Michael Moore Needs To See This!!

[PoconoPragmatist]

http://www.pennlive.com/letters/expresstimes/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1184213277289520.xml&coll=2



Long-time local radio personality Carl Baker died July 1. Carl was my friend and co-worker at stations Q-100 and WEEX in the 1980s and '90s. We also appeared on locally televised professional wrestling shows together. I was hoping to travel back East this summer (I now live on the Oregon coast) and visit with him. That will not happen.

Carl is dead because he had the misfortune to be an American.

Allow me to explain. He was a diabetic. Because of his health concerns, he didn't work much in recent years. As a result, his income was low. Last winter he told me that because his heating bills were so high, he'd have to forgo buying insulin that month.

If he lived in any other industrialized nation, he wouldn't have had to make that terrible choice. In any other country, he would have been a member of a national health system which would have made the medicine he needed available to him, regardless of his income level.

I have become disgusted with politicians who talk endlessly about how "compassionate" and "caring" America is while they work behind the scenes to deny citizens vital medicines and access to medical professionals because a national health care system would conflict with the interests of the wealthy corporations that fund their campaigns.

Any politician who won't support a national health care system should be run out of office, especially if he accepts money from the pharmaceutical or medical industries. Carl Baker was just one of many Americans who die before their time each year, thanks to the bottomless greed of our immoral politicians.

more...click the link above....

[Whoa_Nelly]

1. Did you send the story and link to Moore?

If you have something you want to tell Michael directly, contact him at:
[e-mail]

http://www.michaelmoore.com/email/index.php

[Grey]

2. You are so right.

My cousin Jane died because she couldn't afford the medication. She said she could see a doctor in the emergency room but not pay for the drugs, So she would sit and wait for the chest pain to subside. One day walking across the Safeway parking lot the pain didn't go away....
Worked her whole life, raised her kids, died in a parking lot.

[PoconoPragmatist]

3. :-(

And knowing how compassionate our country is...if she couldn't afford burial, they'd gladly put her on the curb in a Glad bag...

I'm so sorry for your loss. This is disgusting. If you are reading this...and you are not mad yet...then you are not paying attention!

[Grey]

4. Sad and Angry.....

The rest of the family........not so much.

and her kids........ lost their meal ticket.

bible thumping repubs one and all.

[PoconoPragmatist]

6. ....

I wouldn't worry so much about those kids losing their meal ticket...don't you know God will provide for everything?? :sarcasm:

[demigoddess]

5. one local semi-celebrity committed suicide, i heard, because of medical bills

she was trying to pay off for her mother but could not get enough hours at work for more income. depressed she committed suicide. such a loss.

[Grey]

7. I am so THANKFUL...

for the Democratic Underground, for a community of friends that do understand.

so many times you just want to bury the feelings and sulk, But people here remind me, I am not the only one with
despair in my heart. Could we start an effort to have a chain of Hospitals like the Mayo Clinic system, which I've heard is a Not-for-profit hospital system? Is there anyone with an understanding of the Mayo Clinic Model that can explain it to me?

[PoconoPragmatist]

8. That Would Be Nice

but it will never happen. HMO's and pharmaceuticals will fight like hell to keep it from happening, and cutting in to their precious profits. And our elected officials, who depend on campaign contributions from these monsters...they'll sell us all right down the river. Our health be damned...the elected officials have their own health system...far bnetter than the one they impose on us. Just like social Security. THEY have a better pension plan than any of US will ever get!!

Wanna clean up social Security and our healthcare system in one fell swoop? Make these assholes have to suffer the system they have imposed on us, and you'd see it change faster than you could fart and say Mississippi!

[Grey]

9. Correct me if I'm wrong but........

I was given to understand that IF the medicare program that your congress uses was opened to the general public (at the same rate of payment)
everyone could afford to have medical coverage. I have no idea if this is true and would hope someone else with more knowledge would step in,
Why is this not general knowledge. Why can you not use the same medical plan as the congress-critters you elect to serve you??

Sorry, just trying to come up with something that might work for you.....

[PoconoPragmatist]

10. Because

The plan is too good for us common Americans. Only the ELECT among us get good healthcare.