Why We Need Government-Run, Universal, Socialized Health Insurance.
This is just great. Share it with someone you love who doesn’t get it.
And just think about it Democrats in the House and Senate….maybe it will take care of those spine implants you all need so badly.
So I linked the video on my Facebook. Here’s my idiot right-wing, conservative, minister’s wife of an aunt’s response…
“Poor Andy… I don’t think he has a clue as to what he is talking about. No government-run service is without its flaws as well as waste at all levels. Also, he better check and make sure that the facts re political backings are correct. We all know that education systems spend big bucks on the latest fads in ed. methods, etc., all to follow what some ‘expert’s ‘ agenda is. Better check out what our government is really supposed to do and not what we would like our government to provide for us. Then we’ll talk…”
And of course she bashes education as she home-schooled her last 4 (?) children, the youngest of which just recently enrolled “in kollege to become a stoodent again.”
The most basic commonality between most right-wing conservatives is the fact that common sense arguments (such as the video) do nothing to open their eyes.
I looked at the original posting on youtube and I couldn’t believe the number of negative, downright rude comments posted there. I posted something like “Why are we willing to pay a trillion dollars for the war in Iraq but we’re not willing to take care of our own people?” I got an answer from someone saying government is corrupt and inefficient and can’t be trusted.
And yet we all trust that corrupt and inefficient government to educate our children, protect us from foreign aggressors, build our roads, regulate our cars, issues our driving licenses, put out fires, arrest the bad guys and even decide whether someone’s children should be taken from them.
I’m sure the very same people who screamed bloody murder in 1935 about how FDR was turning the country into a socialist nation were more than happy to cash their Social Security checks and get their Medicare coverage in 1969. I just wish the anti-reform/anti-government folks could see that the public option will help everyone. Because it’s always a possibility that you can lose your job and your health insurance one day, and find out you have cancer a week later.
Gee….that was easy to understand.
http://americansunitedhcr.wordpress.com/
Link is to the information for the rally in DC on 09/13/09, which is also Grandparents Day. This took off when it was suggested by Robert Reich in a recent column. If you can be there, please go and show your support!
Where: Washington, D.C.
When: September 13, 2009
Time: 12Noon – 5pm
Gathering spot: Gather near the Lincoln Memorial and march to the steps of the Capitol Building via the National Mall. Our rally and march will be peaceful. We will meet opposition with silence. We will not incite or invite violence. Our goal is to let congress know that Americans need health care and insurance reform.
Former Labor Secretary, Robert Reich, has lent his support to Americans United for Health Care and Insurance Reform:
8/20/2009 8:58am
Dear Julie,
I’m not an organizer, have “no efforts,” and have no particular preference for one day over another. I just want Congress to know how many Americans want universal health care and will settle for no less than complete coverage and no less than a public insurance option, to keep private insurers honest. So I’m happy to lend my support to whatever you are doing. (I hear that right-wing tea-partiers are planning a DC rally for September 12, which may cause the media to treat any progressive march that day more as a controversy than as an affirmative statement of conviction, but that kind of strategizing is beyond my pay grade.)
All best to you,
Robert Reich
This group is not affiliated with Organizing for America or the Democratic National Committee. We will rally with other groups on September 13th, but we are not affiliated with any other groups, special interests or lobbying forums.
http://healthcareforamericanow.org/
Great resources, documents, immediate connections to political offices, etc.
Check this site out.
Hot off the presses is this recent poll on “Universal Health Care” Despite all the noise and naysaying, a vast majority of people, INCLUDING REPUBLICANS, want this passed!
feel free to copy and paste this to every lackwit politician you know!
http://tinyurl.com/m69b92
Bill, that was a good post to Bob Herbert’s essay. I added my tick, you’re now up to 408!
Being the only developed country in the world that doesn’t guarantee health care for its citizens, and being the only developed country in the world that allows the health insurance industry to profit off the sick, makes one wonder if the word “developed” should even apply to this country.
I posted my remarks on this wonderful any-elementary-school-student-can-understand-it, video yesterday on Shannyn’s site.
No need to repeat it here.
AKM, I like your way of reasoning with our representatives in Congress to use the Public Option get some steel rod spine implants… may we add marbles as needed?
My philosophy has always been this: We liberals may talk your ears off, but too many would rather use other means.
All too often it only takes one to succeed in permanently silencing those who prefer civil discourse.
Sad to see doubt about the Pres seeping in. Maybe I’m nuts but I still think he knows exactly what he’s doing. You don’t get to be the POTUS when you are AA, have ‘lets say’ an exotic name, and you seemingly come from left field, without having extreme political awareness.
His timing in the campaign was impeccable and I think it still is.
Look how this started, with the right wing screechers at the town halls, death panels, Hannity, Beck and on and on. They were given enough rope and have hanged themelves. To the majority of sane people they look and are crazy.
Trial balloons have been released about compromising the public option, the left have gone nuts and energised their people, who it seemed to me were relaxing and thinking the Pres can get this. Well not on his own he can’t.
Then I read this little diary on Daily Kos, it didn’t gain loads of traction, mainly I think because there were a couple of really big diaries going on and people were engrossed in them, so it slid off the page really quickly.
Looks to me like the Pres knows this will come out on the 8th Sept., he knows how the public will react and he is supposed to be making a big speech about healthcare next week.
Perfect storm if you ask me.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/9/1/16750/80590
Something, BIG, very big might happen next Tuesday, Sept. 8th. This thing, might tilt the health care debate towards the Public Option. This thing, might change the way people think about the Health Insurance industry. Here is the thing:
D-lightful!
Gasman, I like the way you think. Jam single payer down their throats and just pass it. While they sit around crying about majority rule, we can get on with life.
I agree that we need to let President Obama know that he has our backing, as well as, Congress. We need to keep the the emails and phone calls to our officials crammed consistently. Let our collective voices be heard loud and clear, and drown out the fearmongers!
My wife is Canadian as are all of my in laws (what are the odds?). Every single adult Canadian relative believes their healthcare system to be vastly superior to ours and I agree. The “oh, you’ll wait for procedures until you die!” nonsense is just pure b.s. I had sinus surgery in the U.S. two years ago and I had to wait 2 months for it. There are NO elective surgeries that you schedule and receive the same day. That is a facile and intellectually dishonest argument.
The various Canadian systems – my family is largely in Ontario – all cover EVERYONE and at a LOWER COST. There are NO bankruptcies or foreclosures due to medical emergencies. That accounts for nearly 70% of all foreclosures in the U.S. The system runs more efficiently, and oh, by the way, THE CANADIANS LIVE LONGER THAN WE DO! So much for their “death panels.”
For profit healthcare is immoral and guaranteed to put patient care second to shareholder profits. A government option is not enough. We need single payer universal coverage. The insurance industry is sh*tting bricks right now because they see the very real possibility of their obscene rapacious profits vanishing like so much smoke. Poof!
If the Republicans are going to have this 4 or 8 year long pissy fit, then rework healthcare reform into single payer, jam it down the Republicans’ throats and be done with it. It will work better AND the Republicans will get the spanking they so richly deserve.
Veterans group demand an apology from the Republican party.
http://www.military.com/news/article/August-2009/vets-groups-slam-death-book-claims.html?col=1186032325324&ESRC=army.nl
Taking on veterans was a bad move.
I tweeted this out about 8 hours ago! (I have only 8 ‘followers’, tho’…)
We need to be VERY clear about this. We should write to our Senators, and our Representatives (you know, congresscritters), and let them know where we stand. Then we must write to President Obama and tell him this: “No public option? No second term!”
I posted this on the open thread at #49. Glad AKM picked up on it. It gives some simple non-threatening arguments to use when dealing with people who are anti- Health Care Reform. It won’t work on all of them but it may get some to thinking, and there are a few.
Anybody going to the treehouse?
Excellent! Someone who is close to her should sit Senator Murkowski down and make her watch this. Let’s get this done!
Please read the comment I left on Bob Herbert’s New York Times column. You can find the link on this post from my own blog:
http://wasillaalaskaby300.squarespace.com/journal/2009/8/23/four-standing-portraits-my-health-careobama-comment-on-new-y.html#comment5193577
Sarah in SC,
I feel your pain and know exactly what you’re talking about!
sigh….
There’s already a rebuttal to this video, made in almost the exact likeness–not 10 minutes after I posted this to my facebook, a neighbor down the street who is a “Yooooo! Go marine-what’s-your-name-on-hannity-shooting-off-your-mouth” type posted the “anti” version on hers.
Besides being really ticked that it’s a copycat-anti-piece, the neighbor & her rhetoric are really getting on my nerves. Grrr. She posted the “marine-shooting-off-his-mouth-on-hannity” video the other night (he’s the guy who used the “nazi” term at the town hall deal) and she went on & on about how RIGHT he was. Typical red state garbage. It’s really too bad, because before I knew this about her, I really liked her. lol 😉
Great little movie, but we need to move beyond thinking in terms of health Insurance…health insurance reform is simply an oxymoron. It’s the big nasty Middleman between us and real healthcare. That’s why I was so disheartened the first time I heard Obama talk about “Health Insurance Reform”. Right away, that phrase tells you there’s going to be No Change. The insurance companies think it’s a great idea, though!
I lived in England for eighteen years and their National Health Service was fantastic (it still is, if their Labour Party hasn’t been Conservatized like our Democratic Party seems to be getting Republicanized!). If I had my choice, I would gladly put my taxpayer dollers into healthcare rather than imperialist wars. I thought that’s what Obama was about, and it’s why I voted for him. But with his seeming failure to follow through on healthcare I can’t trust him on anything else. So sad!
Even now the Republicans are gearing up to “start all over again” on the healthcare debate. Yeah, right! And fool the Dems into wasting even MORE time and thereby run out the clock. And when to everyones surprise the economic turnover shows itself to be another mirage, Obama will end up a one-term president.
If Obama doesn’t get a grip in the next few weeks it’s all over. He’ll be a mere footnote in History.
I wish Obamma would watch this, & the dem. would use it. Why is it so difficult to explain health care reform so that people can understand it? Get it together Obamma!
I dunno… I like the idea of having a public option because without it the insurance companies will keep on raising the rates until no company will be able to provide coverage for their employees. The single payer system puts too much into the hands of the government. The public option keeps things in the middle and will force the insurance companies to actually compete for customers.
That being stated, I, too, am somewhat disappointed in the performance of BO on this issue. He’s got to take a stance. And soon.
This is great. I saw it yesterday and sent it to my hopelessly conservative brother. He emailed me back telling me I was naive if I bought into that. Ugh!
There is no convincing some of these people no matter how many facts and truths you toss their way. He listens to Rush, Sean and Glenn….loves Sarah Palin and thinks President Obama is ruining our country. What??? I am not giving up but I truly cannot comprehend these people and their closed minds.
Ack!!
I was at a health care town hall meeting last night, with my NY state congressman Eric Massa (D, 29th district, including Corning) and I wish he had shown this. The amount of anti-government sentiment was astonishing, and of course, very vocal. There was huge applause every time anyone said something like “Why fix it if it isn’t broken?” and “Keep the government out of my life.”
I thought he did very well answering the questions and keeping his composure among a bunch of hotheaded ignoramuses. When a an ex-Marine asked him what gave the government the power to pass health care legislation (to huge applause), he pulled out his pocket Constitution and cited the section that gives Congress the power to pass laws providing for the “general welfare” of the US, as interpreted by the Supreme Court. This guy complained about the cost of the proposed bill–apparently forgetting that the government spends LOTS of money on the military (hence his job as Marine), and also VA health care for veterans (which Massa pointed out was single-payer, truly socialized medicine, as enrollees have no choice of doctors or care facilities/hospitals.)
I could go on and on….bottom line–we need to consider everything carefully, and NOT NOT NOT listen to idiots like Sarah Palin who distort and outright LIE!
Awesome video.
Big Pete….I agree with this…..
absolute disgrace that we’re the only industrialized, A-list, country that doesn’t have a socialized health care system. It’s not surprising that even we don’t refer to ourselves as “world leaders” anymore.
The health care debate just shows that our lobbyist-dominated “democracy” is a big farce. Freedom’s on the march? I think not.
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If the GOP has their way, we will fall further and further behind as they denounce the science of global warming and place leaders in the White House like Palin who believe the world is 6,000 years old. Don’t they get it?
Other countries are passing us by with new technologies and the GOP want everyone to stick their heads in the sand.
Regarding lobbist dominated democracy…..nothing gets done “for the people” anymore….it’s the Corporate States of America.
I wish this could be seen all over, not just by us few in favor. One of the big problems is terminology. I really think folks put socialism and communism in the same category and do not understand the difference. I really cannot believe that elderly folks do not understand where Medicare is coming from.
Amazing, isn’t it, that some people can explain the need for health care in simple and compelling terms? This video….Ted Kennedy….Anthony Weiner….Bill Moyers.
Yet a man we consider our great communicator is struggling with this. I just don’t understand it.
I saw this yesterday on Immoral Majority, I think.
Its perfect.
Hopefully if enough bloggers pick it up it will make it to some of the MSM, or at least get enough space so lots and lots of people see it.
I’m with Claw…may I have my goverment run, health care reform, health care insurance reformed, health Insurance?
and I would add…the very SAME insurance I’m already paying for others to have that I do NOT have….
BTW, I posted this in the open thread, but it’s sort of on topic…
there’s a very brave woman who was at the Texas secessionist rally in Texas yesterday:
http://www.texasobserver.org/blog/?p=1369
scroll down to the third photo after the video and first bunch of text.
Amen.
It’s an absolute disgrace that we’re the only industrialized, A-list, country that doesn’t have a socialized health care system. It’s not surprising that even we don’t refer to ourselves as “world leaders” anymore.
The health care debate just shows that our lobbyist-dominated “democracy” is a big farce. Freedom’s on the march? I think not.
Makes sense to me. Now, may I have my goverment run, health care reform, health care insurance reformed, health Insurance?
Thanks, well done, understandable explanation of the health care insurance reform with public option. Will pass it on.
Yeah, maybe it will help them; some of them do seem somewhat “weak” these days…