ObamaCare Means a Two-Tier Health Care System
The most important amendment Republicans must propose for Obama’s Medi-Grab bill is a very easy one:
Resolved: that all federal and state employees must enroll in ObamaCare, without exception.
Any violation of this amendment will be punishable by a fine, imprisonment, and/or loss of federal or state employment. Enforcement of this provision will be overseen by a popularly elected commission, whose proceedings will be open to the public via the worldwide web.
“All federal and state employees” includes every member of Congress and the executive branch — those who currently have the finest medical insurance available in the country today (courtesy of you and me).
This is the key test for the Medi-Grab bill. Any member of Congress who votes against it reveals his or her true stand on America’s founding principles. Anyone who votes for it shows that he or she actually gets it. There are many terrifying parts of this Medi-Grab bill, but this is the simplest litmus test.
It’s so simple that everyone in the country can understand it. It’s do-or-die in terms of the integrity and honesty of the takeover of one-sixth of the economy that Obama is so determined to drive through Congress.
Socialist regimes reveal their true nature by the special treatment they give to their permanent ruling class; they deny such treatment for ordinary schlubs like you and me. The worst corruption in socialist regimes flows from that simple two-caste system. In Europe, the ruling class hardly bothers with elections any more. The same people just turn over in their lifelong careers, or they just stay in the tenured bureaucracy.
The so-called European Parliament is elected by the voters, all right, but it does not have the power to legislate — or even to investigate the all-powerful EU bureaucracy, which is unelected. The European Parliament is therefore an elaborate front. In typical fashion, the EU has a special term for that: the “democracy deficit.” It is regrettable, to be sure. Only trouble is, nobody does anything about it, and they won’t because the dual caste system is the key power grab whereby all sovereign power in European nations is now flowing into the EU — like so much water draining out of a bathtub.
Obama’s medical takeover bill is a monstrosity in many ways, but the biggest danger comes from the separate treatment it reserves for the ruling left compared to us ordinary folks. Obama’s Medi-Grab will force ordinary people into a medico-legal corral. But it exempts members of the ruling left, and by creating a political monopoly over medical care, it ensures that we must all go begging, hat in hand, to the bureaucracy for our very survival.
If Obama wins, Europe is our future. In Britain, Gordon Brown does not go to his local NHS clinic to get substandard medical care, nor does he go to the scandalously dirty hospitals in the Midlands. In Brussels, the European Union bureaucrats would just sneer at medical care for ordinary folks. They get nothing but the best. That hypocrisy is all over the American ruling left as it is emerging today: Obama and Al Gore both attended special upper-class schools from early on in life. Bill Clinton was a Rhodes scholar. They are special, these well-born rulers, not like you and me.
The european buerocrat elite indeed has a very cushy deal. In most european countries there is a very steeply progressive income tax that goes up to almost 50% (that’s just the income tax). But people who work in one of the various european institutions such as the european patent office DO NOT PAY income tax!
They also have their own childcare institutions such as nursery schools so that their precious little brats don’t come into contact with normal children.
And various other perks from huge porsche cayenne SUVs as company cars to diplomatic immunity for leaders of large european institutions.
“The so-called European Parliament is elected by the voters, all right, but it does not have the power to legislate ”
uh not quite what your fellah Rosenthal is saying, the EU laws prevail on national laws, besides not many people are feeling concerned by what is decided in EU, excepted when its plans forbid some trades, fisheries, cultures, and naturally the “euro crisis”, where it appears that the whole rules are under Germany subjugation
otherwise I couldn’t but agree with you on the EU elite, I wouln’t cry if they would experiment the goulag one day, and that we could spare some of its members lucridous wages to bail out deficits.
This essay is strikingly important. In particular:
This is observably the case in every socialist state known to history.
Beyond even that, one can usually discriminate between the statesman and the aspiring dictator by the P.R. applied to them. The statesman and his supporters, by and large, will refrain from talking about the candidate himself; the aspiring dictator will bathe in hosannas more appropriate to the Second Coming of Christ. The statesman will discuss issues, legalities, the history of various initiatives; the aspiring dictator will assure you that where others have failed, he will succeed.
The overall effect of the P.R. applied to the aspiring dictator is to raise him above the common run of man, to characterize him as an Ubermensch who can do no wrong, and who will overcome obstacles that have thwarted the rest of us by sheer power of intellect and personality. Of course we would want such a world-beater as our Maximum Leader! Of course his care and feeding should be nothing but the best! And of course any criticism of him, or doubt of his positions, should be treated the way the Muslims treat heresy!
Draw the moral, fellow Americans. We’re on the verge of losing our country to such an Ubermensch and his henchmen. It won’t take but one or two mistakes more.
I have been saying that since day one. This bill is about every lobby group getting money; it is not about getting health insurance to Americans. Abandon income tax, implement progressive sales tax: higher the luxury the higher the sales tax; include money for a Canadian style universal coverage (for legal residents only); have a co-pay for all non “emergency” visits; have a thousand dollar co-pay for non-emergency emergency room visits; Everyone including Congress on the program. All doctors and hospitals must post prices or just copy Canada as to what doctors are paid for procedures. Tort reform means all civil suits are automatic counter “suits”; when the jury finds a frivolous shakedown suit the jury finds against the plaintiff lawyer and the plaintiff in the amount they tried to “shake down”.
I totally agree with this. I think it should be a major talking point and be on every talk show and blog in the country. Unfortunately, since repubs benefit from this too, I think they will just ingnore it acting like they aren’t as self serving as the dems.
Great read James, The politician moto: Great health care for me but not for thee.
**European**
Here in Sweden the top rate, which kicks in at about 75k USD, is 59.1 percent. Add to that a 25 percent VAT tax on nearly all goods and services. Is it any wonder things cost 2, 3, 4 sometimes 10 times as much as in the United States. And I am talking everyday items. I bought a pencil case (cheap, little 99 cent type item) and a small bottle of hand sanitizer the other day it totaled just over $10 USD. Dinner at TGIF’s for my family of four is well over $100. I hope Americans are prepared to take a STEEP decline in their standard of living.
anonymous #2 is me
The petulance displayed by a Pete Stark or a Barry Sotero derives from their unhappiness that they must, wearily, continue to deal with unnecessary evils like elections and votes. Their self-assessed greatness should be rewarded with absolute power.
The Founders, in particular Jefferson, provided a clear prescription for dealing with such personalities.
The system works so well! GREECE is a good example where people have socialized medicine and it sucks. Sure you get Doctors for free…My kid had Reflux and a Doctor(at the kids’ Hospital and for free) in Greece told me it was psychological, he needed to be spank and ignored and the cough would go away..Voodo Medicine, Marxist Doctor.
It took one Doctor’s visit in the United States to determine that mey child was suffering from Reflux and he was prescribed Prevacid and that was the end of the story. Why would I want to get socialized medicine? Population control as Dr. Emanuel suggests?
I have spent the last 10 years in Spain and UK – both with national health systems. In both countries, EVERYONE who can afford it has private insurance. In the UK where that NHS is the worst I have ever encountered (& I have lived in 12 countries), private health insurance is part of the average execs package. In Spain company subsidies are less common but again – if you can afford it, you do it.
So you pay up the wazoo in income tax, add another 17%++ in VAT, tons of other more hidden taxes (like when you fill up the tank of your car) and then go out and buy what you supposedly get for free.
To complete the package, high unemployment is simply an integral part of the economic model. Spain currently runs around 19% admitted to (but the govt. lies)but even when it lead the EU in growth it was around double digits.
Is it any wonder that the USA/Obama wants to emulate this miracle system?
There isn’t going to be any two-tiered medical system because there isn’t going to be an Obamacare. In the next 4-5 years, with or without Obamacare, US debt to GDP will be over 100%. Game over. I’m not sure why this isn’t clear to Congress crittters or Obama or to those against them. The money is gone. No amount of taxing is going to make it better. There is likely to be another housing collapse since there are a large number of ARM loans resetting soon. There is likely to be a consumer credit collapse as unemployment worsens. There is likely to be a student loan bubble as the government continues to fund higher ed loans and the people graduating can’t get jobs to pay off there ever expanding debt. The student loan bubble is central to any implementation of Obamacare since doctors graduate with, by far, the highest debt loads. If you make it impossible for new doctors to pay off their loans and actually have a standard of living above the poverty level, they quit. No more doctors. Bail out the doctors and you add to the unsustainable debt. Oh, and I haven’t even gotten to the state and local budget issues. They’ll need to be bailed out too, of course.
There will be no European system in the US because there won’t be a European system in Europe. Spain, Portugal and Italy are likely to soon follow Greece. Then the UK, which is precariously close to a 100% debt to GDP level right now. And when all those dominos fall, the socialist empire crumbles. So it’s over. Either they run the printing press 24/7, in which case we’re done, or we default, in which case we’re done. The one thing elite pols are exceedingly good at it is being amazingly stupid, shortsighted creatures. So let them go ahead and add another trillion dollar entitlement that we cannot possibly afford. All you can hope for is that there are enough grown ups left to pick up the pieces after they trash the country. But rest assured they don’t have sufficient time left on the clock to build their socialist dystopia.
The author hits it on the head. But look at the other side of this issue, Socialists are upset if rich people get more medical care / better care, then poor people.
National health care is not just about providing health care, but making sure that all the people get equal health care. The greatest shame to a socialist is that someone who is rich, (or responsible, ie, has good insurance, savings etc.) will get better medical care then someone with out money, savings etc. “Money should not equal health” is the theory.
Of course in any reality some pigs are more equal then other pigs. And when money is no longer a sorting mechanism, then political power takes it’s place.
A great example of this is the Canadian governor who went to the US for medical treatment.
He helped put the current system in place in Canada. That system is greatly worried that a middle income person might choose to get more expensive treatment not available to everyone in the country. So the more expensive treatment (some sort of heart procedure) was not available in Canada, but the wealthy governor could travel to the US, pay for the treatment out of his pocket and then recover at his South Florida Condo. So the filthy rich, or politically connected get better care, but at least the middle class and the lower classes are equal.
It’s not about access, it’s about “equality”
Health care is about life and death, and who.
Got news for ya: Our Congress already has their own special health care package that is not available to anyone else.
And they get it for the rest of their life for being elected to Congress one time.
They voted this plan in for themselves.
Attacking the inherent “unfairness” of socialized medicine is the wrong approach, IMHO. The free market system can be erroneously labeled “unfair” with a convincing Appeal to Emotion fallacy. “Fairness” is a red herring, and it’s most often used by the left to justify seizing other people’s money.
I can live with a system where some people get better goods and services than others. That happens all the time, in every country, in every sector. I drive a ten-year-old Nissan, not a brand new BMW. I’m fine with that.
What I’m NOT going to stand for is a two-tier… or even a TEN-tier system that drives this nation into perpetual insolvency, when the most obvious, most economically sound alternative – getting government THE HELL OUT OF HEALTH CARE – is SO EASY to implement. All it takes is for the People to STOP letting corrupt politicians make all their decisions for them.
The plan currently under consideration – at least as far as we can tell, since NO ACTUAL BILL EXISTS YET – is strikingly similar to the plan currently FAILING in Japan. Last I checked, Japan’s “exemplary” system helped push its public-debt-to-GDP ratio close to 200% – currently second only to Zimbabwe. Everything about the Democrats’ fiscal agenda provides clear evidence that their goal is to REPEAT this socially suicidal error. Economic collapse, chaos, secession and, likely, open bloodshed will result if we allow this to happen.
#12-To TQ:I really hope you are right…BOY DO I HOPE YOU ARE RIGHT!!!!..It makes alot of sense…No money,no power,no nothing…
RE: #10:
I knew a number of Greek-Canadian individuals in Toronto who of course went to Greece for 6+ months each year for the weather and the civility of their neighbors in their home towns, but were scrupulous about retaining their Ontario, Canada health care benefits (which doesn’t include dental, by the way, you need to purchase that separately).
Now as a US resident I know that the standard of care is higher in the US than Ontario. So how bad is it in Greece?
RE: #13:
1. Any interested reader can log onto the website for the Ministry of Health, Ontario, Canada and see the waiting lists for specific procedures. An interesting comparison is between Fort Erie, Ontario, and Buffalo, NY, a mere 300 years across the Niagara River.
http://www.health.gov.on.ca/transformation/wait_times/wait_mn.html
2. It was of course illegal for me as a Canadian health care enrollee to pay an Ontario MD for speedy or superior care (assuming I’d saved anything from my confiscatory taxes) and for that MD to provide the services. However, it was extremely cost effective for health care providers in BUFFALO, NYC, CLEVELAND, OH and DETROIT, MI having surplus capacity to place expensive full page advertisements in Toronto’s 4 daily papers advertising quick, effective diagnosis for anything from cancer and coronary treatments to gender reassignment.
TQ@12,
Well put. My only conclusion is that they intend to control the recycling of the trashed US. Last man standing with guns wins.
Recent Executive Order authorizing the call up and federal command of the State National Guards in times of civil unrest, suggests they expect and have planned for the revolt. They can shut off your food supply, lights, gas, monitor your cell, landline, cable, internet activity and empty your bank account, IRA, and foreclose on your property, BOLO anyone nationwide and place you on a NO TRANSIT list (apparently non-deletable).
Strangely, your predictions proffer some hope in a scenario that’s just got to get ugly soon. If I read you correctly, chaos rules no matter who wins in 2010.
The Repubs tried to enact an amendment that required all Congressmen to join the plan proposed by the “healthcare” bill and it was unanimously voted down by the Dems.
I was shocked. /sarc
YEAH! – SURE!
Give that amendment about two months before it is deleted.
We have heard so many lies from Obama grabcare that no one believes this Shite anymore.
I am not fed up,
I am burned out.
Keep on preaching a lie until it becomes the truth!
We need to fire all these POS involved,
just can’t wait until the gales of November.
Obama finally realizes one of his dreams:Cuban style health care !
Of course a ‘two tier’ system will evolve. Elitists would never themselves be subject to that which they wish to impose onto their charges, in any aspect of American life.
The current “healthcare” bills, (as one bill/one law will), ultimately, accomplish the democrats’ objective of single payor.
The individual or company opting out of purchasing insurance will pay the much lower fines to be imposed than the egregious costs of individual insurance.
Any numbnut would choose to pay a much smaller fine instead of purchasing a $5000 policy which they may, or may not, need or use.
See how the private insurance industry comes to be destroyed ?
Were the House to pass the Senate bill, that might be it. Obama would have his “win” (cough) & the so called “reconciliation” process enabling amendments/changes might not happen.
House members, it would be stupid to vote “for” something with some kind of promise or assurance that it would be amended in its final version.
If Dame Nancy successfully twists representatives’ arms & threatens them with losing perks, losing committee assignments, losing re-election support etc., any willing bend-overs are, very likely, going to hell.
The federal gov’t had nothing to do with “healthcare” when I was a child. Our family had (affordable) insurance for use only in extreme circumstances/catastrophe and paid expenses that were normal and reasonable out of pocket.
Only a return to something resembling sanity could possibly be a reasonable choice. Certainly allowing in layers of bureaucratic process, under the direction of someone like the brain dead HHS sec’y, is insane.
This whole debate should really be about the stupidity of allowing the federal government into the arena of “healthcare” in the first place.
Cuban style health care!
That sick old revolutionary Fidel had an entire wing of a hospital built just to treat him.
Castro imported doctors from Spain to tend to him, which kind of brings into question all those claims of American socialists as to the really, really excellent care available in Cuba.
Michael Moore sings the praises of Cuban healthcare. Let’s see where that fat ole hypocrite goes for treatment when he has his coronary.
America’s future? In BRITAIN, a desperate HOSPITAL patient rang the POLICE to BEG for WATER.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk
Neglected by ‘lazy’ nurses, man, 22, dying of thirst rang the police to beg for water
By Emily Andrews
06th March 2010
A man of 22 died in agony of dehydration after three days in a leading teaching hospital.
Kane Gorny was so desperate for a drink that he rang police to beg for their help.
They arrived on the ward only to be told by doctors that everything was under control.
The next day his mother Rita Cronin found him delirious and he died within hours.
She said nurses had failed to give him vital drugs which controlled fluid levels in his body. ‘He was totally dependent on the nurses to help him and they totally betrayed him.’
Mr Gorny had been a keen footballer and runner until he was diagnosed with a brain tumour the year before his death. The medication he took caused his bones to weaken and he was admitted to St George’s for a hip replacement in May last year. The operation left him immobile and unable to get out of bed.
She said that two days after his hip operation, while Miss Cronin was at work, he became severely dehydrated but his requests for water were refused. He became aggressive and nurses called in security guards to restrain him.
After they had left, he rang the police from his bed to demand their help.
Miss Cronin, who is divorced from her son’s father Peter, said: ‘The police told me he’d said, “Please help me. All I want is a drink and no one is helping me”.
The next morning she visited him before going to work. ‘He was delirious and his mouth was open,’ she said. ‘I gave him a drink of Ribena. ‘I told three nurses there was something wrong with my son and they said, “He’s fine” and walked off. I started to cry and a locum doctor who was there told me not to worry.
‘Eventually the ward doctor came round, took one look at Kane and started shouting for help.’
Miss Cronin was asked to leave her son’s bedside. ‘He died an hour later,’ she said. ‘I didn’t even realise he was dying. I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1255858/Neglected-lazy-nurses-Kane-Gorny-22-dying-thirst-rang-police-beg-water.html
Rest in peace, Kane Gorny.
Many doctors are seeing some writing on the wall and already positioning themselves & their practices.
Opting out of treating Medicare patients might rise to epidemic proportions.
Some doctors who have the luxury of retiring/not retiring are opting to retire.
I believe more doctors are setting up systems & procedures to completely circumvent government interference and control, such as signing up private patients, each of whom pays a hefty stipend to be seen by/treated by a given physician.
There’s two-tier right there. Your access to certain doctors will be constricted unless you’ve got the cash to hire him or her to be on call to treat you.
Next step, Jabba the Hutt government passes laws to restrict doctors’ freedom of choice to configure their own practices as they wish.
What is the purpose of Obama’s Civilian National Security Force?
Obama: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwaAVJITx1Y
Victoria Jackson: “There’s A Communist Living in the White House!!”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWi182CMJY8&feature=player_embedded
SCARY……
Is this REALLY our AMERICA??????
Know the TRUTH about the Government Health Care Bill H.R.3200 – Key Points
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcBaSP31Be8
The UK Hospital of HORRORS
http://www.dailymail.co.uk
Up to 1,200 needless deaths, patients abused, staff bullied to meet targets… yet a secret inquiry into failing hospital says no one’s to blame
By Fay Schlesinger, Andy Dolan and Tim Shipman
25th February 2010
Up to 1,200 patients died unnecessarily because of appalling care
Labour’s obsession with targets and box ticking blamed for scandal
Patients were ‘routinely neglected’ at hospital
Report calls for FOURTH investigation into scandal
Not a single official has been disciplined over the worst-ever NHS hospital scandal, it emerged last night.
Up to 1,200 people lost their lives needlessly because Mid-Staffordshire NHS Trust put government targets and cost-cutting ahead of patient care. But none of the doctors, nurses and managers who failed them has suffered any formal sanction.
The independent inquiry headed by Robert Francis QC found the safety of sick and dying patients was ‘routinely neglected’. Others were subjected to ‘ inhumane treatment’, ‘bullying’, ‘abuse’ and ‘rudeness’.
The inquiry found that:
• Patients were left unwashed in their own filth for up to a month as nurses ignored their requests to use the toilet or change their sheets;
• Four members of one family. including a new-born baby girl. died within 18 months after blunders at the hospital;
• Medics discharged patients hastily out of fear they risked being sacked for delaying;
• Wards were left filthy with blood, discarded needles and used dressings while bullying managers made whistleblowers too frightened to come forward.
The Francis report said staff numbers were allowed to fall ‘dangerously low’, causing nurses to neglect the most basic care. It said: ‘Requests for assistance to use a bedpan or to get to and from the toilet were not responded to.
‘Some families were left to take soiled sheets home to wash or to change beds when this should have been undertaken by the hospital and its staff.’ Food and drink were left out of reach, forcing patients to drink water from flower vases.
Kelsey Lintern was at the centre of one of the worst tragedies in the hospital’s appalling catalogue of failure. She lost four members of her family within 18 months, her grandmother, uncle, sister and six-day-old baby.
That summer, her grandmother Lilian Wood Latta, 80, died hungry and dehydrated after suffering a stroke. She was left in her own excrement during her final days and the family said the dehydration was caused by staff failing to give her adequate fluids.
James Reay died in agony after a junior doctor at Stafford Hospital failed to check his medical history and gave him the wrong drug…he was rushed to another hospital where he died from internal bleeding after three weeks of intense pain.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1253438/Mid-Staffordshire-NHS-hospital-routinely-neglected-patients.html
Any examination of sociaism in the 20th Century supports the analysis offfered by Mr. Lewis. Those who gravitate to socialist systems are usually in thrall to their own over-inflated sense of importance and self-worth. (Many quite nakedly want power for its own sake.) As a result they can justify anything they do as being “for the good of the people.” A two-tier health system (good for them and shoddy for everyone else) is perfectly acceptable because the elites are “working for change” and thus need to be in tip-top shape in order to get on with the good work. It is completely hypocritical and, to the progressive mind, perfectly acceptable.
I have relatives on both sides of the Atlantic. I don’t know how everything compares directly, but I do know that if you’re elderly, health care coverage in this country sucks across the board compared to Europe, from paperwork to concern to treatment. If you’re old, move to Florida to die, move to France to live longer and prosper.
We already have a two-tier system in Medicare. Nordian – the Medicare claims processor denies claims that were approved by the previous processor.
Remember, the contract to process and approve procedures under Medicare goes to the lowest bidder. Are you having fun yet? Just wait, it wil become the second coming of Hell!
If you’re old, move to Florida to die, move to France to live longer and prosper.
It was France who a few years ago left something like 15,000 old folks to die (w/o air conditioning) in a Parisian heat wave during the August vacation when “the French” boogie out of the cities en masse.
In Florida, with the huge number of retirees, going to the doctor and getting treatment is practically a way of life. Florida is also a focal point of Medicare/Medicaid exploitation & fraud.
It’s interesting that for all of the intensive “treatment” consumed in Florida, statistics for survival/longevity etc. aren’t much different than in states with much less intensive “healthcare” habits than Florida.
A lot of the treatment in America today is completely unnecessary. Of course, a lot of the treatment is a function of doctors practicing “defensive treatment”, thanks to lawyers.
The fact that the democrats are completely in the pocket of the trial lawyers and that Barack & friends show zip, zilch nada interest in righting that situation should be a dead giveaway to anyone with a brain, present company excepted.
#31.
Thanks for another brilliant comment BC. Hey everybody, we can stop debating now. BC “knows” that health for the elderly in Europe. What? Proof? Why do we need proof? BC KNOWS! Isn’t that good enough?
The cost that Medicare covered for John Kerry, Frank Lautenberg, Ted Kennedy, etc, should be published and compared to what their supplemental paid for the difference. And, don’t forget they have on-site medical facilities manned by doctors right their in the congressional buildings that we taxpayers pay for. Nancy Pelosi says they need it to complete their mission. Unbelievable, that they are too important to be self-reliant for their own medical programs. What an insult to our military.
The American public deserves to know what the shell game is.
If this passes, there will be violence. The elected representatives will have shown that they do not feel bound by our Constitution and if that is the case, then they perhaps missed an important point in the Declaration of Independence….
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Health Care or HEALTH ABUSE?
It’s a marriage of government and extremely WEALTHY, extremely POWERFUL corporations. What terrible things will be done to our lives and health if the government controls health care?
http://www.mercola.com
A livestock drug banned in 160 nations and responsible for hyperactivity, muscle breakdown and 10 percent mortality in pigs has been approved by the FDA.
How does a drug marked, “Not for use in humans. Individuals with cardiovascular disease should exercise special caution to avoid exposure. Use protective clothing, impervious gloves, protective eye wear, and a NIOSH-approved dust mask” become “safe” in human food? With no washout period?
The drug is banned in Europe, Taiwan and China, and more than 1,700 people have been “poisoned” from eating pigs fed the drug since 1998, but ractopamine is used in 45 percent of U.S. pigs and 30 percent of ration-fed cattle.
Industrial agriculture lobbyists wield incredible power in Congress.
Michael Taylor, a former vice president of public policy and chief lobbyist at Monsanto Company, is now the senior advisor for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Who is Michael Taylor? He is the person who not only “oversaw the creation of GMO policy,” but also oversaw the policy regarding Monsanto’s genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (rbGH/rbST).
This growth hormone, which has been banned in Canada, Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand because of cancer risks and other health concerns, was approved in the United States while Taylor was in charge at the FDA.
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/03/06/why-does-fda-allow-banned-drugs-to-be-fed-to-livestock.aspx
Any thoughts on how this might violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution?
http://www.worldtribune.com
Organized CRIME: The ‘looting’ of $11 TRILLION from the U.S. economy
March 5, 2010
The following is based on a report by Cliff Kincaid for Accuracy in Media.
Zubi Diamond, author of the powerful new book, Wizards of Wall Street, says the agenda of Soros and other short sellers is clear. Their purpose, he says, is “to loot America and any foreign country which invested in America. Greece was one of them. Iceland was ravaged and annihilated.”
The economic crisis was deliberately engineered for profit and political gain and has already resulted in the “looting” of $11 trillion from the U.S. economy…The Managed Funds Association, the lobbying arm of the hedge fund short sellers, is crafty and deceitful.
“The most influential members of Managed Funds Association, the hedge fund short sellers, have an anti-capitalism agenda, an anti-industrialized nation agenda, and a far left liberal, Marxist radical agenda,” Diamond says.” Hedge Fund short sellers are not capitalist. They are anti-capitalist and they are not investors; they are anti-investors.” He says they “loot” companies and countries.
…“George Soros put the support of the organization [the MFA] behind Obama,” his book says. “Soros wanted somebody that hates the traditional America and its constitution, a left-wing radical like himself, so he chose Obama.”
“Nothing will happen until the American people know what caused the economic crisis and the solution for fixing it,” he tells AIM. “Nothing will happen until the American people know about the Managed Funds Association and their role in engineering the economic collapse.” He calls the MFA “the cancer in our society that needs to be cut out, exterminated and abolished. America and capitalism will not survive unless the Managed Funds Association is eradicated, uprooted and destroyed.”
Diamond notes that Soros is a member of the Managed Funds Association, and they are “making negative comments about the Euro. They are targeting and preying on capitalist countries and currencies.”
He goes on, “They feel invincible. They have a license to destroy any company or country or hold the company or country hostage while preying on the investors. They are having dinner meetings, openly discussing collusion to attack a particular asset class, equity, or a country’s currency. If this is not organized crime, I do not know what is.”
He warns that any asset class that is traded in the NYSE, CME, or EUREX exchanges is susceptible to manipulation by the members of Managed Funds Association and their strategic partners. “They have primed the market for manipulation,” he says.
In the case of Greece, Diamond says that the country “gathered all her nest eggs and brought it to the wolves’ den at Goldman Sachs,” a member of Managed Funds Association, “but Goldman Sachs then shorted the market while their clients were on the other side of the trade.”
Diamond says there would not have been a Greece debt crisis if all the safeguard regulations had not been removed. He blames Christopher Cox, who served as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), for laying the groundwork for this financial upheaval.
…“The Managed Fund Association is the government,” Diamond charges. “They bought the policy makers and regulators, and then took over our government.”
http://www.worldtribune.com/worldtribune/WTARC/2010/ss_economy0172_03_05.asp
Are you still proud that you voted for Obama? Really? ROFLMAO!!!!!
North Korea is not a failed socialist state. It is a perfected one.
I believe more doctors are setting up systems & procedures to completely circumvent government interference and control, such as signing up private patients, each of whom pays a hefty stipend to be seen by/treated by a given physician.
There’s two-tier right there. Your access to certain doctors will be constricted unless you’ve got the cash to hire him or her to be on call to treat you.
Many, many doctors are dropping out of Medicare and starting cash only practices. It’s not new. Two women docs I knew set up such a clinic 25 years ago in Dana Point, CA. They accepted Visa and Mastercard. Probably half their patients were HMO members who couldn’t handle the wait.
Now, there are retainer practices but the cost is not that high. I know of some that charge $100/month for all the primary care you need. That includes e-mail, phone calls and even house calls. There are also total house call practices, many of them emphasizing geriatrics. I know a geriatric specialist in Iowa who was being so harassed by Medicare for seeing her patients too often that she dropped out and runs a cash geriatric practice. She is not getting rich but she is making a living.
I know of a number of specialists who have dropped out and charge cash. An orthopedic surgeon I know of is the best hip replacement surgeon in Orange County, CA and has dropped Medicare. He charges what Medicare paid but he has cut his overhead and doesn’t have to wait two years to be paid.
This will grow, especially if Obamacare passes.
I’ve written an article on this very topic about a week ago and I’ve called it “Influential Canadian nipple escapes universal health care”.
You can read it here:
http://hyphenatedamericans.blogspot.com/2010/02/canadian-nipple-against-universal.html
The most important amendment Republicans must propose for Obama’s Medi-Grab bill is a very easy one:
Resolved: that all federal and state employees must enroll in ObamaCare, without exception.
Any violation of this amendment will be punishable by a fine, imprisonment, and/or loss of federal or state employment. Enforcement of this provision will be overseen by a popularly elected commission, whose proceedings will be open to the public via the worldwide web.
“All federal and state employees” includes every member of Congress and the executive branch — those who currently have the finest medical insurance available in the country today (courtesy of you and me).
I agree. But the GOP sleeps.
I’ve written an article on this very topic a week ago. I called it “Influential Canadian nipple escapes universal health care”. You can find it here:
http://hyphenatedamericans.blogspot.com/2010/02/canadian-nipple-against-universal.html
Also, don’t forget about Obama’s great success with H1N1 vaccine. I’ve reported on it back I don’t remember when:
http://hyphenatedamericans.blogspot.com/2009/10/more-on-h1n1-vaccines-or-back-to-ussr.html
I’ve re-read my old articles – and there are some genuinely funny jokes there. Check it out.
http://hyphenatedamericans.blogspot.com/2009/10/swine-flu-vaccine-update.html
If this Rube Goldberg contraption passes –
TAX STRIKE 2011
The jails couldn’t hold us all. Starve the beast.
Another DailyMail UK link:
Despite Labour’s billions, nurses say patients are STILL treated in kitchens, abandoned in mop cupboards, and left without meals or privacy on mixed-sex wards
Lovely.
@38. Ted: – Any thoughts on how this might violate the equal protection clause of the Constitution?
Probably not necessary. We’ll find out more than we ever wanted to know on that just as soon as the first 4 or 5… hundred thousand people refuse to comply with it.
Even if this passes, SCOTUS could overturn it due to its blatantly unconstitutional provisions. Only if they refuse to do so is violence on the table. The Second Amendment codifies our right to armed resistance, but violent overthrow of the regime is to be done only as a last resort.
I couldn’t help but notice that when Massachusetts’ Ted Kennedy needed brain surgery he somehow wound up at Duke. Connecticut’s Chris Dodd needed cancer care he would up at Sloan Kettering in NYC. There is no way the salons are giving up the best care in the world. The rest of us can go queue up.
anyone who thinks government-run healthcare is a good idea should spend a couple of months in a VA hospital, flat on your back, unable to move. it is a NIGHTMARE. we need to stop this, resoundingly, or we will all have horror tales to tell.
i don’t live in Europe because i am an American – no offense, Europe, but i am damned proud to bleed red, white and blue. i don’t want a European way of life. my heroes are Washington, Jefferson, Reagan, and John Wayne. liberals: believe what you want, say what you want, live the way you want, and STAY THE HELL OUT OF MY WAY!!
. kmbr:
“Here in Sweden the top rate, which kicks in at about 75k USD…”
I hear you. There was a study a few years back that claimed the US poor had a better standard of living than the middle class in Sweden… the US left dismissed it out of hand but it had something to do with what you’re talking about. Standard of living was based on the material things people could afford. Poor families in the US could afford more stuff because there were not these VAT taxes (or other taxes that raise the price of things). Plus, land (for a house) is cheap in many parts of the US so that helped too (although, housing shortages in parts of Sweden are also due to political policy….).
How true this article is. Having lived in a European country I know of where I write. I cannot believe
the politicians. Have they never gone to a European countr? Good Grief. I have written to my senators to no avail. They totally ignore anything I write. After all, they know best!
UK HOSPITALS in THIRD WORLD CONDITIONS
http://www.dailymail.co.uk
Shaming of the NHS: Patients STILL treated in kitchens, abandoned in mop cupboards and left without meals despite Labour’s billions
By Daniel Martin
09th March 2010
Patients are routinely being treated in kitchens, mop cupboards and corridors because hospitals are so overcrowded, a shocking survey reveals.
Third World conditions are commonplace, with hospitals housing patients for days in storage areas, offices, TV rooms and outpatient clinics.
This disturbing treatment of the sick and vulnerable comes despite a tripling of the NHS budget by Labour over the past decade. The survey of 900 nurses follows a Daily Mail story telling how Doris McKeown, 80, spent 48 hours in a supply cupboard while waiting for surgery at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital.
Many nurses also told how extra beds were often crammed into wards to avoid breaching a Whitehall target on A&E waiting times. This increased the risk of infection and threatened patients’ privacy and dignity, especially on mixed-sex overflow wards.
Examples of appalling care cited by staff included:
* A woman ‘barely coping’ after a miscarriage being sent to a ward with male patients.
* Children left at ‘high security risk’ and a threat of infection when adults were put on their ward.
* One overflow ward being so crammed a nurse could not reach the emergency buzzer when someone had a heart attack. She had to run into the corridor to yell for help.
* One patient being left in a mop cupboard where there was only room for a chair, not a bed. At another hospital, a kitchen was set aside for two beds.
* A hospital discharging elderly patients before they were ready.
* Another using a ward which had been ‘condemned’ for patient use.
* Up to three patients being crammed into a tiny office cluttered with staff belongings.
* Eighteen patients being stuck on trolleys in the corridor of a medical assessment unit.
The Nursing Times survey also found that beds were ‘faulty’ and ‘condemned’, fire exits were blocked, toilets were ‘inadequate’, and many patients went without showers and baths. Maintaining single-sex areas was often impossible because of the sheer numbers of extra patients.
Nurses have to take blood samples in corridors and beds are sometimes placed in isolated corners, meaning nurses cannot see if a patient needs help.
Elderly patients are ‘parked’ in day rooms while waiting to be transferred to another hospital, and left ‘soiled and neglected’, and ‘needing fluids’.
Sometimes spare beds run out – and people have to sleep on chairs or mattresses on the floor. Nearly half the nurses said patients in non-clinical areas did not have proper access to water, oxygen, suction and a call bell. Four in ten said they did not have the screening to protect their dignity and privacy.
‘If a patient suddenly had a cardiac arrest, we would not be able to get the crash trolley to them,’ said one nurse at a hospital which squeezed extra beds into wards. Others said cramming patients into wards put them at risk of cross-infection.
One added: ‘Urine bottles are not emptied, meals are missed as staff are not aware of the patient.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1256520/Despite-Labours-billions-nurses-say-patients-STILL-treated-kitchens-abandoned-mop-cupboards-left-meals-privacy-mixed-sex-wards.html
31. BC:
Bullsh*t. We are more than likely going to have to move several of our relatives over to the US from France because of the wretched, backwards medical care in France.
Case in point, my uncle, crippled by a botched surgery with NO RECOURSE because it was done under their health care system for the elderly–they simply don’t offer the surgery to reverse the botched one he had in the first place. Why? because it’s too expensive and he’s just an old pensioner anyways.
You are an idiot or a paid troll.
46. Mike C:
Seconded! Non Serviam! Came and Take It!
Opting out of treating Medicare patients might rise to epidemic proportions.
“Two-tier”, “opting out”… it’s really amazing how closely the arc of socialized medicine in the US is following that in Canada, even down to the terms used.
“Two-tier” is the bogeyman used to oppose any private option in Canada, and “opting out” (of OHIP) was a dominant story in the newspapers in Canada during my youth… before they banned it.
The ultimate goal is single payer. Once health care becomes free, you will have to bribe the admitting nurse to get into the hospital, the floor nurse for the room, the doctor and anaesthesiologist for you operation, the nurse for your meds, etc. The cost of “free” health care!
I’d revise the proposed amendment to exempt active-duty military, and civilians stationed overseas. But otherwise, right on.
If the government is broken and the health care system is broken, then putting the government in charge of insurance care is the solution?
If the system can not affort 30 million uninsured, then putting 30 million under insurance with make it more affordable?
The plan is simple: lock in the 50% of those who don’t pay taxes with promises of free stuff to win the next election.
George Soros, who seems like one of the super villans from the James Bond movies, is willing to affect American politics with his huge money. At this time he is short selling the Euro with the Greek deficit crisis. Now there is a friend of humanity and the true patron of all of those wishing for this entitlement to be once again slaves, serfs, and peasants to their other tier masters. Dear trolls, you want something for nothing, but you will pay a price greater than souls or gold for your free stuff entitlement.
We already have a two-tier system. It is called Medicare. Doctors who treat Medicare patients can not legally offer non- Medicare services to those patients. In some areas, Medicare reimburses too little so few Doctors accept it. Hence only wealthy seniors can buy the healthcare they need. DC suburbs like Reston are among the worst- full of Federal retirees so few MDs need accept Medicare.
I have an honest-to-goodness question.
Where does ‘dentistry’ pile up in this hot mess? Is it included with the medical crappola?
Last week I visited both a State Run hospital where four out of five of the patients ahead of me were chained to their gurneys (we didn’t talk but I got along with the Corrections Officers) and the fancy schmancy Hospital that I opted to pay extra out of pocket to go for surgery.
It’s my understanding that you guys want to have access to the best Health Care (my facility was one of the top two in the city) and it’s my understanding that there is nothing in Obamacare that prevents me from doing this after passage. I will keep my current provider through my employer. I did pay nearly twice what the procedure would normally be, but that was my choice and I’ll pay the surgeons fees (they don’t accept any insurance) in a year or two if not I’ll hock the car or something.
So in that sense what two tiers are you talking about? There is nothing in the bill that tells a doctor what rates to charge. My doctor would still continue charging double what most insurance companies would reimburse and people like myself who feel they want the very best can pay them that rate. Sounds like capitalism to me.
To be fair my insurance would have covered the State run facility or a great number in “better” neighborhoods and I work with some medical people who provide excellent health care in some very bad neighborhoods. It took a long time to get x-rays and pain medication because they were short staffed, but the doctors were competent and took good care of me.
In the UK what’s left of the white middle class (most have fled abroad over the last 15 years) make it a priority to buy private health insurance. If you don’t you are at the mercy of the dirty hospitals, the African and Asian nurses who don’t wash their hands (let alone speak English), the uncaring doctors and the horrible, deadly outcomes.
Even with private health insurance though, you have to go through the “GP”, the gatekeeper, they are usually Indians or Chinese or some such, you have to convince them to give you an official permit to see a specialist, you cannot just contact a specialist on your own. They are rewarded for keeping costs low so they are very reluctant to do more than just prescribe the usual broad spectrum antibiotics for anything from flu through liver cancer.
Until you are nearly dead and it’s too late.
#1 – European “The european buerocrat elite indeed has a very cushy deal.”
America is now subject to the “ruling class” of politicians from both parties. It is the new “lords” and “surfs” of neo-communism.
The only thing they fear is the 2nd Amendment! Look for the global emphasis on stealing guns from the general American population as the next big “healthcare type” initiative. In the dark of night, with sweeping international legislation they will turn 75% of Americans who own guns into criminals. They are drafting the legislation right now in the U.N.
They have dramatically underestimated the character and will of true Americans. It is going to be ugly!
Don’t like 10% unemployment? Well that’s too bad, because it’s the new normal.
It’s simply time to roll back the left. All of it. All the way back, to pre-1965 (pre-Medicare and Medicaid) levels. The only things that await us at the end of the leftist road is unemployment, public insolvency and a high likelihood of tyranny.
55. baal:
31. BC:
“Bullsh*t. We are more than likely going to have to move several of our relatives over to the US from France because of the wretched, backwards medical care in France.
Case in point, my uncle, crippled by a botched surgery with NO RECOURSE because it was done under their health care system for the elderly–they simply don’t offer the surgery to reverse the botched one he had in the first place. Why? because it’s too expensive and he’s just an old pensioner anyways”
uh baal, you’re telling BS, up to now (dunno with the aftermaths of the money crisis) each citizen of my country have access to the best cares that our system provides, probably that your uncle isn’t a full french citizen and or that he hadn’t paid its quater insurance “mutuelle”, yes we are requested to pay this part in the hospitals if we have no “mutuelle”
When this healthcare legislation is implemented (after a lot of us are dead), expect to see more suicide pilots flying their planes into government buildings and hospital complexes, because of lost loved ones and denied services.
This administration is destroying the United States from within more effectively than any enemy could do from afar.
@67. Marie Claude: – …we are requested to pay this part in the hospitals…
So let me get this straight…
In the Mecca of “Universal Health Care”, you don’t actually get access to health care unless you pay for it?
Funny that. It works the same way here. And we don’t need socialized medicine or government bureaucrats to enforce it.
I cannot believe the ignorance and distortions of most of the comments about health insurance in other countries, specially Europe. What cause people to write about things they know nothing about? The article was rather biased also.
Before anybody jumps on it, I have to say that I forgot to mention I live now in France where I have real great health care, up to date and inexpensive. Anyone wanting to contact me can do it at my blog keyboardpolitics.
Gee, you’re right, James! Anyone who doesn’t believe your narrow ideology isn’t a real German, err, American! Back to reality…
The health care bill would require everyone to have insurance so people would stop going to the emergency room with asthma. Since it’s the emergency room, the hospital is required to treat them, even if they don’t have insurance. So, if everybody had health insurance, that wouldn’t happen, and hospitals wouldn’t raise prices, and insurance companies would not have to raise premiums, resulting in lower insurance costs for people who have insurance.
Besides, if the health care bill turns out to instate this fascist dream of yours, then new people would be elected and Republicans could undo what the Democrats did and that will be the end of it.
I will keep my current provider through my employer. I did pay nearly twice what the procedure would normally be, but that was my choice and I’ll pay the surgeons fees (they don’t accept any insurance) in a year or two if not I’ll hock the car or something.
Um,
Healthcare is as expensive as it is because it is that expensive. It probably has as much waste, fraud and inefficiency as any other industry. It also has just as much innovation.
You want to afford your healthcare? Simple. Either ration it, or work till you are seventy to pay for all the new healthcare gadgets. Also, maybe consider getting off your butt and exercising. Maybe go to Burger King a little less often. Obama doesn’t tell people this because, despite it being the hard truth, he doesn’t want to lose votes.
Sorry country, you can’t have your cake and eat it too.
Hello!!
This was a great post and very helpful as well.
Thanks
Rishikesh
yoga rishikesh
Hello!!
This was a great post and very helpful as well.
Thanks
Rishikesh
Ayurved treatment
Hello!!
This was a great post and very helpful as well.
Thanks
Rishikesh
Eco treats
Wonderful points altogether, you just won a new reader. What might you recommend about your submit that you simply made a few days in the past? Any sure?
Usually I do not learn article on blogs, but I wish to say that this write-up very pressured me to try and do it! Your writing style has been surprised me. Thank you, very nice article.