I COULDN'T RESIST THIS!
Dio
PS: If you'd like to leave a comment -- and I encourage you to do so -- simply click on the "number of comments" area, and share your thoughts in the "comment rectangle" that appears.
PPS: We know that there are plenty out there who have stories to tell -- stories of your trying to cope with our dysfunctional healthcare system. Trouble is, we don't know what these stories are! That's where you come in. If you have a story to tell, you can email me at indivisible12401@gmail.com. You can be as anonymous as you like. Thanks!
March 15, 2019
ReplyDeleteDiane Archer on Medicare for All
CounterSpin
DOWNLOAD INTERVIEW: MP3
https://fair.org/home/diane-archer-on-medicare-for-all/?awt_l=EqGfG&awt_m=hciShGaJ82R._TQ
This week on CounterSpin: As a report from the Center for Responsive Politics’ Open Secrets website noted recently, pharmaceutical manufacturers and health insurance companies have a lot of points of disagreement these days—about who’s mainly to blame for high drug prices, for instance. But they agree on something: Medicare for All cannot become law.
Partnership for America’s Health Care Future (PAHCF), a coalition of drugmakers, insurance companies and private hospitals, is lobbying hard to sink the popular proposal, recently introduced in the House by Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D.-Wash.). The coalition has such powerhouses as the AMA and Blue Cross/Blue Shield on its side, and spent some $143 million in lobbying in 2018 alone. On the other side: the growing majority of Americans who think a wealthy country can do better than forcing people to choose between buying insulin and paying rent.
Which side are corporate media on? Well, we’re learning more about that every day. We’ll talk about Medicare for All and the media with Diane Archer—founder and former president of the Medicare Rights Center, she is currently president of JustCareUSA.
MP3 Link
ReplyDeleteJanine Jackson
‘When You Take Healthcare Away From People, People Die’
https://fair.org/home/when-you-take-healthcare-away-from-people-people-die/
“We’re seeing the Trump administration try to go around Congress and do this unilaterally, because they know it’s not something that the American people would allow to happen if it were done in the light of day.”
This is a disturbing new tactic, trying to ram through the dismantling of Medicaid by some sort of executive action, but proponents of that dismantling—which now include Seema Verma, administrator of what’s called the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Service—their argument, or the one they say out loud, anyway, seems basically unchanged.
So this administration has really been doing everything it can to try to dress up its cruel cut-cut-cut agenda with puppies-and-rainbows language that makes it sound like it’s all in service of work.
Now, Republicans in Congress really don’t like when people make the point that you just made, about how when you take healthcare away from people, people die, and lives are literally on the line. But that’s not histrionic, that’s reality, unfortunately, here.
https://truthout.org/articles/establishment-democrats-are-undermining-medicare-for-all/
ReplyDeleteBy
Michael Corcoran,
Truthout
Published March 17, 2019
"The Democratic establishment — deep in the pockets of the health industry — wanted to make sure any blue wave election in 2018 would help sink, rather than support, the growing movement for a single-payer health care system. The recent decline in co-sponsors of the House Medicare for All legislation is, in part, a byproduct of this strategy and a reminder of the great obstacles corporate Democrats have put in front of the single-payer movement."
Full article with a great many details:
https://truthout.org/articles/establishment-democrats-are-undermining-medicare-for-all/
https://mythfighter.com/2019/03/17/medicare-for-all-the-real-stumbling-block/
ReplyDeleteMedicare for All: The real stumbling block Sunday, Mar 17 2019
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
A choice?
Imagine you being forced to choose between your financial devastation vs. sickness or death for your loved ones.
The rich in America already live in such a glorious world, but for most of us, current and future health affordability is an ongoing concern.
Yet, many non-rich Americans oppose even the concept of Medicare for All. Why?
1. It’s unsustainable. Debt fear mongers have been promulgating that myth for at least 80 years.In 1940, when the federal debt was $40 Billion,
the fear-mongers were calling it a “ticking time bomb.
“Every year afterward, they have pounded the same lies into our brains: “The federal government will go broke. It’s “unsustainable.” Your children’s taxes will have to go up.”
Today, the debt is $20 Trillion, and the government has not gone broke, and indeed cannot go broke, and taxes have not risen.
2. It’s socialism. Actually it isn’t. It’s progressivism. Socialism is government ownership and control, not merely government support.
The federal government supports many things: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, poverty aids, education, etc. Shall we eliminate them?
Additionally, we do allow many forms of real socialism: The military, roads, bridges and dams, public libraries, NASA, the VA, etc. Shall we eliminate those, too?
3. It will cause inflation or hyperinflation. Although in the past 80 years, federal debt has risen an astounding 50,000%, inflation has averaged close to the Fed’s 2.5% target.
The reason is that the Fed has tools it needs to prevent and cure inflations, among which is: Control over interest rates.
Raising rates increases demand for the dollar, making it more valuable, so fewer dollars are needed to buy goods and services.
4. We don’t have enough resources. What this really means is: “If the poor start using doctors, hospitals, et al, then there won’t be enough doctors and hospitals for me.”
These objectors believe that a viable health-care system relies on the poor not being able to afford health-care — that “limited” resources should be reserved for the wealthier among us. This is America?
A nation’s resources grow with the money available to pay for them. Funded by a government’s unlimited ability to pay, resources are unlimited.
5. It will take money and jobs from the health insurance industry. Right, just as public transportation takes money and jobs from taxi drivers.
It’s an example of misplaced priorities.
The above are fake reasons, used to conceal the real reason, which is described in the following, brief,
“THE WEEK Magazine” (2/22/19) article says it all,
Despite all the attention tech gets, the biggest five insurance and health benefits companies have greater revenues than the FAANGS – Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google.
The top five health insurers and benefit managers expect &787 billion in revenue for 2019, compared with $784 billion for the FAANGS.
Pharmacy benefit manager CVS expects revenues of $246 billion.
In short, the insurance companies, are massively bribing politicians with campaign contributions and promises of lucrative pay-off employment later. The truth is simply that they don’t want the federal government to offer no deductible insurance at the point of medical care delivery ro you.
OpenSecrets.org also reveals:
One-third of Senate Democrats have cosponsored the Medicare for All Act, which Sanders introduced in September.
Democrats who haven’t cosponsored the bill received 146 percent more money on average from health insurance companies between 2011 and 2016 than those who have ($147,186 to $59,789)
If you’ve been told lies #1 thru #5, there is a good chance the source either is ignorant of economic reality, or has been bribed by the health insurance industry.
Rodger Malcolm Mitchell