Real health care reform creates jobs

Our organization is distributing this in union circles and beyond in preparation for the AFL-CIO's National Convention in September:

Sisters and Brothers, Fellow Workers;

Uniting People (UP) is a new national organization for Peace, Full Employment, Universal Health Care and Protection of the Environment. We appreciate the invitation extended by the AFL-CIO to all people and organizations to comment on its White Paper, “Prosperity Economics, Building An Economy For All” by Jacob S. Hacker and Nate Loewentheil, intended to create discussion about the direction of organized labor and the kind of country we all want to live in where peace, social and economic justice for working people prevail.

Democracy--- as well as social, economic and environmental justice--- require no less than a full and broad discussion of these important concerns and issues.

We agree with the concept of “prosperity economics” by “building an economy that works for everyone.” There are several very basic facts left out of this “White Paper” and it is very hazy, vague and nebulous as to what our concrete and specific goals and objectives are to be and what kind of movement and struggle it will take for the working class--- organized and unorganized together--- to create a prosperity economics for us all.

The “White Paper” does not clearly articulate our main enemy: Wall Street. The “White Paper” doesn't reflect the fact that we, as working people, are engaged in a social, political and economic struggle for power with the intent to replace Wall Street's dominance over every aspect of our lives--- in our schools, at work and in our communities.

Let's state right up front workers create all wealth but workers have had no say in how this wealth is distributed and used. This needs to change. Democracy requires no less.

Let's also put it right out there before the American people that militarism and wars are squandering the wealth of our Nation to such a large extent we don't have the resources to solve our many domestic problems. These dirty imperialist wars are killing our jobs and our standard of living just like they kill people.

Militarism and wars are a major contributing factor to the world-wide collapsing capitalist economy. No nation can continue to endlessly use the wealth of its nation to prepare for wars and to fight wars. This is sheer insanity.

Wall Street's greedy drive for profits results in wars which exacerbates our problems.

Detroit goes broke; the rest of our cities are sure to follow as Wall Street wallows in profits.

Working people go without adequate health care; insurance and pharmaceutical companies get fabulously wealthy. Shorter workweeks/longer vacations with no cut in pay create jobs and would keep us healthier, too.

Our public institutions like public education fall apart, crumble and collapse just like our roads, highways and bridges because we are constantly feeding a war machine intended to fight never-ending wars waged to protect Wall Street's assets and profits.

Prosperity for all begins with the recognition peace is required to achieve full employment.

Full employment is about the government seeing to it that jobs are created for all at real living wages. It is about putting people to work by creating massive universal social programs like Medicare for All, not job destroying legislation like Obama-care as detrimental to our health and jobs as wars without providing real health care reform while pushing the price of health care up instead of its stated intent to push prices down.

Eliminating militarism and wars eliminates the largest carbon footprint contributing to global warming and climate change as the Military Industrial Complex wastes our precious resources in a huge, monstrous complex that ruins our environment--- power generation, mining, manufacturing, the resources like oil and gas required to fight wars. Preparation for war, and war itself, creates a mammoth sized carbon footprint destroying our living environment while creating massive joblessness and poverty and ill health for our people as our air, water and land gets polluted.

The Wall Street selected politicians talk about “jobs, jobs, jobs” when their hidden agenda is really “profits, profits, profits” and “war, war, and more war.”

The time has come to make politicians legislatively responsible for full employment and peace because prosperity economics requires: peace and full employment--- a healthy people and a healthy environment.

Therefore, we propose that a central goal of the American labor and working class movement needs to be the building of an economy for all that is inseparably linked to peace and full employment which must include:

A Minimum Wage tied to all cost of living factors indexed to inflation. Jobs or a living income for all.

Medicare for All. Protect, defend and expand Social Security programs.

Legislation prohibiting lockouts and scabbing. Repeal of “At-Will Employment” legislation--- the primary obstacle to worker empowerment and union organizing.

Price controls are needed for food, gas, home heating fuels and electricity.

A healthy economy means a healthy living environment and a healthy planet. We need a quality of life index.

The two-party system is a trap for working people. We must free ourselves from the Democrats and Republicans. A working class based people's party is required if we are going to have a prosperity economics that works for all of us. We can learn a thing or two about health care and politics from our Canadian Brothers and Sisters.

We are now at a crossroads.

We will have an economy that serves Wall Street or we will have an economy that works for the rest of us--- we can't have both just like we can't have both war and full employment.

We encourage the use of the proposed Full Employment Act of 1945 pushed by the CIO unions and authored by liberal Texas Congressman Wright Patman and the associated hearing testimonies to broaden this discussion:

http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015081304209%3Bseq%3D10%3Bview%3D1up

We also call to your attention the excellent Op-Ed piece by Bob Herbert, “Losing Our Way,” his last piece in the New York Times (March 25, 2011), which declares:

"The U.S. has not just misplaced its priorities. When the most powerful country ever to inhabit the earth finds it so easy to plunge into the horror of warfare but almost impossible to find adequate work for its people or to properly educate its young, it has lost its way entirely."

We ask: What ever happened to William Winpisinger's "Rebuild America Act" and the “peace dividend?” The AFL-CIO should bring back to life its Committee on Conversion--- from military production to producing for human needs; swords into plowshares is what was advocated by the International Association of Machinist's former President, William Winpisinger. Where is this advocacy for peace and reordering our Nation's priorities now?

Thank you for allowing us to offer our critique of the AFL-CIO's “White Paper” and our alternative perspectives.

In solidarity and struggle. Uniting People (UP) for peace, full employment, universal health care and protection of the environment.

Racism and health care

The Washington Post and other media published a story about the pathetic state of health care on Indian Reservations.

The story is entitled:

Promises, Promises Indian health care needs go unmet

I publish the complete story below or you can click on this link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061400903.html?hpid=sec-health?hpid=sec-health

The Indian Health Service is in fact a model health care program based upon socialized health care; but, the Indian Health Service, like most public programs in this country is being sabotaged by those politicians who want to privatize everything from health care to education to maintaining our streets and sewers and hydro dams.

These politicians sabotage these public programs first by appointing people to administer these programs who are opposed to the very programs they are administering.

That the United States Congress allowed and enabled a crooked and corrupt racist bigot like Gale Norton out of the law firm to the mafia and lobbyists to politicians--- Brownstein/Hyatt/Farber/Shreck--- to become the Secretary of the Interior overseeing the Indian Health Service is in itself a racist crime of immense magnitude which tells us a great deal about why there are these serious short-comings in the Indian Health Service. No doubt Jack Abramoff carried enough money around in brown paper shopping bags that he distributed to politicians so that the Indian Health Services could have been funded three times over.

The Indian Health Service is one classic example; here in Minnesota the Department of Health and Human Services is an even better example with Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty appointing one of the most racist, bigoted and viciously anti-working class, anti-people, pro-corporate, pro-free enterprise Neanderthals--- Cal Ludeman--- to head up the Minnesota Department of Health and Human Services.

When politicians appoint those opposed to public programs to oversee these very programs they are opposed to, this is a recipe for disaster.

One has to ask, since the health care needs of Native Americans has been going unmet for so many years, why then, has it taken so long for the media to bring this matter to the attention of the public and politicians? The answer is very simple: The mainstream media is as viciously racist, biased and bigoted as the very politicians who make the decisions and those they appoint to administer social and public programs which are supposed to be about taking care of the needs of the people but are turned into nothing but big government boondoggles where all the friends of these politicians and administrators end up getting rich as people suffer because instead of, in the case of Indian Health Services, you have all these people scamming the system doing everything except providing the government mandated services.

Anyone can look at the budget of the Indian Health Service and see that the problem is a bunch of racist "entrepreneurs" with their dirty, corrupt fingers constantly in "the cookie jar" enabled by a bunch of uncaring administrators.

Barack Obama could pump billions upon billions--- even trillions--- of dollars into the Indian Health Service and it wouldn't improve the health care Native Americans receive because this excellent system of health care is being intentionally sabotaged by a bunch of greedy, profit gouging swindlers who are stealing the funds before these funds can provide the health services people require.

It is ironic that the same tribal governments who operate the casinos send their emissaries out to plead for more funding for the Indian Health Service when the casinos they operate--- and how they operate these casinos--- are responsible for a good share of the health care problems Native Americans are experiencing which is putting a drain on the Indian Health Service which is plagued with corruption--- on and off the reservations.

Here is an example.

This past spring I responded, on behalf of the Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council as its Director of Organizing, to the Red Lake Tribal Council's presentation to federal government officials who made a presentation at a hearing on the terrible situation regarding Indian health care... I submitted my response to U.S. Senators Amy Kolbuchar (Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party), U.S. Senator Carl Levin (Michigan Democratic Party), U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (Michigan Democratic Party, U.S. Congresspersons Colin Peterson (DFL-Minnesota), James Oberstar (DFL-Minnesota). I would note that these politicians over the combined life of their political careers has solicited, received and accepted MILLIONS of dollars in campaign contributions from the lobbyists of Indian Gaming Industry.

This was my letter to them which received no response:


U.S. Senators Amy Kolbuchar (Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party)
U.S. Senator Carl Levin (Michigan Democratic Party)
U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (Michigan Democratic Party
U.S. Rep. Colin Peterson (DFL-Minnesota)
U.S. Rep. James Oberstar (DFL-Minnesota)

April 6, 2009

Senators and Congresspersons,

The Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council was not informed of the March hearings on Indian health care even though each and everyone of you has been repeatedly asked to keep us apprised of hearings which relate to these kinds of issues.

It is with this in mind that I request my comments here be included in the hearing testimony.

You, elected officials, claiming to be public servants with the good of the public at heart in your actions, have gone out of your way to deny us casino workers the right to participate in any hearings relating to labor, health care and environmental issues; and, then, you have the unmitigated gall to preach that we live in the world's greatest bastion of democracy.

As you are fully aware, our Organizing Council consists of Organizing Committees in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Iowa assisting casino workers in their attempts to organize unions in an industry--- the Indian Gaming Industry--- which all of you have had a hand in creating through your support of the most anti-labor, most racist vile "Compacts" which have forced over two-million casino workers (and given the huge employee turnover in this industry, millions more) to work under the most disgraceful and Draconian conditions in loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages without any rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws in this industry now comprising over 350 casino operations many of which include hotels/motel, restaurants, a variety of small shops and boutiques ranging from hair-dressers to artists and even water parks and various theme parks.

And here you are sitting and listening to those like the spokespersons for the Red Lake Nation Tribal government--- a supposedly sovereign nation, but a government that has to ask the federal and state governments for approval before doing anything and begging for tax-dollars as casino revenues in the billions and trillions of dollars go completely without any accountability to anyone except for a bunch of mobsters who own the slot machines and table games leaving the Indian Nations stuck with nothing but a pile of debt and poverty--- talking about how the Indian Health Service is underfunded.

We agree that the Indian Health Service is underfunded. But, the funds are being stolen in many cases before they ever reach the stage of their intended purpose of keeping Indian people healthy and getting them well when sick.

The Indian Health Service is a model program which should be serving as a guide for the kind of socialized health care system we all need in the United States. Instead, you are allowing it to be sabotaged by greedy profit gougers at every level as your colleagues in Congress then point out "socialized health care doesn't work."

A program is intentionally underfunded and then greed takes over with "administrative supervision, oversight and approval" and here we are with one big mess of sick people who can't get the health care they are entitled to.

And, to make maters worse, the very people who provided this testimony from the Red Lake Nation did not tell you that the primary reason for the very substantial need to increase the funding for the Indian Health Services is the direct result of the Indian Gaming Industry.

Common sense tells us that if you put people to work--- force people to work--- in smoke-filled casinos day in and day out seven days a week 365 days of the year, these employees are going to suffer serious health problems because we all know the scientific and health consequences people suffer working under these conditions.

The cancers, the heart and lung diseases, the ill affect on pregnant women and the damage to their unborn children; and, in talking about health problems and risks, perhaps among no other population in America, is diabetes such a killer than on the Indian Reservations. And the medical and scientific community has long ago shown the severe adverse impact that second-hand smoke has on those with diabetes.

So, while the Red Lake Nation Tribal Council has sent their representative to plead the case for an underfunded Indian Health Service, these representatives have failed to state that it is the very policies of this very Tribal Council who control Red Lake Gaming Enterprises who by allowing smoking in their casinos are contributing to the ill-health of the people of the Red Lake Nation, many, who because of the racist hiring practices of employers in northern Minnesota cannot find employment elsewhere, are forced to work in these smoke-filled casinos making them sick--- or sicker than they already are--- which in turn requires an expanded Indian Health Service, which in turn requires greater funding.

Our Organizing Council and our Organizing Committees take the position that Congress should appropriate every single penny required to provide adequate health care to Indian people through the Indian Health Service.

We also insist that there be accountability in gaming revenues and these revenues should be confiscated by the federal government to cover the health care problems being created by an unhealthy working environment.

To add insult to injury to this racism, the Indian Health Service is not even monitoring the health of those people employed in these smoke-filled casinos.

Therefore, it is our contention, that these casino enterprises like Red Lake Gaming Enterprises should be billed for the health care received through Indian Health Services for whatever treatment casino workers require for anything.

Quite frankly, we consider the testimony offered on behalf of the Red Lake Nation Tribal Council to be deceitful and dishonest in not bringing forward the role the tribal government plays in making people sick. Needless to say, these representatives did not make any mention of the way present funding is abused and misappropriated by crooks and thieves.

We point out that dishonesty has been a hallmark of the Indian Gaming Industry from its very inception which began with all of you taking bribes to create this industry which has now resulted in two-million workers going to work in smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages in an industry where the workers have no rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws--- truth is not one of the virtues of such thieves and those like yourselves who pander to these thieving mobsters for campaign contributions.

It is rather ironic that the Red Lake Tribal Council which is wholly and fully complicit in stealing from, and abusing, their own people and everyone else in quest of greater profits... would, under these circumstances, have the unmitigated gall to come before any Congressional Committee demanding funding to solve problems they have helped to create.

Might we be so bold as to suggest that you and your colleagues in the United States Congress contribute the bribes you take from the National Indian Gaming Association and the various state Indian Gaming Associations like the Minnesota Indian Gaming Association and contribute this money to the Indian Health Service?

And then maybe if you would stop wasting our money on wars and maintaining military bases all over the world you could provide an expanded version of the Indian Health Service to include everyone residing in the United States including the thousands of undocumented workers employed in the Indian Gaming Industry.

In closing, let me just say that we know you will take issue with the tone of this letter; but, it is your continued lack of response to our concerns over problems you created in the first place in the way you intentionally created these "Compacts" creating the Indian Gaming Industry that any thinking person would know was going to result in these problems; problem you now want to pretend you had nothing to do with their creation--- including the health care problems being experienced by Indian people.

Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council




I then had the following communication with Dr. Nathaniel Cobb of the Indian Health Service:


From: Alan Maki [mailto:amaki000@centurytel.net]

Sent:Wednesday,April 22, 20099:47 PM

To: Kimi De Leon; Joan Kim

Cc:'Jim Hart';'John Kolstad';'Kip Sullivan';'Carl Levin';'Sen.Jim Carlson'; rep.bill.hilty@house.mn; rep.tom.anzelc@house.mn; rep.tom.Rukavina@house.mn; rep.tony.sertich@house.mn; ddepass@startribune.com; mmiron@bemidjipioneer.com; bswenson@bemidjipioneer.com;'Chris Spotted Eagle'; jgoldstein@americanrightsatwork.org; teresa_detrempe@klobuchar.senate.gov;

peter.erlinder@wmitchell.edu; peter.makowski@mail.house.gov; esquincle@verizon.net;'Walter Tillow'; nursenpo@gmail.com; 'Steve Early'; 'Joshua Frank'; 'Ta, Minh'; 'Rhoda Gilman';'David Shove'; 'ken nash'; 'Ken Pentel';WCS-A@yahoogroups.com; MARKOWIT@history.rutgers.edu; tdennis@gfherald.com; 'Myers, John'; loneagle@paulbunyan.net; 'Thomas Kurhajetz'; mhoney@u.washington.edu;moderator@portside.org; debssoc@sbcglobal.net; 'Tom Meersman'; peterb3121@hotmail.com; laurel1@dailyjournal-ifalls.com; jscannel@aflcio.org; rgettel@uaw.net; gdubovich@usw.org; info@jamesmayer.org; mzweig@notes.cc.sunysb.edu; rachleff@macalester.edu; advocate@stpaulunions.org; elizabeth_reed@levin.senate.gov; 'Alan Uhl';'Charles Underwood'

Subject: Re: Question on Indian Health Summit



To whom it may concern;



Could you tell me if there will be a discussion at the Indian Health

Summit---July 7-9, 2009 in Denver,Colorado---concerning the issue of casino workers in the Indian Gaming Industry and the impact to their health of second hand smoke in their workplaces?



Could you advise me if there have been any discussions about this with the American Cancer Society and/or the Heart and Lung Foundation?



I am very concerned since I find nothing on this important topic among any of the materials you are distributing for the Indian Health Summit.



With health care costs become an important topic for discussion it would seem that this issue would at least merit some kind of mention at an Indian Health Summit considering the large number of Native Americans employed in the Indian Gaming Industry.



Perhaps you would be interested in having me address one of the plenary sessions since this topic has not been considered previously.



I would point out that I have contacted my of the local offices and administrators of the Indian Health Services concerning this issue and no one will speak to me.



With the Indian Health Services being part of the Department of Interior and associated with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, it would only seem logical that no further casino "Compacts" would be approved unless they contain provisions banning and prohibiting smoking.



I would also suggest that the Indian Health Services insist that all existing "Compacts" be re-opened so a ban and prohibition on smoking can be inserted into them.



"Compacts" are nothing more than contracts and the Obama Administration has seen fit to insist that previously negotiated contracts with labor unions be re-negotiated so there is definitely a precedent that has been established for doing this and I am sure you will agree with me that there could not be a better argument made for renegotiating these "Compacts" than to protect the health of hundreds of thousands of workers employed in these casinos who, in addition to working in these smoke-filled working environments are not protected under any state or federal labor laws, which makes this problem of being employed in a work environment detrimental to human health even a more serious concern.



Perhaps the Indian Health Services could make a recommendation to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Secretary of the Department of Interior that the Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, becomes involved so that the protection of casino worker's rights under all state and federal labor laws protecting all other workers in the United States be included at the time the Compacts are re-opened to protect the health of casino workers.



If you have any doubts second-hand smoke contributes to an unhealthy work environment and that second-hand smoke is recognized as a leading contributor to a variety of cancers and heart and lung diseases please do not hesitate to request additional information. I will be more than happy to attend your Indian Health Care Summit with the necessary resource materials.



With some two-million workers now employed in the Indian Gaming Industry we want to make sure everything possible is being done to protect the health and well-being of these workers.



If I have addressed this letter to the wrong persons, would you please provide me with the name of the proper person/s and department/s this letter should be sent to.



If you think this issue concerning the impact of second-hand smoke on the health of casino workers is not significant enough to be discussed at the Indian Health Summit would you be so kind as to advise me of your decision and how it was reached?



Thanking you in advance for your timely consideration;



Alan L. Maki

Director of Organizing,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council



58891 County Road13

Warroad,Minnesota56763

Phone:218-386-2432

Cell phone:651-587-5541

E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net



Check out my blog:



Thoughts From Podunk



http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/



Cc: Maggie Bird

President,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council







Dr. Nathaniel Cobb’s response to me:



Dear Mr. Maki:



Your email (below) was forwarded to me for response, as the Agency lead for tobacco control. Thank you for your suggestions - I completely agree that environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in Casinos is a serious health issue for both the employees and the patrons. Labor law is outside my expertise and purview, but I will try to address a few of the many questions you raise:



1. Can we have a session on casino workers and ETS exposure at the Indian Health Summit?

- reasonable suggestion, but the practical answer is that we did invite the public to submit abstracts, that deadline has passed, and we have already finalized the agenda and cannot add another session. We do have a tobacco session scheduled, but nothing was submitted that focused specifically on casinos.



2. Have we discussed this issue with ACS, AHA, or ALA?

- yes. In discussions with ACS, we have agreed that local advocacy may be the most effective way to approach this issue.



3. Can IHS work with BIA to ban smoking in Casinos?

- IHS is an agency of Health and Human Services, not Interior. We have no regulatory role with regard to Gaming compacts, so no direct influence. In our advisory role with regard to health issues, we may make recommendations to another agency. Your suggestion has merit, and I will discuss it with senior leadership within IHS. I note that you have cc'd your email to your congressional delegation. The Congress has much more power to dictate terms of Indian Compacts than we do, so you should continue to work closely with them. A formal letter to a Member of Congress or to an Agency Head, with a clearly worded request, will always get a response.



4. What else can we do?

- It is true that ETS exposure is a health issue, but the solutions are political. We have great respect for Tribal Sovereignty, and unless and until Tribal Leaders support a smoking ban in casinos, it is not likely to happen. So my suggestion is that you contact the National Indian Health Board and ask for a time slot to present the issue at their next Consumer Conference. That meeting is a great opportunity to influence the thinking of Indian Country leadership.



Thank you for your concern, and I look forward to attending your session at the NIHB conference! If you have any educational materials or scientific studies of ETS and casino workers, I would appreciate your sending me copies.



--

Nathaniel Cobb MD

Chief, Chronic Disease Branch

Division of Epidemiology

Indian Health Service

5300 Homestead Rd NE

AlbuquerqueNM87110

(505)248-4132





My response back to Dr. Cobb:



Dr. Nathaniel Cobb, MD

Division of Epidemiology

Indian Health Service

5300 Homestead Rd NE

AlbuquerqueNM87110

(505)248-4132



Dr. Nathaniel Cobb,



Thank you for the quick response.



As I am sure you must have been thinking as you wrote this response to me, I would not find it satisfactory.



I have contacted all the heads of Indian Health at each of the tribes that operate casinos over the last three years on this issue--- NOT ONE SINGLE ONE has responded to my e-mail or been willing to talk to me on the phone.



Quite frankly, I seriously doubt there are circumstances where the impact of second-hand smoke can be dealt with in one fell swoop.



Yet, we both know this is more about casino PROFITS and the way casino PROFITS influence POLITICS.



What are you suggesting, that it will take some kind of revolution in this country before an agency like yours who has a mandate to educate on this serious issue will act?



I find this coming from a medical doctor such as you very strange; that on this one single issue involving human health where so many lives can be saved and health maintained you suggest that it is up to a union to take the action rather than you.



What are you suggesting is that tribal leaderships motivated solely by profits are to be given into on a health care issue so adversely affecting human health as the issue of being forced to work in an environment composed of second-hand smoke because you do not want to rock the boat--- using as your excuse: "sovereignty."



Is human health not an issue for a “sovereign” nation to be concerned about when it comes to the health of its own people?



There seems to be a clear admission here on your part that these tribal governments involved in gaming have been so corrupted by money they don't even care about the health of their own people; let alone the health of anyone else.



As you are fully aware, most of these casinos are run by outside management firms only using sovereignty to bolster their profits in escaping protecting the rights of casino workers to be free from second-hand smoke in their employment.



You come up with this flimsy excuse that the issue of smoke-free casinos cannot be addressed because the details of the conference are already set and established. However, what is preventing those who will be doing the presentations on the serious consequences of tobacco from raising the issue concerning the need for these casinos to go smoke-free because it is a matter of fundamental human rights for workers not to be forced to work in these conditions that we all know are seriously detrimental to human health.



You, as a medical doctor, are requesting that I should send you further information regarding the consequences of working in these smoke-filled casinos?



It is almost unbelievable that you, being a medical doctor, have even written these words.



That you acknowledge you have known about this problem and not insisted the politicians correct this, is a disgrace. You are the expert witness here.



I find it very difficult to understand how the scientific and medical community has managed to turn out the most respected from these professions to testify:



- Against the tobacco companies in law suits;



- At Congressional and State Legislative hearings;



- In support of smoke-free workplaces for everyone else except casino workers.



But, for some reason there is complete, total, overwhelming and absolute silence when it comes to the issue coercing these casinos in the Indian Gaming Industry to go smoke-free to protect the health of two-million casino workers.



At this point, since you agree this is a very serious problem; I would request that you convey my concerns---AND WHAT YOU CLAIM ARE YOUR SHARED CONCERNS--- to each and everyone of those people who will be participating in the tobacco workshops, forums or making any presentations on tobacco and request that they specifically address the problem of second-hand smoke in casinos and make suggestions and recommendations how this issue will be resolved by coercing these casino managements to go smoke-free.



The Manitoba, Canada provincial government has taken the stand that they will not approve any further casino Compacts or upgrades or new licenses for any casino unless it will be smoke-free.



Something is very wrong with the scenario you bring forward here. I find it kind of strange that a public official such as yourself, who has a legislated mandate to provide the leadership in protecting human health, would tell a citizen writing to you to go and do your job for you.



I expect you to communicate your concerns regarding second-hand smoke (environmental tobacco smoke) to each member of the United States Congress, every single state legislator in each and every state; and, I expect that you will convey your concerns as a medical doctor and in your capacity as a public official with the specific mandate to raise this concern with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Secretary of the Department of Interior; and further, that you instruct all of those employed at the local and state levels working for Indian Health Services to immediately undertake discussions about this with their tribal governments.



Sovereignty has nothing to do with this issue.



Can you provide me one single instance where the human health and welfare of a nation’s people is compromised under the guise of “sovereignty” as you are blatantly doing here? No; you cannot provide any such example. How could “sovereignty” possibly be compromised by protecting the health and well-being of any people from any nation? Do you realize how utterly stupid this sounds coming from an educated man like yourself and a doctor on top of that?



Your department and agency is involved in this conference. As a result, you have a mandate to bring this issue forward.



I assume you do not request permission from tribal governments to raise any other issues related to human health; so, why would you conceded your mandate on this vital health issue to tribal governments with no demonstrated concern on this issue or for the human health of their own people?



To suggest that this issue can wait until another conference, where both you and I know that I will never receive permission to speak on this issue, is about as insensitive and uncaring a response that anyone could ever expect to receive from a public official who has the scientific and medical background to know and understand that thousands of casino workers will lose their health while others will die from second-hand smoke they are forced to breath as forced and coerced terms and conditions of their employment.



I am requesting that you carry out the mandate you have from the United States Congress and act to make sure this issue is addressed at your upcoming conference with the aim of resolving this issue once and for all.



I expect to receive written confirmation that you have taken such action.



I assume that President Barack Obama would not appreciate you dragging your feet on this issue since he is so concerned about health care costs; I don't think I have to lecture you, a medical doctor, about the costs involved in trying to cure cancers and heart & lung problems associated with second-hand smoke in the workplace.



With all the attention now focused on accusations of frivolous government spending, I would think you would be more sensitive to the need to bring this issue forward at your upcoming conference.



Respectfully,



Alan L. Maki

Director of Organizing,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council



Cc: Maggie Bird

President,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council




With all that has take place, along comes the Washington Post and the rest of the mainstream media acting as if no one has known about the health care problems of Indian people.

I would also note that not one single newspaper, radio or television station has documented what is going on in the Indian Gaming Industry when it comes to the health and welfare of casino workers.

Why didn't the mainstream media examine how the Indian Health Service was doing while Gale Norton was in charge at the Interior Department for so many of the Bush years?

But, the larger question is why has hasn't the mainstream media seen fit to explore the conditions under which two-million people are employed in the Indian Gaming Industry in this country of which Indian Country is a part... if it wasn't, the Red Lake Tribal Council wouldn't have sent its representatives to the United States Congress begging for more health care funding.

The United States government shoved Indian people onto reservations after stealing their land and the natural resources; proclaimed these Indian Reservations to be "sovereign nations," intentionally leaving these "sovereign" nations without adequate resources to create real nations... and then, through the development of these anti-labor, racist "Compacts" designed with intent to allow a group of vicious mobsters to control the political, economic, social and cultural life of these "sovereign" Indian Nations; the politicians of this country stand back and say, "We can't do anything. We don't want to intervene in the affairs of sovereign Indian nations. We don't want to be in the position of creating problems among Indian people."

How racist and arrogant. The politicians set up a system of native "self-government" in a way designed to get people fighting amongst themselves and then these politicians stand back holding their bribes and pay-offs in the form of campaign contributions claiming their hands are tied.

I hope this blog posting has given people something to think about;

Alan L. Maki




PROMISES, PROMISES: Indian health care needs unmet

Note: The slideshow is available at the link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061400903.html?hpid=sec-health?hpid=sec-health

SLIDESHOW Previous Next
People sit in the waiting room of the Indian Health Service clinic in Crow Agency, Mont., Oct. 16, 2008. The Indian Health Service system serves almost 2 million American Indians in 35 states. An oftt-quoted refrain on some reservations is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. (AP Photo/Mary Clare Jalonick) (Mary Clare Jalonick - AP)

This July 2005 photo provided by the Little Light Family shows Ta'shon Rain Little Light in Crow Agency, Mont. Five-year-old Ta'shon had stopped eating and walking, and complained constantly to her mother that her stomach hurt. On her first and subsequent visits to the Indian Health Service clinic on the Crow Agency, Mont., Ta'shon's mother was told her daughter was depressed, when in fact she had cancer, and died some months later. (AP Photo/Little Light Family) (AP)

Ta' Shon Little Light, 5, right, who died of cancer following a misdiagnosis by the local Indian Health Service, is seen with her sisters Thea Little Light, 13, left, and Tia Little Light, 10, at their home in Crow Agency, Mont. in this undated photo. Ta'shon died of cancer some months after a repeated diagnosis of depression by the Indian Health Service clinic. (AP Photo/Little Light Family) (AP)

Ada White talks about her great niece Ta'shon Rain Little Light, seen in the photo, during an interview with the Associated Press in Crow Agency, Mont., Oct. 16, 2008. Ta'shon died of cancer in a matter of months subsequent to a misdiagnosis of depression by the local Indian Health Service. (AP Photo/Mary Clare Jalonick) (Mary Clare Jalonick - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, pedestrians walk past the Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters in Fort Yates. N .D. The reservation's Indian Health Service staff say they are trying to improve conditions. They point out recent improvements to their clinic, including a new ambulance bay. But in interviews on the reservation, residents were eager to share stories about substandard care. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, a small child walks toward the front door of the Public Health Service Indian Hospital on the Standing Rock Reservation in Fort Yates. N.D. The U.S. has an obligation, based on a 1787 agreement between tribes and the government, to provide American Indians with free health care on reservations. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, people sit in the Indian Health Services waiting room on Standing Rock Reservation in Fort Yates. N.D. Statistics for health and disease in Indian country are staggering: American Indians have an infant death rate that is 40 percent higher than the rate for whites, are twice as likely to die from diabetes, are 60 percent more likely to have a stroke, 30 percent more likely to have high blood pressure, and 20 percent more likely to have heart disease. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Rhonda Sandland weeps as she talks about almost losing her fingers to frostbite at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, in Fort Yates. N .D. Sandland says the reservation's clinic decided to remove five of her fingers because of the pain, but a visiting doctor from Bismarck, N.D., intervened, giving her drugs instead. She says she eventually lost the tops of her fingers, and the top layer of skin. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Ron His Horse is Thunder, chairman of the Standing Rock tribe, talks about the Indian Health Service at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, Fort Yates. N.D. His Horse is Thunder says his remote reservation on the border between North Dakota and South Dakota can't attract or maintain doctors who know what they are doing. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Dr. Vincent Barnes points out the great distance he and his staff must travel to treat people on the Standing Rock Reservation at Fort Yates, N.D. Barnes is a psychologist with the U.S. Public Health Service. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, sisters Marcella Buckley, left, and Tracy Castaway pose at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, Fort Yates. N .D. Castaway says her sister is in $40,000 of debt because of treatment for Stage 4 stomach cancer after being misdiagnosed for years by the local health clinic, including for the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Marcella Buckley talks about her medical condition at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters in Fort Yates. N .D. Buckley says she visited the local clinic for four years with stomach pains and was given a variety of diagnoses, including the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. She was eventually told she had Stage 4 cancer that had spread throughout her body. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)

In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Victor Brave Thunder talks about his medical condition at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, in Fort Yates. N .D. The reservation's clinic failed to diagnose Victor Brave Thunder with congestive heart failure, giving him Tylenol and cough syrup, when he told a doctor he was uncomfortable and had not slept for several days. He eventually went to a hospital in Bismarck, which immediately admitted him. Brave Thunder, 54, died in April while waiting for a heart transplant. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)


By MARY CLARE JALONICK
The Associated Press
Sunday, June 14, 2009

CROW AGENCY, Mont. -- Ta'Shon Rain Little Light, a happy little girl who loved to dance and dress up in traditional American Indian clothes, had stopped eating and walking. She complained constantly to her mother that her stomach hurt.

When Stephanie Little Light took her daughter to the Indian Health Service clinic in this wind-swept and remote corner of Montana, they told her the 5-year-old was depressed.

Ta'Shon's pain rapidly worsened and she visited the clinic about 10 more times over several months before her lung collapsed and she was airlifted to a children's hospital in Denver. There she was diagnosed with terminal cancer, confirming the suspicions of family members.

A few weeks later, a charity sent the whole family to Disney World so Ta'Shon could see Cinderella's Castle, her biggest dream. She never got to see the castle, though. She died in her hotel bed soon after the family arrived in Florida.

"Maybe it would have been treatable," says her great-aunt, Ada White, as she stoically recounts the last few months of Ta'Shon's short life. Stephanie Little Light cries as she recalls how she once forced her daughter to walk when she was in pain because the doctors told her it was all in the little girl's head.

Ta'Shon's story is not unique in the Indian Health Service system, which serves almost 2 million American Indians in 35 states.

On some reservations, the oft-quoted refrain is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. It's a sick joke, and a sad one, because it's sometimes true, especially on the poorest reservations where residents cannot afford health insurance. Officials say they have about half of what they need to operate, and patients know they must be dying or about to lose a limb to get serious care.

Wealthier tribes can supplement the federal health service budget with their own money. But poorer tribes, often those on the most remote reservations, far away from city hospitals, are stuck with grossly substandard care. The agency itself describes a "rationed health care system."

The sad fact is an old fact, too.

The U.S. has an obligation, based on a 1787 agreement between tribes and the government, to provide American Indians with free health care on reservations. But that promise has not been kept. About one-third more is spent per capita on health care for felons in federal prison, according to 2005 data from the health service.

In Washington, a few lawmakers have tried to bring attention to the broken system as Congress attempts to improve health care for millions of other Americans. But tightening budgets and the relatively small size of the American Indian population have worked against them.

"It is heartbreaking to imagine that our leaders in Washington do not care, so I must believe that they do not know," Joe Garcia, president of the National Congress of American Indians, said in his annual state of Indian nations' address in February.

When it comes to health and disease in Indian country, the statistics are staggering.

American Indians have an infant death rate that is 40 percent higher than the rate for whites. They are twice as likely to die from diabetes, 60 percent more likely to have a stroke, 30 percent more likely to have high blood pressure and 20 percent more likely to have heart disease.

American Indians have disproportionately high death rates from unintentional injuries and suicide, and a high prevalence of risk factors for obesity, substance abuse, sudden infant death syndrome, teenage pregnancy, liver disease and hepatitis.

While campaigning on Indian reservations, presidential candidate Barack Obama cited this statistic: After Haiti, men on the impoverished Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations in South Dakota have the lowest life expectancy in the Western Hemisphere.

Those on reservations qualify for Medicare and Medicaid coverage. But a report by the Government Accountability Office last year found that many American Indians have not applied for those programs because of lack of access to the sign-up process; they often live far away or lack computers. The report said that some do not sign up because they believe the government already has a duty to provide them with health care.

The office of minority health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the Indian Health Service, notes on its Web site that American Indians "frequently contend with issues that prevent them from receiving quality medical care. These issues include cultural barriers, geographic isolation, inadequate sewage disposal and low income."

Indeed, Indian health clinics often are ill-equipped to deal with such high rates of disease, and poor clinics do not have enough money to focus on preventive care. The main problem is a lack of federal money. American Indian programs are not a priority for Congress, which provided the health service with $3.6 billion this budget year.

Officials at the health service say they can't legally comment on specific cases such as Ta'Shon's. But they say they are doing the best they can with the money they have - about 54 cents on the dollar they need.

One of the main problems is that many clinics must "buy" health care from larger medical facilities outside the health service because the clinics are not equipped to handle more serious medical conditions. The money that Congress provides for those contract health care services is rarely sufficient, forcing many clinics to make "life or limb" decisions that leave lower-priority patients out in the cold.

"The picture is much bigger than what the Indian Health Service can do," says Doni Wilder, an official at the agency's headquarters in Rockville, Md., and the former director of the agency's Northwestern region. "Doctors every day in our organization are making decisions about people not getting cataracts removed, gall bladders fixed."

On the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, Indian Health Service staff say they are trying to improve conditions. They point out recent improvements to their clinic, including a new ambulance bay. But in interviews on the reservation, residents were eager to share stories about substandard care.

Rhonda Sandland says she couldn't get help for her advanced frostbite until she threatened to kill herself because of the pain - several months after her first appointment. She says she was exposed to temperatures at more than 50 below, and her hands turned purple. She eventually couldn't dress herself, she says, and she visited the clinic over and over again, sometimes in tears.

"They still wouldn't help with the pain so I just told them that I had a plan," she said. "I was going to sleep in my car in the garage."

She says the clinic then decided to remove five of her fingers, but a visiting doctor from Bismarck, N.D., intervened, giving her drugs instead. She says she eventually lost the tops of her fingers and the top layer of skin.

The same clinic failed to diagnose Victor Brave Thunder with congestive heart failure, giving him Tylenol and cough syrup when he told a doctor he was uncomfortable and had not slept for several days. He eventually went to a hospital in Bismarck, which immediately admitted him. But he had permanent damage to his heart, which he attributed to delays in treatment. Brave Thunder, 54, died in April while waiting for a heart transplant.

"You can talk to anyone on the reservation and they all have a story," says Tracey Castaway, whose sister, Marcella Buckley, said she was in $40,000 of debt because of treatment for stomach cancer.

Buckley says she visited the clinic for four years with stomach pains and was given a variety of diagnoses, including the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. She was eventually told she had Stage 4 cancer that had spread throughout her body.

Ron His Horse is Thunder, chairman of the Standing Rock tribe, says his remote reservation on the border between North Dakota and South Dakota can't attract or maintain doctors who know what they are doing. Instead, he says, "We get old doctors that no one else wants or new doctors who need to be trained."

His Horse is Thunder often travels to Washington to lobby for more money and attention, but he acknowledges that improvements are tough to come by.

"We are not one congruent voting bloc in any one state or area," he said. "So we don't have the political clout."

On another reservation 200 miles north of Standing Rock, Ardel Baker, a member of North Dakota's Three Affiliated Tribes, knows all too well the truth behind the joke about money running out.

Baker went to her local clinic with severe chest pains and was sent by ambulance to a hospital more than an hour away. It wasn't until she got there that she noticed she had a note attached to her, written on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services letterhead.

"Understand that Priority 1 care cannot be paid for at this time due to funding issues," the letter read. "A formal denial letter has been issued."

She lived, but she says she later received a bill for more than $5,000.

"That really epitomizes the conflict that we have," says Robert McSwain, deputy director of the Indian Health Service. "We have to move the patient out, it's an emergency. We need to get them care."

It was too late for Harriet Archambault, according to the chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, who has told her story more than once in the Senate.

Dorgan says Archambault died in 2007 after her medicine for hypertension ran out and she couldn't get an appointment to refill it at the nearest clinic, 18 miles away. She drove to the clinic five times and failed to get an appointment before she died.

Dorgan's swath of the country is the hardest hit in terms of Indian health care. Many reservations there are poor, isolated, devoid of economic development opportunities and subject to long, harsh winters - making it harder for the health service to recruit doctors to practice there.

While the agency overall has an 18 percent vacancy rate for doctors, that rate jumps to 38 percent for the region that includes the Dakotas. That region also has a 29 percent vacancy rate for dentists, and officials and patients report there is almost no preventive dental care. Routine procedures such as root canals are rarely seen here. If there's a problem with a tooth, it is simply pulled.

Dorgan has led efforts in Congress to bring attention to the issue. After many years of talking to frustrated patients at home in North Dakota, he says he believes the problems are systemic within the embattled agency: incompetent staffers are transferred instead of fired; there are few staff to handle complaints; and, in some cases, he says, there is a culture of intimidation within field offices charged with overseeing individual clinics.

The senator has also probed waste at the agency.

A 2008 GAO report, along with a follow-up report this year, accused the Indian Health Service of losing almost $20 million in equipment, including vehicles, X-ray and ultrasound equipment and numerous laptops. The agency says some of the items were later found.

Dorgan persuaded Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to consider an American Indian health improvement bill last year, and the bill passed in the Senate. It would have directed Congress to provide about $35 billion for health programs over the next 10 years, including better access to health care services, screening and mental health programs. A similar bill died in the House, though, after it became entangled in an abortion dispute.

The growing political clout of some remote reservations may bring some attention to health care woes. Last year's Democratic presidential primary played out in part in the Dakotas and Montana, where both Obama and Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton became the first presidential candidates to aggressively campaign on American Indian reservations there. Both politicians promised better health care.

Obama's budget for 2010 includes an increase of $454 million, or about 13 percent, over this year. Also, the stimulus bill he signed this year provided for construction and improvements to clinics.

Back in Montana, Ta'Shon's parents are doing what they can to bring awareness to the issue. They have prepared a slideshow with pictures of her brief life; she is seen dressed up in traditional regalia she wore for dance competitions with a bright smile on her face. Family members approached Dorgan at a Senate field hearing on American Indian health care after her death in 2006, hoping to get the little girl's story out.

"She was a gift, so bright and comforting," says Ada White of her niece, whom she calls her granddaughter according to Crow tradition. "I figure she was brought here for a reason."

Nearby, the clinic on the Crow reservation seems mostly empty, aside from the crowded waiting room. The hospital is down several doctors, a shortage that management attributes recruitment difficulties and the remote location.

Diane Wetsit, a clinical coordinator, said she finds it difficult to think about the congressional bailout for Wall Street.

"I have a hard time with that when I walk down the hallway and see what happens here," she says.

something to think about...

For somewhere between the cost of Postal Service and Public Education we could get a National Public Health Care System.



Think about it; for the price of a couple first class stamps per day, per person, we could fund Primary Health Care for everyone--- completely free. For the cost of about six first class postage stamps per day, per person, we could fund a complete National Public Health Care System from pre-natal to burial, comprehensive and all inclusive.



The only thing standing in our way is a bunch of greedy Wall Street coupon clipping vultures and the government they manipulate and control.



Funding and financing is simple--- we tell the generals and the merchants of death and destruction, the same Wall Street crowd, to go fund their dirty wars by selling seeds and candy bars from door-to-door and with millage elections so we can fund health care. If we don't have quite enough we can tax the rich and/or institute a pay-roll tax just like we fund Social Security only make the corporations pay a little more.



Something to think about.

A letter to David Swanson

David,

John Marty’s healthcare legislation is anything BUT single-payer universal healthcare.

Certainly nothing like Canadian-style healthcare.

John Marty is using this as an election gimmick pure and simple.

You obviously haven’t bothered to ask how much this healthcare will cost someone of very modest means.

A working person making around $35,000.00 a year will be paying a premium of about $750.00 a month. I lived in Canada for ten years, and I seriously doubt even Conrad Black paid that much into the healthcare system every month. With Social Insurance (pretty much like Social Security here) and Canada Health Care combined, about $62.00 was deducted from my pay-check every month while I lived in Manitoba.

You may hold John Marty up as some kind of progressive, in fact, this past weekend he had op-ed pieces published explaining the military budget is robbing us of things like healthcare placing the blame for these wars on Bush--- never mentioned Obama.

In fact, I think if you do a survey of most unions, you will find none supporting this Marty proposal.

In fact, I asked the national PNHP to certify this legislation as authentic single-payer universal healthcare… they have refused to state this.

In fact, anyone taking the time to read this legislation quickly finds out that it will relieve the burden of healthcare costs for business--- especially small business and well-heeled professionals while placing a greater burden for healthcare costs on the backs of the poor and working people.

John Marty can’t even protect the interests of the poor in a Democratic controlled Minnesota legislature which is essentially veto-proof on this issue.

Minnesota Democrats passed the strongest resolution in support of single-payer universal healthcare in the nation--- I wrote it; John Marty and almost every single sitting Democrat in the Minnesota State Legislature opposed it… 72% of the 2006 State DFL Convention delegates supported it. A resolution based on the understanding that what was being supported was Canadian-style healthcare.

PDA and PNHP stopped referring to John Marty’s “Minnesota Health Act” as single-payer; now, here you come claiming that it is single-payer. In fact, because of my objections stated very publicly including in newspaper op-ed pieces, John Marty had to rename his legislation--- he initially called it Single-Payer.

The “Minnesota Health Act” is a most reactionary and regressive piece of healthcare legislation; if the legislation in these other states is anything remotely similar, they are not single-payer.

You need to be up-front with your readers and tell them that you think this is single-payer by explaining the atrocious premiums that will come with this legislation and then state you support this as the kind of single-payer you have in mind.

John Marty has refused, time and time again to state the costs associated with this. In fact, John Marty cancelled a series of campaign events after I stated to the media that I would be present to question him about the costs associated with this legislation.

John Marty is now pushing this as legislation “supplemental” to Barack Obama’s and the Democrat’s health insurance “reforms.”

In fact, John Marty’s primary supporter for this has been the Minnesota Universal Health Care Coalition whose head, John Kolstadt ran for Mayor of Minneapolis with support from the Republicans, the John Birch Society and the Ron and Rand Paul supporters. Kolstadt’s main platform was support for the Minnesota Health Act… boasting that he led the efforts for it’s passage.

I am posting this to my blog… I make the same offer to you I have made to John Marty… I will be happy to publish your response.

I can assure you that if you bother to ask working people if they want a $750.00 health care premium they will tell you in no uncertain terms, “no.”

If anyone challenges my figure of $750.00 a month; I suggest that you get the figures directly from DFL gubernatorial candidate John Marty who is viewed as a washed up loser when it comes to running for governor and publish these figures. Let’s have a complete breakdown of premium fees beginning at $4,000.00 going up to $250,000.00 a year incomes.

Together with Marty’s premium fees and Obama’s mandatory insurance, Minnesotans are going to have it socked to them real good--- fortunately John Marty will never become governor and his Minnesota Health Act doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of ever passing so why is anyone wasting our times on this when real healthcare reform is what is needed--- John Marty just abhors me talking about single-payer as a step towards socialized/public healthcare, but, this is what is really needed.

John Marty is the epitome of an opportunist politician the American people and Minnesotans are fed up with.

Alan L. Maki



Single-Payer Healthcare Coming to Missouri
http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/50429
By David Swanson

Canada did not create a civilized healthcare system nationally until its provinces led the way. Clearly Congress is dragging behind the states in our country, and it is through state successes that we will eventually compel the U.S. government to provide our people with this basic human right.

Hawaii has a single-payer healthcare system. California's legislature has passed a single-payer bill three times but not yet found a governor to sign it into law. Single-payer healthcare bills are advancing in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and a growing list of states, including New Mexico, where State Senator Jerry Ortiz y Pino, a long-time supporter of single-payer healthcare, is running for Lieutenant Governor. In Minnesota, single-payer champion John Marty is running for Governor.

I recently wrote about North Carolina house candidate Marcus Brandon, who has pledged to introduce a bill to create single-payer healthcare in that state as his first act in office. Now a formidable candidate for state representative in Missouri has made a similar commitment.

Byron DeLear, whom I have known and learned from for years, said on Monday: "If elected, I will sponsor the 'Melanie-Care for All Act', providing a simple plan to get all of our Missourian families the coverage, protection and care we deserve." DeLear, is a state rep. candidate in the 79th District of Missouri. (See http://www.ByronDeLear.org ) and who is Melanie?

DeLear explains: "A dear friend of mine, Melanie Shouse, recently passed away from breast cancer. She found a lump in her breast but couldn't afford to see a doctor. Through the course of her disease she tirelessly continued to advocate for healthcare for all as a moral imperative. I met her through our shared work as concerned citizens and like many of her friends and colleagues was inspired by her unbridled energy and enthusiasm to effect positive change. Even in the midst of great personal suffering, Melanie selflessly put it all on the line and did the best she could to help us all. Her story was propelled to the national stage with President Obama mentioning her in a speech and culminating with 'Melanie's March' from Philadelphia to Washington DC, ending with a rally attended by Senate leader Harry Reid and other members of Congress."

DeLear is proposing to accomplish something, however, that neither Obama nor Reid will even entertain any discussion of: taking the profit-motive out of healthcare coverage. "If Melanie had access to affordable healthcare," DeLear says, "her untimely death might have been prevented. Seeing a doctor was simply too expensive, just as it is for tens of thousands of Missourians, whose fear of skyrocketing healthcare costs are justified. Health insurance premiums in Missouri have risen 82.5% in the last decade, consequently, the vast majority of all personal bankruptcies are due to medical costs, for both the insured and uninsured alike. This creates a specter of fear for families all across our state. Melanie's death is one of thousands of needless lives lost due to our current broken and inhumane healthcare insurance system."

DeLear provides the statistics for the nation and his state: "According to a recent Harvard Study, 45,000 Americans perish each year due to lack of preventive or primary healthcare. This equals approximately 800 Missourians like Melanie. 800 Missourians die each year due to our broken healthcare system. This is a moral crisis, and suggests that we should all take a step back from the raging debate to ask ourselves, in a perfect world, what would our ideal system be? What do we want for the family of Missouri? And then takes steps to make that ideal a reality, or get as close to it as possible."

DeLear proposes something that has never been mentioned in over a year of endless, tireless, and tiresome healthcare debating in Washington, namely looking for a minute at all the nations that have already solved this problem and asking how they have done so: "Many nations have struggled with the health-care debate before us. What's the best way to adopt complete healthcare coverage for all? The world is full of examples of different solutions to this question. But the trends over time are very specific. What they show is that . . . universal coverage, regardless of class distinctions, is the desirable end result. This goes to the heart of what insurance is and mathematically what 'risk pools' are all about. Pooling risk makes a community, state, and nation stronger. It protects us all against personal catastrophe. Currently, in the United States, health insurance corporations cherry pick through the populace to determine who's worthy of coverage, or how to deny care once you become sick. This is at odds with the healing mandate of the medical profession, and has to be turned around."

DeLear makes an unequivocal commitment, saying "The right thing to do, is to cover all our citizens with healthcare. Medicare covers and protects more than 800,000 Missourians. The first bill I will support will be a Medicare-for-All type plan for Missouri. In honor of our local heroine, Melanie Shouse, if elected, I will sponsor the 'Melanie Care for All Act', providing a simple plan to get all of our Missourian families the coverage, protection and care we deserve."

Byron DeLear's website is at
http://www.ByronDeLear.org

He needs all the help he can get, and there is a little button on his site reading "Make Donation". Those who want a real healthcare system in this country would be wise to pour money into his campaign and those of other state leaders across the country.

Alternatively we could keep putting all our eggs in the basket of fantasies about the United States Senate getting its act together and fixing bills after they're passed.



Alan L. Maki
58891 County Road 13
Warroad, Minnesota 56763

Phone: 218-386-2432
Cell Phone: 651-587-5541

E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net

Please check out my blog: http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/

Mouse-land and healthcare reform

Mr. Boston;

This is an outright lie and you know it:

“Like the Democrats after their 2008 victory, the CCF moved slowly at first to implement its plan, a delay that emboldened the opposition. In an attempt to win the support of doctors, the government created an advisory panel for their concerns. Doctors used the panel to stall, and the government waited more than a year to pass its reforms, with the start date delayed until July 1, 1962. The province's doctors responded with a vote to strike if the plan was implemented.”

The Democrats have proposed nothing like the CCF or NDP and is in no way like them.

This is dishonest to assert this.

Maybe you should check out this speech out by socialist Tommy Douglas and circulate it to your e-mail list:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqpFm7zAK90

Mouseland by Tommy Douglas.

Tommy Douglas was an ardent proponent of socialized healthcare from the very beginning of his political career… plus, the Liberal Party in Canada which you cite correctly as being an opponent of healthcare reform (and still is) is more akin to the Democratic Party than the Republican Party… but, alas, the Liberal and Conservative parties in Canada are the parties of big-business just like their Democratic and Republican Party counterparts here in the United States… we need a party similar to the socialist New Democratic Party (CCF) if we are ever going to achieve real progressive healthcare reform.

Again, your assertion that Democrats are doing anything like the NDP did in Canada is an out-right lie and you should correct this for those on your e-mail list… but, alas, it has been your purpose from the very beginning to serve to disorient and confuse working people when it comes to healthcare reform. You think you are being real “cute” in engaging in your despicable tactics of deceit… par for the course for the way Democrats operate.

The American people are going to give the Democrats the just trouncing they deserve at the polls come Election Day 2010 and Election Day 2012 and this kind of blatant dishonesty you promote will prove to be the Democrat’s own undoing because the American people are fed up with the kind of shenanigans you are engaged in here looking to confuse and disorient working people on the issue of healthcare reform.

It is dishonest people like you who fuel the fascist and racist Tea-bagger movement which makes working people so cynical they don’t want to participate in politics.

In this article you provide, this is a fine example of what all demagogues do; they include a little bit of truth with their pack of lies to justify giving the working people a good shafting. 

Alan L. Maki

58891 County Road 13

Warroad, Minnesota 56763

Phone: 218-386-2432

Cell Phone: 651-587-5541

E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net

Please check out my blog: http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/

From: mark boston [mailto:markmabmab@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, February 19, 2010 1:25 PM
To: markmabmab@gmail.com
Subject: Fwd: Tea Party, Canada-Style

Tea Party, Canada-Style!

America's battle over health care reform started in Saskatchewan.

By Christopher Flavelle Posted Thursday, Feb. 18, 2010, at 6:51 AM ET

Nearly 50 years before Sarah Palin gave us "death panels," the American Medical Association was testing the limits of health care scare tactics in the Canadian prairies. During the 1960 provincial election in Saskatchewan, the AMA helped fund an advertising campaign aimed at defeating the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, a quasi-socialist party whose leader, a former Baptist minister named Tommy Douglas, had promised to introduce universal, government-funded health care in the province. 

Protesting the implementation of medicare in Saskatchewan, July 11, 1962 The AMA, together with Saskatchewan's College of Physicians and Surgeons, warned that if the CCF won, doctors would leave the province in droves. But here was the kicker: As Dave Margoshes writes in his 1999 biography of Douglas, the campaign told voters that if the state were permitted to take over health care, "patients with hard-to-diagnose problems would be shipped off to insane asylums by bungling bureaucrats." 

The campaign failed. Douglas won the election, and the CCF government went on to introduce his health care plan in 1962, creating the model that the rest of Canada would later follow. (So far as we know, insane-asylum panels did not come to pass.) But the fight for health care reform in Saskatchewan, which the AMA worried could spark change in the United States, was a precursor to the battle in America today—a mix of populist anger, political opportunism, and disinformation. As Democrats debate whether to pursue health care reform in the face of growing opposition, they might consider the lessons of Saskatchewan. 

Like the Democrats after their 2008 victory, the CCF moved slowly at first to implement its plan, a delay that emboldened the opposition. In an attempt to win the support of doctors, the government created an advisory panel for their concerns. Doctors used the panel to stall, and the government waited more than a year to pass its reforms, with the start date delayed until July 1, 1962. The province's doctors responded with a vote to strike if the plan was implemented.

The events of the next 10 months were ugly by Canadian standards. Douglas' push for health care reform "lit the fuse of the incendiary bomb that would tear Saskatchewan apart into its two opposing elements," wrote Doris French Shackleton in her 1975 biography of Douglas. 

Part of the unrest came from doctors themselves. In the months leading up to the new plan, physicians across Saskatchewan put up office signs reading, "Unless agreement is reached between the present government and the medical profession, this office will close as of July 1." Douglas' wife, Irma, described how a doctor would tell his pregnant patient, after a check-up, "I'm afraid this is the last time I'll be able to see you." 

The doctors' worries about being paid by the province, rather than patients, may have been genuine. But those concerns were amplified by Saskatchewan's opposition Liberal Party, which had been shut out of power since 1944. Like the American Republicans 50 years later, the Liberals fought health reform in two ways: directly, by opposing it in public; and indirectly, by supporting groups that could provide the appearance of broad-based public anger. In Saskatchewan, the public opposition to health reform came in the form of a movement called Keep Our Doctors, which organized rallies and protests across the province.

Sometimes, the Liberals blurred the line between political opposition and rabble-rousing. At a Keep Our Doctors rally outside the provincial legislature, Liberal leader Ross Thatcher used the occasion to call for a special session of the legislature, which wasn't sitting at the time. To illustrate his point, he invited TV cameras to follow him up to the locked doors of the legislature, which he then made a show of trying to kick down.

But in another precursor to today's Tea Party movement in the United States, the unrest over health reform in Saskatchewan proved to be more than just political theatrics. "The fears inspired by the doctors and fanned by the Liberal party," Shackleton writes, "convinced many people at least briefly that the CCF was a dictatorial, power-mad, ruthless group of politicians who would rather see people die for lack of medical care than back down." Shackleton described "a sense of civil war." (Read more about the unrest in Saskatchewan.)

Public anger against the plan found its lightning rod in Douglas, who had resigned as Saskatchewan's premier to run for federal office as the member of Parliament for Regina. Election Day was June 18, 1962—just two weeks before the new health care plan was to take effect. A woman who worked on Douglas' election campaign recalled the venom of the time. At night at the campaign office, "teenagers would come up and hiss at us through the glass," she remembered later. 

"The city's residents had been whipped into a near-hysteria by the doctors' anti-medicare campaign," Margoshes writes, adding, "There were graffiti threats on city walls and calls in the middle of the night to Tommy's house. His campaign manager, Ed Whelan, got frequent calls from a man threatening to 'shoot you, you Red bastard!' A few homeowners placed symbolic coffins on their front lawns." 

As in the United States today, opponents of the health reform plan weren't sure whether to denounce the CCF as Communists or Nazis, so they did both. Protesters greeted Douglas' motorcade with Nazi salutes—when they weren't throwing stones at it. Other opponents painted the hammer and sickle on the homes of people thought to be associated with the party.

The doctors made good on their threats: When the new health care plan was introduced on July 1, doctors across the province walked off the job. But the government was ready, flying in replacement doctors, mostly from Britain. The strike ended after three weeks, the health care plan stayed in place, and four years later, the Canadian government passed the Medical Care Act, which provided funding for every province to create a similar plan

Douglas and his party were vindicated. Once their plan took effect, Shackleton writes, it "was soon so well accepted that no political party had the temerity to suggest its abolition."

But that vindication came too late. Douglas, who had led the CCF to five straight provincial victories, lost his federal campaign that June, receiving barely half as many votes as his opponent. Two years later, the Liberals defeated the CCF for the first time in 20 years. The party that passed health care reform would spend the next seven years out of power. 

The events leading up to the 1962 doctors' strike in Saskatchewan are different from today's Tea Party movement in important ways, of course. Saskatchewan wasn't seized by the same level of broad distrust for government that U.S. opinion polls show today. The idea of a government role in health care was already accepted, to a degree: Saskatchewan had already passed the Hospital Insurance Act in 1947, which paid for hospital care. And the changes Democrats have called for stop well short of single-payer health care, notwithstanding the charges of their critics. Even the AMA supported Obama's plan. 

But the anger of those months in Saskatchewan undermines a key belief in the debate over health care reform. When confronted with the overall success of Canada's brand of government-funded health care—better health outcomes at much lower cost—Americans tend to respond that such a broad government role is anathema to American culture. This has the ring of an excuse—after all, the idea was apparently somewhat anathema to Canadian culture in 1962. As Douglas said then, "We've become convinced that these things, which were once thought to be radical, aren't radical at all; they're just plain common sense applied to the economic and social problems of our times." 

The point isn't that U.S. and Canadian cultures aren't different. Rather, it's that cultural attitudes aren't static. However much some segments of U.S. culture may resist Obama's proposals, the Saskatchewan experience suggests that resistance will dissipate if the plan produces a system that works better than the status quo—especially since, as in Saskatchewan, the government was elected on a promise to make that change.

The other lesson of Saskatchewan is less exciting for Democrats: Even if people come around to the reform itself, they may not come around to the party that pushed it through. If they want to achieve health care reform, that may be a chance that Democrats have to take. But re-election qualms shouldn't be dressed up with bromides about the limits of what's possible. As Canadians can attest, health care reform takes a little more backbone than that.