Donald Trump WantsTo Give Everyone HealthCare?

Donald Trump states that under his new plan every US citizen will have healthcare.

 Jimmy Dore breaks it down.

Voting is beautiful, be beautiful ~ vote.©

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders displays and quotes Donald J. Trump tweets during floor speech on repealing #ACA

Watch full speech from Bernie Sanders here: http://cs.pn/2ibx7Pr


Voting is beautiful, be beautiful ~ vote.©

A shamed AARP withdraws from right-wing lobbying organization ALEC

In a notice posted on AARP’s Facebook page, AARP told members, “After hearing from many of you, we’ve decided not to renew our membership to ALEC. We would never work against the interests of older Americans and our engagement with ALEC was NOT an endorsement of the organization’s policies, but an opportunity to engage with state legislators and advance our members’ priorities.”

http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-aarp-alec-20160805-snap-story.html
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Nurses super-PAC endorses primary challenger to Wasserman Schultz

Anne Wernikoff

A super-PAC for nurses that has spent more than $1 million in support of Bernie Sanders's presidential campaign has endorsed a primary challenger to Democratic National Committee (DNC) Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.)

National Nurses United on Wednesday announced their endorsement of Florida professor Tim Canova, who is trying to to unseat Wasserman Schultz in the Democratic primary. 

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/house-races/272557-nurses-super-pac-backing-sanders-endorses-primary-challenger-to

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How The GOP Plan To Kill Medicare And Medicaid Would Work

How The GOP Plan To Kill Medicare And Medicaid Would Work


Brian Beutler and Benjy Sarlin
April 5, 2011, 9:26AM

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)
On Tuesday, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) will introduce a 10-year budget proposal that would over time eliminate Medicare and Medicaid and replace them with less generous health care plans for the elderly, poor, and disabled. The reviews are in, from experts and advocates, and it looks like there's gonna be a fight.

Phasing Out Medicare

Starting with Medicare, Ryan's critics attack his plan as a step back from the single-payer system that, despite looming financing problems, serves the elderly very well.

"There ought to be a TV show called 'That 90s Show,'" said David Cutler, a Harvard economics professor and one-time adviser to President Obama. "What Paul Ryan has in mind is to recreate the managed care era, do for the elderly what we rejected for ourselves."

Republicans will be loath to admit this, but the system Ryan has in mind for Medicare works a lot like dread 'ObamaCare,' too. He developed it in concert with Alice Rivlin, who used to run the Office of Management and Budget for President Clinton. They propose giving the elderly a menu of private insurance options (think the health care exchange) and then subsidizing those plans based on need (think insurance credits). Thus, in addition to all the questions Republicans will have to answer about the plan from experts and stakeholders, they'll have to explain why the health care law is terrible for working adults, but a great idea for retirees.

"I keep talking to Paul and trying to convince him of that," Rivlin told Ezra Klein recently. "But even if he agreed with me, he couldn't say so."

If the goal is to save the government money, Ryan's plan can work -- but not by figuring out cheaper, smarter ways to deliver health care to the elderly, but by dramatically curtailing benefits.

"Our existing efforts to privatize Medicare have failed," Jonathan Gruber, a leading health care economist, and architect of the health care law, said in an interview. "We don't have a good track record, but in principle it could be a good idea [but] the savings doesn't come from all the good things from competition -- it comes from cutting Medicare over time."

Princeton health care expert Uwe Reinhardt has called the plan "radical," for precisely this reason.

"[F]or all those older Americans who voted GOP last year because those nasty Democrats were going to cut Medicare, I have just one word," wrote New York Times columnist, and Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman: "suckers!"

He's referring to ads like this one, which Republicans used to great effect to help win historic victories in the November midterms.

Those cuts were unpopular, but trivial compared to what Ryan's proposing.

Eliminating Medicaid

The reviews are even worse for Ryan's plan to turn Medicaid into a block grant program. Ryan would eliminate the federal parameters governing the program and instead have Washington send states lump sums of money to put towards health care for the poor. In some states, that will mean patients -- the poor, disabled and elderly -- will suffer dramatic benefit cuts, particularly during tough economic times.

Seventeen Democratic governors have signed a letter to congressional leaders strongly opposing the block grant idea. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) wrote a separate letter attacking the plan as well.

"It's a hidden way to cut Medicaid," Gruber said. "I don't see the argument for it at all."

AARP seems if anything more concerned about the Medicaid proposal than the Medicare plan.

"A wholesale overhaul of Medicaid to block grants would likely lead to reduced benefits and eligibility, resulting in powerful negative repercussions for the millions of Americans who rely on Medicaid for their health and long term care," Nora Super, AARP's director of federal government relations for health, tells TPM.

Medicaid is often conceived of as a less luxurious version of Medicare for the poor, but many elderly Americans benefit from both. The GOP has been at war with AARP over its support of the health care law.

The Bottom Line

Ryan's plan would succeed at taking huge amounts of national health care spending off federal books. And that will leave Democrats facing questions about how they propose to reduce health care costs. After all, that will have to happen one way or another if the United States wants to avoid a fiscal crisis in the coming years.

"The better way to do it is not to shift costs but to cut costs, especially in a sensible way," said Cutler, the Harvard expert.

That could include using government purchasing power to force provider costs down, changing the tax code, or even patent reforms. Cutler and other experts point out that some of the most promising cost-cutting ideas are built into the health care reform law as pilot programs, and if one or several of them turn out to be unusually effective costs could drop, health care cost inflation could decrease, and a fiscal nightmare scenario could be averted.

"If there are 27 ideas in the bill, all you need is one of them to work and then you've saved money," Cutler added. "It's a kind of interesting thing. You just need something that really really works and you can build on."

The problem, as Gruber pointed out, is that determining what works best isn't easy, and when you figure it out, politics gets in the way.

"The science is highly uncertain. We don't know on a large scale how to slow the growth rates of federal costs without harming health," he admitted. "Nobody's figured out how to take [working] examples and scale them up."

That's when politics get in the way. During the health care debate, for example, Congress angrily rejected a Preventative Services Task Force finding that mammograms for women between the ages of 40 and 49 shouldn't be automatic.

If all else fails, then blunter measures may be necessary.

"Medicare is a dominant player in the medical market place, and what it needs to do is find a way to use that market power to reduce its cost growth, but to do it in an evidence-based way," said Harold Pollack, a public health expert at the University of Chicago. "The idea that Medicare should be an open spigot to pay providers is insane."

According to the U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Sebelius, 1 in 3 Americans participate in the nation's Single Payer programs: Medicaid, Medicare, TRICARE, SHIP, CHIP.

The companion component to Rep. Conyers' Single Payer Bill is the Single Audit, which has been effectively removed from all discussions on health care reform.

Until the societal benefits of improved quality and delivery of services are addressed, the burdens of fraud, waste and abuse will continue to weigh heavily upon those who pay private insurance.

Dems desire for government run health care exposed

Throughout the lopsided debate that preceded the passage of Obamacare, the Democrats made one thing perfectly clear: Obama's health care reforms were NOT a step on the way to a single-payer system.
The American people were told, repeatedly, that no one wanted government run medicine. Democrats were adamant that they were not interested in having a federal bureaucracy get between patients and their doctors. Even those Congressmen furthest left of center assured the public that a single-payer system was not the goal.

Yet, beneath the surface, there was an obvious ruse. Despite assurances that the cost of coverage would go down, it quickly became clear that the mandates contained within Obamacare would cause insurance rates to skyrocket. Critics claimed that the end result was clear. Corporations would drop their insurance benefits, insurers would go out of business, and the public would be trapped, paying 100 percent of their medical bills themselves. Since the cost of care will continue to increase, the government would be "forced" to step in and offer a single-payer, tax-based, solution. In short, Obama's reform bill was just the first step in a plan for a total health care takeover.

Monday morning, at a National Press Club newsmakers program, Conyers confirmed what many have argued all along.

"Had that bill failed," Conyers said, "it would have taken us another decade or longer to get single payer. We view the health care reform bill as a platform on which we are now able to move forward."

Later, when pressed by a reporter from CNS News, Conyers added "if we didn't have this, health care, universal health care, would be an even more difficult legislative objective."

Conyers has long been a supporter of a universal, government controlled, health care, and has proposed a number of bills designed to create such a system. His most recent attempt began three years ago, and was re-introduced this past February. Dubbed "The Improved and Expanded Medicare for All Act," H.R.676, would establish a 100 percent taxpayer funded, non-profit, single payer system.

In the bill, Conyers claims that "The time has come for deep systemic change in our health care system, and a large dose of common sense."

Perhaps he'll find that common sense among the bill's co-sponsors. Reading like a who's who of pro Universal Health care politicians, the list includes Barney Frank, who has already claimed that Obamacare would be a first step toward single payer, only to retract the statements when admitting how unpopular such a system would be. Other notables include Democrat Dennis Kucinich, who argued favorably that a Republican repeal of Obamacare would open the door to a massive single payer takeover, and Jesse Jackson Jr., who has argued that government run health care is a civil right which should be added to the Constitution.

In short, those who want single payer believe that Obamacare will lead to completely government run health care and they're laying the groundwork for the takeover. John Conyers has now admitted as much, and has authored the plan they hope to implement.

REINS Is Literally "Job-Killing"

Oh, this is hilarious.

Here you have a group of individuals who believe regulation is "job killing".  Well, when you are dealing with elected persons who lack administrative sophistication, you must assume their advice comes from their advocates... oops, I mean lobbyists, the same individuals who would significantly benefit from less regulatory mandates.

See, it goes like this, even though all three branches of government have their input into any administrative regulation that comes down, it is actually "job killing" because most of the local governments would not be in operation if they had to be compliant, let alone have to be compliant wtih civil rights policies.  This rings with even more truth when you understand that these "economically significant" new rules that may come down are dealing with privatization, out-sourced by state governments.

If one possessed basic understanding of the legislative process, one would know there currently exists multiple forms of input from the people regarding the formation and adoption of regulations beyond the sole elected official.


There is the Federal Registry which allows for public content.  The elected official who is concerned with having a voice should assist and engage his/her constituents in the opportunities to submit historical comments into federal record.

Then, there is always the role of the elected official to, again, assist and engage his/her constituents on how to contact the administrators of each agency to voice concerns and to provide critical input in the development of any policies.

Alas, it seems here the elected official would prefer to bog down the legislative process in minutia of applying a fifth layer of approval for policies which would virtually shut down governmental functions.  Grandstanding at its finest.

Now, let's examine the counterfactual of a "so-called" removal of regulatory policies.  Let's take EPA for example.

You remove regulation of EPA, people become sick and die.  Sick people tend to cause a soaring costs to overall health care.  Sick people can not work nor be productive to society which means that they will not be able to afford individual private insurance and seek the single payer programs.  The moral hazard kicks in to increase the cost of private insurance placing more individuals at risk of loosing their medical coverage.

As the insurance companies financially benefit with an increase in profits by cherry picking who will be insured, there will be a need to further reduce its work force with fewer clients.
Dead people do not work nor pay taxes.

Now, that is what I call "job-killing", literally.

Beverly Tran
An Original Source

Michigan Senate Resolution To Memorialize Congress For Moritoria On Regulation With REINS Act 2011

‘Single payer’ still their goal

Shortly after noon on Friday, state Rep. Michael Dembrow stepped to the microphone and addressed a crowd of about 150 people gathered on the steps of the Oregon Capitol in Salem.

“You look so healthy,” he told his audience. “You must all have good health insurance.”

The line got a big laugh for the Portland Democrat, as he must have known it would. Dembrow is the chief sponsor of House Bill 3510, the Affordable Health Care for All Oregon Act, which would all but eliminate private health insurance in Oregon and replace it with a taxpayer-funded system covering everyone in the state: single-payer health care.

Dembrow’s bill was scheduled for a hearing before the House Health Care Committee on Friday afternoon, and the lunchtime rally on the Capitol steps was a bit of political theater calculated to show support.

Toting signs with slogans such as “Patients Not Profits,” “Single Payer Now!” and “Everybody In, Nobody Out,” the crowd chanted and cheered for more than an hour as speaker after speaker slammed the insurance industry, shared horror stories of Americans bankrupted by medical expenses and called on the legislature to enact Dembrow’s proposal.

The really funny thing was, none of them seemed to think it has a ghost of a chance.

Rep. Jules Bailey, one of the bill’s co-sponsors, exhorted the crowd to settle in for a long fight.

“Don’t stop,” Bailey said. “If we don’t get there right away, we will get there eventually. We will get there.”

As Dembrow himself put it, “It’s not all about the bill. Single payer is a movement.”

“A long-term effort”

For hardcore health care reformers, single payer is the holy grail, a system that would rein in out-of-control medical costs while extending coverage to everyone. But they face determined and well-financed opposition from insurers, pharmaceutical companies and tea party Republicans, who deride the idea as socialized medicine.

HB 3510 is not the first attempt to create a single-payer health care system in Oregon. That distinction belongs to Senate Bill 1066, which was introduced in 1995 — and promptly faded into obscurity.

The issue was resuscitated in 2002, when Health Care for All-Oregon mounted a statewide signature-gathering campaign that succeeded in placing Measure 23 before the voters — who shot it down by a 700,000-vote margin.

Now it’s back, and while Dembrow has no illusions that his bill will pass, he’s crossing his fingers that it will stay alive long enough to generate some genuine discussion in the legislature. He has two co-sponsors on the Senate side, where he’s hoping the proposal could get additional hearings.

If he can get enough lawmakers interested in the concept, they might be willing to commission an in-depth cost analysis, a step that could build additional support. And even if 3510 dies this session, as expected, he’ll push to send it to Oregon voters again as a referendum, possibly in 2013.

“The likelihood of this bill passing and us having a single-payer system in the next year or two is remote,” Dembrow acknowledged in an interview last week.

“I see the effort for single payer as being a long-term effort,” he added. “There is still a lot of education that has to happen and a lot of organizing that has to happen, and this bill is a vehicle for that.”

Coalition-building

As health care costs continue to rise faster than American incomes, more and more people are flocking to the single-payer banner. In Oregon as in other states, the coalition that has formed around the issue includes labor unions, doctors and nurses, churches and social justice organizations, all of which were well represented at Friday’s rally in Salem.

Peter Shapiro was the master of ceremonies, introducing the speakers and setting the tone for the event with his rabble-rousing commentary.

A retired mailman who now works as an organizer for Portland Jobs With Justice, Shapiro urged the audience to fight back against the attacks on public employee unions around the country.

“I have one of those gold-plated plans,” he told the crowd. “I’m one of those people you’re supposed to hate. And 25 percent of my federal annuity goes to insurance premiums.”

In an interview, Shapiro talked about organized labor’s shift toward single payer after years of fighting to protect hard-won insurance benefits — often achieved at the cost of significant concessions on wages.

“It’s a difficult transition for union members to make. It’s a mark of how badly our health care system has deteriorated,” he said.

“More and more unions are realizing we’re living on borrowed time as far as benefits are concerned, and they’re paying a greater and greater price to keep those benefits at the bargaining table.”

Portland Jobs With Justice has thrown itself into the campaign for single payer, reaching out to other labor organizations to broaden the coalition supporting HB 3510. So far, nine Oregon unions have officially endorsed the measure — including two that represent teachers, often targeted for having Cadillac health benefits.

In January, Shapiro helped organize a highly successful conference on single payer in Portland. More than 400 people turned out for the event, which featured keynoters such as Dr. Margaret Flowers of Physicians for a National Health Program and Michigan Rep. John Conyers, one of the champions of single payer in Congress.

And on Friday, Shapiro brought a dose of fiery union rhetoric to the rally for HB 3510.

“We have the most profit-driven health care system in the world, and you see where that gets us,” he reminded the crowd as the event came to a close.

“The fact of the matter is, health care is not a commodity, it is a human right. And we are not consumers of health care, we are human beings!”

Mad as hell

Radiation oncologist Mike Huntington of Corvallis has devoted himself to health care reform since retiring in 2006. He became convinced of the need for change after seeing too many of his patients delay treatment because they lacked insurance coverage, with disastrous results.

“I saw it happen so often that it made me sick and then sad and then mad,” Huntington said.

In 2009 Huntington and fellow Corvallis physician Paul Hochfeld helped launch the Mad as Hell Doctors, an Oregon offshoot of Physicians for a National Health Program. The group mounted a cross-country tour, holding raucous single-payer rallies in more than two dozen cities en route to a demonstration on the White House lawn in a bid to influence the congressional debate on health care reform.

No trace of single payer made it into the federal health care reform law, which failed to include even the “public option” initially promoted by President Barack Obama.

But the Mad as Hell Doctors are still on the case. Last year they staged a California road trip to promote a single-payer measure in that state, and they’ve been touring Oregon for several weeks in support of the Dembrow bill.

On Friday, a white-coated contingent of Mad Docs was on hand for the Capitol rally, including Huntington.

The way he sees it, the financial logic of single payer is simply inescapable.

“Even health insurance CEOs privately say it. How can health care expenses keep increasing 25 percent a year? Eventually they’ll run out of customers,” Huntington said in an interview before the rally.

“It’s a false reality, and I’m going to stick around until the real reality is too hard to ignore.”

In it for the long haul

Betty Johnson is a battle-scarred veteran of the fight for single-payer health care in Oregon. She got involved in health care reform in 1991 through her church, and her faith continues to inform her work for the cause.

“It is a moral imperative to ensure that everyone has the health care they need,” she said.

The Corvallis resident, a widely respected leader in the state’s Health Care for All chapter, was a key player in the campaigns for SB 1066 and Measure 23 and now is pushing hard for HB 3510. In fact, she had a hand in writing all three proposals.

Johnson attended the rally, too, but before that she led a small cadre of Corvallis and Albany health care activists through the Capitol corridors on a mission to lobby as many lawmakers as possible to support HB 3510.

The group started on the House side of the building, stopping by the offices of Sara Gelser, Jim Thompson and Andy Olson before crossing over to the Senate wing in search of Frank Morse.

None of the legislators was in, so the mid-valley activists spent their time chatting up secretaries and aides, passing out copies of testimony to be given in the afternoon hearing and laying the groundwork for future meetings.

At Olson’s office, Johnson and Edie Orner, a retired schoolteacher who heads the Albany chapter of the Archimedes Movement, won a small victory: the promise of a breakfast meeting early next month.

Olson, an Albany Republican, is not known as a supporter of single payer, but he is willing to listen. Orner considers it progress.

“Everything that you do is building momentum,” she said, “and you just have to keep doing what you’re doing and hope that eventually there will be a tipping point.”

Johnson agrees. Like Dembrow, she has no expectations that 3510 will actually pass this session. And like him, she takes the long view of the fight for single payer.

The campaigns for SB 1066 in 1995 and Measure 23 in 2002, she said, started the conversation about single payer in Oregon, and Dembrow’s bill has created the opportunity to take the discussion one step further.

“The world is a different place than it was in 2002 — and I can’t help but think that it’s a different place, at least here in Oregon, in part because of what we did in 2002. We informed a lot of people,” Johnson said.

“That was a building block. This is a building block. And this campaign is not going to die.”

THOSE WISELY-USED, UNDER-ACKNOWLEDGED GOVERNMENT SOCIAL PROGRAMS

THOSE WISELY-USED, UNDER-ACKNOWLEDGED GOVERNMENT SOCIAL PROGRAMS....The lack of self-awareness is almost amusing.

In a smart column today, Bruce Bartlett looks at why it will be so hard for politicians to cut government spending: because so many Americans who say they support cutting government programs don't realize just how much they benefit from them.
Remember, for example, when a town hall attendee famously told his congressman to "keep your government hands off my Medicare"? Apparently that bewilderingly blinkered sentiment is hardly unique.

Bartlett relied on research from Cornell political scientist Suzanne Mettler, who reported on beneficiaries of government social programs who sincerely believe they "have not used a government social program." For example, 53% of those who've received student loans don't realize that counts. The same goes for 44% of Social Security recipients, and 40 percent of Medicare recipients.

It's not that these folks are lying; it's just that they don't understand. When they think of "government social program," they very likely think of "welfare" -- the kind of aid that they've never sought and don't think they'll ever need.

I often think of this piece from Matt Taibbi, who attended a Tea Party rally over the summer.

After Palin wraps up, I race to the parking lot in search of departing Medicare-motor-scooter conservatives. I come upon an elderly couple, Janice and David Wheelock, who are fairly itching to share their views.
"I'm anti-spending and anti-government," crows David, as scooter-bound Janice looks on. "The welfare state is out of control."
"OK," I say. "And what do you do for a living?"
"Me?" he says proudly. "Oh, I'm a property appraiser. Have been my whole life."
I frown. "Are either of you on Medicare?"
Silence: Then Janice, a nice enough woman, it seems, slowly raises her hand, offering a faint smile, as if to say, You got me!
"Let me get this straight," I say to David. "You've been picking up a check from the government for decades, as a tax assessor, and your wife is on Medicare. How can you complain about the welfare state?"
"Well," he says, "there's a lot of people on welfare who don't deserve it. Too many people are living off the government."
"But," I protest, "you live off the government. And have been your whole life!"
"Yeah," he says, "but I don't make very much."

The point is that congressional Republicans are desperate to make devastating, job-killing cuts to the budget, and think they're on safe political ground because voters say they support spending cuts. GOP officials might be surprised to learn just how many Americans rely on government spending, and want to keep the benefits that apply to them.

States Cry Foul With Health Care Mandate

States Cry Foul With Health Care Mandate

Ever wanted to know why there was so much opposition to the health care reform?  Well here it is.

It's called fraud.  Yes, contained within health care reform is also regulation.  Here is a great little rant from the State of Florida.  Why are they ranting?  It is because they are not compliant.

Florida is so bad, the U.S. Department of Justice teamed up with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources to establish the Health Care Fraud Enforcement Task Force (H.E.A.T.)  The worst part of the levels of health care fraud in these states that are crying the unconstitutional foul is that the levels of Medicaid fraud, once the federal moritoria on the suspension of the rules are lifted, will make Medicare pail in comparison to the ugly beast called Medicaid fraud.

U.S. DHHS OIG and DOJ Health Care Fraud Prevention Enforcement Team
The lack of Medicaid and Medicare regulation in the states will substantially cut the federal funding to their programs.  In essence, coming into federally funded, mandated compliance to end Medicaid and Medicare fraud will kill jobs because these fraud scheme, racketeering operations will be shut down.Department of Justice and Department of Health and Human Services response to Senator Grassley's inquiry on...

A Grim Prognosis for Medicare Advantage

A Grim Prognosis for Medicare Advantage

By Barbara O'Brien

If you love your Medicare Advantage benefits, brace yourself for some disappointment.  in the next few years Medicare Advantage insurers probably will trim benefits and may drop out of the program altogether because government subsidies to the program are being cut.

But even though the policies are with private companies, taxpayers are subsidizing the benefits.  And taxpayers are not getting their money's worth.  A Medicare Advantage benefit costs taxpayers 14 percentmore than exactly the same benefit offered through regular Medicare in some parts of he country, the difference is as high as 20 percent.

Medicare Advantage makes Medicare more expensive for everyone.  According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, all Medicare beneficiaries are paying for that 14 percent overhead with higher premiums, HHS says that this year these subsidies are adding about $3.60 per month to every Medicare premium.  And little of that 14 percent is providing benefits to seniors.  Instead, it is pocketed by the private insurance companies.  They use it to pay for administration and advertising, and they also take some of it in profits.

It's a sad fact that in our autumn years, nearly all of us will suffer increasing problems with our health.  For example, mesothelioma cancer rarely is diagnosed before the patient is 50, and mesothelioma treatment is expensive.  Private insurance companies don't want seniors as customers -- unless taxpayers are supplying the profits.

Last year, the trustees of the Medicare program said the part of Medicare that pays hospital bills would be out of money by 2017.  This year, because of the cuts to Medicare Advantage and other changes to the way Medicare is administered, the trustees said the hospital fund would be good until 2029.  More needs to be done, but we're moving in the right direction.

There are no plans to cut regular Medicare benefits.  In fact, the Medicare program is adding free preventive care and closing the Part D prescription coverage "doughnut hole".  But Medicare Advantage is turning out to be a luxury we can't afford.