Without Feathers

The President did, quite specifically, say that the public option will be forced to make a go of it out of premiums, not the Federal Treasury.  No ambiguity about it.  It will be just like the USPS, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae… well, maybe those aren’t the best examples, but I get what he means.

He also said that the public option will realize its savings from being a not-for-profit entity (that should lower costs by about six percent) and by not paying the executives who run it — I don’t think that’s quite what he meant to say but, again, I get it.  And, since the program will only be available to those who seek it, there will be no sales, marketing or advertising expenses. 

No word on administrative costs or taxes, but it looks like the public option will enjoy about a 10% cost advantage over the for-profit insurers who will, no doubt, flock to the exchanges to scoop up the otherwise uninsurables for whom that will be the primary market.  What could go wrong?

I have mixed feelings about his assurance that we will no longer be paying the health care costs of the 12 million or so illegal aliens living and working in this country.  On the one hand, I don’t think that people who entered this country illegally should be given anything, let alone free health insurance, on the other hand, come on, we don’t want them coughing and bleeding all over everything while they’re here.  Anyway, I just don’t believe him when he says that they will not be covered in some way (<cough>taxes<cough>).  I’m not calling him a liar, you understand, just sayin’.

President Obama says that  “the Public Option” will be just one of a “basket” of options available to Americans who, if they like their private insurance coverage, will be able to keep it.  “The Public Option” will just be there, you know, sittin’ there and stuff in case there’s anything you don’t like about your private insurance like if it costs too much or requires co-pays or whatever.

There’s absolutely no truth at all to the suggestions that “the Public Option” is a “trojan horse” designed to sneak single-payer national health into the system or that it is in any way intended to undermine the private insurance market.  It will just be another competitor on the same level playing field as everyone else is all.  Nothing to see here.  Move along.

OK, just a few points I want to clear up and then I’ll sit quietly (for awhile, anyway) and let the grown-ups work out all this which is obviously way to complicated for my limited capabilities.

• Will “the Public Option” have to pay its way from premiums collected or will it be able to dip into the Federal Treasury if it is unable to pay claims out of its loss reserves and current cash flow?
• Will “the Public Option” have to pay its own administrative expenses or, like the Social Security Administration (which runs the Medicare program), will it be able to coerce health care providers through force of law to cover its administrative expenses out of the remimbursements they receive from it?
• Will “the Public Option” be liable for the same local, state and federal taxes as private insurers or, like Medicare, will it be exempt from all taxation?

Now we know that “the Public Option” will be under no pressure to make a profit — in fact profits will not be part of “the Public Option” at all, so there should be a cost savings of about six percent (the percentage of Earnings Before Interest, Taxes and Amortization enjoyed by the private health insurance industry); but I guess I’m also asking if there will be any pressure to break even?  Or will “the Public Option” just go to the taxpayers whenever it needs a cash infusion?

Because, you see, here’s the thing: If “the Public Option” doesn’t have to pay taxes and doesn’t have to pay its own administrative costs, and doesn’t even have to break even because it can make up the difference out of public funds; How can any private insurance plan EVER compete against it?  I mean, it just doesn’t add up — literally.

So what exactly is “the Public Option” and what exactly is the purpose of offering a “competing” plan that doesn’t have to, uh, compete?

OK.  I’ll keep quiet now while my betters do the heavy thinking.

Probably not.  This time I actually have a halfway decent excuse for not posting for awhile.  No, I’m not going to use that tired old canard about the dog eating my bandwidth.  I have a real excuse, signed by my doctor.

I lost much of my eyesight for about six weeks as a result of type II Diabetes.  I could see enough to get around without help, but reading was absolutely out of the question.  I just couldn’t read characters less than about an inch tall at any distance.  I’m oversimplifying a bit, but take my word for it: I couldn’t read.

My doctor had been warning me for years that I was “pre-diabetic” and could expect to go over the edge eventually, but my blood sugar seemed to be stabilized at just below the point of concern.  Then in December of last year, I started to experience strange symptoms which ultimately became too strange to ignore.

The first symptom was overwhelming thirst, all day every day.  Not surprisingly, this was accompanied by the need to relieve (I hope that is sufficiently graphic) every 20 to 30 minutes.  By the end of April I had lost 30 pounds and the ability to read, but what really sent me rushing to my doctor’s office was severe muscle spasms in my hands and lower legs.  By severe I mean that I basically couldn’t use my hands for up to two hours at a time.

Blood tests quickly revealed a fasting glucose level of 324 mg/dL (normal is 65-139) and hemoglobin A1C of 12 (normal is less than six).  That explained pretty much everything including my rapidly deteriorating vision.  Dr. Chung prescribed Metformin and advised me to reduce my carbohydrate consumption immediately and substantially.

A visit to my eye doctor confirmed that my vision issues were almost certainly related to the ultra-high levels of glucose coursing around my blood stream.  Two type of vision loss occur with Diabetes: Retinal damage and Lens deformation.  Pictures of the interior of my eyes indicated that my retinas were OK and the problem was almost certainly all in my lenses.

Maybe I have the best eye-doctor in NYC (Dr. Alan Schlussel, in case anyone is in the market) or maybe the level of care I am getting is routine.  Dr. Schlussel has been taking good care of me at no additional cost over my annual (insurance covered) check up and, in particular, has been providing me new contact lenses on an almost weekly basis as my vision swung wildly from near blindness to actually somewhat better than it has been for the last 15 years.

Long story shortened (since I know I’ve already gone on too long about this): I ended up with a net improvement of 1.25 diopters in both eyes and significant improvement in presbyopia as the excess glucose has been purged and glucose production constrained by the Metformin.  Both doctors agree that while the response (in both directions) is well known, it is not well understood, and neither of them have ever seen quite so dramatic a decline and recovery before.

I’m just happy to have eyes and thumbs back and it has been more than six weeks since I’ve awakened in the night with spasms and stabbing pains in my calves.  Modern medicine works for me.  Uh…no, I’m not suggesting that this demonstrates that health care in America is not in need of a substantial overhaul (remaining resolutely in the private sector).  I’m just saying that when skillfully applied, we do enjoy a very high standard of care in this country.

Will I reform my ways and post more often now that I’m (at least feeling) better?  Only time will tell, but I doubt it.  My basic problem is that I’m lazy.

For the second part of my public service project “I watched Sicko so you wouldn’t have to” I present a detailed synopsis of the movie that will at once inform you of the content of said film and also allow you to engage in debate over the film without having to endure taunts from liberals that you are “criticizing a movie that you haven’t even seen.” If you attend this post carefully, you will easily pass any movie trivia quiz the Moorish throw at you.

This synopsis is presented with as much objectivity as I can muster. I will reserve my editorial comments for a subsequent post.

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Michael Moore said that he didn’t care if his new movie Sicko was downloaded off of the internet so, with the aid of a google search, I found myself a copy and… downloaded.

I ended up with is a full, 2 hour, 4 minute, high quality — but low resolution — 16:9 .avi file. I’ve been around the media industry long enough to know when I’m looking at a studio rip from the original master. This is not a bootleg video. I can’t prove it but my professional guess is that this 696MB file — which coincidentally fits almost perfectly on a standard CD — was leaked by the studio as part of a viral marketing campaign.

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