Moneyed Politicians

Some four-letter words are welcome

By Jack E. Lohman

Like… Jobs!!!

Gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker would provide incentives to companies who manufacture their products in Wisconsin, and he is absolutely correct with that strategy. Only corporate favors will bring jobs back to Wisconsin.

Where he has it wrong is believing that he can balance the state’s budget and run it in the black. It just can’t happen, at least not under our current moneyed political system.

Taxpayers want politicians to reduce spending and the Fat Cats that fund the elections want the opposite. The latter will win it every time. It does no good to be a fiscal hawk when your legislature is being paid to spend money, and it does no good to try to attract companies and jobs to a high-tax state. Solve the political problems first and then go after the growth.

The only solution is public funding of campaigns, which Walker has opposed in the past and opposes today.

If the Dems were smart they’d make this happen and lock their party into power for years to come, but they have shown little inclination to do so. For sure it will not happen under a Walker administration.

Walker has made it clear that he does not support “government-run” health care, so that leaves the current privatized insurance system in place. Which, incidentally, also keeps the campaign cash rolling in.

And if congress does pass a health care bill that gives states the option to implement their own single payer, I’d count on a Walker veto here too. His brand of compassionate conservatism doesn’t reach that far.

Bothersome is Walker’s penchant for “privatizing” things; namely, at the moment, Milwaukee’s Mitchell Airport. To believe that the added corporate wastes (executive salaries, bonuses, profits and political contributions) would somehow not be passed onto the taxpayers is wishful thinking.

Outsourcing does not decrease government spending, it ultimately increases it. Chicago (and Milwaukee) are now looking at privatizing their water systems, which will surely come back to bite them. If the state politicians were smart — and nobody has ever accused them of being that — they’d buy back the power companies throughout the state. The ratepayers of WE Energies alone are forking out an extra $9.9 million for its CEO’s salary, a bit much for this neck of the woods.

The only benefit of privatization (to the politicians, anyway) is that government can’t give campaign contributions but private industry can. And that’s what we want to eliminate, not expand.

The level of industry opposition is a measure of its import…

By Jack E. Lohman

Current Political Reality

So valuable and effective (for the public) was the Medicare-for-all (single payer) option that Sen. Baucus and his corrupt colleagues refused to put it on the table. They knew it would pass hands down, and that’s the last thing their insurance funders wanted.

So Congress (and Obama) rolled over to the industry. The industry’s “public posture,” is to oppose any reform to give cover when Baucus and others vote for it … a massive, well-scripted charade to allow $46 million in campaign contributions to work to the max. (Pun intended)

Importantly, anything the insurance companies get is bad for the public. This industry should be eliminated from health care, not expanded as planned.

This is about money. Always has been, always will be. The insurance industry has contributed millions of dollars in the past and will continue sending money in the future…

… that is,  IF  they are left in the loop. Politicians care not about the past contributions, but  they do of the future hundreds of millions of dollars that will most assuredly be given.

That’s why single payer was never put on the table: Medicare cannot contribute cash dollars, private industry can.

This country … our politicians … our esteemed national Board of Directors … must quit trying to satisfy ANYBODY other than the needs of this nation!  Fixing the economy starts with healthcare, and if we don’t fix that correctly, the rest of the fixes will fail.

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What is Medicare-for-all?

It’s what we’ve all been calling a “single-payer system.”  That single payer is the taxpayer, as opposed to the 1500 insurance payers across the nation.

Very simply, with Medicare, you get sick, you get care, and the caregiver gets paid.  It’s just paid for with taxpayer dollars rather than employer premiums. It is part of our national infrastructure.

And if you want cosmetic or other non-essential care not covered by the system, you buy it directly, the old-fashioned free-market way, with cash dollars. Otherwise all essential care is provided. Nobody is without. Nobody dies because they have had to forego doctor appointments.

Sounds simple, why the big fight?

Because there are billions of dollars in insurance industry profits at stake, and they have bought off the politicians to ensure that those profits remain. Over $100 million dollars in campaign contributions pass hands from insurance, pharmaceutical and hospital interests to the politicians calling the shots. They don’t want to lose their profits in the future, but worse, your politicians also don’t want to  lose the contributions next year or in the years that follow.

That your politician is taking money from industry to tweak the laws so money transfers from your wallet to theirs is another issue the voters must soon resolve. With campaign reform we’d not be fighting this today.

But I don’t want to change doctors

You don’t have to. You use the same doctors and hospitals that you use today. They just send their bills to Medicare instead of the private insurer. We use the same payment system that has existed for 50 years. Nothing new is added, except patients. No new government departments, as the new reforms require.

How will this be paid for?

Through our national infrastructure (taxes) rather than the myriad of ways we pay today. There is no simpler or more efficient way.  Part of what makes it cheaper is that it’s a pool of 300 million people rather than a pool of 100 or 1000 (depending on the size of your company), or one, if you pay your own or are uninsured. Another reason is that it eliminates the insurance make-work system.

The taxpayers pay? Isn’t that bad?

The taxpayers already are paying, but in a very roundabout and highly inefficient and more costly way.

At the very least we pay when employers add their health costs to the price of their product and we reimburse them at the cash register. But we also pay when their $40,000 executive packages are written off their taxes, and when uninsured people show up at ERs and the costs are shifted to everybody else, and when bankruptcies and foreclosure costs are passed on to the public, and so forth. We are all — 100% of us — paying horrendously for a very inefficient system, but one that is very profitable to the insurance industry.

But isn’t that “socialized medicine?”

Not really, but it is socialized insurance if you have to give it a name. Yes, pure capitalism is preferred for non-essential consumer products, but essential life-saving services (medical, fire, police) should be made available to all, bypassing the whims of for-profit CEOs and their shareholders.

What’s wrong with the current method of using insurance companies?

A lot. It adds significant and unnecessary inefficiency, virtually all wasted dollars. Insurance company premiums include their medical expenditures, which we all know and respect. But then they must add their administrative costs (billing personnel, which can be cut but not eliminated) and overhead:

* High CEO salaries and bonuses and stock options
* High shareholder profits
* Broker commissions
* Marketing and advertising costs
* Actuarial costs (cherry picking)
* Denial of care costs (nurse gatekeepers)
* Rescission costs (canceling policies retroactively)
* Political costs (lobbying and campaign contributions)

All of which are in the private system, none of which are in Medicare.  Importantly, Medicare-for-all changes only who writes the checks, not how it is provided.

And incidentally, isn’t it nice to know that your politicians are getting a piece of every healthcare dollar, today and in the future?

Does Medicare-for-all increase my costs?

Not the way it is currently designed, but in any case you’d pay for it differently. You’ll be paying through taxes rather than all of the ways outlined above. But some people object because the wealthy will pay more, the middle incomers little if at all, and low-wagers nothing. That’s our progressive tax system which high income folks hate.

So how does it better serve the public?

Actually, for the same amount of dollars we are spending today (16.5% of GDP) we would provide first-class Cheney-care to 100% of our population. Including those in  class=”hiddenSpellError” pre=”in “>BadgerCare, SCHIP, Medicaid, and those who are uninsured and under-insured.

How can it be the same cost (or less) if it does more?

We’d direct the savings on waste (the 31%) on covering the new people added to the system. But be aware that there are also inefficiencies with Medicare that need to be addressed, like malpractice reform, overuse, abuse and fraud. However, these same inefficiencies exist in the private system as well, and usually to a greater degree.

What is Medicare Advantage

Medicare patients have the option to either keep the traditional Medicare or join a “private” version of Medicare, called “Advantage.” But ironically, the private plan costs taxpayers 17% more, so there is no real “advantage.” So much for private being more efficient than public, eh?

But there are sometimes additional services covered, and some advantage patients like that. But my mother dropped her Advantage plan because it didn’t cover some things she needed. You know, that “denial of care” issue. 

You can make your own decisions after reviewing these stories:

– States Look to Rein In Private Medicare Plans 

– Private Medicare Plans’ Cost Questioned 

– Medicare Audits Show Problems in Private Plans

What’s the difference between Medicare-for-all and a public option?

Medicare-for-all is funded by the national infrastructure (taxes) rather than by the patient (either directly or through the employer). Or at least that’s what we think now, but the public option is still up in the air. It likely will be weakened by the insurance industry – so that it does not truly compete – by making it applicable only to low income people and not to employers and people who truly want to opt in.

The “public option” is a political posture, not real reform. And it’s interesting that politicians who otherwise like “choice,” don’t want to give this choice when it truly competes with the moneyed industry.

So what’s this “trigger” thing?

It’s giving the insurance industry “one more chance.” Like, if we extend this current mish-mash by three years and you don’t fix it, THEN we’ll get tough and implement a public option (LOL). It’s a political way of letting the public think congress is doing something when they’ve just extended the rip-off another three years.

To what extent will this affect businesses and American jobs?

Certainly extending care to 100% of our population is valuable, but the positive effects on the business climate and economy are rather significant. Health care represents 15% of wages, and eliminating that cost would allow companies to better compete with foreign product and keep jobs in the US rather than outsourcing them.

For example, more Big Three autos are currently made in Canada than in the US because employers there spend $800 per employee per year versus $6500 here. Thus GM is closing plants in the US and opening them in Canada, and that’s just one company out of the thousands outsourcing. Medicare-for-all would be this country’s wisest bailout ever, for 100% of businesses and not just the bankers.

Taiwan adopted Medicare for 100% of their citizens and are running with an unemployment level of 2.5%.

What’s stopping us from fixing the system?

We have a basic problem with political corruption, and here it’s a matter of who can send the most money to the politicians. In this case the insurance industry has clobbered the non-insurance businesses. Unfortunately, the insurers are also part of the business coalitions (chambers of commerce et al), and they seem to have pulled the wool over their heads as well.

But the bigger problem is political corruption. While we re-elected new congressional leadership we did not replace the special interests that corrupt them and the insurance industry is now controlling the new politicians as they did the old. Nothing will change until we get solid campaign finance reform, and that will not only fuel good health reform but also curtail government spending and taxes.

What are some other ways we can make our system more efficient?

Most certainly Medicare-for-all will reduce the burden on emergency rooms if people now have their own physician, but we should open more rapid-clinics in shopping centers and mega-stores, initiate medical malpractice courts, and reinstitute the Certificate of Need program in the states to control over-building and excessive purchases. But as well, we must move lower level medical care – like treating colds and minor stitches – to credentialed nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and pharmacists.

Would Medicare-for-all fairly compensate healthcare providers?

Yes, Medicare sets the level of reimbursement for each test, but it is fair. And if it weren’t fair or my doctor was losing money on me, he wouldn’t be bugging me to come in for my yearly checkup (as he does). In fact he wouldn’t be accepting Medicare at all, because he has that option.

The fees are based on reasonable salaries, technology costs and overhead. They don’t overpay, though with our current system over-billing can occur (in both the public and private systems). But if doctors were losing money, over-billing would not occur! You cannot make up losses with volume; you can only go further into the hole.

But won’t physicians lose money on Medicare-for-all?

No, they’ll no longer have to provide charity care and absorb bankruptcy losses, all of which are currently cost-shifted to private insurance premiums. Their high charges to the privates are to offset charity-care losses, not Medicare losses (because there are none). That doesn’t mean to say that Medicare rates could not stand increasing, which they can. But right now getting the known waste out of the system is the most prudent place to start.

How do physicians feel about a single-payer Medicare-for-all system?

A single-payer system is supported by 59% of our physicians and a greater number of nurses. Only those currently gaming the system oppose fixing it.

Yes, there are some physicians who don’t take Medicare patients now because they’ve grown their practices and don’t have to settle for “fair.” The privates often overpay, sometimes tremendously, but those high-profit days are coming to an end. These physicians will join Medicare when it is the only system available, and they’ll survive quite well.

Will Medicare-for-all bankrupt us?

No, but the current system will.  In their quest to satisfy the pharmaceutical industry, politicians passed in 2003 a Medicare bill that gives the industry $780 billion over the next decade, all while preventing Medicare from negotiating for lower drug prices. The VA system saves 50% on drugs, but Medicare is not allowed to negotiate. These same politicians are now claiming “Medicare is going broke.”

Yes, the most efficient drug distribution system is — get this — drug stores!  And at a fraction of the cost!!!  The doctor would write a prescription, the patient would pay a deductible, and the drug store would bill Medicare the balance. Nothing could be simpler. Nothing could be more cost-efficient. But no “drug plan” is needed, and no insurance industry is needed to fund it.

But what about overall costs?

Multiple studies have been run by non-profit organizations on the efficiency of Medicare-for-all (for example see the “Medicare for All (Single-Payer) Reform Would Be Major Stimulus for Economy with 2.6 Million New Jobs, $317 Billion in Business Revenue, $100 Billion in Wages.”  And I suspect even the Lewin group has looked at it, but being a subsidiary of UnitedHealth would make it difficult to publish the results.

How about health Savings Accounts (HSAs)?

“HSAs coupled with high-deductible health plans increase cost-consciousness among enrollees, but have little effect on overall health care costs.” The Bell Policy Center

A RAND Corp. study demonstrated that when hypertensive patients had to pay part of the bill, they had a 10% higher death rate. Certainly if people die earlier we will reduce our health care costs, but that sounds too much like a Philip Morris study I once read.

Even partial payment by the patient can be counter-productive, like co-pays, which usually cost more than they save. It was shown in a Kaiser Family Foundation study that mothers in low-income families will too often forego their blood pressure medicine to put food on the table, and then they have a stroke or heart attack or, worse, die. This sounds neither compassionate nor conservative.

Yes, for the young and indestructible they can increase personal savings, as they allow people to opt out of contributing to the healthcare system of the nation. But don’t get sick and then seek a real policy, as it likely won’t be available to you.

But I don’t want the government standing between me and the doctor!

That doesn’t happen with Medicare today, or we wouldn’t have 59% physician support. But it does happen when it affects CEO salaries and bonuses and shareholder profits, and the CEOs do indeed intervene and deny care. Even after you’ve paid your premiums. Remember the 17-year-old California girl who died because she was denied a kidney transplant, even after multiple doctor pleadings? That was Cigna, not Medicare.

More importantly, that was Cigna CEOs, not Medicare politicians.

What will happen if we don’t pass Medicare-for-all?

Nobody is looking at where we’ll be in ten years if we don’t fix the system. Corporations like Kohl’s, QuadMed and Motorola have already started to provide their own self-funded on-premises medical services. That means the for-profit CEOs will eventually be calling the shots rather than your doctor. Some will be very good and some very bad.

Some employers have formed co-operative health care systems where for-profit CEOs are again calling the shots over your doctor. If the CEO doesn’t believe in contraceptives or stem cell research, well, tough.

This is not a pretty picture. Doctors will hate it, nurses will hate it, hospitals will hate it, and eventually even the employers and the insurance industry will hate it.

But worse than all of that, employers will still pick up the tab, though it has been reduced but is still there (remember the 15% of wages?).

But, but… Medicare is not “free market!”

Thankfully it’s not. Indeed there are free market types who don’t want the government involved in anything. It is socialized medicine, don’cha know? And the insurance industry loves it, and even funds the Tea Party protests.

But these are the same guys who supported the capitalistic, free market banking and credit industry and are now accepting a government bailout. You know, socialized banking for losses but privatized banking for profits. That is – and read this carefully – shareholders reaping the profits and taxpayers getting stuck with the losses.

What about competition in health care?

Importantly, there is no such thing as a free market in health care. Never has been and never will be. Rarely will patients or parents send their children to the cheapest doctor or hospital. They will always be viewed as cutting corners to keep costs down, and the reverse will occur as patients and parents seek the best in care (the most expensive) and drive costs up rather than down.

Profits have a place in non-essential consumer products, but not in essential life-saving humanitarian services.

Besides, if insurers ever have to cut costs to compete, you can be sure that they won’t reduce executive salaries and profits. They’ll cut payments for tests and services, thus affecting incomes for doctors and nurses.

But look at Canada

Of course we can point to the wait times in the Canadian system, and that looks bad for single-payer systems. And the insurance industry loves to inflate their weaknesses to scare the people in the US, and the industry is fighting fixes in Canada just as they are in the US.

But that’s Canada and not the United States. Canada’s problem is that they spend only 10% of GDP compared to our 16.5%. If they increased their health care spending by just 10%, to 11% of GDP, they’d not have wait times either.

Alternatively they could eliminate 1/6^th of their population from the system, as we do here, and they’d not have wait times either.

Most Canadians want more of their taxes spent on health care, but the insurance interests in Canada are lobbying parliament to reduce spending even further to force patients into their more profitable privatized system.

But even still, 86% of Canadians prefer their system to ours!

The US insurance industry has been spewing pure garbage about the Canadian and UK systems. Those systems are clearly not perfect, but they are very acceptable to their people. Here are a number of articles that will support those contentions.

• Canadian doctor
• Canadian Lies I
• Canadian Lies II
• Canadian Lies III
• Canadian Lies IV
• Canadian Lies V
• Canadian Medicare
• Canadian Poll 86.2%
• Canadians on Medicare
• Canadians view
• Dobbs on Canada
• Testimonials from Canadians
• We can do better!

But more important than that…

We are not proposing a Canadian or UK system. We are proposing an American Medicare system that is properly funded to replace all of our inefficient private and public systems. But we’ll let the hot shot conservatives opt out if they want. Pay the extra 31% and go private.

U.S. Medicare isn’t perfect and it surely needs fixes, but it is far easier to fix one system than the current mish-mash of 1500 private plans, and each of those with 5-10 different contracts covering or not covering whatever. 

How about opening insurance competition across state lines?

The idea of opening it up to cross-border competition between these 1500 private insurers is a ploy from an industry that knows full well that if competition were to force their medical payments down the losers would be the healthcare providers and not CEO salaries and shareholder profits, all of which will remain a drain on the system.

That adds massive administrative costs to doctors and hospitals who already have enough trouble satisfying the 450 insurers in Wisconsin, and it opens the system to even more fraud and overuse. The insurance industry should be eliminated, not protected.

Besides, the unnecessary and wasteful billing will not be removed by adding more insurers, it will be increased. The unnecessary costs in the current system are generated by the free-market insurance bureaucracy, which wastes 31% of health care costs. Those are not going away with cross-border sales.

But worse, insurers would move their headquarters to the state with the least consumer protections and all other state regulators would be without legal control, which of course the industry would love.

How will all of this affect quality

For those with pricey policies, it’ll neither go up nor down. And you are paying dearly for that privilege. For those uninsured or under-insured there is only one direction. It will improve. 

America’s higher health care costs have not provided a higher level of care. The single-payer systems in Canada and elsewhere have produced longer life expectancy and lower infant mortality rates than ours, mainly because of the patient’s easier access to proper care. Our costs are twice those of other nations, on a per-capita basis, yet the World Health Organization has us listed as 37th in the world in overall efficiency and effectiveness.

We can do better, and the nation’s economy demands that we do. In this time of need we cannot keep throwing healthcare dollars down the tube.

Well, what’s this “Medical Tourism” all about?

That’s the outsourcing of medical care to other countries. If a procedure costs $100,000 here and $20,000 in India, the patient may be given the option to share in the savings – IF, that is, they are willing to risk foreign travel and picking up diseases on the flight back to the states when their immune system is down. Or dealing with a medical malpractice system 5000 miles away. Or worse, a Mumbai-style takeover of the hospital while you are there. But what the hell, nobody said life was easy.

It is what it is…

No health care system is free. Some are funded directly and some indirectly. Some are funded through premiums, wages, cost shifting, tax subsidies, bankruptcy costs and higher priced products. Others are paid for with taxes, which is the most efficient for all concerned. But the insurance CEOs like things just as they are, so the politicians have acquiesced (for a price).

Top priority: If we could keep the moneyed interests from bribing our politicians, we’d fix health care overnight! But for the moment we can’t, so we must fight the bought-and-paid-for misconceptions.

Short and sweet…

By Jack E. Lohman

My Fellow Americans.

You voted me into office to get things done, and I haven’t yet passed the changes you believe in. I said Yes We Can, and now we will. Things are going to change.

I came to Washington thinking I was going to be president and found out that congress was owned by industry contributors and not by the people of the United States. That will change, I guarantee it.

I’ve made mistakes. I appointed old-time financial gurus to help us out of a mess they helped create. It is the fox guarding the henhouse. Guys that failed in their last job were put into this job, thinking they might do better. They didn’t. Geithner and Summers need a permanent vacation.

Taxpayer money that went to bankers that failed, should have instead been loaned to Main Street. We’re gonna get the money back — including the bonuses — and instead directly fund mortgages and car purchases. If any are left, that is. The cash for clunkers program has likely created a dry market because we used up the buyers that were waiting in the weeds.

But cut me some slack, this is my first year in the job. I’m leaning.

Bipartisanship isn’t going to work. The other side wants only to see my failure, and that’s not what I promised. What you want, they don’t. I can’t work with them, so we’ll go it alone.

First we’ll buy back our congress by passing full public funding of campaigns. If we want politicians working for us they are going to have to be paid by us. It’d be the best $6 per person we ever spent, and we’ll get it back in spades.

Then we’re going to pass the health care reform this country needs, a single-payer Medicare-for-all system. It will be the biggest and best corporate bailout ever, but it will be ALL corporations and not just the bankers and insurers and Big Pharma. Money currently spent on health care will now be spent on jobs.

Yea, I know. $46 million in campaign contributions from the insurance industry in 2008 alone. But that is the tip of the iceberg. Billions more await the politicians in years following if they leave the wasteful industry in the loop. I’ll not let that happen.

And no, we are not going to expand the debt limit for our children. The rich can pull us out of this; the poor cannot. We are going to increase taxes on those making over $250K a year and we’re going to eliminate taxes for corporations that both keep jobs in the states and bring back those we’ve lost.

Republicans and Blue Dogs have a heavy decision to make; it’s either the voters or the industry. Vote your conscience.

We won’t need special interest money to win in 2010 if we do it right today.

Thank you and good day.

Yea, right! That’s the speech he should have given but didn’t. He and the Dems are running only slightly ahead of the R’s in the corruption category. This isn’t about policy or ideology, it’s about bribery and corruption and getting cash donations. This year and next. Obama has proven to be no better than the rest.

… it’s that our country is not owned by its people.

By Jack E. Lohman

We live in a plutocracy, a society controlled by a small elite group. In this case given to them in exchange for campaign contributions that help keep politicians in office. The people have no vote in how our country is run.

Why do we allow our politicians to sell our country to the highest bidder? Why do our values not demand honesty in politics?  A corrupt government is no more sustainable in the US than in Somalia.

Get this: the crash of the world’s economy is 100% due to America’s corrupt political system. Blame the politicians that lifted banking regulations in 1999 and then rode to victory on the expansion of risky home loans that turned into massive foreclosures and financial ruin for many.

And blame the politicians who take a hands-off corporate policy with regard to CEO pay and regulations to protect shareholders and the public. And helping the bankers leverage money they didn’t have, all while sleeping with the oil speculators that drove gas to $4.00 per gallon.

And the politicians who have allowed corporate cash to drive taxpayer-funded subsidies and no-bid contracts, defense over-spending, and massive outsourcing. And those who voted to benefit their own investments, a form of insider trading the average citizen would be jailed for.

Add their failure to enact meaningful healthcare reform, which would have helped to keep jobs in the US.

And blame the politicians who are helping the health insurance industry in their bid for a financial windfall equal only to the massive Medicare drug giveaway in 2003. Any congress member who votes for a bill with mandates should be voted out of office.

ALL of this due to the campaign cash they received from the special interests seeking government favors. CASH dollars have corrupted our nation’s and state’s board of directors. But politicians are very good at snow jobs.

Most politicians enter office with good intentions, but then reality sets in. They must stay in office, so the fund-raising begins. Half their paid time is spent raising cash for the next term and the other half satisfying their funders from the last term. It’s corrupt, but our current form of funding elections demands it.

The Fix?  Public funding of campaigns.

Yea, you’ve heard it before but now we are at a tipping point. Right wingers are protesting high taxes and left wingers a fix to the health care system. Guns are being carried to the protests, and the Pittsburgh police called out its weaponry.  It’s only a matter of time before bullets begin to fly, and it is not going to get any better.

Both problems are caused by the same thing – corrupt politicians — but both factions concentrate on the effect rather than the cause.

They MUST pass solid campaign reform, or they must be voted out of office. Next year, not later.

==== >>>>  At the state level

Attend these meetings in Wisconsin and contact your state representatives on the Committee on Elections and Campaign Reform:  Jeff Smith (Chair)  James Soletski (Vice-Chair)  Frederick Kessler   Annette Polly Williams   Kelda Helen Roys   Jeff Stone   Donald Pridemore    Jim Ott

Upcoming Wisconsin Hearings (thanks to wisdc.org for the alert)

• MADISON:       10/8/2009     10 AM
• FRANKLIN:      10/14/2009     2 PM
• EAU CLAIRE:   10/15/2009     1 PM

==== >>>>  At the national level

A public funding proposal is seeking co-signers. Please contact your federal senators and  representative and ask that they sign on to S752 (Durbin-Specter) and HR1826 (Larson-Jones).

Do not fall for the excuse that public funding of campaigns violates free speech, as Jim Sensenbrenner claims. It does not. It is OPTIONAL. Candidates can opt in or opt out. They can take public money or continue taking private money. They will only answer to the voters, not the attorneys.

All other states check Public Campaign

Like, you’ve got until 2010 to fix it, then you’re fired…

By Jack E. Lohman

So, President Obama plans to reward the insurance industry by mandating that every American purchase health insurance, and if they can’t afford it, the taxpayers will pay for subsidies. Wow!!!

There’s a couple of things very wrong with that:

1. First, the insurance industry loves it, which automatically means it has to be bad for the public. The government plans to mandate that 100% of the non-Medicare population buy their product, or you are fined by the IRS. 
                    
2. It’s also wrong because the insurance bureaucracy must be eliminated, not expanded and subsidized. They drain 20% of our healthcare dollars simply for being a very willing middleman. Add the costs for extra clinic and hospital billing personnel and it’s 31% of combined waste.
                 
3. All of that said, the politicians love the cash flow in the current system, and with this they continue getting a piece of the action. They now get a share of the health care dollar, through campaign contributions, and this ensures their cash rewards moving forward. Eliminate the insurance industry and you eliminate the political cash, and they don’t like it a bit.

Aren’t politicians great? This is the Massachusetts plan on steroids, which has failed miserably.

But wait. Congress wants to threaten the industry with a “trigger.” You know, if things don’t work out as planned, say, in three years, they are going to pull this trigger by implementing a public option.

Are they scared, or what? You’ve got to give it to the industry for that idea. That adds three years of same-old same-old, raking in the profits while they think of a new strategy three years down the road. It’s called “buying time.”

We need a trigger, alright, but it needs to be applied to our politicians. Either fix the system by 2010 or you’re outta here!

I’ve vacillated on term limits, but now believe they are the only thing that will get this nation back on track. We need significant election reform — public funding of campaigns and instant runoff voting — and our current jokers (sorry, politicians) are not inclined to fix a system that gives them a 95% likelihood of re-election.

What a great system we have here. You can be sure of one thing; the public will not win this battle.

Tidbits

– I would have loved mandates when I owned my business. I sure know where my future investments are going if this goes through.

– As to penalties employers are required to pay if they don’t offer insurance to their employees, all they’d have to do is have their employees resign and become independent contractors responsible for their own insurance. They could even pay them 5% more and come out ahead.

– Can you imagine this? Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) complained of widespread corruption in Afghanistan as a reason for their many problems. Uh, Senator, how about the widespread corruption in the U.S. Congress? Has that caused any of our problems?

– I am tired of giving tax breaks to 501(c)(3) corporations without knowing who really is behind them, and having them lobbying against the taxpayer’s and nation’s best interests. Thus I support mandatory disclosure of the top 20 contributors of every non-profit, and if those contributors are nonprofits, disclosure there as well. If they are for-profit contributors giving to a nonprofit we deserve to know who their top shareholders are too. Yea it’s going to affect some groups I support, but it has to be done.

– The big question is whether our bought-off politicians will do anything about it.

People are being killed by police, accidentally but unnecessarily.

By Jack E. Lohman

Off-topic but I think it should be known.

Tasers are sometimes needed in legitimate law enforcement, but they nonetheless are dangerous. Police departments should be equipped to deal with the unwanted consequences, or get sued when they aren’t. Nearly 200 people have died by Taser in the last five years, and likely none of them had to.

In medical research (usually animal but sometimes human) hearts are purposely shocked into ventricular tachycardia (VT), a life-threatening and usually life-ending cardiac arrhythmia. This is done by intentionally shocking the heart on its critical T-wave in the cardiac cycle. This “widow” is a critical milliseconds, but it usually causes death.

This serves in medical training to demonstrate the process of restoring the heart to its normal rhythm. It’s called “defibrillation” and is usually successful, thus saving a patient’s life.

But that process is also debilitating when used on an uncontrollable criminal suspect, or a 72-year-old grandmother, and it can lead to death if the shock occurs on the critical portion of the cardiac cycle.

The solution is to equip every law enforcement vehicle with an Automatic Electronic Defibrillator (AED). They cost less than $1500 on Amazon, and I own one myself. I lost a good friend to a heart attack during golf, so I always carry one on the course just in case. And I carry it in my car and have it available at family get-togethers. It’s priceless.

This is not too much to expect of police departments that use Tasers.

I’m not generally one for lawsuits, but this link tells me they are indeed needed.

American College of Cardiology References:

Cardiac Electrophysiological Consequences of Neuromuscular Incapacitating Device Discharges

Effects of Cocaine Intoxication on the Threshold for Stun Gun Induction of Ventricular Fibrillation

Tidbits

– Having spent 40 years in cardiac devices and monitoring, I’m not convinced that these deaths are coincidental. Would the person have died without the Taser procedure? I doubt it.

– There is a safe, proven correction: an AED. If you carry a Taser, also carry an AED! You will ultimately use it.

– And damn, as hard as I’ve looked I’ve not been able to find a money link to politicians. I’m encouraged. They haven’t found a way to milk this issue.

Where are Barrett and Walker on this?

By Jack E. Lohman

Post Office:  The oldest. When there was little accountability in government they were pretty bad. They cleaned up their act and are now decent though far from perfect. But now they are in trouble. Fax crippled the overnight document delivery market, then email, online billing and automatic payments killed first-class delivery.  Package delivery is doing fair, as is FedEx and UPS. But obsolescence dictates that the USPS cut deliveries to three days a week and its personnel and property reduced accordingly.

Health Care: We’ve been through this before. The best option is to let businesses and individuals buy into Medicare at cost. Zero profits and zero losses, just provide an alternative that keeps the private insurers honest. Opt out if you wish, but let others opt in. But politicians don’t like it because the insurers don’t like it. Surprised? Contributions: $46M and $95M and $25M in 2008 alone.

Oil Production: Ultimately we’d like to see oil go away, and over time it will. In the meantime we (taxpayers) should buy our own oil drilling rigs and refineries to compete with the OPEC conspiracy and the oil speculators that pushed prices to $4.00 per gallon without ever taking delivery of the product. They were in it to gouge, and they did, but they wouldn’t have succeeded with a US Oil Option in the race. Contributions: $35M in 2008 alone. Don’t worry, it won’t get done.

Banks: Yea, I didn’t support the stupid bailout. But if we now own Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac we should pump taxpayer money into them to make auto and home loans where the private banks won’t. It’s silly to give them money to sit on, and worse to have them pay it out in executive bonuses. That’s not the economy that needs our help, but “we” are not funding the elections.

Utilities: Can you imagine what Enron would have done if it had to really compete? They trashed Southern California with the exception of Los Angeles County which had its own publicly-owned gas and electric company. How about that? Privatization that didn’t work and a public entity that did! Every community needs a public competitor, but state and local politicians take campaign cash too.

Water Supplies: Now the City of Milwaukee wants to privatize its public water service. What’s next, Tom Barrett? Air? Are the bidders also contributors?

Airports: And don’t forget that Milwaukee County now wants to sell off its airport. Will it ever stop, Scott Walker? Are the bidders also contributors?

Private is better than public when dealing with commercial products or non-critical infrastructure and community services. Otherwise the overpaid for-profit insurance executives cannot be trusted with public needs and lives. Trusting politicians is only slightly better, because we can at least vote them out (though we don’t do it often enough).

Politicians like to privatize everything because private companies can give campaign contributions and public entities can’t. And they often have personal investments in the companies they favor when writing legislation or voting on laws. How’s that for “fair and balanced?”

Politicians have a serious conflict of interest that is costing the nation its resources and democracy, and they refuse to correct it. If the voters knew why things are as bad as they are, there’d be a complete turnover every election.

Politicians like to address each other as “Esteemed Colleague.”  Probably because Dear Leader and Your Highness were taken, but I’d probably use “co-conspirator” instead.

Tidbits

– Health care is just one issue, owned by the insurance industry. But the high tax issue is owned by all the special interests that receive taxpayer-funded government assets.

– You’d think the Teabaggers would “get it.” They don’t. It’s the Dem’s fault, don’cha know?

– Political corruption IS the issue; health care and taxes are byproducts. But politicians absolutely will not discuss the corruption that is driving the issue. They continue to obscure by distraction.