OK, it was wrong of me to say last week that we should deny healthcare to Republicans except for aspirin and hand sanitizer, and thank you to the many readers who kindly took me to task. It was so wrong. And I withdraw the idea that death panels should circulate through red states searching for the obese and slow afoot, the wheezy and limpy, spray-painting orange stripes on their ankles, marking them for future harvest. That was very, very bad.
In June 2008, I used this space to call on then-Sen. Barack Obama to add economist James K. Galbraith's book, "The Predator State," to his reading list. As an account of the capture of government by private interests, I thought it would make a far more useful guide to contemporary political economy than the market-glorifying texts that were still in fashion in those days.
I don't know if Mr. Obama ever took my advice.
America's shouting match over health care reform has turned completely goofy -- and I'm not talking about confused seniors at teabag rallies getting red-faced with anger after being told by the right-wing scare machine that "government is trying to taker over Medicare." No, I'm talking about our United States senators.
Take Max Baucus. Please! He's the lightweight Montana Democrat to whom President Obama entrusted the heavy job of shepherding health care reform through the upper chamber. It was like asking Tweety Bird to lift a bowling ball.
The White House had to go outside the beltway
to find someone to print a story about the President calling Senators
and speaking positively about a public option. It's great that he said
good things to Maria Cantwell, who already supports a public option.
Ben Nelson too (though he doesn't say that Democrats like Nelson
shouldn't side with Republicans and filibuster a bill, the only Nelson
vote that will matter).
In my 20 years of practice as a family physician, I have encountered dozens of cases where the main contributing factor to a person’s death was the lack of health insurance for most of their lives.
The lack of universal health care is a mass killer in this country.
Nearly 45,000 deaths in the United States each year are attributable to the lack of health insurance, according to a Harvard University study released in September.
My favorite moment so far in the health care debate was when Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona argued against mandating maternity benefits as part of a basic insurance coverage. “I don’t need maternity care,’’ he blurted out. At which point, Michigan’s Debbie Stabenow quipped, “I think your mom probably did.’’
For that matter, so did his wife and daughter. But never mind. We had one brief glimpse into the mind of a politician who doesn’t quite see women’s health concerns as equal to his own.
Major progressive organizations see a golden opportunity to
resurrect the public option, and are preparing a campaign, which will
include television ads in Nevada, to pressure Senate Majority Leader
Harry Reid to get on board.
Have you noticed a climate of hate and mean-spiritedness in the land?
Whether inspired by racism or not, it certainly exists.
This isn’t a unique psychological phenomenon. Remember the brutal anti-unionism of the 1930s, the McCarthy-era anti-communist scare of the 1950s, and the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s and early 1970s?
Any voice that rises up to expose the occupation of our government needs to be applauded and encouraged. The discussion however is not Republican or Democrat – the discussion is: Who is supporting the occupation of the United States government – who regulates and inspects – who legislates – who guides the flow of the US treasury? Who and what are these occupiers loyal to? The occupation is the core issue – everything emanates from that.
"I am not
the first person to take up the cause of health care but I am
determined to be the last," President Obama declared to great applause
in his recent speech before Congress."
It was a stirring moment, but in the end perhaps just one more
ephemeral moment on the stage of what passes now for political drama in
the United States. Whatever results from the final health care
legislation passed by Congress, we can be sure it will not come close
to solving the health care crisis. The cause of health care,
post-Obama, will go on.
