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04.15.11 - 12:16 PM
Killing Medicare, Which Takes Care Of Sick People...
...and replacing it with corporate socialism, which doesn't. More.
"The real-life effect of the Republican policy is the same as a perpetual tax increase machine on Medicare recipients, to subsidize a perpetual windfall profits machine for price-gouging companies."
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31 Comments so far
Show AllUS Medical system - If you have cash, you get treated, maybe you get better. If you don't, well then, I guess you didn't listen to Capitalist Jesus.
Again a misuse of the word "Socialism". Is it any wonder that the word is akin to labeling somewhat a satanist in the United States of America.
There can not BE such a thing as Corporate Socialism by the definition of Socialism.
Call it what it is...Plutocracy or Fascism.
Brent Budowsky, made the case clearly and precisely, without mincing words. Medicare supporters now need to get these words into the minds of voters. Health insurance should not be an un-regulated, private, for profit business.
That is the point. Health care should be consdered a right, not an entitlement, as it is in civilized countries.
They've said all along their out to privatize everything, Medicare is just going to be replaced by the Soilent Corporation. They will give you parents a dignified end, and recycle them into something useful.
Gotta love capitolism!
>^^<
Meanwhile Congress continues to have univeral socailistic health care.
I admit everything upside down!,
The servants are not to get better than those they work for, the whole Washinton System has lost it, needs to be recalled en-mass. and replaced with a new term limited, part time ledgislature, remove all the A/C and don't allow any money for it to be replaced.that'll help. A law like all purchases over $1 million must have a recipt on line within 30days. and all the doors must be removed from all rooms and offices, so no more hopefully back room deals may take place.
>^^<
"Meanwhile Congress continues to have univeral socailistic health care."
And "the troops".
I am slightly confused by this posting. I have read that one of the driving arguments for Medicare was that the insurance industry does not want to insure older persons because they are such great risks. Has that changed?
Even today a good private secondary insurance to complement the Medicare primary runs anywhere from $ 4000 to $ 6000 per year per person, medications included. Since Medicare generally covers some 75% of costs those numbers will go up by a factor of three under the "voucher system". The overwhelming majority of elderly will not be able to buy insurance under the GOP plan.
They want to start out targeting folks using Medicare who are under 55 and corporatizing their healthcare and leaving the retired population alone. They are likely doing this for two reasons:
1) Elderly people begin to have multiple conditions as they age so the cost to take care of them is a lot more than those under 55. The corporate insurance companies would save money because they don't have to pay for these multiple health conditions which occur with age. Then they could explain how much their insurance saved the taxpayers because they could then compare it with Medicare recipients that are left. They will then expect a pat on the back and try to privatize everyone’s healthcare eventually.
2) It is also a divide and conquer tactic similar to what Wanker of Wisconsin did with the Unions. Wanker tried to divide the union by only making his union busting legislation affect certain unions instead of all unions. The Firefighters and the Police Unions were left out of the legislation so they would not add to the pissed off workers. This legislation divides the retirees and the people below 55 who are on Social Security which would be mostly the disabled. The AARP folks might even decide to not get involved because it wouldn’t affect them.
That’s the way I see it.
I think the use of the term “Socialism” in the phrase “Corporate Socialism” is totally used out of context. I noticed that right away. It should have been phrased “Corporate Facism”
You conclude: "The overwhelming majority of elderly will not be able to buy insurance under the GOP plan." Well, here are the actual numbers for my wife and I under the CURRENT plan.
I retired on 3/31/11. I spent the previous 6 months researching medical insurance options under the Medicare modifications enacted last fall. Our optimum affordable coverage includes the following policies for each of us:
> Medicare Part B
> Part B Supplements ("Medigap")
> Part D Rx supplemental coverage
> Dental coverage for me
The premiums for these seven policies total over $7,000 per year, subject to annual increases. Based on our prior 3 years medical experience, expert projections of additional costs for co-pays and deductibles will add up to another $7,000 for a grand total of $14,000 per year for our healthcare (if we're lucky). We are very fortunate in being able to afford this (this year) because, in addition to some blessings to go with the setbacks, I was sufficiently prudent (read paranoid) to start a protected savings plan back when I first realized that ronnie reagan's racket was to make america safe for the rich.
While thankful I that I can provide my wife the protection she needs, I am deeply saddened by the fact that the majority of my peers are not as fortunate. I asked my consultant about this. He said most of the retirees he sees cannot afford this so they have to choose between:
> Not retiring (if they have that option
> Buying very poor coverage (if they can even afford that)
> Applying for Medicaid assistance (good luck with that in this state!)
> Going barefoot over the coals
Cormac McCarthy’s chilling novel, “No Country for Old Men”, is eerily allegorical. He took the title from Yeats' poem, “Sailing to Byzantium” (1926), but McCarthy's outlook (2005) is decidedly more pessimistic.
Republicans are once again selling out Americans to plutocratic corporations...this time it's the "health" insurance for profit industry who the Republicans are propping up as they destroy Medicare which has always been a very successful, efficient program. Medicaid is also being gutted...it's no surprise, government programs which benefit the poor, disabled and average person have always been despised by corporate Republicans.
Poverty and health problems for seniors, retirees, the disabled and poor will shoot up as a destroyed Medicare and starved Medicaid leaves millions w/out health care.
As opposed to the official Democrat plan, which forces Americans to buy private health insurance, further enriching those wealthy corporations.
This country is so fucked up, it boggles my mind....
But then, this is the ultimate, end result of a socity and government which puts Capitalism and Profit above any and all other considerations, worshipping at the altar of Mammon. How any of us could expect a government that actually puts the needs and well-being of its citizens above $$, in this Uber-Capitalist-Profit-driven society, is beyond me.
The repugnant plan is to have the vouchers pegged to inflation, meanwhile medical costs are rising much faster. So cynical, and sinister. Really the only problem with Medicare is it's underfunding by Congress. Medicare pays bills on time, so even tho they don't pay much, they at least pay, unlike insurance companies which argue, contest and stall until so many people give up... or die.
Care of it's citizens, infrastructure, and the environment is what a country's taxes should cover, rather than the destruction of people and infrastructure in other countries around the world. Single payer, Medicare for All is the answer.
Democrats are spineless, corporate shills, but Republicans are conscienceless sociopaths who clearly don't give a shit about anyone but their corporate patrons.
Anyone who still votes for Republicans is a soulless, world-class moron who clearly wants the poor, the elderly, women, minorities, and gays to suffer. Their United States is a place reserved only for white, rich, allegedly-straight males whose subservient wifey-poos stay home "where they belong".
Anyone who still votes for Democrats who continue to turn tricks for their corporate johns is a fool. Their United States seems more diverse than that of the Republicans, but, below the surface, most of the same white, privileged, patriarchal values still prevail.
Both parties LOVE war and the war profits which fill the blood-stained coffers of their War-Profiteering campaign contributors ("But they employ millions!!!"), as their continual votes to fund our costly, endless, unnecessary wars prove.
In devout service to all their corporate masters (Wall Street, War Profiteers, Big Insurance, Big Pharma, Big Coal, Big Oil, & Big Nuclear), both parties would prefer a return to the bad old days of the 19th century (though Republicans, being "conservative" and therefore authoritarian, would prefer the pre-Revolutionary days of the 18th century when the lower classes, women, and "coloreds" knew their place).
Both parties and our Nobel Peace President support these endless wars, a global Empire of U.S. bases to protect corporate investments, private businesses robbing us while they "provide" medical care and rape the earth, and tax breaks for these long-suffering corporations and bonuses for their hard-working CEO's.
As for the rest of us, Main Street is on its own. We pay taxes, but our citizens STILL not covered by health insurance or underinsured, our unemployed, our poor and homeless, our public schools, our citizens wanting to attend college, and our infrastructure, can all go to hell.
Without a strong, viable People's Movement (not the corporate-funded Tea Party charade) which takes action to threaten (non-violently, of course) the profits of these corporate murderers and their White House, Congressional, and Supreme Court whores, this pseudo-democratic republic is over.
All the demos, protests, marches, vigils, arrests, petitions, emails, congressional visits, and phone calls in the world no longer matter to the corporate shills who contaminate OUR halls of Congress and OUR public airwaves. They will talk-talk-talk about "caring about us", but FOLLOW THE MONEY. Their actions always reveal for whom they truly work, and those actions are all clearly for corporations and the rich (the President, Congress, the Supreme Court, and corporate media pundits are ALL in that class), NOT for the rest of us.
The ONLY force they understand and fear is that which significantly threatens their profits and funding.
So that is what we must do.
Well said. Not a thing you have stated is untrue. And yes - threatening the elite oligarchy's profits is the only thing they understand.
However, the system is set up so that we can't just "stop enriching" them. Sure, we can grow gardens, ride bikes to work, stop buying crap we don't need. But most of us still need income, and the oligarchy is working hard to make sure that the only jobs left to us "main street" folks are low-paying shit jobs with no benefits. That is what all the "austerity" we are seeing is about, what the tax breaks for corporations who offshore American jobs is all about. The closing of factories, the destruction of unions, the slashing of benefits. To leave the American worker with no options. And by continually raising the retirement age and slashing the payout on Social Security - and, ultimately, to eliminate it entirely - the Right is ensuring that people must work longer, instead of freeing up positions for new younger workers to fill, meaning that the number of shitty low-paying jobs available remains very small. It is all being engineered that way intentionally, so that we serfs must continually be subservient and in need of the few bones the oligarchy throws our way.
RE: "...corporate shills who contaminate OUR halls of Congress and OUR public airwaves."
You nailed it! Contaminate is the operative word. P.T. Barnum must have pissed in the gene pool.
'The ONLY force they understand and fear is that which significantly threatens their profits and funding.
'So that is what we must do.'
Yes, boycotts of goods and services. Worldwide boycotts.
Capitalist Jesus is right. I am getting sick of all the religions including the one I was baptized and confirmed in. Every time I go to church they talk about giving to the poor in some other country, well what about the 120 people that die every day or 4000 a month that die from the lack of health care right here. Where are the churches? are they all republicans? do they not want to help Americans? They want our money but they are no where in sight when we need help convincing the dip shits that watch fox so called news far right propaganda that health care for America is a good thing. I am a christian but I am starting to wonder whether our churches are.
Time to call a spade a spade.
The real plan: slow genocide of 25% of the bottom (i.e. old, disposable, poor, etc) of the population. It's a manufactured malthusian scenario. Time to get out of Disneyland and confront the "New World Order" and its neo-feudal designs.
Must I really illustrate this by bringing up history?
That's how Hitler "solved" the unemployment situation in the 30's: he loaded the trains, and you know the rest of the story.
It doesn't take much to turn people on one another...whether in 1930 Germany
or in Wisconsin.
It's long past time to just arrest these bastards and put them in jail.
Then we can open up an improved Medicare to the whole nation immediately, join the rest of the civilized westernized world in that respect, and get on with other matters.
I get a notice from AARP twice a year. I will not Join because they sold us out on the Prescription Drug Program under Bush II. During this legislation they have been silent. You know that they are trying to cover there jobs and not make wave. All members of AARP should drop there membership and bankrupt them. Thanks for nothing AARP.
How much is an"L - Pill?" It will be easier then fighting with the insurance companies and stress in my older age. If I get something that is priced out of my range. Let just buy an L Pill and be done with it. Sounds crazy but I think our inhumane politicians and rich people would perfer it that way. The Voucher seems more like a slow death.
The people continue to vote into office politicians who are ending Medicare. Tis the will of the people, I suppose.
Oh, but didn't you hear? It's o.k. to vote Democrat, because even though they are money-grubbing paid Corporate whores, too, they aren't AS money-grubbing paid Corporate whores as the Rethugs. That makes it o.k. Didn't you know that?
The last two times I voted, I was given a plastic key card and directed to a touch-screen machine that bore the Diebold logo. Having spent the past 20 years in the computer software industry, I now save a lot of time and gasoline by calling our local election commission to ask if they still use those machines. When the answer is yes, I just stay home... and read about the rise and fall of various empires.
Insurance needs to be re-labled for what it is. Gambling. If you consider an insurance company as being the casino of your choice, and your health care provider as being the croupier, and HMO plans as being the survaillance cameras that keep an eye on everyone then you get the picture. Insurance is an industry that is always betting on the odds. And as is the case with all casinos, they are in it for the money and the house always wins.
Why do they think it's less expensive to do the job AND add profit to the price? Private sector Innovation my rear, insurance is about actuarial matters. There isn't that much low hanging fruit in cutting administrative costs except for out-sourcing.
Boycott the AARP now !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Then Fire the Congress.
And then - never under any circumstance ever again vote for any member of the democratic/republican party.
American Medical Care: For the patient, a tramatic encounter with their own mortality. For everyone else involved, a chance to make a killing by stripping the soon to be corpse of all its worldy goods.