B. Spoon

Recent Activity

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  B. signed the petition | over 2 years ago

  Joe Lieberman: Don’t You Dare
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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  Sorry.  I thought the "Civil Rights Test of Our Generation" was the creation of health care justice, and the end of discrimination against sick people (GLBT included) in America. 

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  I do not fail to realize it.  I said so, and you missed it.  Here it is again: "The ...[part about]... not being able to include (or even have) a ...[legal]... spouse is definitely discrimination".  Unmarried co-habitating hetero couples face the same discrimination by health insurers.  The difference is they could get married if they want to, but they don't want to be forced into doing so. 

  
  

  I repeat: We should ALL have the SAME health coverage, just like in every other civilized nation on Earth.  And gays should be allowed to have the same legal and societal protections that marriage provides, and be able to be marrried in any church that is willing to do so.  I don't think the government should force anyone to perform any marriage ceremony against their own personal wishes, but there are plenty of people available who are (or would be if they could be) more than willing.

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  Neither is being gay, sick and/or uninsured (a "choice", that is).  A person would have to be insane to willingly "choose" to be any of the above in America, what with the way our country is today (backwards).  I have an auto-immune disease that makes me one of our nations "uninsurables" (like India's "untouchables" only slightly different).  But for the grace of God go you.  The insurance industry keeps an "MIB" (Medical Information Bureau) list.  If your name is on it you are actuarial, and therefore human, toast.  I used to be naive too, but since have learned the cold hard truth.

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  I've never seen a health insurance application that asks about sexual orientation (and I've seen lots).  Gay or straight, don't get sick in America. The not being able to include (or even have) a spouse is definitely discrimination.  We should ALL have the SAME coverage (if we get sick , we are covered, like in every other civilized nation on Earth but ours).  You can include children, but (again, gay or straight) what often happens is there is no option for "single parent with child" only "family" coverage, which means single parents pay the same as if they are a married with a dozen kids.  That's discrimination too.

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  Why would anyone "choose" to be anything (like gay, or black, or uninsured, or fat, or old) that has so many negative repercussions in our society?

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  Dr. Martin Luther King knew something about discrimination.  He said (something to the effect) that of all forms of injustice, discrimination in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  There's legal discrimination which is sanctioned by written law, and then there's people's own discrimination, which is difficult if not downright impossible to legislate (other that legally punishing proven discriminstors).

  
  

  "Don't ask don't tell" is legal discrimination, and so is denying, singling out and/or rating up (and therefore out) sick (or fat) people for health insurance.  I don't think they rate up people because they are gay, unless they have AIDS or another illness.  Fat people are discriminated against the same as sick people.  I hope that once we understand more about obesity and its causes, we as a nation will  look back in shame at how we as a society treat fat, sick, black and GLBT people. 

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Civil Rights Test of Our Generation

  We legally sanction health insurer discrimination against sick people in America too.

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  B. commented on the article | over 2 years ago

  The Cost of a Health Reform Fail

  Medicare was passed forty-four years ago.  If you remember before that, then you must have been relatively young and (I'm willing to bet good money) also healthy.  Only sick people truly test any health care system.  I find it ironic when health insurers claim that, "85% of our customers are satisfied with their coverage" because 85% of their customers have never had to use it.  Medicare has a higher customer satisfaction rate tham private health insurance (with the exception of the newly privatized plans), plus most of its customers are actually sick and have had to use it.  Personally I don't know anyone who would rather get an MRI, CAT scan, mammogram or colonoscopy rather than do just about anything else on any given day.  There will always be hypochondriacs in any civilized society.  Gladly they are in the minority and doctors know how to deal with them.  Every other civilized nation has "socialized' their health care system, and hypochondriacs do not rule them.  We are the only one (civilized nation, that is) without any system, and whose health care costs are astronomical compared with everyone else's.

  
  

   

  
  

  Doctors don't make the deals anymore.  Health insurers (and sometimes Uncle Sam) do, and they have the odds rigged better than Vegas against us.