TTAC's best and brightest were not slow off the mark on this one: GM's plan to put $50b into the hands of the United Auto Workers for a union-controlled health care superfund could lead to epic fraud, leaving union members without adequate coverage. The Director of the National Legal and Policy Center's Organized Labor Accountability Project and editor of Union Corruption Update sounds the alarm. "Union-controlled health and benefit plans often shortchange union members and retirees," Dr. Carl Horowitz warns. "Instead of getting the best deal for participants, these plans are often characterized by cozy, inside deals beneficial to the union bosses, and on occasion, organized crime. With the staggering size of this proposed health fund, the UAW bosses must be salivating." In case you didn't notice, Dr. Horowitz (who still has both legs intact) thinks Congress should hold hearings on the health care deal– or else. "Neither GM nor the UAW can be counted on to act in the best interests of workers. Putting the union in charge of this health fund creates a potentially huge conflict of interest for UAW leaders."
[Interview w/Dr. Horowitz below.]
File this under Duh.
Once the Union sees the bills instead of GM we’ll see how much Viagra gets paid for or how many hangnails and sore feet are treated by specialists for years on end. The union could even institute co-pays, deductibles, care limits, and (wait for it) HMO provider rules.
Hehe, where are all the pro union folks on this one? Aren’t we going to attack the source? Surely the upstanding union leaders put the workers’ welfare above their own wallets?
You don’t seriously believe that CORPORATE benefits program directors don’t take meals, golf outings, and other bribes from insurance cos. and brokerage firms looking to get their piece of employees’ health care and 401k dollars,do you?
Why would union leaders be any more crooked than VPs of Human Resources?
Both need to be watched vigilantly, but don’t automatically assume that just because the corporate manager has a degree, he’s more honest or less dishonest than the union guy.
When I agree with RF on a union issue, well let's say it's news, especially in my house. But, you're absolutely right. One percent (1%) of $50B is $500,000,000. When we're dealing with a standard commission structure of 3-5%, the uniquely human trait of GREED is aroused even in a Quaker. Neither side is immune, and the amounts we are dealing with are staggering, especially when put in individual terms. What the union needs is an overseer with the wisdom of Solomon and the tenacity of Ralph Nader. These types are in short supply, especially after twenty-five years of corporate government. An entire generation has come of age thinking that business should be paid to locate in your community and professional sports teams just absolutely cannot compete without luxury stadia catering to the wealthy, paid for by the public tax base. This entire issue has a staggering potential for abuse and controversy, with repercussions felt throughout the blue-collar work force. They should take a small amount and lobby against the pharma and medical communities for an American single-payer health care plan. The rest of the civilized world looks at us and wonders how we could get something so wrong while doing so many other things so right. I believe that most Americans believe that health care should be a right, not an option. Joe Sixpack's kids deserve the same care that your Congressman enjoys. Our country has such great institutional wealth that this should be doable. We went from basic failure to a man on the moon in ten years, why not universal health care ,too? I wish th Union all the best of luck, they're going to need it.
Please, please, please get off the socialized medicine bandwagon! Here in the US, we’ll spend whatever is necessary to keep you alive and make you better – just go to the hospital – especially the county hospital – they have to take you in. In the UK They have an agency (forgive me for not remembering the name) that decides what drugs and treatments are allowed – not on a case by case basis, looking at you as a human, but simply by asking “Does it cost more than 30,000 pounds per year?” If it’s less than that, bring it on, if it’s more, it’s not even allowed to be used in the country. No, it’s not that the government won’t pay, they won’t allow it in the country!
I work at a pharma company, that recently had a drug denied approval in the UK. Not because there isn’t enough science showing that it works. Not because there are harmful side-effects that could be considered too great in comparison to the benefit of the drug. No, the citizens of Great Britain are denied access to this drug because it costs too much. Thanks to Queen and government for telling me exactly how much my life is worth!
If that’s how you want to live your life, then I’ll buy you a one way ticket to anywhere in Europe of your choosing, and you can live in a European Union of Soviet Socialist Republics country where they take 1/2 or more of your income to pay for this wonderful “free” health care. As for me, I’ll stay in the good ol’ USA (lumps and all), where I can take advantages of the freedoms in this country to make enough to afford whatever medical treatment my family or I may need.
/rant
Yeah, I see some small opportunity for corruption to seep into the administration of 50 beeeeeeellion dollars.
Olddavid: No, no no! No single payer healthcare system! We already have one in partial form, it is called Medicare and is rapidly going bankrupt, and the baby boomers have not even hit it yet. A single payer health system will be absolutely disasterous for the US. You think the other countries have it so right? You mean like France, where the economy is teetering on bankruptcy? Like Italy, where the economy is in the pits? like England where waiting long periods of time for surgery dates is well known? Like Canada, where thousands of Canadians cross into the US every year to get prompt medical care?
Please do not compare the US to other countries on this, the US has far more people, a far more diversified population and is taking in an estimated one million or more undocumented people every year.
The fallacy of the “47 million uninsured” is that one third of those 47 million are eligible for Medicaid and have not signed up and another estimated one third are undocumented people here. You really want a single payer system that covers all undocumented people? Where is the money going to come from? Any person now can walk into any ER and get free care, it is federal law. I know I manage ER’s amoung other areas of the health care field. Since the early 1990’s, there has been a net loss of over 40 ER’s in California because of very low reimbursements from governments and undocumented people. Many other hospitals out here are on the brink of closure.
Back to the issue of the union controlled funds and health care, they should consider giving every UAW member a health savings account every year and let them buy their own health care. Let’s face it Americans, by and large, do not take care of themselves, take out the obesity, tabacco usage, alcohol and drug abuse, that is probably 40% of the health care expenditures.
It would not be a surprise if the union plunders the funds, the history is there. The entire ship, the companies, unions etc have very weak underbellies and a very top heavy load, the crushing winds of greed, lack of health self discipline, stupid management mistakes, debt of biblical proportions, unwanted and overpriced products will capsize it all.
“I believe that most Americans believe that health care should be a right, not an option.”
To make health care a right, one would have to enslave doctors. One does not have a right to other people’s labor nor their income from labor efforts…. Ask Kunta Kinte.
I love freemarket capitalists . . . such humanitarians! You should play the videogame Bioshock, it shows the wonders of an Ayn Randian ‘utopia’ gone to its extreme.
Luther . . . you must obviously be a doctor . . .
I love all of your posts and suggestions. Great. Thieves get health care by walking into any old ER and essentially stealing it. And CEOs have gold-plated and bankruptcy-proof benefits (along with Congressmen). Pop stars and ballers make 8 figures a year, so they can just buy a spot in the liver transplant line when they wear out the original.
Everybody else . . . honest workers . . . screw you, Socialist.
Great.
dkulmacz; Yes, there are thieves who steal healthcare, why should healthcare be considered any different than say, your local food market, why not just give away all the food everyone wants and have the taxpayer pay for it? Perhaps the same with utilities, everyone gets free air conditioning, no matter how much they use, except it isn’t free.
The beauty of free enterprise is that if we do not like a ball player getting millions of dollars, stay away frm the games and don’t watch their games on tv. If enough people don’t like it, the pay to the players will dramtically come down.
The gold plated CEO’s, let’s don’t buy the products from their companies (are we speaking of the 2.8 here?), there are alternatives. If people don’t buy, the CEO’s don’t get their pay.
Unlike government of course, we may not want to participate but the threat is always there that we must pay up.
I do not know what you do for a living but I would guess it is not in a field of endeavor where the government forces you to give away your product or service and does not pay you for it, or pays very little, that used to be called slavery and against the Constitution, now it is simply caled “rights”, that being “rights” of those who choose not to pay (and rest assured, in my experience people’s personal choices place them in a position of wanting “rights” to get something others must pay for.
To take Socialism to the extreme, means we all lay work little and have our “needs” taken care of, except that will fail miserably.
The capitalist system has provided more for many than any other system in history. it certainly has major flaws, see GM for example or Enron, but it continues to be mostly a voluntary participation systems where we choose not to participate if we wish, unlike government controlled societies.
Yes I liked “Atlas Shrugged”, Utopian socieities have always failed and it does not take a village.
“Luther . . . you must obviously be a doctor . . .”
Nope. I just don’t claim a right/ownership on other people’s lives/property…Im not a slave nor slavemaster. Im a Humanitarian.
Funny how all these unfettered capitalists bring up the bogeyman of socialism whenever national healthcare comes up. They paint a nightmare of increased costs without looking at a single fact. Here’s a few facts for you.
Percentage of GDP spent on healthcare in 2001.
U.S. 14.6%
France 9.7%
Japan 7.8%
Australia 9.1%
U.K. 7.7%
Finland 7.3%
Child mortality rates:
U.S. 6.3
France 4.2
Japan 3.2
Australia 4.4
U.K. 4.8
Finland 3.7
Nice, free market system that is. We dump more money into healthcare and it produces worse results. Only someone in the healthcare racket–err, industry–could love that system.
Aside from any moral argument, it makes economic sense to support national healthcare. The U.S. has put itself at a competitive disadvantage by spending hundreds of billions per year more than it has to.
“I love freemarket capitalists . . . such humanitarians! You should play the videogame Bioshock, it shows the wonders of an Ayn Randian ‘utopia’ gone to its extreme.”
Too bad the USSR wasn’t just a communist socialist video game. Instead it was real and the suffering was immeasurable.
Qwerty: Just throwing out the child mortality rates by themselves shows nothing unless you look at the underlying causes. First, you’re assuming that medical care is the only factor in such rates. For example, the US is wealthy enough to try to save preemies that other nations don’t even try to save. That includes the preemies of both the rich and poorest of the poor, even the wee ones of addicts. We manage to save about half of the earliest preemies where the rest of the world doesn’t even try (too expensive, not enough equipment and trained personel, etc.). I’d say that saving that many kids is great. But the half we try and fail goes into our child mortality rates. Elsewhere, the 100% not saved often goes into the miscarriage rates making their child mortality rates look better. Second, those numbers are self-reported by the individual nations. You don’t believe that the bureaucrats in charge of those national health plans wouldn’t fudge those numbers to look good? Please spare me the naivete.
Qwerty: You fail to grasp the US is also paying the medical care for millions of people of whom migrated here without documentation, far more than all the other countries combined.
The US costs are also higher because more is spent on high tech and breakthrough care and products saving people’s lives and extending lives.
The US population as a whole does not take care of itself, that has to be factored into the costs.
Government bureaurcracies absorb billions of dollars.
You are comparing apples and oranges. Have Japan or Australia pay for millions of people who go to their country and demand free medical care and see how their spending escalates. Are you aware that in many hospital along the border of the US and Mexico, 50 percent of childbirths are to illegal imkigrants, who pays for that? Don’t believe me? Check out LBJ Hospital in Houston, Parkland Hospital in Dallas, or El Centro Hospital in El Centro, Ca. or Yuma Regional in Yuma, Arizona, I could go on.
If you think socialized medicing is so great, do you travel to Canada to obtain yours, or UK or France?
Study the facts, you are wrong sir, God help us if Hillary gets her way. Like I said earlier, we are already trying universal health care, it is callled Medicare and it is scheduled to go bankrupt in 10 to 15 years, wonderful program uh?
The government builds our roads, runs public schools, provides ambulance services, fights fires, polices our streets, and fights a disastrous war, all using taxpayer money. Is that socialism? The Iraq war budget could pay for health care for everyone, I bet. Medicare is unlikely to go bankrupt given the huge number of baby boomer voters.
HawaiiJim:
“The government builds our roads, runs public schools, provides ambulance services, fights fires, polices our streets, and fights a disastrous war, all using taxpayer money.”
Yes and the roads cost too much, the bridges are falling down, kids leave school without readng and math skills, and you think the war is disastrous, so let’s do healthcare too! Oh and Social Security? Won’t be around in it’s present form much longer – it too will run out of money.
windswords: Good points. A few thoughts, though. First, you did not question the government-provided ambulance services that I cited, which are a form of health care. If we are OK with government paying for ambulance service, why we are we not OK with the government paying for the hospital services where the ambulance drops the patient off? Second, my main point was, do we view ambulance services, police, public schools etc. as socialism? Third, I attended a public school where the education was so good that my parents didn’t need to consider sending me to private schools. I wouldn’t view my great educational experience as classic socialism, in fact my school was in a right-leaning town. Fourth, I would argue that in a crunch, for a sixteen-year old with oncoming diabetes, access to high-quality health care may be more important than access to high-quality education. The health care keeps him or her alive. The education enables him or her to live that life more productively.
The organization you quote, well known to Bill O’Reilly viewers, believes there is only one single measure of ethics.
According to the NLPC website:
“NLPC promotes a single standard of ethics in public life through research, education and legal action.
We do not believe that ethics are advanced through more laws or “better guidelines,” even as existing ones are ignored. We don’t believe the problem is with too few laws, or with too much freedom, but with men and women. We believe the missing ingredients are character, morality and common sense.
We recognize that the bigger the government, the more opportunities for corruption; and the more intervention in the economy, the more reason for special interests to seek influence. We believe that the best way to promote ethics is to reduce the size of government.”
So, let’s see. Bilking the taxpayers out of a trillion over non-existent weapons of mass destruction, that isn’t bad ethics. No-bid contracts with cronies, that’s not bad ethics either. How about breaking the law, and tapping people’s phones without a warrant. Nope, that doesn’t count. Selling drugs that you know will harm people? Nope. Selling lead-based toys to children? Nope. The only bad ethics there is on the part of the government, for finding the lead.
Sorry, but the guy you quoted has about as much credibility as, well, Billy O’Reilly.
hltguy wrote: “If you think socialized medicing is so great, do you travel to Canada to obtain yours, or UK or France?”
Well, actually, yes. I went to the U.K about ten years ago for some basic treatment that would have cost about $3k in New York. But I had no insurance at the time so I bought a cheap round-trip ticket and stayed for a few days with a friend from London. My friend brought me to her local clinic. I told the doctor there that I had no insurance card. He said, “I don’t give a shit. I get paid a salary. This isn’t America.” The treatment was first class and it helped me recover.
Anyone who buys drugs in Canada, is essentially taking their medical care there.
My cousin, who is in her late fifties, works for an employer who doesn’t provide medical care. She doesn’t make enough to afford a private policy. So, when she came down with ovarian cancer a couple of years ago, she had to choose between a $60k medical bill or her house. Instead, she flew to India, go treatment from American-trained physicians, and paid $9k.
There are as many as 600,000 U.S. citizens living in Mexico who pay $45 per month to get a medical insurance card. This card pays for their prescriptions and for visits to clinics. Many of the doctors, especially in the Guadalajara area, speak English. There are also many Americans who go to medical school there.
Who would you trust more to provide health care, the UAW or FEMA? Or, how about Halliburton? Blackwater? Enron? Worldcom? Tyco? Mattel? Maybe we should just give all the money to Tom Delay, Carl Rove and Alberto Gonzalaz. Or, Senator Craig. No, not him. The money would surely go down the toilet.
HawaiiJim: Government run ambulance services do exist, but in most areas they are privately run. We do we need the government to run ambulance services, why are they doing so? Why can’t a private company do it? There are hundreds of excellent private companies in the U.S. providing top notch ambulance, paramedic and air ambulance services.
There are good public schools no doubt, but in many parts of California (I live in California), the drop out rate in public high schools is over 50%. The reading and math skills are non existent, and many of the high school graduates can even spell diploma. A fact: over 45% of California’s budget goes to public education, that equals well over $50 BILLION dollars per year. The District of Columbia spends more than that per student, please look up the achievement rates of those students, it is deplorable, yet the government employed bureaucrates keep pulling down the big bucks, with no performance based guidelines for thier big checks. Did you know in the New York City school system the contract with public employee teachers union only requires teachers to work 3.5 hours per day. Let’s don;t even get into the five months off per year the teachers and students get (try getting away with that in the private sector) Here is another fact:
California spends an average of over $10,000.00 per student in public schools per year, from 1st grade to 12th grade. The average classroom has over 30 students, therefore over $300,000.00 per classroom every school year. The avergae teacher makes, with benefits, around $60,000.00. Where does the remainder of the money go? Security, maintenance and mostly bureaucrats.Despite over $50 billion per year being spent, the state owes tens of billions of dollars more of borrowed money from bond sales that finances school construction. The schools continue to scream they don’t have enough money. The Los Angeles school district last years spent tens of millions of dollars of a new payroll system that is so screwed up, they cannot even produce accurate pay checks. Ask most teachers (I know several), they never have enough money for supplies and pay for supplies out of their own pockets. The teachers union is like the second most powerful union (all public employees) in the state (next to Correctional Officers, and that is another story). Yet, EVERY objective study in the state indicates a failure to produce a majority of competent student annd acceptable gradulation rates,. Compare this to the private schools, who have far higher graduation rates, higher test scopres, higher percentages of students going to college and less criminal behavior. Yet the politicians and government sponsored union won’t allow vouchers for parents to send their students to private schools.
By the way, MEDICARE IS GOING BANKRUPT, study it and you will know. Why is it that people in their 20’s and 30’s years of age when they receive their annual letter from Social Security indicating how much they have earned per year, the letter indicates that there will not be enough money to pay them but a portion of their Social Security benefits, unless changes are made? I know I have seen that letter, one of employees received one, she is 38 years old.
Fact is, the US government debt has grown nine times large than the debt in 1981, and is nine times larger since 1981, than the accumulated debt in the first 205 years of this country. Both the Democrats and Republicans are responsible for it, whether be billions on wars or trillions on social programs. Medicare is going broke, there is little doubt. That is a fact.
This is a automobile site, so to tie into that, those who say the UAW or the 2.8 hope to get a government run healthcare system should be ashamed, why add more crushing debt because of their greed and mismanagement? Shame on them.
hltguy wrote: “If you think socialized medicing is so great, do you travel to Canada to obtain yours, or UK or France?”
Well, actually, yes. I went to the U.K about ten years ago for some basic treatment that would have cost about $3k in New York. But I had no insurance at the time so I bought a cheap round-trip ticket and stayed for a few days with a friend from London. My friend brought me to her local clinic. I told the doctor there that I had no insurance card. He said, “I don’t give a sh*t. I get paid a salary. This isn’t America.” The treatment was first class and it helped me recover.
Anyone who buys drugs in Canada, is essentially taking their medical care there.
My cousin, who is in her late fifties, works for an employer who doesn’t provide medical care. She doesn’t make enough to afford a private policy. So, when she came down with ovarian cancer a couple of years ago, she had to choose between a $60k medical bill or her house. Instead, she flew to India, go treatment from American-trained physicians, and paid $9k.
There are as many as 600,000 U.S. citizens living in Mexico who pay $45 per month to get a medical insurance card. This card pays for their prescriptions and for visits to clinics. Many of the doctors, especially in the Guadalajara area, speak English. There are also many Americans who go to medical school there.
Who would you trust more to provide health care, the UAW or FEMA? Or, how about Halliburton? Blackwater? Enron? Worldcom? Tyco? Mattel? Maybe we should just give all the money to Tom Delay, Carl Rove and Alberto Gonzalaz. Or, Senator Craig. No, not him. The money would surely go down the toilet.
“Medicare is unlikely to go bankrupt given the huge number of baby boomer voters.”
True. They have a long history of voting themselves other people’s money as evidence by the Fed’s (Taxpayer’s!) $70T total unfunded liability…A big portion of that liability is Medicare…Hmmmm. Those 20 year olds out there might consider moving to a freer country in the near future unless you think you might enjoy being a tax-and-inflation slave your whole life (aka, A CopperTop). Plan early…Avoid the rush.
The UAW-managed VEBA will run like a tight ship compared to a gov-controlled health care system. I state that with 100% certainty. Imagine DMV employees as hospital staff.
Luther: Apart from my personal views on the nation’s health care obligations: I don’t think universal government-controlled health care is likely to happen in the U.S. What we’ll probably continue to see is various approaches by the individual states to getting more people onto some form of health insurance. The liberal states like Massachusetts and Hawaii will work harder at this than the conservative states. I do think that America’s approach to health care may be making some of our industries like the auto industry less competitive. Interestingly, I read somewhere recently that America’s employer-based group health insurance system–which we now take for granted–got its start at a period in our history when wage controls made it hard for employers to offer higher salaries to recruit (maybe retain?) good employees, so the companies started offering health care coverage as an inducement. I have not verified this bit of history, though.
“I don’t think universal government-controlled health care is likely to happen in the U.S.”
It already is. There is a government law that states one cannot be turned down for health care even if they can’t pay. When more people discover that they are being fools for paying health insurance since they can get health care for “free” (Free = someone else is forced to pay their bill), they will stop paying which raises the cost of paying-people’s premiums which make more stop paying which raises premium prices which makes more people stop paying….See how that goes? It is a death spiral. Todays laughably expensive health care is a result of government-forced redistribution from those that pay to those that don’t.
The key to excellent and affordable care is to return the system back to the free market where competitive pressures will lower costs and improve service… Like car insurance or anything else in the competitive free market. A phone call to Hawaii today is dang-near free. Had the government not repealed the law that gave ATT a monopoly, it would cost – what – $20 per minute and the Internet would not exist. The Government turns everything it touches into expensive crap…By it’s very nature…It is a destructive parasite that is only good at killing people (need to keep government focused on murderers, rapists, thieves, invading foreign armys…Thats about it).
Yes you are correct, employer-provided health insurance came about due to wage controls and high bracketed income taxes. Employers provided “perks” instead of higher salaries to get around the government’s tyranny.
Hospitals can’t refuse to treat you if you don’t have money or insurance, but they can sure as hell dun you and eventually ruin your credit if you don’t pay promptly enough to suit them.
My daughter couldn’t pay for gall bladder surgery. The surgeons treated her, the business office mistreated her. Every solo attempt to set up an extended payment plan was met with, “Pay up in 120 days or it goes to a collection agency and all the credit bureaus get notified.”
She enlisted the help of a nonprofit credit counseling service who got every one of her creditors,except the hospital, on board with extended payments.
She ended up in bankruptcy.
All this crap about wasteful GOVERNMENT bureaucracy and not one word from you right-wing whackos about the insurance companies and their high advertising and sales budgets, lavish office buildings, lavish executive salaries, etc.
Big business–insurance cos., hospital chains, etc. are always good–bureaucrats always bad.
You people and your Saint Rush need to lay off the oxycontin.
Carlos.Ngero: I am gald you had a successful medical event overseas, I presume all your future care will be done overseas also. You go overseas and pay your medical bill, unfortunately most of the people who come to the U.S. do not pay their medical bills, see the difference? You want to know why healthcare is expensive in America, amoung other reasons, how many millions of people get free healthcare here that are not even citizens? How many lawyers are there overseas that sue at the drop of a hat?
You are correct, I do not trust giving the money to the Senator Craig’s of the world or any other politician, Democrat or Republican. Your assumption is that I am a Republican, they have screwed the system also, it was the Republicans who initiated the stupid prescription drug program a few years ago that is grossly over priced and was not needed. They are as responsible as the Democrats.
Let me ask you this question: You seem to appreciate socialized medicine such as the UK, where is the U.S. going to get the money to pay for health care for all? You say stop the wars? great, the U.S. is already so far in debt, it will never get itself out of it.
By the way, it is laughable you would compare the healthcare system in Mexico to the U.S., you are kidding right? I once did a consulting project in Mexico involving healthcare and the treatment centers most people go there were deplorable. Why do you think so many of their citizens come acrooss the border for healthcare here?
Again, healthcare is so expensive here because:
1) The government overburdened hand is involved (thank you Lyndon Johnson, you idiot)
2) “Free” healthcare being given to millions of people
3) High tech and pharmaceutical advances unseen anywhere in the world on a large scale and without precedent in the history of the world
4) A population that does not take care of itself, obesity, smoking, drugs, alcohol etc
5) A population that demands that most high tech and best drugs anytime anywhere, as long as someone else pays for it
6) The loss of “value” perception by the public of the true cost of healthcare
7) Trial lawyers (see John Edwards’ rise to huge wealth)(By the way, the average attorney earns twice per hour as the average physician)
8) Greedy doctors who harm the hard working ethical doctors
Please check the financial condition of the UK healthcare system, or France’s or India’s or Mexico.. The glorious scenario yoou describe in some of those areas has a dark underside.
hltguy: Kindly provide us with the source for your statement that “the average attorney earns twice per hour as the average physician.”
htlguy: It appears you have swallowed the right wing argument hook, line and sinker.
No, I won’t go abroad for my health care. Instead, I will contribute my money to candidates who support fixing our broken system. But actually, I would consider sending my children abroad for a university education. The cost is far, far less than here, with “free enterprise.”
The rising cost of medical care is not due to malpractice lawsuits. Even when malpractice awards have been limited by legislation, insurance companies have increased rates.
The U.S. medical system is nothing more than crony-capitalism. There is no competition. The number of doctors is limited by law. The state medical schools are taxpayer funded, (private schools also get grants), pharmaceutical companies are some of the biggest lobbyists in D.C. The laws we pass are for the good of the for-profit industry. Have you read about the condition of our corporate-owned nursing homes lately? Ever try negotiating for the cost of an aspirin in a hospital? An MRI? Sure, these are commodities. But they are not treated as such in the U.S.A. Here, we have no market pressure to exert on medical costs.
Don’t like the government, huh? Why don’t we ditch the police and have voluntary speed limits? Why don’t we ditch the EPA and just let the paper companies dump dioxin in our drinking water? What they do with their toxic waste could be voluntary.
You can blame LBJ for Medicare, but congress saw that seniors were eating cat food, and were homeless and were destitute, so they passed a law to take care of them. Bush and his cronies in congress have tried to bankrupt Medicare, destroy Social Security and balloon the deficit in order to prevent any progress in dealing with social problems such as access to higher education. It won’t work. Soon, the tables will be turned. And just like I hate seeing $12 Billion a month go to the war in Iraq, you can suffer watching as some of that money goes to saving the lives of pre-mature babies, or removing a tumor from an otherwise healthy person before it metastasizes. You can let it eat you up as you watch a well deserving low income person get a grant for college. Yes, less for Blackwater. More for blacks.
As far as as other first world countries go, if I were uninsured, I would rather live there in a heartbeat. And no, you can’t send me away. You are stuck with me and my campaign contributions. In the end, it is those with the most money who buy the legislation and every elected office in America. It is those with money who prevail. Thank all the Gods for George Soros. He will go down in history as the most generous multi-billionaire in history.