I Wanna Be “Too Big To Fail”

The Austin Lounge Lizards perform their satirical ode to bank bail-outs. Written by Lindsey Eck.

Debunking Canadian Health Care Myths by Rhonda Hackett

Debunking Canadian Health Care Myths

As a Canadian living in the United States for the past 17 years, I am frequently asked by Americans and Canadians alike to declare one health care system as the better one.

Often I’ll avoid answering, regardless of the questioner’s nationality. To choose one or the other system usually translates into a heated discussion of each one’s merits, pitfalls, and an intense recitation of commonly cited statistical comparisons of the two systems.

Because if the only way we compared the two systems was with statistics, there is a clear victor. It is becoming increasingly more difficult to dispute the fact that Canada spends less money on health care to get better outcomes.

Yet, the debate rages on. Indeed, it has reached a fever pitch since President Barack Obama took office, with Americans either dreading or hoping for the dawn of a single-payer health care system. Opponents of such a system cite Canada as the best example of what not to do, while proponents laud that very same Canadian system as the answer to all of America’s health care problems. Frankly, both sides often get things wrong when trotting out Canada to further their respective arguments.

As America comes to grips with the reality that changes are desperately needed within its health care infrastructure, it might prove useful to first debunk some myths about the Canadian system.

Myth: Taxes in Canada are extremely high, mostly because of national health care.

In actuality, taxes are nearly equal on both sides of the border. Overall, Canada’s taxes are slightly higher than those in the U.S. However, Canadians are afforded many benefits for their tax dollars, even beyond health care (e.g., tax credits, family allowance, cheaper higher education), so the end result is a wash. At the end of the day, the average after-tax income of Canadian workers is equal to about 82 percent of their gross pay. In the U.S., that average is 81.9 percent.

Myth: Canada’s health care system is a cumbersome bureaucracy.

The U.S. has the most bureaucratic health care system in the world. More than 31 percent of every dollar spent on health care in the U.S. goes to paperwork, overhead, CEO salaries, profits, etc. The provincial single-payer system in Canada operates with just a 1 percent overhead. Think about it. It is not necessary to spend a huge amount of money to decide who gets care and who doesn’t when everybody is covered.

Myth: The Canadian system is significantly more expensive than that of the U.S.Ten percent of Canada’s GDP is spent on health care for 100 percent of the population. The U.S. spends 17 percent of its GDP but 15 percent of its population has no coverage whatsoever and millions of others have inadequate coverage. In essence, the U.S. system is considerably more expensive than Canada’s. Part of the reason for this is uninsured and underinsured people in the U.S. still get sick and eventually seek care. People who cannot afford care wait until advanced stages of an illness to see a doctor and then do so through emergency rooms, which cost considerably more than primary care services.

What the American taxpayer may not realize is that such care costs about $45 billion per year, and someone has to pay it. This is why insurance premiums increase every year for insured patients while co-pays and deductibles also rise rapidly.

Myth: Canada’s government decides who gets health care and when they get it.While HMOs and other private medical insurers in the U.S. do indeed make such decisions, the only people in Canada to do so are physicians. In Canada, the government has absolutely no say in who gets care or how they get it. Medical decisions are left entirely up to doctors, as they should be.

There are no requirements for pre-authorization whatsoever. If your family doctor says you need an MRI, you get one. In the U.S., if an insurance administrator says you are not getting an MRI, you don’t get one no matter what your doctor thinks — unless, of course, you have the money to cover the cost.

Myth: There are long waits for care, which compromise access to care.There are no waits for urgent or primary care in Canada. There are reasonable waits for most specialists’ care, and much longer waits for elective surgery. Yes, there are those instances where a patient can wait up to a month for radiation therapy for breast cancer or prostate cancer, for example. However, the wait has nothing to do with money per se, but everything to do with the lack of radiation therapists. Despite such waits, however, it is noteworthy that Canada boasts lower incident and mortality rates than the U.S. for all cancers combined, according to the U.S. Cancer Statistics Working Group and the Canadian Cancer Society. Moreover, fewer Canadians (11.3 percent) than Americans (14.4 percent) admit unmet health care needs.

Myth: Canadians are paying out of pocket to come to the U.S. for medical care.Most patients who come from Canada to the U.S. for health care are those whose costs are covered by the Canadian governments. If a Canadian goes outside of the country to get services that are deemed medically necessary, not experimental, and are not available at home for whatever reason (e.g., shortage or absence of high tech medical equipment; a longer wait for service than is medically prudent; or lack of physician expertise), the provincial government where you live fully funds your care. Those patients who do come to the U.S. for care and pay out of pocket are those who perceive their care to be more urgent than it likely is.

Myth: Canada is a socialized health care system in which the government runs hospitals and where doctors work for the government.Princeton University health economist Uwe Reinhardt says single-payer systems are not “socialized medicine” but “social insurance” systems because doctors work in the private sector while their pay comes from a public source. Most physicians in Canada are self-employed. They are not employees of the government nor are they accountable to the government. Doctors are accountable to their patients only. More than 90 percent of physicians in Canada are paid on a fee-for-service basis. Claims are submitted to a single provincial health care plan for reimbursement, whereas in the U.S., claims are submitted to a multitude of insurance providers. Moreover, Canadian hospitals are controlled by private boards and/or regional health authorities rather than being part of or run by the government.

Myth: There aren’t enough doctors in Canada.

From a purely statistical standpoint, there are enough physicians in Canada to meet the health care needs of its people. But most doctors practice in large urban areas, leaving rural areas with bona fide shortages. This situation is no different than that being experienced in the U.S. Simply training and employing more doctors is not likely to have any significant impact on this specific problem. Whatever issues there are with having an adequate number of doctors in any one geographical area, they have nothing to do with the single-payer system.

And these are just some of the myths about the Canadian health care system. While emulating the Canadian system will likely not fix U.S. health care, it probably isn’t the big bad “socialist” bogeyman it has been made out to be.

It is not a perfect system, but it has its merits. For people like my 55-year-old Aunt Betty, who has been waiting for 14 months for knee-replacement surgery due to a long history of arthritis, it is the superior system. Her $35,000-plus surgery is finally scheduled for next month. She has been in pain, and her quality of life has been compromised. However, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Aunt Betty — who lives on a fixed income and could never afford private health insurance, much less the cost of the surgery and requisite follow-up care — will soon sport a new, high-tech knee. Waiting 14 months for the procedure is easy when the alternative is living in pain for the rest of your life.

Rhonda Hackett of Castle Rock is a clinical psychologist.

Originally posted at DenverPost.com and h/t to AfterDowningStreet

The Battle Of Economists

I am no money guy, but I have been trying to learn the intricacies of the economics of our country and the world.

One guy I have read a lot of is Paul Krugman. Today he wrote about ARTHUR B. LAFFER‘s article in the Washington Post called Get Ready for Inflation and Higher Interest Rates and basically says it is totaly wrong to think that we will have high inflation right now, due to the “liquidity trap” we are in.

Perhaps Kelso can answer, but my memory and basic understanding of economics is that if the Fed prints paper “notes” with abandon isn’t the normal reaction high inflation that can lead to stagflation? Besides the following quote, Paul has some charts referencing Japan’s Recession and America in the 30′s, but somehow I do not understand the seeming discrepancy in what seems like a common occurrence in economics.

I also don’t know much about the Laffer guy and I have always found Paul’s work on the mark, but this, somehow, rubs me the wrong way:

Way Off Base

Mark Thoma and David Altig both react to Arthur Laffer’s assertion that the increase in the monetary base presages huge inflation.

Let me add, for the 1.6 trillionth time, we are in a liquidity trap. And in such circumstances a rise in the monetary base does not lead to inflation.

I need to understand Paul’s graph better when considering the following from Mr Laffer (I understand this one perfectly):

But as bad as the fiscal picture is, panic-driven monetary policies portend to have even more dire consequences. We can expect rapidly rising prices and much, much higher interest rates over the next four or five years, and a concomitant deleterious impact on output and employment not unlike the late 1970s.

About eight months ago, starting in early September 2008, the Bernanke Fed did an abrupt about-face and radically increased the monetary base — which is comprised of currency in circulation, member bank reserves held at the Fed, and vault cash — by a little less than $1 trillion. The Fed controls the monetary base 100% and does so by purchasing and selling assets in the open market. By such a radical move, the Fed signaled a 180-degree shift in its focus from an anti-inflation position to an anti-deflation position.

The percentage increase in the monetary base is the largest increase in the past 50 years by a factor of 10 (see chart nearby). It is so far outside the realm of our prior experiential base that historical comparisons are rendered difficult if not meaningless. The currency-in-circulation component of the monetary base — which prior to the expansion had comprised 95% of the monetary base — has risen by a little less than 10%, while bank reserves have increased almost 20-fold. Now the currency-in-circulation component of the monetary base is a smidgen less than 50% of the monetary base. Yikes!

Redneck Fire Alarm

Oil and Indians Don’t Mix – Greg Palast

by Greg Palast
Friday, June 12, 2009

For Air America Radio’s Ring of Fire

There’s an easy way to find oil.  Go to some remote and gorgeous natural sanctuary, say Alaska or the Amazon, find some Indians, then drill down under them.

If the indigenous folk complain, well, just shoo-them away.  Shoo-ing methods include:  bulldozers, bullets, crooked politicians and fake land sales.

But be aware.  Lately the Natives are shoo-ing back.  Last week, indigenous Peruvians seized an oil pumping station, grabbed the nine policemen guarding it and, say reports, executed them.  This followed the government’s murder of more than a dozen rainforest residents who had protested the seizure of their property for oil drilling.

Again and again I see it in my line of work of investigating fraud.  Here are a few pit-stops on the oily trail of tears:

In the 1980s, Charles Koch was found to have pilfered about $3 worth of crude from Stanlee Ann Mattingly’s oil tank in Oklahoma.  Here’s the weird part.  Koch was (and remains) the 14^th richest man on the planet, worth about $14 billion. Stanlee Ann was a dirt-poor Osage Indian.

Stanlee Ann wasn’t Koch’s only victim.  According to secret tape recordings of a former top executive of his company, Koch Industries, the billionaire demanded that oil tanker drivers secretly siphon a few bucks worth of oil from every tank attached to a stripper well on the Osage Reservation where Koch had a contract to retrieve crude.

Koch, according to the tape, would, “giggle” with joy over the records of the theft.  Koch’s own younger brother Bill ratted him out, complaining that, in effect, brothers Charles and David cheated him out of his fair share of the looting which totaled over three-quarters of a billion dollars from the Native lands.

The FBI filmed the siphoning with hidden cameras, but criminal charges were quashed after quiet objections from Republican senators.

Then there are the Chugach Natives of Alaska.  The Port of Valdez, Alaska, is arguably one of the most valuable pieces of real estate on Earth, the only earthquake-safe ice-free port in Alaska that could load oil from the giant North Slope field.  In 1969, Exxon and British Petroleum companies took the land from the Chugach paid them one dollar.  I kid you not.

Wally Hickel, the former Governor of Alaska, dismissed my suggestion that the Chugach deserved a bit more respect (and cash) for their property. “Land ownership comes in two ways, Mr. Palast.” explained the governor and pipeline magnate, “Purchase or conquest.  The fact that your granddaddy chased a caribou across the land doesn’t make it yours.”  The Chugach had lived there for 3,000 years.

No oil company would dream of digging on the Bush family properties in Midland, Texas, without paying a royalty.  Or drilling near Malibu without the latest in environmental protections.  But when Natives are on top of Exxon’s or BP’s glory hole, suddenly, the great defenders of private property rights turn quite Bolshevik:  lands can be seized for The Public’s Need for Oil.

Some Natives are “re-located” through legal flim-flam, some at gunpoint.  The less lucky are left to wallow, literally, in the gunk left by the drilling process.

Take a look at this photo here, taken in the Amazon rainforest in Ecuador.  It’s from an investigation that I conducted for BBC TV, now in the film “Palast Investigates.”  I’m holding up a stinking, black glop of crude oil residue pulled from an abandoned Chevron-Texaco waste pit.  A pipe runs from the toxic pit right into the water supply of Cofan Indians.

Chief Emergildo Criollo told me how oil company executives helicoptered into his remote village and, speaking in Spanish – which the Cofan didn’t understand – “purchased” drilling rights with trinkets and cheese.  The Natives had never seen cheese.  (“The cheese smelled funny, so we threw it in the jungle.”)

After drilling began, Criollo’s son went swimming in his usual watering hole, came up vomiting blood, and died.

I asked Chevron about the wave of poisonings and deaths.  According to an independent report, 1,401 deaths, mostly of children, mostly from cancers, can be traced to Chevron’s toxic dumping.

Chevron’s lawyer told me, “And it’s the only case of cancer in the world?  How many cases of children with cancer do you have in the States?  … They have to prove that it is our crude,” which, he noted with glee, “is absolutely impossible.”

Big Oil treats indigenous blood like a cheap gasoline additive.   That’s why the Peruvians are up in arms. The Cofan of Ecuador, unlike their brothers in Peru, have taken no hostages. Rather, they have heavily armed themselves with lawyers.

But Chevron and its Big Oil brethren remain dismissive of the law.  This week, Shell Oil, to get rid of a nasty PR problem by paying $15 million to the Ogoni people and the family of Ken Saro-Wiwa for the oil giant’s alleged role in the killing of Wiwa and his associates, activists who had defended these Nigeria Delta people against drilling contamination.  Shell pocketed $31 billion last year in profits and hopes the payoff will clear the way for a drilling partnership with Nigeria’s government.

Congratulations, Shell.  $15 million:  For a license to kill and drill, that’s a quite a bargain.

Better Know a Cradle of Civilization – Barham Saleh

I post this, not because it is funny (it is not), but because Stephen just allowed a puppet on his show to spread the bullshit lies about the Iraq War and the purpose of us being there. It is high time we stop that silly charade and tell it like it is.

more about “Better Know a Cradle of Civilization …“, posted with vodpod

The Most Appropriate Time To Tase Someone?

If this ain’t the time, I don’t know when is:

Naked man, covered in feces Tased after truck burglary

Robbyn Brooks

Daily News

DESTIN — A man walked out to his vehicle June 6 to find a naked man sleeping in his truck.

According to an Okaloosa County Sheriff’s Office arrest report, the nude man was 27-year-old Shane Albert King.

King had entered a 1995 Ford Explorer first and pulled out all the contents of the glove compartment before moving on to a Ford F-150 to do the same.

When a deputy arrived at the scene shortly before 7:30 a.m., he tried to wake up King and saw there was feces throughout the interior of the truck and all over King, the report said.

As King woke up, the deputy quickly placed him in handcuffs and assisted him out of the truck, the report said. The deputy also wrote that King had open sores all over his backside and legs.

King began to yell, “(Expletive) you, pigs. I’ll (expletive) all over you too. I’m going to throw my (expletive) in your mouth.”

The report said that’s when King began reaching down toward feces that had gathered on his leg. Both deputies that were on scene placed him on the ground. King began to kick and pull away from them.

One deputy told King to be still or he would be Tased. King replied, “Tase me, mother (expletive).”

King continued to resist and the deputy removed the cartridge from his M26 Taser and applied a five-second cycle to King’s right side.

King was arrested on felony charges of burglary to a vehicle, resisting arrest with violence, criminal mischief and exposure of sexual organs.

h/t DailyRotten

They’re Here… I Hope They Have Money For A Flu Shot

France poised to disclose presence of Extra Terrestrials on Earth

The words ‘Nous ne sommes pas seuls‘ or ‘We are not alone’ will be somberly pronounced this week by a senior Government official of the nation that brought the world ‘Liberté, égalité, fraternité‘. France is set to concede that it is aware of an alien presence on earth by no later than Friday.

Paris has chosen follow the lead of maverick UFO nation Brazil and resist US pressure to continue delaying disclosure until America feels it is ready for the event.

It is believed that a telephone hot-line has been set up in Paris to deal with queries from panicky citizens. A special division of France’s police department is also to be established: to handle UFO reports.

The French have gone to so much effort to protect their culture from encroaching ‘Anglo-Saxon’ influences and now they are preparing to protect their culture from what might be  even more powerful extraterrestrial forces.

It is believed Holland and Germany are set to soon follow France’s lead.  //M. Cohen

h/t Disinfo

Bust Bush (And Obama For Protecting Him)

Mos Def

more about “StumbleVideo – Bust bush“, posted with vodpod

Man, you hear this bullshit they be talkin’

Every day, man

It’s like these motherfuckers is just like professional liars

YouknowwhatI’msayin? It’s wild

Listen

[Hook - Mos Def]

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

[Verse 1 - Immortal Technique]

I pledge no allegiance, nigga fuck the president’s speeches

I’m baptized by America and covered in leeches

The dirty water that bleaches your soul and your facial features

Drownin’ you in propaganda that they spit through the speakers

And if you speak about the evil that the government does

The Patriot Act’ll track you to the type of your blood

They try to frame you, and say you was tryna sell drugs

And throw a federal indictment on niggaz to show you love

This shit is run by fake Christians, fake politicians

Look at they mansions, then look at the conditions you live in

All they talk about is terrorism on television

They tell you to listen, but they don’t really tell you they mission

They funded Al-Qaeda, and now they blame the Muslim religion

Even though Bin Laden, was a CIA tactician

They gave him billions of dollars, and they funded his purpose

Fahrenheit 9/11, that’s just scratchin’ the surface

[Hook - Mos Def]

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

[Verse 2 - Immortal Technique]

They say the rebels in Iraq still fight for Saddam

But that’s bullshit, I’ll show you why it’s totally wrong

Cuz if another country invaded the hood tonight

It’d be warfare through Harlem, and Washington Heights

I wouldn’t be fightin’ for Bush or White America’s dream

I’d be fightin’ for my people’s survival and self-esteem

I wouldn’t fight for racist churches from the south, my nigga

I’d be fightin’ to keep the occupation out, my nigga

You ever clock someone who talk shit, or look at you wrong?

Imagine if they shot at you, and was rapin’ your moms

And of course Saddam Hussein had chemical weapons

We sold him that shit, after Ronald Reagan’s election

Mercenary contractors fightin’ a new era

Corporate military bankin’ off the war on terror

They controllin’ the ghetto, with the failed attack

Tryna distract the fact that they engineerin’ the crack

So I’m strapped like Lee Malvo holdin’ a sniper rifle

These bullets’ll touch your kids, and I don’t mean like Michael

Your body be sent to the morgue, stripped down and recycled

I fire on house niggaz that support you and like you

Cuz innocent people get murdered in the struggle daily

And poor people never get shit and struggle daily

This ain’t no alien conspiracy theory, this shit is real

Written on the dollar underneath the Masonic seal

(I don’t rap for dead presidents

I’d rather see the president dead

It’s never been said but I set precedents)–[Eminem]

[Hook - Mos Def]

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

Bin Laden didn’t blow up the projects

It was you, nigga

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

Tell the truth, nigga

(Bush knocked down the towers)–[Jadakiss]

(Shady Records was 80 seconds away from the towers

Some cowards fucked with the wrong building, they meant to hit ours)– [Eminem]

WTF Thursday: How Much Is That Doggy In The Window

Prepare to be totally grossed out:

(I warned you… h/t ListVerse)

More extremely disturbing videos clips of movies at that article. Truly bizarre.

1st Wicked Garden Dinner

The fresh squash I picked 5 minutes before cooking is stewed (not my favorite, but BuelahLady’s Mom is in the hospital and asked for it… I like it fried).

But never fear, I did have some fresh green tomato to fry up.

(If you never tried ‘em, you should. Cut thin and covered in cornmeal… Ummm Mmmm)

The green beans are frozen from last year (but delish, nonetheless). Got my own planted this year…

(Lest I forget all seasoned with an onion pulled up today and a piece of fatback)

Some grilled pork chops and grilled Texas Toast

And you have a nice, cheap, redneck-country dinner for 3/4 (3, if you are a lard-ass like me). I also have the satisfaction of knowing I grew things my family and I consume*

(*My best cabbage was attacked by a dog’s turd one day. The next day he pissed on it)

Examining the Single Payer Health Care Option

Rep. Andrews Opening Statement

Rep. Rob Andrews, chair of the Health, Employment, Labor, and Pensions Subcommittee, delivers his opening statement at a hearing examining the Single Payer Health Care Option on June 10, 2009

Rep. Conyers Testimony

Rep. John Conyers, Jr., (D-MI) testifies at a hearing examining the Single Payer Health Care Option on June 10, 2009.

Geri Jenkins Testimony

Ms. Jenkins testifies at a hearing examining the Single Payer Health Care Option on June 10, 2009.

Walter Tsou Testimony

Dr. Tsou testifies at a hearing examining the Single Payer Health Care Option on June 10, 2009.

Marcia Angell Testimony

Dr. Angell testifies at a hearing examining the Single Payer Health Care Option on June 10, 2009.

B’Man’s Patriot Watch: Dennis Kucinich (The POTUS That Got Away)

Dammit. We missed having this guy for POTUS because you numbnuts are too stupid to realize that the rest of them are screwing you with a big nasty grin and you seem to enjoy it. What a miserable bunch of idiots I live among.

You squandered away the best chance we had.

Kucinich on Supplemental: “Cash for Clunkers and Bunkers”

Congressman Dennis Kucinich

Washington, June 9, 2009

Congressman Dennis Kucinich D-OH today made the following statement against the war supplemental on the House floor:

“It is good that our Administration is reaching out to the Muslim world. It is bad to spend another $100 billion to keep wars going which will kill innocent Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“It is good that we try to create an incentive for people to buy efficient cars. It is bad that the car vouchers will not be expressly for the purchase of cars made in America. It is even worse that we tie such an incentive to a war funding bill. Cash for clunkers and bunkers in the same bill!

“Cash for more war in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.  Cash to help China sell its cars to Americans.

“Meanwhile, back in the U.S. of A., factories and auto dealers are closing, people are losing their businesses, their jobs, their homes, their health care, their investments, their retirement security.

“Who are these people who keep coming up with these innovative ideas to keep wars going and to move jobs out of America?  Who are these people?”

h/t Dandelion Salad

America’s Health Insurance: Care Is Not The Goal— Profit Is

THOUGHTS ON SINGLE PAYER HEALTH INSURANCE

Richard Scheerer – Early in my work history, the manager of our personnel department came to me with a moral, ethical, and legal dilemma he was facing. Once a month, the president of the company directed this manager to provide him with a copy of the group medical claim report prepared by our plan administrator. From this report, the president could determine which employees or dependents had medical expenses and the severity of the condition involved. If the conditions had the potential of reoccurring costs, the president would indicate his dissatisfaction to the employee’s superior leading to the employee being terminated or better yet, being forced to resign without unemployment benefits. Even valued employees or company officers did not escape; they would be slowly stripped of responsibilities and would never again qualify for a raise or promotion. What makes this situation so reprehensible and eye opening is that this was an insurance company that sold personal health insurance policies.

This is no longer an isolated situation as employers today continue to eliminate employees for medical reasons to reduce health care costs. The “downsizing” craze of a few years ago was a way to get rid of older long term employees and the higher expenses associated with them – salaries, longer vacations, higher health care costs, higher pension contributions, etc.

I have spent most of my career as an officer of various insurance companies and finished my career as a reinsurance intermediary. My insurance colleagues may look disdainfully upon this writing, but I strongly believe that private health insurance can not, and will not, result in the greater good for our society. I have watched the health insurance industry completely change. At one time, probably 30% of all life insurance companies and a number of casualty companies sold medical insurance. Today we are down to a handful that sell individual medical plans; probably no more that five to ten in any one state including a few national marketers.

The employer group insurance choices are not much better. Although there are a limited number of insurance companies offering group health insurance plans, there are a number of insurance companies and non-insurance administrators that provide claim services for employer self-insurance plans. Self-insured plans have become the trend in recent years as another way to control costs. Even these plans need reinsurance for excess and catastrophic losses, but here again we are down to only a few reinsurers willing to offer such coverage. Have one or two large claims and lose a reinsurer, and your plan is in real trouble.

The real problem with our system of reliance on private insurance, whether individual, group or for that matter employer self-insurance plans, is that no plan wants to pay claims. The primary goal of any private company operating under our capitalistic system is to generate as much profit as possible; as a result, the structure of our private health insurance system operates against good public health policy. Care is not the goal; profit is. The welfare our society is not considered. Greatest profit occurs by charging high premium and eliminating or restricting claims. Underwriting, pre-existing condition clauses and terminations are used to eliminate potential claims by assuring only the healthiest receive coverage. With high deductibles, coinsurance percentages, pre-certification, coverage restricted to certain providers, most plans are designed to reduce claims costs to the insurer and transfer these costs directly to the insured. Additionally, it is becoming common for plans to limit one’s choice of providers and to limit treatment by requiring the provider have prior approval.

We spend 15% of our gross national product, basically twice that of most other developed countries, to insure 80-85% of our population. Are we getting twice the benefit? The answer appears to be no, as we have higher infant mortality, lower life expectancy, 50 million uninsured, and many more underinsured – the latter being the number one cause of bankruptcy. Since our system is not universal and public based, we are probably in the worst position of all developed countries to handle a epidemic or pandemic. Our employers are at a competitive disadvantage due to health care costs.

There are two insurance programs that are directly related to health care that also need discussion. First, almost all medical plans, group or individual, eliminate coverage for occupational accident and sickness. Employers are generally required to carry or furnish occupational sickness and accident coverage under mandatory worker’s compensation laws. The cost of mandated workers compensation alone exceeded the wages in many third world companies; a reason in itself for outsourcing.

The second insurance program not being discussed is medical payment coverage under automobile insurance policies. This should not be confused with liability coverage. Medical coverage is immediate and does not require the assessment of liability. This is duplication of costs, but not a duplication of benefits. Injuries can be collected on only one policy.

There is only one true reform that addresses all – universal single payer health. Anything other than universal single payer will simply be a costly government band-aid to continue a broken system that is destined to fail. A universal single payer system will cover everyone. It could eliminate the need and costs of medical coverage under worker’s compensation, and reduce auto insurance premiums by eliminating redundant medical coverage. Universal single payer health care is not a question of additional cost, but a reallocation of that which we already spend.

Richard Scheerer is President Intermediaries Plus

Article found in Excerpts From Reader Comments at UNDERNEWS

Obama’s Hitler’esque Style

My mother is full blooded German who was raised in the aftermath of the war. She was born on June 10, 1944 (today is BuelahMama’s Birthday!!!!)

My Mom left Germany in 1960 after meeting my Dad who was stationed there. I was born in 1961 to a woman barely 18 years old and hardly knew three words in English. She was the oldest of 4 girls (her Dad was killed in the war) and her Mother did anything and everything she could to keep the family together and fed (her Mom died last year about this time).

She has told me the horror stories of death, bombing, starvation (all the atrocities the German people had to endure after their leadership took them to the very brink of total annihilation). She also told me another story about how the people of Germany were “fooled” into believing the crap that Hitler said. She explained how devastating economic situation was and that the people were ready to do or go along with virtually anything to feed their kids.

Hitler used all of this to his advantage and to propel his country into an all-out power grab of the rest of the world.

Today, I read an article at World Prout Assembly from William Blum that includes a translated speech of Hitler’s to the German people. Do me a favor… read it and compare it to Obama’s speeches and style.

Am I saying that Obama is another Hitler? No. But, are you saying there is no similarity in the speeches and fluffy bullshit that Obama spews? Do you think that the German people listening to Hitler’s speech didn’t reap praise and Messiah-ness on Hitler because he used the words “peace”?

Team Obama/Cult Obama

by William Blum
World Prout Assembly
June 10, 2009

The praise heaped on President Obama for his speech to the Muslim world by writers on the left, both here and abroad, is disturbing. I’m referring to people who I think should know better, who’ve taken Politics 101 and can easily see the many hypocrisies in Obama’s talk, as well as the distortions, omissions, and contradictions, the true but irrelevant observations, the lies, the optimistic words without any matching action, the insensitivities to victims. Yet, these commentators are impressed, in many cases very impressed. In the world at large, this frame of mind borders on a cult.

In such cases one must look beyond the intellect and examine the emotional appeal. We all know the world is in big trouble — Three Great Problems: universal, incessant violence; financial crisis provoking economic suffering; environmental degradation. In all three areas the United States bears more culpability than any other single country. Who better to satisfy humankind’s craving for relief than a new American president who, it appears, understands the problems; admits, to one degree or another, his country’s responsibility for them; and “eloquently” expresses his desire and determination to change US policies and embolden the rest of the world to follow his inspiring example. Is it any wonder that it’s 1964, the Beatles have just arrived in New York, and everyone is a teenage girl?

I could go through the talk Obama gave in Cairo and point out line by line the hypocrisies, the mere platitudes, the plain nonsense, and the rest. (“I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States.” — No mention of it being outsourced, probably to the very country he was speaking in, amongst others. … “No single nation should pick and choose which nation holds nuclear weapons.” — But this is precisely what the United States is trying to do concerning Iran and North Korea.) But since others have been pointing out these lies very well I’d like to try something else in dealing with the problem — the problem of well-educated people, as well as the not so well-educated, being so moved by a career politician saying “all the right things” to give food for hope to billions starving for it, and swallowing it all as if they had been born yesterday. I’d like to take them back to another charismatic figure, Adolf Hitler, speaking to the German people two years and four months after becoming Chancellor, addressing a Germany still reeling with humiliation from its being The Defeated Nation in the World War, with huge losses of its young men, still being punished by the world for its militarism, suffering mass unemployment and other effects of the great depression. Here are excerpts from the speech of May 21, 1935. Imagine how it fed the hungry German people.
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I conceive it my duty to be perfectly frank and open in addressing the nation. I frequently hear from Anglo-Saxon tribes expressions of regret that Germany has departed from those principles of democracy, which in those countries are held particularly sacred. This opinion is entirely erroneous. Germany, too, has a democratic Constitution.

Our love of peace perhaps is greater than in the case of others, for we have suffered most from war. None of us wants to threaten anybody, but we all are determined to obtain the security and equality of our people.

The World War should be a cry of warning here. Not for a second time can Europe survive such a catastrophe.

Germany has solemnly guaranteed France her present frontiers, resigning herself to the permanent loss of Alsace-Lorraine. She has made a treaty with Poland and we hope it will be renewed and renewed again at every expiry of the set period.

The German Reich, especially the present German Government, has no other wish except to live on terms of peace and friendship with all the neighboring States.

Germany has nothing to gain from a European war. What we want is liberty and independence. Because of these intentions of ours we are ready to negotiate non-aggression pacts with our neighbor States.

Germany has neither the wish nor the intention to mix in internal Austrian affairs, or to annex or to unite with Austria.

The German Government is ready in principle to conclude non-aggression pacts with its individual neighbor States and to supplement those provisions which aim at isolating belligerents and localizing war areas.

In limiting German air armament to parity with individual other great nations of the west, it makes possible that at any time the upper figure may be limited, which limit Germany will then take as a binding obligation to keep within.

Germany is ready to participate actively in any efforts for drastic limitation of unrestricted arming. She sees the only possible way in a return to the principles of the old Geneva Red Cross convention. She believes, to begin with, only in the possibility of the gradual abolition and outlawing of fighting methods which are contrary to this convention, such as dum-dum bullets and other missiles which are a deadly menace to civilian women and children.

To abolish fighting places, but to leave the question of bombardment open, seems to us wrong and ineffective. But we believe it is possible to ban certain arms as contrary to international law and to outlaw those who use them. But this, too, can only be done gradually. Therefore, gas and incendiary and explosive bombs outside of the battle area can be banned and the ban extended later to all bombing. As long as bombing is free, a limitation of bombing planes is a doubtful proposition. But as soon as bombing is branded as barbarism, the building of bombing planes will automatically cease.

Just as the Red Cross stopped the killing of wounded and prisoners, it should be possible to stop the bombing of civilians. In the adoption of such principles, Germany sees a better means of pacification and security for peoples than in all the assistance pacts and military conventions.

The German Government is ready to agree to every limitation leading to abandonment of the heaviest weapons which are especially suitable for aggression. These comprise, first, the heaviest artillery and heaviest tanks.

Germany declares herself ready to agree to the delimitation of caliber of artillery and guns on dreadnoughts, cruisers and torpedo boats. Similarly, the German Government is ready to adopt any limitation on naval tonnage, and finally to agree to the limitation of tonnage of submarines or even to their abolition, provided other countries do likewise.

The German Government is of the opinion that all attempts effectively to lessen tension between individual States through international agreements or agreements between several States are doomed to failure unless suitable measures are taken to prevent poisoning of public opinion on the part of irresponsible individuals in speech, writing, in the film and the theatre. The German Government is ready any time to agree to an international agreement which will effectively prevent and make impossible all attempts to interfere from the outside in affairs of other States. The term ‘interference’ should be internationally defined.

If people wish for peace it must be possible for governments to maintain it. We believe the restoration of the German defense force will contribute to this peace because of the simple fact that its existence removes a dangerous vacuum in Europe. We believe if the peoples of the world could agree to destroy all their gas and inflammable and explosive bombs this would be cheaper than using them to destroy one another. In saying this I am not speaking any longer as the representative of a defenseless State which could reap only advantages and no obligations from such action from others.

I cannot better conclude my speech to you, my fellow-figures and trustees of the nation, than by repeating our confession of faith in peace: Whoever lights the torch of war in Europe can wish for nothing but chaos. We, however, live in the firm conviction our times will see not the decline but the renaissance of the West. It is our proud hope and our unshakable belief Germany can make an imperishable contribution to this great work.[1]

– End of speech excerpts –

How many people in the world, including numerous highly educated Germans, reading or hearing that speech in 1935, doubted that Adolf Hitler was a sincere man of peace and an inspiring, visionary leader?

NOTES
[1] The entire speech can be found at: http://members.tripod.com/~Comicism/350521.html