We’re losing more Americans every day because of inaction … than drunk driving and homicide combined.
— Dr. David Himmelstein, co-author of a new study and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard, speaking in an interview with Reuters.
My wife just “got through” breast cancer, and now — suddenly — she’s in the middle of tests that we’re praying won’t show her to have ovarian cancer or anything negative. She does everything around the house. She does everything around us. She is everything to us. She is the Love of Love, and I was put on this earth to love her. She’s so much fun. Such an inspiration, such a great teacher. Rare as flawless chrysolite.
I’ve been hardly sick a day in my 67 years. ((Almost died once from a burst appendix, but Sylvie, in the midst of being plagued by one of her regular over-the-top migraines, saved my butt by being “proactive” with incompetent medical professionals.)) Just enough to know that when you’re really sick… usually… nothing else matters. Sometimes, not even the love of others. Neither for nor by.
WHAT ABOUT THE MASSES OF PEOPLE WHO DON’T HAVE ACCESS TO SUCH TESTS? WHAT ABOUT THE QUESTIONABLE QUALITY OF CARE THAT TOO OFTEN DOMINATES WHEN PEOPLE HAVE COVERAGE? There is an interesting perspective on the public perception of what’s in the works vis-a-vis CHANGE/IMPROVEMENT.
First of all, forget about socialism. We already have socialism in place respecting our military and industrial agriculture, among other horrors . And don’t worry about people getting away with murder milking financial loopholes; the rich do that dance way better than any illegal steps the underprivileged could ever trot out.
That behind you, we force the top 1% or 2% of the country (in terms of the holding of “financial wealth”) to pay for part of what we desperately need. ((Don’t worry ’bout HOW right now. First get on board … so that we can start the ball rolling in California. Remember, though, there’s a big difference between picking a fight with someone giving them a way to… walk away, and cornering them, making them feel that their life is at stake. Just so, there’s a huge difference between telling rich people you’re demanding equal justice and an equal redistribution of wealth and telling them that you’ll settle for simply doubling your financial wealth by draining a very small percentage of what they couldn’t spend if they lived a thousand years.)) At once. Force? Immediately? Yes, right along the lines of what the powers that be pulled when they went into emergency sessions to save the Too Big To Lose Financial Giants.
Remember? That was recently. When THEY forced us to pay right away for _____________ (You fill in the blank.).
The “part of what we desperately need” is the best health care coverage on earth at affordable prices. Not Medicare, better than Medicare. For EVERYONE.
That’s one of the potential great pleasures of being Super Rich (The situation is worse today!). You can help others by only spending a fraction of your financial wealth . Am I being disrespectful of The Rich? Rich people who have zero compassion for the immisserated masses deserve very little respect.
Seriously, that’s THE SOLUTION. Call it the One Percent Solution, or call it the Two Percent Solution. But don’t call it too late.
Fire and Ice. You choose how things will end up.
If the powers that be want to end any of our unnecessary wars — Lots to pick from! — to pay for this , fine. Actually, that might make it easier on us all financially and otherwise. We’ll be safer in the Big Picture to boot. BUT that would demand disentangling our ECONOMY from the Pentagon. Necessary (eventually), but no small order. Jeff Lays shows only one little aspect of what I’m talking about here. The health care and the warfare — both — are just the tip of the iceberg built upon the ice cold atomization of our souls..
Still… what a place to start. Place UNIVERSAL SINGLE-PAYER HEALTH CARE COVERAGE BETTER THAN MEDICARE as a higher priority than having a WAR ECONOMY, and see what we have to do to make it work. And, then, see what happens. You don’t have to have a plan to go get water if the house is on fire, do you?
We CAN make that IMPOSSIBILITY work. Tout de suite.
And as easy as looking up a few French words online.
As easy as getting organized, organizing… like I’m doing with you. No fund raising necessary. No meetings. No petitions to be handed to people who don’t care or who are powerless to change things (even if they want to). Following NONE of the usual ways in which people have been taught to protest, or push for change.
Voilà!