Will our Dems include Universal Healthcare on their list in 2008?

[Ignacio Upton]

I doubt unfortunately, that Universal Healthcare will be proposed as a plan of ours in 2006, for the simple fact that our Dems are STILL SCARED of proposing it THIRTEEN YEARS after "Harry and Louise." People in polls support the general idea of Universal Healthcare, but once they are pumped with drug company ads, they think that its "evil socialized medicine" and told lies about waitings times and choice of doctors. However, since 1993, when Clinton first announced that he was going to fight the problem, the situation has gotten worse, as even more people go without healthcare, and many more of crappy healthcare that won't adequately help. Politically and economically, unlike 1993, the country may be more accepting of Universal Healthcare, IF WE PLAY IT RIGHT. Companies like GM and Ford are reeling from pension and healthcare costs, as are many small businesses because of the legacy costs and retiring Baby Boomers. If we appeal (ironically) to aspects of corporate America, and tell them that we can take the burden of employee costs from them and assume it, then they may support UHC. The drug and insurance companies won't help us, but if we can get support from other businesses NOT in these industries, then we can neutralize the "big guvmint" bullshit talkingpoint. Now, if only we can actually persuade our Dems to go along with it.

[frankenforpres]

1. they should not RUN on it, BUT

they should get elected and DO IT

[Terran1212]

8. Overwhelming majority of americans support it (RUN ON IT!)

Drug companies that own many of the dems don't support it -- but screw them (for once).

[BlueCaliDem]

27. California is on the road to TRUE Universal Healthcare (SB840)...

It's already passed the California legislature, but that's only one battle.

The "war" is not yet over, because Big Pharma, and HMO conglomerates are gearing up to defeat this bill---AND we still have a Republican governor <sigh>.

For more information, please click on:

http://www.americanpolitics.com/20060403Young.html

For Californians, please follow this link to sign and give your support for SB840:

http://www.healthcareforall.org/petition.html

For more information, please go to:

http://www.healthcareforall.org

[demosincebirth]

14. They should run on it! Its a winner.

[surfermaw]

2. They should run on it

Bill Calinton ran on health care, that is when he started to pick up in the polls, I think from listing to Senator Kennedy today, that running on health care may be in the bag to go in 2008, we are spending as much on health care now as any nation, yet there are 28 other countries that have health care.. it is going to have to be, and it is my opinion that the time has come, how many americans without health care. I think Kennedy idea is to expand on the program we already have Medicare.

[Coastie for Truth]

3. Even a conservative repuke like Mitt Romney is on board

This may be the time - if the broad policy is used - not the minutia of details (Harry and Louise went after the detailed minutia - never the broad idea).

[Ignacio Upton]

6. Romney's idea of healthcare is not what you think

His is basically MANDATORY insurance that won't solve the problem.

[Coastie for Truth]

19. It's "compulsory" "Buy Private Insurance" (Like auto insurance)

--or flood or earhtquake insurance if your mortgagee requires it.

But, IMHO, within a short time, it will meld into partially subsidized, single payer.

I am an eternal optimist - it's progress.

[Warpy]

4. Unless the DLC is a lot less powerful than I think they are

I'm sure they'll call for "universal healthcare" and do the single payer thing after the election. If those conservative dolts are still insisting on ruining the party, they'll still call for some half assed plan that leaves for profit insurance companies in the catbird seat, denying care to us to increase their profits.

[Ignacio Upton]

5. Wasn't that the problem with the Clinton 1993 Plan?

I know that some on the left opposed it on grounds that it would help the insurance corporations.

[Warpy]

22. It sure was. It was a rotten plan

that left the problem, the insurance industry, in place, plus gave them the tool of managed care to DENY care.

They adopted the concept of managed care very quickly.

[Patsy Stone]

7. Dean mentioned healthcare yesterday

more than once. Both in rewriting and/or reversing the new Medicare laws, and that most of the other civilized countries have healthcare. So, maybe.

[madfloridian]

9. Yes, they are going to do so.

They say it all the time.

[readmoreoften]

10. A recent MSNBC (or maybe it was CNN) poll...

phrased a poll about universal healthcare in terms of the burden on corporations and 72% voted in favor of univeral health care.

It was phrased something like: "should the US maintain a program of universal healthcare so that American companies are weighed down with the financial burden of paying for employees medical costs?"

Phrased like that, 72% were in favor.

[Ignacio Upton]

11. Interesting

If we frame the debate as lifting the burden on smaller companies (and even GM and Ford) we can play off corporate America against itself.

[readmoreoften]

13. I think it's an excellent idea.

Still, I don't think it's "saucy" enough to capture America's interest like gay marriage or abortion or war. The republicans will always run the issues that provoke unreason. It's what fascist dictatorships do.

[NewJeffCT]

21. This is how we must frame it!

Universal health care is one of the most pro-business moves the politicians out there can make. GM makes a lot of cars in Canada because of their health care system up there. So does United Technologies (parent of Sikorsky, Carrier, Otis, Pratt & Whitney). The CEOs of both companies lobbied the Canadian gov't to strengthen their universal health care program.

[KittyWampus]

12. Damn! Rahm Emmanuel & Democrats put out 5 point plan including health care

and DU'ers have NO FUCKING CLUE!

how sad is that?

"Meet the Press", Emmanuel Hands Reynolds Arse on Plate

"Without raising his voice, without losing repose or composure, Mister Emmanuel layed out the future, while all the boring old man could do was ululate and hyperventilate apothegms so barren of meaning as to render its bearer foolish and obsolescent.

He was handed his arse on a plarte, to be polite, passive and neologistic about it.

The five-point plan layed out by Mr. Emmanuel deserve serious consideration. These are bold ideas. They will get us out of the hole which the other guys would have you keep digging.

Here is where Rahm lays out the future:

REP. EMANUEL: Let me address, though, the future of this country. I'll give you five quick ideas. One, we make college education as universal for the 21st century that a high school education was in the 20th.

MR. RUSSERT: And who pays for that?

REP. EMANUEL: The American people, because it offers--Let me get to it. Second, we get a summit on the budget to deal with the $3 trillion of debt that's been added up in five years and structural deficits of $400 billion a year. Third, an energy policy that says in 10 years, we cut our dependence on foreign oil in half and make this a hybrid economy. Four, we create an institute on science and technology that builds for America like, the National Institutes has done for health care, we maintain our edge. And five, we have a universal health-care system over the next 10 years where if you work, you have health care. That says fiscal discipline and investing in the American people by reputting people first. The policies that the Republicans have offered have gotten us in the ditch we have today.

Ideas. Good ones. If the Republicans had ideas, they didn't bear fruit. And they've had five years. Staying the course is only digging the hole deeper. And we've already hit Hell.

They carry on:

MR. RUSSERT: (To Reynolds) What do you think of that program?

REP. REYNOLDS (as if to say "O come now, Emmanuel!"): Sounds to me like a liberal agenda: bigger government, raise more taxes to pay for it. That's the failed liberal policies. The last 40 years, the Democrats were in control of the Congress.

REP. EMANUEL: Tom, in the last five years the government's gotten bigger...

REP. REYNOLDS: And when we look at this...

REP. EMANUEL: ...under Republican rule...

REP. REYNOLDS: I have not heard...

REP. EMANUEL: ...than anytime in the history.

REP. REYNOLDS: ...any agenda coming out of the Democrats in Congress. It has been all slash and burn, nay. There has been no debate, Tim. This is not the debate of Dole and Moynihan. This is slash and burn, have no new ideas, and attack.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[Lydia Leftcoast]

25. He's not talking about universal health care:

And five, we have a universal health-care system over the next 10 years where if you work, you have health care.

Is this one of those lame buying cooperatives or compulsory insurance schemes that leaves the insurance companies in charge?

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

35. I personally am tired of the incrementalist tactic.

That is why I don't support the Kerry measure of healthcare for children - I want healthcare for all and I am tired of people trying to inch their way to this goal. Be bold, have vision, go for the whole enchilada!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

36. Indeed--not all children are in need of free healthcare

Some of them come from prosperous families, and while children need immunizations and get ordinary childhood diseases and injure themselves playing rough, etc. it is the rare unlucky child who develops a chronic or life-threatening condition or suffers a major injury.

But if you're over 50 and have to buy your own health insurance, you're screwed, even more so if you're over 60 but too "young" for Medicare. Even if you're healthy, you're charged an arm and a leg for a policy with a high premium and a high deductible.

Nobody talks about that.

It's the old "Think of the children" ploy.

(NOTE: I"m not against giving free healthcare to children. But it's not the most urgent need, and children need free healthcare ONLY to the extent that adults need it)

[kestrel91316]

15. Ford Bell is running for US Senate in MN and he is very pro-

universal health care.

[Raksha]

16. What's to be scared of?

I wish they WOULD re-run those "Harry and Louise" ads from 1993. People would just laugh at them now.

[sandnsea]

17. What are you talking about?

Do you mean single payer or some similar central federal plan? If you do, you should say so. Because there are other ways to get universal healthcare besides one tax-funded federal program and they've been supported by lots of Dems for a long time, and part of the Democratic platfom too.

[jerry611]

18. I would only favor it if...

They do something about the cost of healthcare. Right now the cost of healthcare is just way too expensive for the government to pick up the tab. Medicaid programs are already draining state budgets.

Lets fix the problem of rising healthcare costs first...then figure out how the government could pay for it.

[Telly Savalas]

20. But the high costs are a direct consquence of having a private system.

1. Under a public system, providers don't "charge" as much for services, since they don't need to make a profit. They provide services at cost.

2. A single-payer system has a much more streamlined bureaucracy than the complicated mess of competing private insurers and HMO's. On a per capita basis, administrative costs for health care are in the United States are roughly twice that of Canada.

3. A public system provides more leverage in price negotiations with medical equipment suppliers and pharmaceutical companies, which can drive down prices.

4. In the U.S. too many uninsured and underinsured have to rely on emergency rooms as their only source of medical care. This is costly and inefficient. Furthermore, if such people had better access to care, this care could be of a more preventive nature. (e.g. discovering conditions earlier and being able to treat them more easily.)

Just a few examples off the top of my head. Other Western democracies pay a lower percentage of their GDP on health care, and they manage to cover everybody. The United States is the wealthiest country in the world. To suggest that it can't afford to provide health care for all its citizens is absurd.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

26. Also, doctors in private practice have to hire AT LEAST one extra

employee just to process insurance claims, and they have to fill out tons of paperwork (different for each company) to document the patient's treatment in order to get the claim ready to submit.

[K-W]

23. Its all the same problem, and you dont fix it by avoiding reform.

Nations with universal healthcare have lower healthcare costs.

[Rosemary2205]

24. I don't think America is ready for it quite yet

when it gets to where upper middle class can't afford to see the doctor and still afford the vacation house in Tahiti then America will be ready for some sort of universal system. As long as it's only the working class going without healthcare the powers that be won't really care.

[Ignacio Upton]

31. It's not just NOT having healthcare

It is also about having GOOD healthcare. A lot of people who have healthcare aren't covered well.

[Vinca]

32. Bingo!

Many, many people assume their health insurance will foot the bill, but they're in for a shock. My brother briefly worked for an insurer and his sole purpose was to deny claims. Even when they pay, you're usually on the hook for 20% of the bill. That's okay if the bill is $200, but when it's $200,000 you're screwed. More bankruptcies are filed by people with insurance than without. The only answer is universal health care. It works in so many other countries and it can work in this one.

[marions ghost]

28. yes

Run on it. A winner.

[TheFarseer]

29. It can be demonized too easily

Corporations would come out of the woodwork to fund ads that are anti-universal healthcare and would scare the public into not voting democrat. I think the goal should be left at affordable and accessible healthcare and a few specifics on how to do that.

[Yollam]

30. Problem is that dems are scared of single-payer.

The plan the Clintons proposed was doomed from the start precisely because it was NOT a "socialized" plan. It was a huge giveaway to the insurers and health care industries, when what was needed was to get the private sector and profit motive OUT of all levels of health care beyond the provider level. "Socialized" medicine has been proven in country after country to be MUCH more efficient and much better than our scheme. All that protects America's money-grubbing health-care gougers is the average American's ignorance of the rest of the world.

[LWolf]

33. They will if we nominate the right Dems.

There are Democrats that support universal health care. In my opinion, a Democrat that doesn't is not "our dem," but the corporate health care industry's dem. If you really want universal health care, adopt the dems who support it as "yours."

"My Dems" aren't afraid of supporting universal health care; now, or previously.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

34. Great short article from Huffington Post on Universal Health

Cuba Has Better Medical Care Than the US
by Blake Fleetwood

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/blake-fleetwood/cuba-has-better-medical-c_b_19664.html

succinct, figures anyone can understand. We look like dithering idiots for NOT having universal health. A mystery to me has always been why business isn't all over this - you would think they would like to shed some of the expense.