Here is an honest argument about the health care debate .

It explains how and why the republicans and their corporate masters are willing to under cut the attempt at finally fixing our failed system.

“Universal” health care plans have been running in many rich western countries for decades, and while there are no perfect systems, and cost pressures build up there as well, the satisfaction level to date is generally high, much higher than in the US. While at the same time the costs of these systems are way lower than anything the US has been able to come up with. So why the extensive talk, why does the US need to re-invent the wheel? Just look around and pick a tried and true system, like Norway, France, Germany. They’re all cheaper and they all function better. And if you don’t believe that, ask yourself why none of these countries is presently involved in exasperating talks about their systems.

So why does Washington try to invent the wheel? The answer is easy. The difference between US and Western European health care lies exclusively in the political power acquired by corporate industries, in this case -mainly- a combination of drug manufacturers (closely linked to the chemical industry) and insurance companies (which are in turn closely linked to Wall Street banks). The US needs to fabricate its own system because it needs to satisfy the perverted influence industry has on not just health care itself, but also on the political process.

US health care spending is over 15% of GDP, and within 10 years it will be 20% (there’s your bubble). That means today’s dollar total is about $2.2 trillion (that’s Britain’s entire GDP), and we’re on our way to $3 trillion. If the US would adopt a Western European system, it might save 50% of these costs. And a few very powerful corporations would lose $1 trillion per year in revenues. That’s all you need to know about the reason why there will be no significant reform. Sick people are big business. And big business runs the nation.

Ilargi: Automatic earth

Simple when you think about it.

We are the ones saying OUR system is broken

Not the Canadians,

Not the British,

Not the French,

Not the Germans,

Not the Swedish,

Not the Norwegians,

Not the Swiss;

No matter how much the reich wing maligns the foreign health care systems, with their RNC talking points, it is the USA not the other countries who is working to fix a severely flawed system, which is failing many many American citizens when they need it the most.

The right can’t admit that so they try to stifle the facts with buzz words like socialism, government mandated care, fear mongering thru total outright fabrications like the government is gonna kill old people or make it harder to get care. They claim the changes will take away what they people have now and replace it with a system they claim doesn’t work. Or that the government is going to micromanage which doctor you can see, and what care that particular doctor can give.

The right claim a modern government run system can’t work, even though the rest of the modern nations in Europe and Canada have it. Even here in the United States more people receive their health care from government sponsored insurance sources, Medicaid, Medicare, Government employees insurance , and of course the government run systems Military health care and the Veterans Administration; then through a private health care insurance system.

One of the truly amazing and depressing things about the health reform debate is the persistence of fear-mongering over “socialized medicine” even though we already have a system in which the government pays substantially more medical bills (47% of the total) than the private insurance industry (35%).

Paul Krugman

Which means what is being proposed is not socialized medicine, but socialized insurance. In socialized medicine the doctors and hospitals are owned and directly financed from the government,

The VA and military systems are the only thing we really have that comes close, and for the most part they receive ratings above the private sector. All but the British are single payer public insurance systems, or some form of that system, where the doctors remain in the private sector, and receive payments from the government run insurance system. Only the British is an actual government run health care system where the doctors work directly for the government.

However for some reason the republicans and right wing fight tooth and nail against what seems to work very well for the rest of the world. They are trying to preserve our system where we spend more money and end up with 47 million uninsured, people losing their insurance when they need it the most. Other people with pre-existing conditions not even being able to get insurance because that cuts into the bottom line. People worried about their health care and how to pay for it, and of course the hundred of thousands of people who lose everything due to illness and the costs here in the USA.

The reason is simple; the more control the large corporations have the more profits they make. It is really about corporate profits in the end. The more the government makes sure care like the veterans and congress critters get, is provided to the rest of America, the less corporate profit can be skimmed off the top before any “care” is ever considered by the Insurance and Pharmaceutical corporations. So each time any suggestion of fixing the system, the health care corporate industrial conglomerates spend many millions mis-informing, fear mongering, and handing large amounts of money to certain politicians to stop reform, all in the name of ever higher profits.

It really is that simple

Their profits mean more to them, then our health, and they want the system to stay that way.