Sunday September 27, 2009, 6:31 pm
This should be truly fascinating - what kind of an insurance policy would one have to have to be insured against police brutality suffered while demonstrating against an insurance giant?!! ;) Can't wait to see the footage from the NYC demos. Will have to see what's coming up here in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 6:39 pm

Thanks for posting this, dear Panda!

Sunday September 27, 2009, 6:52 pm
I worked for over 30 years in the insurance business, and they have become worse than ever. They need to be stopped, so I'm joining in on this. This is a fight for survival of the US. The people have to win.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 6:53 pm
I don't think I can make it, Pandas, I live in Vermont where there is already a good statewide insurance program and I cannot drive any longer because I am losing my visual acuity.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 6:57 pm
I have been writing, emailing, petitioning, and calling my representative/senators in Congress and the President also. I will not give up. I will not be denied. We can get this done and we have to get it done for American families, for small businesses (and big ones), and for our future. It shouldn't be this hard to do this right, but we have to stand up to the power and money of corruption and never give in.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 7:08 pm
It's about time the other side responds, but in civil ways and proper disobedience. Unlike what we've seen lately in town hall meetings and tea marches with their distateful signs, unfounded claims, festering speeches and venomous phrases, there is such a thing as good disobedience to capture minds and the right attention.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 8:08 pm

All that can be asked is that you ponder taking this action; and that, if you consider it worthy, to forward it.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 8:29 pm


I was about to close down the WWW, I have put alot of "MILEAGE" on it today
when I noticed Just Carole sent this http note in my message box.
t.y. jc.

from the LINK_____"When the civil rights movement faced a similar challenge in the struggle to end segregation, nonviolent civil disobedience moved the nation and made reform possible. Just like the lunch counter sit-ins did for the civil rights movement, we have to make it impossible for the media and our country to ignore how outrageous the status quo of private insurance is for the American people."

___THIS I DO KNOW___
I WAS SEVERELY BRAIN INJURED DUE TO EMPLOYER NEGIGENCE
and the company CUT ME OFF from EVERY ASPECT OF DUE CARE TO MY LIFE
causing VAST SUFFERING TO MY HEALTH as SEIZURES nearly killed Me in a myriad of AGONIZING EFFECT seizure activity had... the INSURER was in fact the COMPANY ITSELF! IT IS SIMPLE: IT WAS CRIMINAL ABUSE!

WHEN A PARENT... leaves a YOUTH unattended...
and MORE INJURY does occur to that YOUTH
the PARENT is SENTENCED to MUCH ORDEAL including FINES etc

the company that VIOLATED MY LIFE and the LIVES of MY LOVED ONES...
it was NOT AT ALL UNDER INVESTIGATON NOR HELD ACCOUNTABLE BY THE USA!
THIS PERIL AFFLICTS MANY USA CITIZENS IN THE LABOR FORCE!

COMPANY INDEBTEDNESS TO us... is likely in the $10s of TRILLIONS!
for their ABUSES!

I DID NOT WANT "us of Care2" to NOT INCLUDE insurance by OWNERSHIP to company in this SERIOUS INJUSTICE TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE! thank you.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 9:08 pm
Panda & Carole,

Being that living in Alaska makes it literally impossible to get to these insurance companie offices, I have instead been like many others in phoning, writing and emailing until I get so bloody angry that they better be happy that I can't get to their home offices....I would scream the their rooftops down if given half the chance.
About a month ago I made the trip to a much fought for Dr.'s appointment after not seeing one for about 3 years. This is after a serious bit of research on my part to find a clinic, doctors office that actually has a real doctor on staff. This is after a battle of making appointments over the last three years to discover upon my arrival to these offices that I was NOT going to see a real doctor, but a P.A. instead. This is after I made it completely clear to them that no substitutes would be accepted under no uncertain terms. When I got the excuses while standing at the appointment counter I refused to accept the appointment, and refused to pay for the office call. They told me that I would be billed anyway because I cancelled without 24 hour notice. I about laughed myself silly over this. Because you see, when I made the appointment 3 months previous I made sure that it was written in the appointment book that no P.A. is acceptable, or patient will cancel appointment upon arrival. And me oh my, guess what....I had a photo copy of that bit of paperwork, right in my purse. I told them the double booking of appointments is no excuse for breaking a contract. That bait and switch was not allowed when it comes to my healthcare, nor for any of any off my families care either. Needless to say.....they stopped the arguing, and I left that Dr.'s office with my money still in my possession, NOT THEIRS.. ..You have to have the ability to say enough is enough, and stick to your guns, and refuse to compromise on your healthcare...period.
It is a blessing that both my hubby & myself have medical insurance that cover ourselves and each other as we both work for the same place. That is all that is good about that bit of info. But because Alaska is far north of anywhere, and ALL medical professionals here in Alaska have taken the nasty side of the line of high pricing ALL healthcare above and beyond the greed factor...your lucky if you don't need a doctor unless you absolutely have to. Almost ALL clinics, dentist, eye doctors demand up front cash for all treatment regardless if your insured or not. Most average office calls are about $125.00-$150.00 for the first visit, and every visit after is about &$75.00. Nice caregivers, are they not? Over 90% of those of us that live here CANNOT afford these outrageous prices, so many people go untreated up until they are forced to go to the emergency room as an end result. Many that have good health insurance here have an allotment in the insurance coverage that covers airfare to the lower 48 for most of the medical needs that cannot be met here.
I share this with you all because the quality of heathcare professionals here is real low. Many of our soldiers on the bases here in Alaska are shipped promptly to the lower 48 for serious health issues rather than take any chances that may result in serious harm from the healthcare, or even death. Yes, there is healthcare on the military bases, but even they know when they can't handle some problems that are far more serious.
So, folks....if I can sign, call and email instead flying south to put my voice into the fray of protest and demand...I will do so with full measure of protest and rightful anger.Sorry about being long winded...but people have to get angry...just so you get heard....this is your life they are playing with. I do believe we are a hell of alot more important than their greedy little fingers in my wallet.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 9:22 pm
Panda your are so right. If ever "We" the people should show force it's now. Healthcare cannot be called healthcare until the health and compassion are put back into the process. Ones health should never have become a commodity. It's a sacrilege what our legislative body have allowed to happen to the health and well being of those who they are suppose to serve, American's..... Gr$$d has ruled the roost for too long...

Like Nick I too know the insurer up close and personal... And let me say this, I have never met a group so hell bent on their bottom line that they would take this nation down in the process. Heartless, Cruel! Would "Dare" call someone who's worked a lifetime, now in need of a healing, a malingerer...Deny them till they just give up and or die...And Ge ARACELI my heart goes out to you because I do know what pain and suffering you've had to endure. It's one reason I began the Dare To Dream Network in 1992. Hang in there Ge ARACELI the American people are about to wake up the legislators who have and continue to fail US.....

Several Dare To Dream Members have been getting signatures for HR 676. That's the bill that Conyers tried to get to the floor but he was not even allowed to express his idea for Single Payer. Conyers and Kucinich have teamed together to get petitions signed so they have ammo which only the people can supply. Their "SIGNATURES" on HR 676! As I tell folks who say what good will my signature do they won't allow any healthcare bill to pass. I simply say, why not? "We" the people say so and this signature is our John Hancock, and it says so...

HR 676 is only 30 pages long, not 1000, and it covers the "Donut Hole" that Senator Kennedy wished to have closed in the Medicare bill. It includes dental and vision provisions. So far the percentage of signers against the non-signers are 90 to 10%.. Looking good! Many folks who sign cannot thank us enough for doing this.. I tell them we're all in this together..

Thank you for rallying the troops Panda! Together "We" the people can be part of the change we need and assist President Obama by doing everything possible to bring it on! I am so pleased that you put this out there and will move it to my Care2 friends and throughout my Dare To Dream Network..Warm wishes are sent your way, Barbara/founder/dtdn www.DareToDreamNetwork.net

Sunday September 27, 2009, 9:38 pm
Ok, the money is where my words are. I signed and will go to a protest to stop these vampires from sucking the life out of our country.

Thanks NICK for the witness of how corrupt these people are. Obama said that he was going to set up a government run Student Loan program because of the waste and added expense to students, further he declared that the program didn't need middle men any more. Health care doesn't need Middle Men any more! EITHER

No MORE Profit from PAIN ! No more Profit from the Sick and Dying ! Health Care IS a RIGHT NOT A PRIVILEGE !! Everyone deserves to live and have access to health care or we don't have the right to "life liberty and happiness."

Sunday September 27, 2009, 10:12 pm
I agree with Nick. Something has to be done to stop the ins. co's.
And the people need to be heard and WIN.
Tx Carole for alerting me.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 11:20 pm
Again thank you Carole for this enlightening, eye opening article.
I am still frustrated with thelack of any moral fiber at all by these insurance companies. They have no remorse but for themselves, and they continue to scrape the bottom of the barrel of at the depth of our humanity.

Quotes on Corruption:

The men with the muck-rake are often indispensable to the well-being of society, but only if they know when to stop raking the muck. - Theodore Roosevelt,

Corruption and hypocrisy ought not to be inevitable products of democracy, as they undoubtedly are today Mahatma Gandhi

The more corrupt the state, the more laws. Publius Cornelius Tacitus

The accomplice to the crime of corruption is frequently our own indifference Bess Myerson

It is said that power corrupts, but actually it`s more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power. David Brin

"I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet."
— Mahatma Gandhi

"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
— Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

"If absolute power corrupts absolutely, where does that leave God?"
— George Deacon

"It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress."
— Mark Twain

"Experience has shown, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny."
— Thomas Jefferson

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back."
— Carl Sagan

"Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power."
— John Steinbeck

"When honor and the Law no longer stand on the same side of the line, how do we choose[?]"
— Anne Bishop (Heir to the Shadows)

"Power-lust is a weed that grows only in the vacant lots of an abandoned mind. "
— Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged)

"Times are not good here. The city is crumbling into ashes. It has been buried under taxes and frauds and maladministraions so that it has become a study for archaeologists...but it is better to live here in sackcloth and ashes than to own the whole state of Ohio."
— Lafcadio Hearn (Inventing New Orleans: Writings of Lafcadio Hearn)

"If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace."
— John Lennon

"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy?"
— Mahatma Gandhi

"I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale."
— Thomas Jefferson

No science is immune to the infection of politics and the CORRUPTION of power.
Jacob Bronowski

The first sign of CORRUPTION in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means.
Georges Bernanos

Those who corrupt the public mind are just as evil as those who steal from the public purse.
Adlai E. Stevenson

“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. Corporations have been enthroned, an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money-power of the country will endeavor to prolong it's reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”
Abraham Lincoln quotes

“In any country where talent and virtue produce no advancement, money will be the national god. Its inhabitants will either have to possess money or make others believe that they do. Wealth will be the highest virtue, poverty the greatest vice. Those who have money will display it in every imaginable way. If their ostentation does not exceed their fortune, all will be well. But if their ostentation does exceed their fortune they will ruin themselves. In such a country, the greatest fortunes will vanish in the twinkling of an eye. Those who don't have money will ruin themselves with vain efforts to conceal their poverty. That is one kind of affluence: the outward sign of wealth for a small number, the mask of poverty for the majority, and a source of corruption for all.”
Denis Diderot quotes

“It is true that so far as wealth gives time for ideal ends and exercise to ideal energies, wealth is better than poverty and ought to be chosen. But wealth does this in only a portion of the actual cases. Elsewhere the desire to gain wealth and the fear to lose it are our chief breeders of cowardice and propagators of corruption. There must be thousands of conjunctures in which a wealth-bound man must be a slave, whilst a man for whom poverty has no terrors becomes a freeman.”
William James quotes

“As a poet there is only one political duty, and that is to defend one's language against corruption. When it is corrupted, people lose faith in what they hear and this leads to violence.”
W. H. Auden quotes

“Wherever you see a man who gives someone else's corruption, someone else's prejudice as a reason for not taking action himself, you see a cog in The Machine that governs us.”
John Jay Chapman quotes

“It is not the young people that degenerate; they are not spoiled till those of mature age are already sunk into corruption.”
santiz Charles de Montesquieu quotes

Corruption, the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty.”
Edward Gibbon quotes

“Money and Corruption Are ruining the land Crooked politicians Betray the working man, Pocketing the profits And treating us like sheep, And we're tired of hearing promises That we know they'll never keep”
Ray Davies quotes

“The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means”
Georges Bernanos quotes

Every clique is a refuge for incompetence. It fosters corruption and disloyalty, it begets cowardice, and consequently is a burden upon and a drawback to the progress of the country. Its instincts and actions are those of the pack.”
Madame Chiang Kai-Shek quotes

“Calvin: Do you believe in the devil? You know, a supreme evil being dedicated to the temptation, corruption, and destruction of man? Hobbes: I'm not sure that man needs the help”
“Peace is the happy natural state of man; war is corruption and disgrace.”
James Thomson quotes

“Corruption never has been compulsory”
Anthony Eden quotes

A government, for protecting business only, is but a carcass, and soon falls by its own corruption and decay.
Amos Bronson Alcott

All institutions are prone to corruption and to the vices of their members.
Morris West

All religions have based morality on obedience, that is to say, on voluntary slavery. That is why they have always been more pernicious than any political organization. For the latter makes use of violence, the former - of the corruption of the will.
Alexander Herzen

And I am saying, how about the other two branches? And putting the pressure on our representatives in the Senate and the Congress, and the court system. They should be counter-acting this corruption, but they are sitting there silent.
Sibel Edmonds

And it is to rock the soul and lead the person to immorality, corruption - to forget their prayers, to forget their God. And thus the world has partaken of the spirit of the Negro race, accepting their ways.
Warren Jeffs

As a columnist, I realize that whatever amount of corruption I expose, half my readers will block it out, although they may get a frisson of joy in the process.
Margaret Carlson

As a consequence, the Court ruled that the limits on campaign spending violated the First Amendment, but it accepted the $1,000 limit on individual contributions on the ground that the need to avoid the appearance of corruption justified this limited constraint on speech.
James L. Buckley

Big government conservatives are spending trillions and wasting billions. Republicans are no longer the party of fiscal conservancy, but the party of runaway spending and corruption.
Sherrod Brown

But eradicating corruption is not enough to sustain a country.
Eduard Shevardnadze

Children also have artistic ability, and there is wisdom in there having it! The more helpless they are, the more instructive are the examples they furnish us; and they must be preserved free of corruption from an early age.
Paul Klee

Communism has never come to power in a country that was not disrupted by war or corruption, or both.
John F. Kennedy

Communism is the corruption of a dream of justice.
Adlai E. Stevenson

Corruption has its own motivations, and one has to thoroughly study that phenomenon and eliminate the foundations that allow corruption to exist.
Eduard Shevardnadze

Corruption is like a ball of snow, once it's set a rolling it must increase.
Charles Caleb Colton

Corruption is nature's way of restoring our faith in democracy.
Peter Ustinov

Corruption is worse than prostitution. The latter might endanger the morals of an individual, the former invariably endangers the morals of the entire country.
Karl Kraus

Corruption never has been compulsory.
Anthony Eden

Corruption, the greatest single bane of our society today.
Olusegun Obasanjo

Corruption, the most infallible symptom of constitutional liberty.
Edward Gibbon

Cutting up fowl to predict the future is, if done honestly and with as little interpretation as possible, a kind of randomization. But chicken guts are hard to read and invite flights of fancy or corruption.
Ian Hacking

Evil has no substance of its own, but is only the defect, excess, perversion, or corruption of that which has substance.
John Henry Newman

Feast of the Holy Cross Does not every man feel, that there is corruption enough within him to drive him to the commission of the greatest enormities, and eternally to destroy his soul?
Charles Simeon

For us Africans, literature must serve a purpose: to expose, embarrass, and fight corruption and authoritarianism. It is understandable why the African artist is utilitarian.
Ama Ata Aidoo

I am a relatively new Member to this Chamber, and it is troublesome to me and I can tell Members it is getting very troublesome to my constituents when they hear this repeated consistent drum beat of a corruption of the democratic process.
Jay Inslee

I filed the ethics complaint against Tom DeLay not because I'm a Democrat and he's a Republican or even because he drew me out of my congressional seat but because he engaged in corruption to further his plans to disenfranchise voters in Texas.
Chris Bell

I have a very steadfast tendency to parent myself, to monitor my development into the person I want to be. I've tried to keep the corruption minimal.
Fiona Apple

I have absolutely no idea what my generation did to enrich our democracy. We dropped the ball. We entered a period of complacency and closed our eyes to the public corruption of our democracy.
Wynton Marsalis

I have always been fascinated by the corruption of power.
Joe Eszterhas

I think we need to start with Philadelphia and make sure that we actually get some election reform in Philadelphia. Actually, a recent election was thrown out by a federal judge because of corruption with the voting process in Philadelphia.
Patrick McHenry

I used to look down on the world for being corrupt, but now I adore it for the utter magnificence of that corruption.
Richard Needham

I want to rid the country of corruption and return our economic environment.
Nestor Kirchner

I weep for the liberty of my country when I see at this early day of its successful experiment that corruption has been imputed to many members of the House of Representatives, and the rights of the people have been bartered for promises of office.
Andrew Jackson

I will be happy with certainly when the corruption index improve.
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi

I would like to end world hunger and create world peace, stop corruption, stop drugs getting to kids.
Kelly Preston

If a country is to be corruption free and become a nation of beautiful minds, I strongly feel there are three key societal members who can make a difference. They are the father, the mother and the teacher.
Abdul Kalam

If vice and corruption prevail, liberty cannot subsist; but if virtue have the advantage, arbitrary power cannot be established.
Algernon Sidney

If, as is natural, you focus on the corruption and on those threatened institutions that are trying to prevent change - even though they don't really know what they're trying to prevent - then you can get pessimistic.
Paul Hawken

In a state where corruption abounds, laws must be very numerous.
Tacitus

In some of the countries where we operate, there is a tradition of corruption, in which the political elites work with business in the framework of unsavory relationships.
Lee R. Raymond

In the final analysis, the incident is seen as originating from an emotional expression of the frustration and anger of the proud people of China who had been subject to ever increasing oppression from without and decadent corruption from within.
Chen Ning Yang

In the lead up to the Iraq war and its later conduct, I saw at a minimum, true dereliction, negligence and irresponsibility, at worse, lying, incompetence and corruption.
Anthony Zinni

In this financial year we will be spending at least $1.5 billion on foreign aid and we cannot be sure that this money will be properly spent, as corruption and mismanagement in many of the recipient countries are legend.
Pauline Hanson

It is not the young people that degenerate; they are not spoiled till those of mature age are already sunk into corruption.
Charles de Montesquieu

Life is a corrupting process from the time a child learns to play his mother off against his father in the politics of when to go to bed; he who fears corruption fears life.
Saul Alinsky

Look at Mexico. We need to make that government better and end the corruption. If people have a better life in their country, they won't come over here.
Tony Garza

Money and corruption are ruining the land, crooked politicians betray the working man, pocketing the profits and treating us like sheep, and we're tired of hearing promises that we know they'll never keep.
Ray Davies

My government will be open. Anyone found guilty of corruption will be dealt with in accordance with the law. If you are corrupt you will have to hang your boots.
George Weah

No pen can give an adequate description of the all-pervading corruption produced by slavery.
Harriet Ann Jacobs

No science is immune to the infection of politics and the corruption of power.
Jacob Bronowski

None of us is guaranteed against failure or corruption of any kind; witness what's going on in the world in this moment, the follies of human nature and the failures of human nature.
Morris West

Obscenity, which is ever blasphemy against the divine beauty in life, is a monster for which the corruption of society forever brings forth new food, which it devours in secret.
Percy Bysshe Shelley

Only the old are innocent. That is what the Victorians understood, and the Christians. Original sin is a property of the young. The old grow beyond corruption very quickly.
Malcolm Bradbury

Other than my hundreds of arrests I really don't have that much experience with the law. While the majority of people aren't corrupt, there certainly is an awful lot of corruption in this country.
James Patterson

Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.
Thomas Jefferson

Over the last decade, at considerable cost to me in money and effort, confronted with ridicule and intimidation, I have brought more than a dozen lawsuits challenging the corruption in the election process in Tennessee.
John Jay Hooker

Peace is the happy natural state of man; war is corruption and disgrace.
James Thomson

Personally I don't think solving corruption is such a big problem.
Imran Khan

Photography does not create eternity, as art does; it embalms time, rescuing it simply from its proper corruption.
Andre Bazin

Public office is supposed to be a public trust. This is a clear sign of the rampant corruption at the highest levels of the Republican leadership.
Bob Etheridge

Rude contact with facts chased my visions and dreams quickly away, and in their stead I beheld the horrors, the corruption, the evils and hypocrisy of society, and as I stood among them, a young wife, a great wail of agony went out from my soul.
Victoria Woodhull

Simply that we are mirroring the trends in society, at any given time smuggling was an issue in the seventies, corruption is an issue today, and we faithfully reflect those issues.
Ajay Devgan

Still, corruption and oppression are far too common threats to the democratic society.
Anna Lindh

The accomplice to the crime of corruption is frequently our own indifference.
Bess Myerson

The beast for me is greed. Whether you read Dante, Swift, or any of these guys, it always boils down to the same thing: the corruption of the soul.
Ben Nicholson

The boxing world is full of all kinds of corruption.
Al Sharpton

The corruption of people is to behave in an inhuman way.
Alan Bullock

The corruption of the American soul is consumerism.
Ben Nicholson

The corruption of the best things gives rise to the worst.
David Hume

The delicate thing about the university is that it has a mixed character, that it is suspended between its position in the eternal world, with all its corruption and evils and cruelties, and the splendid world of our imagination.
Richard Hofstadter

The duty of youth is to challenge corruption.
Kurt Cobain

The fight for justice against corruption is never easy. It never has been and never will be. It exacts a toll on our self, our families, our friends, and especially our children. In the end, I believe, as in my case, the price we pay is well worth holding on to our dignity.
Frank Serpico

The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means.
Georges Bernanos

The first tenet is that you should report corruption regardless of loyalty to incumbent or party.
Linda Tripp

The great constitutional corrective in the hands of the people against usurpation of power, or corruption by their agents is the right of suffrage; and this when used with calmness and deliberation will prove strong enough.
Andrew Jackson

The kind of corruption the media talk about, the kind the Supreme Court was concerned about, involves the putative sale of votes in exchange for campaign contributions.
James L. Buckley

The knife of corruption endangered the life of New York City. The scalpel of the law is making us well again.
Edward Koch

The starting point of sanctification is the filthiness, corruption, or stain of sin.
William Ames

The winner must promote social jusitce, remove corruption and discrmination, and stand against political, cultural and economic plots.
Ayatollah Khamenei

Then there is the worst part of Christianity, which is awful: power, corruption, manipulation... But then again, these feature are ever present in any organization.
Bruce Kent

Therefore, until the day I die, I am going to do what I can, regardless of the cost to me, to try to stop this awful corruption that is destroying our beloved democracy.
John Jay Hooker

Sunday September 27, 2009, 11:32 pm
Medicare/Medicaid has and continues to function at a 3-4% operating rate, there is no reason to assume that Medicare for all will be any more expensive then Medicare is currently. The question is not can we afford it - rather the question is how can afford to not do this. Not the games currently being played in DC, that corruption will solve nothing, in fact it is just another attack by the drug and insurance companies against the American people. We must stand up for single payer, Medicare for all - universal health care...call it whatever -- the fact is we must have this and must apparently fight for this on our own as not even our president is willing to fight insurance or Wall Street and stop the life for profit system that is eroding our country. We have seen the lack of interest and compassion, while the Senate plays mental masturbation, the house claims we (the citizens) are not ready for HR676. Since on this question polls show nearly 70% of us do agree and understand exactly what we need. Universal health care for all citizens, like all civilized countries. The reason Medicare has financial problems is not the cost, rather that each president sans-- Clinton and Carter have used the money for Medicare for their personal projects, we must also demand that this practice STOP.

Count me in! Btw...why does no one ask how we will afford to continue the wars in Iraq-Afghanistan-Pakistan? Wars make money for all the various war profiteer companies which our government has created. Fixed News does not speak for all Americans and it is past time to stand up and be counted.

This may be our last chance for this and the current bills in DC are not in any way helpful to the people just the politicians, health insurance and drug companies.

Sunday September 27, 2009, 11:38 pm
MURDER FOR PROFIT shouldn't be even legal in America! I don't understand how these insurance companies take a persons money, and then deny or delay treatment and literally turn around and then PAY A HIGH COMMISSION to their employee for finding a reason to delay or deny treatment and if the persons dies and they get sued, they pay a half assed fine and go on and do it again and again. Isn't this at least reckless disregard? If I payed someone to kill another person, I'd be in jail, but when an insurance company does it, it's called adding to their "profit margins"??? If I saw a person bleeding to death and walked away and did nothing or saw an accident and walked away it would be manslaughter,or at the least reckless disregard, but insurance companies do it daily to people who pay them. If people don't stand up to them and their ever growing greedy profit margins then we all deserve what we get..( more of the same). Do their CEO's really need a salary to be ( average) 11 MILLION plus and an added billion in stock options? Is "this" why our rates are so high? We have to CALL and WRITE our congresspersons and make them promise us they will fight for a Public Option, period, NO EXCUSES NOW, or just tell them they risk being voted out of office. I have told mine up front I will work my butt off for a replacement if they don't act for the people instead of sit and collect "Campaign donations" from big corp. insurance and health industries.
Seriously people, we all can look at how much blue dog democrats and the republicans get in "campaign donations" for their anti people, anti change votes. These congressman have sold their souls and our lives for money. THIS HAS TO END! INSURANCE COMPANIES ARE BUSING IN PEOPLE TO DISRUPT TOWN HALL MEETINGS AND THERE IS EVEN A WEB SITE ON "TALKING POINTS"! THIS IS A CONSPIRACY TO DISRUPT OUR DEMOCRACY! Look at the indiot reasoning they used, "we'd become a socialist", death panels would happen etc..The TRUE death panels are on the insurance companies payrolls, they are the ones who delay or deny treatment when a person is really ill. We have to scream and stay angry until we get real change now, this year NOT next. No excuses are acceptable.. Look at CIGNA! How many times have they been filed suit against by our own Government for DEFRAUDING MEDICARE, and Social security by 300 BILLION!! No wonder Medicare is broken, and they are still refusing treatent until a person dies. One woman was NOT even told she had breast cancer and by the time she knew it, or was even given a diagnosis, it was too late, they MADE HER DIE! She didn't even get the option of paying for it herself or trying something else to live, instead she walked around with it and is dead now. CIGNA paid out millions in a law suit and most of us never even heard of it because to settle, the family isn't allowed to talk about it.! I DON'T KNOW WHY THESE COMPANIES AREN'T IN JAIL YET! Sorry people, I'm venting, and I'm angry. I had the audacity to hope and I wanted real change, not just a change in the color of my president. I voted for Obama and he needs to see what the GOP is doing and just run over them. Half of them are babbling idiots who assume the world is ending. NONE of them have a soul or a sense of decency! Call your congressperson and get mad people!

Monday September 28, 2009, 6:55 am
Ralph Nader has a new book out that gives a step by step guide to getting a revolution started in the United States.. Watch this interview with him on his new book
Only the Super Rich Can Save Us

Monday September 28, 2009, 8:13 am
Its time for a revolution

Monday September 28, 2009, 8:15 am
I think a revolution might be needed to get the changes we want. But, to go up against the Corporations takes money, big money. The only other way I can think of to bring them down is to refuse to use them. I am afraid there are too many lazy, comfortable people still in existence to allow this to happen. As someone who was unable to get insurance for years and then retired to be put on Medicare, I can attest to the miracle Medicare is...and, how wonderful it is to at last have insurance. We really need Medicare for all. Period. End the wars, begin the coverage!

Monday September 28, 2009, 8:33 am
That's what Nader's book is about. It WILL take big money to get the revolution going. It is his step by step guide and call to action to get key super rich people involved to contribute the resources and money needed to oragnize and mobilize all the small grassroots groups around the country. What is neat as well is that this revolution is for full reform, not just healthcare. It is to get the country back and out of the clutches of the corporations.
It sounds like a cool idea. I can't wait to read it. I can't wait to hear how his rich friends respond to it.

Monday September 28, 2009, 8:53 am
Nader's Raiders and the New American Revolution based on NO Corporate Control of OUR government. We need a Constitutional Revolution to separate Church-Corporate from State NOW! No 50 years ago when Eisenhower
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pWAGgLSCSQ

"Remember, remember the 5th of November, the gun powder treason and plot. I know of no reason why the gun powder treason should ever be forgot."

Remember, remember, as if you could forget, that Corporate American control of our government should never have happened and the next revolution will make sure it is stopped !

This revolution wont take money and guns, it will take awareness, education, and enforcement of our Constitution.

Monday September 28, 2009, 9:08 am
Thanks Panda. I too have signed petitions, made calls, attending insurance company meetings to protest the current insurance company scam and to push for single payer. I will continue to do so.

Monday September 28, 2009, 9:27 am
No one stopped the Birthers or the death panel nuts when they protested and their march was insanity and BS..literally...so why would they stop us?..and yet the true death panels are on the Insurance co.'s, CIGNA who let a woman w/breast cancer die rather then even tell her she had cancer. WHY isn't this depraved indifference, or murder for profit? Corporations are not people. The trouble is some dummy gave them the same rights as people do. We need to flood congress w/calls to demand single payer, Medicare for all and Public Option to be in there period!. CIGNA just was found guilty of a massive defrauding of Medicare by hundreds of millions...and yet they're not jailed? If I defrauded the Government millions I'd be in jail, why is this I wonder?

Monday September 28, 2009, 10:44 am
Lynda,

I so agree with your assessment. Having been there for many years with my Dare To Dream Network, meeting wonderful folks who have been treated like food for the jackals by the slime, called insurance who hire hit man to do their dastardly deeds as you so aptly put it are murderers! I find that I, who at one time was considered someone with great patience can no longer be called a Patient individual..

Watching, assisting, grieving for the least of these who are losing everything has become more then I can bare..The money grabbing health insurers are the biggest leeches in the history of this nation. AIG actually was given OUR MONEY so they could abuse US further. AIG and those like AIG show no mercy because GR$$D has only one intention, to "Dare" leave those who pay outrageous premiums at the wayside to die. Thank you for your assessment Lynda because you certainly, for those who know the truth, touched a vital chord...Wolfweeps great offering...

This is perhaps the most important issue facing America today. A healthy society can function where an unhealthy society cannot. What madness is this? A madness that's become the norm in the "Land of the Free." Whatever happened to the "Brave" that fellow American's would "Dare" treat the health of it's citizens as disposable collateral damage...? Barbara/founder/dtdn

Monday September 28, 2009, 10:48 am
It is good to see so many eyes opening and ears listening.
It took a collapse of the economy, the loss of thousands upon thousands of homes, peoples savings, money markets, so on and so forth to be wiped out, the drop out rate for our children to climb higher each year, our schools crumbling, more and more children going hungry to bed each night, our jobs disappearing, rip offs in every direction, the fact that we hold more prisioners than any other Country in the world, credit cards and banks placing more and higher fees on everything, lack of affordable housing while wages stagnate, the denial of so many to get health care whether they have health insurance or not, seems it almost doesn't matter anymore as the Health Care Industry has us all by the b****, in fact Corporate America has everyone by the b****.
Took all that and more for many in America to wake up. Gee some of the outside World Leaders have been trying to point this out to us. Oh, yes, we were told, don't listen to them, THEY don't have our best interest in mind...only the Few Elites at the Top have our best interests in mind. How silly of us.
So the rose colored glasses are removed from more and more people all the time....As Russell Means of the Lakotah Nation has said, "Welcome to the Reservation!" Now everyone can truly start becoming empathetic to what happened to the First People upon this land. Lets not forget them or this when and if our boats start to rise in the harbour. The model of how to treat or deal with the so called "Indian problem" was all etched in stone and in place, Hilter used this model, so it is now being used by Corporations to screw over everyone. Our Leaders have sold us down the drain with misguided beliefs, turned their head the other way, or they had or are still getting their financial cut in all of this. Follow the money as they say, most of those who hold powerful positions in Government are linked somehow to Corporate America.
The Corportations gooble our resources around the world, tear our Earth apart, tear our Countries apart, tear our communities apart, and tear our families apart. They don't care who lives or who dies as long as the ledger sheet shows a profit.
There is more to it than the Health Care issue....it is the right for all of us to be treated with dignity and respect. That this Earth has a finite amount of space and resources and it has been abused and plundered by the FEW at the EXPENSE of us ALL.
So unless, each and every one of us start to take back our lives then this will continue on and on until, well there is nothing left, our Earth Mother will shake off the species called HUMANS. She will nurse herself back a seed, plant, animal, fish, at a time....but we will be gone. We, the Human, will have destroyed ourselves by allowing a few to do so.
When everyone was happy and content with their TV sets, electric washing machines and power tools then no one really wanted to look at the big picture. But the Corporations got more greedy so they suck out here and there and everywhere so that you have very little left. In actuality they have reached a tipping point for many so people are waking up and saying "wow, when did this all happen?"
It's been happening all along except those people who were warning the majority were treated like they were lunatics or worse they might be "communist, or socialist" or they are hippies who don't wash, all sorts of names for those who warned.
So maybe this tipping point will be a good thing, maybe without wanton consumption our Earth Mother may heal, we won't have the money to fight wars anymore, and our herbal friends who are out there will take care of us and we can take care of them on a barter system.
The thing is, the way things are going now is a true nightmare for many and if it be sit in's, stand up's, peace marches, standing on the corner with posters, everyone has to get out and do something. If you can't drive to places stand on your local street corner with a sign...perhaps the local newspaper will want to know more and interview you. That story may make the local TV news and you won't even have to drive anywhere far. Let others "know" and you'll be surprised at how in time others may also come out of their homes and join you with their signs.
Casey Reed is right, it takes awareness, education, and enforcement of our Constitution!

Monday September 28, 2009, 11:26 am
Thank you Kit, Marion, and Carol for well reasoned articles that are not verbose, are easy to understand and show that you read the article. Your comments are all appreciated and I am learning from them.

Monday September 28, 2009, 11:31 am
WELCOME TO THE RESERVATION! Thank you dandelion because these few words speaks volumes about the reality zone many more Americans are having to face up too. As you said, this did not begin today. It's been festering and looming on the horizon for many years. The events of the last arrogant in your face, abuse of power, years finally raised awareness. It's awakened the complacent, among US, who must now face what betrayal, orchestrated by certain of America's leaders, feels like...

Monday September 28, 2009, 12:46 pm
thank You Radical Panda and Just "C"!

Monday September 28, 2009, 12:57 pm
The public needs a leader to focus on the "Lobbyists" that are getting paid from the insurance companies to shut the health care debate down and in favor of the insurance companies. I call this giving bribes to our representatives who are greedy and insensitive to the needs of the people and should be exposed and voted out of office.

Monday September 28, 2009, 1:18 pm
$1 of every $700 spent in the United States on health care went into ONE PERSONS POCKET!!!!!

His name is Stephen Hemsley President of United Health Care.

That equates to $102,741.68 per HOUR

While millions get no health care at all, and many with health care insurance are denied for all sorts of reasons.
If you haven't watched it copy and paste this link. It is about 5 minutes long, worth the view.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKI9be55N00&feature=player_embedded

People if you don't think its time for a change with these incredible gross profits, profits that the health care companies make are obscene...look at what one man made! If you don't think change is needed then I'm not sure when you will want change. Don't let it be when your son or daughter is denied a life saving procedure, or perhaps yourself.
Thank you Barbara for mention on what I last wrote.

Monday September 28, 2009, 2:16 pm
I was gonna play nice and just push the public option, but now I see who I have been being nice to, doesn't give a hoot about the american people. That's why I'm now for getting profit out of our care. SINGLE PAYER NOW!

Monday September 28, 2009, 2:17 pm

Thank you, Dragonfly!

HR676!

Monday September 28, 2009, 3:55 pm
His name is Stephen Hemsley President of United Health Care.

That equates to $102,741.68 per HOUR

And the son of a bitch is probably laughing at all the people he killed by denial of coverage, and all the people who managed to survive but went broke. We need to find some way to make this sob pay dearly. He must be made to be fearful for his very life, and those in the same position he is with other health insurance companies. Madoff would be proud of them. Health insurance as it exists today is a PONZI SCHEME, a protection racket, and a scam. They are cheating a lot of people. Why aren't state attorney generals working against these scumballs? Ganglynching these evil sobs should show them a lesson!!! Revolution!!! Bring it on!!!

Monday September 28, 2009, 3:57 pm
WAS SEVERELY BRAIN INJURED DUE TO EMPLOYER NEGIGENCE
and the company CUT ME OFF from EVERY ASPECT OF DUE CARE TO MY LIFE
causing VAST SUFFERING TO MY HEALTH as SEIZURES nearly killed Me in a myriad of AGONIZING EFFECT seizure activity had... the INSURER was in fact the COMPANY ITSELF! IT IS SIMPLE: IT WAS CRIMINAL ABUSE!

This is corporate America for you.

Monday September 28, 2009, 7:30 pm
Health Care and the Military Industrial Complex are the BEST examples of Corrupt Capitalism.

It is time we became the society envisioned in our Constitution and enforce the 1st Amendment to separate Church=Corporation and State.

Socialism is democracy when compared to despotic systems such as feudalism and tyrants or even the military system.

When you enforce the Constitution, our government is socialist, but it can't become despotic because of the laws protecting the individual's rights, not the government, or groups, or special interests. The Constitution protects the rights of the individual because the government, groups, and special interests are a threat to the individual and their rights.

Single Payer is socialism in it's best form. Look at any country with socialized medicine and the health of the people are better than the health of people in the U.S. Cuba has the highest quality health care and they do it with the U.S. economic sanctions preventing them from being able to trade or export and import goods in and out of their country for the last 40 years. Which country is despotic? The country with free health care or the one with 50 million with no access to health care, unless they are dying because the insurance companies are running the government?

Corpotocracy is despotic and the tyrants make billions of dollars with the government's approval, so the government is despotic and is violating the people's rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Who can live well or be free if they are sick and can't get care, much less being happy?

Health Care in the U.S. is a violation of our Constitutional Rights! Single Payer Now! That has been true for 50 years.

Monday September 28, 2009, 7:47 pm
Single Payer is reaching new heights with the amount of signatures we've collected in the little town of Abiquiu, NM..I will fill all of you in after we're done and get the sigs sent off to Washington.. During this sign up which we are still working on we met folks from France, Canada and other areas of Europe shopping at the local store, BODIES. And what they all had in common was to say, "What took America so long to get here?" You have no idea how many American's could not thank those of US taking signatures, enough...The stories were many and some very sad.. But at least 90% were for Single Payer especially if we are unable to lock in Public option...

Monday September 28, 2009, 9:31 pm
I signed. I'm in. It's about time!

Monday September 28, 2009, 9:51 pm
How can we trust insurance companies and big pharma with our health. We can't even trust them to tell the truth, or not poison us to death. If they were about our well-being....they'd first, cause no harm. I won't have anything to do w/ the lot of them.

Tuesday September 29, 2009, 4:50 pm
Wow! Keep up the momentum! Great thoughts, everyone.

Tuesday September 29, 2009, 6:22 pm
Noted, voted, I am in.....