What is the cost to us all when 80 to 90 percent of our population finds itself in a constant state of anxiety? Email Article Print Article Bookmark RSS Related Content:   Artist Finances   Websites for Artists   Quit Job for Art   Create Your Blog

Think about it.

The average American toils longer and harder, and for relatively less pay, than his counterparts in other Western industrialized societies. Yet, he has no real job security and he's lucky if he isn't working two jobs or more to make ends meet.

The average family can't cut it without two paychecks. Add one or two children and the family is likely to be just one or two paychecks away from bankruptcy. Factor in an elderly parent or two who needs help and the situation becomes a nightmare.

Few employers provide child care, adding another anxiety to a parent in finding affordable, decent care. It is not unusual for single mothers with low paying jobs, who can't afford a day care center, to wind up being charged with child neglect or worse and losing custody of their children.

Some 43 million people, and the number continues to climb, have no medical insurance. The "lucky" ones (we say that sarcastically) whose incomes are low enough can throw themselves on the mercy of the state. The others can either do without medical attention or face instant bankruptcy. They live with the constant fear of becoming ill, injured or disabled.

The largest group in this country find themselves forced into HMOs whose only interest is their bottom lines. The luckiest few still have fee for service medical plans that don't come cheaply, require co-payments, have deductibles, and pay from 75 to 80 percent of the "negotiated adjustment" (meaning the doctors get stuck, too), don't cover everything, and that can leave the patient with enormous out-of-pocket expenses due to the deductible, coupled with the co-payment and the 15 to 20 percent of the "negotiated adjustment" they have to pay.

Worse, whether it's an HMO or fee for service plan, the patient is often at the mercy of a clerk or a nurse, illegally practicing medicine as a doctor, who decides if a treatment or procedure is medically necessary.

But our "compassionate conservative" Presidunce (we borrowed that from The Nation) Bush doesn't want you to have the right to sue if you are damaged by the actions or negligence of the insurer, a doctor or a hospital. You see, in Bush's Amerika, only corporations have the right to sue each other and you.

People are literally dying in the richest country on earth for lack of medical care or because they can't afford the necessary prescription medications. And woe be to those whose illness or disability requires skilled nursing care. They wind up in hell holes with Medicare paying for a relatively few days, stripped of any assets they might have when Medicare runs out and tossed onto Medicaid.

Not to worry our presidunce, his corporate cohorts and the criminals he has stuffed his illegitimate administration with, who made gone with a projected $3 trillion budget surplus in less than six months with a tax cut gift to the rich, are going to take care of the poor by delivering them up to religious organizations financed with your tax dollars. Does anyone remember Lyndon "Guns and Butter" Johnson's Great Society? Numerous secular charities were given millions in federal grants to help the poor. Shoot, you had charitable groups spring up like mushrooms to swill at the public trough. And millions of those dollars went straight into the pockets of those running the charities. But George W. has a thing for back to the past. Only this time, the poor will have to take a spoonful of religion if they hope to get a bowl of soup.

If Secretary of the Treasury Paul Alcoa O'Neill gets his way, corporations, while retaining their insane status of personhood, will no longer pay taxes-not that they pay much now, given the creativeness of their tax lawyers and accountants. That "little" burden will be shifted onto individual taxpayers-read that the Great Middle. O'Neill also wants to do away with Social Security and Medicare. After all, says Millionaire (or is that Billionaire?) O'Neill, people should provide for their own retirement and health care, and if they can't, let them work until they drop dead.

First, the corporations got away with making gone with pension funds and forcing workers into 401Ks. Notice the corporate media aren't reporting much about the hit 401Ks have taken with the market slides. Then Congress killed the last of the banking safeguards put in place during the Great Depression, so the banks can again play in uninsured securities. Today, banks aren't interested in depositors because they make more money selling you annuities, stocks or bonds. Despositors, in their view cost them money, despite the enormous fees they charge you for the "privilege" of a checking or savings account or for using an ATM. In many cases, even on interest-bearing accounts, the ever sinking rate of interest the banks pay barely covers the fees they charge, unless you can keep a hefty balance in your accounts.

Ironically, Huntington Bancshares, which ate up 60 of the branches NationsBank, which was subsequently gobbled up by Bank of America, was forced to dump after taking over Florida's Barnett Bank, has announced it is pulling out of the Sunshine State, because, as the St. Petersburg Times reported, "because Florida customers bought more certificates of deposit than elsewhere in the country. CDs are typically less profitable for banks than other investments."

By the way, the Florida economy is feeling the effects of those sinking CD rates, because, Mr. O'Neill, many retirees put their savings into FDIC insured CDs, which over the course of the past 10 years yielded them more than if they had gambled their bucks in that great crap shoot called the stock market. Of course, that may be a pittance in comparison to the fast track to bankruptcy Gov. Jeb Bush, the presidunce's little brother, has put the state on in taking care of his rich friends at more than the expense of everything else. It must be something in the Bush genes, eh?

Not enough anxiety? Well, we can't leave the kids out.

While their parent or parents struggle to keep a roof over their heads, food on the table, clothing on their backs, the children are subjected to a numbing barrage of "just say, no"-no to sex, no to alcohol, no to drugs, no to tobacco. Hell, it's easier for overworked parents, caregivers and teachers to tell them "no," than teach them to take responsibility for themselves. Yet, the kids when they reach some magical age are expected to morph into responsible adults.

Worse, their childhoods have been stolen from them by schools that demand they participate in extra-curricular activities. Sports jocks are the most prized. For the kids from more affluent homes, there are the music lessons, the dancing lessons, scouting, church activities, and on and on and on . . . Do you ever wonder why so many children are on Ritalin?

To make matters worse, the presidunce's great education plan is to subject students to mandatory testing. States, such as Texas and Florida (those Bush boys again) that have mandatory testing are already discovering that all the kids are learning is how to take the tests.

Perhaps someone would like to do a study of the toll just the above anxieties are taking on us in terms of the money spent on doctors for the treatment of illnesses-real and psychosomatic-tranquilizers, lost work and school days, accidents because our minds are elsewhere, and even divorces.

What is the price of a little peace of mind? How many real gains as individuals and a society are we not making, because we are mired in madness that is within our power to relieve, except the greedy bean counters and the right wing sheep who swallow their nonsense prefer we suffer so those at the top can make their piles of gold higher? Could this be what Presidunce Bush meant when he said he wanted to make the pie higher?

Oops, in their eyes, a living wage, decent working conditions, job security, universal health care and Social Security are socialism. A little socialism for the people is bad. A lot of socialism for the corporations is good.

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