If you think you're not a liberal, think again

During the health care reform debate in 2009, opponents of what is now commonly called Obamacare, called the new law socialism. Political pundits will never forget images of anti-Obama, Tea Party supporters carrying signs that said, keep your government hands off my Medicare.

But many of the people protesting against government control of Medicare didn't know that it was and always had been a government-controlled program.

Even today, many of the people receiving Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits insist that they are not getting any government assistance, according to polling data.

How can so many people be convinced of something that is so completely false?

Read the full story here....

What Republicans want and what they can get with Citizens United

There is no doubt that Citizens United has brought more money into the 2012 elections than any other election in history. There is also no doubt that most of it is coming from ultra conservative groups with Super PACs. There is a goal for these millions of dollars, and it does not paint a pretty picture for most Americans.

If you look at the pattern that has emerged since the Citizens United decision allowed unlimited corporate spending in U.S. campaigns, it is terrifying.

What the Supreme Court has done with Citizens United has allowed a handful of very wealthy people, both Americans and foreigners, to buy the representation of their choice in U.S. elections, so laws and regulations can be changed in their favor. The balance of the population is not even an afterthought.

Permanent damage to democracy and freedom.....full story

Paul Ryan Medicare vouchers are designed to be worthless

There is a giant hole in the Paul Ryan end Medicare voucher plan that has been hidden under the darker side of the debate. The Medicare vouchers are designed to be completely worthless.

The Affordable Care Act, which is the proper name for what the GOP has dubbed Obamacare, contains a provision that bans insurance companies from excluding people with pre-existing conditions.

The Fact Sheet of the Affordable care Act states: “Starting July 1, Americans locked out of the insurance market because of a pre-existing condition can begin enrolling in the Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan (PCIP). This program offers insurance without medical underwriting to people who have been unable to get it because of a preexisting condition. It ends in 2014, when the ban on insurers refusing to cover adults with pre-existing conditions goes into effect and individuals will have affordable choices through Exchanges – the same choices as members of Congress.”

If the republicans manage to repeal or de-fund the Affordable Care Act, (Obamacare) insurance companies will once again shut the door in the face of ailing seniors, and everyone else with pre-existing conditions. Furthermore, since the Paul Ryan budget plan claims it will not turn Medicare into a voucher system until after the 2014 Affordable Care Act deadline, it means that by the time the voucher program kicks in, people with pre-existing conditions would be unable to get health insurance.

The deck has been stacked against seniors and the details of the Paul Ryan Medicare voucher plan have been purposefully kept hidden. In reality, the only goal Ryan's plan will achieve is the fulfillment of the Republican Party's long time dream to repeal Medicare once and for all.

It’s not hard to do the math, and once you do, the fact of the matter becomes obvious. The Paul Ryan Medicare voucher plan is deliberately designed to be completely worthless.

Paul Ryan's scheme to end Medicare is deadly

While everyone is busy talking about whether or not America will adopt the Ryan plan to end Medicare, no one has bothered to discuss in detail what would happen if Medicare did indeed disappear.

Foremost, people must look past the rhetoric. A voucher to buy private health insurance does not ‘save’ Medicare for future generations; it ends it.

Medicare is a single payer healthcare system where the government acts as a broker in establishing guidelines on what doctors and hospitals can charge for services for a segment of the population that is otherwise uninsurable. Medicare pays the health care providers and collects affordable premiums through Social Security deductions.

Now take the government away. Most elderly people have pre-existing conditions and are uninsurable. So what kind of health care system do you have left?

Here is what I believe will probably happen if the republicans win their 50 year battle to end health care through the Medicare system.

The removal of government pressure on insurance companies through standardized Medicare pricing will cause insurance rates to skyrocket. Employers struggling to cover employees now due to rising costs will be forced to drop coverage, thus adding millions to the ranks of the uninsured.

The vouchers the elderly receive from the government will not even come close to the astronomical rates insurance companies will charge them, so they will end up using the money to pay for as much medical care as they can while the money lasts. Those in assisted living facilities will be forced to move in with relatives, if they have any that will take them.

Hospitals no longer receiving guaranteed payments from the government through Medicare will refuse to treat elderly patients knowing they will not get paid.

In short, people will die at a much younger age than they would have if they had access to health care in their old age. Children born with birth defects or who develop life threatening diseases will die as well.

We have made amazing advances in medicine over the past two decades, but they will do no one any good if they don’t have the money or insurance to benefit from them.

While the concepts of what America would be like without Medicare are strictly speculation at this point, but they do need to be considered because medicine, surgery, and treatments are the difference between life and death for millions of Americans of every age.

“To senior citizens at town hall meetings angry or worried about their plan to convert Medicare to a private insurance scheme, Republicans have a simple answer: It’s not about you. You’ll be fine. This is for “the next generation,” according to The New Republic.

However, Paul Ryan has no right to decide who gets to live and who should die. But that is exactly what is he proposing by pulling the plug on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. In the real world outside of the millionaires of Capitol Hill, people who need surgery or medicine will die if they don’t have insurance or enough money to buy time for their own lives.

One might expect to see old people dying in the streets in a third world country, but not in America - until now.