The US Supreme Court and the Health Care Bill

The Health care reform, Obama’s major legislation, is in front of the Supreme Court. The people who are fundamentally against it say that the legislation is unconstitutional.
Now let us look at the history of this piece of legislation.
In 1993 former President Clinton asked First Lady Hilary Clinton to head the Health Care Reform Act.
Conservatives including conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation said that a single payer was a bad idea, and that a individual mandate was the right way to do it.
Mitt Romney passed the legislation in Massachusetts that included a personal mandate. Newt Gingrich in 1993 said that a individual mandate was the right way to go, Bob Dole said the same thing.
Now let's shift to 2009 and Obama in the White House. The President proposes the Health Care Reform. All these institutions and individuals who had said in the past that the individual mandate was unconstitutional. They had forgotten completely what they had proposed and supported 16 years earlier. When I was growing up we used to have a saying that said “I don’t know what you guys are discussing but I’m against it”. That is the behavior of the Republican Party.
We know perfectly well that Health Care companies, Corporate America, and Wall Street were against the Reform. Their concern, that down the road we could have a single payer system such as in most other industrialized nations where the cost is much lower per person than in the US and that output or result is higher. Conservatives tell us that the health care in the US is the best in the world. What they don't mention is that it’s the best if you can afford it, that it is run by insurance companies deciding what kind of coverage each individual receives, and when these insurance companies will pull the plug in terms of coverage. Studies done by reputable institutions show that the US health care is rated in number 36 in the world, with France being number 1. Our premiums are high, with copays for everything from visit to the doctor, to hospital, to medication. The cost of my family between doctors and medications for 2011 was over $4000. Not exactly pocket change, and that is with health coverage, and that does not include the insurance itself. In countries such as Canada, a place that conservatives bad mouth, braces for teeth for the young are free, and for adults more than 50% of the treatment is covered, while in the US braces are not covered at all. Most kids tend to have crooked teeth and need treatment. In states like NJ the cost of that is over $5000. Not a number that every family can afford.
Now let us look at the main group who organized through the power of big funders, and then ran against the Health Care in 2010, the Tea Party, their proposal is that the individual mandate should be eliminated, and if they could have their way repeal the whole legislation. But, what are they proposing if they repeal Obamacare, like they call it? Nothing, just go back to what we had before. That would mean that college students whose age is between 21 and 26 would have to purchase their own health care instead of being included in their parents insurance, people with pre-conditions would lose their coverage, and that insurances could use all the money they would like for lobbing and advertising instead of the what the bill states which is 80% of premiums goes to health care coverage and 20% administration and other expenses.
What the Tea Party people believe is that nobody should force them to pay for coverage, so that if they have an accident or get sick in another state that is not their place of residence the rest of us who pay for health coverage pay for it, with higher premiums, or have hospitals and doctors eat the expense.
I think the choice is very simple. For the people who think that the health system is so great they should volunteer to work for a couple of months in a hospital, in a doctor's office or become sick, and not listen to Fox News or Rush Limbaugh and base their own opinion on that. Their opinion will change overnight.

BBC vs the Private Sector

Many people in the U.S. believe that nothing can be run as good as when it is in the hands of the private sector, and that when the government runs anything it does it inefficiently, and it never works.
Having grown up in a household that had its ties to the UK the BBC has always been a reliable source of information.
The British Broadcasting Corporation, or BBC as it is commonly known, has always had a reputation of being unbiased. It is said that during World War II the German Army and therefore the troops would follow the BBC because of the reliability of its news.
They arguably have the best documentaries for TV, the quality of their programming is very high, they have qualified reports across the globe. CNN’s concept was based on the BBC.
My father-in-law was for a period of time press secretary for the Armed Forces in Argentina, and he once told me how surprised he was that the reporter of the BBC spoke Spanish fluently. He also said that this reporter had told him that he had come from another assignment in China, and that he spoke several languages. If we look at the history behind many of the reporters that CNN employs many of them had their origins in the BBC.
The BBC in the USA has a couple of channels on TV, one being BBC NEWS, a 24 hour news channel.
I mentioned earlier the documentaries, if we look closely many of the programming of the Discovery Channel in the United States is of the BBC. If we try to find DVDs or Blu Rays about nature such as Planet Earth, or Human Planet they were done by the BBC.
As far as programming, most of the PBSs across this country play British Comedy, the majority, if not all of them, are done by the BBC.
The number 1 program in the world, Top Gear, is done by the BBC, and its viewed across the world, including Africa.
Now one can say what is the point of this blog, and that is very simple, the BBC is a public service broadcaster, this means that it is funded by the public through license fees. Its autonomous, with no advertising, similar to what PBS, or for those who don’t know Public Broadcasting Service, would be in the US. It is the largest broadcaster in the world with around 23000 employees.
This goes to show that PBSs or public funded broadcasters are not a dirty word, and instead of being defunded they should be promoted.
When we watch TV or listen to private run radio stations not only do we listen to corporate advertisement, but in many instances there are many issues that are never addressed. Most of the TV and radio stations are owned by large corporations, who have their own agenda, and who push, in many instances, their own philosophy to their audience. We can look at both sides of the aisle, Fox News is with no doubt the spokesperson of the Republican Party, with conservatives conducting their shows, inviting only people who agreed with their views. The last liberal that Fox News had on its staff was Alan Colmes, and he’s been gone for quite some time. Mitt Romney has not given any interviews to MSNBC, he talks primarily to Fox, and in a special occasions he’ll appear on CNN. Conservatives consider CNN liberal, although the network gave a free pass to the Bush Administration during the Iraq invasion and occupation. CNN is owned by Time Warner, a large corporation that no only owns magazines, but also a TV cable company. Now let us look at NBC, and their affiliates including MSNBC, they are owned by G.E. (General Electric), one of the largest corporations in the world, and for many years was also one of the biggest polluters. This is an issue that is rarely addressed on the network or its affiliates. ABC is owned by Disney. We know the size and penetration of the Disney conglomerate. CBS is owned by Viacom, another large conglomerate.
Private, as we can see, can have its other side as well, with fewer opinions and choices. Nobody says that the CCTV, or China Television, is the perfect model, but neither is a television, radio and newspaper market owned by a handful of conglomerates, because they will publish, discuss and report about the things that they have on their agenda.
A balanced alternative is many times a healthier alternative, even if it goes against our own views.