Black Voters and Bernie Sanders

TL/DR: Bernie won’t actually have a problem with AA/minority voters on the days of vote. The media is just saying that over and over hoping to make it true.

Why Hillary Clinton Doesn’t Deserve the Black Vote – The Nation

Bernie will have the black vote when it matters and here’s why.

I know no one wants to talk about this really for fear of being misconstrued as implying that blacks as a voting block are ignorant. However, the root of Bernie’s problem with the black electorate at this stage is ironically a consequence of everything he’s trying to fight.

Blacks and most others frankly at this point haven’t on average looked into who to vote for yet because they know it’ll be a trivial decision to make and because they on average are too busy or disenfranchised to engage in what is at its point essentially the politico version of fantasy football.

At this point the election is a first world problem for the majority of those 61% of people that didn’t vote last time. For the moment, and only for the moment, most people have more pressing matters to attend to.

Not having the time to inform yourself of the reality of your choice in an upcoming vote is by definition a bigger problem the more disenfranchised your group is because then you have bigger and more real problems to deal with day to day expressly because of systemic racism or other forms of oppression.

When you are worried for example about being shot by the local police walking down the block to buy groceries, assuming you can even afford them, you’re not going to have a lot of time or inclination at first to wiki Bernie vs Clinton and their voting records. This does not make you stupid, it makes you human.

Sure it might be unwise as a group to disengage, but individually (and here is the critical part) this early, it’s essentially a waste of time. But again, be honest, this really isn’t as complicated an nuanced as the media (both mainstream and alternative) how long would it take anyone browsing to decide which is the candidate for them? We all want to sound smart, but really a choice like this takes no more than 30 minutes of searching.

There’s also the general impact of austerity measures especially in republican states on political awareness. Schools generally are in third world shape in this country and they only get worse in oppressed communities. But again, that doesn’t matter much in this specific context because of the internet and the penetration of smart phones into every level of society.

All this is in my opinion why there is this perception that Bernie isn’t doing well among minorities, blacks in particular. It’s ultimately an illusion.

This will all change the moment the primary begins because he’ll win Iowa and New Hampshire and the news will be forced to name him and the busier more distracted of the black electorate will, by virtue of it no longer being a first world problem, will inform themselves on their upcoming choice.

And when they quickly find that their choice is between a woman who accepts money from the private prison lobby and says whatever she thinks is expedient at the time, or a man who walked with King and was arrested fighting for the civil rights movement, who has not deviated from his message of equality and true progressivism in decades, they’ll make the intelligent, self serving, and compassionate choice.

See, the thing about low information voting is about the price in time of acquiring that information. The opportunity cost is the deciding factor here. As the day of the primary gets closer and closer in each state, a moment will be taken by each person who isn’t totally disconnected or prohibited from participation even indirectly, to confirm or deny what they already believe, and they’ll find Bernie’s revolution waiting for them, instead of SSDD not worth the wait inline come election day.

The issue of who to vote for in the primary will for each person stop being a waste of precious time. It then stops being a trivial day to day hobby horse race, and it starts being something real that matters today. And that only means millions of people discovering Bernie and coming to #FeelTheBern

I believe that essentially all it takes to turn the average black Hillary supporter into a Bernie Sanders’ supporter is 30 minutes on a smart phone and an open mind. Call me sappy or naive but I’m pretty sure open minds and smart phones are still ubiquitous in this country, no matter what the news tells us.

Also, primary voters are by definition more engaged than general election only voters, and engaged voters Google who they are voting for. Any progressive that shows up has a great chance of being behind Bernie than any of these polls can predict. Unless they are online, and the online polls show a landslide coming because there are no spoiler effects in play. It’s perfectly safe to vote Bernie. Indeed, given his performance (compared to Hillary) vs Trump and the other republicans, he’s the safer vote.

This election is defined by populism. That will include the dismissal of the main stream media by the electorate. The same anti establishment populism that caused this race to boil down to Trump vs Sanders also is present vs the six company news machine we all know by now has been lying to us for decades.

Mark my words, Bernie is essentially going to sweep the primaries barring outright election rigging.

Update: 2016-02-23 0517 AM

I’m not afraid of being called a racist as a result of my efforts to point out the value of Bernie’s candidacy to minority voters primary because I’m not a racist by any rational definition.

I’ve realized that the scolding by the neoliberal set for whites to get out of the race issue is a slick way to perpetuate the divide.

If a particular person hates me for defending their interests, that’s their right. I’m not doing it to earn praise. I’m doing it because it’s the right thing to do.

It’s not about them, it’s about me 🙂

I’m not going to preemptively give up in a misguided effort to avoid offending someone. This is the Internet. Just existing offends some people heh.

Now obviously I realize that blacks can and should be able to vote for whomever they please.
You’ll notice Bernie isn’t black. I’m not saying blacks should vote Sanders because they are black, I’m saying they should vote Sanders because his policies will disproportionately help the AA community.

He’s an even better idea for the AA community than he is for the country at large (and that is really saying something) and people voting against their own interests undermine the core argument for democracy.

If people can’t be trusted to make a superior (as defined by whatever objective metric you like) decision then they shouldn’t have decision making authority. That’s why we don’t vote on matters of science. Because we know taking a poll wouldn’t be a good way of making that type of decision.

Blacks in particular (but also to a lesser extent the electorate generally) voting against their own interests in this election when the choice is between an advocate of mass incarceration, a literal fascist, and someone who marched with MLK and was a civil rights pioneer, would be rather strong evidence that democracy might generally not objectively be a good idea after all.

I mean really, what more do you want? If you don’t have a scenario in mind that falsifies democracy then you’re a fanatic.

Clinton outright lies about Bernie

From an email sent by DFA: http://democracyforamerica.com/

When 87.9% of DFA members endorsed Bernie Sanders, Democracy for America committed to waging a 100% positive campaign focused on the issues in support of Bernie. This commitment to campaigning on the issues includes defending Sen. Sanders against unfair and inaccurate attacks by his opponents.

Unfortunately, over the past few days, the Clinton campaign has launched extremely dishonest attacks against Bernie Sanders on an issue that defines what it means to be a Democrat — universal health care.

In those spurious attacks, the Clinton campaign has completely distorted and misled voters about Bernie’s universal health care plan.

They said Bernie is in favor of “ripping up Obamacare” and that he would “dismantle Medicare” and “send health insurance to the states, turning over your and my health insurance to governors.” The implication is that his plan would somehow mean seniors would lose access to the benefits they get from Medicare, or that right-wing governors would be able to block it from coming into their states.

That’s ridiculous. It’s time to correct the record:

Bernie’s universal health care plan would make access to health care a right for every single American — and no state government would ever be allowed to stop it.

Why are these attacks on Bernie happening now? Because several new polls in the last few days have proven that the race for the Democratic presidential nomination is up for grabs in Iowa and New Hampshire.

If the Clinton campaign manages to win by scaring voters into believing that Bernie’s plan would hurt them, not only would it be bad for Bernie, it would be a crushing blow to the movement for universal health care and the ability of Democrats to advocate for it in the future.

The Iowa Caucus is now just 18 days away and Bernie Sanders has a good shot to win, but there’s also a real chance we could suffer a devastating defeat because of these false attacks on Bernie. If we fall short, imagine how you will feel the next day, knowing how close we came? Please chip in $3 or more now to Bernie Sanders — and help DFA support him urgently.

Here’s why the attacks by the Clinton campaign are so dangerous:

Regardless of who wins the presidential primary, Democrats need to hold on to the White House in 2016. This is something that all Democrats agree on because we all know just how much is at stake in this election.

In a contested primary, it makes sense for the candidates to draw contrasts with their opponents on the issues. But there is simply no excuse for the Clinton campaign’s dishonesty about Bernie Sanders’s policies — the same kinds of lies we would expect to hear from Republicans in a general election.

Every single second the Clinton campaign continues engaging in false attacks, they make it more and more difficult to bring the party together and achieve victory for our nominee — whomever that might be — in November.

We need to put an end to this kind of dishonesty in the Democratic presidential primary — and the best way to do it is to prove that campaigns that engage in it don’t win.

Your support today can make all the difference: Please chip in $3 or more right now to help Bernie’s campaign win in Iowa and New Hampshire — and to support DFA’s campaign to defend Bernie and help him shock the establishment.

Thanks for getting Bernie’s back at this critical moment in the campaign.

– Charles

Charles Chamberlain, Executive Director
Democracy for America

Hillary Lies About Bernie

Earlier today, Hillary Clinton’s campaign unleashed a series of vicious and coordinated attacks against Bernie’s universal health care plan. They falsely claimed Bernie’s plan would end the Children’s Health Insurance Program, dismantle Medicare and strip millions of people of their coverage.

Here is the truth: Bernie’s plan would guarantee health care as a right for every man, woman, and child, and it would be implemented in every state in the country regardless of who is governor.

We have made tremendous gains in Iowa, but if we lost because Hillary Clinton’s campaign scared voters into thinking Bernie’s plan would cost them their coverage, it could set our vision for universal health care back at least a generation.

We simply cannot let that happen.

We are SO CLOSE. With Iowa less than three weeks away, your additional $5 contribution to Bernie’s campaign today could mean the difference between victory and defeat for our campaign.

Contribute $5I want to close with something important. This campaign isn’t about Bernie Sanders and it isn’t about Hillary Clinton. It’s about the very real issues facing working families across this country. It is a national disgrace that the United States is the only major country in the world that does not offer health care as a right.

We need a president who will fight for the 29 million Americans without health care. That’s what this campaign, and your contribution, is about.

In solidarity,

Jeff Weaver
Campaign Manager
Bernie 2016

Paid for by Bernie 2016

PO Box 905 – Burlington VT 05402 United States – (855) 4-BERNIE

Emperor Innomen?

***Work In Progress, Suggestions Welcome***

Context of Hypothetical

For several reasons is has become relevant for me to elaborate on what my version of global dominion would look like. I do this in an attempt to give the clearest and most concise overview of my political identity without either me or my reader having to know all the relevant academic jargon.

See also: underlore.com/wp-admin/about.php

***I am not asking to be emperor.***

This essay is intended to be a fairly complete if somewhat general overview of my platform so to speak. Sort of a continuation of my Apex post, a kind of “Ok, so what do you suggest?”

I should start by saying that while I do believe a world with me as emperor would be an improvement over the current state, (assuming a peaceful ascension of course,) I don’t for one minute believe I’m the best person Earth has to offer for the job. (Though my girlfriend may very well be, literally.)

In order to determine whether or not a potential emperor is better than another we need to at least partly define the role of emperor in this context.

Obviously it would not be possible for a single human to micromanage every aspect of a functional ethical government. So it becomes rather important to specify what the supplementary government would be like.

To make things relatively simple for myself and my English speaking western readers let’s just say the post of Emperor is a hypothetical fourth branch of the United States government with the power to supersede the other three.

Anything that isn’t an imperial decree is handled as it is being handled now or otherwise according to the usual process in the United States. This would serve two large purposes. Feedback and auto pilot.

For purposes of this hypothetical, what we’re talking about is imperial decree being automatic ratified law. The resulting law (up to an including constitutional amendments) would be processed normally. So in theory if the emperor simply stopped making decrees, he’d stop existing as a legal entity.

Onward!

The goal of my rule would be to encourage a transition to a post-singularity society that may well not need anything like this, or may require a radical rethinking of things. So mine would be an interim government by design and express intent. I’m not building pyramids here.

Imperial merit can be defined based on the principles of the Apex, which are more or less Rule Utilitarian in nature, based on the twin axioms of life and pleasure’s general desirability. Does a given Emperor/platform have a greater net increase in life and pleasure than another? That I leave up to you.

In the longer term I should admit that I saw the ending to The Forbin Project (where an AI takes over earth) as a relatively happy one. We live by laws which we also often call code. What if that code was machine readable? (Much of it already is as machines ability to read existing material expands.) What if we could program a leader AI? Congress and the rest would do their job relevant to its code instead of a body of law. All judges and lawyers would confer with the AI instead of having law books thus making the fields more accessible. Think more jury duty, less law school. More democracy, less republic. Imagine not needing all the lawyers because you could literally ask the law its opinion and then we could choose to change the law or agree to it.

The AI could also point out contradictions and give us extremely useful metadata about law that we just don’t have now, like how many laws there are for example.

Anyway.

Policy Overview and Intent

Firstly let me say that as of now this was written by one man with virtually no help. Where here my wording fails, it would be improved if given any power because I’d enlist aid.

My plans for world improvement can be understood as a fairly interdependent set of policy positions designed to empower and diversify, with the end goal of increasing our odds of survival and our enjoyment of the time granted by that survival.

The zero compromise broad strokes would be as follows:

Immediate mass deployment of nuclear power

Via LFTR reactors and a ban on burning fossil fuels for purposes of grid-level electricity generation. Personal and business use is still permitted. Industrial use must be approved and will be heavily regulated with strong encouragement and aid provided for transitioning to use of the non-fossil power sources. The base load is to be provided entirely by nuclear within 10 years or sooner. (Support Link)

The immediate and permanent open sourcing of all technology and software.

Patents modified to serve mainly as a technical archive and social pride record. Patent protections will extend only to securing your legacy as the inventor. It’s a score board now and a reference manual, little else. It will not be permitted to hide data for reasons of profit. No paywalls. Only privacy protection.

A wealth cap funded UBI both proportional to GDP.

My changes, like any large charges, are going to obviate whole swathes of industry and employment. This must not translate into mass starvation or anything even close. It follows that in order for social organization to have meaning it must supersede everything, and it must benefit all people. What’s the point of a given government if something human sourced is more powerful, and what’s the point of government if it doesn’t do everyone good? The wealth cap prevents the former and a UBI assures the latter.

Immediately extend animal cruelty law.

Fish, reptiles, and simulated brains at or above that complexity count legally as mammals. Preemptively protect artificial life to prevent the torment and murder of artificial minds. (Support Link) Establish that citizenship is contingent on either manifest consciousness, or the genetic predisposition to consciousness. The intent being to protect humans with brain damage as well as software and synthetic life. Consciousness here defined primarily as the ability to experience suffering or pleasure.

Abolish for profit law practice.

I will be extending the full legal system’s protection to everyone regardless of wealth. Really excellent lawyers will just have their pick of clients and everyone can choose to either wait or find another. This should also refocus social attention into areas of reform instead of areas of finance if and when bottlenecks and recurring problems are discovered.

Defense budget immediately splits with NASA.

With a caveat that half NASA’s activity be directed to the establishment of off-world colonies, a space elevator, celestial defense, and generational seed ships. The intent being to prepare for long term one way travel, or local just-in-case backups, should Earth experience an unavoidable extinction level event. Humanity needs a backup and a fire escape.

Pain and death by aging reclassified as illnesses.

The CDC and NIH and all other relevant institutions are directed to respond to them as such. They are to be parsed legally and administratively as curable pandemics and researched and responded to accordingly.

The abolition of compulsory schooling.

Libraries, museums, the Internet, and a UBI should take care of people brain initialization.

Full equal rights for children.

Children right now are legally somewhere between livestock and citizens. This is to end. Children are full citizens. Social adjustments required must apply to all citizens. Think more like “you must be this tall to ride this ride” instead of an arbitrary chronological limit. This would also ensure that adults with the minds of children are treated with all due respect, dignity, and consideration.

Prison is to be replaced with sequestration centers.

These centers will also house other people that need to be kept from humanity for whatever reason. All are to be given full citizen rights except where those rights are likely to harm others, including the right to leave. Self harm is perfectly permissible so long as it or its risk is informed and willful. They are to be livable and humane, possibly by requiring that legislators spend a week there with no special treatment as a condition of reelection. Link 1. Link 2. Link 3. The purpose of these centers is not vengeance but protective isolation either for the occupant, society, or both. This will among other things take care of the logical contradiction of innocent until proven guilty, and incarceration pending trial.

The concept of a felon and probation is to be stricken from legal standing.

Felons are the new slaves quite literally. This ends now. Legally speaking you are either in need of being sequestered or you aren’t. If you aren’t, then you are a full citizen free to live without prejudice. Recidivism is grounds for reevaluation of the criteria for sequestration generally, not an excuse to reduce the rights of a given individual.

All public service is to be recorded and archived for at least five years.

The people will watch the watchmen. Recordings deemed secret for reasons of national security or privacy protection are to be available to all members of congress, SCOTUS justices, the president. These recordings can be made public by executive order, majority ruling, or legislative decree. Privacy protections do not apply to public officials during the course of their duties. Every officer is to wear a body cam while on duty, every proceeding is to be filmed.

End the drug war by legalizing every chemical for informed willful consumption.

Keeping in mind that behaviors are still illegal. One set of law is to be worked out for all drugs, both medical and recreational.

Establish a nationalized food supply.

Baseline food security is to be considered a subset of national security. The government is to stand ready to feed the entire population over which is has authority. And any citizen had the right to demand to be fed sufficient to be healthy. This is to also include a permanent seed and gene bank to avoid the extinction of any existing or potential sources of food.

Legalize medical treatment outside the medical system so long as full disclosure of that outside status is given

We let people climb mountains, so we can let them experiment with treatment. Certified doctors are not permitted to offer certified services outside the system. I will not permit an extortion funded gold rush brain drain.

Restructure the Internet for security and privacy.

It is to be converted into a hard encrypted, anonymous by default, peer to peer model, with a shortwave radio and fiber backbone, nationalized and maintained by the Library of Congress and the NSF.

True and full separation of church and state.

No state recognized religious rituals ever, including marriage. Marriage is to have the same official status as baptism or exorcism. No tax exemptions for churches, and no special dispensations for observance of religious rituals. Yes, I am officially canceling Christmas and all other religious holidays. They can still be celebrated of course but you’re going to have to use up a vacation day for it. If you can’t do a job and maintain your religion at the same time, then you must choose. With a living wage UBI in play there’s no grounds for compromise. You are perfectly able to live as a monk should you so choose.

Race and gender is to be stricken from government policy outside medical contexts.

It is to be given no more official policy status than height or ice cream preference. Human rights mean all humans. Racism or sexism cannot be responses to racism or sexism. Anti-discrimination laws are sufficient. And again, the UBI allows for safe exit of harmful situations. Go be an activist and change what you don’t like.

A public air travel system.

Essentially if you can mail something somewhere you can travel there provided you can pay the fair price for it. Save up if needed. The UBI makes this possible for anyone.

Private companies will no longer be allowed to demand waiver of rights as conditions for services.

No more EULA/TOS evasions of civic liability. If a company doesn’t want to accept the responsibilities, then they can reject the power. Business is a risk. And again, with a living wage UBI in play, there’s no argument for compromise. Business failure here is never going to be personally catastrophic to anyone because the farthest you can ever fall is sequestration and a living wage.

Dual (or more) citizenship is to be honored and encouraged.

It’s petty to force members of other nations to give up their status in those nations simply to be a member of ours as well. We’re a country, not a jealous lover. All the same laws and requirements will still apply. No such thing as diplomatic immunity. That’s why we have telephones and webcams.

The role of the military is to be expanded to include the protection and rescue of citizens during travel.

The nonconsensual intentional infliction of pain, injury, or death shall be prohibited universally outside self defense actions or congressionally authorized acts of war. Tolerance of human rights violations is a human rights violation. My United States would not permit torture or genocide, anywhere. This may mean wars. So be it. Some things are worth fighting for. The military will rescue anyone held for such purposes by foreign governments. Those governments knowing this have full authority to prohibit entry of American citizens, and the right to demand that we facilitate deportation of any of our citizens found to be in local criminal violation.

Citizenship of the United States can be acquired simply by asking, and can never be revoked once granted.

The price of our protection is being subject to our laws forever. Any United States citizen can demand extraction and return to the nearest United States military base or embassy if they fear for their safety.

Establishment of a National Cryonics Archive.

Think Arlington, only for everyone that wants it with cryonic tubes instead of graves.

Immediately ban the replenishment aspects of the meat industry.

They can sell off what they have left, but the refilling of the torture factories ends today. Those industries will receive big oil’s subsidies with a mandate and a 5 year time limit. Scale up and deploy in-vitro meat or change industries. Again, UBI allows no room for excuses.

Relevant Links

https://www.nationstates.net/nation=innomina

http://underlore.com/the-apex/

http://underlore.com/foreign-policy/

http://underlore.com/an-argument-in-favor-of-the-state/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategies_for_Engineered_Negligible_Senescence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Pearce_%28philosopher%29#The_Hedonistic_Imperative

Relevant Video

Relevant Images

(Planned.)

My thoughts on The Force Awakens

Firstly, let’s be honest… They could poop in a cup, film said cup for 2 hours in 3d, call it a Star Wars sequel, and it would make every bit as much money.

The movie is completely bland and a blatant ripoff of the previous films. Seriously. The main plot threat is once against a giant ball that destroys planets with a super laser beam.

It’s both sexist and racist imo. The poor black guy is comic relief, and of course wounded into a coma by the end of the movie, and essentially the main character’s emotional and physical punching bag. Seemingly happy to do her bidding at the risk of his own life for no apparent reason.

Of course he’s required to fall in “love” (in true Disney style) with her, and dutifully does.

Her character on the other hand is a blatant and way over the top effort to pander to feminists in a misguided attempt to apologize for slave Leia, despite the fact of course that “slave” Leia literally strangled her oppressor to death with her own chains in what might well be the most powerful and well known feminist uprising scene in all of the fantasy film genre.

Why do I say pandering? Because the main character is like that kid in make believe sessions that cries if you don’t let them be everything and win everything.

She’s the secret important relative, she’s the prettiest one, she’s the center of all attention, she’s the ninja, she’s the brilliant tech, she’s the savvy smuggler scavenger, she’s the super pilot, she’s the most self reliant, she’s the most competent at whatever she’s doing at the time, she’s the purest heart, she’s got the thicket plot armor, she’s the budding force messiah, she’s the most loved, and on and on and on.

Watching her is like watching someone play a lara croft with all the cheat codes turned on. There is zero tension. I’m reminded of a line from lawn mower man… “I am GOD here.”

And then there’s the cameos, which as far as I can tell are Chewy, Han, Leia, and Luke. Chewy is of course interchangeable. He’s completely unchanged. Han is older, and has been turned into a total incompetent and apparently tragic father figure. Leia’s role is wildly boring and can apparently barely move her own mouth muscles anymore presumably due to surgery. And Luke literally says not one word, takes not one step, and doesn’t even change his facial expression.

The entire plot is obvious from the beginning. Plot armor for everyone!

We even have a wise old tiny alien because we all miss Yoda. (Of course female now because boys are awful, am I right?) And a cute little robot that speaks in bleeps and whistles that of course the main character understands. (Making the token black guy comment on this fact like it’s a joke doesn’t make it any better.)

But I did enjoy watching the movie because I saw it in the theater and it was completely beautiful in 3d. If you just tune out the cloned carcass of a plot and think of it like a 2 hour moving painting it’s way way better.

It’s a Starwars toy infomercial funded by Disney, of course the production values are going to be staggering. And they are.

This Isn’t Reform, It’s Robbery

Via: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090823_this_isnt_reform_its_robbery

Reposted here because I completely agree and I wish I had written it. Also #FeelTheBern because we need single payer as badly now as we needed it then, and Bernie has ALWAYS been saying so.

Posted on Aug 24, 2009

AP / Bob Child

Protesters, in front of health insurer Aetna’s headquarters, hold signs with the company’s profit for 2007’s first quarter, $434 million. The company would report $27.6 billion in revenue for the year and $31 billion for the following year.

By Chris Hedges

Percentage change since 2002 in average premiums paid to large US health-insurance companies: +87%

Percentage change in the profits of the top ten insurance companies: +428%

Chances that an American bankrupted by medical bills has health insurance: 7 in 10

—Harper’s Index, September 2009

Capitalists, as my friend Father Michael Doyle says, should never be allowed near a health care system. They hold sick children hostage as they force parents to bankrupt themselves in the desperate scramble to pay for medical care. The sick do not have a choice. Medical care is not a consumable good. We can choose to buy a used car or a new car, shop at a boutique or a thrift store, but there is no choice between illness and health. And any debate about health care must acknowledge that the for-profit health care industry is the problem and must be destroyed. This is an industry that hires doctors and analysts to deny care to patients in order to increase profits. It is an industry that causes half of all bankruptcies. And the 20,000 Americans who died last year because they did not receive adequate care condemn these corporations as complicit in murder.

The current health care debate in Congress has nothing to do with death panels or public options or socialized medicine. The real debate, the only one that counts, is how much money our blood-sucking insurance, pharmaceutical and for-profit health services are going to be able to siphon off from new health care legislation. The proposed plans rattling around Congress all ensure that the profits for these corporations will increase and the misery for ordinary Americans will be compounded. The corporate state, enabled by both Democrats and Republicans, is yet again cannibalizing the Treasury. It is yet again pushing Americans, especially the poor and the working class, into levels of despair and rage that will continue to fuel the violent, proto-fascist movements leaping up around the edges of American society. And the traditional watchdogs—those in public office, the press and citizens groups—are as useless as the perfumed fops of another era who busied their days with court intrigue at Versailles. Canada never looked so good.

The Democrats are collaborating with lobbyists for the insurance industry, the pharmaceutical industry and for-profit health care providers to craft the current health care reform legislation. “Corporate and industry players are inside the tent this time,” says David Merritt, project director at Newt Gingrich’s Center for Health Transformation, “so there is a vacuum on the outside.” And these lobbyists have already killed a viable public option and made sure nothing in the bills will impede their growing profits and capacity for abuse.

“It will basically be a government law that says you have to buy their defective product,” says Dr. David Himmelstein, a professor at Harvard Medical School and a founder of Physicians for a National Health Plan. “Next the government will tell us a Pinto in every garage, a lead-coated toy to every child and melamine-laced puppy chow for every dog.”

“Health insurance is not a race to the top; it is a race to the bottom,” he told me from Cambridge, Mass. “The way you make money is by abusing people. And if a public-option plan is not ready and willing to abuse patients it is stuck with the expensive patients. The premiums will go up until it is noncompetitive. The conditions that have now been set for the plans include a hobbled public option. Under the best-case scenario there will be tens of millions [who] will remain uninsured at the outset, and the number will climb as more and more people are priced out of the insurance market.”

The inclusion of these corporations in the crafting of health care legislation has not stopped figures like Rick Scott, the former head of the Columbia/HCA health care company, from attempting to sabotage any plan. Scott’s company was forced to pay a $1.7 billion fraud settlement—the largest health care fraud settlement in U.S. history—for stealing hundreds of millions from taxpayers by overbilling for medical care. Scott, who made his money primarily from Medicare, is now saturating the airwaves in a reputed $20 million ad campaign that is stoking the anger and fear of many Americans. His ads are coordinated by CRC Public Relations, the group that masterminded the “Swift boat” attacks against 2004 Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry.

“They are using our money to campaign against us,” Dr. Himmelstein told me. “The money for these commercials came from health care interests that collect fees from American patients. We experienced this before in Massachusetts. We ran a ballot initiative for universal health care in 2000 and the insurance industry spent $5 million on it, including the insurance company I am insured by. They used my premiums to smear an idea that 70 percent in Massachusetts, according to polls, favored before this smear campaign. Universal health care was narrowly defeated.”

The bills now in Congress will, at best, impose on the country the failed model in Massachusetts. That model will demand that Americans buy health insurance from private insurers. There will be some subsidies for the very poor but not for anyone above a modest income. Insurers will be allowed to continue to jack up premiums, including for the elderly. The bankruptcies due to medical bills and swelling premiums will mount along with rising deductibles and co-payments. Health care will be beyond the reach of many families. In Massachusetts one in six people who have mandated insurance still say they cannot afford care, and 30,000 people were evicted from the state program this month because of budget cuts. Expect the same debacle nationwide.

“For someone my age who is making $40,000 a year you are required to lay out $5,000 for an insurance premium for coverage that covers nothing until you have spent $2,000 out of pocket,” Himmelstein said. “You are $7,000 out of pocket before you have any coverage at all. For most people that means you are already bankrupt before you have insurance. If anything, that has made them worse off. Instead of having that $5,000 to cover some of their medical expenses they have laid it out in premiums.”

The U.S. spends twice as much as other industrialized nations on health care—$7,129 per capita—although 45.7 million Americans remain without health coverage and millions more are inadequately covered. There are 14,000 Americans a day now losing their health coverage. A report in the journal Health Affairs estimates that, if the system is left unchanged, one of every five dollars spent by Americans in 2017 will go to health coverage. Private insurance bureaucracy and paperwork consume one-third, 31 percent, of every health care dollar. Streamlining payment through a single nonprofit payer would save more than $400 billion per year, enough, Physicians for a National Health Plan points out, to provide comprehensive, high-quality coverage for all Americans. But the proposed America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009 (H.R. 3200 in the House) will, rather than cut costs, add an estimated $239 billion over 10 years to the federal deficit. This is very good for the corporations. It is very bad for us.

The lobbyists have, as they did with the obscene bailouts for banks and investment firms, hijacked legislation in order to fleece the citizen. The five largest private health insurers and their trade group, America’s Health Insurance Plans, spent more than $6 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2009. Pfizer, the world’s biggest drug maker, spent more than $9 million during the last quarter of 2008 and the first three months of this year. The Washington Post reported that up to 30 members of Congress from both parties who hold key committee memberships have major investments in health care companies totaling between $11 million and $27 million. President Barack Obama’s director of health care policy, who will not discuss single-payer as an option, has served on the boards of several health care corporations.

Obama and the congressional leadership have shut out advocates of single-payer. The press, including papers such as The New York Times, treats single-payer as a fringe movement. The television networks rarely mention it. And yet between 45 and 60 percent of doctors favor single-payer. Between 40 and 62 percent of the American people, including 80 percent of registered Democrats, want universal, single-payer not-for-profit health care for all Americans. The ability of the corporations to discredit and silence voices that represent at least half of the population is another sad testament to the power of our corporate state.

“We are considering a variety of striking efforts for early in the fall,” Dr. Himmelstein said, “including protests outside state capitals by doctors around the country, video links of conferences in 70 or 80 cities around the country, with protests and potential doctors chaining themselves to the fence of the White House.”

Make sure you join them.