Regardless of what else we might think about former president Obama's
efforts to be the president of compromise, Obamacare is a clear
example of the mess compromising can be, when compromising with Greed.
In the coming months, as health care costs rise skyward, the working
class once again finds that they are on the outside looking in, and
that the Star Spangled Banner does not wave over them.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/12/17, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
http://themilitant.com/2017/8131/813102.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 81/No. 31 August 21, 2017
(front page)
Workers discuss way out of capitalist health care disaster
BY SUSAN LAMONT
HAYESVILLE, N.C. — “Even if you have health insurance, it’s still
overwhelming, when you have to pay $2,000 or $3,000 out of your pocket
anyway,” Joyce Bryson told Lisa Potash and other members of the
Socialist Workers Party outside the high school here Aug. 4, where a
free medical clinic was underway. Potash is the SWP candidate for mayor
of Atlanta.
The clinic was sponsored by the Clay County Health Department under the
aegis of the Defense Department’s Innovative Readiness Training program,
with most of the medical personnel provided by the military.
Similar clinics around the country are one of the ways some working
people get medical care. This fair ran for one week, free to all. “First
come, First served, Prepare for potentially lengthy wait times,” said a
county health department flyer.
Medical, vision and dental help were offered, and veterinary care for
people’s cats and dogs.
Bryson, who works part time as a nurse’s aide, was waiting for her
husband Jimmy, a retired construction worker. He was getting some teeth
pulled and hopefully some glasses. “When you’re not old enough for
Medicare, the elderly are left out. If something major happened to us,
they would just let us die,” Bryson said. She was especially interested
in the Militant’s coverage of the Nevada ranchers’ fight against
Washington’s attacks on their right to graze cattle on federal land, and
got a copy of the paper.
“Workers need health care, not insurance companies,” Potash said.
“They’re parasites who do nothing but rake in billions for their owners.
Health care should be free and available for all. Workers need to fight
to expropriate the hospital corporations and drug companies and run them
to benefit the entire working class. In Cuba, where workers and farmers
made a revolution, the social surplus is used in part to make health
care available to all Cubans, from the cradle to the grave. That shows
what workers in power can do.”
Potash and several campaign supporters came here after learning that the
medical clinic would be held Aug. 2-10. A similar clinic in 2014 drew
8,000 people and 2,600 pets. But such military medical fairs every three
years won’t meet workers’ health care needs.
Potash and other SWP members discussed this and other political
questions with workers, active and retired, coming in and out of the
clinic, and knocking on doors in area neighborhoods for three days.
Dental care and glasses were in high demand. Some were looking for help
with alcohol and drug addiction.
The SWP campaigners went door to door in nearby Murphy. Almost everyone
we spoke with who voted in the last election said they had supported
Trump. Most welcomed the chance to talk with the SWP about the party’s
proposals on how to unify the working class and begin building a
fighting movement of millions that can organize and educate toward
workers taking power out of the hands of the capitalist rulers.
Some hoped that Trump would be able to make some positive changes, but
everyone was concerned that not much would improve on health care.
‘We work but can’t get health coverage’
“Insurance is way too high for anybody to afford,” Marie Mcrae, a
disabled longtime garment worker, told Potash and SWP supporter Linda
Joyce at the medical fair. “We work, but can’t get health coverage.
Affording medicine is even worse!”
“Many liberals are furious about Trump, and they’re working overtime to
try and get him indicted or impeached. They really fear you and me, the
working class, saying we’re all stupid, racist and prejudiced against
immigrants,” said Potash. “But working people are less racist than ever.
The civil rights struggle had a big impact on workers of all backgrounds
and we’re more united than ever before.”
Mcrae agreed. “Where I worked there were a lot of Hispanic people and
some became my friends. They are just here trying to survive,” she said,
picking up a subscription to the Militant.
Guy Roberts, 33, who needed glasses, works at a mental health group home
and came to the clinic with a co-worker and several family members.
After discussing what the SWP had to say, Roberts decided to get a copy
of The Clintons’ Anti-Working-Class Record, a book by SWP National
Secretary Jack Barnes, and share a subscription to the Militant with his
fiancé’s parents who were there. He was especially interested in
Potash’s description of Cuba’s role in combating the Ebola epidemic in
West Africa, an act of internationalist solidarity made possible by the
socialist revolution there.
Cole Goffeg, 31, a self-employed landscaper, said he and his mother came
to the clinic for dental work. “When your teeth go bad, there’s no money
to replace them,” he said. “I didn’t really like either candidate in the
last election, but voted for Trump because he wasn’t scared to go
against the politicians in Washington. I didn’t like him as a person,
though. People who voted for him wanted a change.”
Millions of workers voted for Trump because he said he would “drain the
swamp” in Washington, Potash said. Many of them had voted for Barack
Obama in 2008 and 2012, looking for change.
Goffeg got a subscription to the Militant and The Clintons’
Anti-Working-Class Record.
“The Democrats and Republicans are all in a mess,” Angela Smith, 43,
told Potash when she knocked on her door Aug. 3. We agreed on some
things and disagreed on others, but she was intrigued with SWP members
knocking on doors to discuss the need for workers to fight to take
political power.
She decided to get a Militant subscription and The Clintons’
Anti-Working-Class Record. She pointed to the party’s work taking their
ideas and proposals to workers’ doorsteps, saying, “Sometimes the
biggest changes start out small.”
Janice Lynn from Atlanta and Linda Joyce from Hayesville, North
Carolina, contributed to this article.
Related articles:
Workers face health care crisis under capitalist rule
Workers need health care, not health insurance!
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