Rocky Anderson discusses how single-payer health insurance, Medicare for all, will actually cost less and provide better health care for Americans.
When the Supreme Court released its decision on the Affordable Health Care Act mandate I heard Obama and I heard Romney. I disagree with them both. So do millions of Americans.
ObamaRomneyCare is a private for-profit insurance and pharmaceutical industry rip-off. Now, millions of us are required to purchase an overpriced and inadequate insurance plan or else pay a fine to the IRS.
Today, 700,000 bankruptcies are filed each year in the United States because of high medical bills. That doesn’t happen anywhere else in the developed world. Even with the implementation of ObamaRomneyCare, hundreds of thousands of people will be bankrupted because of medical bills.
The Affordable Health Care Act is anything but affordable. There is no control on premiums or copayments. It does nothing to control costs.
With RomneyCare in Massachusetts, the model for ObamaCare, costs are steadily rising by 8% per year because the for-profit insurance industry maximizes profits by raising premiums and minimizing care.
No other country in the industrialized world relies upon for-profit insurance for essential health care. Why does this happen in the United States? Because of the corrupting influence of money. It’s that simple – and that outrageous. The for-profit insurance and pharmaceutical companies – and the politicians they buy – make out like bandits – and the public continues to get shafted.
We Americans now have by far the costliest, least efficient healthcare system in the industrialized world. And it is the only system that leaves millions of people without basic health care coverage. ObamaRomneyCare will continue to leave at least 26 million people without basic healthcare coverage when it is implemented in 2014.
For years, the majority of Americans have wanted a single-payer system where everyone is covered. During the Congressional healthcare debate, doctors and nurses advocated for a Medicare for All, Single Payer system, but Obama and Congress shut them out of the debate. President Obama received huge campaign donations from all sectors of the for profit health care industry, including giant pharmaceutical companies that always seem to get their way in Washington.
Obama received a staggering $20 million dollars in campaign donations in 2008 from the for-profit health care industry.
I have been promoting Medicare for All or Single Payer since I was Mayor of Salt Lake City. This system would be universal, effective, humane, and economical. It would not result in bankruptcies, it would have better medical outcomes, and it would save $400 billion annually.
The majority of Americans want it and the majority of physicians and nurses want it. The only thing getting in the way of the United States joining the rest of the developed world in providing affordable health care for everyone is integrity in government. Let us – the people – demand better leadership that will serve our interests rather than merely the interests of those who buy and pay for campaigns and relentless lobbying.
I’m Rocky Anderson and I approve this message.
Paid for by Rocky Anderson, Our President 2012, Inc.
