Medicare

[nacktman]

Thank you usmc1 for this idea on the new thoughts and ideas thread.

Medicare should be of grave concern to everyone.
How about it, then, what are your thoughts on Medicare?

[MJ_KC]

I am glad that I do not have to be the one to decide what medical and drug coverage to provide and just how to pay for it. We owe it to retirees to see that they are taken care of, but this is going to be something that will be harder to pay for as the number of retirees grows.

I don't really see any option other than to fully fund Medicare, even if we have to cut back spending in some other areas. Some tough choices will need to be made in the coming years.

[earthpassenger(Kevin)]

I believe in Medicare for all. We in America, of course spend more for health care than any one else but don't get the most.

I'm in favor of H.R. 676, which is the single payer Medicare for all bill. It was introduced by John Conyers, Dennis Kucinich, Jim McDermott and Donna Christensen.
The physicians for a national health program is a physicians organization (an alternative to the A.M.A. which has a long complicated not so pretty history)supporting single payer reform.
www.pnhp.org

Here's a website with resources supporting single-payer reform and archived artiicles on the precarious health care situation in various states:
www.everybodyinnobodyout.org
Health Affairs is a journal that has a lot of studies of the health care situation In America and basically supports comprehensive reform:
www.healthaffairs.org

These are places to go for some decent info to counter what you might be hearing if you have a G.O.P. congressperson (like I do ) who just says America has the best health care system in the world.
I'm opposed to the efforts to corrupt the current medicare through privatization (and other tax payer subsidised bonanzas for the super-powerful Health Insurance and Pharmaceutical lobby--like Part D in its present form.)
Peace,
Kevin

[earthpassenger(Kevin)]

In a column in the New York Times about a week ago Paul Krugman pointed out that Medicare Advantage plans are a form of sham privatization.
Under the recent Medicare restructuring law that Bush advocated, which created the Medicare Part D boondoggle, two dollars is being taken out of ordinary Medicare enrollees monthly payments and being put under the control of these
"privatized" accounts.

When you pay your taxes you have the choice to check off yes or no if you want money to go to candidates running for President. But apparently Medicare beneficiaries are not being given this kind of choice under the new Medicare legislation.

The money could have been used to keep Medicare more efficient and more in line with its purpose which is to protect retired Americans from the discrimination against the elderly and those who are actually in need of health care under the private insurance industry's historic practice of "experience rating"--basically weeding out people who are more likely to need health care and who make insurance companies less profitable. The more common term for this practice is, of course, 'Cherry picking'.

Peace,
Kevin