Interconnectedness: Politics-Finance-Your Health

RELATED ARTICLE, 4/22/10

I sometimes think that everyone should think in the same way I do, but then that may not be a good thing. I'd at least like more people to be able to see things in the interconnected way things are and how the Wall Street fiasco, political maneuvering on the health bill, and the limited perspective on the outcomes of these things can directly effect your health.

Yes, I know that was a run-on sentence, but I'm ok with it. Just trying to make a point...

As I explained recently to someone in health care, I've been in health care all my life except for my first five years. I owe that to my father who was trying to brainwash me into being the next doctor in our family (we have lots of them, dating back to before the Civil War). It makes for an unusual childhood, but perhaps the pay off is the way I closely observe.

This foresight, or hindsight, or whatever sight led me to think about a few things and the following is what I ended up expressing.

Now that it has been published, I'm adding in here for those of you who read Natural Health News to consider and comment -

Politics, Finance, and Your Health

In the late 70s I took a position of Executive Director at an urban tribal health center. There were a ton of problems, if not more. This health program was extremely important because it was the first funded under the Indian Self determination Act, PL 93-638.
With all the politics involved a traditional model of governance was established and the clinic continues to serve today. It also has been a model other tribes have used to develop improved health care delivery.
One day I came to work only to find a poster tacked to my office door; it was Wonder Woman.
I don’t usually like to write too much about politics or economics, but from time to time issues do arise that seem to have a close relationship to health.
In the past few days one or three have come to my attention that touch on issues related to health and to things that have been important to me for a very long time.
I don’t like war. And more of what I don’t like about it is the damage it does to not only our military, but other those serving in other countries, and to innocents.
Currently we are spending an obscene amount of money on war that is really getting us nothing, and moving us nowhere.
Here you can learn for yourself - http://costofwar.com/
This is a project of http://www.nationalpriorities.org/
Learning about what members of Congress vote for who gives them how much money can be found here - http://www.opensecrets.org/
Open Secrets becomes very useful when looking at how the health reform bill came to pass, as it were, especially if you watched a recent Frontline program evaluating it.
Lawrence H. Summers was sworn in as the 71st Secretary of the Treasury in July 1999 after serving as Under Secretary for International Affairs and Deputy Secretary of the Treasury. From 1991 to 1993 he served as Chief Economist of the World Bank.
During his first stint in the Clinton administration he basically stopped progressive regulations that would have prevented the most recent problems with ‘bubbles’ and the Wall Street Bailout.
A very astute and erudite woman, Brooksley Born, tried to stop the derivatives mess when Summers was first at the Treasury Department.
He dismissed her to some dark basement of ineffective impact because she wanted strong regulations to halt the derivative nightmare of that time.
Subsequently, Summers again took aim at Born again - http://firedoglake.com/2010/04/09/brooksley-born-raises-an-important-question-but-answers-are-weak/
Another mention of this situation is recorded in a recent program on Bill Moyers Journal - http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/04162010/profile2.html
This is not unlike the work of Catherine Austin Fitts who questioned many concerns when she was at HUD.
As usual, the fast printing of money and the recent sell outs to the banksters comes close to the sell out to Big Insurance and PhRMA.
Much of this could certainly have been avoided it male egos weren’t so entrenched and fragile.
Now we’re about to get it again in the proverbial shorts because the real change we need in banking reform is just another watered down deal for citizens and another government handout to Wall Street.
http://www.campaignmoney.org/blog/2010/04/13/sen-mcconnell-takes-financial-industry-cash-opposes-financial-industry-reform
And we still have Summers, Geithner, and Bernanke. No real change!
Should we start panhandling for spare change?
Or do we need more ‘women of steel’?

Copyright©2010 Gayle Eversole, DHom, PhD, MH, NP, ND. All rights reserved.

Posted in: finance,health,politics