Obamacare - No Advantages for Seniors

Summing It Up:
1. Obamacare cuts $156 billion from Medicare Advantage (MA) Plans
2. Up to half of the 14 million Seniors with MA's could need new health care plans as MA's are dropped or have fewer benefits at greater costs
3. AARP will reap windfall profits as it sells a competing insurance plan
4. President Obama illegally took $8 billion to avoid MA cuts hitting Senior's in October and hurting his re-election
Read on for the full details...
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Until the past week I have felt like the prophet shouting doom in the wilderness which no one heard. I tried to tell everyone how unfair Obamacare was. That it paid for the uninsured by taking away from Seniors and the disabled. No one listened. Until now. The Romney Ryan ticket is finally getting the hypocrisy of Obamacare out in the open. Here are the facts, yes, actual facts about one facet of Obamacare.


The claim that you can keep your insurance under Obamacare is not true for the 14 million people who have Medicare Advantage (MA) Plans. President Obama intends to partly pay for Obamacare by gutting $156 billion from MA's over the next ten years. He claims the cuts are against the greedy doctors, hospitals and insurance companies, not Seniors. How stupid does he think we are? All cuts will of course be passed down to Seniors. Both left and right agree that these cuts will impact Seniors, they only disagree on how badly it will hurt Seniors.


What are MA's? They are a pay per use health plan through private insurance companies ranging from inexpensive HMO's to more expensive PPO's. Nearly one-fourth of all Seniors have this plan from a variety of private insurance companies competing for them. When I became disabled I quickly learned that the 20% copay under Medicare added up to more than I could afford. So I bought an annual MA plan with Humana, getting their PPO for just for $80 a month. I get to keep all my specialists and pay from $5-$35 on average per visit. Hospital stays and at home care are reasonable and if I were fit I could even use a free gym membership. I love my MA, which says a lot considering how much I need and use it.


Yet once Obamacare cuts start, analysts expects enrollments in MA's to drop by up to half of the 14 million people currently using these plans. Some insurance companies will stop offering MA's while other plans will offer less benefits yet become prohibitively expensive. There goes President Obama's claim that if you like your health care you will get to keep it. Wrong! Not only does Obama know this but he is lying to us about it and I do not use the word lightly.



The cuts were to start in January, but as you sign up for MA's in October then Senior's would see the impact of the cuts right before the election. That could lose the election for Obama. To prevent this, the president raided $8 billion from a fund to be used for something else. The Government of Accounting came out and said this was an illegal usage of this money. But once again the president is getting away with a clearly unconstitutional act for the sole reason of trying to fool Americans in order to get re-elected.




Here's another fact not discussed. Once cuts take affect and Seniors lose their current MA's or find them too costly they will look for new health insurance. Guess who does not sell MA's but does sell competing insurance plans and expects to make a huge windfall profit from Seniors replacing their MA's? AARP! Now do you understand why they support Obamacare? I just heard Obama's campaign manager say that Obamacare must be good if AARP supports it. Bullshit. Of course AARP loves Obamacare! AARP will make millions in profit from new members who move away from the decimated MA's. If AARP truly cared about Seniors they would be against this plan which hurts the 14 million Seniors on Medicare Advantage Plans.




One final fact. You must be 65 to qualify for most other plans, including AARP's. So once Obamacare starts cutting Medicare Advantage Plans, then as a 54 year old disabled person, I am screwed. Yes a few insurance companies will sell another plan to me but at a cost ranging from $350 to $1200 a month! It is rough enough coping with my disabilities but now I am truly afraid of the future when Obamacare raids my Medicare Advantage Plan. If my MA is dropped then I am back to just the 20% copay with Medicare, which is terrifying.
Without my Medicare Advantage Plan, my choices become bankruptcy, or to postpone or even not have medical care, including operations to save my limbs or even my life. Overly dramatic? Not really.




In 2009, for example, I needed four separate operations adding up to medical expenses of just over $500,000 for the year! Through my MA, I paid $12k, a lot, but reasonable, since if I only had Medicare I would have owed 20% or $100,000! The April surgery saved my right leg, two others were to save my left leg, is keeping them worth bankruptcy? People might be forced to ask questions just like this under Obamacare. So I have every reason to fear the cuts to this wonderful MA health insurance plan. And to wonder in what world is it right that Obamacare is paid for at the expense of disabled Americans, the very people who depend on health care the most?




Now compare Obamacare to the proposed Romney/Ryan plan. First and most importantly, they say it will not impact anyone over 55, unlike Obamacare which is paid for by taking funds from the Senior's Medicare Advantage Plans. Then I just read that the Republican plan using vouchers will actually be very similar to my Medicare Advantage Plan. They feel that offering it to more people will create more competition and therefore lower prices to the consumer. So instead of ruining this wonderful insurance plan, as Obamacare does, Romney will offer MA's to everyone! And you will love it!




But regardless of the Republican plan, I am just very grateful that Romney and Ryan are finally calling the president on his lies about Obamacare. Now we can begin to have a real debate with facts about what Obamacare will do to Seniors. Not what it might do but what it will do. And what Obamacare will do is hurt old and disabled Americans, the very people Medicare was created to help.

The Tea Party - the Voice of the Silent Majority

I find it very interesting to watch the evolution of the conservatives emergence into today’s Tea Party. The modern day revolt of the middle class began in the late 60’s and early 70’s. Your average folks out in the suburbs and farms were aghast at the chaos all around him. Everywhere they looked people were rioting – college kids burning draft cards, dope smoking (or worse) hippies, inner city riots were destroying and burning their own parts of town, women were burning bras and everyone was beginning to question the Vietnam War. The Silent Majority were stunned into silence by all that was happening around them.

While the Democrats were mired in the violence of their 1968 convention Nixon stepped out at the Republican convention to be the voice of the right . To rail against all these changes and try to stand up for the conservative values that were being carelessly tossed aside by other groups with louder voices. And when Nixon ran for a second term it was a rout with Nixon trouncing the very liberal McGovern with 97% of the electoral vote and 62% of the popular vote! The Silent Majority had spoken in full volume!

As everyone knows, Nixon let his power get to him, and resigned in disgrace. The Silent Majority was disillusioned by this betrayal and stayed away from the polls in 1972 thereby letting Jimmy Carter become the next president. Conservatives believed that under Carter's mismanagment the country continued to slide to the left and was headed for economic disaster, inflation and double digit unemployment. Finally conservatives shook off their paralysis after Nixon’s betrayal of their trust and began to pull together but this time under a new name and a true leader.

One of the few places the Silent Majority felt comfortable in speaking out was in their churches. Yet even that was being taken away from them by liberal ministers and priests who preached social justice and liberation theories. It was no wonder that conservatives flocked to the new TV televangelists who preached Christianity and conservative values. It was a message the right were starved for after two decades of liberals progressive actions.

The Silent Majority found their voices in their churches and became the Moral Majority. Ronald Reagan was their leader and conservatism was once again back in fashion. Not just lower taxes and less government but also a new emphasis on restoring some semblance of old fashioned values combined with a resurgence in American pride and patriotism.

Unfortunately, just as Nixon’s betrayal broke up the Silent Majority, it was the televangelists’ downfalls with women and taxes and unaccounted for riches that dismantled the Moral Majority. The end of Reagan's two terms was another factor in the lessening of the Moral Majority's powers.

Conservatives were then disappointed by the Bushes actions. Bush father’s increasing taxes after his “Read my lips, no new taxes” statement was his downfall and again conservatives weren't passionate about re-electing him. So we got Clinton who was actually good for the economy and conservatives didn't put up a huge fight, with poor candidates running against Clinton during his second election. But it was Bill's morals that concerned people and helped elect Bush W. After 9-11 everyone was behind how he handled the terrorist attacks on 9-11 and conservatives applauded his tax cuts. But Bush W. disenfranchised the right with his big government spending. This past president abandoned a primary conservative tenant of smaller government as he spent us into debt. As the economy became worse he spent even more to bail out banks and provide stimulus money. It was completely against everything conservatives stood for and they were dumbfounded by Bush’s betrayal.

When Obama was elected and began to spend even more money the conservatives felt hamstrung since one of their own Republicans had spent a lot during the last presidency. Democrats said conservatives were hypocrites if they complained about Obama’s spending after Bush spent, too. But Obama, Pelosi and Reid continued to push and push their liberal agenda finally passing a health care bill that no one understood and few people, other than the far left, really wanted. It was too much too soon. Finally, realizing that they were being blatently ignored by their own politicians was the last straw for the people.

This time around, conservatives and even many independents found their political voice with protests followed by confronting politicians during town hall meetings in the summer of 2009. People found their politicians to be so far removed from their constituency that they were no longer representing them. Getting no satisfaction from the current group of politicians, conservatives took the final step and entered the political realm with a vengeance. Faster then anyone anticipated, Tea Party candidates entered the mid-term elections with resolve to replace these old politicians and to everyone's surprise they had the votes to do so. They toppled big name Republicans who were RINO’s (Republicans In Name Only) such as in Florida and won what everyone thought would be unwinable elections such as the MA senate race to replace Ted Kennedy and this week’s Delaware Republican primary win by a Tea Party new politician. To date, Tea Party candidates have won Senate primaries in KY, AZ, AK, CO, NV and DE.

A new political force is being born right in front of our eyes. Yet Democrats continue to be contemptuous of this newfound group and even smugly pleased by the Tea Party’s foray into the mid-term election. Liberals don’t believe these conservative amateur candidates can win in a general election and so they feel that the Senate will retain their Democrat majority. But again, they don’t have a clue as to what is really happening. This is an explosion that has been building for 30 years. Not only have the people found their voice but they are stepping up and taking control. Nixon and the Bush’s betrayed them and there is no Reagan like leader in sight so the average guy is entering the political ring for the first time. And just as importantly, the masses are throwing their support to these Tea Party candidates. For example, this week’s Delaware primary typically had around 30,000 people voting – this week it had 57,000 voters with the majority coming out to support the Tea Party candidate Christine O'Donnell who actually beat the old time Republican politician. That is a huge difference in turnout for just a primary. As I said in an earlier blog, this is not a gentle tidal wave of change, this is a tsunami heading our way in November. Finally, the Silent Majority are truly silent no more.

Sharing the Wealth - My Way

Share the wealth. This is what Obama wants to incorporate into every aspect of America, starting with health care. If the poor can’t afford health care then make the wealthy pay for it. If you take this statement at face value it is not an outrageous suggestion. Someone who can’t afford health care because they have lost their job should be given a helping hand until he can get back on his feet again. The same is true for the elderly, no matter how much a senior has saved he would be wiped out with one major surgery. So we need to help our elderly. Besides, isn’t that what tithing is all about? Giving money which will then be used to help the poor among us?

Helping the less fortunate is at the core of every civilized nation and every modern religion. The problem, however, is that we have become too large and have lost the community feeling whereby neighbor helped neighbor and so the government must step in. Government is always unwieldy and it doesn’t help that we have a growing population of people who choose to be poor and demand government help. Combined these two problems are emptying our treasury and dividing our country.

I’ve counted five different groups of these poor people who are draining our national wealth. First there are the men and women who refuse to get a job, which includes the underqualified and the overqualified. The underqualified includes the large group of people who drop out of school, who can barely read and write, who cannot speak proper English if they speak it at all, who are in gangs or drug dealing and the mentally challenged. The overqualified are formerly employed people who lost their jobs, have not been able to find an equivalent position and prefer to take government assistance rather than take a job that they deem are beneath them.

The third group of poor who are taking advantage of our government handouts are the young, and not so young, women who pop out a kid every year or two. Most of these young women are unmarried and have no means of providing for their children. These women are typically part of the undereducated group and the jobs that they could get pay so little that after providing for day care they wouldn’t be able to pay the rest of their bills. Easier to stay home, have more kids and get more government money.

The final two groups are those who we should be helping; people who are physically or mentally unable to work and the elderly. Ironically many in these groups would like to work, even if for a few hours a week because an extra hundred dollars every month might mean putting the thermostat to a more reasonable level. But the system is set up such that if they work even for a few hours then they might lose all of their government assistance.

What is the solution? Obama wants to spread the wealth but our “poor” are so numerous that paying for the slackards will bankrupt this country. No matter what promises the President makes, he will have to take money not just from the rich but also from the middle class to pay for his health care plan. It’s no surprise that working people are outraged that they will be penalized for working. They will be forced to hand over a bigger and bigger portion of their hard earned money to sluggards who live off of the government dole because they chose not to work. It’s not fair and people are angry.

President Obama, I have a solution to this growing problem and my idea can be summed up in one sentence – With the exception of the ill and elderly, everyone else who takes government money must work. Period. And the details of my plan are equally simple. If after a year of being unemployed a person still hasn’t found a job then they must choose from one of four options; join the military, go to college (must make passing grades), join Americorp or stop taking government money. That’s it. Of course the hope is that eventually they will find a job suitable to their experience but until then they have to pick one of these options.

The key to my proposal is Americorp and something Obama should like – community organizations. I don’t know how either currently operates but I see Americorp setting up in every medium sized community and in every depressed area. Each local Americorp facility would initially set up two businesses; a cafeteria and a day care center. The cafeteria would offer healthy but inexpensive breakfasts and dinners to the poor and their families while the day care center would watch over the children when the poor start working. Of course both of these enterprises would need to hire people thus already creating work for the poor.

Next, my new Americorp would target every farm, factory and other business which hires illegal immigrants. Americorp would now be able to fill these jobs. Some kind of benefits and rewards would be given to both companies who hire Americorp workers and also for the Americorp workers doing this acknowledged hard, manual labor. Thus in one stroke we would deter companies from hiring illegal immigrants while also providing jobs to our own poor.

If an able bodied poor person continuously refuses these job offers then their government handouts will be taken away. It's that cut and dried. Yes I can hear liberals shouting that we would be penalizing the poor children. First, their logic is faulty, it is the lazy parent who is at fault and second, I could see Americorp allowing these families to eat at the cafeteria thereby making sure the children still get healthy meals. And don't even dare try the argument that we would be separating babies from their mothers since this is exactly what working mothers must do every day.

Finally, for the college educated, I would create a fast track to get them teaching at our schools. Now that I think about it, the local Americorp should start a third business; hiring the educated unemployed men and women to act as tutors and mentors for the children of the poor. The ultimate goal is to stop the cycle of poor and the first step is to educate the children. Actually, the educated poor could also mentor and help the undereducated poor adults, too. They could teach these adults not just in school subjects but in everything from cooking healthy to managing a budget to proper etiquette when applying for a job. If there are no other jobs available and yet someone getting unemployment money refuses to take one of these Americorp jobs then they, too, would lose their government handouts. Or they could simply not apply for government money if they know they won't take a government Americorp job.

This leaves just those who truly deserve government assistance; the disabled, the elderly and the mentally ill. If anyone in these three groups is able to work for an hour or two a week then they should be allowed to do this without losing their government benefits. But if they are physically or mentally unable to work then they should receive full government assistance without feeling any shame or guilt. They are the only “poor” who everyone would agree actually deserve help. Everyone else should go to work, go to college, join the military or get off the government dole. I think this is a way to share the wealth that most working people would support. And even Obama should be happy as my plan uses community organizers so that he will have a job waiting for him in two years!

Health Care, 65 Roses and A Prayer

Last year a local news station made a video about a day in the life of my niece, Aubrey Rose. At the time, my niece was an ambassador for Cystic Fibrosis, an incurable disease that she and her family must deal with every day of her life. This emotional video http://www.wftv.com/video/17788642/index.html) shows that life is difficult and the future uncertain for the whole family.

I mention this because in the current discussions of health care I wonder how the government’s plan for health care would affect charities and those with chronic illnesses? There’s been a lot of talk about how the elderly will be treated, but what about those like my niece, Aubrey Rose? Will the government continue to allow her to get expensive medications, participate in clinical trials or go to specialists, particularly if there isn’t a cure? Who will make these decisions? Today it is between you, your doctor and your insurance company. Do you want to have the government become a part of these painful, emotional decisions?

If we had national health care then I could easily see how the government would feel it is looking at the “big picture” and using your dollars to provide the care that would benefit the most. They might ask - is it fair to spend all this money on one child when there is no cure for her disease? Hell yes, if it is your child! And can’t you just see the health care panel denying a CF teen a new lung thinking that she will probably die in another 10 years so let’s give the lung to someone with a longer life expectancy. Wow. This is not what America is all about. A cost-benefit approach is an awful path to go down and we must never take even a first step in that direction. For didn’t some other governments start off with just this kind of questions? First, it was the mentally ill and chronically ill but it went on from there… And even in America, how far might this line of questioning go and where might it lead us?

As I said in the beginning, I am writing about this not only as a concerned citizen but also as “Aunt Patti”. My niece, Aubrey Rose, was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis a few days after she was born. The family was horrified to learn that there is no cure and she was destined to have a difficult and shortened life. In fact, right now her life expectancy is only 37 years old. Can you imagine all that you have done or might miss in your forties, fifties, sixties and even seventies if you were to die in your mid thirties?

Yet my niece is lucky that she was born in America. If she had been born in Ireland, where there is national health care, her life expectancy drops from 37 all the way down to 27! CF patients have ten years taken from an already shortened life because of the lack of care in a country with socialized health care. This should be a huge warning to our country as to the detrimental impact of socialized health care.

Of course, one way to avoid the whole nationalized health care problems is to be healthy. To that end, a lot of people are working very hard to find a cure for CF or to at least give CF patients the means to live a healthier longer life. And we are working hard, too, through our annual 65 Roses Golf Classic. When Aubrey was diagnosed we decided that since government doesn’t give a penny to help the CF Foundation then my family would raise money to help find a cure. But unlike other charity functions which raises money, every dollar donated would go to the CF Foundation and not to some dubious “Trust Fund”, plus 90 cents of every dollar donated to the CF Foundation goes straight to research and not to exorbitant salaries or fancy trips. So you know when you donate money that it is going to truly help out.

Eight years ago my family, friends and the Orlando Chapter of CF started the 65 Roses Golf Classic. About 6 of us worked hard to put on this event but it is worth the effort as we have raised tens of thousands of dollars each year for the CF Foundatoin. Now it’s time for the next tournament. But we need your help. The economy is making it tough on all charities, including our own event. Yet if we help each other than there will never be a need for government to step in. Now that is what America is truly all about – people helping each other without any government interference. And here is how you can help us raise money to find a cure for CF…

If you live in Central Florida, we would love if you could join us at our 65 Roses Golf Classic in honor of Aubrey Rose to be held on November 23, 2009 at the Heathrow Country Club in Lake Mary Florida. Many of our golfers return each year for the golf, great food, drinks, good auction items and for the overall comradery of the group. Plus as a special treat, before the tournament begins, the golfers also enjoy a clinic by professional golfer Chris DiMarco. That is just the start to what is always a fun and rewarding day. Click on this link for more information http://orlando.cff.org/65rosesgolf .

If you can’t be here, you can still help out by giving a donation to this wonderful cause. Your donation, no matter the size, is important since every single dollar is making a real differenced in the search for a cure for Cystic Fibrosis. My family and I would appreciate whatever your budget allows, be it your charitable donation of $10, $25, $50 or $250. Plus this donation is 100% tax deductible. To donate to the 65 Roses Golf Classic to help find a cure for CF, click on this link www.cff.org/lwc/auntpatti.

Aubrey Rose is smart and funny and sweet and stubborn, in other words just like most kids her age. Except as you saw in the video (http://www.wftv.com/video/17788642/index.html) her life is different from her classmates. Yet she deserves, as does every CF child, to have a long and healthy life. And it is up to us to help her do just that. So please, help us find a cure for Aubrey Rose and the 30,000 others with Cystic Fibrosis by donating to our 65 Roses Golf Classic at www.cff.org/lwc/auntpatti. And join me in my prayer for my beautiful niece, Aubrey Rose; that some day a cure is found so that that this terrific little girl who is just starting second grade, will live a long life and will die of old age surrounded by her children and her children’s children in the far far future. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?

One More Thing...

In my last blog, A Patient’s View of HR3200 I argued against the government sending someone to discuss your medical and end of life options if you are seriously ill or injured. Since then I have had people tell me that it is one thing to discuss end of life options with a 51 year old but a totally different matter when the patient is 91. They reminded me of the burden these elderly people were to the system and that there comes a point when you should say enough tests, operations, medical treatments and to simply let nature take it course. End of Life options are appropriate not only for the sake of the elderly person but also because of the extreme expenses to both the family and the government to keep them alive.

I agree, up to a point. In fact I was a bit angered to learn that a friend’s 87 year old mother-in-law had just had a hip replacement operation. This elderly woman suffered from dementia, diabetes, extreme arthritis and a multitude of other ailments plus her family ignored her the one time she spoke out against the operation since they thought they knew best for her. Or at least most did since some family members argued to stop everything and simply let her die but these voices were drowned out by those wanting her to have the operation. Plus I am sure that the nursing home also encouraged the operation for the practical reason of wanting her to be mobile and able to go to the bathroom on her own and not to require diaper changes. Yet all of the family infighting about treatment could have been avoided if she just had a Living Will. But at this point it was too late as she wasn’t capable of making decisions.

So yes, I agree that this woman probably should not get more medical treatment and should simply be made comfortable as she dies. But this puts you on a very slippery slope. For what is the cut off point? If my 51 is too young but there is a need for end of life options for this 87 year old patient then perhaps at 80 people should be denied treatment. Except I look at my own 81 year old mother. If she were to fall I would be one of the ones arguing for a hip replacement operation. Am I being hypocritical? No. For unlike the first elderly woman, my mother is a sharp, active, intelligent older woman who neither looks nor acts her age. My mother at 81 is as active as many a 65 year old. So you can’t use age as the criteria. What might have worked for my friend’s parent certainly would be wrong for my mother.

In fact, my father was only 65 when he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. After only one chemo treatment we realized he was dying and we then wanted to make what little time was left to be as easy as possible for him. In this case we turned to Hospice to help him. If a family member is dying then Hospice is wonderful. So why does the government need to create a whole new panel and one more bureaucratic department? Wouldn’t it make more sense for them to provide government grants to this organization which is already in place and functioning quite well?

The final argument was the costs associated with health care for the elderly. Wow. How cold is that? Liberals actually worry that keeping mom and dad alive and paying for their health care will bankrupt the government. The same problem of lack of funding concerns treating uninsured people. Who is more important – the people or the government? For if the former, we can find the money. Hell, let the banks pay back their bailouts, take the majority of the stimulus money not spent and gee here’s a thought, fire the 30+ highly paid Czars (the Energy and Environment Czar is getting $172,000 for example) and let the Cabinet do its job instead. Money is not an issue. If Obama could find all these trillions for people to buy a car then he can find the money to take care of our parents. Besides, using existing groups such as Hospice would save billions in the projected salaries for new government employees.

Conservatives have made their point about the major problems with HR3200. Now is the time to start offering alternative ideas. Here are a few suggestions; some are already being discussed while others are my own ideas:

• Let the insurance companies create a co-op through which uninsured people can get health insurance. Restrict this to only US Citizens. Illegal immigrants are a tough situation and this country needs to review and revise their entire illegal immigrant policy as soon as possible. Meanwhile the expenses for treating illegal immigrants or citizens who don’t sign up for insurance should be shared by the entire country and not just the border states and those with high illegal immigrant populations.


• Provide grants to encourage and pay for anyone who wants to be a nurse, doctor, technician, nursing home aide or in any other medical professions. We will need all of these once we insure everyone but other than talking about rationing no one has thought of this.


• Use Hospice as the primary end of life care givers. Provide them with grants to expand their current business rather than the government creating a new parallel department. Offer the same grants to any other private company to insure competition.
  
• Make health insurance mandatory when you get or renew your driver’s license. When you renew your driver’s license there should be a Living Will form with the paperwork sent to you. They already ask about organ donations so why not also include Living Wills? Use Hospice or SS to handle all questions about Living Wills.


• Require all Americans including government employees and union members to be a part of whatever new plan is approved.

So come on conservatives. Instead of simply trashing HR3200 you need to start to come up with alternative suggestions. Forget calling people Nazi’s and instead present your Congressman with some great ideas that they can take back to the Senate and House. For we need a Health Care Plan that is truly by the people and not this monstrosity which is a plan by the government for the people.

A Patient's View of HR3200

I recently learned that I need to have more surgery. This will be my second operation this year and my sixth in the past five years. I can’t help but wonder what my life would have been like if we had Obama’s health care plan. Although at 51 I am not quite a senior, I would, however, fall into the chronically ill category. Under Speaker Pelosi’s health plan they would definitely want to send somebody to speak to me and my family about the cost of these expensive surgeries and how I am using up medical resources. Considering how much I have already been through, during their “counseling” I would probably be one of the people who would be urged to just be given pain meds and basically put out to pasture with no further costly care given. No surprise that I am selfishly glad my medical problems are occurring now, before any supposedly new and improved plan is implemented!

Yet it has occurred to me that in all the debates about end of life counseling I have yet to hear anyone mention how your perspective and reasoning changes when you are ill or injured. For example, I am a political junkie who loves to keep up on what is happening in Washington and then to write about it in my blog. And yet since I learned that I have blood clots in my lower aorta which has already nearly destroyed my right leg I no longer care very much about what is happening elsewhere and I have opted out of the politics and discussions whirling around about the health care bill. In fact, I was very surprised to realize just how long it has been since my last blog. That really shows how caught up I am in my own personal drama and ignoring the rest of the world.

I think I am typical in that the world narrows when you are ill. All your focus and energy are inward and you simply are unaware of anything else. So I wonder, how would I react if a stranger, a government official, were to council me about end of life decisions right now? How many people who are ill and weak and tired will simply agree to give up when that is presented as a viable choice in the end of life discussions? I know that I was in so much agony this spring before my last surgery that I am not sure what I would have agreed to in order to stop the pain. While we are in the throws of pain or caught up in an illness or simply physically run down we do think and act differently.

Now try to factor in having someone from the government step into the lives of people who are in pain or ill. They say it will be voluntary but when you are that ill you are in no condition to request this so I don’t doubt that others, including the hospital social worker, might call them in for you or even the panel might stop by as a matter of routine to walk through the hospital. Sure you could tell them to go but you simply don’t care and frequently aren’t totally aware of the surroundings around you.

In April I recall being rushed to the hospital and sitting in the waiting room but after that I have no memory for the next six days other than occasional glimpses of what was going on. I was told I talked and interacted with others but I have no memory of this. So just imagine if an official should happen to stop by or even be called by a family member, who knows what I might have said or which choice I might have agreed to but whatever it was I wouldn’t have had any memory of it later on. And by the time someone tells me what I did, it might be too late.

Even if you are alert, it is still a time when confusion reigns as you grapple with what is wrong with you, what the doctor will do, what is the outcome, how you will cope when you get back home, if you will still have a job, who’s taking care of your family, etc. To add to the confusion is the government expert who would present you with five different choices, including end of life services. This last choice would not only take away your pain but would also allow you to avoid all this hassle and confusion you’re encountering right now and yet end of life is probably not something a person would choose if they were in their right mind.

I thought I read that this end of life counseling was going to be discarded from the health plan. But I just heard Obama’s Saturday radio address. He started off by saying he wanted to debunk the health care myths which are spread by those who would benefit the most. Then a minute or so into his speech he says that death panels are not true and not in the plan. Obama is correct in that the phrase “death panel” is not in the plan but there is a section outlining end of life counseling. So once again he is being a lawyer and specifically calibrating his words to confuse the public.

Obama is also correct when he says that those who have the most to gain are fighting the health plan. For it is every day people like you and me who are protesting this outrageous government take-over of our health care because we know we have the most to lose if it is implemented. And if you think hearing about this is tough, just try to listen to this garbage when you are sick, ill, injured or hurt and require help from the health care system. You want your health care system to make you better, to allow you to get the tests you need, to see doctors who can help you and undergo the operations to make you better. The last thing you need is to have some government stranger butt into your life to tell you that one of your choices is to give up and die.

Short Retort

The title of a column piqued my interest and it not only lived up to its title but made me realize that I wanted to share the article with everyone. It wasn’t until I was two-thirds through that I stopped to see exactly who it was who wrote it. Oh my. OK enough teasing - the column was titled Dirty Secret No. 1 in Obamacare and the author was Chuck Norris. Good thing I decided to link to it instead of plagiarizing from Mr. Norris! In what I assume to be the first of many columns, this article discusses a part of the health care bill which outlines how the US government plans to visit homes of pregnant and new parents to teach them about taking care of children. Wow. I had no clue, did you? But to find out about this particular part of the health care plan that the politicians seem to have skipped over then read this and spread the word ASAP as it is just one more way of government intruding into your home. Here is the link: http://townhall.com/columnists/ChuckNorris/2009/08/11/dirty_secret_no_1_in_obamacare?page=1

Obama's Organizing America

I received an email this week from Obama that caught my attention. In it President Obama stated that “All this week, OFA (Organizing for America) members like you will be stopping by local congressional offices to show our support for insurance reform.” It goes on to say “As you've probably seen in the news, special interest attack groups are stirring up partisan mobs with lies about health reform, and it's getting ugly. Across the country, members of Congress who support reform are being shouted down, physically assaulted, hung in effigy, and receiving death threats. We can't let extremists hijack this debate, or confuse Congress about where the people stand.” And ends with “Earlier this week, the President wrote that "this is the moment our movement was built for" and asked us all to commit to join at least one event this month. This is the way to answer that call, and rise to the challenge of this moment together.”

This alarming language feeding the fear and anger of the far left is totally unbecoming of a President. Sure Obama should encourage his followers to stand up for what they believe in but he is only inflaming the situation by referring to the right as partisan mobs. And I don’t recall hearing that any congressman or woman was physically assaulted, have you?

I also find it ironic that the left accuses the conservative protesters as being part of an organized group and yet here is Obama referring to his group, Organizing for America, and stating that this situation is the reason for this group’s existence. Again, this shouldn’t be something a President does. He should be above the fray, not an integral part of it egging on his supporters and calling his detractors names. It is also a bit scary to think that Obama felt it necessary to start this group just to use when people protest against him. And they are organizing, no doubt about that. In fact some time check out Organizing for America on Facebook

Forty years ago, conservatives were known as "The Silent Majority" for a reason. So based on the historical silence from the right, today’s politicians are surprised to see these previously voiceless conservatives standing up and yelling back. I loved the line from Barbara Boxer (D-CA) who said the protesters had to be fake because they were “too well dressed”! A part of me is oh so tempted to go to one of the Obama Organizing for America events dressed in a formal gown. Better yet, how funny would it be if a whole group of men and women showed up in formal attire? Unfortunately, time has shown that the far left has absolutely no sense of humor when it comes to things like this.

The difference between the two groups of protesters is growing and not just in forms of attire. The right is there because they are truly concerned about the health care plan and what it would do to America and to them. To be fair, some liberals are passionate about universal health care. But many are now showing up because they are angry at the right for protesting against Obama. There have been numerous quotes from the left that a protest against the health care bill is really a protest against the President. Not true. Protesters are simply scared about this health care bill and how it might adversely affect their own personal health care and the ability to be treated properly and quickly when they need medical help.

Again, to be fair, I am sure that some conservatives are misinformed about some aspects of the health care bill, which by the way is actually a number of differing versions that have yet to be finalized. But for the most part the protesters are concerned about the extreme costs of universal health care, potentially intrusive and complete government takeover and how these changes will affect them. On the other hand, I doubt if one in ten from the left could intelligently discuss the 1000+ page bill (including the lawmakers, themselves) and explain why they are protesting in favor of it. In fact, reread that opening paragraph. Does the President give his supporters reasons and arguments to counter the protesters? No. He simply says they must stop them. So much for wanting a "debate" on the issue.

Additionally, the next time the media is showing the two opposing groups protesting on TV, turn off the sound and simply look at the two groups. First, they really aren’t dressed very differently, no matter what some might say. But more importantly, look at their signage. For the most part, those protesting against the health care bill are holding hand made signs. You can tell that most are signs the individual protester made as few are lettered via a graphics shop and they come in various sizes and shapes and with differing verbiage on each one. Then look at the signs of the left, particularly all those uniformed blue ones. The majority are professionally made with many of them having the exact same phrases. No there is nothing wrong with this but it goes back to the argument – which one of the two groups is spontaneous and which is organized?

I just hope that this call to the Organizing for America group to start protesting the protesters doesn’t scare off the citizens who are truly concerned about the health care bill. Or worse, escalate it into genuine physical assaults between the two groups. Remember, this is all lead by politicians versed in Chicago style politics. So I can’t help but worry as to just how far Obama will encourage the Organizing for America supporters to go if this is indeed “the moment it was built for”.

The Sound of America

Did you hear that sound? It is something I haven’t heard in at least ten months. It is the sound of the people finally finding their voices. Americans have had enough and are finally standing up against Obama and the rest of Congress. And these aren’t just Republican tea baggers but Blue Dog Democrats and Independents who are finally questioning the Democratically controlled government and are angry with where Washington is going.

Voters wanted to trust in this newly elected President and Congress and allowed them to push through the stimulus bill, and cap and trade with little to no resistance within the first 100 days. But that is how the American people act – we believe in giving everyone a chance. Even if you didn’t vote for the man, the country was hurting and most of us wanted him to help this country. We didn’t agree with how he wanted to help us but we were willing to give him a chance. We are now realizing that there was a fatal flaw in our generous and naïve trust in President Obama.

You see, it would have never occurred to most citizens that our leaders would enact legislation that would purposively hurt our country. Obama and Congress swore to serve and protect us, right? So we tried to understand the benefits of saddling this country with trillions in debt for economic stimulus bills which might not even implement these jobs for years in the future. We wanted to believe that the cap and trade would help the environment and couldn’t fathom the darker side that it was a way to redistribute wealth and punish successful companies.

But in the past month, Obama has acted in such a manner and Congress has drafted such astonishing legislature that we can’t ignore our misgivings any more. People began to finally wake up when Obama sided with the angry black man vs. law enforcement and when Congress tried to ram through a 1000 page Health Care Bill that would dismantle every existing health plan we have today. Perhaps the epitome of the stupidity found in Washington is the Cash for Clunker program which ran out of money in the first few days. And people are realizing that there can only be some hidden disreputable reason as to why Washington won’t let the banks pay back the bailout money.

I keep thinking of the classic movie Network and the much quoted line “I’m mad as hell and I won’t take it any more.” And it has always been to their own detriment when leaders or other countries dismiss angry citizens. We are basically a friendly and forgiving group of people but when we are angry, we become an entirely different animal altogether. Just ask Japan or Germany or Iraqi’s. We believe in fairness but we also believe in justice. And Washington has not acted fairly to us and we are now out for justice.

Chills now run up my spine as I listen to average citizens confronting their Congressmen. I cheered when the crowd booed Senator Specter when he said they needed to pass the health bill “fast”. I am thrilled when I hear protesters chanting “Just say no” at a Representative’s rally in Texas. I laughed when I read that Senator Diane Feinstein’s office threw out a group of senior citizens who refused to leave her CA office. And I am elated when citizens stop being passive and now are standing up to Washington.

All of this is reflected in the downward spiral of Obama’s popularity. And we must be succeeding because Obama is now going after those who speak out. It is truly scary that Obama wants people to snitch on those who are protesting against him. On Aug 4 a White House website posted the following statement:

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

By the way, when did they start referring the Health Care plan as the health insurance reform plan? Did they think just by changing the name people would be lulled into approving this monstrosity? But that is secondary to the chilling intention of this statement; to report people, like me, to the White House for writing unfavorable things on the health care plan. Good grief! How can the older liberals who spent their youth protesting the government allow this to happen? What is happening to my America when the White House goes after anyone who disagrees with them? What is next? Will anyone opposing the government be sent to rehabilitation camps? Will children be rewarded for snitching on the parents as in Nazi Germany or the like the feared KGB in Russia? But this is America, where things like that don't happen, isn't it?

I can’t help but recall Michelle Obama’s telling statement that she had never been proud to be an American until now. This is the America she envisioned? Well, this is not my America. My America is the land of the people, the land of free speech, the land not of socialism but a republic, the land of the melting pot where immigrants flocked to night school to learn English - not the land of diversity and Habla Espanol, the land where if you work hard anyone can succeed – not the land of handouts and welfare, the land where the citizens respect policemen – not immediately label them racists, the land that my father and my nephew proudly served, the land of Patrick Henry, Teddy Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan and most of all the land of the free and the brave. So be brave and don’t let anyone shut you down or scare you into silence. The people have found their voices and must continue to speak out against what they don’t like or else this won’t be America anymore.

The Death Care Bill

The more I hear about this health care plan the more I despise it. The good news is that politicians and people are now talking about the clause in the bill that turns it into a death care bill, not a health care bill. I quoted it in an earlier blog but it deserves to be repeated because people need to know what our government is proposing: “chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill” and therefore there will have to be some kind of “difficult” and “democratic conversation” that will take place to give “guidance” as to what patients will receive life-sustaining, and expensive, treatments. Oh great. That's all we need - the government to determine who should get medical treatment. No potential for scandals there, right?

And yet they do have a point. I recently had a discussion about a 93 year old woman who had a hip replacement surgery and I must admit that I thought it was a bit much at that age. I was even more disturbed when told that they had found bone cancer and were reviewing all kinds of treatments to extend the poor old woman’s life for another six months or so. In this case I thought it was a waste of money and the doctor’s time; that the best treatment was to make the elderly woman comfortable and out of pain and let her end her life with dignity.

So in this case I agreed with the proposed health care plan. But this was about cutting off surgeries to a 93 year old. How do you determine what that cut off age should be? Should treatment be stopped at 90 or maybe 80 or perhaps go down to 70? In actuality, the health care plan was written where they could refuse treatment to anyone over 59 years old! Hell, Tom Watson, who will turn 60 in Sept. nearly won the British Open and yet this health care bill will consider him as old and potentially unworthy of medical treatment in 2 months!

Think about the implications of this odious bill. A healthy 60 year old man who has a heart attack could be given minimal treatment while a 64 year old woman with breast cancer could be denied chemo treatment since keeping these “old” people alive would be deemed “too expensive” especially if they lived to the current average age of 78. It would instead be much cheaper and we would free up surgeons and medical centers if we simply give these sick people pain meds and let them die. And yet, one of the first things Obama did upon becoming president was to restore a provision in the Endangered Species Protection Act that Bush had removed that would provide greater protection to animals.

What does this tell us? That liberals seem to be more concerned about the welfare of the spotted owl, titmouse, American burying beetle and other obscure animals than they are for your grandparents, parents, diabetic Uncle, chronically ill sister, paraplegic friend or Cystic Fibrosis niece? And at a time when Obama promises new jobs with shovel ready federal projects he has just hamstrung those very federal projects by reinstating that clause in the Endangered Species Protection Act which would require any federal project to undergo an independent scientific review that might affect a protected species. So these new federal projects needed to provide jobs could be delayed or even stopped because of some mouse or fish or bird. Yet while denying jobs in order to save a damn bug the government is condoning euthansia by denying medical treatment to the elderly. This is insane!

What makes it even more preposterous is if you factor in the liberals religious beliefs. For it almost is forgivable to let the elderly die if, as in most religions, you believe that they will be going to a better place. But liberals tend to be atheists. So they don’t have this comforting belief that those who are dying will go to heaven. To the atheists, when you die, you are dead and gone and that’s it. Believing there is nothing after death makes their proposal to take away expensive treatments from seniors (defined as over 59, mind you) and to simply let them die that much crueler than if they thought the dying would go to heaven. Think about it. How cold is that?

We have got to stop this insanity. Mankind must come first and people should recognize that each life is precious. For if we start to deny aid to the elderly then who will be next? Liberals already deplore using animals to test potentially life saving drugs so they might decide we could save a lot of money (and animals) by not funding research to find cures for chronic illnesses and simply let them die, too. Or will expectant mothers one day be required to take tests to determine if their fetus’s have any chronic illness and therefore the pregnancy must be terminated before the child is born and all the health costs are incurred? What might they decide to do with the mentally ill? Once started how far down that slippery slope will we go?

This is still America. The health care reform is the very antithesis of why this country was founded. For remember that each of us was promised Life, not death, in our country’s Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.