Americans Should Not Stand for Lock-down on Single-Payer Discussion

[babylonsister]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/02/06-13

Americans Should Not Stand for Lock-down on Single-Payer Discussion

by Laura Bonham


snip//

The U.S. already spends far more on healthcare than any other nation; yet with all our power and treasure, we are the lone wealthy industrialized nation that does not ensure healthcare for all of our citizens. Fifty million Americans are currently uninsured, and twenty two thousand of those Americans die every year because they do not have access to healthcare.

Meanwhile, CEOs of healthcare corporations earn $3.3 million to $22.2 million in salary per year, paltry amounts compared to their stock options. When a CEO earns $1.6 billion in stock options ("Business 2006: Who Won, Who Lost," Associated Press, December 2006), who loses? The average American, that's who—the people who are dying, getting sick from lack of preventative care, facing bankruptcy from medical bills, losing their jobs and their homes. They are Americans who can't afford "health insurance" and certainly can't afford large contributions to senatorial, congressional, and presidential campaigns.

These CEOs and their corporations have senators like Max Baucus (D-MT) in their pocket. Baucus flatly refuses to even discuss single-payer as an option. The time to take this option off the table is after an honest debate of the pros and cons of HR 676, not before.

So why does the lock-down exist? Could it be because many members of Congress and the Senate are dependent on healthcare corporations for contributions to their election campaigns? HR 676 is a simple elegant solution to what ails us. Congress appears hell-bent on creating a complicated and convoluted program, which won't work because it includes for-profit healthcare corporations as the centerpiece.

All evidence suggests that the majority of Americans want single-payer healthcare, that it would be good for all businesses (with the exception of the healthcare corporations), and that it would stimulate the economy. HR 676, if passed, would create a far more affordable and sustainable system than the current alternatives, which basically puts the healthcare corporations on the public dole and includes mandates that force people who already cannot afford insurance to buy it.

If there ever was an opportune moment for guaranteed healthcare for all, now is that moment. Too bad our elected officials refuse to do what they were elected to do—represent us, instead of the interests of the very powerful and wealthy healthcare corporate lobby. Let your member of Congress know that single-payer healthcare/Medicare for all should, at the very least, be an option that should be discussed. While you're at it, give Max Baucus a call.


Laura Bonham is the Deputy Director of Progressive Democrats of America, a convening organization of the Leadership Conference for Guaranteed Healthcare.

[bertman]

1. Recommend. Thanks for the post, babylonsister.

[Dragonfli]

2. K&R

Thanks for posting this.
The truth must be repeated liberally.

[w4rma]

3. Blame for this entire situation should be laid at the feet of the Clintons who created HMOs.

And now they are entrenched.

[eridani]

4. That's bullshit

HMOs have been around since Kaiser and Group Health. Those, however, are NON-PROFIT HMOs. Clinton actually did nothing at all about health care, except that the insurers were bothered enough by the threat of possible reform that they figured out their own way to temporarily slow down the cost increases until people quit griping and the tech bubble started expanding.

[w4rma]

7. No, the Clintons insisted on private managed health organizations from the beginning.

They've never supported single-payer. Rockefeller Republicans.

[eridani]

11. That was my point. Hillary secretly developed her plan with big insurers

Smaller insurers hated it, and with no buy-in from those members of the public interested in doing something about health care (just about all of whom favor single payer except the lobbyist whores for insurance companies), there was no mass movement to defend it. Therefore the Clintons were not able to do anything. However, whenever there is a move toward even incremental reform, insurance companies get worried enough to try to hold the rates down a little. Never lasts.

[w4rma]

14. Oh. I think I understand your point, now. Thank you for clairifying. (nt)

[babylonsister]

6. You are full of poop. Read up on what happened before you

lie. Jeebus, did you think you'd get away with your accusations, on DU?

[w4rma]

8. No lies. (nt)

[Jakes Progress]

10. They do love those republican lies, don't they?

Makes you wonder who they are.

[wolfgangmo]

12. HMO's - the clintons? Nope.

You are thinking about Nixon.

But I can see how you got them confused. They look so alike?

[Joe Bacon]

16. HMOs were created under Nixon!

SICKO shows how Nixon and his gang hatched the scheme with the Kaisers to blunt Kennedy's Single Payer proposal.

[azul]

5. There seems to be no shame or consequences to getting wealthy

on the misfortune and deaths and financial ruin of sick people. As sicko openly established.

Also no pitchforks and torches for the businesses and people who poison people to make them sick.

The helpless public is getting the 1-2 punch from this circular racket.

[Jakes Progress]

9. I can't think of a thing that would be

a bigger boon to business than a single payer system. US companies have to compete with foreign companies who do not have this cost in their pricing. It would especially be a boon to small businesses and to those who want to start businesses. I know several people who have good ideas for starting a good business or service, but cannot afford to leave their jobs that provide insurance for their family.

No one but insurance companies get anything of value from the system we have.

[depakid]

13. Americans aren't going to get this pony

A good 1/3 of Democrats and all of the Republicans will ensure that it never happens.

[Prophet 451]

15. Universal healthcare would save the economy

Seriously. Setting up universal healthcare would create a stack of new jobs, inject billions into the construction, auto and medical tech industries and provide health cover for absolutely everyone (even non-citizens if you joined the E111 scheme).

OK, it takes an ungodly amount fo money to set up but you're spending that anyway and once it's set up, it's cheaper to run on a yearly basis than your current system (MUCH cheaper. Current system costs around $2.3 trillion annually, applying teh NHS model to the US would ost around $600 billion annually).