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Luckily for my household, we learned that Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now was featuring a #extendthedebate
So we tuned in to “Democracy Now” at 5:30Pm Pacific time. Although we had to endure the wooden postures, and hopelessly platitude-inspired “debate” between the Two Puppets, we also were able to hear two totally relevant, well-informed people who actually debated life as it is lived in the USA. Kudos to Amy Goodman for making the debate between Rocky Anderson and Jill Stein available. (And kudos also to PBS and Lehrer.)
Those two alternate candidates offered reality-based solutions, and not myths created by the One Percent. We found Stein and Anderson’s viewpoints to be totally refreshing.
Yet still my head throbbed whenever listening to the Obamrmoney puppets. There was no real debate, and I found myself laughing in a brittle manner while Obama justified a position that was barely under attack. What a lousy debater the President is.
And when Mitt spoke, I kept expecting Barack to say, “Hey, you know something, Mittens, I was going to pretend to be offering something different, but why don’t you shut up and let me make that my position. We are so similar, we should not be debating!”
In any event, while the two men kept arguing about health insurance “reform,” I wondered what Universe they lived on. Mittens kept saying that his research showed that the average family in the USA pays $ 2,500 more a year, due to the rate hikes that the ACA has allowed the insurance industry to impose. I have no idea if that is true or not. I do know that health insurers in California tried to get rate hikes as high as 52% around the same time that the ACA was being debated. State law put the kaboosh on that.
But the real tragedy regarding the health insurance crisis, is that for any unemployed individual between the ages of 50 and 67, most employers would sooner hire someone thirty years younger, as that way they can save a lot of money on the mandated insurance premiums. (Sixty seven is now the age that you can retire, if you want full benefits, and not half benefits, for all the many years that you have paid into the system.)
My spouse and I must pay, if we were able to afford it, some $ 567 a piece, per the California Insurance exchange. This is because the insurers really sock it to anyone over 50. This “exchange” is the program that Obama was touting, as coming about due to “his ACA.” (Why it is considered his achievement, when he refused to make any statements about the ACA, during its conception, I have no idea. Even Jon Stewart called him out on that, during mid-August 2009.)
But the tragedy beyond the fact that the premiums are high is the fact that employers will not touch a person after the age of 50. I have even been told to my face that I should give up applying for jobs, because that is the case. (the individual telling me that waited till she was sure my cellphone battery was not working, so I couldn’t audio record her statement.)
We mid-age people are left unacknowledged, and totally bereft of both employment and insurance. Although grateful that being self-employed, my company makes too little right now to insure the both of us. And we make too much to receive any help from the County or the State. Our friends are in the same boat. Some struggle to work at the age of 64, trying to deal with the stress of a job that they must hold on to, or else they must take Social Security at half the rate they would get if they were 67.
It is sad that both major Players in terms of the Nation’s Highest Office are divorced from reality. Huge Kudos to Jill and to Rocky for making themselves available to the debate over at “Democracy Now.” Highlights of last night’s debates will be up on the website all day today. (DemocracyNow.org)
The only real solution for this catastrophe for older people was the “Single Payer Universal” Health Care system that the two indie politicians are requesting. But the reality remains that Rocky Anderson doesn’t even qualify for the ballot in most states, and Jill Stein will be lucky if she gets 5 or 6% in the general election.
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23 Comments
elisemattu–
You say: “The only real solution for this catastrophe for older people was the “Single Payer Universal” Health Care system that the two indie politicians are requesting.”
You nailed it.
And, of course, the PtB know that, but apparently it’s of no consequence to them. Heard “little Timmy Geithner” testify in a congressional hearing (before the SCOTUS ruling on the ACA) that they would proceed cautiously, in regard to raising the elibility age for Medicare, UNTIL they knew if the SCOTUS ruled in favor of Obamacare’s individual mandate.
Clearly, the “exchange” will be used to “justify” raising the Medicare eligibility age.
It is imperative that we rid ourselves of the “uniparty.” Otherwise, seniors will see their standard of living drastically decline, in the coming years (Baby Boomers, in particular, since they are the real target of Bowles-Simpson’s austerity measures).
Thanks, and recommended.
Blue
Thank you for considering the plight of the older long-term, unemployed. I am listening to Democracy Now (again) to make sure that I am not imagining what I heard at the actual debate. I surely support Single Payer Healthcare. Recommended.
Irrelevant ! What this 63 year old feels about the two main stream candidates.
I for one am keeping my fingers crossed that Jill And Rocky take about 25% of the vote away from the One Percenter Barack and Mittens. But so many people who I know possess no real reasoning skills. Far better they claim, to vote for Obama, who is surely not as bad as I portray him to be, than to get Mittens. Even though Both Men are the same.
Only small difference I can detect: Obama is sure not to allow any remarks between him and his handlers regarding how little he cares about the unwashed masses of people to ever get out on the internet.
However, Bill Clinton’s May 2012 conversation with Ryan about how very keen the Democrat Leadership is re: cut backs to Social Security and MediCare is making the rounds on the internets. The looting will continue, and we aren’t given any choice.
” Bill Clinton’s May 2012 conversation with Ryan”
In Canada, and I think, Britain, these politicians at least have the decency and self respect, once their done, to leave the stage.
You rarely see them on TV, or opining in the Newspaper. Paul Martin former PM is quietly going about his business working on behalf of native populations in Canada. rarely does he show up in the media.
Why do Americans tolerate having these people around for so long? How long has Kissinger been at it? Cheney?
If Bill Clinton had any manners at all, he would go home, and keep quiet.
once “they’re” done.
mafr–
Couldn’t agree with you more. But how do we “get rid of them?”
Chris Matthews and cohorts are already trotting out the prospect of Hillary being the 2016 Dem party candidate, for cryin’ out loud.
What does it take to get an American politician “off the stage,” if “Monica” couldn’t do it?
Blue
I appreciate the premise of this and agree the two party illusion is sticking it to America but I do feel a need to correct a fact presented here. The benefit amount for Social Security at 62 is more than 1/2 the full benefit a person would receive at 67 (66 & 2 mos in my case). A person slated to receive $1000 a month at their full benefit age would receive $750 at 62. It also goes up each year. For instance, you would get more at 64 than you would get at 62. One person I know signed up about a year ahead of full benefit age and the difference was less than $10. The above mentioned hypothetical beneficiary would get $1350 if they deferred until 70.
…X 2
If your over 60 and you don’t have the big Corp. 401K that somehow survived the Recession plus a pension or a nice fat Public service pension and Health care your screwed in Amerika. Plus, try and escape to another better place and you can forget about that as well, unless your wealthy or a Dr. Nobody wants older Americans without $$.
…so it would seem…thank you elisemattu…we all must keep standing up and saying,showing and telling what needs to be said,shown and told.
Come what may.
And it does seem to be coming does it not?
Pushbacks and takebacks both needed. Essential. Done with no letup(s).
hi, beats me. And no matter how much they mess up, (Clinton for instance), they just keep showing up again and again.
It’s amazing, a bunch of these creeps have been screwing up the world since Nixon.
My big brother was quality control engineer at CE Vetco-Offshore (Houston) in the late 1980s. He tangled assholes with management over some drill stem that didn’t meet ASTM specs. They “retired” him (lucky for him) but he never had a real job again. Fifty has been the end of “hireability” for a good while.
You’ll be happy to know that Vetco paid Gulf or Exxon (got CMS a while back) an $8,000,000 settlement because this non-conforming drill stem caved their hole in when it blew out. Fortunately they were drilling not producing, like BP’s Deepwater Horizon.
“My spouse and I must pay, if we were able to afford it, some $ 567 a piece, per the California Insurance exchange.”
Jesus H. Christ! What do they do for that? In other words, being born 50+ years ago is a perexisting condition. I’m appalled.
That would piss me off. In fact it does piss me off. I don’t even want to think about how you must feel.
What about Robert Redford? Or Carol Burnett? It’s called celebrity. It is good media business, and it’s actually good politics. Look at Jimmy Carter; he can move mountains, for one reason: Everybody on earth knows who he is.
Obama committed Weds. nite to gutting aka “strengthening” Social Security along the lines the Repugnacants want. Higher full benefit age, COLA that even less than before reflects increased senior cost of living (you know, you will switch to eating carrots instead of asparagus (or go chew on leaves that fall from the trees in the park – beat the deer and rabbits to it!) .. increase the top .. cap benefits at $15,000 a year …
Obama is toxic. The reason he can’t debate is that he is an empty suit. He surrounded himself with Republican and Democratic trolls and they put all thoughts and words into his head.
He does not even have the thought “I will keep my campaign promises” .. so far as we know, he never even kept track of the 2,000 or so promises he made. And we know he laughed when asked about keeping them (Someone asked him why all the secrecy in negotiating the health care act when you specifically said you would not do that? He laughed!).
I am voting third party. Regardless.
I’m not smart enough to check on stuff like this, but my wife did. This was back when full elegibility was 65, so there may be some differences, but I suspect they’re yet more strongly in favor of the following. She found an actuarially sound discounted-cost model that showed that nearly nobody would ever come out ahead by waiting past age 62 to apply for SS. The increased annuity achieved by waiting would take like twenty years to overhaul the benefits of the three years benefits attained by early initiation. Shouldn’t plan on living past 82 in the first place, but what are you gonna do with that extra benefit when you’re in a nursing home living on Medicaid anyway?
I think the beginning of the end was when the Beatles broke up. But I do appreciate these summaries of last night’s debate — you all have so much courage to face the sort of grim nonsense that the political scene has become.
You’re lucky. I just turned 65–before that over a period of 5 years I was paying premiums for health insurance coverage starting at $10,900 and rising to 17,500 a year for HMO coverage in NJ. To achieve the rates you pay, for the last 8 months I dropped to a plan that would have required me to pay 50%(!) of any hospital/diagnostic fees I incurred, and that after $2,500 deductible. I figure I blew about 5 years of viable retirement with the money I spent on health insurance premiums. And now that I’m finally on Medicare, hoping to find decent doctors who still accept it, the Republicans would like to start giving me a voucher instead. I’m sure they’ll say that my shrunken retirement fund is somehow my fault too, although I would have been considered “irresponsible” had I not had health insurance coverage.
Wait, what? CAP benefits at $15,000/yr ($1250/mo)???
The President, the LEADER of the “Democratic” Party proposes that the MAXIMUM Social Security benefit should be below the poverty line? And appartently not indexed to inflation? JFC.
Forget Catfood. Obama wants us to eat kitty litter.
I greatly appreciate you posting the facts relating to age 62 retirement that I was unaware of. Although I will vet them, just to be on the safe side, I hope that others read these facts and are able to benefit in whatever manner that helps them the most.
My spouse and I run a publishing business, so we will try to stay employed till our late sixties. But my old line of work, elder care, is very hard on the body, and many people are in “the same boat”: Teachers, mechanics, nurses, often cannot handle the burden that is placed on an older body that is not as fond of being on its feet all daylong, five days a week, as the body managed back in its late forties.
That situation you describe is really dreadful.
And you are right – to be responsible before reaching MediCare’s age of 65, a person has to blow through large sums of money just to be insured. Then that same person is told they weren’t responsible enough in saving for their retirement.
It is pretty much a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” paradigm.
Thank you, elisemattu for writing this up. I watched Rocky and Jill at Kevin’s live broadcast and found myself eventually lowering the volume on O and R, much the more important points were being made by the former pair. Jill Stein had a good rebut on Obama/Romney care being dubbed as ‘affordable care’ since she is a physician and lives in Massachussetts – her response is better than my reprise and can be viewed in the video at democracynow.org which presents the entire debate.
I remember that one point she made was that people are still going into bankruptcy over medical expenses because the system doesn’t work well for anyone above the poverty line. Both she and Rocky emphasized that the costs of running a private insurance based system run far higher than a government implemented plan, and Rocky made the point that the US is the only country that attempts to keep private corporations in the picture.