Hopefully the racist, social darwinian right-wing teabaggers will follow their leaders Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck to the libertarian paradise of Somalia, where healthcare is NOT a right.
Here in the civilized western world, however, we believe that healthcare is a RIGHT, everyone should have it regardless of wealth, income or ability to pay, and we should not be allowing greedy private insurance companies trying to deny that basic right to us!
But the bill that Democrats barely passed today is not the end. It is still forcing people to pay for private insurance, rather than having a public single-payer system like most countries, or open up medicare for all. That is what we must fight for now... the fight is just beginning!
The few remaining Democrats who were pushing for at least a vote on "single-payer" (Medicare for All) universal health insurance have given up and called off votes on their amendments:
The House of Representatives is expected to pass a healthcare bill today which will include a weak "public option" which will only cover about 2% of the American people. While it may increase healthcare insurance to millions more, it also includes big give-a-ways to the insurance and drug companies. So I'm not sure that Socialists, and those who support REAL universal healthcare, should support it or not. It certainly NOT guarantee healthcare to all Americans.
Socialists must step up our attack on the "for-profit" healthcare industry and keep making the case for Medicare For All, or even better, socialized medicine. It may be a long fight, but the current capitalist system, especially when it comes to healthcare, is in crisis and will not stand. It is up to us to fight for a better future, and universal healthcare that is not rationed based on ability to pay and does not enrich a few at the expense of the many.
UPDATE: U.S. House Passes Watered-Down Healthcare Bill (220-215)
The medical-industrial complex and their partners in the corporate media are pressuring Obama to kill the "single-payer" solution to the U.S. health care crisis and replace it with either a "public option" or, more likely, some kind of "co-op" exchange. Neither of these will solve the health care crisis. Neither will provide 100% universal health insurance for every U.S. citizen. Neither will control skyrocketing medical costs.
Progressives must FIGHT against these weak "reform" alternatives and push for a single-payer, public health insurance program (MEDICARE FOR ALL).
Before the 1970s, Democrats were full of confidence when pushing for federal programs. Indeed, 44 years ago this week, on July 30, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed the legislation that created Medicare and Medicaid. The event took place at Harry Truman's presidential library in Independence, Missouri.
Sitting beside the 81-year-old former president, Johnson announced: "No longer will older Americans be denied the healing miracle of modern medicine. No longer will illness crush and destroy the savings that they have so carefully put away over a lifetime so that they might enjoy dignity in their later years."
The program succeeded. Government worked. Before Medicare started, only about 50 percent of Americans who were 65 or older possessed hospital coverage. Within five years of the program's creation, 97 percent of the elderly had hospital coverage. The same changes occurred with physician's coverage. Today, more than 40 million elderly Americans rely on the program -- as do their families who don't have to take responsibility for these costs.
In a national Commonwealth Fund survey, elderly Medicare beneficiaries reported greater overall satisfaction with their health coverage, better access to care, and fewer problems paying medical bills than people covered by employer-sponsored plans. The findings bolster the argument that offering a public insurance plan similar to Medicare to the under-65 population has the potential to improve access and reduce costs.
And another BIG GOVERNMENT program that works BETTER than private for-profit healthcare is the SOCIALIST Veteran's Administration!
The lobbyists for the "health care" industry (insurance companies, etc.) are winning the fight on health care "reform." They have successfully put off Congressional action for months, giving them more time to kill any serious health care reform, especially any public option" for consumers to choose instead of their expensive insurance plans.
We are gong to have to fight like hell for a SINGLE-PAYER national health care plan now! Obama's watered-down weakened "public option" plan is dead. The conservative Democrats are siding with the Republicans against any serious reform. Now is the time to push for a real universal health care plan, which will cost less and cover everyone!
Obama's healthcare "reform" is falling far short of the "CHANGE" he campaigned on. Instead of leading a fight for a single-payer public health insurance program, Obama and the Democrats are proposing minor "reforms" to the current for-profit health care system that will not insure everyone, and will not control costs. The main driving force in the rising costs of healthcare and the lack of universal coverage are the profit-making private insurance companies, which keep raising premiums and deductibles, while denying full coverage, while giving $million bonuses to their CEOs.
The only viable solution to the healthcare crisis is a single-payer system, and socialized medicine. Take the profit out of healthcare!
The insurance companies are ratcheting up their propaganda campaign against a single-payer universal public insurance program, or even a public option in the healthcare "reform" being debated in Congress.
Everyone should read and watch what former insurance company insider Wendell Porter says about the lies of the insurance companies:
The Big Med lobby is fighting hard against a single-payer universal health insurance program, and they are even trying to kill Obama's proposed public health insurance option in the "healthcare reform" being debated in Congress. The Big Med industry has successfully killed any discussion of the single-payer option in the current debates in Congress. Sen. Max Bacchus, Chair of the Sen. Finance Committee, is chairing a committee to discuss healthcare "reform" that does not include ONE advocate for single-payer health insurance!
If we are going to have REAL healthcare "reform" we need to organize and get active NOW! Once again, the healthcare industry is KILLING serious healthcare reform, and is killing the ONLY option that will provide universal healthcare for every American, without all the cost and waste of the private insurance industry.
Get Active, Get Involved, Contact your Representatives and ask them to support the National Universal Healthcare Bill HR 676!
These groups are working for you, and need your support:
You may have seen the ad by the "Conservatives for Patients' Rights" (CPR). The ad is filled with lies. Rick Scott, the sponsor of the CPR ads, is the discredited owner of Columbia/HCA, of the the largest private health care companies in the world. In 1997, his board of directors removed him during the largest health care fraud scandal in the U.S. The company was forced to pay $1.7 billion in fines for overbilling state and federal government health plans.
The ad features the former president of the Canadian Medical Association (the Canadian version of the AMA) who is another opponent of public health care and an advocate of private for profit health insurance. Dr. Day, whose private surgical clinic in Canada is under investigation by the B.C. govenment for illegal billing, does NOT represent the values of Canadians or the views of most doctors in Canada.
(One of the leading crusaders for private insurance and against public single-payer insurance in Canada, Dr. Jacques Chaoulli had a patient DIE in the waiting room of one of his clinics because Dr. Chaoulli withheld cardiopulmonary resuscitation, a basic procedure than any public health facility would have administered to save a patient's life!)
Don't belive the LIES of the for profit private health insurance industry!
Here's a great video from the Democratic Socialists of America demonstrating the need for a SINGLE-PAYER health insurance program in the United States:
Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting: Media Black-Out of Single-Payer Health Insurance Despite the popular support of a "single-payer" healthcare program, the U.S. media, as well as the Obama Administration and Congress, are ignoring the best plan to "reform" healthcare and insure every American. --- Not only do private insurance companies oppose a single-payer national public health insurance program, they do not want to compete against any government/public health insurance plan! While Obama is not going to propose a single-payer plan, his plan would offer the option of "Medicare" for anyone who wants it. The Companies are trying to kill that part of his plan. Dean Baker explains why on Common Dreams: If Private Insurers Compete With Govenment, They'll Lose
Here's what Democrats SHOULD argue--we want people to have the option to CHOOSE if they want to pay out the ass for a private insurance plan, which will give them less for their money, or a PUBLIC healthcare plan (Medicare) which will cost less and give them more for their money. If Republicans are really for letting people CHOOSE their healthcare plan, they cannot refuse!
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