~~Medicare and the Dongatta Breakthrough~~
Where to start? I guess with the fact that, for years, because of my excruciatingly low wages as a professor hired on adjunct contracts, I was unable to afford the obscene costs of the for-profit medical insurers in the U.S. So, I went without health insurance; on the rare occasion when I needed a doctor (which was all of about twice in the last decade), I paid out of pocket. Then, the Obama campaign came along, promising to reform the horrible medical system we had. He promised a public option where citizens could opt into the program that, up until then, was offered only to seniors – the Medicare system. But once Obama was elected and the healthcare “reform” was underway, what we were told immediately was that the public option was no longer on the table. It was claimed that the reformed system would work, instead, by forcing through law, all those citizens who did not carry insurance (and shouldn’t we be ashamed for how irresponsible we