Kucinich is right on health care

By Derrick Z. Jackson

Dennis Kucinich, the Ohio congressman running for the Democratic presidential nomination, deserves more attention than he gets. On health care, he says what Americans believe, even as his rivals rake in contributions from the industry.

In a CNN poll this spring, 64 percent of respondents said the government should "provide a national insurance program for all Americans, even if this would require higher taxes," and 73 percent approve of higher taxes to insure children under 18. Those results track New York Times and Gallup polls last year, in which about two-thirds of respondents said it is the federal government's responsibility to guarantee health coverage to all Americans.

Such polls allow Kucinich to joke that, far from being in the loony left, "I'm in the center. Everyone else is to the right of me."

"One of the greatest hoaxes of this campaign — everyone's for universal health care," Kucinich said. "It's like a mantra. But when you get into the details, you find out that all the other candidates are talking about maintaining the existing for-profit system."

Kucinich quoted the 2003 study published by the New England Journal of Medicine that found that 31 percent of health-care expenditures pay not for actual care but for administrative costs. That compares with only 16.7 percent in Canada. Administrative and clerical employees make up 27 percent of the health-care work force in the United States, compared with 19 percent in Canada. More...

Why of course the people don't want war

"Why of course the people don't want war... That is understood. But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger."
- Hermann Goering

The words of Hermann Goering, one of the major figures of Nazi Germany, starkly illustrate the power of leaders to whip their people into war. Throughout history, tyrants have manipulated and misled citizens to join in conflicts that serve only their own interests. But even in more democratically-minded societies, politicians have used fear-mongering and scare tactics to drive public opinion towards war.

Goering's quote reveals that leaders can more easily drag people along toward war than it may seem. In a democracy, this is done by creating false narratives about an imminent attack and denouncing pacifists for lack of patriotism. In autocratic regimes, dissenters are castigated or threatened until they comply with the will of the leader.
What has become clear throughout history is that war is motivated not just by strategic thought or the public interest, but also by power dynamics. Various elements come together to create an environment where war can be launched: a leader willing to exploit their people; a population that can be convinced to go along with a policy they don't necessarily agree with; and a flurry of media coverage amplifying the rhetoric and causing division among citizens.
We must recognize how leaders can take advantage of our deepest fears to pursue aggressive policies like militarism. We must also question our willingness to blindly accept these calls for war and consider if there are other ways for us as citizens to respond -- some that may contribute more positively to peace and stability in the world.

As the world passes us by

Watching the wealth of our nation - as well as the blood and body parts of our soldiers - poured down a rat hole in Iraq is not the only thing that grieves me.

It's that we hardly notice as the world passes us by.

We are led by reactionaries who see the world is as it was in 1949, when America was the last nation standing. Or maybe as it was a century before that, during the time of the robber barons. Who knows what they really see?

Meanwhile, the Euro has surpassed the dollar in value; it's been this way almost from the day it was founded. China, which holds the paper on America, is now the world's fastest-growing economy. India's is the second-fastest.

Moribund America, however, slides deeper and deeper into debt. We have no jobs. We make no things. We make no capital investments in our future. Our housing bubble, which has sustained the economy for years, is bursting as I write.

While people in other countries learn to speak two or three languages, America still has vigilantes on its borders trying to keep out anyone who doesn't speak English. Instead of welcoming the immigrants who are already here, it tries to demonize them. Artists, students and intellectuals find it difficult to get visas. They go to other, more welcoming countries instead.

Many of us have been living with pain during the past few years. We love this country, both the greatness and the promise of it. We love the way every new wave of immigrants has come here to make a better life and has made everyone else's life better as a result. But it seems that now openness and opportunity are gone.

America is becoming a moral, cultural, religious and intellectual backwater, a banana republic without a hope or a prayer of catching up to the fascinating new world which is flourishing without us. More...

The occupation’s biggest failures

Iraqi deaths due to the invasion, whether directly from U.S. forces or from sectarian violence erupting as a result of the invasion, far exceed the horrors imposed by Saddam Hussein. Credible estimates put the total Iraqi deaths since the beginning of the war at nearly 1 million. Between 1 million and 2 million Iraqis have been displaced internally and as many as 2.2 million have fled the country.

Iraqis currently enjoy only four hours or so a day of electricity. Aziz al-Shimari, Baghdad’s Electricity Ministry spokesperson, said power generation across the country totals only half of the demand. In the first couple of days in August, there had already been four nationwide blackouts. Al-Shimari complained that the current problems are worse than even in the summer of 2003.

Sporadic electrical power has led to faulty sewage systems and an increased public health menace that has not been adequately addressed in large parts of Baghdad and in many outlying provinces. Sewage has also contaminated crops, leading to illnesses and food shortages.

These problems are compounded by a lack of potable water. According to a recent IRIN news report, a study by the UK-based charity Oxfam and the NGO Coordination Committee in Iraq shows that around 8 million Iraqis, approximately one-third of the population, are in urgent need of water and sanitation.

The severity of the water shortage is intensified for the more than 1 million internally displaced persons who face both water shortages and armed groups who hoard water in order to extort high prices from the refugees, IRIN reports.

Additionally, cooking oil and gasoline have now become precious commodities that few Iraqis can get, with gasoline prices as high as $5 per gallon in the city of Karbala (half of the daily wage of a taxi driver there). More...

What really kills Americans

Here is the top 3: 

3. Cancer 

2. Smoking 

1. Heart disease. 

What? No terrorism? How could this be? Could it be that the news media has lied to me?