Interesting question! Here are some milestones that might help us understand how long certain systematic Big Lies have been around:
1947: First hospitalization insurance plan established in Saskatchewan
1962: First comprehensive universal health care plan established in Saskatchewan, soon spreads to all of Canada. Fierce opposition was supported and inflamed by American lobbyists from health insurers and the AMA, fearing that “socialized medicine” would spread to the US.
Early 60s: Intensive lobbying campaigns throughout the US against the proposal for a national Medicare system for the elderly, warning of “the end of freedom”, imminent communism, and “the end of America as we know it”. Medicare finally enacted in 1965. America seems to survive.
1990: First report on climate change issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC.
I don’t know how much ruckus occurred back during the enactment of the first hospitalization plan, but I think we can safely take 1962 or even earlier as the beginning of fierce fights against socialized medicine and UHC. We can conservatively take 1990 as the beginning of fierce fights against the scientific findings on climate change.
So the conclusions are:
The big health insurers, their AHIP lobby and its predecessors, and medical associations like the AMA and (worse) the AAPS, and the right-wing media, have been lying for more than 56 years about universal health care and how it really works in the civilized world.
The big oil and coal companies, their lobbyists and fake front groups and the right-wing media, have been lying about the facts of climate change for more than 28 years.
If Bernie Sanders or some other advocate of single-payer is caught going to a for-profit hospital or clinic and paying with his own money, would you rant at equal length about what a hypocrite he is? Or in that case, would you understand that all people including politicians need health care, and when they need it they take the best available option, which in the real world almost certainly does not conform 100% to their vision of how the health care industry should be set up?
I still fail to understand how there can really be people out there (not just politicians) that would be against a modest hike in taxes to pay for honest UHC like Canada has, which benefits everyone. Or perhaps dig into that defense budget some?
What are people so frakking scared of? Good healthcare?
I just realized that I never responded to your first post, so I’ll do that now as part of my response to both. The hypocrisy arises from the various implications that Republicans like Paul have made – and that Paul has indeed unambiguously stated (e.g.- the “doctors conscripted into slavery” comment) that government-run public health insurance results in a crappy health care system, and by extension, American style mercenary health care results in the best health care in the world. Yet he’s coming to get surgery at a world-class institution right in the middle of a completely government-run single-payer health insurance system, and indeed one that is even more socialized than most countries with UHC, because it doesn’t have an exclusionary private component at all (one that only accepts cash or private insurance, and not the public plan), and also is virtually completely free of monetary considerations, paying for everything directly and in full.
And worse, he then lies about what sort of institution the Shouldice is, his spokesperson claiming that “it’s not part of any system”, yet as I described, it’s hard to imagine any hospital or clinic being more integrated into the overall public system than Shouldice is, notwithstanding the fact that it’s a private for-profit institution. And when Paul meets some of his fellow patients during the post-operative rehab, he’ll find that most of them are residents of Ontario or other parts of Canada, and unlike him, are getting their treatment at no charge, fully covered by OHIP or their home province’s health plan.
I’ve already addressed the first paragraph above. On the second paragraph, only the first part is true: I, too, believe that people should be allowed to shop for the best possible health care, public or private, taking into account quality, successful outcomes, convenience, and whatever else is important to them. Too bad that the private insurance bureaucracy that Paul and his fellow Republicans advocate doesn’t allow this, and generally tries to limit patients to their own network of providers, and furthermore, may not pay for the procedure at all if the insurance bureaucrats can find any reason not to. Any of those limitations would be utterly reprehensible and unacceptable to anyone accustomed to single-payer UHC. This paradoxical contradiction has to be described as either hypocrisy or ignorance.
The second part – that people should be allowed to shop for health insurance, in which they need “choice”, is a persistent American myth when it comes to medically necessary procedures, and mostly and pervasively comes from the conservative side. If a patient has a medically necessary need, he has no interest in “choice” of a plan to pay for it – he just needs to have it paid for, period. All he needs is a plan that does that reliably. Single-payer does this in full, unconditionally. Private insurance does it in part, maybe, and even then, typically only for in-network providers, and often leaves the patient with staggering debts in the form of deductibles and co-pays. The only “choice” in this sort of situation is the choice of an insurance company that is least likely to screw you, or screws you the least, none of which are considerations in single-payer.
Your last paragraph is funny. It’s been used for years by right-wing types under the apparent delusion that it’s some kind of rebuttal to climate change arguments: “Al Gore says climate change is a serious problem”. “Ha ha! But he lives a great big house!” :rolleyes: How big is Al Gore’s house compared to his peers, to people who have his level of wealth? There seems to be some kind of delusion among conservatives that (according to liberals and, presumably, scientists) the only way to deal with climate change is to live in a cave and use a single candle for lighting. I haven’t heard Gore say that everyone has to cut energy use, and that is in any case not at all the important part of his message: the message is that climate change is a problem and we need to move to clean energy, which requires major national and international initiatives, and which Gore has been working for years to encourage.
And hey, while we’re at it, Gore never claimed that “he invented the Internet”, either.
You overlooked Richard Nixon signing, 1973ish, a health management act that allowed hospitals, clinics, Drs to operate as ‘for profit’, instead of as service agencies, as previously required. One of the biggest contributors to his election funding was Edgar Kaiser of Kaiser Permanente. I believe the first to receive federal funding to make the transition.
Literally the thin edge of the wedge, start of the slippery slope!
They are afraid of their “inferiors” getting good healthcare. Many would rather get mediocre healthcare, as long as that means their “inferiors” get poor or no healthcare.
Otherwise, how would they know they’re inferior? Civilization would collapse!
The only people who have reason to fear a public health care system are the ones who are making enormous profits out of our current private health care system. Unfortunately that includes the politicians who accept campaign contributions from private health care providers.
I have no idea what they are afraid of. They’re just brainless goddamned drones whose “leaders” told them to be afraid of ‘socialism’ and ‘slavery’ and ‘death panels.’ The vast majority have not even the slightest clue how the American health insurance industry (doesn’t) work. Hence, we find people screaming at the top of their lungs about how much they hate Obamacare but love the Affordable Care Act. Or saying that the US needs to let the ‘free market’ work while completely oblivious to the fact that no ‘free market’ exists. Or claiming sick people should just go to the Emergency Room when they need free care, without giving a moment’s thought to where that ER bill goes.