This post was submitted by Friends of Justice founding member, Dr. Charles Kiker.

“The poor can’t afford diamonds either.”

I know it’s not polite to speak disparagingly of the dead, but that was William F. Buckley’s response a couple of decades or so ago to the plight of the poor when it comes to health care.

Mr. Buckley was right. The poor cannot afford diamonds. But he was wrong to suggest that diamonds and health care are comparable. I’m perfectly willing for the “free market” to control the availability of diamonds. Health care is in a completely different category.
 
Starting in 1980, government started telling us that government is bad. That movement picked up steam during the administration of George W.  Bush. With guys like Grover Norquist leading the charge, “Starve the beast” became a popular slogan. The idea was to cut taxes to the extent that there wouldn’t be any money for government programs. So taxes were cut, especially in the higher brackets. When the second round of tax cuts in the Bush 43 administration was under discussion after the mid-term elections in 2002, even President Bush advised caution. Vice President Cheney reportedly chimed in, “We won the mid-terms. We deserve it, and Ronald Reagan taught us that deficits don’t matter.”
 
The big beef we hear about health care reform is government involvement and socialism.
 
A few years ago I was riding down I-27 between Amarillo and Tulia in the presence of some ardent anti-socialists. I asked if they knew the origin of the word “turnpike.” Not surprisingly, they didn’t. Turnpike in former days referred to access to a roadway when a landowner turned the pike (pole) that blocked access across his land, for a fee of course. Now that was untrammeled free enterprise. But it was not in the public interest. So it was not long before roadways became publicly owned. I wondered how my ardent anti-socialist friends would like to stop every mile or two and pay a landowner a fee to cross his property.
 
I’m glad we have socialist roads, streets, and bridges.
 
When I pay my property taxes each year, a portion goes to the Swisher County Hospital district. So, whenever I make use of the services of the hospital in Tulia, I am participating in socialized medicine.
 
And I participate in socialized medicine on a far larger scale through Medicare. If my wife and I paid for private insurance for 100% of our coverage at the same rate we pay for our supplemental insurance, I have calculated it would cost us about $1,500 per month, or $18,000 annually. That would force us to choose between insurance and life’s necessities, like food, shelter, and clothing.
 
We need universal medicare. Medicare is a government health insurance program, more efficient by far than private insurance. Medicare spends 97% of its funding on medical care, with some 3% going for administrative expenses. Private insurance companies spend approximately 80% on medical care. The goal of private insurance is to keep the portion that goes to medical care as low as possible in order to have higher returns for shareholders, and, oh yes, higher salaries and bonuses for executive employees. They do their best to avoid insuring high risk individuals, and seize upon any opportunity to avoid paying high end claims. So the insurance companies are going all out to defeat health care reform, and especially any reform that includes a government option.
 
On a per capita basis, Canada spends about half as much on health care as the U. S. And by some measures Canadians get better care. Infant mortality is lower in Canada than in the States.
 
We need universal, single payer medical insurance. One of the scare tactics opponents are using is that health care is rationed in Canada. And they can find horror stories from north of the border. But horror stories abound under the Stars and Stripes as well. And health care is rationed and delayed here. I recently talked with an individual who is waiting for approval from the insurance company before having a needed procedure.
 
Marilyn Boydstun Clement, Tulia native, social activist all her adult life, ardent supporter and organizer for single payer, universal health insurance, passed away in New York City on August 3.  It appears that her vision of health care reform will not make it this time, but hopefully a bill which contains a public option can make it through Congress. Without that we will not have meaningful health care reform. If scare tactics succeed in defeating meaningful health care reform, the winners will be the insurance companies and the politicians they buy.

The rest of us will be losers.
 
Charles Kiker
Tulia
 
Charles Kiker is a retired minister and social activist