Sunday, February 23rd, 2020
Stephan: All day today as I was working on a paper I listened to CNN, FOX, and MSNBC to see how they would cover the Nevada Caucus. I was particularly interested in how they discussed healthcare, which I think is, or should be, a defining issue in the upcoming election.
Predictably FOX was a disinformation operation for people whose IQs seem to be roughly twice their waist size. I really find it amazing that anyone takes this propaganda spew seriously; yet I know millions do, and it is very depressing.
MSNBC was so blatantly corporatist I got to thinking why this should be the case? I think the answer may be that about 50% of their advertising is for pharmaceuticals. MSNBC lives on the largesse of the illness profit system.
Once again their open anti-Sanders bias was on full display. Out of some crypt in Arkansas, they located the body of James Carville and, in a display of full Frankensteinian reanimation, got him to talk and interviewed him. This was followed by Chris Matthews who to my astonishment compared a Sanders victory to Vichy France at the beginning of World War II. (Matthews really should retire before he makes a worse fool of himself than he does most days.)
CNN had the best day of it; its commentators did not overly embarrass themselves, and actually talked about relevant issues.
But the point none of them will really discuss with any intelligence or integrity is that facts are facts, and the facts are that replacing America's illness profit system with universal birthright Medicare-for-all healthcare will save hundreds of billions of dollars and save many tens of thousands of American lives. Here is an article on two good recent research studies on this, one from Yale, the other from Harvard.
None of this will come as a surprise to my regular SR readers, who are very familiar with these facts. I am publishing this report, now, because I hope each of you will talk to family and friends and get their heads screwed on right on the healthcare issue. The report has lots of click-throughs that will take you to the primary source material; that's why I picked it. 2020 may be America's last chance to get a functioning healthcare system devoted to... health and wellbeing.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) speaks while introducing health care legislation titled the “Medicare for All Act of 2019” with Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), during a news conference on Capitol Hill, on April 9, 2019 in Washington, DC.
Credit: Mark Wilson/Getty
Two new studies found that the Medicare for All plan proposed by candidates like Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., would cost less than the public option proposed by former Vice President Joe Biden and other moderates in the Democratic primary.
Biden and former South Bend, Indiana, mayor Pete Buttigieg have repeatedly argued that the Medicare for All proposal would be too expensive. They have instead proposed a public option or “Medicare for all who want it,” which they argue would be more fiscally sound.
“Sanders’ ‘Medicare for All’ plan “would cost more than the entire federal budget that we spend now,” Biden claimed during a debate earlier this month, which PolitiFact rated as false.
Biden has repeatedly demanded to know how Sanders plans to pay for the proposal. […]
Thanks for the article. It makes it simple to post to facebook.
Most world religions teach the concept of God, Supreme Being or Creator. Wether given to us by prophets, ET or however, that is to most a no brainer. Intelligent design of all that is cannot be denied. Century’s of manipulation by man of the worlds religions have gotten them to corrupted mess they are today. Maybe in the past homosexual men (and women) were attracted to men or women only organizations (religious or otherwise) because of past intolerance and it offered a safe hiding place? I don’t know. The old saying about how a few bad apples can spoil the whole basket is as true as it ever was. As to Medicare for all, it’s a pipe dream. Low reimbursement rates will drive doctors and hospitals out of business and the profession, and dilute care to unacceptable levels. You have way more faith in government to run well things than I do! And that is from my observation of and research on what they already run!
I totally agree with you, Stephan, that he Medicare For All system would get rid of the profit-only administrative costs within our current system, as well as insure many more people who cannot even afford healthcare.