On Health Care: For Democrats, The Glass Is Half-Full; For Republicans, 'The Glass Is Mine'

By Manifesto Joe

Two votes down, one to go. It now looks certain that the maximum-diluted, piss-poor Senate version of "health care reform" will pass, and that some sort of conference-approved bill will make it to Barack Obama's desk.

There's not much meaningful left in the bill -- but something is better than nothing. Despite unhappiness among people like me, those who would heartily favor national single-payer, there are now no dissenters among the 60 Senate votes in the Democrats' bloc. Even Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who has described himself as a socialist, has apparently decided that this beats the status quo.

I'm not even a socialist; I'm a Keynesian. Yet my first instinct about this was to say, hell no. Then I thought some more.

There are some reasons why all 40 Senate Republicans are voting, as a bloc, against this. The denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions, one of the most heinous of the insurance companies' practices, would be banned. An estimated 30 million Americans would be able to get shitty private health insurance, with subsidies for those who can't afford it. SOMEBODY with plenty of juice doesn't want this passed -- they're just thankful that it wasn't real, far-reaching reform.

The Republicans, typically disingenuous, are doing a lot of posturing and posing on what they depict as a moral high ground. In a rare moment of genuine wit, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., called the Medicaid deals that were perhaps cut for Sen. Mary Landrieu's (D-La.) vote "The Louisiana Purchase."

Good for a chuckle, but come now -- Republicans never cut any deals like that to get legislation passed? It was recalled among TV journalists, at least those who actually possess memories, that Texas' own Tom "Twinkle Toes" DeLay, back in his infamous days as The Hammer of the House, came under fire for cutting deals like that in order to get the necessary votes for passage of Medicare drug coverage.

Granted, we've had some stinky bloodwurst made here, but a certain number of human lives will be saved because of it.

And, the issue won't go away. Monopoly insurers and Big Pharm are still screwing millions upon millions of us, with big profits going to their stockholders. I've been through the mill with them at workplaces -- Aetna, Blue Cross-Blue Shield, United HealthCare, etc. -- ostensibly competitors, but they certainly don't do price competition. Your employer is typically under contract for a calendar year. And, if they go to the expense and hassle of switching providers, they get pretty much the same deal from the "competition." Take it or leave it, MFs.

Something is better than nothing. In 1965, Medicare was passed for the growing population 65 and older. It's in trouble now because people don't want to pay the taxes to support it, and because crooked providers often find ways to bilk the system. But my wife and I have both been caretakers for sick, elderly people. I say, go ahead and cuss that single-payer Medicare system all you want -- that is, until you need it. Then it becomes something you can't figure out how people ever did without. I've got a big hint for those folks -- look at U.S. life expectancy, pre-1965 and post-1965. (And we're not even one of the best countries in that department -- about 42nd. Want to guess why that is?)

I repeat, something is better than nothing. LBJ couldn't get single-payer for all Americans through Congress. So he and the Democrats of the time (hey, and even a few Republicans, back when that party had moderates) did what they could do.

The fight for real reform is some years away. I'd hoped that, amid what is being called The Great Recession, enough people had become uncomfortable enough to have an epiphany -- that throughout the rest of the developed world, even conservatives realize that health care shouldn't be dominated by the profit motive.

But not quite enough people became that uncomfortable, and even some who did interpreted their pain in a back-asswards way, deciding that their taxes are too high while remarkably oblivious about their premiums and co-payments. And of course, the lobbies for Big Pharm and Big Insurance are the best that money can buy.

Some 56 senators, plus four who apparently had to be bought, are apparently going to deliver something, as opposed to nothing. So, let's get on with it, and see what tomorrow brings. Happy holidays.

Some related links:

Economist Robert Reich pretty much sums up my sentiments about this health care debacle. We're definitely on the same page.

The most magnificent Keith Olbermann sums up my initial reaction to this outcome. My source of disagreement is that, at 53, my days of idealism are long past.

And finally, Big Pharm has opened up a whole new door to obscene profits by doping up little kids, as well as their parents, with psychiatric drugs.

Break out that eggnog -- the real stuff. That's a much older panacea, and it probably won't kill you any quicker. Season's greetings.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Lieberman Just Wants To Keep His Chairmanship

Unless the ghost of Hanuka Past comes for a midnight visit, count on Liar Joe to be the key vote that kills the public option.

By Manifesto Joe

The one and only thing that makes the Bush presidency look good in hindsight is the thought that this man could have been a heartbeat away from the presidency. Liar Joe Lieberman voted with the Democratic majority Saturday night to bring the health care bill to debate on the Senate floor.

Barring divine intervention, consider that to be Liar Joe's ass-covering vote, the one that will save his chairmanship as a member of the Senate's majority Democratic caucus.

Don't count on any more of them. I think this man made his Faustian bargains long ago, and the time has come for Lucifer to collect the bill. Liar Joe will vote with the Republicans every time after this, I predict -- once again, unless the gods intervene. I've been wrong before, as the old Randy Newman song (a 1965 hit for Cilla Black) went. And I sincerely hope I'm wrong this time.

Liar Joe is chairman of the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, because the Democratic Senate majority accepts him as a caucus vote and permits it. I think they made a huge mistake back when. It was bad enough in 2006, when he got past the challenge of Ned Lamont. The Democratic Party should have kicked his scrawny ass to the curb when he campaigned for John McCain.

But, here he is, and here this is. Look for the upcoming vote to be, quite possibly, 59-41 "against" cloture of the health care filibuster -- with Liar Joe the deciding vote.

I honestly hope he will surprise me. Baby, I've been wrong before.

But I'm not holding my breath.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Odds Are Against Real Health Care Reform In Senate, But House Vote Was Worth It

By Manifesto Joe

The public option for health insurance probably doesn't stand a chance in the Senate. Renegade Joe Lieberman and several "blue dog" DINOs are very likely to stop it from getting to an up-or-down vote like we saw in the House late Saturday. But it was worth it to go this far, for three big reasons.

1. The debate has been educational, and the American public needed schooling on this subject.

I confess that I didn't know before this summer that private insurers, in the current system, have an exemption from federal antitrust laws. They've had it for many decades, all the way back to 1945. (Here's a link.) And yet these Tea Party imbeciles persist in bellowing about free markets, and patient choice? Unfortunately, there's no FDA-approved treatment for stupidity on the "free market" yet.

This antitrust exemption was apparently, in part, the brainchild of U.S. Sen. Pat McCarran, D-Nev. (Another link.) McCarran (1876-1954) was one of the era's notorious Red-baiters, chief sponsor of the McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950, which required Communist Party members and those in affiliated "fronts" to register with the government. By the way, the act was never enforced, and major provisions of it were ruled unconstitutional in 1965 and 1967, as it was decided that even commies have free-speech guarantees. This "distinguished gentleman," Sen. McCarran, was living proof that DINOs were around in the 1940s, too.

Another thing that this year's debate has made clear: The majority of U.S. bankruptcies are the result of catastrophic illnesses -- combined with a monopolistic private health insurance system that doesn't cover 47 million people, or can simply refuse to cover many others because of "pre-existing conditions."

(2) Democrats, real ones, can beat Republicans over the head with this in next year's midterm congressional elections.

The public option won in an up-or-down vote, 220-215, in the more representative and "little-d" democratic part of our legislative branch. And polls show that a majority of Americans favor a public option. There's an opportunity to pillory Republicans here, if Democrats will capitalize on it. The Republicans are ready to block something that a majority of the public had decided it wanted. Make the insurance-company prostitutes pay at the polls.

(3) If health care reform fails this time, or is diluted into just another subsidy for the private insurance industry, the eventual outcome may well be a single-payer system.

Saturday's vote in the U.S. House came against great odds -- the well-financed and ruthless opposition of the American health insurance monopoly. The vote came about because the anger that has been building among the American people for decades finally overpowered the insurance companies' almighty dollar.

If the status quo, or something like it, continues, the pressure from below will keep building. Some of the Tea Party fools may have been through illness and bankruptcy by then -- sometimes personal experience can make somebody realize that they've been a chicken supporting Colonel Sanders.

In time, we may finally get real reform: a single-payer system. If it takes misery and financial ruin for millions to get this done -- well, so be it. It took the Great Depression to turn enough Republicans into independents, and independents into Democrats, to get us something as basic as Social Security back in 1935.

I can see in this the beginnings of history repeating itself.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.