Open Left

Yeah, I Was Planning To Do A Diary About It After Watching Last Night

But I'm still not sure what to say beyond, "Lookie there!  They sure didn't mess around!"

It was refreshingly straightforward.

Ah, even as I write this, ideas start to come...

"You know what they say -- those of us who fail history... doomed to repeat it in summer school." -- Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 6, Episode 3

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by: Paul Rosenberg @ Sat Jul 25, 2009 at 10:00:15 AM CDT

Robert Reich says it's cause they got theirs

This from his blog.

Big Pharma, for example, is in line to get just what it wants. The Senate health panel's bill protects biotech companies from generic competition for 12 years after their drugs go to market, which is guaranteed to keep prices sky high. Meanwhile, legislation expected from the Senate Finance committee won't allow cheaper drugs to be imported from Canada and won't give the federal government the right to negotiate Medicare drug prices directly with pharmaceutical companies. Last month Big Pharma agreed to what the White House touted as $80 billion in givebacks to help pay for expanded health insurance, but so far there's been no mechanism to force the industry to keep its promise. No wonder Big Pharma is now running "Harry and Louise" ads -- the same couple who fifteen years ago scared Americans into thinking the Clinton plan would take away their choice of doctor -- now supportive of Obamacare.

"If you want that good feeling that comes from doing things for other people, then you have to pay for it in abuse and misunderstanding..."
Zora Neale Hurston

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by: bruce.dixon @ Sat Jul 25, 2009 at 20:40:20 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Passing a Bill, debating policy, pushing form the left, being disappointed, working with what we have.

   God grant me the serenity
   To accept the things I cannot change;
   Courage to change the things I can;
   And wisdom to know the difference.

I know, its pablum. But lets add in the comments from the admittedly knowledgeable dedicated research based policy analysts that Bill Moyer invited to this excellent discussion about Health Care policy reform cited here. I like their intents, I respect their health policy knowledge, and I want Single Payer. Lets look at the portion, not about policy, but the Bill(s) themselves the bill(s) passage and legislation.

TRUDY LIEBERMAN: It's really a political calculation. And I think that they believe that they have to act quickly, because it might not happen. Because the sooner you have the special interests going back home, during the August recess and holding town hall meetings and talking to people in coffee shops, they're going to find that maybe this isn't something that people really want or have doubts about.

MARCIA ANGELL: Well, I think we are in a hurry. I think that President Obama's worried, that what happened with the Clinton plan can happen with him. And I do have a feeling of Déjà vu all over again. That this is like 1993. That the opposition is having a chance to mobilize. To march out these Canadians who say they had brain tumors and had to die. Or these ads that say 20 percent of Europeans drop dead.

TRUDY LIEBERMAN: And Harry and Louise are back

MARCIA ANGELL: And I think he does. He is right to worry about that. And he is right to want to do it in a hurry. The problem is he is not doing the right hing.

Ok we get this, this is easy and simple to understand and I want to move toward literally putting Health insurance Companies out of business.

Although let us admit, a system that retrained and employed the massive numbers of people employed in this business, in other work, preferably one that actually produced something, unlike their present work, which produces nothing except the denial of service to those in dire need. I have written before about the fact that in the United States, the billing dept.s of Hospitals are other buildings full of workers, possibly more workers than working in the hospital, whose only job is figuring and keeping on top of the many places and people responsible for paying bills, and the fights between those ducking responsibility. And that is the health providers. In Canada, it is not another, bigger building beside the hospital, it is part of one floor, in the hospital.

The Insurance 'industry' has a similar number of people whose job it is to wack away the requests for payments like flies at the junk yard, paying the requests when it can't be avoided, delisting services, delisting the insured, enticing people to sign up, advertising their product to people, breaking unions in the industry and of course sending the profits remaining to voraciously greedy suck holes of blood lust whose gargantuan weight of sheer luxury dwarfs successful nation states.

This massive 'industry' is one sixth of the economy. One sixth of the economy. All right? Canada's health system, including both sides of the above equations is 7% or about one fourteenth of the economy. So that means, that profit, (which is huge! HUGE!(this is not sarcasm)) and the two sets of employees, in the billing/ administration/ fundraising part of the health provision sector, and the service denying/ rippingoff/ paying/ advertising/ billing portions of the Insurance 'industry' make up about 8% of the economy. So if we implement Single payer tomorrow we add more than a little to the unemployment rate already sitting at 9 to 11%.  But that's just an aside.

Lets get back to the quote from Ms. Angell's and Ms. Lieberman's discussion with Bill Moyers. They admit "we are in a hurry" and "what happened with the Clinton plan can happen with him" and "have to act quickly, because it might not happen" because "march out these Canadians who say they had brain tumors and had to die. Or these ads that say 20 percent of Europeans drop dead." "And Harry and Louise are back" and finally "He is right to worry about that. And he is right to want to do it in a hurry."

On these things, we completely agree, we all know, and I have been re-iterating, and others have been re-iterating here and elsewhere. So what is their response?

The problem is he is not doing the right thing.

Great! Now we get to the new part. Now we get the meat. The discussion on what to actually do!! (this has been asked so often it has its own section in political science dept's and even books) How do we get from a sick, demented, soul destroying, mother killing, child wasting profit tunnel to hell, to a: life enhancing, economy saving, people loving, bankruptcy preventing, worry ending Single Payer system.

Lets read their answer:

I think we have to start all over on this. I really do. I think we have to go for a single payer system. You could institute that gradually. You could do it state by state. You could do it decade by decade. You could improve Medicare. That is, make it nonprofit. But extend it down to age 55 and age 45 and age 35. It would give the private insurance industry a chance to go into hurricanes, earthquakes or something. To get out of the health business. It could be done gradually. I think that has to be done. And it's the only thing that can be done.

And now, besides "starting over" what is the different in the approach suggested by these policy analysts:"You could institute that gradually. You could do it state by state." I thought the gradualism was awful? And I thought the most vibrant version of the Bill moving out of the House HELP committee had an Amendment, passed bipartisanly, that makes provision for, makes the rules allowing, gives permission to: States Implementing Statewide Single Payer Systems.
They continue:

"It could be done gradually. I think that has to be done. And it's the only thing that can be done."

So except for "starting over" - they are in complete agreement with the present process. I think they want a title on the final Bill that says "We are moving to Single Payer, dont be too patient or in too much of a hurry" But otherwise, despite their trepidation, they have a descriptive laying out of congress's and the administrations arm twisting, panderer molifying, greed distracting, regionally diverse and constantly attacked plan of action, as it appears to moving through the tunnel of that resembles Hunter S. Thompson's description of "The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side."

What they want is so close to what is happening as to be merley a description, whose only addition, is that we:

start over

Now on the pablum quoted above:

the wisdom to know the difference

Just on the point of what needs to be done to change what is happening now. I think a little wisdom needs to be applied on that.

Second ( I always have a second, its a style flaw, I don't write well, shoot me) Is there wisdom in their knowledge about what can be changed, in order to achieve this thing they have said needs to be changed because "hes not doing it  right"

Starting over. Is this a wise thing to do? Well, no. leaving aside the fact that demonstrably there is no reason to start over. A gradual, section by section, state by state, introduction of structural change is being made into law. Giving up and doing it again with a new name, or something.

So leaving aside the fact that it doesn't need to be done, according not to me, not to the greed/corruption addicted powermongers in congress, but to the policy experts. No. No their suggested path says, but not their suggestion says.

Should we stop? Should the Obama administration stop moving forward with this bill?

To accept the things I cannot change;

When  would we bring a newly named bill back? In the fall? What would be different then? Would one vote in congress have changed? Would any new members be elected? Is there a process were we could use our money (and organizing) to counter the Billions and Billions of health insurance "industry" spending showing dead European Harry and Louises' begging from the grave that we protect our defenceless children from the satanic but well meaning plans of that failed politician Obama (who really wasn't ready to run the country, nor was he born here, you know)?

Biden shocked the world when he said that Obama would be tested in the first months of his holding office. Well now he is. This the test that

Republican Senator Jim De Mint proclaimed: "If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

This is the test Billy Bloody Hands Kristol writes:

With Obamacare on the ropes, there will be a temptation for opponents to let up on their criticism, and to try to appear constructive, or at least responsible. There will be a tendency to want to let the Democrats' plans sink of their own weight, to emphasize that the critics have been pushing sound reform ideas all along and suggest it's not too late for a bipartisan compromise over the next couple of weeks or months.

My advice, for what it's worth: Resist the temptation. This is no time to pull punches. Go for the kill.

So in the opinion o' the rightwing think tanks the only path back to power comes from:

starting over

Should we wait till after the mid terms? Should we ask Clinton? Bill? Hillary? Will a democratic party, having given up on a reform program that formed the deep basis of Obamas promise and election, increase or decrease the number of Democratic Party candidates?

Shall we take all the promises made, shall we abandon all the campaigning being done now, shall we give up on all the negotiations done to date, shall lessen all the approval ratings still extant, shall we tell all the families waiting we're going to come back to this, later, because while we wont be stronger, while we tried and failed once, while we promised action, while there seems to policy analysts no real change in actual policy needs to be made... we are just gong to give up.

God grant me the serenity

So what can we do?

Courage to change the things I can;

We can work on the greed heads in the congress. Attack them in their comfort. Let the public know,who is blocking the gradual implementation of a system that will provide the right to healthcare, even its flawed state because they are greed heads who take money from Health Insurance "industry" bloodsuckers who will do ANYTHING to keep their levels of profit, their economy destroying, system of cash diverting, care preventing vampirism.

We can promote the bill, that we helped the progressive caucus demand with a "line in the sand" commitment to defeat any bill that did not meet, what they analysed, was the best path forward, and not a sellout. Promote while knowing it is gradual, like social security was, like CHIP was, like civil rights legislation was, like the constitution was before the bill of rights, like emancipation was and like the voting rights acts were.

We promote it aying that a public option is a first step, an not final solution, a way of judging pthe public opotion, of getting used to public coverage, a way makinbg single payer an American, made by Americans way of providing the right to health that all of us who arent Rush, Steele, Kristol or Rove, want for each of us.

A step toward the right to healthcare, like a right fire protection, like the right to an education, like the right to be free despite your poverty, like the right to freedom of speech despite a lack of advertising dollars.

I  know who I stand with. I know what I support.  

Change
"We must break up the banks and never again let them get so big that they distort our politics and take down the economy.

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by: HousesofProgress @ Sat Jul 25, 2009 at 14:18:00 PM CDT

Is this dupe an accident?

I hope so. Pasting the same comment over and over is jejune. At least on the same blog ;-)

I am in earnest -- I will not equivocate -- I will not excuse -- I will not retreat a single inch -- AND I WILL BE HEARD.  

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by: lambert @ Sun Jul 26, 2009 at 00:22:04 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Maybe HoP is posting the same thing and expecting different results.

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by: nasrudin @ Sun Jul 26, 2009 at 01:36:47 AM CDT

[ Parent ]