No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.
The Biblical citation is also found, excepting one word, in Matthew 6:24. Matthew substitutes man for servant. Since the subject is public servants, I lean toward Luke.
In my last two posts I mentioned my challenge to Bart Gordon, Blue Dog extraordinaire, to debate me on healthcare reform. I made a mistake.
I wanted to debate the representative of my congressional district, which includes the counties of Sumner, Rutherford, Wilson, Robertson, Macon, Trousdale, Clay, Jackson, Smith, Overton, Putnam, Dekalb, Cannon, Bedford and Marshall. It appears that this district is unrepresented. Perhaps it’s time to break out the old rallying cry of “No taxation without representation.” It certainly applies.
It seems that Representative Gordon’s district includes Blue Cross, Cigna, Aetna and the other members of AHIP, as well as the American Hospital Association, al-PhARMA and AARP. The challenge stands, however. Otherwise I would have to find some other representative to debate.
I was just ruminating about the Blue Dogs and thought that their constituents must have a very weak case if it costs so many millions to get their side out. Another thought was that they are always attacking the ephemeral “public option.”
Their version of the public option is socialistic, government-run, rationed care, expensive, denial of choice, et cetera, ad nauseum. We are always on the defensive. Someone asked, what’s so good about the private plans. Let’s go there.
Private plans are far more expensive. Not only do they average close to 30% more in administrative costs than Medicare, they have to charge enough to make a profit. Cigna’s CEO makes $12.2 million a year, plus stock options and a $73 million golden parachute. You pay for that. I don’t think any government employees make quite that much. Oh, and they have to buy all of those congressmen and spend all of that money defending lawsuits and paying multi-million dollar fines for fraud.
Private plans ration care. Several months ago a 19-year old girl was told a liver transplant was “experimental.” Tell that to Steve Jobs. National publicity caused the insurance company to reverse itself, the day before she died. Waits for most types of transplants are longer in the U.S. than most European countries and elsewhere.
Private plans also ration care by canceling customers, limiting total expenditures and denying preexisting conditions. Between 1995 and 2008 the percentage of small and medium businesses providing health insurance to employees dropped from 67% to 38%. That’s called rationing by price.
A former New York Times health reporter says that at any given time 65% of us have a prescription drug in our home. Since the health industry has access to pharmacy records (oh, you didn’t know?) they can easily find a “preexisting condition” to use for denying you coverage. Do you take a birth control pill? That means you have the preexisting condition of potentially bearing a child. Did a psychiatrist prescribe an SSRI to help you when a parent, child or spouse died?
Since most private plans are through employers, a pink slip means you just lost your coverage. The stimulus package included some money to help a little with the temporary Cobra plan. That could still run you $700 a month or more. That’s alright though. You can cover that from your unemployment check.
The largest contingent of people filing for bankruptcy are those forced to do so because of medical bills. The majority of these people had private health insurance. I have not found a single case of anyone forced into bankruptcy because of Medicare.
Private plans frequently limit your choice of providers, physicians and hospitals. I have had 32 or 33 doctors in the past 4 years while covered by Medicare. I always ask for referrals from those I already see. I have not had a single problem and, Nashville being one of the major hubs for hospitals and medical care, many of my doctors have national or regional reputations.
Private plans resemble a Keystone Cops version of the Mafia. Consider this. You own a retail shop and the Mafia comes in and asks the value of your inventory. You answer $100,000. They offer protection for 30% of that. You can be certain no one will touch that merchandise, as long as you pay up.
Private plans want 30% or so for their administrative costs plus all of the other costs I mentioned above. So now you are covered. Right? Well, maybe, maybe not. Remember those 14,000 losing their private plan every day? Remember those “experimental procedures?” And, lest we forget, the price will change. It will likely double again in the next six years. The Mafia are bleeding hearts by comparison.
Private plans are socialistic. Hey, I caught you off guard with that one, didn’t I? It’s true. Private insurance plans, as well as hospitals, drug companies, et alia, get direct subsidies. They get indirect subsidies. They get tremendous tax breaks. In fact, without those subsidies and tax breaks it is difficult to see how they could possibly operate. The numbers are interesting.
Private plans put bureaucrats between you and your provider. Yeah, I know how they yell and scream that it will happen with a public option. I also know that no bureaucrat from Medicare has ever gotten between me and any of my providers. But, it happens constantly with private plans.
The private firms actually have layers of bureaucrats. Bureaucrats working for the private plans are often given goals of how many procedures will be turned down. One may also want to ingratiate himself with the boss, or just try to protect his job. They don’t have civil service protection.
Private insurance companies lie, to anyone and everyone. They are now telling Congress they will quit denying people with preexisting conditions and work for universal coverage. If you would like to check, you will find that they made the exact same promises in 1993, in their successful effort to stop any reform.
And speaking of lying, the health industry has formed and funded several “grass roots” nonprofits to help you “get the facts” about our healthcare system. You know the one, the best in the world, that provides a shorter life expectancy for men than Mexico; a higher infant mortality than Cuba.
Those congressmen might find a way to represent us mere citizens, if they were familiar with the Bible.
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I’m getting a javascript error, is anyone else?
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