Reflection on Health Care Legislation

Reflections on Current Events

There has been a discussion on a local blog, OlyBlog, whether we should support the current health care legislation even though it is flawed. This is what I posted. today, November 9, 2009.

With regards to the recent discussion on health-care, as we all know, the current health care system is dysfunctional—50 million uninsured, many millions more,  under-insured. Millions can’t afford insurance or get turned down for needed health-care. The profits of the pharmaceuticals, the health insurance companies are obscene as are salaries of top hospital officials, many doctors and other executives in this health for profit system.  In any good system, health care would be a human right and no one would get rich or profit of other people’s health needs. To me, in addition to single payer health care, it would include a greatly expanded system of public and free clinics that are public and/or non-profit but paid for by the government and financed by higher taxes on high income people.  It should cover immigrants, reproductive health including abortion, dental and vision care, mental health and modern as well as alternative medicine.

The bill that narrowly passed the U.S. House of Representatives on Saturday, November 6th by five votes is clearly not that. This bill,  if it  became law,  would increase coverage for low income people by expanding Medicaid and provide some subsidies for insurance premiums for working class people and that is certainly positive. So are penalties for employers who do not provide health insurance although they should be larger. The requirement that insurance companies provide health insurance to those with prior conditions is a step in the right direction.  However, because of the very limited controls on what insurance companies will be able to charge and the limited public option,  it  will  keep health care insurance extremely expensive and unaffordable to many, and  lead to big increases in insurance company and pharmaceutical profits.

Olympia Single Payer Action (OSPA) took the position that we would oppose a bill that did not have the option for States to have a single payer plan, the Kucinich amendment. The reasoning was that only single payer has the possibility of providing affordable and quality health care for all. The question is how we get to single payer, which is a strategic and tactical question. It is imperative that we explain in easy to understand language the concept of a single payer system and that we advocate for and build a powerful movement for health care as a human right for all.  To advocate for less than this guarantees we will get less. Our main task should be  building a strong and growing movement. We have not done that yet. However, that 49% of the U.S. population, according to Phil Owen on OlyBlog, already support single payer is incredibly high, given the absence of this position in the mainstream media and by most politicians. I am sure it means far less than 49% are opposed to a single payer plan  as many are unsure or undecided.  It shows the potential of getting a large majority in favor of real health care reform.

Olympia Single Payer Action (OSPA) is focusing on building a movement for single payer with a possible state wide initiative in the not too distant future. Possibly, on the bill that passed the U.S. House of Representatives 0n November 6th, our position should have been slightly different than what it was:  that we, OSPA, would only support a bill that permitted States to have a single payer option. Will the current bill if passed be a step towards quality and affordable health care for all or will it foreclose the possibility of major and needed future reform?  I do not know.

Advocating for fundamental changes in health care and not supporting the bill that passed the House does not mean lack of concern for the poor. It means concluding that now  is a very good time, because health care reform is being debated, to make visible and advocate for and organize for quality health care as a basic right, and for  a system that could really improve health care for all but especially for poor people. Peter Bohmer

Brief reflection on Ecovergence Conference

Reflections on Current Events, talks

Econvergence was a success. There were over 80 panels, most very informative. The talk by Noam Chomsky on “Why Elites Fail” was very powerful and complete and should be up on our web-site soon. Most of the attendees were from Portland and Olympia as were most of the panelists. There were panelists from Mexico City, California, Vancouver, BC, and New York City.  Most people I spoke to felt they learned a lot and felt a little bit more part of a movement than before attending.  The outreach could have been better. We are currently discussing whether to try something similar in the future in Portland Vancouver, Olympia or some other place, and whether a regional or local gatherings make more sense.

Check out the website, Econvergence: Northwest Gathering on the Economic and Ecological Crises which we hope to maintain.

The schedule is now posted on line. So is the application for scholarships.   There are about 100 panels. The movie,  Plunder, by Danny Schecter, who will introduce it,  will be premiered Thursday night, October 1st. The conference is free except for two speakers, Noam Chomsky, Friday night and Derrick Jensen, Saturday night. There are scholarships for those two talks. Go to the website for the application. Tickets for Chomsky are $20, students and low income; $40 for living wage, and $60 for donors. Chomsky is sold out but you can get seats in rooms next to where he is speaking.  It will be shown live. For Derrick Jensen, they are $10, $20 and $30 respectively. Email me at peterbohmer@yahoo.com for more info.

The struggle in Honduras continues

Upcoming events

Lisa Sullivan, spoke in Olympia on the current situation in Honduras and Venezuela and the growth of the left throughout Latin America on Wednesday, September 30th at 1:30 and 7 P.M.

Right now, the elected President of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya is taking refuge in the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa, Honduras after returning clandestinely to Honduras after being overthrown in a military coup. The U.S. right-wing is playing a major role in supporting this illegal coup.   Lisa Sullivan in her talks pointed out the aim by the right-wing of Honduras to stay in power until the next scheduled elections in Honduras, November 28th. What is exciting and positive is the growth h of the popular movements in Honduras who in spite of serious repression are calling for the return of Zelaya to the presidency.

Lisa Sullivan recently traveled to Honduras with Fr. Joe Mulligan and seven others to demand democracy be restored by reinstating the elected President Zelaya who had been ousted by a military coup. Sullivan had just been to Honduras the month prior to the coup, asking President Zelaya to stop sending his troops to the School of the Americas/ WHINSEC for training. Sullivan has already met seven Latin American Presidents making similar requests, with some success. Sullivan will share with us her overall impressions of the recent political and economic changes in Latin America and the U.S. role there.

Wednesday, September 30th:

Evergreen State College

Sem. 2, E 1105 at  1:30 P.M.

Talk:  The Latest Developments in Honduras!

and

Traditions Cafe  at 7PM

5th and Water-downtown Olympia

Talk: The significance of what is happening in Honduras and Venezuela for liberation and justice in Latin America

BIO: Lisa Sullivan directs the Latin American office of the School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) and leads its Partnership America Latina (PAL). Born, raised and educated in the United States, Sullivan studied and lived in Mexico and Guatemala during the 1970s. She married and moved to Bolivia to work among the poor as a lay Maryknoll community worker. She raised her three children living and working among the poor in the barrios of Bolivia and Venezuela. For the past 32 years she has lived in different countries of Latin America currently residing in Venezuela for more than 20 years.

NO Charge!

Event Sponsored by Latin American Solidarity Organization (LASO) and the Political Economy and Social Movements Program at Evergreen.

Call Peter at 867-6431 for more info.

Note:  Lisa Sullivan will also be talking at the Econvergence conference in Portland, October 3 and 4.

Reflection on the U.S. Economy, September 2009

Reflections on Current Events, Talks, Writings

by Peter Bohmer

In the short-run, it is very likely that a total financial collapse has been averted and that the free fall in the United States of Gross Domestic Production (GDP) and employment has come to an end.  There will probably be an increase in GDP for the third quarter, 2009 and most mainstream economists and the media will say that the recession is over. This will be true in the way that recession is officially defined. However, in the more important sense of people’s economic lives, employment  is likely to continue falling or increase at a rate slower than the increase in population meaning that unemployment, measured and unmeasured, is likely to continue growing. Given the high rates of unemployment and underemployment and the lack of bargaining power of workers, real wages are likely to continue to fall as are employee benefits. Given the continued budget deficits of most States and cities, public employees are also facing a future in the short run of no wage increases.  Public services will continue to deteriorate.  Housing foreclosures are likely to continue at a high rate. Poverty and unemployment will remain high. As Barbara Ehrenreich and Dedrick Muhammad, pointed out in the New York Times, Sunday, September 13th, depression like conditions have been created in the Black community in the last two years and are likely to persist. In communities,  based on manufacturing and construction there has also been an economic depression with no relief in sight.

The 2009 stimulus package of the Obama Administration although smaller than desirable and somewhat misdirected has had a positive effect in stimulating output and employment and in averting a full-scale economic depression. The other part of economic policy that begun under Bush and has been continued by the Obama administration has been the injection of huge infusions of money into failing banks, and financial institutions such as AIG, Citibank and Fannie Mae. Without these infusions, these institutions would have gone bankrupt. However, far cheaper and more economically just policies such as direct mortgage relief to homeowners, and nationalizing financial institutions with the purpose of providing credit to support people in need and desirable investment by businesses and cooperatives and public investment were not considered. This is because of the power of Wall Street and the extreme capitalist ideology of the Democrats and Republicans.

A generalized economic depression has been averted in the short run but with the likelihood that another and possibly even more severe financial collapse and recession/depression is  likely to reoccur in the not too distant future.  The necessary structural changes in the economy and significant financial regulation that would provide some economic stability and reduced financial speculation are increasingly unlikely.

There are different structures of accumulation that shape capitalist development. The  social structure of accumulation of the U.S. economy and the global economy for the last 30 years has been a neoliberal one, marked by growing inequality of income and wealth, privatization, deregulation of corporations and finance within and between borders,  and the dominance of financial capital. The financial bubble and near collapse were the non-surprising outcomes of this financialization.

A new social structure of accumulation  has been promoted by liberal economists such as Robert Reich, Jamie Galbraith, Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz.  It would incorporate much tighter regulation of finance, universal health care, massive public investment in rail, mass transit, green technology, public subsidies for the develop of alternatives to oil based energy systems, some increases in taxes on the wealthy and restrictions on executive income, and  increased public spending for education and for reducing poverty. It is what Van Jones in his book, Green Collar Economy, has called a Green New Deal.  This would still be capitalism and would not end exploitation and poverty, militarism and imperialism, nor environmental destruction and alienation. We would still need to replace it.  It would not end economic depressions and the business cycle. However, this Green New Deal would reduce the probability of another even worse financial collapse and severe economic recession/depression in the next few years. While clearly being insufficient for economic and social and environmental justice, it would provide a social structure of accumulation for reducing unemployment and inequality.

The conditions for a future financial bubble and collapse have not been altered.  Wall Street has not been restrained. It is highly unlikely that even in the midst of the worst recession/depression since the 1930’s that financial derivatives and the casino economy will be meaningfully regulated. The economic system is still very fragile and highly leveraged with debt. Although unlikely in the immediate future, the financial system could unravel if the market for securities in commercial mortgages or another type of securitized asset (bond) collapses.  The top 10% of the population now have an income equal to the bottom 90% of the population; the 13,000 households with the highest incomes have an income equal to the 40 million with the lowest incomes. (Left Business Observer, #120). Besides this inequality being obscene, it means that the majority will continue to  go increasingly into debt to buy what they need. Consumer debt will grow.

The so-called economic recovery we will increasingly be hearing about will be a jobless recovery. Employment will  start growing no later than summer, 2010 but unemployment and particularly underemployment will stay high. Unless wages grow significantly which will not happen unless there is a huge growth in the militancy and strength of the labor movement, consumption spending will restrained, limiting the growth of employment.  Manufacturing will continue to decline and the quality of life for the majority and global warming will worsen unless we rise up and organize and revolt.

The possibility of growing social movements is real and hopeful. The Obama Presidential campaign has led to an increased interest, especially by young people and Black people in public affairs and social change.  The gloss of Obama’s victory is wearing off. The U.S. occupation of Afghanistan is increasingly unpopular at home.  So is the frustration and anger at the absence of meaningful healthcare reform. The limitations of what President Obama can or wants to do are becoming more apparent every day.

Just like the expectations raised by John Kennedy and the limitations of the reforms he proposed spurred massive activism in the 1960’s, this can happen again now. Let us build and connect movements and issues as we organize and struggle for significant and meaningful reforms and revolution.

Don’t Mourn, Organize!

Si Se Puede!

Observations on Obama’s health care speech

Reflections on Current Events, Upcoming events

I watched President Obama’s health care speech last night, Wednesday, September 9th,  and it was about what I expected. There was no mention at all of a plan that would really mean universal and affordable health care coverage. The idea of a single payer plan where you could choose you health care provider and the government would negotiate how much they would pay to the hospital, doctor, dentist, etc. was totally absent in Obama’s discussion.

Obama did mention that he favored a public option where people who did not have health care coverage and maybe small businesses could pay a monthly fee to the government and in return would have their health care covered.  Even here Obama mentioned that he was willing to compromise further on this idea  and that the plan would have to be self-supporting.  Insurance companies are likely to increase their profits as more people will be required to have coverage and  the public plan will be limited. The subsidies to low and moderate income are likely to be quite low meaning that health care will still be unaffordable for many people.

Obama excluded abortions from his proposals and excluded any money going to undocumented immigrants.  Both of these are things we need to fight for.

The behavior of many of the Republicans was reprehensible, it looked like the white citizens councils of the 1960’s–overwhelmingly white and male and reactionary.

On a more hopeful note on Tuesday, September 8th, I joined the Mad as Hell Doctors Tour which was a caravan of mainly doctors that started in Portland, went to Seattle and will caravan to D.C. demanding Single Payer Health Care. The main group sponsoring the caravan is Physicians for a National Health Plan. (Check out their excellent web-site). At a very exciting town hall meeting that   these two group organized, a group of very persuasive doctors talked about how the for profit health system prevented them and other health care providers form carrying out their mission of curing people.

Single Payer makes so much sense. Doug Henwood in the latest issue of Left Business Observer examines why the capitalist class, the corporate elite, so strongly opposes single payer. He argues that the big health insurance companies are  only a small part of Corporate America and not very significantly interlocked with them. They should not have the power by themselves to stop single payer.  He concludes that major corporations in other sectors fear the loss of profits that would occur to the large health insures like Aetna,  Humana, etc might happen to them next and thus oppose it.  Henwood also adds that if  workers had good health care independent of their jobs they would be less afraid to lose their jobs and more willing to fight for better working conditions and wages which could reduce profits. To these reasons i would  add that the insurance companies and the pharmaceuticals are fighting against it with all their energy and power and the rest of the elite does not want to oppose them.

We need to build a grass roots movement to fight for single payer health care. The next meeting of the newly formed Olympians for Single Payer Action is Tuesday, September 15th at 7 P.M at the Olympia Center, downtown.

Organizing for Health Care for All

Reflections on Current Events, Upcoming events

There is a rally at 5 P.M today Monday, August 31st  at Sylvester Park calling for Health Care for and a Town Hall Meeting at 7 P.M. at the Washington Center meeting called by Congressperson Brian Baird.

There will also be an meeting to organize for single payer health, tomorrow, Sept., 1 at 7 PM at the Olympia Center (see below)

My thoughts on the current health care debate and reform plans follow.

It is important that we stand up to the right-wing attack on health care reform. We should challenge the lies of the right and their love of our current  broken health care system with 50 million uninsured and many millions more with inadequate coverage.  This does not mean that we should support Obama’s and the House and Senate Democrats health care plan no matter what they propose.

A decent health plan would cut out the insurance companies and include dental care, mental health care, prescription drugs and alternative medicine and be affordable to low and moderate income people and include coverage for immigrants. This together with a lot of federally funded and community controlled free clinics could make for a quality health care system for all, real universal health care.

Single Payer or Medicare for all is not even being considered by the Democratic Party leadership. It should be and should be raised by us in all forums including Town Halls, in rallies, in letters to the editor. We should not just support Obama and Congressperson  Baird because their  inadequate health reform plans are being attacked by the insurance companies and Fox News.

The so-called public option would permit people not being currently covered by their employer or by already existing public programs to choose a Medicare like plan where they would pay a monthly fee to the federal government and they could choose their doctor, hospital, etc. If the government could negotiate lower rates they would pay to hospitals, doctors, pharmaceutical companies this public option plan could be quite a bit cheaper than one from a private insurance company. One growing problem is that the public option may either be removed from the proposed legislation or so weakened with restrictions that it will basically be meaningless. For example, if the government cannot try to get sharply reduced prices for prescription drugs or hospital stays, and/or if it disproportionately covers the sickest people who have the most needs and costs and the public option choice  must break even and not cost the government any money,  its price to people who purchase it will be very high. The price of this public option will be even higher if it has to break even immediately and/or hold large reserves. With these possible restrictions, compromises the public option will not be affordable and will not put much pressure on insurance companies to reduce its prices.  These are the restrictions on it being proposed in Congress by influential Democrats such as Senator Schumer of New York.

So let us build a movement for a health-care plan that really is accessible to all and affordable  and that is paid for by taxes on the wealthy and on corporations.  This is what we should organize and educate for rather than supporting the positions of President Obama, Congressman Baird and Senators Cantwell and Murray because the Republicans are attacking them. Their plans will leave many people without health coverage and the insurance companies will continue to make billions.

Let us make our voices heard today for a single payer health care system for all.
Monday, August, 31st 5 P.M–Rally at Sylvester Park for Health Care
7 P.M–Town Hall meeting with Brian Baird  at the Washington Center

Let’s organize locally for a single payer system for all:
Tuesday, Sept. 15th, from 7 – 9 pm
Olympia Community Center in downtown Olympia,  Room 204
222 Colombia St. NW

Also check out the music video that follows.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UU8cPNcjKs