Trump is NOT the answer

[A Voice from the Mountains]

Posted by Flash (here)
The American plans for medicare were the worst I have ever seen in the Western Hemisphere - the worst, completely sold to the big pharma, completely. No way it would ever work, ever. Layman with not much understanding in this could see it with naked eyes.

There is rampant corruption in our healthcare system, yes, but they are murdering people with radiation and chemo in Canada just the same, even if you've been getting a discount on it until lately, so maybe some self-reflection is in order before going so overboard in your anti-Americanism.

Not to mention we've also had socialized healthcare since ObamaCare was shoved down the American peoples' throats, and I won't ask why you aren't defending that piece of legislation, as I'm sure you'll be tempted to blame all of its faults on "the other." Not sure who you have to blame in Canada for all of the problems I'll lay out here, though, or the healthcare problems in other countries that have government-controlled industries, either.

The healthcare system in Canada has worked up to now. The main reason it presently has difficulties is because the population is getting too old (no new children, we make less than in the USA) and old people spend a lot more on healthcare than the younger ones.

Those aren't the only problems. Let's add a few more: over-priced drugs (even if you pay via taxes rather than directly at time of treatment), ballooning costs, lack of competition, increased wait times (measured in months -- hope it's not urgent, or you're dead!), and the growing prospect of bankruptcy.

Wait times, from 2014:

If Universal Health Care Is The Goal, Don't Copy Canada

The heated and often emotionally charged debate over the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) hasn’t subsided despite it being the law of the land for more than four years. Indeed, with the VA scandal, continuing problems in the rollout of aspects of Obamacare and the upcoming mid-term elections, the likelihood of increased acrimony is high.

One aspect of the health care debate in the United States that is, unfortunately, riddled with misinformation is the state of Canada’s single-payer health care system. Too often advocates of Canadian-style health care in the U.S. present limited or even misleading information about the true state of Canada’s health care system and worse, often times present the ideal of Canadian health care rather than its reality.

It’s first important to recognize that a single-payer model is not a necessary condition for universal health care. There are ample examples from OECD countries where universal health care is guaranteed without imposing a single-payer model.

Amongst industrialized countries -- members of the OECD -- with universal health care, Canada has the second most expensive health care system as a share of the economy after adjusting for age. This is not necessarily a problem, however, depending on the value received for such spending. As countries become richer, citizens may choose to allocate a larger portion of their income to health care. However, such expenditures are a problem when they are not matched by value.

The most visible manifestation of Canada’s failing health care system are wait times for health care services. In 2013, Canadians, on average, faced a four and a half month wait for medically necessary treatment after referral by a general practitioner. This wait time is almost twice as long as it was in 1993 when national wait times were first measured.

[...]

There is also considerable evidence indicating that excessive wait times lead to poorer health outcomes and in some cases, death. Dr. Brian Day, former head of the Canadian Medical Association recently noted that “[d]elayed care often transforms an acute and potentially reversible illness or injury into a chronic, irreversible condition that involves permanent disability.”

https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapot.../#2715724578d5

Ouch. Sounds like ObamaCare. Private care could literally save your life in these situations.

Looks like this has been going on in Canada for over a decade. This one is from 2005, nearly ten years earlier than the previous article:

Canadian Health Care In Crisis

A letter from the Moncton Hospital to a New Brunswick heart patient in need of an electrocardiogram said the appointment would be in three months. It added: "If the person named on this computer-generated letter is deceased, please accept our sincere apologies."

The patient wasn't dead, according to the doctor who showed the letter to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. But there are many Canadians who claim the long wait for the test and the frigid formality of the letter are indicative of a health system badly in need of emergency care.

Americans who flock to Canada for cheap flu shots often come away impressed at the free and first-class medical care available to Canadians, rich or poor. But tell that to hospital administrators constantly having to cut staff for lack of funds, or to the mother whose teenager was advised she would have to wait up to three years for surgery to repair a torn knee ligament.

"It's like somebody's telling you that you can buy this car, and you've paid for the car, but you can't have it right now," said Jane Pelton. Rather than leave daughter Emily in pain and a knee brace, the Ottawa family opted to pay $3,300 for arthroscopic surgery at a private clinic in Vancouver, with no help from the government.

"Every day we're paying for health care, yet when we go to access it, it's just not there," said Pelton.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/canadia...are-in-crisis/


One more on having to wait for dangerous amounts of time to actually receive any treatment:

The Ugly Truth About Canadian Health Care

Socialized medicine has meant rationed care and lack of innovation. Small wonder Canadians are looking to the market.

Mountain-bike enthusiast Suzanne Aucoin had to fight more than her Stage IV colon cancer. Her doctor suggested Erbitux—a proven cancer drug that targets cancer cells exclusively, unlike conventional chemotherapies that more crudely kill all fast-growing cells in the body—and Aucoin went to a clinic to begin treatment. But if Erbitux offered hope, Aucoin’s insurance didn’t: she received one inscrutable form letter after another, rejecting her claim for reimbursement. Yet another example of the callous hand of managed care, depriving someone of needed medical help, right? Guess again. Erbitux is standard treatment, covered by insurance companies—in the United States. Aucoin lives in Ontario, Canada.

[...]

I was once a believer in socialized medicine. I don’t want to overstate my case: growing up in Canada, I didn’t spend much time contemplating the nuances of health economics. I wanted to get into medical school—my mind brimmed with statistics on MCAT scores and admissions rates, not health spending. But as a Canadian, I had soaked up three things from my environment: a love of ice hockey; an ability to convert Celsius into Fahrenheit in my head; and the belief that government-run health care was truly compassionate. What I knew about American health care was unappealing: high expenses and lots of uninsured people. When HillaryCare shook Washington, I remember thinking that the Clintonistas were right.

But single-payer systems—confronting dirty hospitals, long waiting lists, and substandard treatment—are starting to crack. Today my book wouldn’t seem so provocative to Canadians, whose views on public health care are much less rosy than they were even a few years ago. Canadian newspapers are now filled with stories of people frustrated by long delays for care:

vow broken on cancer wait times: most hospitals across canada fail to meet ottawa’s four-week guideline for radiation
patients wait as p.e.t. scans used in animal experiments
back patients waiting years for treatment: study
the doctor is . . . out

As if a taboo had lifted, government statistics on the health-care system’s problems are suddenly available. In fact, government researchers have provided the best data on the doctor shortage, noting, for example, that more than 1.5 million Ontarians (or 12 percent of that province’s population) can’t find family physicians. Health officials in one Nova Scotia community actually resorted to a lottery to determine who’d get a doctor’s appointment.

[...]

And now even Canadian governments are looking to the private sector to shrink the waiting lists. Day’s clinic, for instance, handles workers’-compensation cases for employees of both public and private corporations. In British Columbia, private clinics perform roughly 80 percent of government-funded diagnostic testing. In Ontario, where fealty to socialized medicine has always been strong, the government recently hired a private firm to staff a rural hospital’s emergency room.

https://www.city-journal.org/html/ug...are-13032.html


Over-priced drugs (you may not pay at the counter, but your taxes are certainly paying the price) -- from 2016:

Canadian drug price gouging for generics called 'hard to celebrate'

Canadians spend extra $1 billion a year compared with other industrialized countries

There's almost a 20 per cent gap between generic drug prices in Canada and foreign markets, according to a new report, a price difference one expert called gouging.

The Patented Medicine Prices Review Board (PMPRB) is a federal watchdog on drug prices. In a report titled Generics360 released Tuesday, the board examined the prices of 554 generic drugs representing more than $1 billion in Canadian sales in 2014.

[...]

In 2010, Canadian prices were 40 per cent higher than in 11 industrialized countries: France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States, the Netherlands, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand.

"There has been a shift towards a lower extent of gouging, but basically that's hard to celebrate," said Amir Attaran, a law professor at the University of Ottawa who studies drug pricing.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/drug-...eric-1.3441080

I guess the mentality in Canada must be that Big Pharma is evil in America, but in Canada, where taxpayers collectively foot the big, Big Pharma suddenly becomes Jesus Christ and would never overcharge the government.

That's the kind of naive thinking endemic to socialism, frankly. And it is just as crazy as it sounds. Even your own government-run media is admitting that you pay more for generics than Americans do, government subsidies or not.


Another Canadian source raising the same problem:

The worst-run industry in Canada: Health care

The real crisis ruining universal medicare is bad management. Here’s how to fix it.

If the Canadian health-care system were a corporation, it would be among the biggest in the world. Last year, the total amount paid into the system — or the revenues it pulled in, depending on how you look at it — topped out at a record $183.1 billion, enough to earn it third place on the Fortune 500, between oil giants Exxon Mobil and Chevron. And if it were a corporation, it would be in a state of dire crisis.

Of course, Canadians are used to hearing this sort of thing. No matter how it’s framed, the phrase “health-care crisis” is so often bandied about by politicians, media and the general public that it’s become old news. As costs and dissatisfaction mount, most Canadians believe that the problem is rooted in either insufficient funding, demographic overload or corporate profiteering. But according to a growing chorus of health economists, policy analysts and doctors, the real issue is mismanagement — horrible, pervasive inefficiency that is preventing the system from running even close to as well as it could. More than anything, they say, the failure to adopt even basic business management principles is what’s standing in the way of preserving universal health care for generations to come.

It may be our most cherished social benefit, but what the system needs, experts argue, is corporate sensibility: more rational and co-ordinated leadership, better information on health outcomes and a ruthless determination to eliminate duplication and waste. Because at present, says Robert Evans, a leading health economist and founding member of University of British Columbia’s Centre for Health Services and Policy Research (CHSPR), we’re spending far more than we need to on everything from drugs to doctors to hospitals. Meanwhile, as customers continue to pour money in, they’re increasingly disappointed with what comes out. Quite simply, says Duncan Sinclair, former dean of medicine at Queen’s University, “if [the Canadian health-care system] were a business, it would be out of business.”

https://www.canadianbusiness.com/bus...a-health-care/


Ballooning expenses and the prospect of bankruptcy of the program:

The Rising Cost of Canadian Healthcare

There is a looming financial nightmare facing our health care system, and we need to start making fundamental changes now or we’re going to be in big trouble. In 1984, the year the Canadian Health Act was instituted, Ontario’s government spent approximately 32% of the provincial overall budget on health care. Today in 2014, that percentage has risen to 42%. With the number of adults over the age of 65 in Ontario expected to double in the next 15 years and the rising cost of new medications and technologies, it’s projected that within the next decade we could be spending 50-80% of the total provincial budget on health care (Ontario Ministry of Finance 2010). This is clearly not sustainable.

https://canadiem.org/rising-cost-of-...an-healthcare/


Same is happening in France, and this from a left-wing (socialist New Yorker) American news source:

France's Health-Care System Is Going Broke

The country’s ultragenerous health-care plan is going broke

Anita Manfredi got nine massages and 18 mud baths at a luxury spa in November. The French government paid two-thirds of the $1,022 bill. “The treatment has done me a lot of good,” says Manfredi, a French retiree who suffers from arthritis and enjoys a three-week retreat at the southern spa town of Dax every year. “I no longer have flare-ups.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...th-care-system

Most of that article is behind a paywall, but just the opening paragraph alone should be sufficiently illuminating as to why France's socialized healthcare is going broke. I wish I could make other citizens pay for my mud baths and massages. (Not really. I'm nowhere near that entitled.)


Despite (or rather because of) the Canadian government bankrolling Big Pharma via taxpayers, socialized medicine is still not preventing its citizens from being hit in the wallet by outrageously over-priced drugs and treatment, no different than in the United States:

Health issues and health care expenses in Canadian bankruptcies and insolvencies.

Abstract
Illness can contribute to financial problems directly, through high medical bills, and indirectly, through lost income. No previous in-depth studies have documented the role of medical problems among Canadian bankruptcy filers. We obtained the bankruptcy filings from a random sample of 5,000 debtors across Canada and mailed surveys to them seeking information about the medical antecedents of their bankruptcy. A total of 521 debtors responded (response rate of 10.4%), of whom 40.1 percent reported losing at least two weeks of work-related income because of illness or injury in the two years before their filing; 8.3 percent reported a similar income loss because of caregiving responsibilities for someone else who was ill. Although 60.1 percent of respondents reported being responsible for a medical bill within the previous two years, only 6.9 percent had bills over $5,000 (all amounts in Canadian Dollars). Prescription drugs were cited as the costliest medical expense by two-thirds of debtors reporting bills > $5,000, with dental bills cited by 22.2 percent. Universal health insurance affords Canadians protection against ruinous doctor and hospital bills. Inadequate coverage for prescription drugs and dental care, however, leaves some with unaffordable out-of-pocket costs. In addition, illness is a frequent indirect cause of bankruptcy through loss of work-related income.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24684082

I am not correcting your post for your understanding, but rather for the rest of the members and forum readers.

Same, but I notice that people who have subscribed to socialist economic theories usually have done so for emotional reasons rather than logical ones, and it doesn't do any good to talk to them anyway.

It seems to me that socialists look at the government as a parent that is supposed to take care of them, shifting their own responsibilities as citizens onto the government as if that's ever been a good solution to anything. But when people are just looking to feel safe and secure that mommy and daddy government are going to take care of them, that's all they really need. Until the whole thing collapses, because, as it turns out, governments are prone to financial and economic corruption. I bet you would have never seen that one coming!

Which happens regularly in the USA.

I hear there was no homelessness at all in Stalin's USSR, either. If Canadians follow socialism out to its logical conclusion, they'll reap those same benefits in short order.

Now, tell me, the whole western hemisphere, which has socialized medicine is wrong, only the USA is right? How closed minded one can be.

The US is different than most of the rest of the world in many more ways than that, and yet we aren't the ones begging for bail-outs from the central banks like you see in the EU and elsewhere in the world. Usually it's our tax money going around the world to fund everyone else, and I hope it gets 100% cut off, including defense support. I hope we bring it all back home. Then we will see how many countries can afford giving their citizens free mud baths and massages.

How are meat prices in Canada lately, by the way?

Food Prices In Canada To Surge, And Trudeau’s Carbon Tax Will Make It Even Worse

https://www.spencerfernando.com/2018...it-even-worse/

That's it, you sold me! I'm moving to the socialist paradise of Canada!

When you write all your extreme rights false reasons for our systems in Canada to fail

The sources above aren't "extreme right." Most of them are either Canadian or otherwise leftist sources. Someone must have spent billions trying to convince you that your healthcare system is awesome.

I have never heard of reading making anyone stupider, either. You can start with all the Canadian and leftist articles I just posted above.

[onawah]

Putting information-- whether it's good or not, which may be a matter of opinion-- in the right context, in the appropriate thread, is also a necessary part of the process.
I am not seeking "the floor", thanks, just compliance with the forum's ground rules.

Posted by Deux Corbeaux (here)
I’ve put out good information, but I’ll step back. You have the floor all to yourself.

[Deux Corbeaux]

Posted by onawah (here)
Putting information-- whether it's good or not, which may be a matter of opinion-- in the right context, in the appropriate thread, is also a necessary part of the process.
I am not seeking "the floor", thanks, just compliance with the forum's ground rules.

Posted by Deux Corbeaux (here)
I’ve put out good information, but I’ll step back. You have the floor all to yourself.

I think my contribution to this thread was relevant and good information.
It was a reaction to your Post#780. So in the right context in the appropriate thread. Where else do I have to react?

But sorry for not knowing this particular thread was a "no discussion thread".
I thought a forum is actually for discussion. But I could be wrong.

If my "Interlude", Post #781 was, according to you, out of place, then I'm sorry. It was my sense of balance that made me do it.
And NO, I'm not familiar with Pro Trump threads. I'm aware of Q threads, but I seldom go there, because I've nothing with the Q- phenomenon.

You can PM me if you want to discuss this further, since this is derailing the thread now.

[PurpleLama]

Posted by Deux Corbeaux (here)

Posted by onawah (here)
Putting information-- whether it's good or not, which may be a matter of opinion-- in the right context, in the appropriate thread, is also a necessary part of the process.
I am not seeking "the floor", thanks, just compliance with the forum's ground rules.

Posted by Deux Corbeaux (here)
I’ve put out good information, but I’ll step back. You have the floor all to yourself.

I think my contribution to this thread was relevant and good information.
It was a reaction to your Post#780. So in the right context in the appropriate thread. Where else do I have to react?

But sorry for not knowing this particular thread was a "no discussion thread".
I thought a forum is actually for discussion. But I could be wrong.

If my "Interlude", Post #781 was, according to you, out of place, then I'm sorry. It was my sense of balance that made me do it.
And NO, I'm not familiar with Pro Trump threads. I'm aware of Q threads, but I seldom go there, because I've nothing with the Q- phenomenon.

You can PM me if you want to discuss this further, since this is derailing the thread now.

https://projectavalon.net/forum4/show...ion-into-Trump

Here is one of the pro-Trump threads, no longer maintained by a former forum member.

[onawah]

CIA Secret Air Wars [signatures needed]
From: Win Without War
https://act.winwithoutwar.org/act/ba...92854%2Edfu3nV

"Red Alert: This month, Trump signed an Executive Order that could allow the CIA to become a secret killing squad, with no way to know how many people they kill.

Drone strikes have tripled under Trump. He already sneaked the CIA dangerous authority to conduct shadow drone wars around the world that are killing civilians, including Somalia, Yemen, and Pakistan. And now there is literally nothing in U.S. law requiring reporting on civilian casualties by the CIA — making those wars completely invisible.

But Congress can stop the CIA from waging secret air wars around the world — by banning the CIA from conducting drone strikes entirely. So it’s time for us to make sure Congress hears us loud and clear:

Tell your members of Congress to ban the secret CIA drone strikes NOW!
https://act.winwithoutwar.org/act/ba...92854%2Edfu3nV

Since Trump took office, finding out who the U.S. is killing through lethal air wars has become nearly impossible.

The Pentagon claims it has killed no civilians in its Somalia drone war over the last 2 years. But we know drone strikes have killed civilians in Somalia — and the U.S. is the only government conducting airstrikes in the country [2]. In other words: the CIA is almost certainly launching secret drone strikes killing Somali civilians, and then flat-out lying about it!

Halimo Mohamed Abdi was hit by a drone strike in Bariire, outside of the Somali capital of Mogadishu. Before losing consciousness, she saw three little boys, ages 9, 10, and 16, die in explosions. The strike broke her hips, left shrapnel in her thigh and terrible burns on her chest. After being hospitalized for 3 months, she returned to her home in ruins and 25 of her goats dead. She was forced to move to a camp housing tens of thousands of Somalis fleeing U.S. airstrikes, and fighting between Al Shabab and the Somali government. [3]

We cannot let our government conduct unchecked, secret wars that kill and displace people around the world. That’s why we have to get Congress to ban CIA air wars NOW.

Act Now: Tell US Representatives to ban CIA drone strikes.
https://act.winwithoutwar.org/act/ba...92854%2Edfu3nV

Thank you for working for peace,

Tara, Kate, Mariam, and the Win Without War team"

[onawah]

Tell Trump: Being Hungry Won’t Help Anyone Find a Job.
Food Policy Action
3/29/19

"It’s time to speak out! When the administration issues rules like these, they are required to provide time for comments from the general public—and we have a short timeframe to let them know this is the wrong way to go. By adding your own personal experience to the sample email, you help make an effective case. • Have you been on SNAP? • Do you know someone who has? • How did being hungry affect you? • Would you have been able to focus on finding a job? • Make your email personal!"

The deadline is Monday, 4/2 at midnight. Have you sent in your comments yet?
https://p2a.co/8xZN3jn

The Trump administration is creating harsh work requirements and further reporting requirements for some SNAP recipients who might be unemployed, under-employed, or who struggle with unpredictable hours or multiple jobs. In some cases, they could be denied food assistance for up to three years.

Being hungry and having to worry about the next meal will make finding a job that much harder to do.

We don’t want hungry workers and families hurt by these mean-spirited rules.

Let’s fight these regulations.

If you haven’t already told your story, use the “Comment Today” button below. Tell the Trump Administration that it is wrong to punish the most vulnerable. Add your voice and share with your family and friends so they can tell their story, too. Thank you!

Warmly,

Monica

P.S. Taking action at this urgent moment will help us make sure that those who most need help with food assistance will continue to get it. The deadline is Monday at midnight!"
Take action: https://p2a.co/8xZN3jn

[A Voice from the Mountains]

Posted by onawah (here)
Tell Trump: Being Hungry Won’t Help Anyone Find a Job.

Getting endless free stuff for nothing won't encourage anyone to get a job, either, actually.

[onawah]

Trump’s NAFTA 2.0 Puts Big Pharma First, America Second
By Eric Levitz
3/19/19
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/...ca-second.html

"If there’s anything Donald Trump hates more than globalist trade deals that restrict U.S. sovereignty, it’s the exorbitant cost of pharmaceuticals in this country.

“The next major priority for me, and for all of us, should be to lower the cost of health care and prescription drugs,” the president said in his most recent State of the Union Address. “It is unacceptable that Americans pay vastly more than people in other countries for the exact same drugs, often made in the exact same place.”

And yet, the president’s new version of NAFTA — the uncreatively named United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) — actually forbids the U.S. Congress from curtailing Big Pharma’s patent monopolies on some of the world’s most expensive drugs. In other words: Trump’s “America First” trade deal restricts U.S. sovereignty, for the sake of locking in high drug prices.

In the U.S. today, drug companies that produce new “biologics” — specialty drugs made with living cells — are provided 12 years of immunity from generic competition. This awards such firms monopolistic pricing power over their (often life-saving) medicines for more than a decade after their wares hit the market. The rationale for this policy is that companies will not invest in high-cost biologic research if they aren’t guaranteed windfall profits for their innovations. But even if one accepts this (tendentious) premise, a 12-year monopoly appears both arbitrary and excessive. In Mexico, biologic makers are only immunized against competition from so-called “biosimilars” for five years; in Canada, such protections last eight. Congressional Democrats have drafted legislation that would cut the duration of biologic monopolies down to seven years.

But if Trump’s revised version of NAFTA takes effect, Democrats will not have the legal authority to advance that legislation — because the USMCA guarantees biologic makers at least a ten-year monopoly on their new drugs across all three of North America’s major economies.

House Democrats say that’s unacceptable. As the administration pushes to get its trade deal through Congress, Nancy Pelosi’s caucus has made striking the provision on biologics one of it top demands.If the rule isn’t rolled back, “I don’t think candidly that it passes out of my trade subcommittee,” Earl Blumenauer of Oregon told the Associated Press in February. “The biologics are some of the most expensive drugs on the planet.” Even staunchly pro-trade border-state Democrats are drawing a red line on the rule, with Texas’s Lloyd Doggett calling it “totally contrary to Trump’s professed interest in lower drug prices.”

It isn’t hard to see why Democrats are picking this fight. Few issues are more salient to a broader, more bipartisan swath of voters than the rising cost of prescription drugs. In January, a Politico-Harvard poll found 80 percent of Americans saying that congressional “action to lower prescription medicine prices is extremely important,” making it the top issue for voters in both parties. Meanwhile, in recent focus groups with soft Trump supporters, Democratic operatives say that the biologics issue has proven explosively potent. As USA Today reports:

In December, Stanley Greenberg, a leading Democratic pollster and strategist, conducted focus groups in Michigan and Wisconsin with Trump voters who weren’t affiliated with the Republican Party. Some had previously voted for Barack Obama. Others called themselves political independents. They’re the kinds of voters Democrats hope to attract in 2020.



Greenberg said he was “shocked” by the intensity of their hostility to drug companies — and to the idea that a trade pact would shield those companies from competition.



“It was like throwing a bomb into the focus group,” said Greenberg … He said the voters’ consensus view was essentially: “The president was supposed to go and renegotiate (NAFTA) so that it worked for American workers. But it must be that these lobbyists are working behind the scenes” to sneak in special-interest provisions.

Trump hasn’t been feigning concern about the cost of prescription drugs for his health. Outrage at Big Pharma is prevalent throughout the electorate, but it may be even more acute among the Republican Party’s graying base, whose dependence on pharmaceuticals leaves them especially vulnerable to price shocks.

What’s more, unlike most of Congress’s complaints about drafted trade agreements, Democrats’ opposition to exporting decade-long biologic monopolies is shared by America’s trade partners. When Congress demands further concessions from foreign countries before ratifying a trade deal, the White House can insist that they simply lack the power to force such changes. But in this case, Canada and Mexico have no interest in increasing drug costs for their citizens. The entity foisting the biologics rule on the U.S. isn’t a foreign government, but a (widely reviled) domestic interest group. Democrats can therefore stand their ground while credibly claiming that they aren’t mere obstructionists.

Finally, Nancy Pelosi’s caucus simply has more leverage in the broader ratification fight than the White House does. True, domestic industries will place great pressure on Democratic representatives to ratify the deal. And the agreement isn’t without its substantive virtues: Trump’s updated NAFTA would curb the undemocratic investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) process, which allows foreign corporations to sue national governments when they enact regulations that reduce their firms’ profits. And it also raises wage standards for auto workers across North America, and encourages Mexico to expand collective bargaining rights (although these provisions lack adequate enforcement mechanisms, a detail that Nancy Pelosi has described as a dealbreaker).

Nevertheless, awarding Donald Trump a bipartisan victory on trade policy on the eve of the 2020 campaign simply isn’t in the Democratic Party’s best interests. The president has a lot to gain from returning to Wisconsin next year with a new, more worker-friendly NAFTA in tow. Team Blue has much to lose by helping him do that. Thus, if Democrats are going to put their substantive goals above their electoral interests — and approve the USMCA — then that agreement can’t very well prohibit them from achieving their substantive goal on the most salient issue in American politics.

Or, at least, it can’t do that unless Big Pharma has way more clout on the left side of the aisle than the Democratic leadership would like us to believe."

[onawah]

Rick Scott’s Company Committed Historic Medicare Fraud. He Will Now Lead Trump’s Health-Care Push.
By Matt Stieb
4/1/19
"If the Trump administration has a domestic policy doctrine at this point, it could be described as the following practice: the appointment of industry insiders to Cabinet-level positions in order to deregulate or otherwise surgically dismantle the protections of a given department.

In this spirit comes the announcement that Florida Senator Rick Scott intends to deliver on President Trump’s promise that the GOP “will soon be known as the party of health care.” On Thursday, Trump told reporters that Scott, and fellow Republican Senators John Barrasso of Wyoming and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, will lead the party’s push on health-care reform.
“They are going to come up with something really spectacular,” the president said.

If by spectacular, he means a candidate who was at the helm of a company that pleaded guilty to historic efforts to defraud Medicare, the president has found his man. In the 1990s, Scott was the CEO of Columbia/HCA, a company that, under his direction, owned more than 340 hospitals, 135 surgery centers, and 550 home-health locations by the time Scott resigned in 1997. That year, federal agents announced an investigation into whether or not the company defrauded Medicare and Medicaid on a massive scale. Turns out, they did: According to Politifact’s summary of the settlement Columbia/HCA made with the Justice Department, the company took the following actions while Scott was CEO:

Columbia billed Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal programs for tests that were not necessary or ordered by physicians;
The company attached false diagnosis codes to patient records to increase reimbursement to the hospitals;
The company illegally claimed non-reimbursable marketing and advertising costs as community education;
Columbia billed the government for home health-care visits for patients who did not qualify to receive them.
As part of the settlement, Columbia/HCA agreed to plead guilty to 14 corporate felonies — charges that involve financial penalties, but no jail time. (Corporations are people, but they cannot be sent to prison.) Over two settlement rounds, Columbia/HCA wound up paying the government $1.7 billion in criminal fines, civil damages, and penalties, in what the Justice Department called “the largest health-care fraud case in U.S. history.

Naturally, Democrats have attempted to use this information to weigh down Scott’s electoral prospects in a state with one of the highest rates of Medicare beneficiaries as a percentage of the population. But Scott has been able to rise above the fray, in part by the virtue of spending a ridiculous amount of his own money. In 2010, Scott spent $75 million of his own fortune to become the governor of Florida; after vowing he wouldn’t do that again, Scott then spent $12.8 million of his family’s money to propel his 2014 reelection campaign. To make it something of an exorbitant tradition, Scott self-financed his 2018 campaign to the tune of $63.6 million.

In his eight-year career in politics, Scott has wavered in his positions on health care more than the average Republican. Coming into the governor’s mansion, Scott refused to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. But in 2013, he agreed to accept federal funds for Medicaid expansion and by his second term, Scott reversed his position on the expansion.

Still, as the Orlando Sentinel notes, since November 2018, “Scott has written four op-eds stressing the urgency of repealing Obamacare.” And on a Sunday appearance on Face the Nation, Scott discussed the possibility of the Republican “alternative” to the ACA: Despite having nine years to come up with a viable replacement, the only concrete policy the senator could commit to was that the GOP’s future policy would protect patients with pre-existing conditions. Scott, a lawmaker, also surprised host Margaret Brennan when he told her that he “look[s] forward to seeing what the president’s going to put out.”According to a report from Axios, noted legal expert Donald Trump is not confident that the lawsuit attempting to strike down the ACA is going to succeed. Rather, the president is concerned that Democrats will hammer him on health-care issues in 2020 — thus the pivot to “the party of health care.” Rather than actually develop an actionable policy portfolio after the Obamacare-repeal failures of 2017, Axios reports that Trump intends to “brand” his party as caring about pre-existing conditions, and that he “plans to repeat this message again and again and again.”

If the motion sounds hollow, at least it’s consistent with his party’s greater efforts on health-care reform. Senate Republicans are reportedly hoping Trump will soon drop the idea, and when Chuck Grassley was asked if the two Senate committees overseeing health care policy intended to draft an ACA replacement proposal, he responded with a firm “no.”

[onawah]

Why Trump’s Goon in Charge of Medicare and Medicaid Should Resign Immediately
Verma’s attacks on Medicare are more subtle but no less dangerous
4/1/19
by Alex Lawson
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2...gn-immediately

"From Tom Price’s $1 million in private plane travel to Scott Pruitt’s attempt to get his wife a Chick-fil-A franchise, officials in the Trump administration appear to be having a competition with each other to see who can be the most nakedly corrupt. Seema Verma, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), is a top contender. Price and Pruitt are two of the many Trump officials who have already resigned in disgrace. It’s past time for Verma to do the same.

Last week, the depths of Verma’s corruption were exposed when an investigative report revealed that she spent millions of taxpayer dollars on hiring Republican communications consultants to “bolster her public profile.” Verma’s agency already has around 24 in-house communications staff, but apparently that wasn’t enough for her. She saw the opportunity to funnel huge sums of money to her political buddies, and eagerly took it.

Verma does have good reason to be concerned about her public image. Her tenure running Medicare and Medicaid has been marked by attacks on both programs and their beneficiaries. Since these programs are extremely popular, attacking them is a great way to get a terrible reputation.

Her assault on Medicaid has been relentless. Before joining the Trump administration, Verma was the head of SVC Inc., a consulting firm that worked on making state Medicaid programs as cruel and stingy as possible.

When Mike Pence was governor of Indiana, he paid her firm $3.5 million of taxpayer money to design a Medicaid program that forced beneficiaries to pay premiums or go without needed care—defeating the entire purpose of Medicaid, which is specifically intended for people who can’t afford health care. Simultaneously, Verma’s firm was paid an additional $1.2 million by the Hewlett-Packard corporation, which had contracts to administer the Medicaid program she designed. Her work in Indiana, foreshadowing her tenure at CMS, was the height of both cruelty and corruption.

Once Trump put Verma in charge of CMS, she wasted no time in finding another way to attack Medicaid beneficiaries. Under her leadership, CMS has approved waivers from six Republican states allowing them to add so-called work requirements to Medicaid. In Arkansas alone, nearly 50,000 Americans could lose their health care due to these bureaucratic hurdles. Experts agree that this is a cruel and terrible policy, for reasons that should be obvious: It’s much more difficult to look for work when you are sick and going without treatment.

Verma’s attacks on Medicare are more subtle but no less dangerous. Under her leadership, CMS has been exhibiting blatant favoritism to Medicare Advantage plans, which are run by for-profit insurance corporations, over traditional Medicare. This is very dangerous for seniors because unlike traditional Medicare, Medicare Advantage plans restrict patients to a limited number of doctors and frequently and improperly deny people the care that they need. These plans lure seniors in with perks like gym memberships. It’s only when people become sick that their hidden downsides become evident.

Verma’s CMS has issued several regulations to push people toward Medicare Advantage, such as allowing these plans to cover services traditional Medicare is forbidden from covering. Further, the agency has been essentially acting as a marketing arm of Medicare Advantage plans, sending emails to Medicare beneficiaries pushing the plans with subject lines like “Get more benefits for your money.” Verma frequently cheerleads for Medicare Advantage in her public remarks, tweets, and op-eds.

The reason she loves Medicare Advantage so much could be that corruption loves company as much as misery. The corporate insurers that make up Medicare Advantage also like to just bilk the taxpayers, according to a recent whistleblower lawsuit exposing that the “amounts in question industrywide are mind-boggling: Some analysts estimate improper Medicare Advantage payments at $10 billion a year or more.”

Seema Verma’s attacks on Medicare and Medicaid, along with her close involvement in the Trump administration’s efforts to weaken and destroy the Affordable Care Act, have hurt Verma’s public image. Paying $3.5 million in taxpayer money to her Republican consultant friends has done nothing to help. If Verma wants to do something that’s actually popular with the public, the answer is simple: Resign.

This article was produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media Institute."

[onawah]

Potential Federal Reserve board member Herman Cain frequently promoted scammy financial emails
https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/20...-emails/222717


(Seems like Trump keeps on scraping the bottom of the barrel. Is this really draining the swamp?)

"Right-wing commentator Herman Cain, who is reportedly being considered for a Federal Reserve seat, has spent years pushing scammy financial emails to his mailing list. Those sponsored emails touted a “weird trick” that supposedly “adds up to $1,000 a month to Social Security checks”; advice on “the best place to hide your money”; and financial trades that could “turn $1,000 into $1.6 million.”

Bloomberg reported today that Cain, who has been a radio host and often appears on Fox News, “is being considered by President Donald Trump for a seat on the Federal Reserve Board. … Cain ran for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination but dropped out in late 2011 after allegations he engaged in sexual harassment when he led the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s.”

Trump, who himself has been reported for sexual misconduct by more than 20 women, defended Cain at the time. As CNN’s Andrew Kaczynski and Chris Massie reported, Trump told Fox News in November 2011 that the women who reported Cain “probably do love their names splashed across the front pages. … I think Herman should take very, very strong action, even if he has to bring a major lawsuit against the women.”

After dropping his 2012 presidential bid, Cain profited off his email list of supporters by sending sponsored content. (Those emails contained the following disclaimer at the end: “The sender of this email may receive compensation for the advertising contained in this message. Any products or services offered by sponsors or advertisers have not been evaluated by Herman Cain and as such no warranty or claims are made.”)

As Ben Adler wrote in The New Republic in January 2014, Cain is one of several conservatives who “are pioneering a new, more direct method for post-campaign buckraking. All it requires is some digitally savvy accomplices—and a total immunity to shame.”

Media Matters has documented over the years how politicians like Cain -- including former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, U.S. Ambassador Scott Brown -- and right-wing publications have been bilking their followers with scammy emails from questionable sources.

With Cain poised to potentially join the Federal Reserve board, here are some of the scammiest financial emails that he has sent over the years.

Maryland teacher “collects $4,891 piggybacking ‘Canadian Social Security’”
Cain sent a sponsored email from Agora Financial suggesting that Americans could piggyback “onto ‘Canadian Social Security’” and collect “extra benefit checks between $400 and $4,700 every month.” CNBC criticized Agora Financial for the ad, stating: “There's only one problem: that's not the way it works, according to authorities.” Mother Jones’ Tim Murphy reported that “Agora and its subsidiaries have been accused of crossing the line between aggressive salesmanship and deception.” "
See the link for many examples of Cain's scammy emails. https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/20...-emails/222717

[Fellow Aspirant]

We haven't heard much lately about how the "Swamp" is being drained. There's much evidence, however, that shows just the opposite, that it's really just business as usual in Washington, and the water us just getting higher and more murky. Take this post, for example, by Matt Agorist, about the leniency with which convicted child abuser/trafficker Jeffery Epstein (he of 'Lolita Express' fame - whose passengers included luminaries like Bill Clinton) is being let off for crimes that surfaced decades ago. Far from signaling a time of reckoning for such criminals, it's obvious that the Trump administration is not just turning a blind eye to their activities, but is actively defending such:

"On Wednesday, Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta appeared before a budget appropriations subcommittee to testify about the effectiveness of the Labor Department’s 2020 budget which calls for a 10 percent cut in programs affecting millions of workers. When it came time for Acosta to testify whether or not he could safeguard children from illegal labor practices and combat human trafficking, multiple lawmakers grilled him over the sweetheart deal he gave convicted billionaire pedophile Jeffery Epstein who is also suspected of running a massive child sex trafficking ring.

During the testimony, Acosta defended his cuts to multiple programs, noting that the new budget provides “greater investment in programs that work, eliminates programs that do not, and generally bolsters opportunities for working Americans through common-sense reforms.’’

However, some of these cuts are to programs designed to stop child trafficking which makes very little “common sense” given the administration’s ostensible view on the matter. When the cuts to these programs designed to prevent human trafficking were brought up, lawmakers were given the green light to bring up the Epstein conspiracy.

“This is not the first time you have ignored human trafficking,’’ said Massachusetts representative Katherine Clark.

As TFTP has reported on multiple occasions, Epstein is a convicted child molester and sexually abused no less than 40 underage girls. Despite this fact, Acosta protected him while serving as a U.S. Attorney in Florida. Had Acosta actually prosecuted Epstein for his crimes, Epstein would have gone to prison for life.

However, instead of going to prison for life, as he should’ve considering the evidence against him, Epstein only got 13 months and was allowed to stay in the Palm Beach County Jail in his own private cell where he was allowed to leave the prison six days a week for “work release.”

In February, a federal judge made a bombshell ruling which stated that the prosecutors who worked under then-U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta—now Trump’s Labor Secretary—broke the law when handling the case of the billionaire pedophile.

According to the ruling, the prosecutors acted illegally when they concealed a plea agreement from more than 30 underage victims who had been sexually abused by the New York hedge fund manager.

“The government aligned themselves with Epstein, working against his victims, for 11 years,’’ Brad Edwards, who represents Courtney Wild — Jane Doe No. 1 in the case — said. “Yes, this is a huge victory, but to make his victims suffer for 11 years, this should not have happened. Instead of admitting what they did, and doing the right thing, they spent 11 years fighting these girls.’’

As the Miami Herald—who has been a critical in shining light on this most dark area—points out:

The deal, signed in 2007, was done in secret, and it was sealed so that no one could know how many girls Epstein abused or who else was involved in his scheme. Moreover, Acosta’s staff agreed to demands by Epstein’s lawyers that the victims not be made aware of the federal non-prosecution agreement until after it was signed and executed.

This illegal deal came up during the budget testimony on Wednesday.

“The judge found you broke the law, Mr. Acosta, when you chose not to tell the victims about this deal and you gave them the impression that the investigation was ongoing,’’ said Clark at the hearing. “Was the judge right?’’

Acosta attempted to avoid the question before Clark interrupted, saying, “I asked you a yes or no question.”

Still, Acosta avoided answering the question.

After Clark grilled him, Rep. Lois Frankel joined in and told the Labor Secretary “many people in my community are upset that you allowed a sexual predator on the loose.”

Again, Acosta defended his position and noted that his actions sent Epstein to jail for 13 month—a laughable defense for a disgustingly lenient sentence and when we take a closer look, it’s not at all true.

Epstein never really went to jail. This was a fact admitted by Palm Beach Sheriff Ric Bradshaw during a radio interview last week on WLRN. During the interview Bradshaw explained how Epstein spent almost no time in jail and had a private driver pick him up daily and drive him to his office where he was allowed to go about his life as normal.

“All we did was house him,’’ Bradshaw told Luis Hernandez, host of the station’s Sundial program, according to the Herald. “He met the criteria for work release. He was not adjudicated as a violent sex offender — he wasn’t even adjudicated as a sex offender.’’

Still, Acosta defends his actions.

“Let me just say I understand the frustration, but if the state prosecuted him, he was going to get off entirely …it was the work of our office that resulted in him going to jail and it was the work of our office that made it so the world was put on notice that he is a sex offender.’’

These claims are entirely unfounded as civil case after civil case have all been successful leading to untold millions being paid out to his former victims, not too mention that the sheriff himself denied the fact that Epstein served any significant time behind bars.

Despite this glaring case of special privilege given to a person who preyed on dozens of children, Acosta was appointed to his position in the federal government, a disturbing notion indeed.

https://thefreethoughtproject.com/ep...ect+Newsletter


Matt Agorist

Matt Agorist is an honorably discharged veteran of the USMC and former intelligence operator directly tasked by the NSA. This prior experience gives him unique insight into the world of government corruption and the American police state. Agorist has been an independent journalist for over a decade and has been featured on mainstream networks around the world. Agorist is also the Editor at Large at the Free Thought Project. Follow @MattAgorist on Twitter, Steemit, and now on Minds.

[Fellow Aspirant]

Here's a wee dose of the reality that I, and 35 million other Canadians live in:



Why would you even bother to post such incredibly insane lies about Canadian food prices? It's so easy to Google the reality of real food prices. What weird agenda are you following? Or do you really believe such crazy information?

Brian

[onawah]

What are you referring to here? What post about Canadian food prices?

Posted by Fellow Aspirant (here)
Here's a wee dose of the reality that I, and 35 million other Canadians live in:

Why would you even bother to post such incredibly insane lies about Canadian food prices? It's so easy to Google the reality of real food prices. What weird agenda are you following? Or do you really believe such crazy information?

Brian

Update: Never mind--Flash illuminated me.

[Franny]

Dang, very low prices. Last time I saw strawberries they were $7 a 6 oz clamshell, chicken was $9 a lb., sardines are about $3 a tin.

[Flash]

Posted by Fellow Aspirant (here)
Here's a wee dose of the reality that I, and 35 million other Canadians live in:

Attachment 40365

Why would you even bother to post such incredibly insane lies about Canadian food prices? It's so easy to Google the reality of real food prices. What weird agenda are you following? Or do you really believe such crazy information?

Brian

WOW, where are those no Frill prices? Got to go buy there. Not in Montreal for sure those prices.

One thing to remember, Canada is vast, from one side of the country to the other side is a complete different world, and for Southern part to far Northern parts, another world again. 3$ for Sardines is a dream price for Inuits for example.

NOW 64$ for a cooked chicken!!! Really!! even in Inuit land, this is ludicrous, and it is the only place where prices may get that crazy.

Once again, and again, and again, Voice in the Mountain, could you just use your brain a little instead of spreading false anything from an ultra right view point and skewing any data you may find anywhere to justify your ultra right point of view.

Again false news, lies and screwed up thinking published on the net, shadowing anything related to truth and some views that would help humanity and giving zero credit to anything on the web to future forum readers.

Anyone, do not listen to the stupidities he spread, not worth it.

Yes reading seems to make you stupider Voice, cause you seem not to be able to process what you read and think independently. Stiff stiff processing.

[onawah]

Ah, that explains it. I have made good use of the Ignore option.

[A Voice from the Mountains]

Posted by Fellow Aspirant (here)
Why would you even bother to post such incredibly insane lies about Canadian food prices? It's so easy to Google the reality of real food prices. What weird agenda are you following? Or do you really believe such crazy information?

Those aren't lies, those are real Canadian meat prices, albeit from the far northern parts of Canada.

What's the CBC's agenda? They seem pretty leftist to me.

Your grocery bill could rise 3.5% in 2019, study predicts

But cost of meat and seafood set to fall as more Canadians adopt plant-based diets

The price of food could increase by up to 3.5 per cent in 2019, an annual study of food prices predicts, but there's good news for Canadian consumers buying meat and seafood, which are projected to become cheaper.

Meat and seafood have seen sharp increases in recent years, but a shift away from eating meat to a more plant-based diet is reducing demand.

Canada's Food Price Report 2019, an independent analysis produced by university researchers, predicts the price of meat will drop by up to three per cent and seafood by two per cent.

But those drops are more than offset by rising prices in other areas, led by a 4-6 per cent hike in the price of vegetables.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/can...2019-1.4930130

Articles like this are hilarious to me, because it's obvious that Canadians are eating less meat because the prices are going up, not because of some sudden wave of vegetarianism.


I laugh about what you guys pay for beer too:

The price of a 24 of Molson varies pretty widely across the country. The cheapest 24 in Canada can be purchased in Quebec for $26.99 and the most expensive is $56.65 in the Northwest Territories. The reason for the big discrepancy? Varying taxes and transportation costs. Between these two extremes there is some more nuanced pricing. Ontario ($34.95) and British Columbia ($34.99) are relatively inexpensive. Prices rise a little in the sparsely-populated Prairies, with Manitobans paying $40.49, Albertans shelling out $44.99, and Saskatchewanians getting their drink on for $46.49.

https://www.theloop.ca/where-is-beer...t-in-canada-2/

The cheapest case of 24 beers here is about $15.

I don't drink beer, but if I did, good Lord, I wouldn't live in Canada. Same if I smoked cigarettes. I heard it's $12 a pack up there. Only about $4 down here.

No need to get so mad and start calling people stupid, guys. You're the ones who like high taxes and socialism, not me.

[onawah]

Actually, if you do a Google search for the flyer image that Voice posted, it is a current flyer from a box store chain in various parts of Canada called No Frills.
Not sure if you have to buy in quantity to get those prices or not, though.

[Fellow Aspirant]

Posted by onawah (here)
Actually, if you do a Google search for the flyer image that Voice posted, it is a current flyer from a box store chain in various parts of Canada called No Frills.
Not sure if you have to buy in quantity to get those prices or not, though.

No-Frills is a chain here in Ontario. My regular grocery store for 20 years. Those prices are for single unit purchases, I believe, and were published within the last month. There are more expensive places to buy, and I'll go to Loblaws if I want a higher end selection. There are also a couple of cheaper chains as well. Food Basics, for one, and Farm Fresh. Anyway, food can get really expensive around here, and never seems to get cheaper (within the category). I wouldn't want to be poor and try to feed a family.

B.