On the Contrary

I am an engineer and a project manager by training.  That means I try to find solutions to problems using my training in my field (structural engineering and construction).  We are always looking for better more economical and innovative solutions to problems.  It’s in our blood.  I am not wedded to one particular technology or approach to solve a particular problem.  So what I find so amazing to me is that when we face social issues such as solving the health care problem, a fixation on ideology (analogous to technology) is driving the train.

One thing you would think we have learned in our highly innovative business and science culture is that we have to think outside the box.  We have to try different approaches and be flexible to thinking about things in different ways.  And if it doesn’t work, we should have no hesitation to discard it and try something new.  But all of the political discourse we have been witnessing is basically an argument about whether or not to try something different or to stay with what is obviously not working.  In a nutshell, Republicans think that the status quo is fine and the market place is the best way to solve all problems, and the Democrats would like to try something else.

But the discussion is never an honest consideration of the efficacy of the approach, but becomes a faith-based test of ideology.  Think of it in my analogy about being not wedded to a technology to solve a structural engineering problem.  If I were wedded to a particular technology, say concrete, then everything I designed would be concrete.  But in some environments, concrete structures are neither economical nor functional.  So I would ask my Republican friends, why do you think only market based solutions work?  There certainly is enough evidence out there to say they don’t and you continue to ignore it.

The arguments about trying a different approach are frozen in an ideological wasteland.  It can’t possibly work because it is not according to my ideology.  My favorite is, “It will destroy democracy as we know it.”  Here is where I think you will find a major difference between Democrats and Republicans.  Democrats have no problem with market-based solutions if they work.  Republicans will never accept government anything.  A case in point is the cash for clunkers.  Here we have a government program that actually was highly successful at what it was intended to do.  So they tried to kill it.  Was it embarrassing them?  Another is torture.  We are finding out that not only was it inhumane, immoral, and cruel, it was ineffective.  But we still have Republicans arguing just the opposite.  Their ideology blinds them to the facts.

Most Democrats know that while market based solutions are working very well for a few, the majority of the middle class has been losing ground.  Maybe the stock market is not the end all of finance and a measure of success, and we need to help our economy restructure so that more might participate in the bounty.  Republicans know that  government anything is bad, therefore they are against it.  But the engineer in me says, why not try a new approach, especially if the old one is not working.  Apparently it is not working except for the already rich so let’s try something different.

How about a bench test?  Bench tests in the world of engineering are small scale projects to test out the feasibility of the concept.  Republicans will adamantly object.  Why?  Because if it works their ideology has to be examined.  You would think in this day and age with the problems we are facing a little re-examination might be in order.  It is no wonder we call them the party of no.

The prime example of this ideological constipation is the health care debate.  As the problems of our health care system become more and more apparent, the first thing you hear from those defenders of doing nothing is denial that there is a problem.  I wonder how many times I have heard “we have the best damn system in the world”?  Hope they never lose their jobs.

Left of the lefties like me would like a pure single payer system paid for by our taxes, everybody covered.  Republicans want no change or minor tweaking on an employer and market based system that most of us think is the problem. Because they believe anything government does is bad, there can be no government involvement.

Okay, I will meet you half way.  Let’s try a bench test called a public option and see if it works.  They are all opposed to it.  Why?  Why not try something different and if it fails we will get rid of it.  They won’t try it because they are terrified it will succeed.  So they invent the death panels and government bureaucrats between you and your doctor scare tactics for the weak minds in Red Land.  This should tell everything you want to know about ideological constipation.  If they were free to really think, then they could debate these issues on the real substance of the proposal instead of inventing false ones.

Here is my point:  Democrats as a group are much more flexible to change and trying new things than are Republicans.  They are much more likely to lead us to a new and better future.  Unlike Republicans, if a particular system or policy is not working (market based medicine), they are much more likely to admit it is not working and try something different.   I never thought that mental constipation would become a requirement for political affiliation but that is where we have arrived.  You will hear all kinds of arguments as to why we can’t try something different, but the real reason is that they can’t afford to be proven wrong.  Hopefully our future is not in the hands of those who have to create a false reality to be against something, but in those who are willing to sacrifice and try something new.

I think the health care debate kind of epitomizes the American decline.  It is a decline driven by people who feel entitled to certain things and are no longer willing to sacrifice for them.  It is about a country that has lost its way in an ever-increasing struggle to hang on to what they have.  It is about how little people are frightened of change, and paralyzed by their fear, stymie any potential for growth.  It is about how one political party capitalizes on that fear and in using that fear to prevent any change in the status quo, works against the best interests of the fearful.  Why do they do that?  Big money and big corporations.  The status quo makes them rich.

There is only one solution to the health care problem (covering all our population and getting control on the costs).  That solution is a single payer system where we all pay for it through our tax system.  Anything else is built on lies.  The health care insurance industry is incentivized to maximize profits for their stockholders, not provide cost effective health care for all.  Taxing the rich to pay for expanded coverage or requiring everyone to buy health care insurance is just another way of trying to find a free ride and maintaining a failed system.  We think nothing of paying for police and fire protection through our tax base, why not medical care?

Will there be rationing?  Of course there will be rationing.  People want unlimited care, but they don’t want to pay for it.  Should granny, who has only about six months to live, get that hip replacement?  If it is not your money, why not?  But if it is your money and it could also be spent to ensure that one of your children gets the care now to ensure a long life, where would you spend it?  Sooner or later we have to quit running around like scared children and face up to some hard decisions.

The fear of change and the future is driving a lot of the behavior we are seeing to today, especially from those over weight white people screaming at Town Hall meetings.  Health care isn’t really the issue.  Their world is rapidly changing and they are terrified.  They think if they just hang on to the status quo everything will be okay.  As the world population grows and other nations become real competitors with the United States, their security and our favored position has been threatened and they are lashing out like frightened children.  And the Republicans know how to play on that fear.  This morning in the local paper (Sacramento Bee) there was an article about how CalPERS (California Public Employees’ Retirement System), the country’s second-biggest buyer of health care services, has urged Congress to act quickly to overhaul the nation’s health care as the present system and the benefits they are paying for are not sustainable.  So much for the status quo.

Why would Republicans be so supportive of policies that will lead to the decline of our country?  Well there are several factors here.  First, if anyone saw the interview on Meet the Press last Sunday with Dick Armie and Senator Tom Colburn from Oklahoma (this state elects some of the most ignorant and backward politicians of our times) then part of that question is answered.  They aren’t very smart.  It was shocking to see the amount of misinformation, which poor Rachel Maddow tried to correct, that they put out as fact.  But the real insightful moment was when Rachel pointed out that Armie has been against Medicare and Social Security.  Arianna Huffington drew the obvious generalization about this crop of Republicans on Keith Olbermann’s Countdown on Monday night (sorry, no transcript is available yet).  They want to make government so small as to be totally ineffective.  Even though we have seen where that leads us, they persist in this ideological pursuit of dismantling government.  That would leave the corporations in charge and these are the entities that make the Armies and Colburns of the world rich.

So in this health care debate, we see the seeds of our own downfall.  If the corporations win by using ideologues like Armie and Colburn to strike fear of change into our less than educated and informed population, then we are truly a failed nation.  Instead of standing firm behind a basic right for health care for all citizens, that government has an important role in our future, and that we must invest in that future, we become frighten selfish people who protect what is ours and fail to make the sacrifices for our future.  In doing so we think they are protecting our American way of life.  But what we are really doing is sowing the seeds of our destruction.

One poorly informed citizen at a town hall meeting said, “This is not about Democrats or Republicans, red or blue, it is about socialism taking over our country.”  I guess this young woman is going to refuse any social security she earns, deny Medicare coverage to herself (and by the way no insurance company will insure her), take her kids out of public schools, and deny federal aid to colleges.  I think she is confused.

“Socialism refers to various theories of economic organization advocating state, public or common worker ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and a society characterized by equal access to resources for all individuals with a more egalitarian method of compensation.” (Wikapedia)

Now there are some things that we take for granted that the state provides.  That would be police and fire protection for one, and we don’t call this socialism although it is state ownership and administration of these services.  Generally speaking your ambulance driver and EMT are also state provided although they may seek reimbursement from your health care insurance.  Sometimes we have to recognize that in our capitalist system, there are some things that the state does better than the private sector.  I do not want to see a police department going to low bidder and being controlled by corporate interests, and I think she would agree.

We have public schools so we can guarantee equal access to education, which is a form of socialism. Our federal government controls our airspace and airports.  Should we turn this over to the private sector?  They did a bang up job regulating themselves in the banking crisis and where the profit motive drives risk taking that would be unacceptable in the public arena.  Many colleges are state endowed with their employees state employees, and that also is a form of socialism.  But nobody in the health care discussion is arguing that the federal government own the means of production (services) for health care.

Most people think we have a capitalist system, but of course capitalism has been muted so that the rough edges don’t trample upon the poor and the less fortunate.  We think nothing of having the government provide flood insurance for a good portion of the population, yet in a truly capitalist system the belief would be these people should fend for themselves and if the market place won’t provide for them, so be it.  So the socialism this woman and others are so afraid of is part or our economic system that we take for granted.

The single payer system is simply the federal government taking over the role of insurer and removing the profit motive from the insurance companies and with that the motivation to deny care to increase profits.  It does not take over the means of production (health care providers) and basically like public schools, police protection, or fire protection, it recognizes that this is a basic right and it is government’s role to insure that all have equal access.  In a hybrid system that is being proposed, we leave health care providers free to negotiate and compete for their services.  No one is preventing private insurers from co-existing with the government system as long as they operate under the same rules as the federal system, taking all comers, and no longer denying care.

And then there is that silly discussion about the government getting between you and your doctor.  You believe that your doctor has free reign on your care?  He is controlled and regulated in what he can and cannot do by the health care company.  Those decisions about what care you can have and not have are not base on the common good.  They are based upon how much the health insurance company is willing to pay before their profit margin shrinks to an unacceptable level.  Quite frankly I would rather a government agency make that decision that is answerable to the people than a health insurance executive who is answerable only to his share holders.

As for all the moronic claims about death panels, and cutting off care, one has to ask where is your brain.  Do you think we bleeding heart liberals would stand for such a system?  There is no rational basis for your arguments and your fear is totally irrational.  You should be more afraid that a few private corporations now control your access to health care and they make all those decision regarding covered care based solely on maximizing the profits to their shareholders.  For those 64% who are happy with their present health care, I would refer you to a column by Simon Johnson and James Kwak in the Washington Post on Tuesday (Like Your Health Insurance?  Maybe You Shouldn’t) pointing out that most people have never really tested their health care.  People, get a grip.  Your displays of ignorance at these town hall meetings is truly distressing.

Apparently Bill Maher was on CNN a couple of weeks ago and when asked if he thought Sarah Palin could be elected President, he said, “I hope not, but I would not put anything past this stupid country.” This started a landslide of hate mail and he responded to it with a new rule, “Just because this country elects a smart President doesn’t make this a smart country,” and a wonderful essay about the level of stupidity in this country (Bill Maher: New Rule).

Of course I am watching the health care “debate” and I believe his argument is moot because the level of stupidity is obvious.  What is on display are amazingly stupid people who lack the critical thinking skills to evaluate and separate lies and propaganda from real issues.  I watched a Democratic Congressman from Texas asked his Town Hall gathering who were dead set against a single payer system, how many were on Medicare.  About three-quarters raised their hands.  Then he asked them how many of them had healthcare that was financed by the government and only a few raised their hands.  This is the very definition of ignorance and stupidity.  With that level of ignorance, debate is hopeless.

What I really love is our media keeps repeating that the support for President Obama’s health care plan has fallen, while proponents of the plan urge Democrats and the grass roots support that elected President Obama to get out and support the plan.  Here is my question:  DOES ANYBODY KNOW WHAT IS IN HIS PLAN?

The answer of course is an emphatic NO because he has left it to Congress to craft it and it is in hiding.  That is why there is falling support, the grass roots haven’t come out, and the know-nothings are controlling the debate.  I would highly recommend a frontal assault on the know-nothings, but you have to have a plan to defend and right now the White House strategy is failing badly.  Pick one Mr. President, but pick a plan we can fight for, not some watered down plan meant to preserve the status quo and the profits for the industry.

But I digress.  In an editorial this morning by Charles Blow (Health Care Hullabaloo), he used the phrase, “Belligerence is the currency of the intellectually bankrupt” to describe what is going on out in the hinterlands.  The fact that so many can be swayed by this type of “logic” makes me fear for the future of this country.  What I do see at most of these Town Hall meetings, sadly, are mostly fat ignorant white people who are going to be most hurt when they no longer can afford their health care.  And sadly many speakers had that southern drawl that characterizes a particularly ignorant portion of our country.  Actually, ignorant may not be the right characterization, but racist might be more appropriate.  The ignorant are the easiest to whip up into a frenzy as you stoke their fires of fear.  This particular fire is change and people different from you.  One woman before the podium was weeping and said they had stolen her country.  Yep, we need to return to the good 60’s where those blackies and other off color people new their place and the country was full of injustice.

Anyone who reads or thinks knows this country is in decline and has been for sometime.  There was an interesting story in the business pages of the New York Times about the fact that job growth over the last 10 years has been infinitesimal (Job Growth Lacking in the Private Sector)

You mean that after all those tax cuts during the Bush years, we barely created any jobs? This is not a trend we want to keep up.  It is time to take a new path and try something different.  But what we are seeing is a Republican Party that is firmly planted in the past and is bought and paid for by those that do benefit from our current economic path (the rich and the corporations).  Their offering to the public is no change, fear of change, and “small town values”.  “I got mine, screw you.”  It is anti-intellectual, irrational, and destined for failure.  But apparently large portions of our population are ignorant and easily scared into believing this nonsense.

Probably what is most sad is that the people who will suffer the most from continuing our failed approaches to the economy, health care, energy, climate, you name it, are the same people who are bellowing for no change.  How do you actually have a rational debate with these people, I have no idea.  But I am in my frontal assault mode and I would like to see both the press and the Democrats take them on and belittle stupid people.  Unless we are willing to point out their stupidity, embarrassed and more importantly debunk their hysteria, we are likely to continue down the same path that has got us nowhere in the last 30 years (Ronald Reagan on).

I hope we are up to the challenge.  As I get older, I am becoming less tolerant of stupidity and people who don’t read or think. After watching the Town Hall “debates”, maybe more people ought to be less tolerant of this intolerance.  More people ought to confront this level of ignorance head on.  Apparently Bill Maher will.  Thank you Bill.  Your honesty is so refreshing.