Frank Lynch Democrat for  President

FREE UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE

© 2007 Frank Lynch 2008 Inc.

I, Frank Lynch, hereby make free universal healthcare, directly paid by the government, with complete choice of your doctors, the first and foremost issue of my campaign.

"Whatsoever you do unto the least among you, so also you do unto me."

Or, from a secular viewpoint, when every person in a society receives equal medical care, which to be equal must be the best possible medical care, including preventive education, preventive drugs and preventive treatment, then all members of that society are better off.

From a secular moral viewpoint, a key measure of the level of civilization of any society is the level and quality of healthcare provided to all of its citizens. Medical care should be cheaply and efficiently administered by the existing Medicare structure which only costs overhead and administrative expense of less than 2% compared to 25% to 33% overhead, commissions and profits for commercial health insurance companies. Employees and their families can go to any doctor, any specialist, any hospital with no involvement of their employer. Patients just show their Universal US ID Card, the medical services supplier scans their ID Card into the computer which verifies it complete with photo verification over the internet link to Medicare, and presto! It is paid!

We can give Free Universal Healthcare to every person in America, with complete choice of your doctor, to every child, to every pregnant woman, to every mother, every working mother and every family in America, to the 47,000,000 uninsured Americans, and to the hundred million underinsured Americans, for the same amount of money we spend today to badly care for only some of our people. Just by getting insurance companies out of healthcare, we can save almost 25% of what we now spend. That savings all by itself is more than enough to cover all the uninsured Americans. Frank will pay for Free Universal Healthcare with Abraham Lincoln's tax on imports.

The costs of healthcare have been a huge drag on American companies. By shifting these costs to Abraham Lincoln's Tax on Imports, American companies will be much healthier.

Startup and small businesses are crushed by the burden of employee healthcare. No More!

Most of you do not realize that most municipalities, school systems, and state and local governments will soon face bankruptcy because they will be unable to pay the costs of the medical care promised to their firefighter, police, teacher, and civil service retirees.

The U.S. medical system is failed and broken. We spend much more per person than any other nation on earth for a healthcare system which ranks 37th in the world. That is not a good bargain. Conservatives love to make fun of France, but the French healthcare system is ranked Number One in the world, and they spend much less than we do.

Bill O'Reilly is fond of saying that when world leaders and the super-rich get sick, they come to the U.S. for treatment. Wrong! They go to France. Accurate facts make discussions so much more meaningful, don't you agree Bill?

There are only two things wrong with our healthcare system: insurance companies and doctors.

What do you think are the three leading causes of death in America?

First, heart disease, which is largely preventable. Second, cancer, which is much tougher to treat. Third, doctors' errors! We spend billions on treating heart disease and cancer, and there are thousands of charities raising hundreds of millions of dollars to find cures for cancer and heart disease. But doctors' errors kill approximately as many people as cancer! I am exaggerating a bit. Actually the figures include all medical errors. But most medical errors are doctors' errors, including illegible writing on prescriptions so you get the wrong drugs.

But we spend nothing, absolutely nothing on decreasing doctor's errors! There is not a single charity working to fix this third leading cause of death. Email me at errors@franklynch.org if you would like to contribute tax deductible to a charity program to decrease doctors' errors in America.

One way to decrease America's huge medical bill is to decrease unnecessary surgeries. Unnecessary surgeries increase deaths because every surgery carries with it the danger of death. We estimate that up to one third, yes, up to 33% of all surgeries are unnecessary, either because (1) the diagnosis is wrong; or (2) there is nothing wrong, but hey, if you can bill another $50,000 who is to know?; or (3) drugs are a more effective or equally effective treatment, but hey, if you can bill another $50,000 who is to know?

Attack of the Killer Insurance Companies.

Sounds like one of those old horror movies, "Attack of the Killer Rabbits." But the "Attack of the Killer Insurance Companies" is a very serious business. They will fight with the viciousness of a cornered tiger fighting for its life, because that is exactly what they will be doing: fighting for their existence. Because I want to end the existence of health insurance companies.

We must expect a tidal wave, a tsunami of TV commercials, and hordes of phony "experts" on all the talk shows and on the radio, fighting this simple idea because the medical insurance companies today collect almost one out of every six dollars spent in America each year. Not of the money spent on healthcare, but of all the money we Americans spend on everything we buy and pay for. That is hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars every year.

Medical insurance is the biggest industry in America, and they spend hundreds of millions of dollars so that nobody knows they are the biggest industry in America.

Medical insurance is bigger than home building. Medical insurance if bigger than oil, bigger than cars, bigger than defense. And they use that power viciously. They will do everything possible to kill the idea of free universal healthcare.

Medical insurance companies and HMOs pay about 75% of their revenue for actual medical care of people. The other 25%, which is equal to one-third (25% divided by 75% is one third) of the money they spend for medical care, goes to profit and to operate the insurance companies.

This simple arithmetic shows that simply by getting rid of the insurance companies, one-third more of the money we are already spending will be available to pay for actual medical care.

To put it another way, the best way, by getting rid of insurance companies, the money which we now spend is enough to give medical care to all the uninsured people in America. Without any increase in spending.

Estimates are that insurance companies' overhead adds more than $100 billion to medical costs. Employers spend another $100 billion dealing with the insurance companies. Doctors and hospitals spend another $100 billion dealing with, billing and fighting with the insurance companies. Getting rid of the insurance companies will save more than $300 billion a year.

Actually, since roughly 47 to 50 million people are uninsured, and our population is 300 million people, the uninsured are about 16%. The insurance companies siphon off 25%. By getting rid of the insurance companies, that 25% will be available for healthcare. So we can give medical care to the uninsured 16% and still have 9% (25% minus 16%) left over to improve the quality of care for everyone.

So get rid of the medical insurance companies. Medicare uses 1.5%, only one and one half percent for administration and operation, compared to 25% for insurance companies. Critics say Medicare is going broke. Sure, but only because of our incompetent politicians. Set Medicare up as a separate entity outside of political influence and it will be just fine.

Did you know that your life expectancy increases by a few years on your 65th birthday? That is because you become covered by Medicare!

Just expand Medicare to cover everyone, and fund it with the money employers now pay for their employee medical plans, and everyone will have excellent, complete health care with total choice of your doctors, for the same amount of money we now spend to badly cover only some of our people.

There is an even better way to fund free health care for everyone. Get rid of the Medicare and Medicaid tax deducted from workers' paychecks. Instead have employers pay a 10% Medicare payroll tax, and fund the rest from my Abraham Lincoln Tax. As you will see in my section on "The Right Tax" Abraham Lincoln sparked a tremendous economic boom and expansion of American industry and jobs when he placed a tax on imports.

I propose we tax imports for two wonderful benefits: one, as a means of bringing jobs back to America, and secondly, use that tax to pay for free universal healthcare.

See how simple life can be?

But expect the Republicans and the older members of Congress to go absolutely insanely nuts about taxing imports. Just remember this: every elected official who is against taxing imports is doing that because the corporations own the politicians. There is no rational reason not to tax imports.

So, I make free universal healthcare, directly paid by the government, with complete choice of your doctors, the first and foremost issue of my campaign.

When people say they are against socialized medicine, do they understand that they are saying they are against Medicare.

Medicare is socialized medicine, and it works!

Don't believe me? Just try and take Medicare away from us! I do not know what I or my mother would do without Medicare.

I went uninsured for twenty years until I aged into Medicare, and that twenty years was hell, sheer hell. And to have one out of six people in America with no coverage is not merely unacceptable, it is absolutely horrible!

By taking the money used to operate the insurance company's profit and overhead we can provide free medical care to everyone in this nation without waiting times, without giving up our ability to choose our own doctor, without sacrificing anything except several hundred millionaires who get rich in the insurance companies by killing people.

Yes, I actually said it!

Health insurance companies kill people.

Health insurance companies hire hundreds and hundreds of doctors and other staff to deny treatments to people. Denying medical care to people kills people. Period. End of discussion.

In case you have not watched Michael Moore's film "Sicko," go see it immediately or buy it from him on the internet. And his movie has limited scope: it is only about people who thought they were completely covered, and how the insurance companies screwed them. These are the people that I mean when I say we have a hundred million underinsured people in America.

His movie says nothing about the 50 million people with no coverage whatsoever. Here is the link to his website where you can buy the DVD: www.michaelmoore.com/. Last time I looked Sicko was on the top left corner.