Colorado & healthcare reform

Colorado has an unreasonable number of healthcare activists with national prominence.

I'll begin with T.R. Reid, although he's a journalist, not an activist. His Frontline film and upcoming book are and will be important in the debate.

There's Nathan Wilkes, a young father and member of the board of Health Care for All Colorado who speaks nationally on the need for universal, effective, quality healthcare.

There's Donna Smith - who's now in Chicago, but has deep roots in Colorado. She appeared in Michael Moore's Sicko.

David Sirota, the pundit, is here. He's not exclusively about healthcare, but he speaks on the issue, and how it's central to a movement to strengthen the middle class.

Glen Pearson, MD, is former president of Physicians for a National Health Plan.

Rocky White, MD, also on HCAC's board, is running for the State House of Representatives, and is the editor of the reprint of Healthcare Meltdown, a book to read if you're wanting to learn more about the need for healthcare reform.

Elinor Christiansen, MD, was one of the original authors of the first draft of HR676, the single-payer legislation sponsored by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) and Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH).

In the center there's the 208 Commission, with many of its members being nationally known leaders in healthcare policy, Barb Yondorf in particular, who has co-authored several papers.

On the right, there are Paul Hsieh, MD, and Lin Zinser. The two have an article on "Moral Health Care vs. 'Universal Health Care'" at something called The Objective Standard.

There are a number of single-payer advocates who ignore stuff like this on the grounds that it's mean-spirited. Other activists love to get exercised over this kind of argument, ignoring the fact that most Americans see Zinser and Hsieh's position for what it is - not only mean-spirited but also extremist.

I guess I think it's good to understand where people are coming from, even if you know beforehand that you won't agree. To be a Social Darwinist and still feel good about yourself must require an extreme ability to think in the abstract. For instance, Z&h's first step in fixing what they now acknowledge to be an American healthcare crisis is to repeal EMTALA, the law that requires hospitals to treat people who show up injured or sick at their doors. They'd also eliminate Medicare, Medicaid, and all insurance regulations.

About EMTALA - While the need for the EMTALA law is new, brought about by the distortions of profit in what used to be religious institutions' mission of caring, the underlying value is centuries old - at least as old as Christianity and Judaism.

Z&H give a history of our current crisis, beginning with how Blue Cross/Blue Shield became non-profits, and thereby began to compete with other insurance companies on what Z&H consider an unfair playing field. They believe it became even more distorted after the WWII wage freezes took place, with their concurrent tax breaks for employers offering health insurance.

Z&H compare health insurance to homeowners' insurance, arguing that if homeowners' insurance covered lawn work, painting and remodeling, our homeowners' insurance rates would skyrocket. Especially if the government forced homeowners' insurance to cover poor homeowners...

The problem with that analogy is that homeownership is completely optional - as is, to a lesser extent, upkeep. Health isn't optional. A good portion of what happens to our health isn't choice-driven either. No one chooses their father's stroke proclivity, their mother's and sisters' breast cancer. No one chooses to grow up down river from a chemical plant, or for their mother's crappy prenatal care.

Z&H see Medicare as worse than charity, worse because, they write, people don't realize it's charity. We fools think we've been paying for it via our own taxes.

I'll stop. It's tedious reading someone else's rebuttals to something, and more instructive to do it yourself. The Libertarian notion is that if the healthcare market were simply freed from government meddling it would thrive. It's not a bad intellectual exercise to actually think through what the evidence is against that being true. May even come in handy one day - especially here in Colorado.

Even some of the up-and-coming Colorado politicians are taking notice.

It's too bad the newspapers are out of the loop. Katy Human at the Denver Post does a good job of covering health issues and stories, but the opinion pages have pretty much taken a pass. It would be a public service if they did a better job of covering the issue - with an emphasis on single-payer and modified single-payer, since it is the funding mechanism by which the rest of the world keeps their costs down and provides universal coverage - despite Z&H's ongoing success in ignoring that.

Put a Doctor in the House!

Rocky White, M.D., has a website up regarding his run for Colorado House District 62. Rocky's website looks great - single-payer-financed healthcare is front and center. He writes:

I believe in a single risk pool for everyone in Colorado so that everyone shares in the expense of our health care system according to their ability to pay. I believe that every resident should have equal access to a defined benefits package that ensures a minimum standard of health and welfare for all. I believe that everyone should have a certain degree of personal responsibility for their own health care and that the burden of health care financing should not rest exclusively on the back of business.

The transcript from Amy Goodman's show with Rocky is at Alternet, titled, "Evangelical Doctor Touts Better Health Care Plan Than Clinton, Obama."

Rocky got a brief mention in the Denver Post article on the Democratic State Convention:

One of the few surprises of the weekend was the upset of Rep. Rafael Gallegos, D-Antonito, who was seeking a third term in the House.

Gallegos' own District 62 assembly swept him out, picking Rocky White, a doctor from Alamosa, to be on the ballot. The district covers eight counties in south-central Colorado in an area that includes the San Luis Valley.

White attributed his victory to being well-known in the valley and "just campaigning like crazy."

Gallegos, who received 14 votes, and Ed Vigil, another candidate seeking the seat who received 12 votes, can still petition to get on the ballot.

Denver Post vs. the Governor

What is it with the Denver Post and Colorado Governor Bill Ritter?

I'm even seeing this when I basically agree with the criticism. Today it's a good health care story about a 53-year-old guy with seizure disorder who can't get insurance. Me, basically, except I've managed to keep my coverage.

Cover Colorado said they'd insure the guy for $500 a month. Only $100 more than I pay. The one private insurer who agree to take him on had a plan that cost $650. Pretty standard, if you're talking about decent coverage for someone with pre-existing conditions. And how many of us reach 50 without a few?

Katy Human, their health care reporter, writes:

While some Coloradans can't afford health insurance and others have inadequate coverage, Sullivan falls into another problem group — people who are generally healthy and middle-class but can't easily get insurance because of pre-existing medical conditions.

Colorado lawmakers, who promised last year to make health reform a priority this session, are rapidly backing off health-reform ideas after realizing it would cost roughly $1 billion to get insurance to the state's 790,000 people without it.

She didn't mention the fact that Health Care for All Colorado's plan would save the state $1.4 billion annually, and that people like this guy with the seizure disorder would be covered -- but again: Pretty standard fare.

Then comes this quote that provides the pullquote and jump tag that the paper uses. It's from the guy's wife:

"When a government cannot respond to the needs of the people, then there is a real problem," Patty Sullivan said Tuesday. "Gov. Ritter is not our friend on this."

What? It's a great quote, and I agree with the basic premise -- politicians are not providing the leadership that they could on this. Ritter himself told me in front of a crowd that the time isn't right, that the pols need us to do more educating. Standard fare, fair enough. Probably even right by many measures.

So on the one hand, I agree that the governor, as the highest elected official in the state has a special responsibility to lead. On the other hand, the Post really viciously attacked Ritter for his support of unions. So I wonder.

Ritter has a press conference today on health care. He referenced cost-shifting the other night on a public television call-in show, a misleading diversion from real solutions. Reducing cost-shifting due to the uninsured has very little potential for saving money under health insurance mandate schemes. If Ritter goes in that direction it would be a great disappointment.

The last part of Human's article was great. It referenced the phased approach to single-payer that Rep. Claire Levy of Boulder hopes to introduce.

Sullivan said she's pinning hope on the few state lawmakers still interested in universal coverage, including Rep. Claire Levy, a Democrat representing parts of Clear Creek, Gilpin and Boulder counties.

Levy said she is looking to introduce a late bill to start building a universal health insurance system in the state by creating an agency to draw up a benefit package and calculate costs.

Eventually, a single-payer system would probably need voter approval.

Startup costs could be high, as much as $15 billion by one estimate, though a nonprofit insurance program would lead to savings for most Colorado families, businesses and health care providers, Levy said.

"I keep hearing people repeat as if it's a received truth that the voters won't pass it," Levy said. "But I hear the same people saying they support a single-payer system. And businesses — especially small businesses."

Coloradoan single-payer - again!

Fort Collins' is the real deal. The progressive community likes to say that while other progressive places in Colorado (no names...) do a lot of talking, the progressives in Fort Collins actually get things done.

I gotta admit, I see proof of it on a daily basis. Here's yet another single-payer column in The Coloradoan, their paper -- this one by G. Richard Dunn. He writes:

The potential national savings has been confirmed recently at our own state level; the Colorado 208 Health Care Commission report is complete and confirms there could be a major savings in health-care costs for Coloradans. The stated charge to the commission was to make a recommendation of health care for all Coloradans and to reduce health-care costs. The good news is that one of the recommendations does exactly that! The bad news is several politicians have already responded that while it might save our residents money, we need to carefully study the issue because it might raise taxes.

The commission retained an independent cost expert and the expert confirmed that 100 percent of Coloradans, including the 800,000 presently uninsured, could be covered and still enjoy an annual savings of $1.4 billion. The commission has forwarded its findings to the Legislature.

If the Legislature and the governor will read carefully, they will find there was a great deal of public and professional support across the state during the hearings for the "Colorado Health Services Plan (single payer)."

True. The 208 Commission held hearings across the state, and they heard again and again from single-payer supporters. Some of the commissioners -- and Colorado pols -- thought that Health Care for All Colorado must have sabotaged the hearings, filling them with our members.

In fact, we'd never heard of most of the people who showed up. There's a groundswell of support for single-payer, not just in Colorado but across the country.

I'd say it's past time for the insurance industry to bring out their big guns, and start running ads on how horrible health care is outside the U.S. They seem to be counting on the Democratic politicians to bring about mandates for people to buy their crappy product. They may be reassessing that now that it's failed in California.

Caucuses and Shame

I went to my precinct caucus tonight, resolution for single-payer in hand.

I walked away pondering how we can use people's unwillingness to be seen as uncaring to our advantage.

The caucus took place in the cafeteria of my old high school in southeast suburban Denver. Back then, I attended on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and every other Friday. Honestly. I never would have gotten that diploma had I faced the attendance requirements my children faced. Back when I was in school the administration had the option of graduating kids just to get 'em out.

Tonight a crunchy, dry snow covered the roads -- enough to provide a good excuse to anyone who hadn't really wanted to go. We got there about a quarter til, and the parking lots were already filled. It's a suburban school, so there are plenty of parking lots.

There were about 10 precincts, 600 - 700 people in the cafeteria. It was hot, crowded and noisy. At 40, we were one of the smaller precincts. I passed out copies of the resolution to the various tables, explaining that we'd be voting on it later.

We moved through the straw polling, delegate selection and other business, and some of the people melted away. I've been sick but did my best to shout out why we were pushing this resolution -- the only one considered by this somewhat apolitical crowd. I explained that single-payer was already part of the state platform, but not explicitly. I read the HCAC resolution --

"The current health care system in the United States has reached crisis point. The fragmented, administratively wasteful model of commercial health care costs and bureaucratic nightmares for health care providers, patients and employers. Therefore, as a matter of basic economics and the common good, the Denver County Party supports guaranteed, quality, affordable health care for all through a single-payer financed system..."

And so on. We voted -- first for it, then against.

No one raised their hand against it. No one.

But afterwards I learned that someone had muttered, "Right, and who'll pay for it?"

But they didn't openly vote against it.

What if it had been a curtained booth, though? How often do we vote against the common good when there's a curtain there? I did it once. I'm usually a reliable vote for increased taxes when it's for the cause of civilization, but on that election day, for some reason, I was feeling churlish. I still remember it. I wouldn't have done it if it had been visible. It felt like I'd slipped a five out of the church offering instead of putting one in. Or lit a bank of candles without giving an offering.

The trick is, once that curtain is pulled behind you, it's just between you and God -- or you and the thought of your grandchildren's future. What kind of country will we leave them?

Of course, fortunately, single-payer actually means it's less expensive. So it's a fairly easy concern to allay, if a person actually looks into it. But there will always be the folks who don't get the message. And aren't they the same people most tempted when the curtain's closed?

Come to the Rally Tomorrow!

Rally at the Capitol, Thursday!

Come to the Thursday Rally!

Where's the single-payer coverage?

The Rocky Mountain News' media critic, Jasan Salzman, has a good question in his column today. He asks why reporters aren't asking Colorado politicians, in particular Governor Bill Ritter, about Health Care for All Colorado's single-payer plan for Colorado health care. Salzman writes that both the News and the Denver Post "have reported that Gov. Bill Ritter is worried about the expense of his goal of providing health care to all Coloradans, regardless of which plan is chosen.

"Reporters should challenge this notion by noting that the governor's own Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform states that a single-payer system would actually reduce total state health-care expenditures by $2 billion. But it would require, according to the commission's report, an 8 percent income tax increase. Our political leaders should be asked whether the real issue is cost or political will."

Governor Ritter answered that question when I posed it to him at the Faith in Action Conference last weekend. Answered it to my satisfaction, in fact. He said that he was in favor of universal health care, but that it shouldn't come to a vote until it can win.

In some ways, we're at the same stage in this issue as we were back in the 1960s with cigarettes. Lots of educating needs to take place.

But for that education to take place, the reporters do need to pay attention, and ask the questions.

Rally at the Capitol, 31 January

HCAC questions report

The Northern Colorado Business Report ran this article on the 208 Commission, which is meeting today to go over their final report to the Colorado Legislature:

DENVER -- A group of health-care professionals who offered one of four proposals selected for review by the Colorado Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform released a statement Jan. 7 that said it has "deep concerns" about the draft recommendations that appear headed to the state Legislature later this month.

Board members of the Health Care for All Colorado Coalition, which submitted the Colorado Health Services Program proposal to the commission -- sometimes called the 208 Commission -- said the recommendations that are making their way to the Legislature on Jan. 31 won't cover all Coloradans or cut the administrative costs continually increasing health-care premiums.

Board member Michele Swenson said the 208 Commission recommendations fail to address the rising cost of health insurance premiums and would provide taxpayer subsidies to private insurance companies by requiring the purchase of a "minimum-benefit plan."

"They're moving people into minimum-benefit plans and they don't protect families adequately against health and financial risk," Swenson said. "The bottom line is, do we want to increase the bottom line of the insurance industry or increase health-care coverage for all?"

The Health Care for All Colorado proposal was the only single-payer proposal that automatically covered everyone in the state. A financial analysis showed the plan could save about $1.4 billion annually in state health-care spending but would also be the most expensive to implement, costing about $15 billion in new spending to set up.

208 Commission analysis at PNHP

HCAC board member Michele Swenson has an analysis of what's missing from the 208 Commission's final report at the Physicians for a National Health Program website. Michele writes:

The 208 Commission Recommendations fail to address:

• Rising cost of health insurance premiums (82% increase in 6 years in Colorado), as well as copays, deductibles and prescriptions
  
• The U.S. fragmented commercial health insurance system that siphons more than 20 percent of health care dollars to profits, exorbitant CEO salaries, etc. and duplicative layers of administrative waste.
  
• A greater than doubling of median family income spent on health insurance: 7.7% in 1987 to 19% in 2005
  
• As premium costs continue to increase, coverage has decreased: “Insurance does not equal health care.”

This is an excellent analysis, really recommended for Colorado bloggers and journalists who want to understand the issue.

Colorado politicians for single-payer

An increasing number of Colorado politicians are going on record for single-payer. Part of this is because of Barry Keene's savvy politicking. Barry, a Republican businessman whose family had a bad experience with the healthcare system, is vice-president of Health Care for All Colorado. As he looked into the systemics of healthcare, he became more and more outraged at its heartlessness and inefficiencies.

Barry tells HCAC members that for all the talk about the fight for single-payer healthcare, the people who will actually be bloodied are the politicians. The insurance industry has not yet put its terrible forces onto the field, but when they do, the pols know perfectly well that it's their jobs that are at risk — not ours.

Barry tells single-payer advocates that their job is to make sure that we create enough deep public support for single-payer that the inevitable propoganda campaign to come won't be effective.

He's very sympathetic to the between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place that is the natural habitat of American politicians.

Two of the candidates for my Colorado House District (HD 9) have shown up at HCAC's monthly Denver meetings. On Saturday one of them, Joe Miklosi, told the 50 attendees that he'd been barraged with stories on healthcare as he's knocked on doors in the district. Most recently, a couple of physicians told him they were planning to stop practicing because of the way the current system works.

The number of docs getting out needs to be documented and publicized.

Joe spoke well. He says the only thing Americans dislike more than a bully is a person who won't stand up for and defend their beliefs.

Let's stand up together for a cost-effective, single payer health care reform plan that lets doctors, nurses, and patients control their health care choices, not an insurance-run system.

We can strengthen families and create secure communities by restoring equal access and opportunity to guaranteed, high quality health care that protects us from the financial ruin of unaffordable health care.

Eliza Carney lauded

Eliza Carney is a major force at Health Care for All Colorado. She's got an amazing stamina and the skills to organize — she's built a great team of healthcare activists in Fort Collins, Colo. She's also smart and funny. So bravo to Cherry Sokoloski, editor of the North Forty News, for this feature on Eliza.

Sokoloski writes:

Her opinions about health-care systems were forged partially in New Zealand, where she and her husband, Jim, lived for a time. New Zealand has universal health care, with the government paying the bills.

"It was much more personal care," with a greater emphasis on wellness, Carney recalled.

Also, doctors did not push for unnecessary surgeries. Her husband had problems with his back while in New Zealand, and his doctor prescribed a body cast instead of surgery. The approach worked.

"We use far too many drugs and surgeries in this country," Carney stated.

Go Eliza!

Howie's rant!

Funny how these things work — Howie Wolf, MD, a longtime board member of Health Care for All Colorado, says he's not a writer, and I'm pretty sure he wrote this in a flush of annoyance (or rage!) last weekend, never expecting to get it published.

The Daily Camera, the publication of record for what the rest of Colorado calls the People's Republic of Boulder, did well to print it. He writes:

Thank you, President Bush.... As a family doctor with more than 45 years of experience working in our disjointed, unjust and inhumane health system, your endorsement of the status quo will surely help the efforts of those of us who are activists eager for major reform. The polls indicating that 65 percent to 70 percent of Americans favor a government-funded health-care system, plus the latest ABC News poll revealing diminished support for your leadership at a mere 20 percent gives me hope that again you are on the wrong side of an issue.

Bravo Howie! Keep writing!

Colorado's fifth proposal for reform

The Denver Post's report on the latest 208 Commission news was as good as can be expected. Katy Human is a thoughtful reporter who does her homework.

According to Human, only seven commissioners voted against the commission coming up with their own proposal, including Mark Simon and Linda Gorman. The usual suspects, in other words.

The "208" commission suggested requiring individuals to purchase health insurance and banning insurance companies from rejecting sick applicants.

The group's latest proposal, which resembles the plan Massachusetts started last spring, would levy a tax penalty on anyone who didn't have insurance.

My favorite quote: "The solution is not giving more money to the insurance companies" said Mark Simon, an advocate for the disabled and former business owner on the panel.

There was a "what planet does she live on?" quote from Gorman: "What you are talking about doing is taking a functioning market and ruining it," said commission member Linda Gorman, senior fellow at the Independence Institute.

Let's see, you've got about 15 percent of Americans uninsured, an equal number underinsured, a quarter of Americans on Medicaid, Medicare, the VA, etc., millions of Americans forced into bankruptcy because of medical bills, annual cost increases that double to triple the cost of inflation and you call that a functioning market? Actually, of course it is a functioning market. It's just not a functional market. Another way of looking at this is the fact that government — aka your tax dollars — already pay for 60 percent of U.S. healthcare costs. You pay another big chunk straight out of your pocket. Health insurance pays for very little care compared to how much they take in. This "functioning market" adds nothing of value to the system, but rather only skims the cream off the top.

The Rocky Mountain News' article got the number of commissioners wrong (picky, picky, picky, but there never were 23 — there were 24 before Governor Ritter appointed three more, making 27) but the reporter also got a good quote from Simon: "I have an increasing level of discomfort . . . but I've got to say the solution is not to give more money to the insurance companies," Simon said. "That's outrageous."

HCAC members at the commission meeting report that early in the meeting Lewin went over some detailing on the SEIU proposal specific to their efforts to reduce costs and spread service for long-term care. The strategy results in damaging effects to vulnerable and disabled populations. It was in fact so onerous that it led to a heated exchange between commissioners and may have damaged the SEIU proposal.

However, the Commission is going full throttle towards subsidized mandates. The fight for U.S. reform, in fact, comes down to mandated private insurance vs. publicly-funded single-payer. People need to understand that their tax dollars will be going to private insurance companies through this scheme: mandates will be publicly funded and subsidized, in some cases up to 400% of FPL.

Barry Keene, HCAC's vice president, made a forceful public comment on this issue, telling the commissioners that they were becoming vulnerable to group think about enforced insurance mandates that the public was not going to accept. He noted that when he talks to people about this they're incredulous about mandates, with a uniform reaction of: "They wanna to do what?!? No way I'm going for that!"

But, Barry notes, Massachusetts voters went for mandates.

Mandates have become the default answer for mainstream health care policy thinkers, a way of assuring themselves that everybody is covered. Single-payer supporters must work hard to push Legislators away from this notion. Legislators need to be concerned about the public reaction to subsidizing insurance companies.

"Subsidizing insurance companies." When Barry put it that way to the Commission, reports are that some of them shifted uncomfortably in their seats. Mark Simon also used those words.

Christopher this morning asked me what value health insurance companies add to our healthcare system. What good are they?

Colorado single-payer calendar

The Science of Change

How do people change?

After a rough day yesterday, I was ready to say that they don't.

Former Governor Dick Lamm autographed his latest book for me, writing that single-payer advocates should keep up the good work: "History is on your side," he wrote.

I wasn't sure at all yesterday that was true. I'd just met with a progressive Denver group about a vigil to be held on 28 September for the victims of our health care system: 18,000 a year, 50 a day — including my brother. The spokesperson for the group wasn't as interested when I said that no, Michael Moore wouldn't be at the vigil.

Beyond that, the group's leader said they'd be happy with any reform proposal for Colorado that comes out of the 208 Commission — or actually, they'd be supportive of any progressive proposal.

I said there was only one progressive proposal that the commission was considering: the single-payer proposal from Health Care for All Colorado.

The person shrugged and said the group has members supporting all of the proposals. No doubt true — all but the underwriters' proposal, anyway.

SEIU has a proposal that has very meager benefits with a $35,000 cap — meaning that if you're in an accident forget staying out of bankruptcy. It would leave 465,000 uninsured of Colorado's 780,000 currently uninsured, at an additional cost of about $600 million. On the plus side, they don't have mandates to buy shoddy products from for-profit companies.

A group of safety-net providers has a proposal that would have both individual and business mandates to buy inadequate insurance, further enriching insurance companies, adding to the numbers of underinsured, and expanding the safety net. It would add $1.3 billion to the current total state health spending of $30 billion, with about 100,000 still uninsured.

The underwriters have a proposal that would have individual mandates to buy insurance, but no business mandates. A $50,000 cap. It would leave about 133,000 uninsured, and cost another $271 million.

Health Care for All Colorado's single-payer proposal would SAVE $1.4 billion — lowering that total health bill in the state. It would cover everyone. Three-quarters of Colorado's households would pay less for health coverage than they do now. Colorado businesses that currently insure their employees would pay less than they do now. The benefit package is a rich one.

So which is the progressive proposal? Which is the sustainable proposal?

When I heard this group would not be backing the single-payer proposal and wouldn't co-sponsor the vigil, I couldn't stop my eyes from crying. Damn eyes.

It doesn't hurt when conservatives spread their misinformation. Today's paper had a conservative columnist saying that the great challenges of the Republican party will be to maintain troops in Iraq and keep private health insurance. Eh.

What hurts is that the people who should be behind single-payer have convinced themselves that they're smarter than that — that there has to be an interim step between injustice and justice. What would that have looked like with ending slavery? With the Civil Rights Movement? And when they say that change is impossible, it makes it impossible. We won't get to single-payer until progressive groups embrace it. We'll never convince the social Darwinists and libertarians. But these folks should be with us.

It was therefore a relief to read Susan Rosenthal's The Science of Change: How it Happens and How it Doesn't. She lays out a strategy of hope. The three parts of change are:

Social support. People need support from others to overcome feelings of powerlessness, to create strategies for change and to act on them. In the context of supportive relationships, we learn that we are neither crazy nor powerless. By pulling together, we give each other hope and strength....
Presenting problems as solvable. To change their behavior, people need to see themselves and the world differently, in ways that make change seem possible....
Michael Moore’s film, "Sicko," has made a huge impact, not only because it reveals the horrors of the American medical system, but because it shows them to be neither necessary nor inevitable.
Repetition. When the level of struggle is high, people seem to change overnight in a kind of explosive chain reaction. At all other times, the dominant ideas are those that maintain the status quo. Changing those ideas requires patient and repeated encouragement. It’s like boiling water.
You put the kettle on the stove and turn up the heat, but nothing seems to happen. Do you remove the kettle in disgust at the failure of heat to boil water? Of course not!

Forcing people to buy inadequate insurance from the industry that has created our healthcare crisis is taking the kettle off the fire. It's not progressive. It's capitulation. It's not what's "feasible." It's a dead end.

Jim Spencer reappears!

The Denver Post's fine columnist Jim Spencer was given the boot earlier this year — a matter of rationing liberal views, evidently.

We all missed him — and so I was pleased to see his byline on this column: "In the Matter of Health Care Versus Baloney" at Colorado Confidential, Colorado's preeminent progressive blog.

Spencer, as always, did his homework responding to the Rocky Mountain News's scurrilous attack on Health Care for All Colorado's proposal to the Blue Ribbon Commission for Health Care Reform. The title of that RMN piece? "Single-payer Baloney."

They got just about everything wrong. No. They got everything wrong.

Unlike the Rocky, which didn't evidently do any research, no quotes, no references, and they certainly didn't get in touch with us or the Colorado Nurses, Jim quoted Donna Smith:

But on the business side, the U.S. system “doesn’t even make economic sense,” said Donna Smith of Aurora, whose family health problems forced her and her husband to declare bankruptcy. “Single payer would lower the burden on American businesses.”

Smith and her husband, Larry, appear in Michael Moore’s documentary “SICKO,” which lambastes the U.S. health care model. Smith testified before Congress in July about the inability of many Americans to afford health care. She just started a group called American Patients for Universal Health Care.

If you’re worried that Smith isn’t objective because she has a dog in this fight, then check with Colorado’s own financial consultant on health care reform. The Lewin Group has issued a preliminary finding that cumulatively, a single payer health system will save Colorado money on health care.

The Rocky did print Fran Ricker's and my rebuttal on Saturday — which was good of them, since it's a combined circulation that day of both Rocky subscribers and Denver Post subscribers.

HCAC Boulder at the Peach Festival

Join the revolution!
HCAC's Boulder chapter turned out to gather signatures and hand out information at the Lafayette Peach Festival today. They got a great response — bravo!
Thanks to Terry Fedak for this photo.