The CEO Of Whole Foods Makes A Convincing Case For Libertarian Healthcare Reform
by tristero
John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, in an op-ed on healthcare reform tackles healthcare. In articulating a libertarian vision of reform he makes an utterly convincing case.
He convinces us to buy our food directly from farmers and farmer’s markets. Oh, sure, there are conservatives and libertarians among farmers. But at least they don’t call their workers “team members,” for crissakes. And it’s cheaper.
On The Road With Orly
by digby
Esquire has a great story about the conservo-crazy cult which he colorfully describes as “pus exploding from a wound.” When you read the article, you’ll see just how apt this description is. Here’s just a little excerpt:
Almost immediately following the election, a rash of extreme but nonetheless important statements about Obama and his agenda started appearing in the media. Here’s a small but representative sample, lest we allow the latest Dobbsian rhetoric (or Chuck Norris) to obfuscate the chorus: 1. Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma said the bailout was the start of America’s downfall. “To abandon a market-oriented society and transfer it to a Soviet-style, government-centered, bureaucratic-run and mandated program, that is the thing that will put the stake in the heart of freedom in this country.” 2. Congressman Pete Sessions of Texas said that Obama intended “to inflict damage and hardship on the free enterprise system, if not kill it.” 3. Congressman Ron Paul of Texas said that “socialism” was too mild a word for what Obama was doing because taking over corporations “adds a fascistic aspect to socialism.” 4. Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota said she wanted her constituents “armed and dangerous” because Obama was planning “re-education camps for young people.” She also said that “Thomas Jefferson told us having a revolution every now and then is a good thing.” 5. Ambassador Alan Keyes called Obama a communist who is trying to establish “an American KGB.” 6. Rush Limbaugh Show guest host Mark Davis told a joke about a soldier who has only two bullets in his gun when he meets Osama Bin Laden, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi — and uses both bullets on Pelosi before strangling the other two. 7. Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama put his considerable weight behind the “birther” movement: “His father was Kenyan and they said he was born in Hawaii, but I haven’t seen any birth certificate.” 8. Legislators in thirty states filed Tenth Amendment “sovereignty” laws as a symbolic gesture of defiance to Washington. 9. Tens of thousands of YouTubers watched a video called “Revolution Now,” in which a masked man claiming to be a soldier and an “anonymous American patriot” warned of growing resistance within the military. “There’s a revolution brewing,” he said. “We have allowed the tyrants to take over this country.” 10. Seven percent of the country thought, at a time when the Republicans were almost unanimously resistant to everything the Democrats proposed, that the GOP was being too cooperative. That’s roughly 21 million seriously alienated people. But nobody vibrated with the new sense of alarm more vividly than Fox’s new talk-show host, Glenn Beck. “The year is 2014. All the banks have been nationalized,” he began one show. “Unemployment is about between 12 percent and 20 percent. Dow is trading at 2,800. The real-estate market has collapsed. Government and unions control most of business, and America’s credit rating has been downgraded.” In another, he sounded exactly like a militia member from the backwoods of Montana: “They’ll take away guns, they’ll take way our sovereignty, they’ll take away our currency, our money. They’re already starting to put all the global framework in with this bullcrap called global warming. This is an effort to globalize, to tie together everybody on the planet!” Beck called for resistance and talked about storming Washington, selling T-shirts blazed with the pitchfork of an angry mob — and all of this led to startling success. Debuting last January in a weak 5 P.M. time slot, Beck shot to the No. 3 cable-news slot overnight, right behind Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity with 2.5 million viewers. And all of this was nothing compared to the alarmed citizens raging away on his Web site: * Obamacare meant that “bureaucrats are going to decide who lives and dies,” one said. * The new pro-union card check law was “possibly the greatest threat against American free enterprise ever,” said another. * People were “better off trusting their mattresses” than the greedy bankers, said another. * There were “35 terrorist training camps spread across the U.S.A.” that were run by Sheikh Gilani from Pakistan, said another. * Homeland Security “deliberately ignores the border and the redistribution of wealth is NOT constitutional,” said another. * Others solicited signatures for a new “martial law early alert” system and suggested that people download a video that “completely destroys the myth that Barack Obama is working for the best interests of the American people.” * “GET YOURSELVES HUNKERED DOWN WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS,” one woman advised. “GET PASSPORTS AND START LOOKING NOW FOR INEXPENSIVES SAFE PLACES TO GO — THE U.S.A. IS OVER AS WE HAVE KNOWN IT.”
This is beyond free floating anxiety; it’s a form of mass hysteria and it wasn’t precipitated by ideological differences with Obama. It’s Vince Foster Banarama 2.0. And it’s grown even though they had a run of eight long years of blood and Jesus. Maybe it’s because there aren’t any normal Republicans anymore so their feedback loop is completely closed — or maybe it’s the addition of FOX News and Free Republic to their old toxic stew combined with the fact that they were so soundly humiliated by Republican failure that has given them this new energy. But basically, it’s the same people spouting the same crap: pissed off white, middle aged conservatives who think they own this country and can’t stand it that they have to share it with anyone else.
Be sure to read to the end for the report on the “road trip” with Orly Taitz. Wow.
Update: And then there’s this.
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Good. But Not Good Enough.
by tristero
Focus on the Family, one of the most repellent and cynical of the modern extremist christianist organizations, is facing a “serious shortfall.”
Focus on the Family also announced Tuesday it would no longer stage “Love Won Out” conferences across the country. The events drew both participants and picketers for their promise to “help men and women dissatisfied with living homosexually understand that same-sex attractions can be overcome.”
But don’t celebrate just yet. There are still plenty of nutjobs to go around. Nothing PZ Myers could do or say will ever be half as insulting to the beliefs of genuine Christians as the “core message” of these sleazeballs:
The events will go on, instead staged by Orlando, Fla.-based Exodus International, a network of ministries whose core message is “Freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ.”
A Little Less Information and A Little More Inspiration
by digby
There is a lot of chatter about how people don’t know what’s in the plan and that’s why they are angry. Perhaps. But here’s what Obama said today, as he has over and over again, as do other health reform advocates:
“If you like your health-care plan, you can keep your health-care plan,” the president told a gathering in Portsmouth, N.H. “You will not be waiting in any lines. This is not about putting the government in charge of your health insurance.”
“For all the chatter and the yelling and the shouting and the noise, what you need to know is this: If you don’t have health insurance, you will finally have quality, affordable options, once we pass reform. If you do have health insurance, we will make sure that no insurance company, or a government bureaucrat, gets between you and the care that you need.”
I really doubt that most people need to understand the mechanisms of the health exchange or the regulatory structure of the public plan to understand what he’s promising there.
It’s not that they don’t know what he’s saying, it’s that they either think he’s lying or that he can’t achieve what he’s promising. It seems that “yes we can” isn’t enough, and it isn’t all that surprising since the whole country is deep in the shit and nobody feels very inspired about anything.
I honestly don’t know what anyone, even Obama, can say at this point to make it seem as though anything can change. But maybe he needs to leave the explanations to others and get back to the hope, which seems to be sadly missing in all this.
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Strange Days Indeed
by digby
When you feel overwhelmed by the crazy, always read the great Tom Tomorrow. It’s gotten me through many a tough time in Bizarroword USA:
This point is one that continues to amaze me. These people are coming unhinged over expanding access to health care. It’s not about taking away guns or mandating abortion or outlawing churches or some other issue about which you could understand these people having such strong feelings. They have worked themselves up into a complete frenzy over helping sick people. The right wing noise machine is awesome.
Click over and read the whole Tom Tomorrow strip. You’ll feel better. Or, at least, you’ll know you’re not alone.
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Raw Democracy
by digby
Howie is going to Adam Schiff’s Town Hall today. If you’re in LA, click to link to get instructions. There are a lot of interesting wingnuts, egged on by talk radio, planning to attend so it should be quite the spectacle.
I am having a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact that so many people think it’s just dandy to carry weapons to these things, though. Apparently, it’s a constitutional right to go to public political events, get red in the face and hysterically shout down everybody who doesn’t agree with you while packing heat. From what I gather from all the apologists on TV, no American should be intimidated by this and there’s no reason that anyone should feel this sort of thing keeps others from expressing their views.
I don’t think it’s legal to carry guns to public events in LA, so you probably won’t get shot at this one. But be advised anyway that if someone shows up with a gun strapped to his leg like he’s Wyatt Earp* with a sign talking about revolution, you shouldn’t feel that it’s a dangerous environment and be intimidated. He’s just expressing his views — emphatically. Nothing to worry about.
*As you probably know, Earp is famous not just for the Gunfight at the OK corral. He’s also famous for confiscating guns. But whatever …
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Who Says We Don’t Have Universal Health Care?
by digby
See, it’s all good:
Hundreds of people were already lining up to receive free health care checks at the the Forum in Inglewood.
Volunteer doctors, dentists and optometrists will conduct free health clinic for uninsured and under-insured individuals.
The eight-day healthcare event will run from 5:30 a.m to 6 p.m. and is sponsored by Remote Area Medical, a charity that in the past has staged clinics in rural sections of the United States.
People started arriving before 3. Many said they didn’t have health insurance and saw this as an opportunity to be checked out. Organizers placed them in stadium seats outside the Forum, and some said they waited for hours to get medical treatment.
Since 1985, about 400,000 adults and children have been treated by the organization, its leaders said. Individuals will not be required to show proof of income or insurance or documentation of any kind for treatment, according to organizers.
This is the same group that does the rural health care program that radicalized former insurance flack Wendell Potter. They work in major urban areas as well. If things don’t change, in a couple of years they’ll be needed in the suburbs as well.
If the uninsured want health care they can (probably) get it by staying up all night and waiting in the street outside a sports stadium once a year. What’s the problem?
Update: I just heard on TV that they think nearly 100,000 people showed up for this event. I don’t know if that’s true, but the crowd was much more vast that the above report indicates. Of course, there are three million uninsured in LA, so that’s really just a drop in the bucket.
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Like Drugged Up Thugs
by digby
Out in Wyoming, the very heart of Real America, the locals don’t like seeing the cops use their tasers up close and personal against one of their own:
Glenrock residents packed their town hall Monday to voice outrage over the tasing of a 76-year-old man by police officers at a parade.
The man’s family called for the officers’ firing, and Police Chief Tom Sweet told the crowd “we probably didn’t do things the best way we could have.”
The Aug. 1 incident remains under investigation, but most of the people who addressed town leaders at a council meeting suggested the officers used excessive force when they tased Bud Grose at Glenrock’s annual Deer Creek Days event.
“They both, in my opinion, acted like doped up thugs,” Grose’s daughter-in-law, Pat Grose, said.
Glenrock Mayor Steve Cielinski and most of the town council apologized to residents and asked for patience, as agents with the Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation examine whether any crimes were committed during the encounter.
Cielinski promised the results of the investigation would be made public. “If we have to stand up and take it on the chin, we will,” he said.
The exact circumstances that led to the tasing have not been disclosed by authorities. Glenrock police told state agents Bud Grose failed to obey directions while he was operating an antique tractor at the parade.
Grose had not discussed the encounter publicly, but several people who witnessed the event told the crowd police repeatedly shocked him with a taser.
“Those two were the most out-of-control officers I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Scott McWilliams, a witness who said he was shoved by one of the officers. “These two guys got to go.”
Mike Pyatt, a former Glenrock police officer, called one of the officers a “hot head” and said the other had poor people skills. He called on town leaders to make changes at the department.
“We will hold you accountable,” he said.
Police officers are no long required to have “people skills,” because they have weapons which are deemed perfectly acceptable to use in any situation, at their sole discretion. Why should they need patience or basic psychology or even any kind of rudimentary analytical skills when they can, without threat of serious repercussion, shoot people with 50,000 volts, thus instantly crumpling them to the ground in horrible pain they will do anything to not repeat? It’s a very efficient way to solve any situation and reinforce the All American belief that you must obey police no matter what.
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Surprise
by digby
Mark Karlin writes:
In two telling interviews yesterday, White House staffers acted is if Republicans never acted like brown shirts and propagandists without scruples before. A threesome of WH anonymous WH aides — who might be identified as Curly, Larry and Moe — told the Huffington Post:
In a sit down with online reporters on Monday, the three Obama aides, who spoke only on condition that they not be identified by name, stressed that they were still committed to crafting health care with Republican input and would continue to work with conservative media outlets despite the harsh reception they have received. While some angst was directed toward the opposition of Republican lawmakers who, the administration claims, have distorted the president’s position — particularly on end of life consultations — the majority of their ire was directed at the conservative commentariat. “The so-called Obama health care logo? What is the Obama health care logo?” one aide asked, with some incredulity. “We don’t have [one] but Rush Limbaugh thinks it looks like a Swastika… These are the sort of things we are dealing with.” “I don’t know where they are making this stuff up,” the aide added. “The bill, I was just looking at the House bill… [T]he part of this that covers insurance market reforms and the things to extend coverage and the exchange and public plan is actually pretty spare. And yet they have managed to make that into a vast government bureaucracy and really tried to scare people about the whole thing, which is disappointing.”And a story in the NYT notes: And Democratic Party officials enlisted in the fight by the White House acknowledged in interviews that the growing intensity of the opposition to the president’s health care plans — within the last week likened on talk radio to something out of Hitler’s Germany, lampooned by protesters at Congressional town-hall-style meetings and vilified in television commercials — had caught them off guard and forced them to begin an August counteroffensive. Fire the lot of them.
As Karlin goes on to point out, most observers from afar are not surpised at this at all. In fact, I was surprised it took the right this long to find their footing.
But most of the Democratic establishment internalized all the demagogic bullshit and character assassination that was hurled at Clinton, Gore and others and believed that it was probably deserved. It was the Democrats who kept making the fatal mistake of giving the other side an opening and these people believed they were smarter and more disciplined than that. They always do.
I actually suspect that many in the Obama White House believed the hype about changing Washington, which was always patent nonsense. Perhaps the more cynical among them felt that his race actually protected him from the kind of low level character attacks that the right usually employs. But they didn’t get it. The right doesn’t need to resort to low level character attacks on Obama because he’s black. It’s baked in.
So they can just call him Hitler, even though it makes no sense, and gin up the most outlandish conspiracy theories and their crazies are on board without anything having to be said. The conservative base, and a good number of people whose committment to progress of any kind is pretty thin on a good day, can easily be prodded into providing the kind of entertaining sideshow the media just love. Et voila — teabagging.
If these Democrats had spent less time gossiping about what Clinton really did with Monica or handwringing about Gore’s “lies” and more time analyzing how those spectacles unfolded, they wouldn’t be caught flat footed today. But they didn’t because they blamed Clinton for being “weak” and Gore for being “inauthentic” as if those were the real problems. I’m sure it made them feel very confident that it couldn’t happen to them.But, of course, it can, because it’s not a function of the individual Democrats who are the targets of these juhads but rather the nature of the opposition. Until they finally grok that — and after impeachment, stolen elections and Cheney it’s mind-boggling that they still haven’t done that — this will keep happening.
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What’s So Good About It?
by digby
Here’s an excellent op-ed called “Like Your Insurance? Maybe You Shouldn’t,” about why people who have insurance shouldn’t be so goddamned complacent about what they’ve got
First, what does it mean to say that you are satisfied with your health insurance? Consider homeowner’s insurance. Until you need it — your house burns down — you have no way of judging its quality. The same goes for health coverage; until you have a serious illness, the kind where your plan’s limits and exclusions may kick in, how do you know if your health coverage is any good?
That’s a good point. But people who choose to be tribal clones over their own self-interest or are so deeply uninformed that they should probably not be allowed to drive cars are plentiful in this country so I don’t think they’ve thought of that. But they should. Plainly, those who have insurance are on thin ice too, every last one of them.
If you have Medicare or the VA, bully for you. But you have no business arguing against health care reform or protecting the insurance companies because you are accepting the horrible “government run insurance” which you insist must be denied to the general population. You know in your heart that insurance backed by the US Government is going to keep covering you, don’t you? You just don’t want other people to have what you have.
If you are in the individual market, as I am (especially if you are over 50, as I am) you are just plain screwed.
The individual market is completely broken; according to a recent Commonwealth Fund study, 73 percent of people who tried to buy individual coverage in the last three years did not end up buying a plan.
And that’s because if you can even get it in the first place it’s so expensive and terrible that it’s hardly worth having. If you get really sick and you aren’t a millionaire, expect to lose everything because that’s probably what will happen. And don’t plan on keeping the policy you have now at the price you have. You’re living in a dream world:
Among this year’s large rate increases on the individual market: • Anthem Blue Cross in California has notified about 80% of its 800,000 individual policyholders of double-digit increases, many above 30%. Spokesman Ben Singer says rising medical costs are prompting the increases. • Blue Cross of Michigan is seeking state approval for a 56% increase in individual premiums. Spokesman Andy Hetzel says the company needs to offset losses stemming from state rules making it the sole insurer required to take all applicants. • Regence Blue Cross Blue Shield of Oregon will raise rates for approximately 10,000 Washington state customers by 27.1% on March 1. Another Washington insurer, LifeWise, raised rates 17.6% on Jan. 1, according to the Office of the Insurance Commissioner in Washington state. By comparison, group health insurance premiums paid by employers rose about 5% in 2008, says a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Some insurers say increases this year for individual policies aren’t out of the ordinary. Aetna, for example, says individual policy increases nationwide range from 8% to 22%
And by the way, the recession has thrown many, many more suckers into that wonderful individual market than before and they are all screwed now too.
Which brings us to the employer paid insurance market which most people have. Guess what? This article says that employer paid health care dropped from 64% to 59% in 2007 alone! It’s getting ridiculously expensive out there for employers as well and they are dropping their coverage like hot potatoes. I can’t wait to see the stats for 2008.
And that doesn’t even address the fact that by having your insurance tied to your specific employer you are, at this point, giving yourself over to indentured servitude in order to be free to get sick. I’ve always suspected that America’s great love of “liberty” was overstated (except when it comes to guns, of course) but the fact that people are willing to continue to submit themselves to virtual serfdom to some corporation for insurance rather than support a change that would allow them to easily move from job to job (or start their own business), just strikes me as a sad commentary on what we’ve become.
So yeah, everybody you know who’s panicking over the idea the government’s gonna take what they’ve got, had better think twice. They’re likely to lose what they’ve got anyway, or at least start paying a whole hell of a lot more for it. Maybe they think the god of the market can save them, but they’d better hope he intervenes before they get sick because if he doesn’t they are just as screwed as those who are stuggling mightily to hang on until we can crawl to the Medicare office at 65 and finally get some decent insurance.
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