The missing foreign policy element in Clinton interviews

Glenn Greenwald writes that one notable missing element in Hillary Clinton’s book tour and media appearances has been the ignoring of the role that her disastrous policies of military intervention played in her defeat. He says that many media commentators seem to think that it was only domestic issues that played a role because it was absurd to think of Donald Trump as some kind of peace candidate. But Greenwald says that Trump shrewdly manipulated people’s anger over the state of endless wars that Clinton helped expand and perpetuate.
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Bernie Sanders introduces ‘Medicare For All’ bill

Today at a press conference Bernie Sanders will present his plan for a universal single-payer health plan. It will be based on a gradual expansion of the Medicare program over four years to eventually cover everyone, not just those currently over 65 years or those who are younger but have disabilities and a few illnesses. People zero to 18 would be eligible for the coverage in the first year. In following year, the eligibility age would be lowered to 45. The next year, it would drop again to 35. In year four, everyone else would be included. The advantage of expanding Medicare instead of creating a new system is that it does not require a new bureaucracy and those who are on Medicare like what they have.
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The attempts to sabotage Obamacare

Now that the attempts to repeal Obamacare failed in the US Senate, a peevish Donald Trump vows to sabotage it by cutting off administration support for it, mainly by withdrawing the subsidies for the program that made it affordable. The problem for Trump is that some of the Byzantine features of Obamacare that are embedded in the law will tend to neutralize his efforts. For example, if the subsidies are cut, then the tax credits get increased, resulting in a net loss for the government. Kevin Drum tries to explain this trade-off and why cutting the subsidies may actually be a good thing.
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Obamacare repeal is not yet dead

In the wee hours of this morning, the US Senate voted down the ‘skinny repeal’ of Obamacare bill and then adjourned for the August recess without having achieved their goal of starting the process of dismantling Obamacare. The final vote was 51-49 with three Republicans (Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and John McCain) joining all 48 Democrats in voting against the measure. As one could have predicted, McCain has hogged media praise for his gosh-darned maverickiness in voting against his party at the last minute while Collins and Murkowski, not to mention the 48 Democratic senators who have long held firm, are largely ignored.
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The prospects for the ‘repeal and replace’ Obamacre plans

I wrote a month ago that I expected that after all the posturing ends and the dust settles, all 52 Republicans in the US Senate would do what they always do, and that is dutifully fall in line and vote as demanded by the party leadership and president Donald Trump to gut the health insurance of tens of millions of people while giving the wealthy a tax cut.
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Treatment of the drug epidemic follows a predictable pattern

We are seeing the familiar trajectory of how the US views social problems played out in the case of the opioid overuse epidemic. When a social problem like drug use is seen as primarily affecting the black community, it is treated as a crime and dealt with harshly, with police crackdowns on users and the handing out of long criminal sentences. The racial disparity in sentencing was most visible in the way that use of crack cocaine (used primarily in the black community) was treated far more harshly than powdered cocaine, a form of the drug that was favored by the affluent white community.
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Why Americans pay more for worse care

Matt Taibbi explains how the presence of private, for-profit health insurance companies in the US are a direct threat to people’s health.

Many years ago, while researching a book chapter on health care reform, I visited a hospital in Bayonne, New Jersey that was having problems. Upon arrival, administrators told me a story that summed up everything that is terrible and stupid about American health care.

A patient of theirs suffering from a chronic illness took a bad turn and had to come in for a minor surgical procedure. The only problem was, the patient had been taking Coumadin, a common blood thinner, as part of his outpatient care.
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Wait for the Republicans to cave on the health care vote

The Republican majority leader Mitch McConnell has released his version of the health care reform bill and it has as its main feature a massive transfer of wealth to the rich while cutting health service to the poor. The main target seems to be Medicaid, the government-run system that serves the poor. Steven Rosenfeld summarizes the main features.
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The absurdity of ‘free market health care’

Cartoonist Ruben Bolling captures well the absurdity of the idea that health care should be left to the so-called ‘free market’ (in reality a monopoly or quasi-monopoly market) and that each of us should shop around to find the best possible health insurance for our families. Health care is vastly more complicated than pretty much anything else in our lives. Access to basic health care should be universal and free and paid for by the government out of our taxes. It is just that simple.

Tom the Dancing Bug 1343 chagrin falls 20 – free market health care