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Obama to Single Payer Advocates: Drop Dead
President Obama's White House made crystal clear this week: a Canadian-style, Medicare-for-all, single payer health insurance system is off the table.
Obama doesn't even want to discuss it.
Take the case of Congressman John Conyers (D-Michigan).
Conyers is the leading advocate for single payer health insurance in Congress.
Last week, Conyers attended a Congressional Black Caucus meeting with President Obama at the White House.
During the meeting, Congressman Conyers, sponsor of the single payer bill in the House (HR 676), asked President Obama for an invite to the President's Marchy 5 health care summit at the White House.
Conyers said he would bring along with him two doctors - Dr. Marcia Angell and Dr. Quentin Young - to represent the majority of physicians in the United States who favor single payer.
Obama would have none of it.
This week, by e-mail, Conyers heard back from the White House - no invite.
Why not?
Well, believe it or not, the Obama White House is under the thumb of the health insurance industry.
Obama has become the industry's chief enforcer of its key demand: single payer health insurance is off the table.
Earlier this week, Obama named his health reform leadership team - Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and Nancy-Ann DeParle.
Single payer advocates were not happy.
Since leaving Medicare, DeParle cashed in as a director at major for profit health care corporations, including Medco Health Solutions, Cerner, Boston Scientific, DaVita, and Triad Hospitals.
Now, what does the health insurance industry make of the Sebelius/DeParle team?
Here is Karen Ignagni, president of the lead health insurance lobbying group, America's Health Insurance Plans:
"Today the President is putting in place a team that is ready on day one to provide the leadership necessary to achieve health care reform. Governor Sebelius is the right person to move the President's health care agenda forward. She is a proven leader with extensive knowledge of health care issues and a long history of working effectively across the political aisle. As a former CMS administrator, Nancy-Ann DeParle brings considerable experience and a strong track record working on all of the health care issues facing the nation."
Karen sounds really upset, right?
Dr. David Himmelstein is a founder and spokesperson for Physicians for a National Health Program.
Himmelstein's take - Obama is caving to the insurance industry.
"The President once acknowledged that single payer reform was the best option, but now he's caving in to corporate healthcare interests and completely shutting out advocates of single payer reform," Himmelstein said. "The majority of Americans favor single payer, and it's the most popular reform option among doctors and health economists, but no single payer supporter has been invited to participate in the administration's health care summit. Meanwhile, he's appointed as his health reform czar Nancy-Ann DeParle, a woman who has made her living advising health care investors and sits on the board of many for-profit firms that have made billions from Medicare. Her appointment - and the invitation list to the healthcare summit - is a clear signal that the administration plans to propose a corporate-friendly health reform that has no chance of actually solving our health care crisis."
Obama to single payer advocates: drop dead.
- Posted in
108 Comments so far
Show AllMaybe it is time for the health care CEO's to take their just deserts before they turn into toxic waste.
Another questionable choice for the Obama administration. Governor Sebelius' own attempt at health care reform in her state was an abysmal failure....
So how much of that 700 million dollar war chest Obama raised came from the healath care industry?
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
Obama would not have been invited to the 2008 AARP-sponsored presidential candidate debates if he supported a single payer system. He will continue to dismiss single payer as he doesn't want to lose contributions from AARP and other members of the medical insurance cartel.
Obama witnessed how far the campaigns of Dennis Kucinich, Nader and other single-payer advocates got without cartel support.
Just sign all constituents up for the same plan and cost that their Senators and Congressional representative have. It will be cheaper than I have to pay for Medicare, Medigap and Part D.
Actually, it is not.
I'm a US govenment worker under the same FEHB plan as the politicians. My contribution from my pay check is about $330 per month. If I got laid off and got the US government eqivalent of COBRA, my mothly payment would be about $1200 per month.
---USAn---
i'll take $330... state of florida... $449/mo... plus... comparable federal wages are higher...
COBRA... it's the same for everyone... and it's only six months... then you're in the open market...
except if you're in a state that has subsidized healthcare for unemployed... i.e.... Pennsylvania circa 2003 used their tobacco settlement monies to fund this... cost... about $30/ month...
COBRA is for a year, and if you're in California, you can get a year of Cal-COBRA. But they go out of their way to NOT tell you about Cal.
Eat your hearts out: I pay $18.00 a month and have never, never, seen one medical bill in my entire life. My doctor sends me to all sorts of specialists for all kinds of tests whenever I have any concerns and I've also had 3 or 4 surgeries.
If I were on welfare, I wouldn't have to pay anything for my health care coverage.
Can you guess where I live?
Your moms basement in Canada?
Ha ha...that's a cheeky question. No, not "freeloading" off anyone.
Worked all my life and am retired now and have my own place. I just feel secure that I have my own doctor and will get proper medical attention and I won't end up homeless if some serious health problem were to arise.
My American friend went through a long, serious health crisis - first her mother got cancer and she nursed her mom for a few years - their health care didn't cover everything - and the family money started dwindling. After her mother died, she came down with a terminal illness and when she died, she was broke and homeless. They used to be a well-to-do family.
That would never happen here.
We are a "we" society; not a "me" society.
p.s. yes, Canada
Yes, the wonderful Obama is rally listening to all the clamor for single-payer on his wonderful change.gov web site, isn't he?
---USAn---
I fear our president is either cowering from the health industry or incapable of making a positive move toward healthcare for everyone. Those in power call the play, and our president has not the power to change things.
He does have the power, just not the guts, or the will. Look what happened to JFK, RFK and MLK, and most Americans still accept the official version of what happened, as they do 9/11. So can't say I blame him. Freedom is for the brave, not cowards, and Americans have surrendered it so Big Brother can keep them safe from dangers that are not real, while allowing the terrorists who live on Wall Street and lobby on K-street to feed on them. People consent to be ruled and are content to live in ignorance, and wonder why their pockets keep getting picked. The Emperor has no clothes, but nobody dares speak out, even when his hand is in their pocket.
Actually, it isn't fear that is driving Obama - as a wealthy elite himself, he is genuinely a friend of the elite interests.
---USAn---
Obama is in their back pocket, otherwise they would have let them hicks assassinate him by now.
Obama knows that much too.
I just hope the powers that be allow him to do some good.
If we are looking for change from within the American capitalist system, we are sorely mistaken. We are barking up the wrong tree.
The whole world must unite before its too late: nuclear war or environmental disaster (mass extinctions due to widespread ecosystem collapses). The signs are there...
Why can't we take the best ideas from every country's constitution and make a world constitution? We make compilations of music all the time, so why not constitutions? The UDHR doesn't count because it was not all inclusive and has never been enforced, nor was it intended to be enforced.
We need to redo humanity, not the mere congress of the USA. Besides, the only way to fix congress is to boot them all out and start over with serious term limits. If you can't get it done in 6 years you weren't meant for the job.
There is... The Earth Charter... It is like the UN universal declaration of human rights...
I do not recall Obama ever saying single payer was on the table, he always seemed to be advocating making insurance available for everyone who can afford it, and making it more affordable, which is a complete loser. I guess those 30 second commercials that people use to make their voting decisions did not make this clear.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpAyan1fXCE
I agree.
It is exactly those commercials that totally mischaracterized single payer in a single dismissive sentence that convinced me that I could not vote for him.
But let's remember, it is not the president who will write any health care legislation, it is congress. HR 676 is a very mature and well-thought out bill. We need to give up on Obama, and push Congress like hell - including serious civil-disobiednet actions in the congressional offices.
We may even need to be able to override an Obama veto.
---USAn---
Absolutely! Obama is president, not dictator-king. The coalition for single-payer cuts across all sections of the US - geographically, economically, ideologically. Let him go on record and veto a single-payer bill.
The best presentation I ever heard about single-payer came from Dennis Kucinich. He had all the numbers and pointed out how it would pay for itself when we weren't paying the insurance industry, including the astronomical salaries of the CEOs.
Finally, if Obama was serious about health care reform, he would have at least considered Howard Dean as secretary of HHS.
I would offer that the plan Obama presented ( well not exactly presented, more hinted at) left 25 million Americans without any health care outside of emergency rooms. This may be an improvement over the current 47 million of us without such care but it aint much of one.
The real issue here is who runs this country and to what purpose? If this nation is run for the profit of the few then I applaud President Obama as doing his job. If it to be run for the general welfare of the citizenry then not so good a job so far.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
This pipe dream that one politician is actually going to do what they say or what they hint they will do has gone on long enough. Please start understanding that the corporations and business people run this country under the name of capitalism, which we have supported by the way, this is what you will get and all you will ever get.
The only shocker in the mix to date is that a Task Force hasn't been appointed to oversee the corporate healthcare profit proliferation. Donna Shalala - Board Member of UnitedHealth Group, Newt Gingrich - consultant to innumerable healthcare corporations, Rudy Giuliani - a shill for Big Pharma, Jeb Bush - Tenet Board Member, Bill Frist - cardiologist and HCA-enriched, Tommy Thompson - the public face of several healthcare operations, etc. --- should be invited to partake of the new opportunities.
At least the grub-fest would be open and transparent.
This article is horse shit. There is absolutely no fact behind it. I suppose such an article is easy to write when you don't sign your name to it.
Tell us the source of this information or save yourself the trouble of writing.
God, has CD turned into Fox News?
well... then maybe you could read this... by...
Daniel P. Wirt, M.D. is a Pathologist, Houston, Texas and member of Health Care for All Texas and member of Physicians for a National Health Program. He can be reached at: boojum@wt.net
Removing the Foxes From the Henhouse
Single-Payer Health Care Reform
By DANIEL P. WIRT, MD
The data and evidence are clear: to a scientific certainty, only a single-payer “Medicare-for-All” system of health care financing will solve the serious cost and access problems and achieve good, affordable health care for all in the United States. As a scientist and physician, this is my conclusion after studying the data for years. The data are voluminous, stretching back to World War II, and come not only from the United States, but from all other industrialized countries. link to article...
http://counterpunch.org/wirt03032009.html
"Competition among the foxes does not benefit the chickens, the patients, the doctors or the hospitals."
To merely scream "greed" isn't enough. The elites are violating fundamental market rules. Institutionalized, criminal greed, taught in the "ivy league" business schools like Harvard. The insurers are practicing cartel collusion by fixing prices. This is illegal and yet it's been rampant in most sectors in the USA since Raygun. But the real problem is that the people have no idea and no care that for example, the market rules they uphold in their daily local exchange, are not honored by the elites. USans are quick to criticize foreign societies for lacking ethics in local exchange but turn a blind eye to their own elites practicing monopoly, cartel and crony capitalism, and worst. They're spellbound.
If you can't tell the difference between Fox News and a progressive news site, then heaven help you. Obama is not some sort of Messiah, nor is he even non-status quo politician except in rhetoric. He has already demonstrated his allegiance to Wall Street interests. He is a servant of the people, not some sort of demigod father of the nation.
Are you hyperlink phobic?
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/
Corporate Crime Reporter
1209 National Press Bldg.
Washington, D.C. 20045
202.737.1680
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
I understand that there will be a choice and that one choice will be medicare. If this is true we will have medicare for everyone in a short time. Howard Dean said this is the way it will go. Am I wrong?
i can't comment directly on your question...
obama's plan... seems to revolve around making the current system... more efficient and cost effective... and mandatory... thus resulting in more affordable premiums... copays... and deductibles...
but it's a flawed design...
health "care" corporations... "lose" money... EVERYtime they pay... ANY claim... and ONLY make more profit... by paying LESS claims...
it's a loser for those who need haealthcare before it even starts...
think about it... the MOST PROFITIBLE HEALTH"CARE" Corporation... would be one... that paid NO claims... EVER... to ANYone... right?
if they only collected premiums... and denied EVERY claim... it would be the purest form of profit... and isn't that why one starts a corporation? to make profit...
i don't care how much profit a auto maker makes... a tv mfgr. makes... or a cruise line company... but when i'm sick... i can't just choose not to be... like i can forego a tv or car purchase...
obama's plan isn't written down yet... i kind of voted with muted silence... because he's kind of shrewd... i think the jury's still out...
like i didn't expect his budget after he got the stimulus... maybe a few months working on the banks and laying a little lower... then WHAMMO... two weeks later... everything but the kitchen sink...
we "may" be seeing "The Shock Doctrine" in reverse... but i'll believe it when i see it - single payer that is...
Mandatory health insurance is like mandatory car insurance... A guaranteed racket that criminalizes poverty...
All insurance should be pay-at-the-pump or pay-at-the-hosital...
Medicare operates with an overhead of only three percent. No other health care facility or provider can make such a claim, thus the choice to expand Medicare to cover all who choose that option seems sane enough. Add the ability to demand competitive drug pricing and we the taxpayer can save again.
By removing the need for companies to provide health care for their employees much money is freed up, some of which can be assessed in a health care tax to fund the expanded Medicare coverage. Companies win, the consumer certainly wins and only the provably inefficient and greedy insurers lose, as they should.
For those who simply resent govt run health care one can always opt out and find private care on ones own.....the wealthy certainly will use that option as they in fact already do, self insured through annuities and such.
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
If anything shows how much Obama is beholden to powerful special interest groups, it is this issue of single payer health care. It's got to be the most important issue in the country right now, and it's a no brainer. Houses are important, jobs are important, a vibrant industry is important, but what's more important than being able to have health care without worry? A person's health is the most important thing he or she has in the physical world. Being assured of health care would do much to ease the spirits of the wretched citizens of this increasingly benighted land. We need a David in the White House to combat the giants that beset us.
GObama!
It's time for everyone who supports single-payer healthcare to stop waiting for and expecting Obama to protect our human rights.
We need to ACT on the moral outrage that is healthcare for profit.
...and oh yeah, Himmelstein rocks.
I'm not sure I want single payer healthcare and this is the reason: I do not do drugs. More specifically, I do not do prescription drugs that the doctors want to shove down my throat to support the pharmaceutical corporations. I have become more and more involved in holistic and naturalpathic cures and find they are much gentler on the body and far more effective.
Case in point: 15 years ago I had gallstones. Eating became tenuous because I never knew what foods exactly would trigger an attack. The doctors wanted to cut my gall bladder. I wanted to keep it. So I went down to my health food practitioners and bought a book on getting the stones out naturally and without surgery. 15 years later I still have my gall bladder and the stones are gone.
I'm afraid that if single payer health care becomes mandated, somehow my choices will be limited. In other words, I expect the pharmaceutical companies to somehow "backdoor" this legislation to keep their pills flowing in the market place.
i too had a physical in '04... cholesterol a little higher than previous year... immediately given script for lipitor... and several warnings... if you get serious pains about the joints and elbows... and... and...
so i humored him... took the script... and filed it... (not fiLLEd)... went to NIH site... was "borderline high"... on the low side...
over the next year i didn't stop eating pizza... bagels w/ cream cheese... or cheap chocolate cupcakes... but made the effort to reduce intake of cholesterol raising foods while eating more fruits and veggies...
12-21% reduction by the next year... NO lipitor. also... new doctor.
another part of the problem is too many people want to whisk thru the CVS drive thru every time they get static cling in their socks... there's a sort of "chic" with some people rattling off their prescription diets...
and these folks can't be mobilized for boring old single payer health without the glitz...
the wall street journal did an exhaustive piece in the late 90's where the big pharmas were looking at the end of their big profit patents... and made an organized and well funded effort to 'advertise their way out' of loss of future revenues... btw... drug patents are just "socialized" medicine for the corporations... patents are just government subsidies for a the few...
but - i do disagree with this on one level... if you're injured severely and need major intensive and immediate care... holistic won't stop the bleeding...
but... if only 25% of the population followed healthy living... would probably put several "health care deny-ers" out of business...
every issue on the table right now... if folks would start VOTING WITH THEIR WALLETS... would have 10 times the impact of any policy decisions...
my comment has it's naitvete... but... sometimes big problems can be broken down in smaller parts...
i mean... if no one's buying the bulllshit... (like now, but because of economic meltdown)... these parasitic corporations GO OUT OF BUSINESS... without one single blogpost... or bought politician...
if you want your ill to be cure by natural way without help of the doctor or drag, you just need not to go to the hospital that's all. it's your choice, doesn't matter it's single payer system or private health insurance.
I'm Japanese and a person who took granted Japan's government run health insurance system, I feel americans are so ignorant about the idea of healthcare system run by the government as simply duty of the government for their own citizens.
I think it because many of the people in advocacy groups themself have not clear idea what it should be to suggest people.
i maybe wrong and I myself don't know clear idea what kind of system they are suggesting.
first of all, why people call "single payer"? is it not government run health insurance system? there is only one government so government run health insurance means single payer isn't it? or is "single payer system" including option as one health insurance company run the system?
in Japan, the system works like this- you pay fixed amount every month to local government office (I don't know how much now, I live in US for 15 years, but when I was there it was like $20/month) and you will have health insurance ID card. when you got sick or something, you go to the hospital (any hospital,any clinic, any dentist of cause) and you get exam or treatment or whatever necessary care, then you pay 15% of cost for the care. (maybe it's more than 15% now, not sure). I never got badly ill, so, I don;t know but I'm sure there is cap for the price I have to pay or some kind of support if the cost got too much for your financial situation.
I think the system of other countries are same more or less, beside of little differences of how much you have to pay or what's to be covered (I mean, like england, covers cost of the transportation sounds little bit too much coverage).
isn't it something like this?
or what?
Complete nonsense. Single payer isn't the demon you claim it to be. All this "personal responsibility" bullshit is just excuse for more of the same. When money can be wasted on wars and doling out more handouts to Big Pharma and Big Insurance, surely a fraction of it can be spent towards single payer. And single payer still gives you plenty of choices. If you can't learn to be pro-choice, then step aside. Besides, a real PRO-LIFER would choose single payer over privatized "care". As for doing drugs, if you still wanna believe that phoney "war on drugs", then be my guest. Besides, 15 years is a hell of a long time and almost any shit can happen in those years. You may be lucky but your "solution" ain't a cookie-cutter.
Actually, your choices will likely be improved under single payer. Right now, insurance companies limit which doctors you can see and which treatments you can use and get paid for them. Of course, to control costs, single payer would have rules too, but less than those imposed by the current system of totally unregulated insurance corporations.
You completely lose me with you idea that single payer would somehow force you to take medications or submit to treatment you don't want. Simply tell the doctor "no", and/or don't fill the prescription.
---USAn---
Hello Faithful,
I understand your fear of the orthodox medical monopoly.
The historical record, however, shows that it is the medicine for profit system which most zealously guards a narrow minded monopoly; and that once the medical system is free of the profit motive it is much more open to alternatives. Germany, for example, is a leader in herbal and homeopathic remedies. German researchers do serious double blind clinical studies on herbs which can never be tested rigorously in the US because the drug companies cannot patent them. And a friend of mine in Berlin does massage therapy and is paid by national health.
Why do we have to fight in Congress to preserve the right to take adequate doses of vitamins? Because the drug companies don't want the competition, and keep key doctors on their payrolls.
Even from the standpoint of alternative health, Single Payer is the way to go.
Hello Faithful,
I understand your fear of the orthodox medical monopoly.
The historical record, however, shows that it is the medicine for profit system which most zealously guards a narrow minded monopoly; and that once the medical system is free of the profit motive it is much more open to alternatives. Germany, for example, is a leader in herbal and homeopathic remedies. German researchers do serious double blind clinical studies on herbs which can never be tested rigorously in the US because the drug companies cannot patent them. And a friend of mine in Berlin does massage therapy and is paid by national health.
Why do we have to fight in Congress to preserve the right to take adequate doses of vitamins? Because the drug companies don't want the competition, and keep key doctors on their payrolls.
Even from the standpoint of alternative health, Single Payer is the way to go.
Where did you get the notion that all doctors on a single payer system want to shove pills down your throat? Where did you get the idea that your choices are limited?
I pay $18.00 a month and have never seen a medical bill in my life. My doctor never forces me (or coerces, or cajoles) to take drugs. We discuss my lifestyle - we discuss options (like lowering blood pressure with diet and exercise, etc.)
I've noticed that the younger doctors have a wholelistic attitude towards health. They ask about your stress levels, about your diet, your mental well-being etc.
My choices have never been limited. My doctor asks if I'd like to see a nutritionist, or a dermatologist, or an internist, etc. - whatever the situation calls for.
I have a thorough annual check-up including all sorts of blood tests. Annual or semi-annual mammograms - and unlimited doctor appointments - all included in the $18.00 a month.
There's been too much misinformation in the USA about single payer healthcare.
I live in Canada. And I don't pay any more taxes than an American in the same financial bracket.
Michael Moore had it quite right in his movie "Sicko".
I fail to see the dichotomy between availability of universal health care and your own preferences for holistic care....
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
FC also rails against women's rights to choose on the issue of abortion. Besides, if in those 15 years, something were to get in the way of FC's progress, FC would have been begging for single payer or maybe not. The bible thumpers can be off the wall.
Ahh thanks for the heads up. Though the position on choice would be obvious from the moniker....
"Most people would sooner die than think, in fact they do so." Bertrand Russell
Murder of an unborn child is hardly in the same league as me wanting to take herbs instead of oil based pharmaceuticals, is it?
Of course, only a liberal could look at a dismembered human body, cut into pieces by a "doctor" and claim "It's really not a baby. It's really not a baby"
Keep repeating that mantra and perhaps soon you won't be able to see the little toes, fingers, etc.
Rember whe he said that he would change Nafta with Canada, then admited in
private that he did not mean it? He only said it to get elected?
the same with auto manufaturers in Canada, the health care system is paid by
the government. In the USA the auto companies have to pay for our healthcare.
Isn't this an advantage to Canada Auto Makers? Isn't this a violation of Nafta?
I don't think so, because it is not an advantage specific to Canadian auto makers; all Canadians enjoy the benefit of "universal health care."