"Don’t rob the poor person because he is poor, and don’t crush the helpless in court, for the Lord will plead their case and ruin the lives of those who ruin them."
-- Proverbs 22:22-23
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2 comments:
OK, a couple of things (at least):
Your Medicaid travails are familiar to me. After my stroke I had to learn to navigate healthcare in the pre-ACA world, and since I live in Oakland, that meant learning to use Highland Hospital.
Some of the things you have to do to get your healthcare from there took me a while to figure out, but god damn it I'm glad I had what it took to just figure out what they wanted and then do exactly that.
Sometimes you have to wait. In fact, there's a really good film called "The Waiting Room" about the Highland Emergency department that was made by the husband of my incredible speech pathologist that I highly recommend. It just chroniclers a hypothetical day in the emergency room there, and tells the stories of the people being served complete with some of the circumstances that brought them to an ER instead of a primary care doctor.
It also shows the ER doctor going to bat for his patients in the sort of ways that never occur to you unless you've been in that situation. I was especially taken by one patient who had suffered a stroke, been admitted to a private hospital (Highland is a county hospital) and the next day, since he could walk, they discharged him. The ER doctor at Highland got on the phone and basically sweet talked the neurology department into admitting the guy. Then I remembered how supremely lucky I had been, to lack insurance and still get the care I got.
Anyway, I have a wonderful primary care doctor at Highland, I get my medicine at the pharmacy there, they got me re-applied for MediCal in one hour when I found out I needed cataract surgery, then they got me on the waiting list for the ophthalmology clinic and within six months I had both surgeries there, and now I have 20/40 in my left eye, and 20/25 in my right.
As you can imagine, I've spent quite a bit of time there, and I have seen so many people who get frustrated with the waiting, or the order of steps that must be taken to get what you need when you need what you need right now, and when I can sort of help, I do, but mostly I just feel really glad that I was able to figure it out, even in the quasi-mobile aftermath of my stroke. And thankful that there even exist the sort of people who work there and deal compassionately with the needs and frustrations of Oakland's poor people, day after day. The ER doctor says in one scene of the movie "We are the resource of last resort, so even when there are sound reasons to turn someone away, we try not to."
The other thing I wanted to comment on was the state of even the best of broadcast media, and their seeming aversion to memory. I was watching AM Joy right after I listened to the podcast, and she had Jennifer Rubin and some Republican guy, both crowing about how the Republican Party they knew had been killed, killed I say! by the Trump-beast and that they could no longer be a part of a party of such bigotry and lack of inclusion. And I went really? Neither of you remember a guy named Nixon? Or another guy named Atwater? Or another, oh fuck you, you slimy assholes, you're both old enough to have played a significant role in the construction of this beast you are decrying on liberal TV in an attempt to weasel out of your own responsibility for the damage it's causing, and last I checked I wasn't a priest, so don't come whining to me for absolution. Maxine Waters was pretty good though.
-Doug in Oakland
It seems Bullshit Mountain is a Volcano in the early stages of erupting and already its debris is tossed out and landing all over . And it hasn't blow fully yet.
To focus on one issue of Medicaid.
The GOP think tanks are remarkably putting out the rehearsed marketing talking pints to its GOP robots. Every republican is a re run of from the 1950's.
Work requirement for Medicaid.
*If you are in a nursing home do you have to clean toilets to qualify for Medicaid that pays to keep you there?
*How about the Medicaid recipient in the hospital getting cancer treatment. How does he work to qualify?
*Those not on Medicare with severe Dementia?
* And those young pregnant Mothers to be with no real financial means? Do they have to work up to the day before giving Birth to qualify? Sure if they were more responsible when they were much younger . they would have chosen more wisely to the financial stability of the parents they were born to.
"Ball of Confusion" That is what the conservative world is today.
But dammit, What about white people? Especially those in those coal country that voted for Trump? Don't we need to have more media attention on them? I mean there is no one else with pressing issues is there?
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