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What We Make Our Sisters Do for Healthcare
Sisters, we are allowing great pain and suffering. Sisters, we are doing more than allowing great pain and suffering, we are participating in it. All around us, our moms, our daughters, our cousins, our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends and, yes, our sisters are fighting in quiet desperation against a system so full of greed and corruption that we work to feed the beast stalking us for its next meal.
As I write this, I can almost hear the complaints from those who believe they are not at fault simply because they support a change to the political system or the healthcare system in this nation. We seem to have become a nation of people who confuse concern about an issue with protecting one another - we confuse words with actions. And we teach the lessons to our children over and over again: Actions speak louder than words, as my mom used to say.
A woman I know - an insured woman - was diagnosed with breast cancer about six months ago. She had a double, radical mastectomy on a Tuesday and was back to work the next Monday. Her cancer, they found, had already spread to lymph nodes throughout her body. So, every Thursday for the next year, she will get her dose of chemo, and she'll wait for the devastating sickness to subside soon enough for her to return to work the following Monday. She commutes a long distance every day so she can keep the insurance through her job that allows her to have the chemo and any chance at beating her cancer. Four days sick, three days to work. Every single week. She never mentions the cancer. We cannot speak of it. It might upset her husband and children. She must simply work to pay the piper.
It is brutal. It is awful. This woman's husband owns his own small business and does not carry his own insurance; the whole family must rely on the mom with cancer to gut it out - even until she can do no more - to protect everyone. I hear the stories over and over again. Stiff upper lip and lesson to the kids? Work. Buy insurance. Get cancer. Keep working. Keep buying insurance. Get chemo. Feel awful. Snap out of it. Pour yourself in the car. Drive to work. Suck it up. Work. Work. Work.
There is no compassion and no respite for this woman or thousands and thousands of our sisters in similar situations. We work. Especially when people we love rely on us, we work and we keep going even when it is close to impossible. It is a uniquely American sort of abuse and misuse of women. It's a sort of secret sorority into which we are inducted through the example of the tough women around us and from which we can almost never extricate ourselves. Show one sign of weakness at work or grumble at home, and you will be labeled as a loser.
Yet, did any of the women in our government or any of the women in positions of influence and power who had the chance to fight for women such as these do so during the last round of healthcare debates? No, they did not. And did any of the women loudly supporting the for-profit, private insurance product bailout bill sold as health reform really care to break up the brutal game injuring so many of their sisters around the nation. No, they did not. In fact, some of those who went to work every day for the powerful folks who will benefit from this most recent bail-out bill did so while gutting it through situations similar to the woman I know.
We live with a healthcare system that is largely selfish, greed-driven, money-hungry and brutal to almost every person with an illness - unless that person has care secured a way to survive and afford care while someone else close to them works or unless they have access to care through Medicare, Medicaid, the IHS or the VA. And even in some of those settings, providers are very hard to find and some care little about the wellness of the patient and a lot about the healthy profits.
Check out the status of most insured Americans' health and you'll find some shocking, but predictable realities. Teeth get pulled not fixed. People take OTC meds to avoid the healthcare system and its costs. Symptoms needing attention are ignored until the symptoms become insistent. Parents find ways to get kids to care whenever they care, but many still go without basic services.
And nothing we did in the current Congressional cycle changes up the reality for most of us beyond forcing us to purchase the defective product that leaves so many women driving to work through the pain, through the nausea and through the fear of an illness because we've offered no other options besides pumping up the profits instead of throwing out the abusers.
People are tired of talking about it right now. They want to move on to the war or the oil spill or the unemployment rate or the green jobs issue or poverty or any other of the many problems we have to face together. But it seems to me that the poor example we just set when it comes to healthcare reform effort would lead one to know our ability to protect and defend much of anything is suspect. If we are not our sister's keepers, then who are we?
Moms. Wives. Sisters. Friends. Companions. Neighbors. Do we care how awful the struggle? Enough to act on their behalf? Or do we simply care enough to give of a few hours a day to hear ourselves talk about our own brilliance in terms of policy and politics? When will our sister's pain be enough to motivate us to contact someone in her community to challenge a doctor, a provider or two, a neighborhood and a community to care for her and embrace her family so she does not have to struggle so? When will we advocate for others enough to truly help them through and make the common struggle so commonly owned that the solutions will have to be commonly embraced and won together? Or are we so selfish that isn't even possible?
Help a sister today. Lift her load today. Make another person accountable today. Make yourself accountable to lift the burdens of someone who is hurting. Maybe a transformation of this sort can also leaven the rising of greater humanity within our society so that the next time we cry, "Everybody in, nobody out," the response from within our communities will be a resounding, "Of course."
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Show AllDuring the Obamacare coup, the president kept telling us how most Americans like their employer-sponsored medical insurance. This assertion was based on a choice between what we have and no insurance coverage...single-payer, public options, etc. were not included in the choices.
Obama also kept telling us that a public option was needed to keep insurance companies honest. Has Obama yet told us how we will keep insurance companies honest now that he made sure the public option vanished ?
Obamacare has further entrenched employer-sponsored medical insurance and further empowered insurance companies.
Public option was included until it was actually dropped or at least that's what I thought. I remember the media doing polls on whether people want the government stepping in to help them on health care and used that to say that public option was fine. Now I realize that even that public option wasn't even for real because the insurance companies still had a say. If they had kept the public option in that bill, I might have been still foolish to accept what passed.
Oh, Donna!
You articulate the problems in our fundamentally immoral health care system so well--but then when it comes to offering a solution, you have nothing to suggest but individual acts of charity?
Donna, that's exactly what the followers of Milton Friedman and Ayn Rand and Ronald Reagan and George Bush and other extreme right wingers would have us do. Not to mention their so-called progressive partners, such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
And you hope this idea of the poor helping the poorer will somehow cause a groundswell of support for a single payer system "next time"? NEXT time? When will this mythical "next time" come, anyway? Ten years? Twenty years? Never?
There is absolutely no hope without some kind of organized national resistance movement to put an end to this injustice once and for all. Little acts of charity will simply take focus off of the corporate criminals and the bought-and-paid-for elected officials who maintain this corrupt health insurance empire, and this misdirected effort will only delay the time that anything changes.
Your article has depressed me even further, I am sorry to say. I am one of the people who is desperately trying to hang onto my health insurance in spite of soaring rates, but I don't know how much longer I can do it. I have not been able to work very much for the past two years due to illness, and my savings are running out. Sure, there are people who help me out from time to time--but that is in no way a substitute for real health care support that is an entitlement in this country, something that you do not have to feel any guilt about. Little acts of charity are just that--little--and they do not have the significance or staying power of health care rights. I am tired of fighting every day to keep the minimal coverage I have; I am tired of feeling guilty about the sacrafices of those who diminish their own small resources to help me out from time to time. My god, this is agony.
North Star, I'm sorry for your pain! I'm also ill with a chronic sickness, and have no insurance. If I go to the doctor when the pain gets unbearable, I receive less than no support, painful and invasive testing, and worse advice than I can give myself. I have periods when I cannot work, and thus I am self-employed in my own limited capacity. Human Beings should not be forced into restrictive poverty and shame because of illness when our science and medicine is so thorough and competent for people with money and insurance. Don't feel guilty, though! It's not your fault, and the people that help you love you, or would not help at all. Being a little poorer is nothing to poor people when someone we love is in need of our help. Guilt is illness, as well as a barrier to wellness. You are not alone in your situation, there are billions of people suffering along with you, it's the medical system that is broken, not you.
I am sorry for your pain, and North Star's pain and all the people in the world that have to suffer because of this creeping fascism.
Stop working and stop letting doctors give you painful and invasive tests. Stop letting bureaucrats (who should have a red light over their doors as the insurance company prostitutes they are) deny that chronic pain sufferers are in pain.
Well insured people get good care and treatment, not pain and suffering.
The Underinsured, or people with insurance claims and veterens get things like electromyography which could only be thought up by a country that likes torturing people.
Imagine being a chronic pain patient and having to let electric shocks be put in your most painful areas to "Test" if there really is a problem!
To satisfy the sadistic creeps at the insurance company and HMO's.
Thats what it is like for the underinsured because they automatically assume that you are lying to get benefits!
TO HELL WITH THEM
Apply for disability and when they call you a drug addicted alcoholic maligerer
Get a Lawyer! Don't give up.
Then don't participate in this sick system any more.
Get rid of the banks and the credit cards and the insurance companies.
Kill your TV, stop consuming and Get off the grid.
And remember, we are all going to get sick and die, so don't spend the last years fighting bureaucrats and sitting in waiting rooms so that more money can be made off of your body being used like a pod in the Matrix!
Spend your time with your loved ones instead.
Look into Natural Medicines.
Work less - live more fully.
"Get a lawyer" is easier said that done. Lawyers work for money, or for publicity that will lead to opportunities to work for money. "Get on TV" is better advice.
I beg to differ!
Lawyers work for a cut of the final settlement that you would probably not get from an insurance company unless you are really savvy.
Getting on TV and expecting to be treated with respect is like going to Hell and expecting a nice hot tub!
PP might have a point though. When is the last time you got a lawyer who wasn't too expensive? The good lawyers of the past have been replaced by the greedy corporate versions today.
I agree that lawyers charge alot. However, I know some lawyers and they are not as greedy and evil as the propaganda has made them out to be. It is better to spend money than get the bum’s rush which is given to anyone who goes up against an insurance company without one.
Social security disability is not an "entitlement" (welfare) it is an INSURANCE program which is paid for with the money taken out of our paychecks or in taxes.
It is the misconceptions about lawyers and about how the system works that keeps people from advocating for themselves; and many chronic pain patients might just think they couldn't afford a lawyer when they can't afford not to have one.
I thought PP's advice was wrong and anyone who has been in serious disabling chronic pain should get a lawyer without hesitation. So should Donna's friend with cancer.
I wouldn't bother going through the pain of checking back to see my posts if I hadn't been through hell and back and I want people like the two chronic pain posters here make a free call to a lawyer and find out their rights right away.
(By the way I am not a lawyer and have no ulterior motive for posting the advice)
RG, thanks for clarifying and I have nothing against lawyers either. It is true that often times, not having one costs one more than having one.
Yeah, the way this system works sometimes you just need a lawyer. I got fed up with all the "Lawsuit Hell" headlines and talk about "frivilous" lawsuits in the media a couple of years ago during the Bush reign because it was all propaganda to cap insurance settlements and privitize social security... And demonize lawyers who are the group that advocate for people so they can keep the money and services they have paid for. Thats the system we have now and its a system that is corrupted by fraud in every sector. But only some lawyers (and only some doctors) are corrupt - they are like people everywhere. In my experience lawyers were more honest than doctors. The insurance racket is systematically corrupt; and it is a catalist for more corruption to spin off it (Like the prescription drugs that are pushed on everyone who goes to the HMO's). It's easier and more profitable to give a patient an antidepressent than take the time to listen to them, which might lead to better care. Although I'm sure there are ethical insurance adjusters and employees - but it's mostly a racket.
You would be surprised about the people in the media talking about "frivolous lawsuits". Those same people had no qualms and a few of them even made it clear that they don't mind corporations suing regular people for millions. For example, Orrin Hatch would complain about patients suing doctors but defended music companies suing P2P users millions of dollars. They also don't mind doing it themselves. For example, former Senator Trent Lott tried to enact tort reform dozens of times, but after Hurricane Katrina, found himself with thousands of other Gulf Coast residents whose only remaining recourse was through the courts after insurance companies refused to pay claims. The Democrats successfully filibustered GOP attempts to cap punitive damages in 2003, or was it 2004. Even the Wall Street Journal had a few articles on the usually cozy relationship Republicans actually have with trial lawyers, corporate to be exact. I figured that like the anti-abortion people, the anti-lawsuit people don't really want to get rid of it but privatize it like everything else and use it as another "populist wedge issue" to keep their pots stirring. As for the doctors preferring to give pills instead of doing actual care, true. The good news though is that there are alternative practitioners out there who usually don't tie themselves to the insurance companies or big drug companies as cassandra has mentioned before. The bad news though is they can be hard to find and someone mentioned before that they don't get obvious listings in the phone books and rarely get to advertise elsewhere.
True,
Far more frivilous lawsuits - notably SLAPP lawsuits against activists, are pursued by corporations than individuals.
"Social security disability is not an "entitlement" (welfare) it is an INSURANCE program which is paid for with the money taken out of our paychecks or in taxes."
It is an insurance program whose funds are used to support troops in Afghanistan to the tune of one million dollars a year each in their mission to kill innocent people who had nothing to do with 911, funds which are replaced by pieces of paper called "special bonds".
While I fully agree with a great part of your comment, Donna wasn't asking for individual charity for her friens, she was asking for actions of solidarity with her friend - in the manner of West Wirginia mineres in early days. If the bosses abused one union organizer, the whole mine would walk out - even if it meant the entire workforce being locked out and fired.
But there was something else the miners had - they had guns, and were skillful in using them.
"She doesn't always site her full political program..."
Its "cite" her full political program.
Do poeple nowadays don't know the differnce between:
site,
sight,
cite?
Thanks for this article, Donna. What a loving and responsible point of view!
Employer based health insurance is the root of the problem.
When the insurance companies took over the healthcare system and started telling doctors how to treat patients (and how much they could charge) the insidious under belly was that with all the perks of employee "benefits" we were actually entering Dracula's castle voluntarily and could then be spellbound. Tied to our jobs while we work to pay for the corrupt Healthcare that is not "caring" or "healthy" we become sicker and then find out what the system is really like.
When I cared for my mother who had Alzheimer's I worked several part time low wage jobs with no insurance so I could be with her. During this time I had a spinal injury and the HMO doctors refused to order diagnostic tests and treatment because I was underinsured.
When I finally got a job with insurance I was working just to keep my health insurance like the woman in this story.
I know what it is like to be in such agonizing pain that all you can do is work and nothing else. I know what it is like to come home Friday and not be able to get out of bed till Monday morning and then do it all over again. Work to pay the doctors and the co-pays and the minimum payments on the credit cards for the medications and "treatment" not covered. Paying over 100 dollars a bottle for medication that makes you sick but allows you to sit at a desk in front of a computer for 9 hours a day with an undiagnosed spinal injury. Then get put in collection anyway by the doctors and HMO's.
I had back surgery as an out patient because I could not afford the co-pay for a hospital bed - and had no one to care for me after the surgery because my husband had to go to work. When I filed a complaint to the Board of Medical Examiners they investigated me.
Do not serve them. Do not let the vampires take your life blood. Insurance is for things not people.
Human beings deserve Healthcare.
REVENGE: Thank you for sharing your story. I guess it explains your screen name? I never had a major illness, but as a single Mom, there were times I had flu or a very bad cold and I still had to get the daughters up and to school, still had to make sure there were meals and that the household ran smoothly. In Oriental countries the female served everyone and took whatever was left on the plate for herself. That's how women were trained for centuries. Its remnant is still very much with us, not to mention embedded into the system. How cavalier of a few men in this forum to protest. Their lack of sensitivity (for anything to do with women) is blinding. And they'll be the first ones to say equality has now been established in the homeland insecurity state of the anything but free, brave... or aware.
Hi Siouxrose,
I picked this name in the middle of the Bush Cheney reign and it still comes in handy. I like to tell my story because I want people to know about this stuff.
I grew up in an extended (if disfunctional) family where elders and children were taken care of by every member of the family.
The problem today is that everyone is overworked and underpaid, sometimes working several jobs without healthcare, so it usually falls upon the women to drop out of the work rat race and be the caregiver. This keeps women in lower wage jobs, and means that when we age there will be less money when we get old and need it.
We care for elders and children and their children too; and also have to work. I get the feeling that everyone in the USA, except the wealthy few, is really exhausted from all this and we're at the point that the USA has killed the Goose that laid the golden egg - it's workers.
"Equality" doesn't mean equal access to servitude!
REVENGE: I'm with you! Our society is a care-less society. It throws people away, it boasts about its love of family, but then does little to help Mothers with small children or aging relatives. The Indigenous understood the importance of the extended family as do many ethnic groups. Given the economics of our times, more people will be forced to share homes; and perhaps the elderly will watch the little ones as too many Mothers will be forced into the workplace.
I made the decision when my children were young to stay home. I began writing articles and tutoring students; and while the income was marginal, we always had a roof over our heads. One of my daughters has turned to the corporate world as she was the only one of her crowd not to be gifted with a brand new car at age 16. I never had a new car in my life, and besides, I think things are better appreciated when one works to earn them.
The collapse of the Western paradigm of wealth based on ceaseless extractions of "Natural Capital" is underway. It's unfortunate that so much treasure was squandered on soldiers and weapons, as now, all those deadly toys may be used to try to maintain order precisely when it's all coming apart. We will need to be kind to one another... to survive.
Unless the rich start feeling the same pain as the poor, nothing will change. Refuse to give blood and refuse to donate organs. The rich need our body parts and fluids to survive their own illnesses. DO NOT GIVE IT TO THEM! They will beg, plead, promise, threaten, but don't give in. When enough drop over dead cause the workers won't bleed for them anymore, they will be forced to change things. Don't moralize this away, just do it. Refuse to participate in this hollow sham of a health care delivery system.
hm, withholding blood and organs... isn't that just playing into the same stinginess routine that the insurance companies use?
on the other hand, let's say that you are fairly consistently a compassionate and generous person, and that you are also an organ donor. Upon your death, the recipient of your organ(s) will also receive your compassion and generosity.
They've actually done studies on personality changes caused by receiving a donated organ... One woman received the heart of someone who was deeply in love and had died just before getting married. The recipient (and those around her) noticed that that post-transplant, she had a not-so-subtle personality change and was noticeably happier and in love with life.
Not that I'm advocating that you give up an organ you are currently using for someone with alot of money. :-) But... compassion and generosity are powerful antidotes, and especially in need now...
Hmmm. I'm not so sure. I have a kidney for sale, priced at a low, low five million dollars. I charge the same rate for bone marrow donations. A lung will cost you $20 million.
"They" all ready thought of that scenario. That is why what you describe is big time illegal.
Everybody In Nobody Out, no other way will work.Thanks Donna some day the U.S. will join the community of Humane nations who care for their own,and the least amongst themselves.
WE must become a compassionate community to support each other.It may take years to change the way we access paid medical care,but free help and hospice and neighbors helping neighbors is what can work now.
Reach out in the darkness and you may find the light.
peace
Feminist drivel bullshit. If Donna wanted single payer health care, she should have supported Ralph Nader for president instead of Obama. It's funny how most feminists voted against their own interests by picking Obama or Mccain because of Palin while I voted Nader. Health care is dead. Finding something better to write about.
If an article only talks about mothers and sisters while leaving out fathers and brothers, wouldn't you agree that the article is biased?
If that is how she does business, then I am not surprised that her own son went to Afghanistan to fight. In an earlier article, http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/02/16-0, she wrote about worrying about her own son speaking against health care for all while rooting for serving. If Donna had been opened her audience to both men and women, her own son wouldn't have gotten the wrong impression and he would have joined her in saying Health care, not warfare. I saw her sight and I think she is taking a flawed approach. A poll not too long ago showed that among supporters of single payer health care, the majority was women. We need strong and equal support from both genders.
i would be willing to donate some funds towards a local healthcare system based on the Cuban model of healthcare.
If there were a group of doctors and nurses willing to start a prototypical clinic like that in a small town, and label it "local single payer prototype" - progressives around the US could fund it. Start with one center, and if it worked, it could spread and eventually be funded by towns and counties.
Since the Federal Gov't is out to lunch, we need to come up with alternate small plans that, if successful, could go viral.
Anyone else have some ideas?
Esabi,
You seem like a very generous and good-hearted person.
The problem with these "start small" ideas is that they are impacted by the economic conditions in our local communities now, and I don't know any place that is not suffering. In California, for example, we are actually cutting back on services to Medicare recipients and the poor, due to budget problems.
And we have had a few free medical care clinics in our state in recent years--one was held in Los Angeles--but they only last for a week at the most and then leave town. If they could stay on, I think they would already be doing so.
I think we need a real activist challenge, like a national strike or a national health care workers strike to have any hope at all...
Donna Smith's remarks are, without question, true! I met with Colorado US Senator Bennet yesterday to discuss the lack of cost reduction strategies in the Affordable Care Act. Without cost containment the health care reform effort has been an exercise in futility. I pointed out to the senator that as long as people like Cigna CEO, H. Edward Hanway, make $28.82 million annually, and McKesson Medical CEO, Hammereren, make $34,372,037.00 annually, and Wyeth CEO, Bernard J. Poussot, make $21,357,397.00 annually, and DaVita Dialysis CEO Kent Thiry, make $34,800.000.00 annually, to mention only a few, health care will continue to be unaffordable. Senator Bennet responded, "I've been told that even if we did include cost containment provisions we would only save 5% of overall costs." This is nonsense and this is the kind of propaganda our federal elected officials foist upon us day after day. There are too many women and men in similar situations Ms. Smith describes. Such situations have become the rule rather than the exception. www.innovativestrategies.us
As far as I can tell Obama-care was primarily just another bailout to big business. The private health care business model as practiced in this country just does not work. That has been proved in country after country. It was just a bailout to keep an unsustainable industry going for a bit longer.
Other countries do use private insurance companies in their universal systems, but they are heavily regulated. Saying that we would only save 5% of overall costs flies in the face of reason. If it would only save 5% why did the insurance companies fight it so bad, while other countries embrace it.
I really like Donna's writings on the health care issue, but this article really had me puzzled. Why make it sexist by titling it "What We Make Our Sisters Do for Healthcare". That seemed odd to me. Does that mean if I wrote a similar article, because I'm a man I should entitle it "What We Make Our Brothers Do for Healthcare?".
I'd like to think we're all in this together. Dividing us little folk by sex, race, sexuality, etc. is one of the tricks the powers that be use to keep us weak. IMHO we should avoid using that tactic on ourselves.
NC: There is a demographic of women who are still caring for their nearly grown children as their own parents begin to decline. Culturally speaking, the care of the young and the old tend to fall on the shoulders of women. And because it so frequently is Mom who makes the meals, cleans the house, gets the kids to school, (while now also working full time)... if MOM is not feeling well, she may not be able to take off from those expected duties to heal herself. That is the essence of Donna's point. Very often the female is the caregiver in any family, and how can she provide that care for others when her own body (and maybe mind and soul) is slowly dying? That is the issue Donna asks her readers to empathize with. Sure, plenty of men have to work to maintain their health insurance/benefits, too; however, the general dynamics are different (in terms of demands at home).
I think many in this forum would favor a single payer system. The benefits have been delineated many times, and one poster (Ubrew?) pointed out that a hidden area of savings would have been that we'd pay less car insurance (for injuries), or workman's comp (for injuries) because all medical needs would be covered without any insurer deciding if it would diminish company profits or his own CEO bonus.
Points taken. But IMHO an article entitled, "What we make our families do for healthcare", where women's plight was explained, and maybe a MENTION of men who have to take care of wives in failing health, for example, might have been a better way of going at it. Again I think Donna does a great job in her articles, I just hate to see the fragmenting of whites, blacks, men, women, etc in discussions of things like healthcare, which cross all racial, and sexual lines.
And yes your second paragraph is spot on. There would be savings all over the place with Single Payer. Maybe in another 15, or 20 years single payer will come up again once it is realized that Obama-care is too expensive, because as Winston Churchill once said, "You can always trust the Americans to do the right thing after they have tried everything else first..."
NC: I agree with all the points you made, and appreciate your polite response. Women's issues often are distinct from those of men. For instance, insurance pays for Viagra, but not birth control. The metrics of our society still bend to favor those who once owned ALL the power. However, given the awful realities of our times, it's true (and KIVALS is one who always respectfully points this out) that more power would extend to "the people" if they could transcend their separate issue-areas and work together to somehow dislodge this nation of corruption in high places. Ultimately, I believe this will happen; and I am one who believes that nature's cycles and universal law will play into this eventual outcome. Getting there will NOT be a soft, gentle ride.
I understand and appreciate what you are saying, and as always, thanks for your thoughtful posts.
This is what make HCR such a vicious lie.
It mandates that every one participate in the for profit insurance system except for those too poor to pay tribute.
Even the so called subsidies and tax relief go into the pockets of the insurers and we are all supposed to celebrate that they get to skim only 20% off the top. They'll maybe pay the other 80% to the "greedy" doctors, nurses and hospitals if they jump through enough hoops and wait long enough.
Shame on you Barack Obama.Anyone regardless of party who voted for this rape deserves to lose his or her seat.
It is unconstitutional for people to be forced to buy something.
Obama shoud know this. He talked about health insurance like we were all insuring our cars. But people can decide not to own a car, or not to drive. We all have a human body and we are all going to get sick and die. We have no choice in that.
So the insurance sponsored profit seeking healthcare is just a racket.
Making this kind of profit off the bodies of individual human beings is parasitical.
It serves no purpose except to enrich the corporations. It does not keep health costs down. It does not put "all the healthcare under on roof." That is the lie that made all the non profit hospitals go out of business in favor of the rackets thay call HMOs. Now you must pay cash for a doctor that is not bought by the system.
It makes doctors afraid to talk to their patients about more than one health problem per appointment for fear of not pleasing their HMO CEO and the bottom line. That is the reason Medicare costs are so high.
Insurance is the sickness in the system and must be purged.
We're forced to buy many, many things. We're forced to pay for police protection, the potential services of the fire department, public education, the military, etc. The fact that we pay for those things through taxes rather than directly, seems pretty irrelevant. I don't object to being required to pay for health insurance. I object to being required to pay for really bad and really overpriced health insurance hawked by people who's primary objective is to get wealthy by finding ways of not paying for needed procedures.
I agree that the empire demands tribute in many ways, but my point is that there is something sick about forcing someone to insure their body. That's why I say that insurance should be for things not people. The only thing we should have for human life is Health Care. That's why we should stop talking about "Insurance for all" and call it "Healthcare for all" no insurance company involved - phase them out of the healthcare system.
Your last point about the over priced and inadaquate care is correct. This has gotten worse with HMO systems rather than better. The profit motive has allowed the business man in the room with you and your doctor and you are sometimes not the most important entity in that room.
There's no way we're gonna get single payer on the federal level or on a state level since states are prohibited from doing so but a more thorough check on any rules against local single payer doesn't show any restrictions there. I wouldn't expect Virgina Beach to pass local single payer but most counties all over the country should have no problem trying that out. I mean if we can't get a national or statewide, at least start with our cities, towns, and counties for a change. Maybe later something can be done about the states. Better yet, since the ban on states is less than 10 years, if more cities, towns, and counties do it systematically before then, then by the time that federal ban expires, we'll have a better shot at statewide single payer in many states and eventually get some kind of a national agreement among the states on single payer like Canada.
That's all nice talk and you know we have a shitty health care system but why bother talking about it? You voted for Obama and you'll do it again in 2012 and then write another 4 years of sad stories. We ain't gettin single payer health care anyway so enjoy making money writing sob stories while keeping the system running. You should have voted for people like Perot and Nader who woulda changed the system. Enjoy Obamacare.
not fair. what is this "vote" thing you speak of? do you think we are living in a democracy? don't blame the people. we are being occupied by a corporatocracy, and we never voted for it. we do not have votes in this country.
Hey, I lived in South Carolina all these years as a lower middle class worker and I had no problem voting my conscience. The people had their chances but they chose to blow it and surrender it to the corpirates. Howard Zinn voted for Ralph Nader. Why couldn't the author? Obama had no plans on supporting health care for all but Nader did. Donna still believes that we can beg the bozos in Washington to listen. We have the votes. Most of you chose to screw up again and then cry about it. Obama showed us that he was a conservative while Nader was a progressive but who did most progressives vote for? Obama of course. Complain all you want like Donna but you voted for it and I'm tired of apologists for the status quo.
Frederick: I am fairly certain you post here using a number of names. However, the objection I wish to raise with you is that of your utter lack of compassion. Donna has been on the front lines of this health care fight for years, and her own family has suffered directly from the corrupt health insurance behemoths. So what if she voted for what she took for the lesser of evils? Jesus was very clear about the dangers of being judgmental about things like this... the lesson of take the board away from your own eyes looms large. Donna probably sees through Obama now. He was the best PR stunt the nation's put on in decades.
When anyone in this forum tries to discredit someone who's seeking to make a real difference by relating the fact that they voted for Obama, it seems like an insidious way to totally erase the value of the work that individual is doing. That makes me question YOUR motives. Or as the apologists for the status quo in this forum like to say, "What are YOU doing to make any positive changes happen in our crashing empire?"
"I am fairly certain you post here using a number of names."
You aren't certain about anything. You're damn wrong about who I am. I only post once in a while when I feel like it. Just who else do you think I post as? You don't know jack shit about what you're talking about. I'm my own self and nobody else.
"However, the objection I wish to raise with you is that of your utter lack of compassion. Donna has been on the front lines of this health care fight for years, and her own family has suffered directly from the corrupt health insurance behemoths."
Hey lady. I voted against the health insurance bastards while Donna voted to keep them in place so she could keep complaining for a living. Where were you when Ross Perot and Ralph Nader were trying to help? Campaigning for Obama?
"So what if she voted for what she took for the lesser of evils?"
How come you attack anyone who admits to voting for Obama but you defend someone in the media like the author? She fought against single payer by voting for Obama. Don't you Obama apologists get it?
"When anyone in this forum tries to discredit someone who's seeking to make a real difference by relating the fact that they voted for Obama, it seems like an insidious way to totally erase the value of the work that individual is doing."
Get it straight lady. She chose to erase the value of her own work by voting for the status quo. That's the truth and if telling it is a crime, bite me.
"That makes me question YOUR motives. Or as the apologists for the status quo in this forum like to say, "What are YOU doing to make any positive changes happen in our crashing empire?""
I know you Obama apologists very well and I meet them all the time in the black neighborhoods and rich white neighborhoods too. Nice try but I ain't fallin for your bait. You voted for it so take your punishment. I'm already retired and survived hell.
I agree, there was ample evidence that Obama was going
to be the shill that he is, anyone that has followed
American polictics and voted for either Obama or McCain,
should be apologizing to the rest of us not scolding us.
20 years and people supported the duopoly. You should change your name. You're much better than that.
FREDERICK: You sure know how to conflate absolutely separate issues! I am HARDLY an Obama apologist. I despise his policies and while we all expect politicians to impeach their own words/integrity, in this case, the betrayal of the public's good will is way over "the line."
I am defending the worthy acts of a human being who IS fighting for better health care. Many are caught inside a system that allows no true options, politically. If Donna had voted for Nader would that have changed the current paradigm? Slowly we see lots of published (and as a writer, I can tell you, it's VERY tough to get one's stuff published these days as the "gatekeepers" maintain a strict control over subject matter. They also control access, apart from the Internet) writers recognizing the degree to which they have been sold out by having voted for the Democrat instead of the Republican. I have seen some in this forum condemn Dave Lindorff, David Michael Green, Normon Solomon and others. These individuals thought that it would be suicide to risk someone like John McCain or Ms. Palin taking high office. Very few could have believed that the same egregious policies of the Bush Junta would remain the rule of the land. The sell-out of the greater good is now too evident for ANY to miss. The times are RIPE for a 3rd party leader who could "magnetize" the disaffected from both parties, along with natural greens and independents.
Pouncing on top of Donna Smith with blame and anger is insensitive and unfair. Are YOU out on the front lines doing anything to risk your life or reputation? Let he who is without sin among you cast the first stone.