After reading BigAl's healthcare related essay yesterday did a little digging as this is a big issue for me. We have had to pay out around $15,000-20,000 out of savings in the last 5 years as opposed to over $120,000 had we had no coverage. Jakkalbessie and I both had big hospital events and extended treatment since we retired 12 years ago, and would have been bankrupt by now without our shitty teacher retirement healthcare that now has it's funding in question at the state level. Since we turned 65 two years ago both are covered by regular Medicare with teacher retirement coverage as secondary.

Give Up On Healthcare ?

It would be easy to just give up fighting for single payer given the election results and outcomes in CO and CA, and with Ryan's gloating announcements about plans to replace Medicare with a private system and Trump, who in the election said he would protect Medicare but repeal ACA, now talking about health savings account fail.

To those of here at Caucus99 who are looking to get a little more positive outlook back and who are ready to take action on Healthcare suggest reading this:

Posted on: Saturday, November 12, 2016
The Lancet interviews Dr. David Himmelstein on the U.S. election results
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2016/november/the-lancet-interviews-dr-david-hi...

Dr. Himmelstein is a co-founder of Physicians for A National Health Plan, whose members along with National Nurses United have been the leaders among health care professionals advocating for single payer Medicare for All type change.

PNHP has been a constant critic of ACA Obamacare and advocate for replacing it with Medicare for All. Check out their proposal and bill, here: http://pnhp.org/ .

In the interview the doc discusses what is known about Republican Plans but also gives his take on how millions will quickly have increased suffering so advocacy debate for single payer will go forward even with the recent election results.

Paul Ryan and Trump to Cause 20,000 Americans To Die?
Dr. Himmelstein points out

DH: We have no sense yet of whom Trump will choose for Health and Human Services secretary. But surely there will be intense advocacy efforts in the in the months ahead. We know from past research that something like a thousand people die each year for every million people who are uninsured. So uninsurance remains one of our major causes of death. And if they do indeed throw 20 million people out of coverage, we expect about 20,000 additional deaths each year. That is a public health emergency that we can scarcely ignore. And I think advocates at all levels will surely join joint efforts in a very vigorous way to try and move our health care system forward. We at this point may not be able to move back to the ACA, but we’re hopeful that we could move forward to something even better. I mean we’ve already seen on the streets of cities around the country the deep concerns of Americans who didn’t vote for Trump. And frankly among the many people who did vote for Trump, we’re likely to see very grave concerns arise as the reality of a Trump administration emerges. We know that among white middle-aged people of lower income, who were largely Trump voters, their death rates are rising in this country and many of them can’t get the care they need. We know that medical bankruptcy is extraordinarily common among people with insurance, and those problems are likely to get worse, not better. And I think that provides a very strong basis for advocacy for change. We may see a few months of hiatus in real debate, but it will emerge again.

Lying Ryan Called Out Today, Pass it On

Ryan has been going on Fox and other outlets saying Medicare going broke because of ACA, hoping to tie peoples' dislike for ACA to get them to swallow the lie that Medicare is broke. Glad that today he was fact checked in WaPo, which I quickly shared on Facebook and hope you will, too if you have an account. If not doing Facebook, how about a letter to the editor or sharing however you can would be appreciated.

Paul Ryan’s false claim that "because of Obamacare, Medicare is going broke" https://t.co/tZGO1UGPjT

— Washington Post (@washingtonpost) November 14, 2016

Action Now
IMO we should act now to offset the lies of the think tanks, bipartisan committees, and Paul Ryan and do everything we can to keep them from replacing Medicare single payer with a for profit fail.

TPM has a great article on need for action

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/ryan-plans-to-phase-out-medicare-in-...

Ryan says current beneficiaries will be allowed to keep their Medicare. Says. But after the cord is cut between current and future beneficiaries, everything is fair game. For those entering the system, Ryan proposes phasing out Medicare and replacing it private insurance with subsidies to help seniors afford the private insurance. That is unquestionably what it means because that is what Ryan says. So if you're nearing retirement and looking forward to going on Medicare, good luck. You're going to get private insurance but you'll get some subsidies from the government to pay the bill.

Through all the gobbledygook and bamboozlement, you'll find this line on Ryan's page: "For younger workers, when they become eligible, Medicare will provide a premium-support payment and a list of guaranteed coverage options – including a traditional fee-for-service option – from which recipients can choose a plan that best suits their needs."

This means, if you haven't gone on Medicare yet, when you do, you won't get Medicare. You'll get a "premium-support payment" - i.e., a check that will allow you to buy insurance from private insurers. The "support" in the phrase means it won't cover the whole amount. And in any case, rather than Medicare you'll have insurance from an insurance company, which everybody should love because haven't you heard from your parents and grandparents how bummed they were when they had to give up their private insurance for Medicare?

You'll hear lots of people calling this "reform" and other catchwords. But Medicare is a single payer, universal health care system. Replacing it with private insurance means getting rid of it. Even calling it "privatization" masks what is really afoot.

Every Democrat should be focused and talking about it volubly both as a matter of policy and politics. There isn't much time.

Josh Marshall is editor and publisher of TalkingPointsMemo.com.

Josh says 'Every Democrat, which doesn't apply to most of us here, but I say all of us should do what he suggests to Dems.

What Action Then?

Calls to Congress, letters to editor, emails to cable talk hosts, spread the word on Twitter and FB?

Other suggestions?

Stop any Bipartisan Fail !

The Hill: Bipartisan Senators Unveil Bipartisan #MedicareReforms. https://t.co/FZEM9KaolE

— HINJ (@HINJ_ORG) November 6, 2016

Edited for typos etc.