip them of their health insurance coverage (paid for by us) and force them to go to emergency rooms.

Time to abandon the Dems. and get behind parties that truly represent us: Green Party, Working Families Party, or Populist Party.

cavedweller: "Once in a while, just as in Las Vegas, one of the poor hits the jackpot"

We want a diverse array of opinions among the people regarding whether the economic system should be structured as predatory capitalism or cooperative socialism.

The crisis occurs when the elites drive the government/media/academia to relentlessly promote vicious predation and extinguish or marginalize the peaceful/productive alternative.

Progressives have real contempt for the elites because they deserve it, very simply put. The crisis has reached a point now where we are morally obligated to let the elites complete as much suicidal self-destruction as they can achieve. This is why we offer zero support to Demoks.

If we progressives vote our principles by voting third party candidates and if the Repuks win power, the silver lining of the resulting cloud will very likely be the key to our non-violently achieving significant and lasting change toward social democracy in the USA.

.

Nader will change things.
Nader is our only hope.
Nader is the only choice.
Fight the Two-party system.
VOTE NADER 2008… You'll be glad you did and so will I…

.

"Well all you Dem bashers… when you get your man, McCain, in the white house he will see that your medical care is much more affordable…then you can march in the streets (Whoopee) and he will give you what you need… a lesson in how to win wars and keep the people down. You will all deserve McCain. Good Luck!" Oh please. As if we wouldn't get the same from Obama. Why is it that Democrats cannot come up with a reason to vote FOR their candidate? They support Obama by saying vote anti-McCain. But they have it bass ackwards. It's not that a vote for Nader is a vote for McCain. It's that a vote for a Democrat or a Republican is a vote for THE SAME! Run Ralph. Run!

This is just another area in which my hard-earned dollars are going to somebody's profits instead of services. In areas of the commons, like health care, privatization is a diversion of community resources (money, time, etc) to the benefit of rich individuals and their agents (corporations). Let them make profits selling salad shooters and SUVs, but keep the commons free of vultures.

Sell-outs and cowards. But what Obama wants.

As the Democratic Party Leadership ("How now, Howie Dean?") hoists both middle fingers to progressives it is time for progressives to vote:

Nader/Gonzalez
or
McKinney/Clemente

Any questions class?

I'm deeply disappointed that the Dems did not act more aggressively and back single payer health care, because anything else is just more corporate welfare for the insurance industry, which is raping us blind and leaving us all broke.

I've been so completely soaked by medical expenses recently that I've barely been able to make my monthly rent, which is dirt cheap for where I live. My prescription co-pays are outrageous because I am on "Tier III" drugs that don't come in generic, and those in our insurance company's drug formulary that are under the designation of "Tier III" are the most expensive, so I end up paying ridiculous amounts of money for fairly common medications.

I had recent surgery on my left hand that the insurance did not pay for, and I have no clue as to how to come up with the money to pay the bill. I wish I could find a legitimate federal grant to pay off my debts, but there are so many web sites out there that advertise federal grant money available that I am quite entirely sure that 99% of them are scams made to bilk desperate people out of their hard earned cash, so it's hard to know whether there is such a thing as a real, legit federal grant available to help people pay off debts. Then, if there are such things, how one would go about writing a grant proposal to receive such money is another mystery.

So it all adds up to the fact that we have a very broken system in this country that no one has the cojones to address and which means we'll still all be enslaved by the health insurance industry that is a big campaign cash cow for so many candidates that they're afraid to bite the hand that feeds them.

Call me a pessimist, but I doubt that we'll ever get true universal single payer health care in this country. Just not going to happen, at least not in my lifetime, anyway. Too much money and power at stake for it ever to become a reality, sadly. :-(

Modern conservatives have gutted the government and raised the deficit so high that none of the Democratic promises can be accomplished. The American people remain in the dark by choice. Just who in Washington is going to fix things?

We already know the reality. Change happens at the bottom first and slowly works it's way upward. We are clearly in for some very hard times and must change our values to sustain ourselves through the troubled times. The Democrats and Republicans have both positioned themselves to sustain themselves, not us. Today fifty percent of congressmen become lobbyists or work for industries in and around Washington once leaving congress. Also, five of the richest counties in America are in the Washington area. Little more needs to be said.

There are a lot of Nader supporters here. I voted for Nader in the last 3 elections, and admire him greatly. This is a man who has been working for the common good, and working as effectively as possible in a rigged system, for 40+ years. Every year, every day.

Only the very ignorant, of which we have millions in the US and some here at CommonDreams, would claim that Nader only comes out every 4 years to run because of his ego.

That said, I am going to vote for Cynthia McKinney this time. I think that if all disaffected voters would vote Green, we could get on the ballot next time. The laws in this country are stacked against 3rd parties, and it is difficult to get on the ballots, as josefz pointed out.

Of course, whether they count the votes is another story. I tend to believe that they do count the votes, they just don't tell us what the true total is. So voting 3rd party can scare the ruling class, even if they don't admit our total in public.

Don't worry, Obamaniacs. Your man is a shoe-in. McCain is the Alan Keyes of the US election. He isn't even eligible! He wasn't born in this country. This entire 2 year circus is being performed to keep us frothing about trivialities, while the voting machines have been preset to Obama for months. (Although I used to be sure that Clinton would win)

Ralph has the answers. He is the only true progressive. Dems have turned into lap dogs and puppets for the corp world...long ago. Since Uncle Nafta Bill. (There's his real first name.) He sold us all down the river, or maybe that's wrong its the you-know-what creek, and it's not down it's UP! Go Ralph, go!

SOME Democratic members of Congress are fighting for single payer, but it seems the Blue Dogs have the upper hand on health care so far. I find it amazing that they take a simple truth (private insurance makes our health care cost twice as much per person and leaves 47 million people without access except that provided by overwhelmed hospital emergency rooms) and pretend that we can save money and provide care to all WITHOUT changing to single payer.

In Minnesota, Representative Keith Ellison (Dem, Mpls.) is convening a forum tonight at which he and others will discuss how to promote HR 676, John Conyers' excellent single-payer plan. On the State level, Senator John Marty has developed a single-payer tax-supported plan that can/could show America how it's done when it's done right. (Unless our no-tax governor and his version of the failed Massachusetts plan can somehow prevent the Marty plan's passage.)

"The party now declares itself "united behind a commitment that every American man, woman and child be guaranteed to have affordable, comprehensive health care.""

And what percentage of a family or individual's income would qualify as "affordable"?

I only recently started reading Commondreams and this is one issue that comes up that I don't understand and don't necessarily agree with. Why is it a given that single payer is better. There is always lots of very strong support for it but why? Isn't the issue that some people can't afford health care and we need to provide them with decent healthcare? That's great, but why take away the right of other people to have private insurance? I am in Quebec right now and I can tell you regardless of Michael Moore's movie people here are very frustrated wth having this right taken away from them and I have heard personal stories of people having to pay thousands out of their own pocket to save their lives basically because the government healthcare wouldn't move fast enough. After listening to them I am thankful for my private American health insurance and will happily continue to pay for it each month, I save much more in taxes compared to Canadian citizens anyway...

Surprisingly, most of us writing in these threads dance around the most important issue. Clearly, the corporations have bought off the two major parties. Progressives need to line up behind one leader who calls for nationalizing the major industries in this country that have been allowed to run amok. Energy, pharmaceuticals, insurance and airlines are industries that are ripe for nationalization. The myth that private industry can run large organizations better than government is exploded by the actions of the largest industries over the past 25 years.

P.S.

Would that "affordable" health care coverage actually cover illness' and procedures that are currently being rejected today by insurers who are raking-in astronimical profits while many of their paying clients are dying as a result of lack of coverage?

As a former computer person who worked on hospital systems, I must say that the chaotic insurance situation creates a Tower of Babel that is extremely wasteful.

For now let us not consider the profiteering of the insurance companies, the pharmaceutical companies and the medical supply and service companies. The administrative costs of recovering revenue from hundreds of insurance sources, each with their own constantly shifting rules and data requirements for billing, contributes significantly to inflation of costs. In order to collect revenue hospitals and doctors must divert time, effort and dollars away from employing care-givers to employing billing support personnel. It's nuts.

Bernice suggests that perhaps we could get more traction for single payer in certain states. That is something to think about. Often states' rights have been used against a progressive agenda. Maybe it can be a way to break through here and there.

Now that the Democrat Plan has been announced - Look for all the propaganda that is being generated by the Main Stream Media about "Entitlements". They are calling Social Security Disability an entitlement (meaning welfare).
Social Security Disability is an insurance program that those who work are forced to buy - not an "entitlement".

This is to promote the idea that Social Security has been "Broken", and the idea that the whole country would be bankrupted by a similar single payer plan for all Americans.

The Social Security Medicare and Medicaid systems have been bilked by the same corporations that caused the problem in the first place. (Insurance Cos. Big Pharma, Hmo's etc.) and the war machine which borrows from the Social Security trust fund to continue it's nefarious acts.

First they make a Health "Care" system where only the well insured have good medical treatment. This keeps poor people from getting diagnosic tests and preventive care. Then they make people who apply for disability because of chronic pain or illness wait three years while the government pays to have the patient investigated (and calls them a liar). If finally on disability (after being financially ruined during the process), the only doctors who will treat the disabled person are part of an insurance pool of Doctors that give out antidepressants like lollypops and pressure them to go back to work.

By the time the patient is really old and permanently disabled, the system has only one choice to make a profit - Give the patient the all the expensive diagnostic tests and medications they can justify in the paperwork. In other words, if the disabled person is not going to contribute to the plan of Maximum Productivity by working - Make them like a pod in The Matrix, with Insurance Cos, Pharma, and for profit HMO's all sucking the life out of them (and everyone else who pays into the system) - for profit again.

And if the system is broken, just create more propaganda to blame the elderly and disabled! (Those welfare cheats!!)Thus preventing any true reform like Universal Healthcare and keeping the Insurance Companies and the politicians they have bought in business.