According to Sick Around the World, American's consume 15.3% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on health care versus 11.6% for Switzerland, a highly capitalist nation which recently topped the U. S. as the world's most competitive country. This 3.7% gap is approximately 75% of what American consumers have spent in excess of their earnings over the last 10 years. If the reform opportunity was not squandered in 1994, but a public option was embraced like in Switzerland; Americans very well could have lived within their means over the last decade. The current critics of the public option use the same superstitious arguments as their 1994 predecessors to keep voters in a psychological "comfort zone . Americans will remain prisoners of a dysfunctional health care system so long as voters allow themselves to remain prisoners of the anti-reformer's status-quo thinking.
It's the System, Stupid.
W. Edwards Deming is widely credited with improving U.S. armament production during World War II and best known for transforming Japan into an innovative high-quality producer and economic power. He taught that 85+% of a system's problems are the responsibility of the system's leaders, because only those in leadership positions have the authority to change the system. The foundation of his blueprint for "continual improvement is that a system, to be effective, must have an aim that is communicated and understood by all stakeholders. The Deming Library Vol. 26 contrasts the health care aim of "eliminating illness and death" with the broader aim of "reducing the burden of illness . The burden of illness holistically encompasses the physical, psychological, financial and quality of life issues. Over the last 40 years, how well has our health care system reduced the burden of illness ?
Advocates of public option would do well to call anti-reformers to account for squandering the opportunity that the Swiss seized in 1994. With trust near an all-time low, both sides of the reform issue have a credibility challenge. Trust in advocates can be greatly enhanced by documentaries from highly regarded independent sources, like PBS. Since 2006, PBS has aired the following health care related documentaries that are highly supportive of the "Yes, We can health care reform message:
Money-driven Medicine, Maggie Mahar, August 2009, transcript
Sick Around the World, T.R. Reid, April 2008 on demand webcast
Good News" Hospitals Heal Themselves, Lloyd Dobyns, Clare Crawford-Mason, March 2006, trailer
The aforementioned documentaries should be available to local PBS stations for rebroadcast, through December 2009. Anti-reformers and their special interest allies are spending tens of millions of dollars promoting Adam's Smith's 230+ years old ideology, that unbridled self-interest invisibly serves the common interest. Sick Around the World's message is that the common interest is better served by the coordinated interaction of the stakeholders. Health care reformers can seize a golden opportunity, i.e. the rebroadcast of the aforementioned documentaries through the end of 2009 Emails, telephone calls and letters to local PBS stations, by viewers and PBS members, requesting their rebroadcast can more than counter the anti-reformer's advertising. Contact information for your locate PBS station(s) can be obtained by visiting: PBS Station Finder and entering your zip code or state.
If the best defense is an offense, its time to challenge the anti-reformer's credibility, on the following:Their complacency about America's unaffordable, forth-rate health care system
Their under-estimation of Americans' creativity and ingenuity, to match and surpass the value-add health care achieved by other major capitalistic democracies
Their special interest focus that runs counter to the common interest, especially the interest of middle-class Americans
Their unwillingness to take responsible and account for the decades lost, by not addressing health care reform since 1994
No economic system is perfect. The value added health care that is enjoyed by citizens of numerous other capitalistic democracies hasn't been matched by the United State's 100% free markets system. The free market cheerleaders, who are unwilling and unable to defend the current system based on its merits, resort to the favorite tact of propagandists, namely, fear-mongering to create the paranoia necessary to promote resistance to change.
"No one has to change. Survival is optional. --- W. Edwards Deming
