Friday, May 11, 2012

Indiana Republicans and Universal Health Care

In the primary every Republican candidate said they were going to repeal Health Care. One of the favorite arguments is look what is going on in Canada. So here is a short version of an article posted by AARP with a few comments by me. Even if you are a Republican you should be very concerned about health care. A chest pain and not even a heart attack will set you back about $20,000 and that is for only 1-2 days in the hospital. Cancer about $60,000. One very interesting item was getting treatment in a hospital cost more than if you get it at your doctors office. My guess is the overhead at the hospital and part of the overhead are people who don’t have insurance and get “free” care at the hospital they then pass this on to everyone who comes in the door. If we had everyone insurance you no longer would have people just showing up for free care. Hospital bills would drop. How many Canadians come to the US for heath care: .5% for care electively .11% for emergency care* 99.39% stay in Canada for heath care *80% 0f these visits were to emergency rooms while on vacation. A lot of cold Canadians go to Florida during the winter. Are Canadian doctors taking U.S. jobs? Are they coming to the US? The USA has 800,000 physicians and in both 2005 and 2006 just over 120 Canadian physicians came to the USA. But at the same time more US physicians moved to Canada. Canada rations health care; that’s why hip replacements and cataract surgeries happen faster in the United States. Not so says the St Louis Post Dispatch that did a study on Canadian hip replacements and found 63 percent were for people over 65. So the Republican who claim that Canadians can’t get hip replacements is bunk. Wait times are longer in Canada and the answer is yes they are but not because of rationing but rather because of fiscal conservation policy to limit supply. While the US limits care by cost. In a study by Commonwealth Fund of Washington in the US 42% of Americans expressed an opinion they not be able to afford health care if they became seriously ill. About one third of Americans didn’t go to a doctor when sick or fill a prescription or skipped medication because of cost. Then 20% of people who had medical costs have to struggle to pay their bills. So we as a nation are also rationing health care but using cost as that tool. So when someone says we don’t want to be like Canada on health care maybe the answer yes we do. BTW- When someone says the Health Care Bill has death panels the real answer is that those who vote against it are the death panel. If 42 percent can’t afford to see a doctor or get care are we sending them to their death? Sure looks like it. One last note – How many Canadians does it take to screw in a light bulb? – The same as Americans. Then how come they have health care and we don’t.

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Smearfest

Smearfest Last night my wife just looked at me and said politics is now a smearfest. First time I had heard that word and I had to wonder if it even was a word, so off to Google I went and to my surprise it is becoming a word. Now on Google it is spelled three ways with preventative medicine. But mixed in were the articles on this new word. Someone named Mark posted one of the better definitions: Sometimes, in the right-wing noise machine, you really need to stretch to spread your smears across as many targets as possible. It calls for a strategy that aims to cast your juvenile insults so broadly that they ensnare any of your perceived enemies within certain proximity. In a way, it’s a conservative approach that allows you to use less tar to tarnish more opponents in one wide swipe. Even Glenn Beck said: “Campaigns are ugly. Watching the way politicians act makes you long for the respect and self-control of the Sopranos.” But lets be totally honest smearfests are not only the work of the right; the left is just as guilty. Lets look at some of the older political smears: Sarah Palin - "Sarah Palin believes God told her to go to war with Iraq!" Rick Perry - 'Noted Homosexual Rick Perry' Barack Obama – Birth Certificate, Secretly a Muslim Global Warming Pink Slime Now these are minor league compared to today’s attacks. Herman Cain - Ginger White and how many others. Ron Paul - Smeared by everyone just because he is Ron Paul. And of course this is not reserved for national campaigns. Here in Indiana at both the state and local level we have a smearfest beyond belief. What is even more amazing is members of their own party are killing each other. Look at Senator Lugar, better yet Google "smearfest Lugar" and see the Trash you get. Even worst is a Congressional race where one candidate in an ad blasts not one but two opponents at the same time making claims that are totally false. And to top it off this is a candidate who moved(?) into the state for the purpose of running for congress. Where are these ads coming from out of state of course, from big Pac’s? The Supreme Court opened the door a few years ago by saying corporations have free speech and can be a person. What happened to “truth and the American way” it appears it has gone for a long walk and lost its way. It seems we prefer a candidate that uses lies and hides what they would do if elected. No wonder the Congress of the United States is no longer effective, the extreme right and left wings are too busy being evil to each other and others to shake hands and work for the common good. There can also be a fun side of Smearfests: Stranded with zombies VS Hazmat Skippy Peanut Butter on a smearfest