Last friday, the Omaha World-Herald printed the following letter I wrote in its Public Pulse section:

Universal health care = liberty

The time has come for the United States to join the modern world by adopting a universal health insurance system similar to Canada’s single-payer system. Those who say that this type of system will curtail our freedoms have it backward.

Many children and adults in the United States now face a lifetime of poverty and government dependence solely because the price of their needed medication is over­whelming. Right now, health care is rationed in the United States, based upon economic status. Thousands die every year because they cannot afford health insurance. How free are they?

The ridiculous cost of health care in America is hurting the competitiveness of our businesses in the global market. It is crushing the entrepreneurial spirit of our citizens, causing needless deaths and mak­ing it impossible for people to lead produc­tive lives. Drastic change is needed.

Donald Kuhns, Omaha

As if to prove one of my points, the World-Herald on Tuesday printed an astounding article describing health care rationing right here in Omaha on its front page.

“We can't provide (care) fast enough,” said Skolkin, CEO of OneWorld Community Health Centers.

Patient counts continue to increase at federally funded health centers in Nebraska and Iowa, which primarily serve the uninsured and low- to moderate-income people with insurance.

Although there are signs that the economy is recovering, clinics in the region say the gains have not caught up to patients who lost jobs and health coverage during the recession.

Each month, OneWorld turns away more than 250 people seeking first-time appointments, up from 50 per month two years ago. The health center tells them to call back in several weeks. Patient volume is so high that keeping a waiting list is impractical.

Such patients at the Council Bluffs Community Health Center wait a month to get in for an appointment, twice as long as a few years ago.

New patients without insurance are waiting six to eight weeks for appointments at the People's Health Center in Lincoln. Waits most likely will increase this year, said Deb Shoemaker, the center's executive director. (Waits are shorter for those with private insurance because slots for those patients don't fill up as fast.)

But don't you dare call it rationing.  This is America.

Take 'Em Down

It's payback time.

donate to the recall campaign here.

Conservatives Love The '80s. (The 1880s, that is)

Sorry for the gap.  I've been on vacation for the last week.

Missouri State Senator Jane Cunningham took a lot of heat this month for introducing a bill to gut child labor laws in that state.

the bill’s own official summary decribes it thus(emphasis added by Think Progress):

This act modifies the child labor laws. It eliminates the prohibition on employment of children under age fourteen. Restrictions on the number of hours and restrictions on when a child may work during the day are also removed. It also repeals the requirement that a child ages fourteen or fifteen obtain a work certificate or work permit in order to be employed. Children under sixteen will also be allowed to work in any capacity in a motel, resort or hotel where sleeping accommodations are furnished. It also removes the authority of the director of the Division of Labor Standards to inspect employers who employ children and to require them to keep certain records for children they employ. It also repeals the presumption that the presence of a child in a workplace is evidence of employment.

 She has since removed the controversial bill from consideration but, according to Think Progress, Ms. Cunningham is not alone in her zeal to roll back worker rights and protections:

In a lengthy lecture delivered before his election to the U.S. Senate, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) praises a discredited 1918 Supreme Court decision declaring child labor laws unconstitutional. That decision, which Lee holds out a model for his tenther vision of the Constitution, was unanimously overruled by the Supreme Court in 1941.

The tea party agenda can be summed up in a single word:  Regression.

Now That's Class Warfare!

While Michigan's new conservative governor Rick Snyder has been taking heat this week for his plan to declare economic martial law in Michigan, Think Progress and others have noted that his tax prescriptions are equally extreme:

Gov. Rick Snyder (R-MI) has proposed ending his state’s Earned Income Tax Credit, cutting a $600 per child tax credit, and reducing credits for seniors, while also cutting funding for school districts by eight to ten percent. At the same time, as the Michigan League for Human Services found, the state’s business taxes would be reduced by nearly $2 billion, or 86 percent, under Snyder’s plan:

Business taxes would be cut by 86 percent from an estimated $2.1 billion in FY 2011 to $292.7 million in FY 2013, the first full year of the proposed tax changes…Taxes on individuals from the state income tax would rise by $1.7 billion or nearly 31 percent, from an estimated $5.75 billion in FY 2011 to $7.5 billion in FY 2013, the first full year of the tax changes.

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