Don't cut our (public) health care

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

The America hating tea baggers, birthers and racists ought to take note of what the American Way really is and has been.

Don't cut our (public) health care

By Jennifer Klein

NEW HAVEN, Connecticut (CNN) -- "We worked hard to get it and we're going to keep it," said Nancy Snyder, one of the protesters attending this summer's health care town meetings.

Nancy and her husband Robert, retirees from Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, showed up at a town hall held by Sen. Arlen Specter, in State College, Pennsylvania, with signs condemning socialist takeover of their health care, and she was interviewed by Michel Martin on National Public Radio's "Tell Me More."

When asked how she had insurance coverage, Nancy explained that because her husband was a retired coal miner, they received insurance and care through the United Mine Workers. She attended the town hall because she said she had "had enough of the government interfering with our lives, after working hard all of our lives, especially to get the health care."

The historical reality, however, is that there would be no UMW health and retirement plan without the federal government. Our inability to acknowledge the real role of government plays right into the hands of private companies that have never solved the challenges of health security.

In April 1946, John L. Lewis, leader of the UMW, led the coal miners out on strike around a pioneering demand: employer contributions to a union health and welfare fund. Miners had long suffered debilitating health problems and notorious medical neglect in camps and towns run by authoritarian mine companies. For Lewis, changing the balance of power between workers and owners necessitated independent and guaranteed health security, but the mine owners had no intention of settling.

Facing a strike that could choke the economy, President Harry Truman intervened through the War Labor Disputes Act. With the mines officially under federal jurisdiction, Truman was ready to make a deal. The mine owners however were not as eager.

Truman pressured mine owners into signing a contract in which they would pay for a union Welfare and Retirement Fund -- hospital, medical, and retirement plans -- all financed by a royalty assessed on the amount of coal extracted by union workers.

The Social Security Administration provided technical assistance in designing the union-run welfare program. The settlement was industry-wide, regardless of company, thus equalizing the sharing of risk and the benefits of "social" insurance.

The Social Security Administration and the Public Health Service recruited staff for the UMW program. Physicians, public health experts, and industrial health experts came from the Public Health Service and the Farm Security Administration. The FSA had successfully run rural medical programs during the 1930s and World War II. Through the fund, UMW built a network of well equipped, modern hospitals, bringing about a major improvement in living standards.

Over the next two decades, federal subsidy became more direct. Social Security disability benefits and federal rehabilitation programs aided thousands of disabled miners, many of whom had been bedridden for years. By picking up the tab for rehabilitation and disability support, the federal government also kept the UMW program financially sustainable.

As employment declined and mining families struggled in the 1960s, mineworkers launched widespread protest demonstrations and traveled to Washington to lobby for federal support of UMW hospitals. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson responded with the Area Redevelopment Administration, the 1964 Economic Opportunity Act, the Appalachian Redevelopment Act, and of course, Medicare.

Government stabilized and expanded the miners' health system. Miners were proud beneficiaries of Johnson's Great Society -- today so much maligned by the conservative talk show hosts. Miners continued their pressure, leading to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, marshalling public force to protect their health in the private workplace.

If Nancy Snyder "did not pay one penny" for her husband's cancer treatment or her surgeries, it's because government subsidized that care since Robert's early days as a miner.

While she and her husband undoubtedly worked hard for what they have, these were by no means individual or private achievements. They represent shared social projects that were fought for and won collectively. The entire system of employee health insurance emerged because of direct federal support for unions and collective bargaining during the formative decades of the 1940s, 50s, and 60s.

The thousands of people who poured into the Remote Area Medical care emergency clinic on one August weekend in Virginia have no health insurance. They are suffering like the miners of 80 years ago. Who will tip the balance of power again in their favor?

Health care reform will derail once more if we can't learn to talk honestly about public benefits and public goods -- how they protect us from the insecurities and inequities of the market and promote genuine economic security in the face of real imbalances of economic power and resources.

The only moments when health security has been achieved in America are those founded on a partnership between empowered citizens and the federal government.

It's been the American way all along.

[PlatyPius 5]

I blame Obama.....

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

I blame Obama.....

It's the hip thing to do.

[Ban Hammer 13,337]

I blame Obama.....

It's the hip thing to do.

since gwb is gone........

[Tahoma 2,292]

MBD...great post. Let's send a copy to Nancy and Robert.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

I blame Obama.....

It's the hip thing to do.

since gwb is gone........

touché

[rebeccajo 14]

Fascinating.

It was the plight of the miners in Great Britain that helped drive the development of the NHS.

[PlatyPius 5]

Fascinating.

It was the plight of the miners in Great Britain that helped drive the development of the NHS.

I thought it was Stalin who dreamed that up....

[justashooter 430]

you obviously failed Critical Thinking 101, and are bedazzled by the spin the author puts upon the facts which little jennifer herself has presented us with. the benefit the UMW retirees receive is an EMPLOYMENT BENEFIT that was paid for long ago by the company they were working for. it doesn't matter if the .gov helped the miners union get the benefit negotiated into the terms of their employment, or not. it is still an EMPLOYMENT BENEFIT.

this is not what osama wants to force American taxpayers to pay for. he wants us to pay for health care for EVERYBODY, including illegals, whether they are working or have worked or are married to someone who has or are a child of someone who has, OR NOT. this is called socialism, a system in which the rich take from the middle and the poor, keep 30% for unrelated spending and general graft and corruption, spend 30% on inflated salaries for their buds, and give 40% back to the people they took it from.

shame on the rest of you for not reading the article and seeing it for yourselves.

[pedroh 21]

who is Osama?

could you please be mature, and call the President by his name?

[justashooter 430]

who is Osama?

could you please be mature, and call the President by his name?

OK, so barry sotero wants to force American taxpayers to pay for his next crop of voters.

lemme see if your ugly mug comes up in a search of posts using the keyword "shrub", or is this a one-way-mother- fuxer kind of thing? face it buddy, anybody who takes public office invites scorn from a certain segment of society. it's what the first amendment is all about. read it sometime. but then, when you can't confront my logic and observation, i suppose it's SOP to attack the messenger rather than refute the message.

Edited September 17, 2009 by justashooter

[pedroh 21]

calling Obama Osama, oh, like the terrorist.. such logic and observation there...

Freedom of speech has responsibility as well.. or else, you look like a fool, i.e. calling Obama "the fuhrer"..

[justashooter 430]

calling Obama Osama, oh, like the terrorist.. such logic and observation there...

Freedom of speech has responsibility as well.. or else, you look like a fool, i.e. calling Obama "the fuhrer"..

two guys with similar education and orientation, both intent on destroying the cohesive America of my youth. neither one gets any points with me. neither one is adding to order in our society.

freedom of speach is for all of us, pedro, not just you.

[Peikko 1,575]

You can't take anything that shootfromthehips says seriously. I mean, what have we hear, Hitler and Obama have similar educational backgrounds and ideology? How abusrd and off the mark can any person get really? You have to laugh at such lunacy, not expect critical thinking or rational thought.

Well, that's my advice Pedroh, for what it's worth

Edited September 17, 2009 by Madame Cleo

[pedroh 21]

calling Obama Osama, oh, like the terrorist.. such logic and observation there...

Freedom of speech has responsibility as well.. or else, you look like a fool, i.e. calling Obama "the fuhrer"..

two guys with similar education and orientation, both intent on destroying the cohesive America of my youth. neither one gets any points with me. neither one is adding to order in our society.

freedom of speach is for all of us, pedro, not just you.

Hitler and Obama have similar Orientation... now that's news to me... so are we living in the fourth Reich now?