Think Humanely

Below you’ll find a recent speech given by Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason and Letter to a Christian Nation, as well as co-founder of Project Reason, a non-profit organization “devoted to spreading scientific knowledge and secular values in society.”

I’ll have more to say about the relationship between science and morality (and religion and morality) in the coming days. In the meantime, enjoy the roughly 22-minute talk.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich announced that he would vote ‘Yea’ for the excrement-filled piece of legislation laughingly referred to as health care reform. Kucinich, who has advocated for universal health care, has the following press release on his website:

Congressman Kucinich, along with Congressman John Conyers (D-MI), introduced HR 676, Medicare for All, a bill to provide high-quality health care to every American. This bill would provide all Americans the health care they need, from any doctor they choose, at a universal, high standard of quality. Americans would not be burdened with co-payments, premiums or deductibles. Rather, they would be guaranteed access to medically necessary health care, including inpatient and outpatient care, dental care, vision care, pharmaceuticals, and other treatments that a patient’s doctor would deem necessary.

Medicare for All would cost the same amount of money that is now spent on health care costs. Funds would be provided by savings from a vast reduction of paperwork, existing government spending on healthcare, savings from rational bulk procurement of medications, a tax on the top 5 percent of income earners, a small tax on stock and bond transfers, and a phased-in payroll tax that is less than what employers currently pay on average for less complete employee health coverage.

Compare the above bill, which is excellent and actually accomplishes what those who support the current Senate bill claim to support, with the utterly corrupt and impotent legislation that is likely to now be passed both in the House and the Senate. The current version of bill most likely to pass has no single-payer system. It has no public option. It has nothing to control costs. It has nothing to keep greedy insurance companies from charging customers mafia-like rates for coverage. Worst of all, especially given that insurance companies have no check on their price-gouging, is that the government is forcing every single American to buy from one of these private insurance companies or else face the bureaucratic wrath of the IRS. Here is what I wrote about the mandate vis-à-vis no public option:

The service provided by private insurance companies is so astronomically priced and provides so very little that of all the medical-related bankruptcies in this country, 60% are actually already insured. The average cost of health insurance doesn’t reflect the hundreds of thousands that one is still likely to incur if ever seriously injured or ill. This isn’t protection. It’s more akin to a mafia shakedown. Pay us money or we’ll beat the shit out of you. Paying this mandate won’t be the sign of a responsible American, but a desperate one who has been mugged in the alley, an American that is likely to fall further and further into economic disarray while receiving a product that has consistently been ranked as one of the worst in the Western world. The World Health Organization currently has us rated #37 in the world , far behind all of those “evil socialist” countries in Europe and elsewhere.

The very idea of forcing Americans to give more of their money – money that they do not have – to private insurance companies is repulsive. These companies already make billions of dollars. According to FactCheck.org, the following companies posted these earnings:

UnitedHealth Group: $859 million in the second quarter of 2009
Humana Inc.: $282 million quarterly profit
Health Net: $40 million profit in the spring alone
Wellpoint: $693 million in this quarter
CIGNA: $435 million for the quarter

All of this while the average family income has fallen. David Leonhardt writes , “the typical American household made less money last year than the typical household made a full decade ago. . . In the four decades that the Census Bureau has been tracking household income, there has never before been a full decade in which median income failed to rise. (The previous record was seven years, ending in 1985.) Other Census data suggest that it also never happened between the late 1940s and the late 1960s. So it doesn’t seem to have happened since at least the 1930s.” As if further stuffing the coffers of gluttonous, indifferent insurers with the diminishing savings of Americans were not offensive enough, consider not just the inferiority of the service, but the character of the companies providing it. Their profits are in direct proportion to the suffering of Americans. Former senior executive at CIGNA Wendell Potter testified against his former company before the very Senate that craft this bill. As Ezra Klein reports

“The industry, Potter says, is driven by ‘two key figures: earnings per share and the medical-loss ratio, or medical-benefit ratio, as the industry now terms it. That is the ratio between what the company actually pays out in claims and what it has left over to cover sales, marketing, underwriting and other administrative expenses and, of course, profits.”

Think about that term for a moment: The industry literally has a term for how much money it “loses” paying for health care.

Knowing this, these companies find ways to refuse the authorization of treatments. Americans will be paying for something that they may never receive, not because of some product shortage or lack of need but simply because the insurance companies know they can increase their profit off of saying no to the sick and dying. And whereas a car insurance company’s refusal to pay a claim may only result in having to live with a dent in the side of your car, a health insurer’s declination can and does result in death.

This is who the Senate, knowing all of this full well, wants to force you to enrich. This is who they want to force you to rely on in order to live and be healthy. Is it any wonder then that the stock for these companies have increased upon completion of a bill that is supposedly reforming and regulating the industry? Shahien Nasiripour notes

“Investors are seeing the Senate’s version of health care reform as a massive public subsidy for insurance companies — and as a result, are sending the sector’s stock prices shooting up, up, up. Stripped of a government-run insurance plan, the bill would give tens of millions of Americans no option but to start paying hefty premiums to private companies.

“The rise in stock prices has been particularly striking in the period since Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) said on October 27 that he would filibuster a Senate health care reform bill if it included a public option – a threat that caused Senate leaders to cave without much of a fight.

“Here’s a quick breakdown of major health insurance company stock performance from Oct. 27 to Friday’s market close:

• Coventry Health Care, Inc. is up 31.6 percent;
• CIGNA Corp. is up 29.1 percent;
• Aetna Inc. is up 27.1 percent;
• WellPoint, Inc. is up 26.6 percent;
• UnitedHealth Group Inc. is up 20.5 percent;
• And Humana Inc. is up 13.6 percent.”

Kucinich, in a press release in November of 2009, had the following comments about the then-version of the “reform” bill:

We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing health care. We cannot fault the insurance companies for being what they are. But we can fault legislation in which the government incentivizes the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem. When health insurance companies deny care or raise premiums, co-pays and deductibles they are simply trying to make a profit. That is our system.

Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by less than 200% while the number of administrators has increased by 3000%. It is no wonder that 31 cents of every health care dollar goes to administrative costs, not toward providing care. Even those with insurance are at risk. The single biggest cause of bankruptcies in the U.S. is health insurance policies that do not cover you when you get sick.

But instead of working toward the elimination of for-profit insurance, H.R. 3962 would put the government in the role of accelerating the privatization of health care. In H.R. 3962, the government is requiring at least 21 million Americans to buy private health insurance from the very industry that causes costs to be so high, which will result in at least $70 billion in new annual revenue, much of which is coming from taxpayers. This inevitably will lead to even more costs, more subsidies, and higher profits for insurance companies — a bailout under a blue cross.

And the bill which Kucinich rightfully lashes above is one that actually had a public option. This is what makes his turn to support the current legislation so very disappointing. It would be one thing if we knew that the Senate would largely fix all the gross deficiencies in the bill via reconciliation, which would include adding in a public option. But we don’t know this. And we have no reason to even find such a scenario probable. Instead, we’ll likely see only minor tweaks – if any – made, and thus Americans will once again be forced to take it on all fours.

So why did Kucinich do this? He has obviously spent most of the current session thinking that this and similar bills are pretty horrible. He has obviously thought that there are significantly better alternatives, alternatives that will actually benefit the American people whereas this one largely will not. I obviously cannot know what goes on in this man’s mind; I do know, however, that he has been the subject of some rather vociferous attacks by members of the left.

Markos Moulitsas said that Kucinich had blood on his hands and would face a primary challenge if he continued to oppose this government subsidiary of private insurance companies at the expense of poor Americans. This hack then proceeds, petulantly, to claim that Kucinich has never accomplished anything in his career, that he’s a ‘Utopian,’ and that he doesn’t represent his constituents. The last is an especially odd claim given that Kucinich has been re-elected, term after term, since 1996. Moulitsas: you, sir, are a fucking asshole.

Alex Koppleman recently wrote the absurdly titled piece, “The Liberal Case Against Dennis Kucinich,” in which he parrots many of Moulitsas’ so-called points without providing any ioda of skepticism or critical opposition to the ranting of what appears to be a man who has let the popularity of his circle-jerk of a website go to his head. Two individuals, whatever intelligence they might exert on other public policy issues, here display the mental acumen of people who have been deprived of oxygen for one minute too long.

Again, I don’t know what role, if any, such public admonition played in Kucinich’s reversal. But I almost have to hope that it did; the alternative is that he somehow convinced himself that this bill is actually worth becoming law. If this is true, then there is one less voice fighting for the ‘Utopia’ that Americans deserve.

In a related note, Sen. Harry Reid’s wife and daughter were in a serious car accident recently. His wife broke her nose, neck and back. She was rushed to a hospital and operated on, during the course of which she had a titanium plate inserted into her neck. She is expected to make a full recovery. How fortunate for her that her husband not only makes $174,000 for less than a year’s worth of work, but also receives federally-provided insurance.

You can now watch the latest rendition of ‘We are the World’ on Hulu, a benefit song for Haiti. It opens with an introduction by Academy-award winner Jamie Foxx ,and the video itself is directed by another Academy-award winner, Paul Haggis. “Please do more than just watch. Reach deep into your hearts and give anything that you can,” says Foxx. Commercials consistently ran through the NFL playoffs imploring viewers to donate on Haiti’s behalf. On Sunday, Angelina Jolie sat down with CNN’s Amanpour to discuss the former’s trip to Haiti. The First Lady routinely pops up in commercials imploring viewers to call the Red Cross or to text a certain number in order to send donations on behalf of the country.

One might start to get the wild idea that the reason we’re able to spend so much of our time and energy concerned with the plight of another country is due to the fact that there are no Americans who are in need of similar attention and donations. Surely if American cities had been devastated by poverty, drugs, violence, and various political decisions that continue to decimate the working class and poor, we’d hear about it during our football games, interviews with Angelina Jolie, Mrs. Obama, and so on, yes? I mean, if Americans were suffering and in desperate need of help, we’d definitely be bombarded with the news and ways to help out our fellow citizens just as frequently, if not more so, than we have been in respect to Haiti, correct? Obviously not.

I’d imagine that you wouldn’t be able to throw a stone without hitting someone who can tell you all about the plight of Haiti, the various ways to help, the commercials and ads asking for aid, and roughly how many people have died. Throw that stone a hundred times, and you’ll be lucky to find someone who can tell you the poverty level in this country, where the US ranks in terms of class mobility, the poorest city or state in the country, the state with the highest unemployment or what state has the highest percentage of the uninsured. Hell, people in this country don’t even know what the three branches of government are, let alone ‘little’ details like these.

According to the most recent Census data, Mississippi has the lowest median household income at $37,790 as well as the lowest per capita income ($15,853), barely ‘beating’ out West Virginia, Arkansas and Louisiana. The poorest cities in the country based on per capita income? Allen, South Dakota ($1,539); Cuevitas and Brundage, Texas ($1,703 and $2,371, respectively); and Wounded Knee, South Dakota ($2,403). According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,

Unemployment rates were higher in December than a year earlier in 371 of the 372 metropolitan areas and lower in 1 area, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Nineteen areas recorded jobless rates of at least 15.0 percent, while 10 areas registered rates below 5.0 percent. The national unemployment rate in December was 9.7 percent, not seasonally adjusted, up from 7.1 percent a year earlier. Among the 369 metropolitan areas for which nonfarm payroll employment were available,
356 areas reported over-the-year decreases in employment, 12 reported increases, and 1 remained unchanged.

The BLS also lists the unemployment rate for Michigan at 14.6%, Nevada at 13%, and Rhode Island and South Carolina at 12.9% and 12.6%, respectively.

Stateline.org highlights the growing numbers of the uninsured in this country:

Forty-seven million Americans went without health insurance in 2006, an increase of 2.2 million people from the year before, according to a report issued by the U.S. Census Bureau Tuesday (Aug. 28). It marks the sixth consecutive year the ranks of the uninsured have grown.

For the second year in a row, the percentage of children without medical coverage also increased. The Census Bureau estimates 8.7 million kids – or 11.7 percent – had no insurance, an increase of 700,000 over the year before.

…

“The huge number of uninsured Americans exceeds the cumulative population of 24 states plus the District of Columbia. This epidemic of uninsurance has reached crisis proportions, and Americans want to see the problem solved,” said Kathleen Stoll, health policy director of Families USA, a group pushing for a large expansion of SCHIP.

In a statement released by American Medical Association, Dr. Joseph Heyman, a board member, said, “It is unconscionable that the number of uninsured children has substantially increased over the past year. Children are our future, and for kids to get a good start in life, they need access to regular visits to the doctor.”

The state’s with the highest percentage of people without health insurance are Texas (24.1), New Mexico (21), Florida (20.3), Arizona (19), Oklahoma (18.7), California and Louisiana (18.5), Nevada (18.3), and Mississippi (18.1). An additional eight states have percentages ranging from 16-17.9.

Roughly 14,000,000 results come up when one Googles ‘Haiti AND donations.’ Some examples of these results:
American Red Cross Pledges Initial $1 Million to Haiti Relief

Support Disaster Relief in Haiti

Haiti text donations to Red Cross pass $5M

Haiti Relief Donations Qualify for Immediate Tex Relief

Haiti Earthquake Relief: How You Can Help

Haiti Earthquake Donations

Haiti Clothing Donations: Find Out Where to Send Supplies

Haiti earthquake response – Donate now

MCC to respond to Haiti earthquake, donations welcome

InterAction Members Respond to the Earthquake in Haiti

And this was just on the first two pages and doesn’t count entries from the same source.

Obviously, not all of the results are positive. To wit: one result was about Rush Limbaugh and, well, does one need to even explain what his position is about giving money to a non-Christian, predominately black country? I didn’t think so. Nevertheless, one can’t combine the words donation and Haiti without being bombarded with a plethora of ways to assist that country and its people, just as one can’t watch a football game, Hulu, or an average commercial break without being reminded of one’s financial obligations to them.

What happens when one performs the same search for Detroit? There are about 2,000,000 results, the first two of which are ‘Archdiocese of Detroit urges donations to Haiti,’ and ‘Haitian network group collecting donations.’ In fact, there is only one result on the first page that has anything to do with actually trying to donate money to help the city of Detroit, and guess what? The site is no longer available.

The easy explanation for the discrepancy between the outpouring of support for Haiti compared to the support for American citizens who continue to languor in what are de facto third-world conditions is that the cause of the Haitian crisis is not only easily understood but also spectacular. Americans like simplistic explanations (e.g., “They hate us for our freedoms”), and they like anything that looks like it could pop up in the next Michael Bay film. Americans also like it when the cause of such widespread suffering and tragedy isn’t their fault. These truisms are roughly the case with Haiti as far as most Americans are concerned.

The same cannot be said of the cities and communities all across this country that are still reeling from American-made disasters, social, economic, and political. Americans, in their laziness, ignorance, pettiness, and continued support of their sham political parties and corrupt politicians that they never vote out of office, are very much responsible for the uninsured rate in Texas, the per capita income level in Mississippi and Wounded Knee, South Dakota, and the unemployment rate in Michigan. This blame is one of the gifts of democracy. This isn’t (yet) a dictatorial government. We cannot point to a single tyrannical ruler who, by fiat after fiat, has created all the pain and suffering in this country. We can only point to ourselves, the citizens who either never both to vote for actual, genuine change, and those who do vote but not for change; rather, these men and women continue, year after year, election after election, to vote for the same people who have gotten us to where we are. They’re not pulling us out of anything – they’re simply pulling us further and further into this American-made abyss. The socio-economic turmoil in this country did not arrive overnight; it was crafted, in one legislative session after another, one free-trade deal after another, slowly and methodically.

And yet we do nothing for those who are electoral decisions hurt. We won’t admit our own culpability. We won’t face the consequences of our actions. But earthquakes? Hurricanes and tsunamis? Those are easy. Dealing with these doesn’t make us feel bad about ourselves. In fact, we can send a text to Red Cross and then pat ourselves on the back for a job well-done.

America: the only time we’re not tribal narcissists is when it comes to providing sustained help for our fellow citizens.

I recently wrote about the recent Supreme Court decision allowing corporations to spend unlimited funds on behalf of political candidates here, and the desire on the part of the American government to assassinate its own citizens without charge or trial here. Below you’ll find a discussion on these subjects between Representative Dennis Kucinich and constitutional lawyer and writer Glenn Greenwald. The discussion is conducted by Amy Goodman of DemocracyNow!

From DemocracyNow!:

White House lawyers are debating whether the US can legally assassinate a US citizen in Yemen. Anwar al-Awlaki is a US-born cleric who has been accused of having ties to the failed Christmas Day airline bombing and the shooting at Fort Hood. ABC reports US officials fear the possibility of criminal prosecution without approval in advance from the White House for a targeted strike against Awlaki. Awlaki has not been charged with any crimes under US law.

The same government that Republicans do not trust to run a public option, that Democrats do not trust to craft meaningful health care reform, and the same intelligence and justice communities that gave us lie after lie about Iraq, weapons of mass destruction, failed to catch the person(s) responsible for the anthrax attacks and – shall I go on? – now want the power and legal authority to assasinate Americans anywhere in the world based on their say-so. Anwar al-Awlaki might very well be guilty. But we don’t know. Why? Because he hasn’t been found guilty in a court of law. Why hasn’t he been found guilty? Because he hasn’t been tried. Why hasn’t he been tried? Because he hasn’t even been charged with a crime. He is “suspected.”

Do you know who else was “suspected” of being a terrorist or having ties to terrorism? Maher Arar, a Canadian who was tortured for almost a year. There is also German citizen Khaled al-Masri, who was allegedly beaten and sodomized after he was imprisoned indefinitely “because his name was the same as that of another man suspected of terrorist links.” What of the men, women and children imprisoned it our Guantanamo Bay base? From a press release by the Department of Justice:

Since 2002, more than 550 detainees have departed Guantanamo Bay for other destinations, including Albania, Algeria, Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Belgium, Bermuda, Chad, Denmark, Egypt, France, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Pakistan, Palau, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Sudan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom and Yemen.

We were told that these were the “worst of the worst.” They want to kill your children. Et cetera. Et cetera. Why were they freed? Largely because there was no reliable or credible evidence to support their incarceration. None, which would explain why there were no charges for hundreds of prisoners. No trials. No convictions. Innocent people were imprisoned for years. Innocent people were tortured. Now the government wants to play god and be allowed, with impunity, to declare people, not only in abstentia, but without any legal proceeding whatsoever, not guilty (because, after all, they haven’t been charged with anything) but deserving of death. They want to be able to send assassins (or drones or whatever new killing toy our $700+ billion defense budget can come up with) after Americans anywhere in the world, and “neutralize” them. But we should just trust the government, right? After all, the White House, Congress, Department of Justice, and intelligence agencies have proven themselves to be perfectly credible. They definitely won’t make any mistakes. And they certainly won’t abuse this power.