Health Care Scare

Besides the medical establishment well established to rip off Medicare and Medicaid – rated abuse #1 upon the U.S. taxpayers’ ten years in a row – there is definitely a need to overhaul, makeover, whatever you wish to call it this medical health insurance fiasco. I work in the oil industry up here in Alaska. Cry-baby oil is upset now that the price of crude oil is way below $150-dollars a barrel. So the CEOs claim that cutbacks are needed! Anyway, the work I do is for a contractor under a contract and under another contract for big oil here in the 49er. I guess the contractor Ponzi scheme provides some semblance of immunity to liability. Anyway, when cuts come from the top, it usually means the contract finds another contractor. With that, the workers take it or leave it, the pay cuts I am talking about. Now the pay cuts are not that drastic, considering the workers can still book some overtime each and every day away from their families while working up in Prudhoe Bay. But here is what really irks my chain. Every-time the contract changes to a different entity, usually a different corporation, the workers just exchange the old hardhat for a new one - with a new name. It is basically an easy transition. The HR policy remains the same, that “at will” doctrine and about the only thing that changes is the benefits portion of the employment contract. That’s right, we are “at will” so the employment contract does not exist. What always changes hands is the insurance provider. Now I am healthy so splurge with a higher deductible, say $1000-a year. I often pay out that amount through the year and never have to bother the carrier to dish over anything, but it saves me in the long run, staying healthy. It is like auto insurance, you pay for nothing. It is basically catastrophic coverage should something mean and nasty occur. Anyway, each time the contract changes and the provider changes, I have to begin all over again with the deductible? This year alone it has cost me double the normal amount I would normally pay out of my pocket. See, we usually front-load the necessities like the routine stuff early on in the year, then get by with the preventive measurers when required. But when the carrier changes hands and expects me to pay again this deductible crap, it sucks. What sucks even more, it is the same provider under a different contract as monopoly rules here in Alaska, just ask any “worthwhile” Alaska attorney general. So with this type of crap, I get stuck with more out of pocket bull-crap. Is this fair? No way in healthy hell is it. But this goes to show that the provider business is just that, for profit first and health benefit payments are a side attraction nuisance and an inconvenience to the shareholders and million dollar CEOs. Whether a national health coverage plan of attack will prove its worth is still debatable. But one thing for sure, the Ponzi will be terminated. And why should Congress give a rat’s ass about coverage for the people that pay their lucrative salaries? See, they get a private health insurance policy so don’t have to worry about a national program. It is amazing that they believe they have to play a different game then their constituents. If they were true Americans, they would play the same game, the same tune, and then they would be prepared to know what is right for America, for the people by the people. But it somehow doesn’t work that way. Must be a disease called “Trust me” then I will screw you over and over again! Or vote me in again and again so I can continue to screw you over as you must like being screwed over. The sad thing, I bet the next insurance entity that the taxpayers’ bailout is the Bill Frist lobby, a.k.a. the health care providers. Why is it that the taxpayers of this country continue to get screwed? Why is it that this country did nothing when there was election corruption and now we see Iran doing just that, protesting. And that country is not even close to a DEMOCRACY! Warped nation? Seems to be we are. Anyway, lets hope for the best with this health care stuff before the Congress, but as history has proved, Congress does very little for the people and a whole lot for special interests, time and time again. Maybe with this nationalized health care, lobotomies can be included, for those on the Hill!