Sunday, August 16, 2009

Ye Olde American Death Panel

...."never once did I have a Medicare bureaucrat tell me what I couldn't do for a patient, but all the time we have bureaucrats from the insurance companies calling up and saying we're not going to cover this, we're not going to pay for that, we're denying coverage for that. The system we have now is broken. We need to fix it."
Dr. Howard Dean, former Democratic Presidential Candidate and former DNC Chairman

Based on my own family experience, I know this is a fact. I grew up in a solid middle class family that was destroyed financially by health problems. My father had Blue Cross and worked for Chrysler and Ford for 25 years, but died in debt because his insurance did not cover the costs of my mothers illness.
He died soon after of a chronic condition that was accelerated by his own personal stress. We were told after by a doctor that he could have been given more care, but it was decided that our insurance didn't cover it.

Needless to say, my teenage existence was not solid middleclass. I was a homeless kid for 3 years, because there were no real social services in Detroit to deal with my specific problem. No sweat, I survived...It was an educational experience and perhaps I should thank the insurance company for the golden opportunity I had to become a teenage pot dealer in Detroit.


The reality is that the most intrusive system to life-saving medical care is already occurring. Doctors daily have to contend with the regulation on their medical practice by the Health Insurance Industry that decides what treatment is acceptable for payment.

So while former Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin has called President Obama's health plan "evil" because it may lead to "death panels" that decide who gets to live and die. Unfortunately, we already have these death panels and they are insurance company executives that decide who will get to live and die based upon what they will pay for.

The absurdity of the rationale in which it is all right for a person to live or die based upon whether they have good health insurance, but it isn't all right for all people to have access to health care because the government might be involved is a type of American madness.

Americans have been conditioned for so many years to see the government as the enemy but never to question their own slavery to the Financial and Corporate interests that run America.

The real enemy is the not-so-invisible hand of Financial and Corporate power that not only calls the shots on who gets to live and die, but also gets to call the shots on how well Americans live and the way in which they will live.

The money system that has corrupted the American psyche to its very core views any form of care and help for others as a threat to the welfare of America. This allows for the fear mongering of near lunatics like Sarah Palin and the unbelievable willingness of many Americans to accept the insanity.

The seeming political insanity of Palin is more evident for what it really is when you read this Proclamation, issued by the then Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin on April 16, 2008 which she declared "HealthCare Decisions Day":

WHEREAS, Healthcare Decisions Day is designed to raise public awareness of the need to plan ahead for healthcare decisions, related to end of life care and medical decision-making whenever patients are unable to speak for themselves and to encourage the specific use of advance directives to communicate these important healthcare decisions. [...]

WHEREAS, one of the principal goals of Healthcare Decisions Day is to encourage hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, continuing care retirement communities, and hospices to participate in a statewide effort to provide clear and consistent information to the public about advance directives, as well as to encourage medical professionals and lawyers to volunteer their time and efforts to improve public knowledge and increase the number of Alaska’s citizens with advance directives.

WHEREAS, the Foundation for End of Life Care in Juneau, Alaska, and other organizations throughout the United States have endorsed this event and are committed to educating the public about the importance of discussing healthcare choices and executing advance directives.

This is exact concept in the Administrations Health Care Legislation that Ms. Palin is now referring to Euthanasia in her attempt to shill for the Insurance Industry.

Much of the body of the proposed legislation to be included in the reform legislation has already been enacted into law under 2 Republican Administrations. Many of the same legislators who are using this issue, that end of life counseling is a form of euthanasia, supported and enacted the laws that we already have.

Ms. Palin has scrubbed her website of any mention of Alaska's Health Care Decision Day. She was proud of it when she did it, now it's a liability to her value as a lackey of the corporations she is paid off by.

Again, we already have death panels, they are the administrators of the insurance companies. They are making intrusive medical decisions based purely on profit.
How many more real solid American families will be destroyed by their greed?

2 comments:

mud_rake said...

"Again, we already have death panels, they are the administrators of the insurance companies."

Yes they are.

Why is it, microdot, that you and I and Engineer and a handful of other people know this but 46% of America seems to be ignorant of this most obvious fact?

America is sliding backwards again, into the abyss!!

Joe said...

Having lived behind the iron curtain, I can only wonder what's going on in your head when you want to give the monopoly that is government even more power. It's as though you've learned nothing from the 20th century.