The Great Health Care Debate

I just read an article by everyone favorite Free Market neoconservative, Patrick McIlheran, and was somewhat dismayed by his apparent lack of knowledge regarding the health care issue. So I think it's time to clear some misconceptions up.

First, don't be surprised to see a number of links inside Patrick's column. He's good at providing information to back-up his flawed arguments. The problem is all of the information he provides comes from, well, sources that are hardly regarded as unbiased or even intelligent. He uses Web sites like the National Review and Fraser Institute and freemarketcure.com. "Freedom!" the privileged white man screams, brandishing his sword. "You'll never take our freedom!"

Patrick McIlheran isn't Braveheart, and his arguments are, at best, fuzzy logic. At worst, they're an impassioned attempt to avoid a nationwide health care system in favor of a free market-based approach that would supposedly preserve our "Freedom." So I'm going to tell you about the market-based approach we have now (to some extent) and the version Canada has, and then I'm going to let you in on some additional information so you can help sniff out the bullcrap free market conservatives spew on a daily basis.

Here's my problem with a free market system: in a free market system, the private insurance companies compete and so do the hospitals (remember, Ronald Reagan deregulated the health care system so most hospitals are now "for-profit"). Consumers shop smart, choose what they want and don't want, and then pick the best plan, probably the most affordable. With competition, the prices drop and health care can be affordable and fast. On FreeMarketCure.com, there are a variety of reasons this isn't working yet in America, and it even cites a beautiful study conducted by the RAND think tank (a free market think tank) that--surprise!--happened to have a result that backed up the institute's claims that intelligent consumer spending can work better than a "free" version.

That's all well and good, but all of these points neglect one very important aspect of the for-profit private health insurance sector: that is, they make their wild profits by denying claims from their own clients. That is how private health insurance companies make their money. That is how private health insurance companies make their money. Monthly premiums are not a large source of profit. You can buy the cheapest, most amazing insurance in the world from a company like Aetna, but they can still deny your claim when you get sick, forcing you to pay out of pocket. The only way to change this is to regulate the insurance companies more strictly, but Free Market proponents steadfastly refuse this. So how free are you in a privatized system?

Don't get me wrong--the free market approach has its upsides, and it makes a lot of relevant points. The problem is that its arguments have a tendency to leave out very key facts that are essential to deciding what kind of system we should use. The fact that one of the largest private health insurance companies in America recently gave their CEO a 1.6 billion dollar retirement package seems important. How can an insurance company give away all that money? Why, by denying $1.6 billion in claims!

This still doesn't account for the extremely poor. How free are they? Or, if you refuse to help out any poor adults because you honestly think they're all lazy, then think about their kids. Why do children need to "Trust the Market" with their lives? Is that fair? Is it constitutional? Is a child truly "Free" if he or she cannot receive the basic health care necessary to make the most of his/her life? If you don't want to pay for health insurance for people who can't afford it, do you honestly think they'll simply roll over and die? Or will they go to the emergency room when they're sick and not pay the bill? Then who pays the bill? How do you win in this market-based system?

Here are some other things you need to watch out for when reading anything from the Free Market "experts":

1. Why do they always bring up Canada? Why do they always use such obscure examples of people who hate the system? Why is it their articles continually reference THE SAME PEOPLE? Canada's health care system is new, and it was started by one of its provinces and the system was so popular and well-liked that the rest of the country adapted it. In any system, there will always be a few people who hate the new changes. Canada is no exception. Finding someone in America who hates something the rest of us love would be just as possible.

So why don't any of these Free Market capitalists attack the German health care system, or Japan's? Both are universal health care systems. Germany's is the best health care system in the world. If universal health care is so horrible, then why can't these "Experts" spend more time attacking the systems at the top of the health care ladder? Because they're not vulnerable. They attack Canada's universal system because it's vulnerable.

2. But I should be "Free," they say. Any time you see a privileged white man complain he isn't "Free Enough," your bullcrap detector should immediately turn on.

3. But isn't this socialism? The Right Wing attempts to label any progress or any government program as "Socialism," including the raising of taxes for the rich for any reason. Universal Health Care does carry with it--like many aspects of any democracy--certain aspects that could be considered socialism. But does that make it socialism? Or is guaranteeing health care for every citizen a fundamental key to any Democracy? Free Market Capitalism shares a lot of commonalities with Fascism, but if I were to suggest Free Market Capitalism IS Fascism, there would be an all-out war. Every ideology overlaps with other ideologies, and politics is no different. Don't buy into the "Socialism" myth. Our government can do things to help us, so long as a majority of us want it. That's a fundamental point of democracy.

4. But isn't Universal Health Care just another bureaucracy? So are privatized health care companies. The questions is this: which would you rather have:

a) Health insurance run by a government bureaucracy run by elected representatives that WE THE PEOPLE elect. Those representatives must then answer to WE THE PEOPLE or be voted out of office.

b) Health insurance run by a private bureaucracy run by a CEO who answers directly to the shareholders.

5. Medicare is a universal program, and it has problems, they say. Not nearly as many as private health insurance companies do. The problem is bashing Medicare is easy, and there is a LOT of money being spent doing so. You want help with this, you'll need to do a LOT of digging through a LOT of Free Market Think Tanks to get to any relevant information.

There you go. I hope this was somewhat informative, and that you can take something from it. As always, I'll try to make a point of keeping an eye on our Neoconservative friends in Milwaukee to ensure not too many of you get ensnared.

Yours,

Ken Brosky

Tax Cuts? TAX CUTS?!

While you're whittling away the day with your various chores, here's something to think about: How many tax cuts have been passed since the Reagan era?

The answer: None. Because cutting taxes on a budget deficit means the government is simply borrowing money to give back to us. Which means tax cuts are actually tax "Deferments." Every time Congress cuts taxes without balancing the budget, all that money piles onto the national deficit, which will eventually be paid by us at a later date or our children.

The same goes with the Iraq war. We can fight there as long as Bush wants, but the money will eventually come out of our pockets. He is the only president to have ever cut taxes during a time of war, skyrocketing the deficit further in order to deceive the public into believe our current economic system is still "OK." It's not. And when the security bubble pops (i.e. the military industrial complex), things are only going to get worse. And THEN while we're trying to figure out how to pay off our personal debts, the government is going to need help paying off the national debt.

And then what will it do? "Cut" taxes again to increase spending?

The John Edwards Legacy

John Edwards has officially dropped out of the race. It's a disappointment because this was without a doubt the most progressive candidate we've had in a long time, and the only one with the guts to literally stand up against our corporate elite. As a result, the corporate elite--especially the corporate media--did little to promote his presidency in the way they do with Obama and Clinton. I know Russ Feingold and others have criticized Edwards for a number of votes he made while senator, but--and it pains me to say this because I have nothing but respect for Feingold--I disagree with such criticism. Edwards voted poorly a few times, but he has since demonstrated that he's learned from those mistakes, and understands why those were mistakes.

Worse, Edwards was the only Democratic candidate who overwhelmingly defeated every single Republican in a mock-presidential poll. What does this mean? It means Obama and Clinton both have a long, long road ahead of them.

But this isn't all bad news. There is a silver lining here, and that is Edwards literally commanded close to 15% of the popular vote in every single state. His support can literally change the outcome of the Democratic race. And he has stated repeatedly that he wants both Obama and Clinton to essentially take more progressive issues.

What does this mean? It means both Obama and Clinton will have to step it up. No more skirting around the corporatism issue. No more dancing around the idea of combating poverty or half-cocked health care solutions or even waffling on the war in Iraq. Now, with Edwards' support up in the air, both Obama and Clinton will have to take a harsher stance on the issues that so many Americans care passionately about.

May the best candidate win.

Yours,

Ken Brosky

Why even have a Congress at this point?

What's the point in having a Congress at all when President Bush makes signing statements on every single piece of legislation that crosses his desk? Let me explain in further detail for you with the help of Constitutional scholar John W. Dean:

"Suppose a new law requires the President to act in a certain manner - for instance, to report to Congress on how he is dealing with terrorism. Bush's signing statement will flat out reject the law, and state that he will construe the law "in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to withhold information the disclosure of which could impair foreign relations, the national security, the deliberative processes of the Executive, or the performance of the Executive's constitutional duties."

The upshot? It is as if no law had been passed on the matter at all."

This is especially troubling when it comes to torture, which you should definitely be upset about.

But most importantly, this has a giant impact on the occupation of Iraq. Bush's most recent signing statement suggests he might consider putting permanent bases inside Iraq in the future, suggesting he has absolutely NO INTEREST in bringing our troops home anytime soon, or ending this war. This is the same president who talked extensively about not "passing the buck" to the next president, and yet what we have now is an absolute quagmire and another state--Afghanistan--teetering on the brink, economic instability and a slew of other problems that the next president will have to tackle.

I say this with absolute confidence: The president is an authoritarian. He is a monarch. He does not care what laws Congress passes, because he will simply sidestep them when needed.

Click here to contact Gwen Moore, our representative. Tell her that she should focus on bringing this into the public light. Tell her this issue is important.


Want to learn more about Bush's many, many, many signing statements? Click here.



Yours,

Ken Brosky

A day in the life of Joe Republican

In honor of our local conservative radio hosts, I thought I would pass along this little story that I originally found on Media Matters. Read it, because I'll comment more below:

"A DAY IN THE LIFE OF JOE REPUBLICAN"

Joe gets up at 6 a.m. and fills his coffeepot with water to prepare his morning coffee. The water is clean and good because some tree-hugging liberal fought for minimum water-quality standards. With his first swallow of water, he takes his daily medication. His medications are safe to take because some stupid commie liberal fought to ensure their safety and that they work as advertised.

All but $10 of his medications are paid for by his employer's medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance - now Joe gets it too.

He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some girly-man liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

In the morning shower, Joe reaches for his shampoo. His bottle is properly labeled with each ingredient and its amount in the total contents because some crybaby liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained.

Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some environmentalist wacko liberal fought for the laws to stop industries from polluting our air.

He walks on the government-provided sidewalk to subway station for his government-subsidized ride to work. It saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees because some fancy-pants liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day. He has a good job with excellent pay, medical benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some lazy liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union.

If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed, he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some stupid liberal didn't think he should lose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

It is noontime and Joe needs to make a bank deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some godless liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the Great Depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae-underwritten mortgage and his below-market federal student loan because some elitist liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his lifetime. Joe also forgets that his in addition to his federally subsidized student loans, he attended a state funded university.

Joe is home from work. He plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive. His car is among the safest in the world because some America-hating liberal fought for car safety standards to go along with the tax-payer funded roads.

He arrives at his boyhood home. His was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers' Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans.

The house didn't have electricity until some big-government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification.

He is happy to see his father, who is now retired. His father lives on Social Security and a union pension because some wine-drinking, cheese-eating liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to.

Joe gets back in his car for the ride home, and turns on a radio talk show. The radio host keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. He doesn't mention that the beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day. Joe agrees: "We don't need those big-government liberals ruining our lives! After all, I'm a self-made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have."

Obviously, it's a little one-sided. That's the point. But what interested me more were the responses by conservatives to this particular post. Some argued that, obviously, it was one-sided and typical liberal junk. Another person--much to the joy of the conservative bloggers--attempted to create a conservative-friendly version called "Joe Democrat." The problem is the story didn't work in the same way. Rather than show how Joe Democrat's life has been made better by Conservative-based "Free Market" policies, instead it's based almost entirely on myths and hearsay, the typical fodder that "Joe Republican" makes a point of using for satire. Phrases like "post-traumatic slavery disorder" and suggesting inner-city students are capable only when it comes to fitting on condoms.

Some of the arguments aren't even plausible! Besides outright inaccuracies applied to liberals that could just as easily be applied to conservative politicians, he suggest liberals are behind the classification of alcohol as a disease (they're actually called scientists, in this case). Rural electrification is considered evil in this case, since Joe Democrat's life was easier when he was "living off the land." A lot of this is based on the classic privileged white man's concept of freedom, and how much of it the big bad government takes. But how free, truly, we rural citizens when private power companies refused to provide them with electricity because it wasn't profitable? Something for another time, perhaps.

Almost all of the arguments are based on stereotypes, some proven entirely wrong, some barely credible even in this form. "Joe Democract" even manages to outright slander John Kerry's war record (Kerry served in the Navy for four years, hardly the type of behavior from a "draft dodger"). But the point is that this rebuttal offers relatively no examples of how conservative ideology has helped the average American. Because most of the time they don't. But the Republican Party can't say that, because then it would never win elections. So it relies on rallying its supporters with cries of "freedom!" and convincing regular Joe's that the government is evil.

Yours,

Ken Brosky

Dupont and Napalm

Dupont, it seems, has been attempting to buy up all recorded copies of the military marching tune "Napalm Sticks to Kids." Dupont, a maker of napalm, most likely sees this type of song as a threat to its consumer-friendly image. After all, Dupont has its fingers in every aspect of our society, and you better believe it's still profiting on the death of human beings. In 2003, before the U.S. could "sanitize" Saddam Hussein's report to the United Nations, DuPont was listed as one of the companies that supplied Saddam with materials necessary for his chemical, biological and early nuclear weapons programs.

Why should this bother you? Well, if you enjoy smoking pot and wonder why it's illegal, you can partially blame DuPont. If you're wondering why hemp is illegal, you can partially blame DuPont. While FDR was trying to improve working conditions, DuPont/General Motors was working its employees to death and assembling a terrorist group known as the "Black Legion" to fight unionization efforts in the American Midwest.

DuPont also helped the Nazis in Germany.

Scary? You bet. For more history of the company, click here.

How does this relate to you? Because this company is so streamlined into our culture that it's impossible to boycott. How do we quantify or qualify the positive contributions of a corporation or the negative contributions? DuPont's war profiteering may be bad, its collaborations with the Nazis may be horrendous, but this IS the same company that gave us Spandex. Sure, DuPont poisoned babies on a regular basis (then covered it up), but they also invented Teflon.

What Economic Stimulus?

Funny how, just two years ago, there was little to no talk about "The Economy," as if the wage disparities that have been occurring since the Reagan era weren't worth talking about, as if the accrued debt from working-class Americans wasn't a problem, as if the skyrocketing health care costs and low-wage jobs were simply an effect of a healthy "Economy."

What's changed so far this year? I'll tell you exactly what's changed: the rich are getting pinched. Now, all of a sudden, it's a massive issue. Money is falling out of the hands of the wealthiest one percent and now we're suddently facing a crisis. I've got news for our government: this has been a crisis ever since Ronald Reagan took office, ever since he began applying free market policies like cutting taxes for the wealthiest of the wealthy in order to let it "Trickle Down" while raising taxes for the rest of us and shutting down as many government programs as possible, including the Department of Labor which now almost always sides with corporations. And then Clinton pushes through "Free Trade" that cuts American jobs and forces the rest of the working class to compete with desperate third-world individuals who are more than happy to work in sweatshop-like conditions for dollars a day simply to survive in their deregulated economies pushed through by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

Conditions have been getting worse since the 80's, and now anytime anyone suggests actually taxing the rich at a fair level, conservatives demonize them as "Socialists." Anything that could actually level the playing field, any regulations or fair taxes on the rich are demonized immediately by conservative think tanks who pretend to be defending "Freedom."

"Freedom!" they say, "Freedom for the market to regulate itself! Freedom for individuals who reject BIG GOVERNMENT, Freedom for all!"

Who are these people who claim to fight for freedom? Why, they're the freest people on the planet:

Rich. White. Men.

When they cry "Freedom!" they mean only freedom for themselves and their friends, to accumulate more wealth and push down more workers. The free market has failed miserably a number of times since the 70's, which is why these conservative think tanks focus on demonizing all criticism as "Socialism" and shove the word "Freedom" down our collective mouth without a spoonful of sugar.

Now all of a sudden the market is stumbling and the rich are losing money. And NOW, only now, it becomes a problem. I've got news for Bush and the Democrats: I'm taking my rebate and paying off my debt ... let this corrupt economy continue its freefall.

Ken Brosky