It Doesn't Have to be This Hard

Well, another day in the life of the "health insurance reform" debacle. That's my first comment. I LOVE how the powers that be are now calling it health insurance reform instead of the health care reform that it should be. At least there's one thing Congress isn't currently lying about.

I'm 42 years old and I have to say, I never thought I'd be arrested - let alone arrested for fighting for universal health care for the country I was born in. A friend commented recently that it was ironic that it was taking an American Australian to fight this fight. Well, actually, there is nothing ironic about that at all. You see, I've seen the promised land. I am priviledged enough to have lived in/be a citizen of a country that truly believes that health care is a right for everyone. It's hard to describe how easy it can be and should be to never have to worry about getting sick or losing your job and losing your healthcare or paying premiums that will eat up most of your income, or being denied coverage for a "pre-existing condition", etc., etc.

So, on Wednesday, Oct. 28th, 8 fellow protesters and I risked arrest at the corporate headquarters of Wellpoint, one of the largest insurance companies in the U.S., where CEO Angela Braly makes $9.8 million while instructing her employees to routinely deny people coverage. In another delightful piece of information, it's important to point out that former Wellpoint lobbyist Elizabeth Fowler now acts as staff for Senator Max Baucus from Montana and essentially wrote the insurance reform legislation announced by Congress yesterday. So what is there to do?

Jail is hell. There is no doubt about it. First NYPD took us to the 1st precinct, where it took 20 or so policeman 6 hours to fingerprint and photograph 9 people. ("How many people does it take to screw in a lightbulb?) At the precinct, the 5 females were put in a cell by ourselves but there was not room for all of us to sit down so we took turns. Little did we know that the precinct would be a veritable playground compared to central booking, or "The Tombs" as it is very aptly called. We were transferred to central booking in a chain. Yes, that's right - in metal chain handcuffs. After an hour or so, we were brought to the basement, put under bright lights (the blinding kind) and photographed again. By the time we made it to the cell which we would share with 18 or so women from the "general population", we were starving and so, didn't complain too much about the rock hard bread with pre-mixed peanut butter and jelly on it that we got for dinner. After a few hours, for no apparent reason, they moved us to a smaller cell, with fewer mats and fewer places to sit that was even filthier, if possible. And then they moved us back to the bigger cell and then they moved us back to the small cell. It definitely wasn't cleaning they were doing. If they were trying to exhaust us, it worked. But where do you sleep? On the floor, with no choice but to press up against several people you've never met. When you're tired or degraded enough, sitting up is not an option. Everyone is relieved to be woken up at 5:30 in the morning because the end could be in sight but it doesn't really feel that way because then, they transfer you to a very small, freezing cold cell, where you wait for 4 more hours before meeting the lawyer and then another hour of waiting before you meet the judge.

So, this is what it's come to. But it doesn't have to be this hard. If only Americans would step up for what should not be a privilege and for what is most definitely right.

To Do Something, see:

Michael Moore's Web site and/or

the Mobilization for Health Care for All site

Or send me an email and ask me anything you like. I'd be thrilled if someone did.

14 Arrested in NYC for You and Me

I am writing tonight hoping that my brothers and sisters are out of jail by now. Brothers and sisters? Well, that's how I look at the 14 people who got arrested at United Health's Headquarters in Manhattan yesterday after staging a sit-in to protest United Health's practices and to call for Medicare for All.

Before I get into the outrageous stats on United Health and the outcome of our demonstration at their headquarters yesterday, I have to ask, where are you during this debate? What are you doing to make your voice heard? An estimated 45,000 of your fellow Americans die every year due to lack of health insurance and yet, out of nearly 100 people I have sent emails to on this issue, I have had only a handful of responses. Why don't you care? Or is it just that you feel helpless? I hope it's the latter but if it is, get over it. Please stand up and do something for your fellow citizens. Do something for yourselves and your families. If you think you are immune to this issue, you are wrong. Anyone can lose their health insurance at any time. Catastrophe can strike anyone and I'm tired of reading the stories in the newspapers about lives that were ruined or ended because of lack of health insurance or refusal by an insurance company to pay benefits.

Let's take a look at United Health now and let's see that they, like most private health insurance companies (if not all), are indeed an evil to battle against:

• United Health is the 21st largest corporation in the world
• Last year alone United Health collected $75 billion in premiums
• In the first part of 2009, United Health spent $3.4 million buying congressional influence regarding our health care legislation
• United Health has been underpaying doctors and denying care to patients so egregiously that it was forced to pay $350 million in a class action lawsuit filed by the American Medical Association last year

And the list goes on. So, I ask again, where is the outrage and what will you do to work for universal health care for all Americans?

It's very simple, really. There are many organizations devoted to bringing universal healthcare to America. They are making it easy for you to make your voice heard. Here are just a couple:

http://www.healthcare-now.org/

http://mobilizeforhealthcare.org/

Yesterday on the subway I was carrying a bag of signs for the protest at United Health. Several people who noticed the signs asked me if I was going to a demonstration. When I replied, "Yes - for Medicare for All", people were very supportive. Perhaps the most surprising support came from an NYPD police officer who stood next to me on the train. When I told him about the demonstration, he told me that America was becoming more and more a country of haves and have nots. That it used to be just the minorities that were victims but now it was the white people, too. I know, I said. I couldn't agree more. Is this the America we want to be a part of? I don't think so. So, please - for you and for me, take a stand. Do something for your 14 brothers and sisters in NYC and the others across the country yesterday who went to jail for the greater good. Do something, anything, to make your voice heard.

GO HOWARD DEAN! HERE IS THE DEMOCRACY!

Yesterday, I was delighted to discover that Howard Dean has a Website that beautifully summarizes where we are at with the Public Option - without all the propaganda of the major news sites - and provides a petition that you can sign in support of the Public Option. This is A CRITICAL TIME TO ACT on what is currently the most important domestic issue in American politics. You can even find out where your elected officials currently stand on the issue and might be surprised to find out that 45 senators currently support the Public Option and with only 5 more senators on board, the Public Option could pass!!!

You can read more and sign the petition here: http://www.standwithdrdean.com/. Please do it now if you care about the 40 million Americans who don't have insurance, the tens of millions more who are underinsured and others like me who have been denied coverage for a pre-existing condition.

Your fellow Americans, your kids and your grandchildren will thank you.

Letter to the President

Below is the letter I wrote and snail mailed to President Obama last week, before the news today that he and his administration are supposedly getting ready to dump the Public Option. I can only hope that this situation will turn around. I know that millions of Americans feel the same way I do.

I will say that this is the one issue that will forever turn me away from the Democrats if they pander to non-progressives and scare mongers and dump what Howard Dean is referring to today as the only meaningful chance at Health Care Reform. Why can't the Dems have some spine for a change? Anyway, I still intend to call the White House and I hope anyone who sees this blog and agrees will, too. The President's number is Comments: 202-456-1111 or Switchboard: 202-456-1414.

P.S. If you're wondering about the photo, it's an image of Cowboy shooting his first commercial on a beautiful beach in Australia, a country that has Universal Health Care called "Medicare" and also, non-profit, private health insurance companies that are actually interested in helping sick people instead of profiting off them. Ironically, the commercial was for a pharmaceutical drug!

President Barack Obama

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW

Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Mr. President:

I'm writing to you to ask you to give the American people a Public Option, as was your original intention when you began talking about heath care reform.

What is going on at the moment with the scare-mongering in the town hall meetings is a national disgrace. It is propaganda and any educated person knows it.

A Public Option is just that, an option. It has nothing to do with the private insurance companies which will still exist. And the White House needs to do a better job of explaining that. Afterall, poll after poll shows that the vast majority of Americans want a public option and it is only the special interests in the form of private insurance companies giving millions of dollars to people in your own party that will stop that from happening if you let it. I know that you are only one man and yet, you have the power to do this if you show courage and rally the American people as you did in your campaign. Ask us to come out in full force for the Public Option and we will. Ask us to show up in Washington demanding the Public Option and we will.

I will end by telling the story of why this issue is so dear to my heart. I have been a victim of private insurance companies and their attempt to deny people coverage. At 18, I developed colitis, which is a form of Irritable Bowel Disease. I lived with this disease for 5 years before I was officially diagnosed at the age of 22. When I first went to the doctor for this condition at the age of 18, they told me nothing was wrong with me. I guess the technology wasn't good enough then. When my condition worsened, I returned for tests 5 years later and finally, they diagnosed me. Yet a couple of months after the diagnosis, the insurance company informed me that I had a "pre-existing condition", that they would not pay benefits and that I owed them the $3000.00 in benefits they had already paid.

Because I am a good advocate for myself, I battled the insurance company for 6 months, going to the Washington State Insurance Commissioner, writing countless letters to Blue Cross/Blue Shield and finally, seeing a lawyer. Luckily, after much stress, time and money spent on the issue, Blue Cross/Blue Shield caved and told me they would pay benefits. However, they made it clear in their final letter that they were doing this purely out of the goodness of their heart and were not by any means admitting to any wrong-doing.

In the years since (I am 42 now), when recounting this story, I have often wondered out loud how many of my fellow Americans who couldn't advocate for themselves fell victim to the callous greed of private insurance companies. And this is one of the many reasons why we need the Public Option.

Please Mr. President. Make it happen. I believe in you and so do the majority of the American people.

Sincerely and with best wishes -

Lori

I am an American in favor of what is currently known as a "Public Option" in health care reform. And I am in the majority. That is, I stand with the VAST majority of Americans who want a public option with any health care reform legislation that will pass this year. Poll after poll shows that upwards of 70% of our population wants a public option. And yet, the scare mongers that are out in town meetings in full force at the moment, seek to make us forget this.

Why do we want a public option? The answer is simple. Private health insurance companies have a stranglehold on the American health care system with ever-rising costs and ever fewer people truly covered and the tentacles of the industry reach to both sides of the political spectrum in the American government. The August 17, 2009, issue of BusinessWeek very clearly paints this picture in it's cover story, "Health Reform: Why Insurers Are Winning".

How can the majority of Americans win this fight with vested interests literally owning our politicians? I don't have the answer and so I am turning to this blog to think outloud and hopefully build some momentum among my fellow Americans to turn the tide of this debate in our favor.

Perhaps our biggest weapon is a treasure chest of facts:

• The politicians of the right and left in this country - Republicans and Democrats alike - cannot act in our best interest unless each and every one of us demands it. Why? Because every member of Congress has CADILLAC HEALTH CARE COVERAGE that can never be taken away.
  

• Let's take one Republican and one Democrat as examples that America's politicians are completely out of touch with the average hard-working American and thus, are not acting in our best interest when it comes to a public option but in the interest of their own pockets:

• Democrat Max Baucus, the powerful member of the Senate Finance Committee who is now trying to derail the public option, has collected to date more than $3 million in contributions from the health insurance industry.
  

• Republican Charles Grassley, the Senate Finance Committee's ranking Republican, has received more than $2 million in contributions from the health insurance industry to date.

• At this writing, a six-member group of Senators on the Finance Committee is in PRIVATE MEETINGS - that is, no other members of Congress know what is going on in these secret talks - determining the future of America's health care. SIX MEN determining the health care needs of our nation's 300 million citizens. Where is the democracy?
  

• Health Insurance Companies are running scared of a public option because of the competition a public plan would create. A public plan would force them to cut premiums. Afterall, in nearly half of the states in this country, a mere one or two insurance companies controls upwards of 70% of the health insurance market. OF COURSE THE HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES DO NOT WANT A PUBLIC OPTION. They might have to actually compete in the free market that they are supposedly a part of.
  

And the list goes on but you get the idea.

I have created an email for the majority of us for the Public Option and I would love to hear your support and/or ideas for bringing our voice to Washington: public_option@yahoo.com

Among my ideas are a March on Washington by early September. Hell, I might do it even if I'm the only one marching!

Upcoming blog entries:

• Why am I so invested in Health Reform, specifically a public option? The story of my 24- year chronic illness and my six-month battle with my private health insurer to pay benefits.
• How I am privileged to be a dual citizen and have citizenship in a country that already has a well-functioning public and private system that serves all of its citizens.