Perhaps because I am 61 years old and can't do most of the things I used to do, I spent some time browsing through the Obama political record and came across something interesting. When he was running for a seat in the Senate in 2004, the President gave a policy speech on health care in American and said quite strongly, that the only way we can permanently fix our health care problems and insure that all Americans have adequate coverage, is to adopt a European style single-payer insurance system. You know, like we already have if you are over 65, in the military, a veteran, or best yet, a member of the United States Congress.
Then, just a few weeks ago, when now President Obama introduced his proposals for the big health car fix, he called for some kind of a multi-tiered, private/public payment system that still won't cover every man, woman, and child in the US. So what happened? Did the young naive State Senator from Illinois finally come to his senses and abandon his initial idea? Or might their be the faint whiff of a big sewer rat, drifting off the president's modified stance on health in America?
To answer these questions, we need to look back to the failed Clinton health care bill of 1994. Back then, the team of Billary introduced sweeping reforms for a program not yet terminal, as is our system today. Central to their program, as called for by Senate candidate Obama in 2004, was a single-payer system to insure all Americans. The Clinton White House knew that the big health insurance companies wanted nothing to do with any kind of universal health coverage, as that would mean that they would actually have to offer protection to people who were really sick! So they moved away from the private, for profit sector, and proposed a Medicare-like system that would cover everyone, thus spreading the payout liabilities in an equitable manner.
Well it did not take long for the big insurance companies, drug manufacturers, and the AMA to muster their forces and call an all out frontal attack on the bill. Perhaps you remember the now infamous TV spots with Harry and Louise agonizing over the possibility of a government run health care system. More importantly, the private health care industry created a number of highly effective lobbying groups and began pouring massive amounts of money into the campaign coffers of every member of the US Congress, Democrat and Republican. And like magic Senators and Representatives discovered that there wasn't actually all that much wrong with the way we deliver health care in this country. Further, they touted the fact that all the major corporate players promised to severely cut costs on their own in a voluntary effort.
Well all I can say is that I hope that Harry and Louise won the lottery, as most of us have seen our health care costs skyrocket over the last fifteen years, while the quality of the services delivered has continued to erode. Isn't it wonderful to know that while you live in the richest country on the face of the earth, you also live in the only developed country where health coverage is not a right. In fact, you live in the only country where it is possible to go bankrupt due to medical expenses. Meanwhile, all those people who swore an oath to represent you and me, spend two out of every five working days fundraising for their next election campaigns. And the big health care players like Blue Shield, Merck, the American Hospital Association, and the AMA keep on writing those checks.
Come on, do you really believe that all these fat cats are going to support real change in our health care system? By the way, if you care to look, you will find that after 2004, Barrack Obama has taken more campaign money from the health care industry than any other elected official in Washington. After all, it costs upward of a billion dollars to be elected president these days, and there are only so many five dollar Internet donations out there.
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