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What is this weird “Single-Payer” Thing?

The core problem is that right now about 30% of every health care
dollar goes to insurance conglomerate and big pharma overhead and
profit, a large part of which represents medical care WRONGFULLY and
purposely denied. If you are looking for so-called death panels
(actually death czars), they are the EXISTING business model in place
for the corporate medical insurance industry, where single
bureaucrats are under the directive to deny as much care as they can
get way with. Every other major industrial country long ago switched
to some kind of single payer system, where full and comprehensive
health care is deemed a right of every tax paying citizen. And not
one of those countries has switched back to their previous
inefficient, private for profit systems.

And yet all we hear on cable TV are unrelenting lies and smears about
the systems of these other countries, including demagoguery about how
it's basically all some kind of commie conspiracy, as if that
language was not old and tired enough already. Sean Hannity recruited
some guy with a British accent to denigrate his own country's health
care (which he had never actually used), only to be denounced himself
by actual members of the British parliament. An investor's paper
asserted that Dr. Stephen Hawking would have died if he had depended
on UK health care, when in FACT it had saved his life. And when you
call these liars out on their lies they just tell new and fresh ones
and keep on trucking.

Please read below so you will at least know what everyone is talking about- and then you decide:

What single payer does in essence is pool the medical interests of
those who need care, and thereby gives them the power to negotiate,
through whatever is established as the funding agency, favorable and
truly competitive pricing from the medical service providers.

Government does not "take over" health care, it just takes
responsibility for paying for it. And by eliminating complicated
coverage bureaucracies it is a much more efficient system with lower
overhead. And THIS is why it is so mortally opposed by those
profitting off our existing inefficient, uneconomical system now.

We are hearing alot of talk about a so-called "public option". What
exactly is the difference between that and single payer health care,
you ask? The first thing you must understand about what is being
called the "public option" is that it was designed to be a
distraction, to give the American people a FALSE choice. What the
corporate interests orchestrating this whole charade want to do is
transform the debate, such as it is, into an argument about whether
there should be a "public option" or not.

But as designed, the "public option" being propounded would do NONE
of the effective things that a single payer system would do. It would
not give itself the clout to actual compete with the existing corrupt
system. It would not eliminate the byzantine overhead as compared to
the miserable mess we have now. In other words, it is being designed
to FAIL. Heads they win, tails we lose. They last thing the medical
insurance industry wants is actual meaningful competition, and that
is why they have tried to keep true single payer out of the debate
entirely, as sick as that sounds.

One symptom of this is talk over the weekend that the Senate is
working on a "streamlined" proposal, because even the congressional
budget office recognizes what a massive, honking scam this all is.
But why do we have to reinvent the wheel? HR 676, a true single payer
bill, Medicare for All, has been on the table for years already, with
more sponsors in the House than any other proposal. So why don't they
just pass it already? Because the insurance companies won't have it??
What about the interests of the American policy? When is it time for
actual good public policy in this country for a change?

Even worse, under the guise of so-called reform, the one proposal you
can count on surviving is a REQUIREMENT that you pay for whatever
they come up with. You say you can't afford health insurance now and
that is why you have no coverage? Well guess what, they want you to
be FORCED to become a customer of these same greedy medical
conglomerates, or pay effectively NO LESS for a phony "public
option", all the cost of single payer with NONE of the real benefits,
and it is just as sick as it sounds.

The false choice debate was in high gear this week with Pelosi
demanding a "public option". Then just the next day Steny Hoyer piped
up and said the "public option" might have to go. Well, it is
beginning to appear more and more like Steny Hoyer will have to go,
and probably Pelosi as well, if we are ever going to ever have real
policy reform in this country. And the first step in that direction
is to keep speaking out, something that frankly NONE of those on our
side are doing enough of right now.

The entire so-called debate, such as it is, is being driven by a tiny
handful of loudmouths given over-sized coverage in the corporate
media, from a couple lunatics disrupting town halls to right wing
reactionaries with giant media megaphones, and those not on the
corporate payroll are just too stupid to demand their salary. Yet and
still, the only way they can possibly win is for us to NOT raise our
voices and keep doing so.

We know the phone lobby resource is a new thing, and it may take a
while for our participants to get used to using it, and to understand
how powerful it will be. Right there at your finger tips are links to
pop up the local district office phone numbers of your own members of
Congress. Right there is a link to pop up a window of policy points
to make on the phone. We have done everything we can to make it as
easy to use as possible, just like our regular email action pages.

So please take the time to use one or the other

HR 676 People's Phone Lobby:

or the email to Congress action page on this same issue at

HR 676 Email Action Page:

Speak out again, and keep speaking out. Don't let the handful of
right wing loudmouths be the only voices out there. There are so many
more of us on the people's side. If you just make your voice heard
there is no corporate power than can prevail against us. They are
depending on your silence to cheat you out of the medical care you
deserve as a citizen of the United States of America. Is this the
only first world country where we CAN'T put good, public policy in
place? Don't let it happen, please speak out again now.

Posted by on August 27, 2009 3:50 AM |

Comments

Ok Charles – I will admit I have been ignorant on the health care debate. I read pro and con articles and honestly don’t know who is telling the truth and who is lying (I suspect both sides). So after reading your post this morning I decided to check around a bit.

My administrative assistant moved her from Canada, she did say that her health care there was inexpensive / free but that her tax rate there was 45 percent and that here (for comparable pay) her tax rate is around 12 percent. She went on to say that wait times for routine procedures can be long due to a shortage of doctors and a high demand for service. Apparently she needed a root canal and it was seven months between the time her dentist said she needed it and the time that it happened. Also, her sister in law went to a doctor complaining of a bad headache. The doctor prescribed a medication but the headache only got worse. Over a nine day period she saw six different doctors each of who either increased the dosage or changed to a different medication. Finally on the ninth day her husband took her to the emergency room because the pain was soo intense. The ER doctor ordered an MRI which revealed a bleeding aneurysm. She didn’t survive the day.

I later spoke to one of my clients who moved here from London. He said that he did not know better as long as he lived there and thought all health care was the same. When he moved to Florida he said that he could not believe the quality and expediency of the health care in this country. In a nutshell he said we do not have any idea how good we have it in this country.

Before I left for the day I spoke with an administrator at All Childrens Hospital in St. Petersburg. In our conversation he said that hospitals can not turn down patients in need regardless of their ability to pay. He also said that last year alone All Childrens performed almost sixty million dollars worth of care for children who’s family’s didn’t have health care and who could not afford to pay for services. He said that is why my health insurance company gets billed ten dollars for an aspirin or a packet of tissues.

Tomorrow I will be talking with two people I used to work with, one from Germany and one from Yugoslavia.

So far three for three

Posted by: Rich | August 27, 2009 12:03 PM

I dont know what to believe? I am certainly NOT taking the stance of, "if it aint broke dont fix it" while there are certainly injustices in the insurance industry and these should carry more weight because you are dealing with peoples health and well being, but no one can tell me that the quality of medical professionals in the United States is second to the ones in any other country! A big part of what drives costs up is the inability of large numbers of people to pay their medical bills, so fine tax the shit out of me and pay for them, but leave all the working parts of the system in tact!The government should also revoke the non-profit status of any helath insurance company, because when there is a surplus of money left on the books at the end of the fiscal year at say blue cross, guess what rather than giving subscribers a rebate, everyone who works there gets a bonus. As for big pharma being the devil? fine regulate their profits and watch what happens to R+D it will be gone and so will pharmaceutical progress. Obama has said recently that this is not a trojan horse for some single payer system,yet he has said in the past that he is a proponent of the single payer system and that it will take some tome to stop employer sponsored health insurance so what am I suppose to believe? what he said then? or what he is saying now? I dont know, you tell me

Posted by: memory man | August 27, 2009 3:23 PM

NO CO-OP'S! A Little History Lesson

Young People. America needs your help.

More than two thirds of the American people want a single payer health care system. And if they cant have a single payer system 77% of all Americans want a strong government-run public option on day one (86% of democrats, 75% of independents, and 72% of republicans). Basically everyone.

According to a new AARP POLL: 86 percent of seniors want universal healthcare security for All, including 93% of Democrats, 87% of Independents, and 78% of Republicans. And 79% of seniors support creating a new strong Government-run public option plan, available immediately. Including 89% of Democrats, 80% of Independents, and 61% of Republicans, STUNNING!! Senator Max Baucus, You better come out of committee with a strong government-run public option available on day one.

The History:

Our last great economic catastrophe was called the Great Depression. Then as now it was caused by a reckless, and corrupt Republican administration and republican congress. FDR a Democrat, was then elected to save the nation and the American people from the unbridled GREED and profiteering, of the unregulated predatory self-interest of the banking industry and Wallstreet. Just like now.

FDR proposed a Government-run health insurance plan to go with Social Security. To assure all Americans high quality, easily accessible, affordable, National Healthcare security. Regardless of where you lived, worked, or your ability to pay. But the AMA riled against it. Using all manor of scare tactics, like Calling it SOCIALIZED MEDICINE!! :-0

So FDR established thousands of co-op's around the country in rural America. And all of them failed. The biggest of these co-op organizations would become the grandfather of the predatory monster that all of you know today as the DISGRACEFUL GREED DRIVEN PRIVATE FOR PROFIT health insurance industry. And the DISGRACEFUL GREED DRIVEN PRIVATE FOR PROFIT healthcare industry.

This former co-op would grow so powerful that it would corrupt every aspect of healthcare delivery in America. Even corrupting the Government of the United States.

This former co-op's name is BLUE CROSS/BLUE SHIELD.

Do you see now why even the suggestion of co-op's is ridiculous. It makes me so ANGRY! Co-op's are not a substitute for a government-run public option.

They are trying to pull the wool over our eye's again. Senators, if you don't have the votes now, GET THEM! Or turn them over to us. WE WILL! DEAL WITH THEM. Why do you think we gave your party Control of the House, Control of the Senate, Control of the Whitehouse. The only option on the table that has any chance of fixing our healthcare crisis is a STRONG GOVERNMENT-RUN PUBLIC OPTION.

An insurance mandate and subsidies without a strong government-run public option choice available on day one, would be worse than the healthcare catastrophe we have now. The insurance, and healthcare industry have been very successful at exploiting the good hearts of the American people. But Congress and the president must not let that happen this time. House Progressives and members of the Tri-caucus must continue to hold firm on their demand for a strong Government-run public option.

A healthcare reform bill with mandates and subsidies but without a STRONG government-run public option choice on day one, would be much worse than NO healthcare reform at all. So you must be strong and KILL IT! if you have too. And let the chips fall where they may. You can do insurance reform without mandates, subsidies, or taxpayer expense.

Actually, no tax payer funds should be use to subsidize any private for profit insurance plans. So, NO TAX PAYER SUBSIDIES TO PRIVATE FOR PROFIT PLANS. Tax payer funds should only be used to subsidize the public plans. Healthcare reform should be 100% for the American people. Not another taxpayer bailout of the private for profit insurance industry, disguised as healthcare reform for the people.

God Bless You

Jacksmith — Working Class

Twitter search #welovetheNHS #NHS Check it out

(http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/25/why-markets-cant-cure-healthcare/)

Senator Bernie Sanders on healthcare (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSM8t_cLZgk&feature=player_embedded)

American HEROES!! :-) Click replay to play http://bit.ly/j31oU

(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbWw23XwO5o) CYBER WARRIORS!! - TAKE THIS VIRAL

Posted by: jacksmith | August 27, 2009 3:56 PM

to drill: You are such a pathetic tool..
Do you want to start sharing nightmare medical stories from here in U.S. as well?

You really would be opening a huge can of worms- and you know better. Don't go there- there is something fucked about each country and each system.
The only universal truth is that money talks- no matter what system you belong to... and, if you have the money, no one argues that the U.S. is number ONE.

• But there also is no arguing this staggering fact:
America is not #33 healthcare in the world for nothing... We have to work at it!
Let go, naysayers, and hear the truth.

Until then, let's all go enjoy a drink: Since I already have great healthcare and you won't let me share it- I'm buyin'...

Posted by: Charles Laquidara | August 28, 2009 1:13 AM

Accoding to the UN WHO we are #33. OK, and the criteria is. Also who are the top 32?

Posted by: Danny | August 28, 2009 8:13 AM

What seems so plain to see (and absolutely befuddles me as to how it's not realized) is that the quality of Healthcare is not the issue. There is no way that the quality is lowered in any plan being discussed - none.

It's all about the money system. Too late now, but I figure that much more traction may have been gained using the term "Helth Insurance Reform" instead of "Health Care Reform".

How can anyone possibly justify the current incentive system inherent within the current insurance providers (to say nothing of justifying the CEO salaries).

Shouldn't this alone simply rankle everyone?

whoever willingly adopteW

Posted by: GSP | August 28, 2009 8:15 AM

GSP

Do you honestly think that the quality of care will remain the same after the government takes control of this? Have you ever set foot in A V.A. hospital? Based on your argument that the free healthcare like the care offered at V.A hospitals will be the same as or better than say at The Mass General or Sloan Kettiring or John's Hopkins? This is where unintended consequences get government into big big trouble. The whole insurance system does not need to be overhauled, they should lose their non-profit status, that is total BS and what needs to happen is hospitals and health centers need to be re-imbursed for the care of people who can't pay for it, but I get the sense that this is more to correct inequality than it is about free health care for all. The system that everyone applauds in the U.K. has a loophole, there are big private hospitals all over the UK with no signs and big walls all around them where people who have money go for the best healthcare in the country. Executives actually get the private healthcare as part of their compensation package, So the model of the "healthcare world" still seperates the haves and the have nots. For actual meaningful debate to have taken place in this country both sides should have been more honest, sooner. There is absolutely no way that meaningful reform will happen now, the conservatives have done too good a job exploiting the buzzword opportunities that the dem's presented and you cant send congressmen out to do damage control and expect to win hearts and minds. This issue is going to go down the path of W.'s social security reform and Obama's coat tails are shrinking by the minute, If he wants this issue to win he needs to be lobbying around the country no-stop for the next two months, but i think everyday that this bill is stalled is another nail in the coffin of "health Insurance reform"

Posted by: memory man | August 28, 2009 11:04 AM

I have a headache from reading all of this. What line do I stand in to get some aspirin???

Posted by: Sauce | August 29, 2009 4:54 AM


What do you think would happen to our vets if there WERE no Government run VA hospitals?After fighting our stupid wars I guess we'd just leave them on their own when they return.
What will happen to you- or Mom and Dad if medicare/medicaid isn't there and your Alzheimer's kicks in-is that when you hit the streets?
Industrialized nations who tend to care for their people with nationalized preventative health insurance -live longer, have healthier babies, and prevent future illnesses BETTER than our current system provides for us. Don't believe me? ok, look at the statistics:
http://www.gapminder.org/videos/

Posted by: squeak | August 30, 2009 1:25 AM

single payer is an OPTION... if you're happy with what you have, then don't change it. what is so wrong with getting health care for people who do not currently have it?

Posted by: bsteed | August 30, 2009 4:09 AM

Good piece by James Surowiecki in last week's New Yorker about some of the psychology associated with the debate...


http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2009/08/31/090831ta_talk_surowiecki

Posted by: GSP | September 1, 2009 4:38 AM

If there were no government hospitals the heroes from the armed services could go to private hospiatls on the taxpayers dime and get good quality care at a private hospital instead of the low quality care at predominately shit hole hospitals, we should absolutely treat veterans better then they get treated at crappy, overcrowded government facilities!!

Posted by: memory man | September 3, 2009 1:04 PM

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