And after reading nyceve’sdiary last night, I know where it's going...
It started me thinking...
I’d like to think there is hope...hope for a real dialogue in politics.
A Herculean leap of faith I know, and a year ago I would’ve laughed like a kid holding a firecracker. It’s all fun and games till someone loses an eye.
Hope. Sheesh!
I say I would have laughed, but I was too busy filling out unnecessarily intrusive health insurance forms and trying to find a ‘PCP’ in my ‘network’ that I could get to on public transportation. When I could get the time off work.
I woke up one morning deaf in one ear. I was dizzy to the point of incapacitation.
I fell down a lot because my balance was shot, and when I was (finally) able to get a doctor’s attention to ask what was happening I was told:
Well, the only real way to tell is at the autopsy when we take that side of your head off and look around.
Excuse me...did you say autopsy?
About 6 months later I was diagnosed with meniere's disease.
The damage is done.
I have lost 90% of my hearing in my right ear.
And a very unfunny punch line is that I now have a constant scream of white noise in my head all the time.
There’s also chance I could lose my hearing completely.
All because of half-assed service and ham handed treatment, I live in glorious lo-fi mono.
This disease moves in quick and the longer treatment is delayed, the less hearing will have a tendency to recover after each attack, until, unfortunately, many patients become deaf.
Want some sick irony?
I’m a sound engineer.
Yeah, I’m pretty scared.
Part of what feeds that fear is, and this is my very real problem, I have health insurance. Because of this wad of incompetence and lack of compassion,
I could lose it all.
Not the worst health care horror story at all I realize. Boy do I realize.
But it goes on the list.
I think I got the message. Our health care system cares about nothing but profit, and our government does nothing but their bidding. Am I close?
How much of that profit helps fuel the war and feed the insurance business.
The cost of medical care and compensation benefits for returning veterans will skyrocket once those troops return home. It also estimates that the cost over the soldier’s lives will amount to up to seven hundred billion dollars.
...and effectively brings the already underfunded VA to its knees.
We all know this, right? Sadly though, only a few candidates are willing to commit to a real answer.
And only one of the candidates in the IL-14 congressional race. John Laesch.
From the rest, all I keep hearing (through my fog of tinnitus) is rhetoric, and rhetoric doesn’t answer my question why.
Why does an American’s health have a price tag so high?
Who is going to protect the people who are going bankrupt because they have no insurance or are underinsured?
When will we stop seeing individuals and families destroyed because of our appallingly reptilian health care system?
This sure isn’t any answer:
Just as the Hippocratic Oath requires doctors to "first, do no harm," when examining our health care delivery system with a view to reforming it, we must first do no harm. The Federal Government should do nothing which would have the effect of reducing the quality of health care afforded us. One-payer systems, like those in Great Britain and Canada, are not the answer.
Instead, we should take steps to make health care more available and more affordable.
-Jim Oberweis - Republican candidate
So...we should do nothing until more people get sick and die, cuz it still kinda works?
And...
"One-payer’" is not the answer because...we should wait until there’s a clearance sale or the new shipment of health comes in?
Neither is this:
I soundly reject the concept of rationed care and a single-payer, nationalized health care system. The better approach is to support fair competition that will make care more flexible and affordable. At the same time, we all must remain accountable for the decisions we make and must work together to contain exploding health care costs.
-Chris Lauzen - Republican candidate
Competition? Take me to the cheapest hospital please. I have a coupon for a free ambulance ride.
And...
I guess I should be held accountable for my decisions because opening that box of cancer in the house was a totally bad idea.
I don’t think new computers will help the real issue either.
Use of computer information technology is one of the most promising means of controlling these costs, but progress has been extremely slow due to entrenched interests and lack of government standards.
-Bill Foster -Democratic candidate
Yeah, after 8yrs I got a new computer. And it still crashes.
Must be my entrenched interests.
And, of course, this:
"So what you have to do is make a transition on a low end, where essentially the homeless person who has no means can get something...It’s not gonna be great. And then if you’re very wealthy, you should be able to buy the best health care you can buy and there’s a transition in there, somewhere in between. People in the U.S. are not going to buy into a system where if you have the money you can’t get the medical care that you think you need and want to pay for"
-Bill Foster, after the NIU Debate
Whoa indeed! I see why Bill sticks to the rhetoric. Because when he really talks for himself, he’s scary!
How engaging it is then to read this:
It is my belief that everyone, especially the sick and elderly, should have access to our healthcare system. I support the National Health Insurance Act that delivers private healthcare through a publicly financed system that uses the existing Medicare program.
-John Laesch
Which is a real answer.
An inclusive answer.
The dialog continues with bullets loaded with details...details that you can read for yourself.
Maybe I’m too harsh on the other candidates. It is, after all, positioning right? I don’t really know any of them personally.
I just know what their handlers want me to know.
And I’m so, so, so very tired of voting for packaging instead of people.
I’ve got enough white noise in my head already thank you.
Rhetoric offers no solutions and kills dialogue.
Hmmm...
Rhetoric kills dialogue.
It also protects the status quo.
A political dialogue based on rhetoric and talking points is dangerous. It cuddles up with ineffectiveness and chokes the life out of the middle class.
But I did say I have hope, right? I have some friends in the 14th that have a chance at taking back the political dialogue and involving the people in the discussion.
It’s positive, constructive and pretty obvious if you think about it.
We shouldn’t be too proud to examine the self-evident things that are closest to us.
That’s how you miss the truth. And we do miss it time and again because we are looking for something obscure to be the answer.
Take your eyes away from the horizon for a sec and see what lies at your feet.
As a working union carpenter and a veteran, I believe John is grounded in the realities of surviving day to day.
This is my first diary and I have a history of snark-
hopefuly this is balanced with a bit of substance-
But when you live every day in a cloud of noise it makes you cranky. I have to summon up every ounce of Zen-like calm to stay sane with this incessant test-pattern interface with the world. Every sound is a gift, and all I get from my Representatives are White Elephants. It sucks when all you want for Christmas is a medical referral.
I feel there is a real chance here for something big to be accomplished in IL-14.
To turn the Coach's seat true blue, with a clear strong progressive voice. Not just by electing a Democrat, but a Democrat that deserves to be there, through the will and the work of the people.