Health Care on the Road to Neo-Feudalism
By: emptywheel Tuesday December 15, 2009 8:53 pm
Consider, first of all, this fact. The bill, if it became law, would legally require a portion of Americans to pay more than 20% of the fruits of their labor to a private corporation in exchange for 70% of their health care costs.
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It’s one thing to require a citizen to pay taxes-to pay into the commons. It’s another thing to require taxpayers to pay a private corporation, and to have up to 25% of that go to paying for luxuries like private jets and gyms for the company CEOs.
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They will, at a minimum, be asked to pay 9.8% of their income to the insurance company. And if they have a significant medical event, they’ll pay 22%…
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But for those who think we can fix it, consider this, too. If the Senate bill passes, in its current form, it will mean that the health care industry was able to dictate-through their Senators Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson-what they wanted the US Congress to do. They will have succeeded in dictating the precise terms of legislation.
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When this passes, it will become clear that Congress is no longer the sovereign of this nation. Rather, the corporations dictating the laws will be.
I understand the temptation to offer 30 million people health care. What I don’t understand is the nonchalance with which we’re about to fundamentally shift the relationships of governance in doing so.
We’ve seen our Constitution and means of government under attack in the last 8 years. This does so in a different-but every bit as significant way. We don’t mandate tithing corporations in this country-at least not yet. And it troubles me that so many Democrats are rushing to do so, without considering the logical consequences.
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in a way, is do we refuse people care, or not?
Right now we don’t refuse people care. You can have all your assets seized, but you cannot be refused care.
So, either we move into a 19th century sort of situation where we actually have to trip over the poor sods dying in the street (though we’re moving that way a bit already) or we move into a situation where we continue to fund an unsustainable, underregulated health care system.
If we choose the former…well, then we become more transparently what we already are, in some ways.
If we choose the latter, then what do we do when THAT collapses?
What part of “These solutions are well beyond unacceptable” don’t the Feds understand?
It was really just noise relative to the signal concerning the mandate. Only radical opposition matters. Reasoning and cajoling the unreasonable and uncajolable is stupid.
Barack Obama is not “ineffectual.” He’s a total fucking dick.
until your electric bill goes to $500 bucks a month, gas is ten bucks a gallon and people start croaking from the swine vaccine debacle. I mean all of it made me rethink the remote survivalist compound way back in the woods. Right here in ex-suburbia it’s going to become remote. And for what?
Drug tests for my daughter?
by standing on the tracks in front of it.
Worst president (and congress) ever.
emptywheel is dead right spot on.
This has got to be unconstitutional.
Ive been against the mandate from day one, but I tried to understand with my little pea brain, that having the Big Pool is what makes it all work bla bla bla. Even an “inclusive robust” Public Option was always a stretch for me if the trade off was accepting the mandate.
Call me a purist, I dunno. I thought this was AMERICA!!!!!!! 🙂