By Donald
B. Ardell – September 06, 2009
INTRODUCTION
I should
note at the start that I have been an enthusiastic supporter of Barack Obama
since early in his candidacy for president. My appreciation for the man only grew stronger as the
election drew near. Like so many,
I was transfixed on election night. My hope grew to audacious levels right up to the Inauguration, despite
Obama's awful choice of a mumbo-jumbo talking, gay-bashing spiritual witch
doctor to interject a prayer into what is a secular event of our non-Christian
Republic. I was also taken aback
by the president's lamentable decision to continue Bush's unconstitutional
faith-based misuse of taxpayer dollars. But, I got over these shocks - nobody's perfect, I've heard. I remained a fan. I found in Obama's style, vision and
words an eloquence and level of inspiration I had not experienced since college
years listening to JFK.
Alas, I
have recently been losing faith in Obama. I had faith in the sense that I hoped he was better than the presidents
since Kennedy. Of course, that's faint praise in some cases (the Bushes and
Reagan, Ford and Nixon) and not exactly high encomium in others (Clinton,
Carter and Johnson). I had the audacity to believe Obama was what many admirers
termed a transformative leader. I
saw what I desired to believe in - a leader committed to and capable of lifting
our society beyond the highest-bidder corruption of campaign donations for
favors practiced by big business and all special interests.
TWO KINDS
OF FAITH
Was this
naïve? Misplaced hope? Perhaps, but it was NOT the innocent,
helpless-to-resist faith to which I (like hundreds of millions of others) was
exposed and indoctrinated during my formative years. That faith, religious in nature, was not lost reluctantly,
and it did not pass little-by-little and bit-by-bit. No, that version of faith was shucked at once, washed away,
discarded and (figuratively) boiled in acid one afternoon in my eleventh year
when I developed, at the pre-puberty stage, an ounce or two of common
sense. Even as a youth, the toxic
nature of superstition, magical thinking and dogma, reinforced via elaborate
pomp and circumstance by ecclesiastical shamans, began to appear self-evidently
ludicrous. Of course, the
programming I endured before this stage also made it clear that such
questioning was a sin! Happily, I
got over that worry soon enough and never looked back, except with contempt for
the whole business of programming innocent but trusting children. If there is such a thing as sin, it
might be brainwashing toddlers with a faith before they are capable of
reasoning and making their own choices.
There
could be another interpretation, a different explanation for why I
"lost" my own assigned faith. Maybe I was born deprived of the religion gene. If so, it means I was left with no
option but to rely on free inquiry for guidance and direction.
My hopes
for Obama were never characterized by this kind of accepting, trusting faith
devoid of evidence. (Twain once said, "faith is believing what you know
ain't so.") Instead, my
beliefs, faith or hopes in Obama were based upon indications of excellence. In Obama I saw an enthusiasm for and a
commitment to values I favored. These included but were not restricted to respect for the commons, the
public interest, secular government, science as the preferred path to human
betterment and improved social conditions, particularly for those with
less. The latter surely, I
concluded, entailed systematic reforms in our $2.4 billion medical
complex. The controllers of this
dreadful non-system had proven themselves incapable of and very much indisposed
to providing access to quality medical care for all. I saw Obama as a change agent who would lead the way to
reform of this far too private profit system. I had faith he would promote a culture of personal
responsibility that advanced quality of life for all Americans.
CAUSE FOR
ALARM
Alas, as
the health system debate goes on, my faith in Obama is sinking fast.
Is it
true, as Patrice Greanville suggests, that President Obama is "a purveyor
of grand illusions?" What is it about the president's approach to health
system reform that has sparked dismay and disappointment among large numbers of
his most ardent supporters, while still attracting the usual vitriol from the
unhinged Republican Party of No?
I believe
it's the widening gap between the promise and reality of Obama's
presidency. My disappointment with
Obama can be summarized in three parts:
1. A
failure to protect or even respect sufficiently church/state separation;
2.
Economic policies that overly support Wall Street, banking and big business
interests; and
3. The
direction of health system reform efforts.
Only the
latter is addressed in this commentary about my loss of confidence in Obama as
a transformative politician. I
wonder if it's time, as Greanville suggests, to cast aside "the malignant
delusions surrounding Obama and the Democratic party as saviors of the day -
the sooner the better?" (See
Cyrano's Journal Daily Dispatch, "Malignant Illusions," Vol 1, No. 19
/// 8.14.09.) I think it is.
THE
PROBLEMS WITH HEALTH REFORM
Basically,
Obama's proposed reforms change too little and cost too much. As of August 17, the Wall Street
Journal quotes both Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and
the president's press secretary Robert Gibbs to the effect that the new goal of
the Administration is simply "choice and competition in the insurance
market." (Elizabeth Williamson
and August Cole, "Chances Dim For A Public Plan," WSJ, August 17,
2009, p. 1.)
Well
goodness me, big deal. The real
problems with the current system are profiteering by pharmaceutical and
insurance industries. Sounds as if
these ingrained dysfunctions are to be ignored. Worse, Obama Administration secret deals with these
industries practically guarantee that the problems reform should address will
not be challenged. Evidence for
this concern comes from reports of a series of White House meetings between the
president and leaders of the insurance and drug companies. Excluded from these or any other White
House meetings have been the progressive reform leaders seeking system
overhaul. Notable among the
missing are doctors Quentin Young and Sidney Wolfe, Rose Ann DeMoro, head of
the California Nurses Association and Ralph Nader.
As a
consequence of collusion and the decision to accept an illusion of reform
instead of insisting upon pursuing genuine restructuring that would eliminate
the power of entrenched industries, the president is choosing to ignore
dismaying realities, including the following:
* $250 billion in documented industry
billing fraud and abuse (identified by the GAO in 2008).
* $350 billion in overhead waste from
Aetna, United Healthcare and other health insurance companies, as well as
bloated bureaucracies with executive salaries that give new meaning to the term
pornography.
* The fact that the senator in charge of
healthcare reform, Democrat Max Baucus of Montana, is wholly owned by the
health care and insurance industries. He is the recipient of more campaign money from these two groups than
any other member of Congress. This
is the case for each of the last six years!
President
Obama is also being undermined by powerful forces in his own party. Would it not be better to tell the
American people about this, rather than accommodate the enemies of real reform
within his own ranks? Ralph Nader
has explained that Obama, by catering to giant corporations, has made
"every mistake Clinton made in the early part of his first term except
that he's leaving Michelle Obama out of it." (See Tom Rigbert, "Amy Goodman talks to Ralph Nader on
Obama's back room deal with Big Pharma," Cyrano's Journal Online, August
14, 2009.)
The public
interest is not served when Obama makes deals with leaders of the system that
need replacing. Only by
eliminating or at least curtailing the influence of the health insurance
industry can efficiencies be realized. Only by dramatically reducing drug company subsidies of legislators can
full access to quality care be established.
WHAT OBAMA
SHOULD BE DOING
Obama
should be mobilizing the progressive base that brought him to the White
House. He should campaign for a
single payer, Medicare-for-all system. Nader and others cite polls that show a majority of Americans want a
public system, not just a public option (though Obama no longer seeks even
that). Americans who voted for
this president expected and still want a transformational leader, not one
devoted to harmony and concessions. (Or simply "choice and competition in
the insurance market.")
Maybe none
of this will happen unless Obama does what the satirist Andy Borowitz described
in his fictional blog recently. Borowitz wrote that Obama "has decided to tailor health reform
explanations to all idiotic Americans." He cites a White House statement to the effect that "we
clearly underestimated the role that doofuses and dimwits were going to play in
this debate." (Andy Borowitz,
"In Move to Appease Critics, Obama Promises to Extend Health Care Coverage
to Morons," Borowitz Report, August 17, 2009.)
Borowitz
went on to note "critics of the president's new plan worry that extending
coverage to every American who is a few bricks shy of a load could triple the
size of the nation's deficit." Then Borowitz cited cautionary remarks of an imaginary University of
Minnesota expert who studies the demography of idiots: "The sheer number
of lamebrains in the U.S. is much greater than the Administration
estimates. Just look at Glenn
Beck's ratings."
If you
feel dispirited like me, and if you feel your hopes for audacity were
misplaced, well, I suggest you look after yourself to minimize the need for
future encounters with the medical system and do what the Monty Python folks
suggested back in the 70's, namely, "always look on the bright side of
life."
That's what I did when I voted last time, and look where it
got me. Oh well, it could have
been worse - much worse. Sarah
Palin could be a heartbeat away from you know what. 
Don Ardell is the Well Infidel. He favors evidence over faith, reason over revelation and
meaning and purpose over spirituality. His enthusiasm for reason, exuberance and liberty are reflected in his
books (14), newsletter (500 editions of a weekly report) and lectures across
North America and a dozen other countries.