I will preface this column with some “new rules” that are effective immediately. In the short term I will be doing only one column a week. In the short term, the comment section (thread) to all my columns will be closed. I am not getting into an explanation at the moment; it isn’t important right now. Just last week, Chris Owens admonished me to get back to “quality” and get away from “quantity”; so I will try to appease him/lol.

I start out this “Vines” column with some news that isn’t so good. Mr. Roy Hastick- head of the Caribbean-American Chamber of Commerce Inc. (CACCI) – has suffered a major stroke. It is serious. My best wishes for a speedy recovery are extended. He is recuperating. Roy is a very fine gentleman who has befriended many in the political circles of Brooklyn and beyond.

According to a press release put up on this site “New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli, New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. and the New York City Pension Funds today announced the expansion of the consolidated class action lawsuit filed against Countrywide Financial Corporation and other defendants. The expanded suit will include 26 different financial services companies that underwrote Countrywide stock and bond offerings, two global accounting firms, and additional Countrywide officers and directors who signed SEC filings that contained false and misleading information about Countrywide’s
business and finances.”

With the price of oil having touched $100 per barrel and gasoline over $3.00 per gallon, Americans are beginning to adjust, just as they did in the late-1970s and early-1980s. They are looking to buy gas-sipping hybrids instead of gas guzzling SUVs, and compact urban condos or smaller, more efficient suburban homes, rather than sprawling exurban McMansions. Some are carpooling, others switching to mass transit, scooters, motorcycles or even bicycles. The boom in rooftop solar is so strong that there is a shortage of panels. American business has also started to make changes. Investment capital and research dollars are pouring into alternative energy sources. The nuclear energy market has revived. After killing off the electric car and fighting fuel economy standards, General Motors is desperately trying to develop a plug-in hybrid while killing off the H1 Hummer.

What are we, a bunch of idiots? OPEC knows that what most Americans really want is to be fat, lazy, and stupid, and that our politicians get elected by pandering to our worst instincts. As soon as conservation and alternatives begin to make a dent in our fossil fuel dependence OPEC will, as in the mid-1980s, pump up production and cut the price of oil. And as soon as it does Americans will forget all about our long-term economy, our national security, and the global environment, and suck that cheap oil like a pacifier. Those who conserve will again be derided as losers, as the winners drive more massive vehicles designed to cause rather than suffer fatalities in a crash, and those who invest in energy alternatives will go broke. Until they have us over a barrel yet again.

Contrary to the thinking of some of my detractors here on Room Eight New York, I don’t have a thin skin; that’s why I have stayed on New York’s blogs for the past three years, mixing it up with the best of the anons and with the few who are brave enough to use their own names when they critique me. I spent years in the boxing ring, I do know how to give and take.

Today, I am going to apologize here for the many times I used profanity to express myself; I should have done this better over the years (Chris Owens is absolutely correct about his critique in this regard); and yes my mother never used profanity, and she did teach me to be better than that. My Papa didn’t take any mess but he didn’t use profanity either. I cut across the grain sometimes.

So I have proposed universal healthcare financing at the national level. How would I pay for it? My view is that we are already paying for it, directly or indirectly, through existing government programs, subsidies, and tax exclusions. My goal would not be to send health care soaring beyond its already world-leading nearly 16 percent of GDP, nor to increase the share of GDP devoted to health care by the government. My goal would be to shift government health care funding to basic, established care for everyone, rather than wasteful, luxury care for some and nothing for others. People could buy more, or contribute to charities that provide more to others, by choice. We need to avoid having the government force people to pay for wasteful, luxury care today, at the cost of national bankruptcy, and no care for today’s young people when they are senior citizens tomorrow. Federal politicians, including members of Congress and Presidential candidates, shrink from a simple, federally financed system for two reasons. First, they do not wish to confront those who benefit from the system as it is. Second, they do not wish to raise federal taxes for health care, and then get blamed, while saving businesses and state and local governments money, for which they will receive credit. Neither is an excuse for the disaster that is our existing health care finance system. Let’s move forward.

My experience in public policy tells me that in general anything that isn’t simple is a ripoff, and in the dark corners of back-door funding, money flows to power not to need. So what would I do about healthcare finance in the United States? Something like Senator Edwards proposed when he said “Health Care Markets will offer a choice between private insurers and a public insurance plan modeled on Medicare, but separate and apart from it. Families and individuals will choose the plan that works best for them.” And that’s all. People would be allowed to keep their current employer-provided insurance, but the back-door government subsidy for it via an exclusion from personal income taxes would be replaced by a front door subsidy that was equitable. Existing senior citizens could stay in Medicare as it now exists, but it would phase out and be replaced by the new “Medicare” as it would be. Medicaid would disappear, except for the custodial care of adults (mostly seniors and the severely disabled) with self-care limitations. And even in that case the continuation of Medicaid would be temporary, because the custodial care issue is massive and needs to be rethought carefully, and separately from health care for everyone else.

If the financial markets overseas tomorrow are like they were today and Wall Street follows, I have a suggestion for Governor Spitzer. Cancel the budget presentation, throw the document in the trash, and start over. He should probably do it anyway. Going along with a fantasy until after the November elections, at the price of far more severe damage to our public services and economy, is unethical — but absolutely consistent with past practice. Note the difference between Mayor Bloomberg’s already-announced budget cuts and news of spending increases already leaked from the Governor’s budget.

Well, I’ve read through the healthcare sections on the major candidate’s websites, even in cases where it wasn’t made easy (Hey Edwards, if you want fair comparisons and accurate citations, don’t put you policies in PDF), and I’ve got some good news.  If you take the best parts of the plans of Senator Clinton, Senator Obama, Senator Edwards, Senator McCain, Governor Romney, Mayor Giuliani, and Governor Huckabee (yep even he had a good point or two), the U.S. could have a plan that addresses the inequities, economic damage and waste in the U.S. healthcare finance system that I discussed in my prior three posts.  All of them accept there is a problem, and that public policy is at the center of it.  All of the Democrats propose reducing the inequity by creating a universal health care finance system.  Most of the Republicans accept the need to limit the economic damage by separating health insurance from place of work, and some assert the need to force people to make cost-benefit choices in health care.  In my next couple of posts I’ll lay out my suggestion, and to my surprise I’ll be able to do so while quoting all the candidates.  The problem is that if you take all the bad ideas and put them together, you have a disaster on your hands.  And most of the bad ideas are not the result of ideological beliefs; they are the result of bending those beliefs to accommodate those who benefit the mess as it is.  This post is about the bad ideas.