Aquarian Weekly 4/7/10
REALITY CHECK

READERS RESPONSES

Comments on Health Care Reform are still pouring in from all quarters. Below is a sample.

Don't know how much you've clarified ... as the lies you want to "debunk" aren't debunked with facts but with your opinion. (TEN LIES ABOUT HEALTH CARE REFORM - Issue: 3/31/10) As for "This is actually fiscally responsible legislation" and your reply: "Not in the least," you run afoul of Paul Krugman, who states this is indeed fiscally responsible legislation. Since Krugman is no big fan of Obama or the Democrats (though he likes Republicans less) and since he's won a "Nobel" for economics (it's not really a NObel, but let's let that lie for now) & he's no dummy, I have to go with Paul on this one.

Everyone should read his "Three Myths about Health Care Reform" ... including "this is fiscally irresponsible".

It is a reasonable, responsible plan. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Vincent Czyz

Thank you, Mr. Campion!

I breathed a great sigh of relief after inhaling a few paragraphs of this week's Reality Check. The polarized shitstorm that is cable news will admit no middle ground.

I did enjoy President Obama's statement at the "feel good" rally in Sometown, USA where he said (paraphrasing liberally) that 'the conservatives said great cracks would open up in the earth ...turns out to be a pretty nice day! Birds are singing, people walking down the mall hand in hand."

Indeed, his statement foreshadows the future of health care...Business as Usual! Fat Cats getting fatter, Middle Class getting bullshitted ad nauseum. This legislation did crack the tough shell of the health care coconut and I think there is much to like in the new legislation, as well as much to sneer at.

Keep it coming!

Jonathan Young
N. Kingstown RI

You forgot "This is of the people, by the people, and for the people." Whether "the American people demand it," the implementation is very clearly an agreement between the Congress and the health care insurance corporations. The glaring and obvious clue is that the pre-existing conditions clause doesn't take effect until 2014. I parse that as, "We need enough time to buy legislation to have that part repealed."

What's missing, I think, is reform of the other aspects of health care, e.g., providers charging whatever the market will bear, per each insurer's market share. The history of health care in these United States reveals growth most resembling a yeast culture: Unstructured, following the path of most profit, and completely without conscious consideration of the impacts of the growth.

It's abundantly clear that We the People are not the customers, merely the consumers.

Brad Morrison

GW Bush's "massive prescription drug overhaul" wound up costing me $60 for a GENERIC drug that used to cost $12.00...so much for Republicans' efforts.

Paula di Napoli

I woke up today to a big surprise. I was expecting Armageddon. I called my doctor's office and he was still there taking appointment. My insurance company was still trying to raise my rates, the pharmacy was still open and hadn't been taken over by bureaucrats, the Catholic hospital was still operating with nuns scurrying about. In fact I couldn't tell the difference between the day before health care passed and today.

Now I've been told that the federal government was going to sweep in, round up all the doctors and make them work out of a big government building, that private hospitals were going to be shut down, that pharmacies were going to close and be moved to the big government building. That all those private doctors, nurses and pharmacists were going to become federal employees…you know…the takeover of our entire health care system

Oh well, I'll give my doctor a call next week and see. Maybe it will take a few days before he has to report to the government health care center.

Armageddon is starting to look like just another day.

Norris Hall

From the AP (hardly a right-wing mouthpiece) a week ago - "The new healthcare legislation will take us from 83% of the country covered to about 95%..." So we're about to drop a trillion (and that number is a joke because the Dems purposely left out the doc fix and double counted Medicare savings to keep the price tag low, and the CBO only works off of the numbers they're given whether they're fantasy or not) for 12 measly percentage points? A trillion for 12. Wow what a bargain. I guess the Dems used that new math they touted but that has put U.S. educational performance behind some Slavic village somewhere out in the great Russian wasteland.

The anger all this engenders is deep-seated. It's not as shallow as the Dems classic of Repubs wanting to leave children and the elderly out in the street to die "quickly." Come November with a still lame and getting lamer economy, high unemployment, everyone feeling more than a pinch in the wallet, and a ruling party racking up a trillion (more like 2) on our credit card as if it were the roaring 20's, there will be payback. And that's not even factoring in the new low the Dems set in getting reform passed. I'm surprised they didn't dig up Teddy Kennedy for an aye vote.

Ken Eustace

We are under siege from a corrupt and leftist leaning government that seemingly sees no limit to it's power and desecrates the Constitution and everything the founders stood for…but take heart…the founders knew such a thing could happen and there are still several roadblocks that could derail the Obama Express to Socialism or worse…like the courts and state governments…the latter are just waking up now to the fact that Obama is their enemy and is encroaching on their sovereignty in a manner that could eventually lead to the dissolution of state governments concentrating all power and gov't revenues in Washington. We are not there yet, even if the courts fail us, the states have vested interests to resist being overtaken by Washington.

JL

What I find most dismaying is that no one can see the simple truth now facing each and every American - our Republic and the values we stand for have been fundamentally undermined. The unconstitutionality of this bill is clear for anyone looking at it with any degree of objectivity - the wealthy will be punished for being wealthy - in the form of higher taxes to pay for the care of those who can not pay. It is a central tenet of Socialism and Marxism that those who have wealth must surrender it to those who do not. Every Marxist for Mao Tze Tong, to Fidel Castro, and now, sadly, our president, has sought to begin the "Socialization" of society by taking over health care. Our men and women in uniform spent the better part of the last century keeping the spread of communism in check - I know I don't have to explain this to my elders - they lived through it. What the hell were they fighting for?

The Monkey King

Considering how overwhelmingly in control wealth and corporate interests already are of the political and legal process, it is just silly to argue that government somehow is now establishing draconian and on-the-way-to-dictatorial control with this bill. What little they will actually control in between all the loopholes and provisions for ineffective regulation, will undoubtedly disappear thanks to inevitable outsourcing to and lobbying by the same companies who would supposedly now be held in check.

If Obama really wanted to, he could simply have followed all the precedents set by the previous administration in abusing executive power. Instead, he gave speeches for a year while Democrats in senate and congress waffled & failed to rally around anything. Then finally they lost a crucial seat in the senate, and pushed through on a bill that will in all likelihood not reduce the continued profit growth of the industries that are driving the ever-higher costs of health services in the first place.

Far too much media attention has distorted the view as to what this health reform bill means to the American public and who is for or against it. The reality is that it is a mixed bag for many people, but that it is a first step toward the government promoting the health of its citizens. The first implementation of the bill will have some problems, but because it exists and touches so many areas, the amendments will continue to make it more effective. Were the law not passed, there would not be the same government involvement to try to fix the system

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