What Do You Support?‏

At the present time for every dollar spent in America, $5.00 goes into healthcare, we spend 2-1/2 times more on healthcare then any other industrialized nation on earth and get lower results and less healthcare. Our country ranks lower on infant mortality, life expectancy and many other means of measuring healthcare then many third world countries. Contrary to popular belief AMERICA DOES NOT HAVE THE BEST HEALTHCARE IN THE WORLD! What we have instead is the best healthcare money can buy, if you do not have the money you do not get the healthcare available! Recently a Harvard study revealed that 44,789 Americans died last year from lack of healthcare, that is more then the drunk driving and murder rates combined, currently 20% of South Carolina citizens do not have healthcare! South Carolina leads the nation with the highest teen pregnancies and the highest premature births resulting in the lowest birth weight and the highest infant mortality rate in the nation! South Carolina also has the lowest vaccination rate in the nation for HPV, an often fatal but preventable cancer through early vaccination! The President has laid out a Health Care Plan for affordable and obtainable healthcare for all Americans with a Public Option, are we going to continue the status quo of denying coverage that every member of Congress and federal employee presently enjoys? Are we going to continue allowing the Health Care Insurance Industry to dictate who gets healthcare, deny healthcare for pre-existing conditions, lifetime caps and allow personal bankruptcies brought on by a serious accident or illness and finding oneself seriously underinsured? Continue allowing the outright denial of treatment? There is your actual and real Death Panel that has existed for decades, at work! Are we going to continue increasing our federal deficit until we are a bankrupt nation by giving tax subsidies to pay for healthcare premiums? Because that is exactly what tax subsidies for healthcare premiums do, taking from the federal government and giving to the Health Care Insurance Industry in ever increasing amounts! We presently give 65 Billion dollars a year in tax subsidies and will be giving 483 Billion dollars a year in tax subsidies by the mandatory enrollment of all Americans to an industry whose profits rose 430% over the past seven years, how high has your income risen? OR, are we finally going to end the practices of pre-existing conditions, lifetime caps, denial of treatment, canceling of healthcare coverage and the constantly rising premiums? End the personal bankruptcies caused by a serious illness or accident and end all discrimination in healthcare by making strong binding regulations to govern the future conduct of the Health Care Insurance Industry? End the spending of 2-1/2 times more then all the other industrialized nations spend on healthcare? Are we going to end the Bush Tax Cuts that only benefit the extremely wealthy and no one else to pay for Health Care Reform?72% of American voters across America Support a Public Option77% of doctors across America Support a Public Option51% of Business Leaders across America Support a Public Option50% of Republican voters Support a Government run Health Care Plan51% of Republican voters Oppose Health Care Reform Without a Government run Health Care Plan.According to the Congressional Budget Office a Public Option would save 85 Billion dollars a year from our federal deficit. Massachusetts has a Public Option/Private Healthcare that raises their budget 1%. What do you support? As President Franklin Roosevelt famously said about Social Security, I'm all for it, now make me do it! It will not happen unless each one of us screams long and loud and demand it happen now!
Frank Gorman
Aiken, South Carolina