Flash: Massachusetts PROGRESSIVES Revolting Against UNAFFORDABLE Health Insurance Mandates! Voting For REAL reform!
The dirty little secret of health insurance reform, what is it?
Its this, the whole insurance model is wrong, its based on a game where insurance companies 'win' by not paying and its fundamentally designed for people who almost never get sick. AND the truth is that the withholding of needed care by the ugly system we have is really designed to insulate the government from responsibility and ration care away from those who need it the most to those who need it the least
The US healthcare monster is increasingly being seen globally to be morally bankrupt.
It also takes so much money away from care that its UNAFFORDABLE to 3/4 of us without help. (government subsidies, or employer subsidies) (Shhhh!!)
One reason is that almost half of the money spent in this country on healthcare DOESN'T GO TO CARE AT ALL. It pays, in essence, to insulate the government and other payers from liability. And thats also why we have laws like ERISA Section 514 that make insurers legally unaccountable for even their worst abuses and denials of care.
As most of us know, the people of Massachusetts have been the guinea pigs for a national wealth redistribution program designed to suck money away from the poor and working people and give it to the insurance and banking industries.
Its designed to preserve, against all odds, the worst way of paying for healthcare on Earth. In order to distract people, the Obama administration has pledged $260 a year per American over ten years to preserve the insurance companies death grip on America and prevent single payer, which works.
The people of Massachusetts ARE complaining but their voices are being drowned out by the chorus of powerful special interests who want to shove more insurance down our throats, INSTEAD of solving the problem of HEALTHCARE IN THE UNITED STATES BEING UNAFFORDABLE TO THREE OUT OF FOUR AMERICANS WITHOUT HELP.
Why do they want to treat the problem with an expensive, partial "treatment" instead of curing it by doing what the rest of the world knows works? Because thats the way we do things in the United States. American medicine hasn't emphasized cures in decades, because they are unprofitable. Well, politicians are no different, 'Health insurance reform' is the gift that seems to keep on giving, so the Dems figure they are guaranteed winners if they can just keep promising a little more than the Republicans. Even if the numbers don't add up, and their plan COULD NEVER ACTUALLY WORK, they can keep winning in 2012, 2014, 2016 and beyond by making promises. AS LONG AS THEY NEVER ACTUALLY ATTEMPT TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM, AS LONG AS THEY PUT THE ACTUAL DATE OFF INTO THE FUTURE, NOBODY CAN PROVE THAT THEY HAVE BEEN LYING TO US.
Well, the people of massachusetts have seen the mandatory insurance game up close and they know that it stinks. It raises prices and the quality of care people can afford is going down. Especially burdened are those with some health issue because they are hit with huge uncovered costs and co-pays, but can't afford them. If they manage to get better and make more money, their income goes up, their subsidy goes away, and they cant afford the costs and can no longer afford treatment, and then get sick again and can't work. Its a trap, its a Catch 22 made in hell for the sick.
Obviously, a huge number can't afford both the mandatory catastrophic insurance AND the catastophe of chronic illness. This isn't what they thought they were getting into. Something has to give and they are SCREAMING for relief. They - by an overwhelming margin, want single payer.
But, there is a news quarantine on single payer because its too popular. The media has agreed not to cover it. Democrats should be listening, but they don't have the ear of the powerful because the powerful want the whole country to follow them into debt and mediocre expensive healthcare hell.
Politicians, falsely convinced that the only solutions that work wont get votes, seem to want to force the whole rest of the country into a trap much like Massachusetts'.
Poll after poll, study after study, says that's the wrong idea.
The Latest News From Massachusetts- Progressives Voting As A Block Against Obama-style UNDERINSURANCE MANDATE
Health Reform Lessons From Massachusetts (Multi-part series honestly examining the Massachusetts unaffordability situation)
including:
10/20/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part VIII - Unintended consequences for patients
10/07/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part VII - Unintended consequences for small business
09/16/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part VI - The canary in the coal mine
08/05/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part V - Finding affordable health insurance
07/21/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part IV - The new math, or maybe it’s the old
06/10/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part III - Rapidly rising medical costs jeopardize the state’s insurance miracle
05/04/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part II - Does an individual mandate work? Depends on who’s talking
03/23/09: Health Reform Lessons from Massachusetts, Part I - Critical analysis begins to trickle in
PNHP report, "Massachusetts’ Plan: A Failed Model for Health Care Reform."
Essays on Massachusetts Is No Model for National Health Care Reform at Public Citizen's website
Costs are Keeping Patients from care (Boston Globe/boston.com series)