Democrats Against Universal Health Care
The failure of Trumpcare might cause you to think that Democrats might use the chaos to push for single-payer health care.
You would be wrong.
It's past time to stop blaming Republicans for the fact that we are the only developed nation without universal health care. The problem is the Democrats.
The possibility of achieving single payer is “a bigger problem” than America’s already broken health-care system, according to one Democratic governor; it’s a boondoggle that would require a “massive tax increase,” says a Colorado senator; one liberal commentator charges that it “doesn’t make sense,” and shows an “indifference to real-world consequences.”
The push for “Medicare for All,” one high-profile liberal pundit tells us, is simply based in “outrage that private insurers get to play any role,” and aims to “punish or demonize insurance companies.” Oh and by the way, it’ll “never, ever come to pass” anyway, according to the Democratic Party’s former standard-bearer. How times have changed.
..
The issue flared up again during the 2008 Democratic primary fight, where both Obama and Hillary Clinton tried hedging their bets. Clinton put forward a plan that was basically Obamacare while insisting that “Medicare for All” could still be on the cards under the right circumstances. Meanwhile Obama repeatedly flip-flopped, at one point telling an audience that “the Canadian model won’t work in the United States” and that “we’ve got to develop a uniquely American approach,” and nine days later hinting to a different audience that over time single payer may be on the table.
DLC leaders felt reassured however, telling the New York Times they were “pleased that none of the Democratic candidates supports a single-payer health-care system.”
It isn't just those Dems in the White House.
While a vast majority of Democratic voters want Medicare for all, a majority of Democrats in the House are against it.
Enter the Justice Democrats, a political group founded by former leadership from the Sanders campaign, by Cenk Uygur (Young Turks), and Kyle Kulinski (Secular Talk). Their goal is to rebuild the Democratic Party from scratch and remove corporate-backed members of Congress. Currently, they have a second purpose: keeping track of all the Democrats who are (and aren’t) supporting single-payer. The chart below—their creation—shows every Congressperson who isn’t on board with the Sanders plan.
“Medicare for all is backed by 81% of Democratic voters but only 38% of Democrats in the House of Representatives,” said Corbin Trent, the group’s communications director.
Just a couple months ago a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center found that “60% of Americans say the government should be responsible for ensuring health care coverage for all Americans.”
Comments
Funny how most of the industrialized world has some form
of centralised/government universal/single payer health care system that costabout half as much as the Americans privatised one and are generally better.... thinking of propaganda these days...hmmm
Something that always annoyed me
on TOP was that all of the blame always went to the Repubs.
Sure Repubs prefer a Mad Max future for poor people (aka a free market utopia), but if a large majority of the Dem politicians don't support single-payer then stop finger-pointing at the Repubs, because you have to clean your own house first.
And if you can't do that then all you are doing to causing a useless distraction.
As I have said before blinkers are not useful nor are party
political tinted glasses.
They shut up about war as soon as a Dem was elected.
They started to use the same excuses as Republicans when war crimes occurred.
They backed a neo-liberal completely coupled with basically what amounted to a "loyalty pledge".
They told some of us to shut up and that they didn't need us.
We warned them of the possible outcome we could see coming down the road.
Now they are behaving as if the last 8 years never happened and Kos is going after the "big money" to try and keep a dead horse on its feet.
That Krugman quote...
He criticized us, and Bernie in particular, for simply wanting to 'demonize insurance companies', as though they surely have never deserved such a demonization.
I have argued that the very KEY to winning the battle for MFA is to embrace an all-out effort to demonize the insurance companies for their role in hurting America. They deserve it and we really can't hold back in our harsh denunciations.
It is the ONLY way we will ever be able to get members of Congress to be afraid of being identified with them. Harsh emotional attacks are just what's needed.
James Kroeger
Exactly. Channel that energy, as OWS did, into demonizing banks
and insurance companies instead of Russia and Trump.
Fear of Russia and hating on Trump are a diversion and smoke screen to keep the pitchforks and torches away from, not just the DNC, but their backers in the FIRE (finance, insurance, and real estate) sector, a social class that has been skimming off all the gains since the 1980s.
Totally correct on that diversion
and if Her had won then we'd be having Impeachment threats and hearings out the ass also. Either way, we were most likely guaranteed to have just this type of circus.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
@James Kroeger
The fact that he prefers that Americans should literally die rather than deprive insurance health parasites of massively profiting from their desperation and misery - while controlling what health care they can and can't get - indicates that he has no place in public discourse regarding such public policy.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
There's nary a word about this
or anything else of relevance at TOP anymore. It's all Russia, all of the time now.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Whenever I'm concerned
about the drop in traffic here at c99p, I just visit TOP and see how there is endless amounts of traffic and yet absolutely no content.
It's still a wasteland there.
What's wrong with this picture ?
We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.
@Azazello Everything?
Everything?
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
@Azazello I think it doesn't
I think it doesn't contain quite enough giveaways to the billionaire class. After all, we wouldn't want to demonize or blame them.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Nothing much wrong with it
if you're a Congress critter with government-funded health insurance.
native
It would not require any tax
increase probably if we stopped paying for the wars to enrich multinational oil companies. Just had a little of this discussion today with a co-worker who's probably a moderate Republican, and even she agreed that we're always willing to pay for wars but not for health care that every other industrialized country has! We all require it at some point but we act like it's a choice. Ignorant and willfully so.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
It might need a tax increase but...
Corporations would save by not having to pay for employer provided insurance and individuals would likewise save. All the evidence is for an overall savings.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
And remove their tax breaks and subsidies
There is no reason for them to get those when their profits are so high and their CEOs pay is so high.
And quit letting them sell their products here if they have bought a company in another country for the purpose of not paying their taxes.
There is $2.3 trillion that the big corporations have offshore and congress wants to give them a huge decrease on it if they bring the money back here. I think it would be over $200 billion lost revenue if congress gives them the tax holiday break.
It's easy to find the money for single payer if they want to, but we know that they won't upset their donors, the insurance, pharmaceutical and other companies.
If we had public financing for elections and outlawed lobbying then congress wouldn't need to be bribed to pass their legislation.
Another pipe dream.
There were problems with running a campaign of Joy while committing a genocide? Who could have guessed?
Harris is unburdened of speaking going forward.
Can't outlaw lobbying.
It's a Constitutional right to petition Congress. But we could outlaw paid lobbying and we could (maybe) outlaw campaign contributions from lobbyists.
I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.
Democrats are just the smiley face on the jackboot
of the American dystopia.
Eat your peas, and embrace the suck. Now!!
Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.
Is there really any support for single-payer
in the Dem Party?
I don't see it. I found a piece that I'll be posting at EB, in which Raul Grijalva throws 'single-payer' under the bus after the Supreme Court decision upholding the constitutionality of the ACA.
And, lately, Bernie is waffling back and forth as to whether he will support MFA, or a 'public option.' They are not the same thing, or interchangeable. His office says that he will propose a single-payer plan in a couple of weeks (I called yesterday), even though he has said at least 3 times on Cable News (CNN) since last Friday, that it can't pass.
Go figure.
Mollie
"I think dogs are the most amazing creatures--they give unconditional love. For me, they are the role model for being alive."--Gilda Radner
"If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went."--Will Rogers
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
@Unabashed Liberal Once upon a time, John
Once upon a time, John Conyers supported it (he's the one who put forward HR 676). Now, in the grand heyday of Black right-wing politicians, I have no idea if he's still of the same mind.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The parasite class
Medicare operates on a 3% overhead; for-profit insurance needs 15% to 18%. Anything over 3% is waste.
The treatment for Hepatitis C costs $84,000 per year; if the drug were a generic the cost would be $200 per year(thanks to CEPR for this)
The AMA got from Clinton a requirement that a doctor from a foreign country has to undergo an American internship and residency even though they did this at home. I think a German or Canadian doctor is just as good as an American one. American doctors get paid approx. twice their European counterparts. The cost: $800 per year for an average family.
These are three examples of nonproductive expenditures foisted on Americans needlessly: I call it parasitism. Nothing of value is produced and money is taken from our pockets to give to the powerful few.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
Of course Single Payer will require a tax base--
Everyone knows this. How much does your corporate insurance policy cost? Unless you can afford $20,000 a month for premiums your deductible will cause you to go broke as the average deductible is about $6,000. Someone making only 25 or 30 thousand a year will have to forgo common tests, such as mammograms, colonoscopy, etc. because they will have to pay he deductible out of pocket. This is compounded for those that have children.
"I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones."
John Cage
As some of the excellent comments above explained,
there is no excuse any longer. The facts overwhelmingly favor medicare for all. Quality and equal health care has to be viewed as a right. It's like other civil rights issues we've come to slowly as a society, there is only one right way in this.
But really, this is like taking on the MIC, that's how big it is.
As of April 1,
like, after the stroke of midnight, while I am hopefully asleep, I am de facto on Medicare.
I was unable to obtain health insurance from age 35 until age 61 because I was self-employed and had pre-existing conditions. Just being able to get into a hospital if need be was worth $800 a month.
I understand insurance is what you obtain to prevent financial disaster. That is why my home is insured for a few hundred a year, my vehicles are insured for a few hundred a year, but my health insurance premiums for 4 years were $45,000, more or less.
The roof over my head. The mode of transportation to
to get me to work.
The last 4 years of health care premiums have guaranteed I can't retire.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Glad you finally have coverage, OTC. Mr M
and I are just now qualifying for Medicare, too, although we've been fortunate to have continuous health care coverage over the years.
I've read more than one article that suggests that some folks (including some leading the single-payer movement in Cali) are actually talking about creating a system similar to Medicare Advantage (the private Medicare system)--not Traditional Medicare. Although I have no problem with others signing up for it, we want nothing to do with that program, since what savings there may be, often come with very narrow provider networks--and denial of care, as a result.
Hope you can rest easier, now!
Mollie
"I think dogs are the most amazing creatures--they give unconditional love. For me, they are the role model for being alive."--Gilda Radner
"If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went."--Will Rogers
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
I have never had insurance as an adult.
@on the cusp
I was on Medicaid as a kid until age 18. Since then I've had to rely on sliding scale local clinics for things like meds or checkups. Voc Rehab has also been a boon when it comes to my leg braces and such.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
@The Aspie Corner My late husband was a
My late husband was a paraplegic, couldn't even get a cheap life insurance policy, much less health insurance.
Over and over, I have said the only positive for me about Obamacare was just being able to get insurance, albeit at enormous, life-altering price. He died slowly and painfully, and I work until I die.
But my own personal battle is over. In a few hours, I will have affordable insurance for the first time since I was 35. The fight to survive with medical assistance is now guaranteed for me because I just didn't die.
Why should the youth of this nation have to struggle and wait like I did? When does my struggle ever get to be "old hat"?
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
If we make through to 65
And at no time since you were 35 was this nation not able to provide health care for you ... and the rest of us for that matter. This nation is so very exceptional. Not.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGDo1Jybs_I]
Krugman is a former registered Repukelican.
Liberal, he ain't! He's more of a moderate conservative (not a FRightwingnut). Rec'd!!
Inner and Outer Space: the Final Frontiers.
Krugman is a corporate conservative.
Let's use the scheme described here for American politics.
“When there's no fight over programme, the election becomes a casting exercise. Trump's win is the unstoppable consequence of this situation.” - Jean-Luc Melanchon