Benefits Back On The Chopping Block: Now Is Not The Time To Sit On The Fence

<"The ice age is comin', the sun's zooming in:
Engines stop running, the wheat is growing thin...>

<i.>

They've done it again. The Republican ideologues in the House of Representatives...who couldn't agree on the finer details of screwing the poor (and their low- to moderate-income peers)...jump-started their innocuously-titled monstrosity, the American Health Care Act (AHCA), in all its ghasty glory, by a 217-213 vote today. As expected, the measure passed along party lines, with 29 Republicans voting no, and no Democrats voting for it. The political football back to the Senate, where the math hasn't changed: you still need 60 votes, including eight Democrats, to actually pass this so-called piece of legislation. We'll see how well that scenario plays out.

However, I'm not going to spend time rehashing the ugliness of the AHCA, which is almost stupefying, in terms of who it rewards (the already insanely wealthy) and punishes (seniors,  via the "age tax" that insurers imposed before the Affordable Care Act (ACA); the poor, via the attempted conversion of Medicaid into a block grant program, or the imposition of high-risk pools, which failed spectacularly in states that tried them iduring the pre-ACA era). You can read the links below to see how the screw will bore through your back. Trust me -- no matter who does the analyzing, it's not a pretty picture.

Nor will I revisit the familiar pro and con arguments about the ACA's impact on the average person. Obviously, major issues that need correcting -- starting with the sky-high deductibles ($6,000 and $12,000? who were they kidding?), and double-digit rate increases that stoked resentments against the law. Now that people realize what they might lose, support for the ACA has shot up. If the Democrats ever regain majority control, they'll need to address these issues -- but that's another discussion for another day. If the law vanishes, that discussion is academic.

There's something downright surreal about the House's race to strip so many millions of what coverage they've gained since the ACA passed in 2010. Somewhere in his special little air-conditioned room in Hell, the late, discredited East German Communist leader, Erich Honecker, is high-fiving his equally grimy colleagues, as they observe the anticsnow going on in Washington: "Ja, ja, see? I told you so! I told you so!"

No, today, as we hold our breath, once again -- I'm going to focus on the people who, even now, after all the picketing and protesting, keep saying things like, Give him (Trump) a chance." "He doesn't really mean what he says." "He probably won't finish out his term." "It doesn't matter, and it doesn't affect me." "Whatever he does, we can overturn it at some other time." To all of those excuses, I offer a simple rejoinder: Now is not the time to sit on the fence, and here's why.

<I think we've all seen this movie before...>

<ii.>

Maybe you voted for Trump, thinking he really is some kind of  populist, waiting to tap his inner Bernie Sanders? There's a classic saying in business that past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior. Granted, Herr Trump zigzags constantly, but the few proposals that he's tried to advance --the AHCA, the massive social services cuts envisioned in his so-called budget, or the proposed tax cuts that would, effectively, soak the rich dreams to unimaginable new heights -- hail from the ultra-right playbook. Yet he's trying to jam all these things down our throats,with an approval rating that hovers somewhere in the low 40s. I don't feel like keeping quiet as he rolls out these evil science experiments. And neither should anybody else.

Maybe you take Trump for the latest clown who'll limp out of Washington with his tail between his legs, without any substantive achievements? Perhaps, but he can still wreak plenty of havoc by default. The best chance to check him  -- the 2018 midterm elections -- is a gut-wrenching 18 months away. Unless we lay the groundwork now, the Democratic dreams of recapturing one (or both) Houses of Congress will amount to no more than that. Ask the rivals who watched Trump stumble in Iowa last year, only to see him walk off with the nomination. Ask them what happens when you don't take a looming threat seriously.

Maybe you're unwilling to stand up, because Trump won't survive the impeachment process, and you somehow won't be affected? Impeaching Trump leaves us vulnerable to his equally batshit crazy VP, Mike Pence -- the same "compassionate conservative" who also presided over massive public health cuts as governor of Indiana. Putting someone like him at the top of the pyramid doesn't buy us relief; protest does, at least some degree, if only because it serve as a rude interruption of Trump's and Pence's narcissisitic fantasies ("Who cares what the media claims? They love me!"). And don't think you'll slip under the radar somehow. How many employers will continue offering the same kind of insurance -- or, for that matter, any kind of insurance -- if the AHCA actually becomes law?

Maybe you're counting on someone else to speak their mind, because you think the damage can be undone later? That scenario only becomes probable if Democrats capture the U.S. House and Senate, which nobody in their wildest dreams is floating right now (Most of the smart money is focused on regaining the former body). Part of the reason we're in this fix is because everybody waited for someone else to do the right thing. The progressives waited for the Democratic establishment to hear them out. Didn't happen. The voters returned the House to GOP control, hoping for relief from ACA premiums. Didn't happen. Trump's rivals, then Hillary Clinton, waited for him to stumble, and commit political hara-kiri. DIdn't happen. 

See where that logic gets us? No matter what rationalization you choose, the result is the same, as the British abolitionist William Wilberforce once observed: "Having heard all of this you may choose to look the other way but you can never again say you did not know." No matter what happens with the House vote today, whatever protesting we do must continue, and we must continue to drive home the message. Now is not the time to sit on the fence. --The Reckoner

Links To Go (Hurry, Before
They Yank The Coverage Rug For Good):
Center For American Progress:
The Upton Amendment To The ACA
Repeal Bill Will Have Almost No Effect:
https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/healthcare/news/2017/05/03/431827/upton-amendment-aca-repeal-bill-will-almost-no-effect/

Huffington Post: Jimmy Kimmel's Humanity
Underscores GOP's Heartlessness Toward The Poor:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/jimmy-kimmel-mo-brooks_us_590882a9e4b05c397682861c

Los Angeles Times: All The Horrific Details
Of The GOP's New Obamacare Bill: A Handy Guide:
http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-obamacare-repeal-20170504-story.html

Los Angeles Times: Seven Ways
The GOP's Obamacare Repeal Bill
Would Wreck Your Healthcare:
http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-gop-healthcare-20170314-story.html

Los Angeles Times: The GOP Isn't Replacing
All Of Obamacare -- Just the Parts That Work:
http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-gop-obamacare-replacement-plan-20170306-story.html

Life's Little Injustices (Take X): A Month Of Pain Pills Costs $100

<Those troublesome little Colcrys 
tablets, up close and personal>

I'll always remember Election Day 2016 for a different reason: the emergency tooth extraction that I endured, the morning after millions of Americans mourned the now all too real nightmare of Donald Trump clawing his way to the presidency.  The need to take out this right rear tooth didn't surprise me, because it had bothered me for several months. By Election Week, the situation had escalated to on-again/off-again pain and throbbing, to the point of putting an ice pack over my cheek (so I could get whatever passed for sleep).

Thankfully, our town has a clinic that serves the low-income and uninsured -- blokes like me, in other words. The only catch? According to their rules, I had to come as an emergency walk-in, since I hadn't used their dental services in so long. However, once I dragged my carcass down there, the waiting around -- and the inevitable paperwork blizzard that accompanied it -- took longer than the procedure. I arrived at 8:07 a.m., By 9:45 a.m., I was ready to go home. Not bad, in the scheme of things.

This clinic also has a pharmacy, which is good, since -- if you're on being charged on a sliding fee scale, like me -- you can theoretically save money on your drugs. I say "theoretically," because this isn't possible in every case.  I paid $22.30 for the dentist's prescriptions, including $10.30, for Tramadol -- to deal with post-procedural pain that, thankfully, never materialized -- and $12 for Ibuprofen (of the 800-milligram super-duper variety). Good show, I told myself. Now, you'll have a stockpile for the next toothache.

I decided to stock up on my gout medications, while I was at it. I'd spent much of October -- and early November -- battling two different attacks that hit  my right ankle and right knee. Both kept me virtually immobilized, and confined to bed, for a couple weeks. As a result, I had to visit the clinic, which gave me a steroid shot for the pain. However, since I was broke at the time, I had to put off getting the drugs that I needed -- until my toothache forced that issue, and prompted my return.

That meant I needed Colcrys and Indomethecin, to deal with the pain and swelling, respectively, and Allopurinol, which you take to prevent future gout attacks. The pharmacy tech reckoned that the Allopurinol and Indomethecin would cost about $22, based on my sliding fee status. "Okay, so far, so good," I said. Between The Squawker and myself, we could come up with that sum. "Now, what about the Colcrys, then?"

"That's gonna be a bit more expensive..." The pharmacy tech knitted her brows together, and punched the relevant keys on the cash register. "Yeah, that's gonna be $100, for 30 of them -- $98.92, with tax."

"Wow," I said, "at that price, they'd better do the job, right? There's no substitute for this one, I take it?"

"I don't see one, offhand. I can leave the doctor a note..."

"Tell you what," I suggested. "I'll take three of them, to get out of the pain today, and come back for the rest."

"Sounds good. Just let us know when you come back," the tech responded. "You should try to get Medicaid -- we have a lot of those patients here, and they typically don't pay anything. Or not very much."

"Right," I said. "I'll look into that."

And so, I went on my way, having plunked down $22.30 for the dental prescriptions, $22 for the gout pills that seemed halfway affordable, and $9 for the Colcrys, to zero out the pain I'm feeling today. Who cares about tomorrow, or even next week?

Like millions of Americans, I'm not in a position to care about such things, because a) I haven't been insured for a decade, so b) the traditional medical infrastructure isn't obliged to deal with me, which means c) without places like this clinic, I'd slide between the cracks completely.

Health care is already maddening enough -- something the Affordable Care Act, however well-intentioned or ill-conceived it is, depending on who you ask, did nothing to halt. However, as so many savvy commentators have already observed, it's about to get a lot worse under Trump, whose minions will spend a lot of time repeating two bromides, over and over again, to people in my position:

"Sure, it sucks. You're on your own."

"You don't like it? 

Well, you just can get rich!"

I suspect we'll hear these mantras a lot in the Trump era, because he and his cohorts will never have to depend on the crappy health care options they expect those below them to live under -- and therein lies the problem. --The Reckoner

<Twenty years of household bills, all neatly filed away for a rainy day -- and yes, most of them are medical ones.>

Shock, Horror, Film At 11: The Wall Street Journal Doesn't "Get" '60s & '70s Radicalism

<i.>

Reading this book reminds me of a comment in 1971, a documentary recently aired on PBS about the Citizens' Commission to Investigate the FBI -- a group of activists whose break-in of the agency's satellite office in Media, PA, unmasked the agency's COINTELPRO program...and its snooping into millions of Americans' lives, to an unprecedented degree: in short, more or less like today's climate (just substitute the names of Edward Snowden, and the National Security Agency). Anyway, one of the former activist burglars makes a telling point by saying that, in many ways, he feels that America has never gotten over 1968.

The Wall Street Journal's review of Days Of Rage makes me feel the same way. Reviewer Peter Hellman co-authored Chief! with the late Albert Seedman, the New York Police Department's own Chief of Detectives, who spent a fair amount of quality time pursuing the era's radical bogeys -- including the Black Liberation Army, the FALN, and the Weather Underground, who get much of the ink here.

It's always fun to read what establishment voices think, and Hellman's review is no exception. Consider how Hellman characterizes the book's more significant scenes -- such as the November 4, 1984 capture of Ray Lavasseur, ending the bank robberies and bombings of his own United Freedom Front (whose fugitive partners also raised children on the run -- ponder the implications of that one for a moment). As Hellman writes, "Two days later, the United States reelected Ronald Reagan in a landslide. So much for Lavessur's dream of fomenting popular revolution." 

To which I would humbly retort, "Um, not so fast, grasshopper." While a massive effort to overthrow the U.S. government didn't materialize, it's a  stretch to imply that the Gipper's re-election invalidated concerns about America's social ills, which seem more noxious than ever (unprecedented levels of social equality, jobless recoveries, massive expansion of state and federal power at citizens' expense -- need I say more, or go on?). At that time, barely half the U.S. population voted -- so, when considered in that light, Mr. Reagan's so-called "mandate" looks far less impressive.

Hellman also misses the mark with this observation: "Arriving on the 50th anniversary of Selma, this book provides a rare chance to appreciate the true radicalness of Martin Luther King's non-violence, a strategy for creating social change that was scorned by the radical underground." His review glosses over the reason why groups like the Black Panthers and the Black Liberation Army ridiculed the idea -- because the feds didn't respond with love and kisses to anyone seeking to stop the Vietnam War, or halt any of their crazier schemes (as even a casual listen to Nixon's many infamous White House recordings will quickly attest). 

<ii.>

Similar responses occurred around the world, especially in Germany, where the Baader-Meinhof Gang/Red Army Faction rose in response to the federal police's excesses -- such as the June 1967 shooting of Benno Ohnesorg, a student demonstrator whose wife was pregnant with their first child. New research by federal prosecutors and Der Spiegel shows that a) police didn't shoot in self-defense, as claimed; b) the medical examiner was ordered to falsify the post-morterm report; and c) subsequent investigations covered up key points that implicated the responsible parties. Naturally, none of these facts will prove sufficient to hold any of them accountable.

While these facts weren't common knowledge among the German New Left of '67-'68, sufficient grounds existed to suspect them. The presence of numerous ex-Nazis in lower- or mid-level government positions and unrelenting hostility from a conservative media establishment also did nothing, one suspects, to dissuade radicals from believing that peaceful dialogue was possible...or desirable. Ulrike Meinof presumably had this climate in mind for her spring 1969 article, "Columnism," which offers a cogent critique of the mass media space that she herself occupied as a noted journalist:

"My criticism is aimed at the way publishers internalise the conditions of the market, and at the way editors internalise the publishers' focus on profits. We are not looking for saints. We simply want an oppositional stance. We do not want our subjugation to market demands to be presented as free journalism, or the art of meeting deadlines to be confused with the of presenting people with the truth. We do not want editorial democracy to grind like sand in the gears, and we want the columnists' freedom to be recognised for what it is: a prestige and profit factor, a fraud for the readers, a self-deception, a personality cult."

Whatever you think of Meinhof's subsequent murderous odyssey, the article offers a glimpse into her thinking -- which, by now, rejected the idea of working within the system, or trying to influence it in a non-militant way:

"It is opportunistic to claim to be struggling against the conditions that one is actually reproducing. It is opportunistic to use the methods that stabilise a system and claim to be seeking change. It is opportunitistc to clamp down on editorial freedoms and the extra-parliamentary opposition and cave in to the market, i.e., to profits. It is opportunistic to limit the anti-authoritarian position to the authoritarian form of the column." 

<iii.>

Of course, the radical leftists made numerous mistakes. The biggest came in assuming that Maoist- or Stalinist-style Communism could simply be transplanted, root and branch, into consumer societies that had not experienced traditions of revolutionary violence (except Germany, perhaps). Also, it's hard to think of a successful radical group that didn't have a political wing -- as exemplified by the African National Congress, or the Irish Republican Army.

At least Hellman acknowledges that the government committed plenty of excesses in pursuing these small radical groups, though it's curious that he doesn't see fit to question the John Wayne Complex that often grips law enforcement. A good example is the so-called 1974 siege that led to the Symbionese Liberation Army's demise. It's curious that police never entertained the idea of simply blockading Donald DeFreeze and his would-be revolutionaries until their food, water and ammo stocks ran out...then again, it probably didn't sound as attractive as the full-scale operation to kick weirdo butt on live TV.

Naturally, Hellman does dwell at length on the middle- or upper-class backgrounds that characterized radical poster children like Bernadine Dohrn -- but, far from discrediting their ideology, it only makes the whole story more poignant. If people from monied backgrounds doesn't think they have options, what does that mean for the rest of us? The answers aren't pleasant to contemplate.

Finally, Hellman also ignores one other point: if the nation's radical business really is a finished affair, done and dusted, why do so many conservatives and ultra-right-wingers continue running so hard against it? Think back to the 2008 election, when Obama's Democratic and Republican opponents tried to tar him with the Weather Underground brush. If those ghosts really are dormant, why do commentators like Pat Buchanan continue to resurrect them, when the need arises?

Read Hellman's review and draw your own conclusions -- though, per usual, it seems like a missed opportunity for the substantive discussion that the subject deserves. Perhaps he missed the implied memo of JFK's famous 1962 quote: "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable." Then again...what else can we expect from the Paper Of The One Percent? --The Reckoner

Links To Go (Just Don't Shake That Molotov Cocktail):
Der Spiegel International Online:
New Probe Into 1967 Student Killing:
Police Covered Up Truth Behind Infamous Student Shooting:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/new-probe-into-1967-killing-police-covered-up-truth-behind-infamous-student-shooting-a-810877.html

Lib.com: Ulrike Meinhof: Columnism:
https://libcom.org/library/columnism-1968

PBS: 1971: FBI Office Break-In Changed Everything
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/1971/film.html

The Wall Street Journal: A Pestilence of Bombs:
http://www.wsj.com/articles/book-review-days-of-rage-by-bryan-burrough-1429307327

Post-Ferguson Dog 'N' Pony Show: The County Prosecutor Cometh (And Findeth Nothing Amiss)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2848622/Federal-investigation-Ferguson-cops-ongoing-

says-Attorney-General-Holder.html

As we previously suggested, the fallout of Ferguson's grand jury investigation played out in all its grimy, depressing ticktock regularity. The government -- in this case, St. Louis County Prosecutor Bob McCulloch -- investigated its own police department, and found no grounds to indict Officer Darren Wilson in 18-year-old Michael Brown's shooting death.

The establishment's local, state and federal paladins fell into their assigned roles of playing a tinhorn Greek chorus for "calm," "reason," and "restraint" -- when it seemed all too obvious that McCulloch's handling of the grand jury process would ensure the opposite outcome, in a community whose members are treated like walking dollar signs (at best) or subjects of an occupying army (at worst). Anyone expecting cool detachment in such a climate had to be kidding themselves.

The rioters fell into their own preassigned roles, as well. Burning and looting local mom 'n' pop businesses that people spent a lifetime building up won't bring Michael Brown back -- and, in the short run, may well prompt the town's power structure to ramp up its police department's militarized approach, making it even more difficult to change the entrenched apparatus already in place.

"Everyone's heading for the top

But tell me, how far is it from the bottom?

Nobody knows it, but everyone's fighting for the top

How far is it from the bottom?

"I don't want no peace

I want equal rights and justice

I need equal rights and justice..."

(Peter Tosh: "Equal Rights")

So, given the dynamic that played out on the streets of Ferguson, could anything have been done to avert it?  (Put it this way -- when the process raises the eyebrows of someone like Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia...who's never been known for showing warm 'n' fuzzy feelings for criminal suspects, alive or dead...you know something funny's going on. See the link below for the story.)

At least one alternative that apparently never crossed the St. Louis County power structure's mind, let alone the state's -- appointing a special prosecutor to provide an independent pair of eyes. As talking head after talking head on CNN pointed out, McCulloch's status as county prosecutor calls his objectivity into question...and that's before we get into his family history. (His father was a St. Louis cop killed in the line of duty by a black man.)

Even without that history, though, it's reasonable to assume that McCulloch would show little or no inclination to press charges against the police officers whom he views as his natural allies. He does business with them on a daily basis -- from issuing warrants, to reviewing reports, and resolving issues that often pop up during investigations -- so it's hard to see how he could be truly unbiased. He's never been on the receiving end of the power he wields over ordinary peoples' lives, so why should it upset him when a few cops break character?

Bluntly put, many county prosecutors are also political animals -- that's why so many of them run for district or county judgeships that boost their power and effectively entrench them from life, since they usually run unopposed. That's because most local attorneys won't take on an established face without major financial muscle behind them, evidence of serious discontent, or both. Who wants to represent a client in a victorious political opponent's courtroom?

However, people don't have to accept conflicts of interest as the natural order of things. I recall one local prosecutor on Michigan's southeast side who responded quite differently in two cases of alleged local police brutality. Instead of asserting his authority to undercut or sidetrack the investigation, this particular prosecutor immediately called on a neighboring county's colleague to oversee both cases as a special prosecutor.

In both instances, the jury acquitted the cops -- one being a police chief who was accused of backhanding a teenager in the mouth during a drug search. While that verdict upset people, at least nobody could accuse the government of investigating its own...unlike, ahem, in Ferguson. (The chief ended up resigning under fire and leaving the community, so at least some justice -- however delayed -- got done there.)

"Everyone's talking about crime

But tell me, who are the criminals?

Everyone's talking about crime

Tell me, who are the criminals? I really don't see it...

"I don't want no peace

I want equal rights and justice

I need equal rights and justice..."

(Peter Tosh: "Equal Rights")

One other aspect of the script hasn't finished playing out yet, which is the "where do we go from here" conversation. Missouri Governor Jay Nixon claims to have the answer by calling for a special commission to ilook into Ferguson's social and economic conditions. However, he's tipped his hand by saying that police brutality shouldn't be on the table, which is like Adolf Hitler telling his inspector general not to pursue an in-depth review of his henchmens' murderous actions.

The anger in Ferguson simply reflects the violence inflicted them every day, whether it's being stopped and harassed, or swept into a net of whopping civil ticket fines. I may be testing these waters myself as the proud recipient of a civil suit that I'll be soon forced to defend at great aggravation and cost to myself. I'll fight as hard as I can, though I'm not looking forward to the experience (as all-white jury convictions of minorities are still common in my neck of the woods).

Nevertheless, it's safe to say that the anger isn't likely to die down, at least until someone makes a show of addressing the concerns that have been boiling over for so long. All too often, though, it's only a dog 'n' pony show. For another textbook example, look at the 2003 riots that shook Benton Harbor. Then-Governor Jennifer Granholm responded by naming her own special task force that made roughly a dozen recommendations for improving its own highly-charged climate.

Sadly, most of those recommendations have either been ignored, sidestepped or watered down to serve the dominant power structure's interests. As in Ferguson, local police officers were cleared of all wrongdoing. As in Ferguson, the poor are treated as nothing more than perennial cash cows to pimp and abuse. Unlike in Ferguson, however, Benton Harbor got an emergency management regime whose operatives remain in place to this day.

If that's your idea of social progress, then it's time to look out the window...whip out your binoculars...and check the sky for flying pigs. I'll be waiting. --The Reckoner


Links To Go (Good Old Boys Never Die...
...They Just Cling To Power Like Barnacles)

MSNBC: Missouri Governor Jay Nixon 
Unveils Plan For Ferguson's Future:
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/missouri-gov-jay-nixon-has-plan-make-ferguson-fairer

Newsweek: Ferguson Prosecutor Robert P. McCulloch's
Long History Of Siding With Police:
http://www.newsweek.com/ferguson-prosecutor-robert-p-mccullochs-long-history-siding-police-267357

Think Progress: Justice Scalia Explains 
What Was Wrong With The Ferguson Grand Jury:
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/11/26/3597322/justice-scalia-explains-what-was-wrong-with-the-ferguson-grand-jury/

World Socialist Website
An American City: Benton Harbor And The Social Crisis In The United States:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:931osPvpYQoJ:www.wsws.org/en/articles/2003/08/bent-a14.html+&cd=8&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us