Ever felt like you’re trying to push a rope — tangled and frustrated with an impossible task? Everything is loosey-goosey in these last few days, nothing quite ‘cooked.’ I’ve tried to grab a single subject and explore it, but to no avail — rounding up the news is like this Toles ‘toon [a comment on Franken's win after EIGHT LONG MONTHS.] We’re in flux, moving forward, backward and sideways, all at once and at light speed, so here are some of the disjointed bits that make up the fabric of the moment.
Franken is, indeed, finally getting his passport out of Minnesota and onto the Hill; he inherits the Paul Wellstone seat, and it seems appropriate for the man who wrote Rush Limbaugh Is A Big Fat Idiot. His vote, including the Independents that caucus with the Left, will make 60 — the ironclad number that has the ability to stop opposition filibuster cold. Now Mary Landrieu and Olympia Snow will no longer be those whose moves we have to watch, but rather, the Blue Dogs … led by Ben Nelson who never met a corporation he didn’t cozy to.
Joe Biden has gone to Iraq to help push a homogeneous democratic agenda with the Kurds, Shi’ia and Sunni; they had their own Independence Day celebration with fireworks this week, as the US presence faded from their cities; but we’re still there, of course. They have a newly minted police force, no air defense and limited resolve; these are important baby steps, but baby steps still. I’ve always thought this handover was going to be very very messy, a bloody sorting of internal power. We shall see.
The Brit/American coalition are surging all over the place in Afghanistan, attempting to seize control of the border area that is conduit for opiates and most recent breeding ground for Taliban activity. Not many of us are happy about this … but in terms of this ‘enemy,’ reports today indicate that the Taliban are buying children to use for suicide bombings which puts this in perspective. It’s nuclear Pakistan we’re in struggle for, as much as anything; and radical terrorism we’re routing. This may not be the way of the future, but … it’s the way of the day. Keep prayers.
California is issuing IOU’s again; they did this briefly in 1992. They had already issued IOU’s for state tax returns; it’s unclear what happens next, except that the first to feel the heat will be those with the least. This worries me, personally; too many of my loved ones are California dreamers, and its still that place of my birth where … whenever I return … my body relaxes, my mind clears and my soul dances. It’s a vibrational thing. Hang in there, kids — we’re pulling for ya.
And you’d think the LAPD would have cleaned up its act after OJ — LA isn’t Mississippi or Louisiana, fumbling and bumbling in CYA-style due to its old bias and kick-backs; but it never seems to get it right, either. So Michael Jackson’s death investigation is now being scrutinized by the DEA. My take on the whole of it is in the weekly; Joe Jacksons can be found in this Telnaes ‘toon. Pity — it was always about ‘property’ with Joe.
Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina simply can’t shut his yap about his personal peccadillo’s, jonesing for his share of press coverage, and causing Jon Stewart to skewer him: “God killed Michael Jackson to save your ass — and you gave another interview?!?” Colbert couldn’t let the moment pass either, connecting the dots in this brilliant bit.
Nico Pitney is still doing a splendid job collecting bits and pieces about the situation in Iran; here’s today’s. In a display of police state belligerency, the courts are going to try the UK embassy staff — if what Iran wanted was international respect, they’ve done exactly the wrong thing. Here, you’ll find a [tragic and difficult to read] article about their idea of ‘interrogation — of course we’ve lost our moral high ground on this; and perhaps the fact that we’re all insufferable predators levels the playing field. Maybe we can’t come together to Just Say No to brutality until we realize that each of us is infected with power-hunger and death culture and must, together, make the choices that leads to life and love. That can’t come too soon.
Matt Taibbi gets my nomination for Most Ballsy Newsie of the year with his Rolling Stone exposé of Goldman-Sachs; the money game is a killer deserving of lethal injection. The last article in this short collection is spoof, a cartoon on the condition of our greed, taken to end-game; one stop shopping on life/death — it might have been an Onion offering.
And while I’m giving you links to Big Reads, here’s the Vanity Fair piece on Sarah Palin; both Matt’s and this one are too large to include here. It has a great graphic and started an internal war in the GOP; well … internal to the whiny finger-pointers that are left anyhow.
To round out the picture, Cynthia McKinney is locked up in Israeli prison with a Nobel Peace laureate, the Tea Baggers evidently don’t have a will or way for another uprising, and certainly not a cogent point to make — and regarding the Winship piece below about whose state government is craziest, I’m entering one of Missouri’s own in the race for Queen of the Callow — even faux-Pub Colbert couldn’t own this one; I’ll bet she didn’t even see the [little yellow] bus that hit her!
Interesting and amusing stuff today, as herded cats go, and the links are worth exploring if your Fourth is shaping up like mine, with the early heat giving way to thunderstorms to dampen our proceedings. This is our new pattern for the last few years and I’ve rationalized that at least we have fewer fires from the incessant fireworks that start in late June and last most of July … there are stands about every half mile around here so there’s already late night color and sound. Lots of cities can’t afford displays this year, though … I see that Tucson has cancelled their annual fireworks and that really caught me up short; that was always my favorite event in the [long] heat-season.
I don’t know how the Patch’s traditional display will work out, done on donation basis. Unimpressive, I’d predict. Still, I’m working the Democratic booth at the village fair tomorrow and I’d prefer not to do it holding an umbrella. Here’s hoping there’s better weather from the observation deck of Lady Liberty’s crown, opened for the first time since 9/11.
Happy Independence Day, Wavers — be safe, of course, and grateful that this year, after the last depressingly grim eight, the intent to create a saner world … even in fits and starts … is finally on America’s To-Do List again.
Jude
* with a nod to Cheeseburger/LOLCATS
Harpers Weekly Review
Iraq held its first National Sovereignty Day in honor of
the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraqi cities. A
celebration was held with poets and singers in Baghdad’s
al-Zawraa park and former Vice President Dick Cheney said
that he was worried that the withdrawal would “waste all
the tremendous sacrifice that has gotten us to this
point.” Two hundred Iraqis were killed or wounded in the
last ten days of June. A federal court judge in New York
City sentenced Bernard Madoff to 150 years in prison,
calling Madoff “extraordinarily evil” and noting that none
of the financier’s family members, friends, or associates
had pleaded for leniency on his behalf. Honduran President
Manuel Zelaya was exiled to Costa Rica by the military as
part of a coup d’etat under the direction of the Honduran
Supreme Court; he was replaced by Roberto Michelletti, who
took power in what he called “an absolutely legal
transition process.” Steve Jobs returned to Apple with a
new liver. Google CEO Eric Schmidt said that attempts by
governments to censor the Internet were futile, and that
governments censored “at their own peril.” The New York
Times revealed that, for seven months, it had sought to
keep news of the kidnapping of one of its reporters by the
Taliban out of the media, and had worked closely with
Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales to suppress news of the
kidnapping. Spanish fertility researchers advised
professional cyclists to freeze their sperm, and the
sheriff of Los Angeles County was considering whether to
distribute condoms to all L.A. jail inmates, rather than
just the gay ones.
South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, after going missing
for a week, returned home and announced that, instead of
hiking the Appalachian Trail, he had actually been in
Buenos Aires, where he had a girlfriend, to whom he once
wrote in an email: “Sleep soundly knowing that despite the
best efforts of my head my heart cries out for you, your
voice, your body, the touch of your lips.” Sanford
justified his continuing role as the state’s executive by
noting that Biblical philanderer King David didn’t
resign. Papal archaeologists in Rome authenticated the
bones of Saint Paul the Apostle, and a new cell-phone ring
tone that features Philip Roth’s “Jewish shouting” was
growing popular among the literary-minded. Born-again
Christians, dispensing Bibles, were arrested at a Gay
Pride festival in Minneapolis; a parishioner at Our Lady
of Hope Catholic Church in Carle Place, New York, was
arrested for stealing cash from another worshipper during
a Sunday service; and an Australian ewe gave birth to a
five-legged, six-footed lamb. The U.S. government was
working to protect ugly animals from extinction. Colorado
officials legalized rainwater. Toyota unveiled a
wheelchair steering system that can be directly controlled
by a human brain.
The Guardian Council of Iran announced that its partial
recount of the recent presidential election showed “no
major irregularities.” A spokesman for the Council stated
that the “results were positive.” Tasmanian wallabies were
eating opium poppies, getting high, and running around,
causing crop circles. Scientists at Stanford University
succeeded in “infecting” mice with a virus that made them
highly sensitive to light, and actress Farrah Fawcett
died, as did entertainer Michael Jackson and noted TV
pitchman Billy Mays, spokesman for OxiClean and Kaboom, a
cleaner that “put the power back in your shower.” Russia
refused to cooperate in a lawsuit brought by Hasidic Jews
claiming rights over sacred documents that were seized by
the Nazis and are currently held in the Russian State
Library. A new “Indiana Jones” movie was in
development. The U.S. Supreme Court determined “reverse
discrimination” to be unconstitutional, thereby permitting
the fire department of the city of New Haven, Connecticut,
to promote more white men to positions of authority. A
Tennessee man was charged with sexual exploitation for
Photoshopping the faces of little girls (two local girls,
and Miley Cyrus) onto the bodies of nude adult women, and
a child porn stash was found in the sewer drain of a
public bathroom in Saginaw, Michigan, but the images were
too damaged by fecal matter for authorities to use in an
investigation. Cosmetic nipple surgery was on the rise in
England, seagulls off Argentina were attacking whales and
eating their skin, and Latvians, asked to provide
collateral for loans of up to 500 lats, were offering
their eternal souls (must be previously unmortgaged).
– Theodore Ross
http://harpers.org/archive/2009/06/WeeklyReview2009-06-30
My State Legislature’s Crazier than Yours. Oh Yeah?
Michael Winship, Smirking Chimp
July 3, 2009
California should just be done with it and rename the entire state “Neverland Ranch.”
This serves several useful purposes. It would be the ultimate tribute to Michael Jackson, pleasing his most ardent and bereft fans. Further validate the state’s Cloud Cuckoo, fairy tale reputation, thus probably promoting additional, revenue-generating tourism. Stand as an accurate metaphor for the state government’s airheaded inability to cope with its current financial disaster.
On Wednesday, Governor Schwarzenegger announced that California’s deficit has grown to $26.3 billion and proposed billions of additional cuts to education. He declared a fiscal emergency, triggering an automatic 45-day deadline for the state legislature to come up with a plan to cover the shortfall and balance the budget. If that fails, they’re banned from considering any other legislation until they come up with a solution.
Arnold also signed an executive order forcing the state’s 220,000 employees to take a third, unpaid furlough day every month. This, after weeks of failed proposals, threatened vetoes, political contortionism, suspended social programs - a fiscal train wreck of such proportions that on Thursday the state planned on starting to pay its bills with IOU’s instead of cash.
It’s “an institutional breakdown,” according to State Treasurer Bill Lockyer, a Democrat.
Lockyer has called for professional mediation to unjam talks between legislators and Governor Terminator, and even a two-tiered budget system that would raise taxes and allot resources differently for different parts of the state.
That may sound crazy, but this is California. Besides, we in New York State are in no position to cast stones. Our State Senate has degenerated into a slaphappy free-for-all that resembles a drunken demolition derby more than anything remotely like a deliberative body.
On June 8, two Democratic state senators, both of whom are under investigation on an assortment of charges, defected to the other side of the aisle, giving the Republicans a 32-30 majority. Then one of the Democrats changed what was left of his mind and went back, creating a 31-31 split and deadlock.
Under normal circumstances, the lieutenant governor, who also serves as Senate president, could break a tie. But currently, we don’t have one of those. David Paterson had the job until he was elevated to the top spot when Governor Eliot Spitzer was caught engaged in commercialized bedhopping and resigned.
Last month’s legislative coup has led to name-calling, accusations, general inertia and circumstances under which, among other assorted wackiness, the guy who the Republicans say is the current Senate president has claimed that because there is no lieutenant governor, he should have two votes.
Because neither side can come up with the requisite 32 members for a quorum, the Senate disintegrated into a series of alternating, one-party sessions during which nothing could be accomplished. Although on Tuesday, when Democrats spotted Republican member Frank Padavan walking through the rear of the chamber, they seized on the moment, claiming a quorum, and started ramming through legislation, which the Republicans say was illegal.
Padavan says he was just taking a shortcut for a cup of coffee.
Imagine West Side Story meets Duck Soup, with the Marx Brothers playing the Sharks and Jets, using whoopee cushions instead of switchblades, and you get the general idea. With the backing of a court order, Governor Paterson is trying to force all 62 members into the chamber for daily “extraordinary” sessions at which he hopes a deal can be cut that will get the Senate up and running again. He says he’ll keep them coming right through the Fourth of July weekend. Some are refusing to attend. Watch this space.
Because, despite all the foolishness, as in California, this is serious stuff with potentially dire consequences. As The New York Times reports, June 30 “was the expiration date of more than a dozen statutes that authorize local governments to carry out their everyday duties, from planning budgets to collecting taxes. And as Democrats and Republicans in the Senate continued… to argue fruitlessly over who controlled the chamber, officials around the state were left to ponder contingency plans that they never thought they would need.”
What’s also infuriating is the way certain enabled individuals consciously are helping stymie any possible breakthrough. In California, it’s Governor Schwarzenegger, whose veto threats, blocking of short-term loans, and refusal to raise any tax or virtually any fee have thrown additional wooden shoes into the works. In New York, it’s not the governor, who has tried to break gridlock but whose efficacy is virtually nil and popularity is south of “get lost.” It’s upstate billionaire businessman Tom Golisano, a gadfly who, according to the Times, helped broker the defection of the two NY Senate Democrats that precipitated the current mess. Apparently, he did so out of pique over proposed tax hikes on the wealthy.
It’s all a nasty game that puts cronyism, partisan bickering, and corrupt, despicable self-interest above the needs of increasingly desperate citizens. Especially abhorrent as we celebrate the country’s independence and commemorate that long ago struggle against abuses of power.
At least Brooklyn Democratic Senator John Sampson, when asked this week if he was embarrassed about the situation, had the grace to reply, “Embarrassed? That’s an understatement. We’re ashamed.” ++
(more…)
July 3rd, 2009
We continue to struggle against the concentrated effort to stop all Left turns, by whatever means necessary. The military coup in Honduras is the latest wrinkle. And although the celebrity grief-a-thon has taken Iran off the cable channels for awhile, the situation there remains dire for many.
It was inevitable that their organic revolution would shift form and today that appears to be a combination of tactics learned in their earlier revolution, including smaller if peaceful assembly inviting violence [albeit an approved gathering,] the continuing use of call and response, Allah Akbar, from their rooftops in the evening and changing their color scheme from green to black and, as they’ve been denied mourning ritual [a social and religious imperative that kept the '79 Revolution alive and vibrant,] impossible to stop.
The crackdown by the Ayatollah has resulted in death and imprisonment, newly created tribunals to handle protesters, urging severe penalties; with the British embassy staff arrested. The major players continue to shift for position, but it appears to be shaping up as further power grab for the Iranian Guard and more obviously, a military coup. Juan Cole continues to be my point man on this — don’t miss his daily postings — and he put out a guest op/ed yesterday that sums up the situation:
The current civil uprising in Iran reflects not just a protest against a rigged election. Nor is it primarily a symptom of contentions for power or clashes between opposing perspectives on the nature of the Islamic regime. It is, rather, resistance against a political coup, whose engineers plan to impose a Taliban-style Islamic government on Iran. The coup has been organized by an alliance between the supreme leader and the most militant and fundamentalist faction within the ruling establishment, backed by the Revolutionary Guard.
Lets face it; this IS all Obama’s doing, in his role as the poster boy for another way to look at things, champion of exploring detente solutions to big challenges and monkey wrench-thrower into all things configured to polarize. When Iran was pitted against George Bush and the NeoCons, it had the worthy adversary it needed to insist on its oppressive Kool Aid. Along comes a reasonable man and the argument falls apart; much like the Republican rhetoric. And believe me … if the Pubs had a Republican Guard they could march out to crack heads and bully citizens back into line, they’d be using them today.
So, as stated in some of the articles linked below, this is escalation of a slo-mo takeover by the hardliners … met with an organic movement by the people they mean to control. It will be messy and the short-cut to normalizing relations with Iran has been stunted for awhile, but eventually this will shake out because when you have rot from within and a growing realization of it, change is on its way.
And speaking of rot from within, the health care conversation just seems to be getting more and more stupid. Financial projections being tossed around are all based on the known-knowns of the bloated system rather than the streamlined possibilities; as with so much we’ve seen in Obama’s short tenure, the eventual product gets watered down by the special interests who own the legislators. Big money is at stake and big lobbying bucks are flying around.
If we can’t get single payer, as yet, we also can’t do without public option; that would give no competition at all to a system calculated to ruthlessly milk us of money and options and deliver very little. O has given us a grassroots forum here, a collection of our stories which speak louder than all the Congressional huffinpuff combined. This is Must Read stuff, and your opportunity to contribute. SEE TO IT that this gets passed around; and while you’re passing, you might include the Alternet article below that is another of those effective comparisons to Canadian health care.
More often than not, those who are impeding the truth about health care are already ON socialized medicine [Medicare] and … from my own experience with my elderly father … getting more duplicated tests and medications than they need, anyhow. I’ve never had a cat scan — I’d bet he’s had over a dozen in the last couple of years. Serious issues notwithstanding, his care has been complicated by too many specialists, inadequate record keeping and sharing, and eagerness to bill the system; all of which has come from our HMO for-profit mentality. Chaos reigns; and it seems as though once you give your power over to this system, you’re on the bus to perdition until you meet yer Maker.
Common sense needs to prevail now; do your part to pass this stuff around. Here’s fact: health care has risen by FOUR times that of wages in the last couple of years; and that’s due to DOUBLE in the next few.
We need an awakening to what must be inevitable if we are to create a bridge into a viable 21st century; and the opportunity to change this system rarely comes … it’s NOW or we and our children will suffer well into the future, as will our economy and even … gasp … our national security. Use the link below to contact your Congress critter; if you’d done it before, do it again. Make yourself a Verizon commercial: CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
By the way, Bernie Madoff just got 150 years in prison for his ponzi activity — let’s hope he’s not an isolated scapegoat, but just the beginning of accountability for this financial mess.
Below, a couple of important health reads — and … Iran.
Jude
We’ve Been Trapped Inside a Bad Health Care System So Long, We Don’t Even Know How Much We’re Missing
Our current system has robbed us of the chance to save, educate ourselves, see the world and live to a robust old age.
Sara Robinson, Campaign for America’s Future via Alternet
June 26, 2009
Sometimes, when you’re up to your chin in alligators, it’s hard to focus on the fact that there’s a big, broad, alligator-free world waiting somewhere out there, beyond the edge of the swamp.
In this case, it’s hard for most Americans to even imagine that nobody in the rest of the developed world lives this way. We’ve been living inside the restrictions and making the trade-offs required to hang onto our all-important health care coverage for so long that we don’t even realize that we’re cutting those deals, or what we’re giving up, or how thoroughly those choices have come to dominate and limit our lives.
If you’re an American under 40, you can’t remember a time that the health care system didn’t work this way — or that keeping coverage wasn’t a dominant factor in making your life choices. If you’re older than that, the memory of another, happier era beyond the swamp is dim, and fading fast.
This was one of the things that struck me hardest when I arrived in Canada five years ago. The swamp-blindness was so dark and deep that it took a while to adjust to a world without alligators. It’s almost impossible to describe to folks back home how different life is when health insurance simply doesn’t factor at all into how you choose to live your life. There’s almost no language for it. Rather than even attempt it, I sometimes just ask my American friends and relatives to open up their imaginations, and answer the question for themselves:
How would your life be different if you never had to worry about getting, keeping, or affording health care again?
What other choices might you have made?
Where else would you be right now?
How would it change your plans for the future?
I’ve seen people reduced to tears of rage and frustration by these questions. When you really stop and think about it — pause for a few minutes to take it all in, past, present, and future — it becomes clear that the full absurdity and the sheer enormity of the sacrifices we have to make for an almighty health care card are the greatest obstacle to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness that most of us are burdened with today.
Polls say most Americans who have health care are satisfied with it. But nobody ever asks them if they’re satisfied with what they’ve had to do to get it, keep it, or afford it.
What would you do differently? I watch my Canadian neighbors live their lives, and the world beyond the swamp comes into sharp and stunning focus.
My neighbors go to the doctor when they need to — and often, when they don’t. If they’re just feeling funky for a day or two, they go. If the splinter is too big to handle with a needle, they go. Anything goes a little bit sideways — they go.
By American standards, they’re probably overusing the system. (My husband once asked an employee who was nursing a cough, “Have you seen a doctor about that?” The guy just looked at him, confused. Of course he’d seen a doctor. Up here, only an American would ask such a stupid question.)
But the upshot is that the small symptoms of really big things — little lumps, creeping blood pressure, wounds that don’t heal right, coughs that don’t go away — are caught and diagnosed early in a GP’s office, instead of months or years down the road in a full-blown crisis at the ER, which is now the American way. And this is central to cost containment: getting emergent problems calmly headed off right away in a $30 office visit is a lot more cost-effective than having to deal with the full catastrophe later on in a $3,000 emergency-room drama scene. And it allows people to maintain their good health through the years, instead of delaying treatment until it’s too late to recover it and permanent damage is done.
My neighbors heal, recover, and go on with their lives. The U.S. disability rate last year was 19.1 percent, and rising fast. In Canada, it’s 14.3 percent — and Statistics Canada believes that the only reason their stats are creeping up these days is that people who once hid their disabilities are now more willing to admit them.
That disability rate affects the country’s economic competitiveness. Americans just don’t have the time or money to spend on a proper recovery after a major event, or get the full course of treatment that a chronic condition requires to be truly well-managed. Fearing for our income or our jobs, we hurry back to work too soon. Our insurance doesn’t cover necessary follow-up therapies, so things may not heal thoroughly or properly. We can’t afford the drugs, so we cut the pills in half, or stop taking them entirely.
The result is that too many of us end up far more impaired than we need to be — and may, in fact, never be quite right again. Deferred maintenance — which is what this is — takes a ferocious toll on the American workforce, which is now being forced to compete with workers around the world who get better care, make better recoveries, and are able to return to work at full strength.
My neighbors start small businesses. Americans routinely stay chained to jobs they hate because they can’t afford to lose coverage. Canada has an exuberant entrepreneurial culture, fueled by favorable tax structures for small business and a preference for Main Streets over malls. Canadians may bet the house and the kids’ college funds on a new venture; but they never think twice about whether or not they can afford to leave BigCo because they’ll lose their insurance, or what will happen to the new business if they get hit by a delivery truck, or how they’ll afford some kind of minimal coverage for their new employees.
Unburdened by health care costs or concerns, their ventures are far more likely to thrive.
My neighbors go back to school. Low-cost government-subsidized universities combined with assured health care make it easy for people to make mid-course career adjustments, pursue their passions, and expand their horizons. The upshot is a better-educated, more capable workforce that’s constantly improving its skills.
My neighbors quit jobs they hate. “Take this job and shove it” is a lot easier — and sweeter — when your boss isn’t holding an almighty health care card over your head. Bosses know this, too, and working conditions are often better as a result.
My neighbors stay home with their kids. They can afford to do that, because they’re not wholly dependent on whichever breadwinner can manage to find a job with a decent health care plan.
My neighbors invest. They’ve got stable household budgets that aren’t being thrown off by surprise health events. Because Canada doesn’t have a mortgage interest deduction, most Canadians reduce interest costs by taking out 10- or 15-year mortgages. The payments really squeeze the family budget for that decade — but by their 40s a lot of them own their homes outright, something most Americans will never achieve. Home ownership, college savings and retirement funds are all big-money investments that you simply can’t commit to if you’re liable to be hit with five-figure medical bills at any moment.
My neighbors travel. Americans don’t get vacation time; and when they do get it, they tend to stay in-country. A lot of Canadians take three weeks off in the winter to go somewhere fabulous and warm (understandable, given the climate). The sheer variety of these escapes boggles me yet: They fly off to build schools in Guatemala, or take holiday jobs in New Zealand, or learn French in Morocco. Even the guy who paints my house can afford to do this, because he’s not spending half his annual income on health care premiums. That $15K-a-year savings will buy a whole lot of margaritas in Cancun.
The result is a population with broad global awareness, and extensive global ties — a necessary thing for a country whose economy depends completely on trade. And it may be an important factor in keeping Canada progressive. According to Diana Kerry, who ran her brother John’s overseas campaign in 2004, Americans who own passports vote Democratic three to one. So travel makes you liberal. Who knew?
My neighbors seldom go bankrupt. The Canadian bankruptcy rate has soared in the past year to 4.3 per thousand. In the U.S., it’s 11.1 per thousand. The entire difference between these two figures is accounted for by the fact that 62 percent of all U.S. bankruptcies were driven at least in part by medical expenses.
But tidy numbers like this elide a harder reality: Bankruptcy doesn’t just cost us financially. It also destroys the foundations of our social capital. When the house, the dreams, and the future are gone, very often the marriage is the next thing that goes, too. Bankruptcy travels in close company with domestic trouble, divorce, drug use, homelessness, and broken families. (After medical-bill refugees, the second most common people in bankruptcy courts are recently divorced women.) If, as conservatives like to remind us, the family is the basic unit of civilization, then our health care system is directly making its profits by pulling down our social foundations — and ultimately undermining our ability to hold our civilization together.
My neighbors have never seen anyone die because they didn’t have health care. With 22,000 Americans dying every year due to a lack of health insurance — that’s one every 24 minutes — there aren’t many of us who don’t know someone who lost a loved one because they couldn’t get the treatment they needed. (For me, it was my father.)
But when I share this factoid with Canadians, they invariably do a long double take. They lean back, squint, stare, and pause to reassess my credibility (if not my sanity). It’s literally unbelievable. They can’t even process it. I must be making it up, or at least exaggerating. It’s just beyond the realm of imagining that a rich nation like America would let that kind of thing happen — let alone let it happen sixty times a day, for years on end.
And yet, they know things are bad down here, because everybody who goes South buys travel insurance before they cross the border. Everybody has heard scary stories about people who got sick or hurt and ended up in an American ER with a five-figure bill to pay. It’s just a stupid risk, and they’re not willing to take it.
What would you have done differently if you’d never had to worry about health insurance? How would life be different now? How would it change your plans for the future?
Go ahead. Think about it. Let yourself get good and angry. The current system has robbed an entire generation of Americans of their full potential. It has made us serfs. It has narrowed our horizons. It has undermined our families and communities. It has deprived us of the chance to save, to own a home, to educate ourselves and our children, to see the world, to retire in comfort, and to live to a healthy and robust old age.
It has left us in this swamp, chin-deep in alligators. And the first step in getting back out is getting very clear in our own minds that there are other places where people don’t live this way — and then angry enough to lean on our leaders, and make it just as clear to them that we don’t intend to live like this any more, either.
Your representatives need to hear from you. Today.
Because your future is still out there — and the most important thing you need to get there is a health care plan nobody can ever take away. ++
(more…)
June 29th, 2009
