Since monitory and other numerical figures vary by interest group whose sources vary by funding. Statistics and figures will be absent in the following FAQ. Instead the document will focus on the reasoned pro argument and con dispute.

1. Other countries that have socialized medicine have long waits for surgery and we do not. Why should we become like them?

Those other nations triage their patients in order of need so an average wait is going to be longer for elective knee surgery or rhinoplasty than for kidney transplant or appendicitis repair.

We don’t have to be like any other nation’s health care. Ours can be our own. The best of other nations’ health care systems and the creative new methods we are capable of, will make-up a new Single Payer Health Care system.

2. Why should my family and I pay for those who do not pay for their own health insurance? It doesn’t seem fair to me.

You already pay for their health care. Except that by the time those without insurance get to a doctor, or hospital, their ailments / diseases have progressed to their most expensive stages. Costing the taxpayers far more, easily surpassing funding enough to have bought them health insurance in the first place. So, the absence of coverage for the poor and middle class, who can’t afford premiums and deductibles, costs taxpayers a lot of money, billions.

What’s more fair to the taxpaying American, every single taxpayer paying for everyone’s health care at once, or allowing tens of millions of taxpayers (yes they all have jobs) without affordable health care access to enter the system upon charity conditions (taxpayer subsidies to hospitals) with their diseases advanced to a point of expensive post onset care? The latter is not fair.

3. What about fraud by doctors and hospitals and those equipment manufacturers and sales people?

Under and new SPHC system stopping fraud will have to be paramount. The ideology that we are all spending our own fortunes, our own hard earned dollars on each other will have to be understood widespread throughout the system, by patients who will be welcomed whistle blowers, by everyone from kitchen employees to the chief surgeon.

A new anti fraud division will be necessary. It must draw a balance between punishment and repercussions for just being investigated, so that those subject to investigation are not threatened should they be innocent.

Some of the types of fraud to watch for will be: over treatment (padding the bill) tough to prove, best discovered by the patient. Over billing for treatment (especially common now towards Medicare and Medicaid systems due to their absence of investigative funding). Equipment over billing and over production and over manufacturing: titanium wheel chairs are not necessary, carved / milled walking canes are a luxury and less sturdy than aluminum canes. Over medicating by physicians; doctors are susceptible to the influences of pharmaceutical company sales persons and their perks, i.e. vacations, flights, golf junkets. Doctors often pile-on medications to the point where side effects from one medication are masking the side effects of another, creating a dangerous situation for the patient. The alert patient is the best whistleblower for this type of fraud and abuse.

4. No one is going to want to be a doctor or nurse under this kind of strictly regulated and restricted environment?

If its strict and restrictive environments that doctors and nurses don’t like, they should leave now. Because, under the current system the greatest pain in the ass is the health insurance companies that determine if a procedure can be paid for – literally a faceless voice on the phone dictates to a nurse or doctor whether or not a healthful or lifesaving procedure can be performed. Some hospitals dedicate an entire floor or wing to desks of workers whose main job is to communicate with mega bureaucratic health insurance companies. Does that seem right?

Under a SPHC system the Administrative body or the SPHCA will allow any and all procedures deemed reasonable by the doctor in charge.

Quality should be rewarded with monitory bonuses and promotions to health care workers.

Under an SPHC system funding will be made available for health care professional higher education and even the building of new campuses dedicated to professional training in medicine.

5. Government sometimes seems to get things so wrong, I don’t trust it. Why would a SPHC system be any different than other government failures, with fraud, negligence and etcetera?

Democracy is the answer to the checks and balances needed to ensure that a SPHC system continues efficiently and without fraud. A hierarchy of councils which ends at the top in Washington D.C. at the SPHCA and a cabinet level appointed bipartisan committee members totaling 9 members (for instance – a tie breaking number of members i.e. the Supreme Court).

The SPHCA must be created via Constitutional Amendment. The main purpose of this would be to separate the funding from the U.S. Congress, which could be swayed by power shifts to functionally change the SPHC system by removal of funds. The second reason the SPHCA should birth via Constitutional Amendment is that the people should be behind it in unanimity. This will ensure an extended life of the program as generations will recall in memory why they created the SPHCA.

The accountability to the consumer should begin with democracy at the local level (as per Clinton Health Care Reform plan of 1995). A Health Care Regional Council District (HCRCD), several or more than one in each state depending on population and number of health care facilities, will be voted in by the local populace during each general election (every four years). This local council would review all consumer complaints. It would review all medical professional complaints. The council must contain a minority of medical professionals and a majority of non medical professional citizens, and this will require run off electioneering allowing election boards to chose second tier candidates to meet the mandate.

The spirit of competition does not have to die with SPHC. Consumer information plays a crucial role in maintaining and building the quality of a facility and its staff. Internet and mailing pamphlets must be prolific in each HCRCD ensuring citizen awareness and input. No citizen should have to be limited to receiving care in his or her own local HCRCD, this is the competitive edge maintained by the consumer/citizen. This edge raises and lowers the numerical value points of any given facility.

You must ask the question of yourself: Do I like democracy? Has America worked pretty well? What if I knew a full accounting of the quality and performance of the hospital in my local area? What if I never had to deal with a health insurance company again?

Visit SiCKOCure.org to learn more and become a part of the struggle for real universal health care.

Labels: for profit health care, Government, Health Care Reform, health insurance, Healthcare, Insurance companies, medicare for all, private for-profit, Single Payer, Universal Health Care

 The deep south still has a color problem. But not entirely a problem of race but of flags. Where I live in south central Georgia the landscape is adorned with decorative Confederate flag license plates, flag decals, caps and t-shirts and actual flags of the Confederacy flying on poles in front yards. Its all on display like fans displaying the colors of a favorite sports team in a college town. Yet slavery guilt, civil war loser shame and cause of the civil war denial are also present to the observant.

I can’t discuss Southern pride or Southern shame without a discussion of the Confederate flag, what’s many controversies sum-up the issues surrounding Southern identity. Today the 20th century Confederate flag is but a modernization of several flags of the civil war era. The “stars and bars” or “Dixie” as some call it, is displayed for many reasons besides a longing for war with the Yankees – don’t disregard this yearning.

A general rebellion against the federal government is one reason to fly the Stars and Bars. A sense of free will is exerted in the direction of the north, where the federal government is located. “Don’t tell me what to do, northerners!”

During the recent referendum on the Georgia state flag, words flew high and mighty over the meaning of the flag, as fans of the confederacy fought hard to keep the Stars and Bars as part of the state flag. They won. But one interesting slogan touted to convince others of the banality of the request of having “Dixie” stay on the flag was “Its Heritage Not Hate.” It was a long and hard fought battle, the Antietum of popular referendums. It was also a telling battle. Because it is often what oppositions don’t say that says as much about background and motive as any outward statements and sloganeering.

The white supremacists groups will also fly the Stars and Bars as an outward defiant statement of racism, white power, and pro segregation.

Civil War re-enactors and other enthusiasts will tout the flag for authenticity and for heritage motives. The modern “Dixie” of today was the battle flag of the 1860s.

Heritage (and not necessarily hatred) is indeed another reason for flying the Stars and Bars. Heritage that is inherently connected to identity needed to overcome the status and power of the industrial, now high tech, north. The North; where everyone seems to live, where the majority of the welfare dollars originate for the recipients in the south. The North where television shows are focused upon as if the world is centered there. The North where beautiful women speak without “twang,” and have good posture and express themselves sexually, as seen on television. The Stars and Bars overcomes an identity ignored, enforces an identity lost to modern media, brings comfort to those all too aware of the disparity yet all too aware that they may never leave the south. Embrace the Stars and Bars and learn to love yourself Southern Man.

On the polar side of the merits of waving the Stars and Bars there is the shame, the prejudice, the hatred conveyed and or just perceived, the out-right slap in the face racism that some feel when seeing this symbol.

Civil War Shame

The shame is everywhere. It begins with Atlanta and the humiliation of Sherman’s conquer and occupation of that fair city. Still not forgotten in the sub conscience of the southerner. Then Sherman marched south and east burning, looting, killing, and raping, on orders from Washington D.C.. Tearing a path of humility and shame with him. Where were the men to protect those people? Gone, fighting somewhere else and dying by the tens of thousands while their wives and children suffered and lost everything life and material.

Meet the web site of the Dublin, Georgia chamber of commerce and the page titled The History of Dublin; an approximately 5,000 word article which mysteriously stops telling its own history at 1854. The Dublin historian writing this article chose not to tell that Dublin was smack in the middle of General Sherman’s reign of terror from Atlanta to Savannah, that the town was razed, that the young men of Dublin were no where to be found because they were off dying somewhere else.

A fascinating entry by the historian on the web page was a mention of the slave statistics of the immediate area (see below). Having left out the entire Civil War from her notations she saw fit to include the following.

From the History of Laurens County, Georgia, by Harriet Claxton:
”Slavery was a national institution, and although most of the people in Laurens County did not own slaves, they were loyal to the principle of slavery and resented any disrupting influences of the Abolitionists. In 1845, there were 3,258 whites and 2,760 slaves in the county."

The majority of white people did not own slaves. In fact more than %90 did not own slaves, they could not afford to. Slaves belonged to the wealthy mega acreage land owners who grew cotton, tobacco and corn, it is these few men who had everything to lose from abolition of slavery, and men like these who bankrolled the Civil War.

It was also these few men who distributed the propaganda needed to launch a Civil War, through the newspapers they owned. Not well known is that most white men in the north were not willing to fight a war to free slaves. Most northern men had never even seen a slave. In the south, because the great majority of white men did not own slaves, they were not willing to fight a war to keep slaves. Enter the rich white propaganda machine; “fight a war over taxes and tariffs!” The old battle cry of no taxation without representation would have fit well. It was enough to fool the masses and garnish the unlearned to arms to fight and die over slavery.

Yes the Civil War was fought over slavery. Southerners who are still sore losers and feel the guilt, and will concoct hypotheses, and will produce antique letters. But the truth of the matter is that if the issue of slavery were not there, nor would have been the Civil War.

Southern states have higher monetary needs than do the northern states, absorbed through federal government distribution via natural disaster relief, hurricanes and tornadoes, and via welfare and infrastructure needs like highway funds (larger states longer highways more bridges), and health care of the uninsured. In fact, if there is a welfare queen, she lives in the deep south or Texas. So the southerner should in fairness love the “union” part of the “United States.” But if one day the South were to secede from the North, their poverty would be unimaginable, while the North would benefit through release of burden.

The Rebel southerner loves the idea of the confederacy of 8 generations past, and at the same time takes shame in his ancestors having gotten their asses kicked by Yankees because their leadership of the time wanted to maintain slavery, and the right to secede to do so. As shown in the example of the Dublin, Georgia, history page on their web site, purposefully leaving off the Civil War and General Sherman’s “visit.”

Join the army and fight for our freedom, because freedom is not free. Take pride in knowing that you are fighting to keep America free. Simultaneously, while at home, fly a confederate flag and tout the merits of the South, as a Rebel would. This is the duplicity of the southern confederate patriot. Crossing the line from duplicity into hypocrisy is the war in Iraq and the large numbers of Southern Rebel enlisted men and women from southern states. The identity they tout is one of separation at home yet they fight overseas for democratic governance and a unified nation in the middle east.

For further reading, Kenneth Stampp's (1993 Lincoln Prize for lifetime achievement by the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College) Causes of the Civil War..

Labels: civil war, confederacy, confederate, Dixie, heritage, history civil war, shame, slavery, slaves, southern, stars and bars

It is possible to go through life, living and functioning much like anyone else, with no beliefs at all . . . none.   “What?” You say.  “What the hell do you stand for, what about your morals?”  

Morals are determined by belief, if you are on shaky ground with your morals, then beliefs would be convenient as a support tool for those shaky morals.   Philosophy is what guides us.  That philosophy taught by our parents and that we are cornered into by the norms and consequences of our actions in society.

First let’s informally define belief.

It is several things all at once or several things conveyed or experienced individually.  Belief is a disposition.  Belief is a state of mind.  Belief is knowledge unrealized, or unjustified.  It is confidence or trust.  It is spiritual and supernatural.  It is used to hold hope and wishful thinking. It is voluntary or placed from without to be engrained within.  It is words used in excess in language with abandon.   But most important of all the concept of belief is not necessary at all, never.  

Belief can be voluntary.  For example belief can require maintenance, or up-keep, like going to church weekly to get one’s belief supported and polished.   Belief can be involuntary.  For example belief’s superstition and mythology can be engrained at an early age, as a very young child, causing belief to be an assumption to the mind and very tough to overcome.

Belief is commonly used to describe a personal position on whether or not a thing is true in the absence of evidence or other proof.

Belief is used to convey trust and confidence in another person, i.e. “I believe in you, you can do it!”

Belief is holding to be true that which you can not prove, i.e. “I believe the president has very small testicles.”    

Even the word “believes,” is a fallacy in our language, a misnomer, a word to fill-in for several others at time.  How often do we Americans say something to the effect of “I trust in you Bob, evidence shows, you can do this.” Or perhaps “I feel this is not right, after all, there’s just no evidence for it.”  

In none of these instances and uses above is “belief” needed to communicate, to live, to function technically, to live structured.  Belief is just not necessary, period.  The concept of belief, and the word, so abused as it is, is totally unnecessary.  

Giving up beliefs will take a person decades, but it can be done.  Superstition is the greatest hurdle to overcome; it lasts long after one thinks he has rid him or her self of belief.  “Step on a crack, break your mother’s back?”

The language a newly non-believer uses is as important as his or her determination to give up belief.  Using the correct language in daily situations will assist the non-believer wanna-be to verify the uselessness of the “b” words.  Try using variations of the following prefaces to open sentences when speaking or writing:

“It appears that this is the case . . .”

“I think you’re right about this, because it shows . . .”

“I have confidence in your ability to do this . . .”

“Evidence supports that thesis . . .”

“Evidence would indicate you’re right . . .”

“You had better know its true . . . .”

What do you personally lose when you successfully give up belief and the use of belief?

Superstition and fate and destiny are lost as your mind reminds you when you are being silly, as these feelings reoccur periodically.  Hope is partially lost as it is realized to be a negative that must be believed in.  Hope is replaced with wanting with good feelings, i.e. “wouldn’t that be great!”  You stop saying “believe” and your conversational language changes to a more geeky persona.   You lose a fantasy life that you walked through every day.  It may feel as though you have lost a crutch of sorts.  A support of non reality that had been holding you upright is gone.

 
What do you personally get when you stop believing?

 Life on life’s terms is what you get without beliefs.  Because with beliefs goes superstition and that feeling of fate, of destiny, which are also unnecessary concepts.   This does not mean you are any happier or more sad in your life.  You are however living more grounded to reality than most people around you.

Try to imagine one moment in your life when having a belief or conveying a belief to someone else was absolutely necessary.  Try to remember one time when speaking in terms of belief was necessary for anyone.   Okay, if you were Jim Jones and you wanted eight hundred people to drink your poison Kool-Aid, then using the concept of belief was necessary.  So, try to remember one time in history when there was a non religious use of the “b” word that was absolutely necessary to accomplish anything productive.  Comment in the comments section of this blog if you can think of anything.  

Thank you and stop believing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief