Rx and the Single Payer

[t0dd]

Source: t r u t h o u t

In 2003, a young Illinois state senator named Barack Obama told an AFL-CIO meeting, "I am a proponent of a single-payer universal health care program."

Single payer. Universal. That's health coverage, like Medicare, but for everyone who wants it. Single payer eliminates insurance companies as pricey middlemen. The government pays care providers directly. It's a system that polls consistently have shown the American people favoring by as much as two to one.

There was only one thing standing in the way, Obama said six years ago: "All of you know we might not get there immediately because first we have to take back the White House, we have to take back the Senate and we have to take back the House."

Fast forward six years. President Obama has everything he said was needed - Democrats in control of the executive branch and both chambers of Congress. So what's happened to single payer?

A woman at his town hall meeting in New Mexico last week asked him exactly that. "If I were starting a system from scratch, then I think that the idea of moving towards a single-payer system could very well make sense," the president replied. "That's the kind of system that you have in most industrialized countries around the world.

"The only problem is that we're not starting from scratch. We have historically a tradition of employer-based health care. And although there are a lot of people who are not satisfied with their health care, the truth is, is that the vast majority of people currently get health care from their employers and you've got this system that's already in place. We don't want a huge disruption as we go into health care reform where suddenly we're trying to completely reinvent one-sixth of the economy."

So, the banks were too big to fail and now, apparently, health care is too big to fix, at least the way a majority of people indicate they would like it to be fixed, with a single payer option. President Obama favors a public health plan competing with the medical cartel that he hopes will create a real market that would bring down costs. But single payer has vanished from his radar.

Nor is single payer getting much coverage in the mainstream media. Barely a mention was given to the hundreds of doctors, nurses and other health care professionals who came to Washington last week to protest the absence of official debate over single payer.

Is it the proverbial tree falling in the forest, making a noise that journalists can't or won't hear? Could the indifference of the press be because both the president of the United States and Congress have been avoiding single payer like, well, like the plague? As we see so often, government officials set the agenda by what they do and don't talk about.

Instead, President Obama is looking for consensus, seeking peace among all the parties involved. Except for single-payer advocates. At that big White House powwow in Washington last week, the president asked representatives of the health care business to reason together with him. "What's brought us all together today is a recognition that we can't continue down the same dangerous road we've been traveling for so many years," he said, " that costs are out of control; and that reform is not a luxury that can be postponed, but a necessity that cannot wait."

They came, listened, made nice for the photo op, and while they failed to participate in a hearty chorus of "Kumbaya," they did promise to cut health care costs voluntarily over the next ten years. The press ate it up - and Mr. Obama was a happy man.

Meanwhile, some of us looking on - those of us who've been around a long time - were scratching our heads. Hadn't we heard this before?

...

More here: http://www.truthout.org/052209A

[L0oniX]

1. !@#$%^&*()_+! all to hell. We've been had.

[DJ13]

3. Politics is no longer about doing whats right

Its now become nothing more than saying what they need in order to get your vote, then doing as they wish once in office.

They count on our short attention spans to let them lie to us all over again 4-6 years later when they run again.

[L0oniX]

5. We're like a discarded condom that was used to f*ck the repukes.

[Hawkowl]

16. HA!

At least we prevented Obama from catching that horrible disease of Progressivism. Hope is for suckers. And Obama is beginning to validate my cynicism.

[elleng]

9. Politics has ALWAYS been about WHAT'S POSSIBLE,

and it is just WRONG to accuse politicians of deliberately lying to 'get your vote.' In campaigns, they tell us what they would like to do/what their priorities are. When they've got the job, they and we learn what's possible.

http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/24903.html

[bbgrunt]

10. well to me it sounds like he's giving up before he

even gives it a chance--once you start conceding to the opposition before the challenge is even undertaken says you won't even try.

[elleng]

11. I doubt it,

I don't see him as a quitter, and I don't think we should, either.

[tkmorris]

15. Sounds like faith-based politics to me

[elleng]

23. Sure.

I have faith in MY JUDGMENT.

[riderinthestorm]

26. And I have faith in reality. What's really happening vs. what I HOPE happens. nt.

[elleng]

27. Yes, my judgment based on what I observe.

REALLY

[eridani]

13. What's possible is in large part determined by what you actually TRY TO DO

How stupid to you have to be to ask for $3000 for your used car if that's your minimum acceptable offer? You need to ask for at least $5000.

[Greyhound]

20. Thank you. What is possible is discovered by trying. We have been subjected to this same old BS

for years. "Oh we can't not support the Resident or we'll lose in the next election", "We must not block this nominee, we must keep our powder dry for when it's really important", "We dare not prosecute blatant criminality, the votes are not there", and still there are those that swallow this codswallop time after time, excusing the inexcusable in the name of party unity.

How stupid do you have to be, indeed.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

2. right now my 17 yr old daughter's BCBS has $5,000 deductible

so in other words, its insurance for catastrophic situations.

It is not access to health care, for preventitive or every day illnesses.

[stray cat]

4. I pay at least 20% of an employees salary on health insurance for them

so thats about $12,000 for health insurance per person. How much will a really good single health payer cost per person? The cost is irrespective of salary so most will also have to subsidize lower income payments. I assume it will be cheaper - but how much and how much will we have to pay in addition to cover those who can't pay or can't pay the full amount? Right now my employees don't have to pay a thing.

[AdHocSolver]

8. Last year, I attended a lecture by a Canadian who discussed their national health care system.

The Canadian system is administered by the individual provinces, but is accepted anywhere in Canada.

There are no deductibles or copays. Fees are negotiated once a year between the governments and the various medical associations. There are no preexisting condition loopholes. All Canadians are covered.

For this kind of health coverage, the cost to Canadians is approximately $4000 per person. It comes out of the general taxes.

From what I remember, Americans pay twice as much as any other industrialized country for health care, not accounting for deductibles, copays, and exclusions, and considering that 45 million+ people don't even have access to health care, and that the U.S. is way down the list in quality of outcomes. We are being so screwed.

(P.S. Having worked in hospitals, I can tell you from observation that the situation is worse than you can imagine. But, that is for another post.)

[RufusTFirefly]

6. I don't think we can be an empire AND have single-payer

Being an empire is all about selfishly grabbing everything in sight and stomping on people who get in your way. Single-payer is all about compassion and community.

There's a disconnect here.

[eridani]

14. Actually, we can. We are ALREADY PAYING for universal health care

--we just aren't GETTING it. Now of course we can't be an empire and deal with our crumbling infrastructure and fund green energy--those things require infusions of new cash.

[RufusTFirefly]

21. I didn't say anything about MONEY. It's all about MIND SET.

We are no longer a society that takes care of its own. We are an avaricious empire. We clearly have no problem spending billions to kill people, rape the planet, prop up Wall Street. That's because we're making an elite group richer by doing so. Changing our focus to care and compassion would require a big personality shift. And it would make a sociopathic elite very angry.

I've Canadian relatives. Trust me. You don't need to convince me about the benefits of single-payer. I'm 100 percent in favor.

[eridani]

24. Makes sense. However, the Pew Foundation has been doing polling on this

--for some time, and consistently finds 70% of the population in favor of government guaranteed health care.

[RufusTFirefly]

25. Don't doubt that either. But again, that's besides the point

You're assuming a direct connection between what the public wants and what the politicians will provide. That's where you've gone astray. We are not their constituents. Large corporations, such as Big Pharma and the insurance industry, are. How else can you explain the absence of a single-payer advocate "at the table" at the Senate Finance Committee hearings?

[emsimon33]

17. Not true. A single payer system would save $400 BILLION a year--enough

to cover everyone. Go to pbs.org and watch (or listen on podcast) to the May 22 Bill Moyers' Journal on health care reform. We can not be an empire and NOT have single payer national health care!

Just to give you one example, I have $6000 a year in premiums and have a $6000 deductible, yet I do not use any of it. One third of the $6000 under the present system does not go to health care.

We have been so misled about the pros of national single payer health care's true costs.

[emsimon33]

18. Here's the PBS url

Please watch Bill Moyers Journal from May 22 on health care reform:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05222009/watch.html

"DR. SIDNEY WOLFE: The seats at the table, or the witnesses at the hearing are, in a sense, controlled by the health insurance industry. They don't want someone essentially saying, "We don't need a health insurance industry. We can do what most other countries in the world have done. Have the government collect the money and pay the bills and get rid of all these people who are wasting $400 billion a year on excessive administrative costs.

"So, we have got a fragmented health insurance industry. And it thrives on being fragmented. The drug countries make much more money with the fragmentation, because there's no price control. The insurance companies make much more money, 'cause they can push away people who aren't going to be profitable. The only people that suffer are the patients."
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05222009/watch.html

or read the transcript:
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05222009/transcript4.html

[RC]

7. We have way too many DINO's and not enough true liberals in Congress.

We need to be more careful who we vote for in the primaries. Encourage new blood to run. The old stuff has obviously coagulated into conservatives.

[handmade34]

12. May 30th

http://www.healthcare-now.org/takeaction/events-calendar/

[Senator]

19. Link To 2003 Obama Video

From http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05222009/watch2.html">Bill Moyer's Journal (at approx. 01:15).

---

[slipslidingaway]

22. Youtube link and full quote from Obama in 2003...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpAyan1fXCE


http://www.pnhp.org/change/

"Full quote from Obama in 2003:

"I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program." (applause) "I see no reason why the United States of America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, spending 14 percent of its Gross National Product on health care cannot provide basic health insurance to everybody. And that's what Jim is talking about when he says everybody in, nobody out. A single payer health care plan, a universal health care plan. And that's what I'd like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we have to take back the White House, we have to take back the Senate, and we have to take back the House."

Obama speaking to the Illinois AFL-CIO, June 30, 2003."