Comments by "Xyz Same" (@xyzsame4081) on "Bernie Sanders"
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@clarissamontgomery6484 there were precincts where Sanders was doing well or extremely well. The party KNEW of course where that was, they wanted to "quality control" but they had the numbers as the precinct heads had reported them. If Sanders has won with 50, 60, or more % and the number of counted people had been reported - that was not going tho change.
Rounding errors when doing percent calculations, the way the volunteer heading the caucus calculated the delegate equivalents, whether or nor a coin toss was justified - those things can be flawed. But it would not change the numbers of people that had lined up and had been hand counted.
he "release" of 62 % of precincts (that were NOT representative) was on Tuesday.
All the precints where Sanders did best were counted at the very end, so with 97 % of precincts numbers released after "quality control", Sanders leads in the popular vote round 1 and 2 (clearly - and he always has).
Both he and Pete will get the same number of National Delegates (11 or 12 each, not yet clear).
And now (3 % missing) they are an inch away from tying Pete on the SDE count. Those 3 % will also be high turnout for Sanders.
Sanders in the press conference in New Hampshire where he claimed victory: the media has been pontificating about the SDE. But after 2016 there was a reform and the STATE Delegate equivalent has become irrelevant for NATIONAL affairs for instance like the primary. SDE is still relevant for affairs of the Iowa Democratic party.
this was the only metric Pete ever lead with (and it used to be somewhat relevant in the past because State delegates then could change national delegates).
Rural votes bring more SDE that urban votes. Pete did better in that category and with the cherrypicked partial release of Tuesday he could spin the narrative how he was victorious. With hardly any pushback from the media.
Pete worked for McKinsey he likes that technocratic, numbers crunching approach (he proudly said in his book he had that mindset as mayor).
The Iowa party is used to the media circus they did not even caution that the partial release did not cover stronghold of Sanders, so don't run away with your conclusions .....
Not that the media would have been nuanced about it, but they did not even make that formal attempt to statistical consistency.
The satellite caucus events were set up to include people that cannot be there at the evening. Working in the evening, night shifts, no babysitter, disabled, .... The Sanders campaign reached out the the Latino, black community, low(er) income working class people - and they crushed it at the Satellite caucuses.
So naturally those were countes last (or still not counted, it is Friday I do not know if the party now has released the missing 3 %).
way to show respect for the efforts of volunteers, caucus goers that have to take time out of their busy day.
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The success of Obama's task to deflate the energy of the base on behalf of the donor class showed in the midterm 2010 results. the voters had showed up in 2006 (blue wave midterms, the Dems - well Obama buddy Rahm Emanuel then DCCC chair - ran lots of Wallstreet Democrats. Some people had an inkling the bubble was about to burst and they would need "their" guys and gals in place) The Democratic base had a strong shwoing in 2008. They had not become too stupid to understand elections. I think on a deep level citizens "got" that it wasn't gonna be "Hope and Change" even if they missed to what degree Obama had deceived them (the nice media reporting AND the open racism of Republicans sheltered him. The base rallied behind Obama not questions asked).
someone close to the White House asked Harry Belafonte and Cornel West (both had endorsed Obama) in the early years of the presidency, why they didn't cut Obama some slack ? (they were not so easily deceived as the regular voters and noticed and understood ! the appointments and the bills that were passed, and those bills that were NOT created). Belafonte's answer: What makes you think we don't cut him a lot of slack.
Media and politicians are usually wealthy or rich people, even the anchors and "reporters" and "news" persons.
Added bonus for the Dem establishment if Trump wins the second time: they can blame the unreasonable progressives for the loss against Trump and fiercly attack third party voters. (those are a danger for the cozy scheme, voters that do not accept the blackmail of the Democratic machine. Nice little country you have here, wouldn't it be a shame if Trump happened to it.
The corp. Dems do not want to implement real reforms that would benefit the masses, so it is either things that do not cost their donors - abortions, guns, LGBT, or identity politcis. Republicans specialize in the same issues - they just cover the opposite side of the issues. Racism is variety of identity politics for instance.
Or they do "bipartisan". Or they lose elections and can throw up their hands in the air (if only the Republicans let us ...)
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One has to give the Republicans credit, they execute the voter suppression strategy consistently (over decades), brazen, widespread, well-organized, diligently and with high levels of creativity. - Helped of course by a spineless Democratic party. Which also hands over the lower courts to them, no questions asked.
The Republicans would fight like crazy and then some if they were in that position. They would not fasttrack the appointments of "liberal" judges, and definitely not w/o getting something in return. Stacking the courts can be the last line of defense when you want to steal elections and hinder people to vote. See the court in Ohio in 2016, and of course the Supreme court.
Only Andrew Gillum and even more so Stacy Abrams clearly spoke up about voter suppression. Since the "liberal" corporate networks were interested to have a good blue result in the midterms of 2018 they even reported about it - a little bit. has vanished from the headlines though.
Bloomberg (the org not the former mayor) did a panel with Gillum and Abrams in spring 2019 about elections / voter suppression tactics and prospects for the election process in 2020.
It does not matter what a voter sees on the screen, it matters what the machine reports to the center for tabulation. That can differ - it is easy to achieve that on an electronic device, and the program can self delete after completing the task to change the vote. Or what the center does with the data even IF the data is reported correctly (again a self deleting code could be used). See the testimony of Clinton Curtis, coder, Florida (the clip is on youtube).
In Ohio the safety features on the machines never have been activated, so there is not even a paper trail - and having a paper trail is far from perfect as well - althoug it is hard to do large scale manipulation throughout a state).
Then there is normal voter suppression, closing down polling stations, making it very hard to register, and constant voter roll purges (purging 10 - 20 % of the rolls in 3 years - see Georgia and Florida).
ID laws, exact match laws (when struck down by a federal court, just pass a law on the state level that allows it anyway (if one blank, dot, abbreviation is different it is sorted out as invalid. That applies to voter registration and mail ballots that are coming in. With registration the data is compared to SS or DMV database. These databases are not coordinated, so the entry mask for data does not gear you towards certain formats nor are there warnings to maintain a certain format.
Deafening silence of the Dems on the very unsafe machines - also on how easily they can be hacked.
Al Gore also lost his home state Tennessee where his father had been Senator and where al Gore had won several times as well (and quite decisively) until he became VP for 8 years under Clinton from 1993 - 2000. Losing in Tennessee (by 1 % but still) was quite an "achievement". Always assuming he lost in a fair race.
But he and Bill Clinton could not be bothered to scream bloody murder when the voter suppression shenanigans of the Republicans in Florida were leaked:
Voter roll purges of people of color especially of black men under the pretext that they were ex felons. They weren't (of course not ! why would anyone risk 5 more years of prison for registering to vote as ex-felon when that was not allowed in Florida) - but the these legitimate voters couldn't vote anyway. Al Gore only needed a few hundred votes to win Florida.
Party leadership told him to go away quietly. Keeping the big donors happy (the donors that finance BOTH parties so they always win).
Keeping the money of the donor's was even more important than winning the presidency. The oligarchs do not like it if the unwashed massed get engaged in mass protests and start organizing and paying too close attention to the political process apart from the election circus.
The sheeple could be getting ideas while they are at it. The oligarchs / donors want the voters isolated, in a hamster wheel regarding work, and stuck with ONLY the choices THEY let them have on the ballot. Either a spineless sellout Democrat or a fierce Republican.
Al Gore clearly did not want the presidency as much as Cheney and GWB (can you imagine THEM rolling over and accepting a ruling by an activist Surpreme court, or a mob intimidating the people doing the recount which is a federal crime ?).
Gore was handsomely rewarded for not making a stink. After that he founded a carbon trading company with Goldman Sachs (Clinton buddies) and got very rich (we are talking about 100 millions more, he had a few as VP, but he was a single digit - millionaire before he "lost" the election).
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@jackstanfield4480 I currently live in a single payer country (Austria, I also know the German system well and some knowledge about the Swiss) - like almost all other (now) wealthy countries they overhauled their systems or implemented one if they did not have one before (like the U.K.).
They are all doing fine, just fine, the overwhelming majority spend between 49 and 55 % of the U.S. (spending per person, that is ALL that is spent in the country divided by ALL people. in the U.S. that includes of course people with no or not enough coverage, people going broke over medical bills,e tc.)
Sidenote: the U.K. has the most cost-efficient system in the world - but they spend only 42 % of what the U.S. is spending, and the strain starts showing. The Tories have intentionally defunded it over 10 years, also to "save" it with privatization. If the system hums along with a lean but sufficient budget how would they ever justify to bring in the contractors (their buddies and donors to the party).
These other countries have first world healthcare for all AT HALF THE COSTS of the U.S. (or less)
Sure MODERN MEDICINE is EXPENSIVE (think around USD 5,500 per person per year) even if the system is cost efficient. You should take into account though that most European countries (with the exception of Iceland) have a much older population than the traditional immigration countries U.S., Canada, Australia.
Japan, followed by German have the oldest population. Japan 49 % of spending (that must be lifestyle too, it is a phantastic achievement) and Germany 56 % of the U.S. spending per person. (Data for 2017, Kaiser Foundation, also see World Bank Data).
Canada, Australia, Iceland are in the range of 49 - 50 % so there the cost advantage shows, the common range is 49 - 55 percent of the U.S. spending. The U.S spent 10,260 USD per person in 2017 - note that spending per_person_ includes spending of persons in the U.S. who may or may not have insurance).
Age is a major cost driver in healthcare spending, you spend the most on the elderly in a first world nation (it shows in life expectancy).
But that is of little consequence (a few percent, so the countries with ageing population get createive to find inefficiencies) compared with what a cost driver it is to allow large for-profit companies dominate a healthcare system (hospitals, and private insurers).
In single payer nations the only powerful for-profit player are pharmaceutical companies. The public non-profit healthcare insurance agencies contain them well. Medicare COULD get a good bargain as well - they are forbidden to negotiate drug prices.
These public agencies are set up per nation (ever country has done their own thing, grandfathered in their traditional solutions, they had 70 years to develop apart, and there are differences. However, it is remarkable in what close range the spending of countries like Japan, France, Netherlands, Canada, ... Sweden) is.
Countries of all sizes (tiny or 85 or 120 plus millions), on 4 continents, and very different cultures and lifestyles /risk factors (diet).
But: They all observe the crucial rules for single payer - which I see reflected in the bill of Senator Sanders - an only in his proposal to the full (and very necessary) extent. All other D candidates that have a Medicare for xx proposals have deviated from genuine single payer, and they offer a public option while using the now popular term Medicare For xx.
They either have either fallen for the industry lobbyists (because they do not fully "get" it) or they know their plan is inferior (and sets up the reform for failure) and have sold out. No other developed nation has a public option, there is a reason for tht.
For the profiteers and predators in the U.S. Public Option is now the contingency plan (the insurance comapnies stay relevant, can subvert a reform and it offers them the best chance to keep the most lucrative part of the clients - the young and healthy, and they are in the best position to hit back).
You can see the issue has been dear to the heart of Sanders for decades, he did his homework: Benchmarking - what other countries (which all beat the U.S.) are doing.
It helps a lot with understanding if a politician does not have the lobbyists in his or her ear, and does not chase after donations.
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the private insurance companies will lose more and more of the segment - and YOU WILL NOT MISS THEM. They are intermediaries, the non-profit public insurance agency = Medicare - becomes the new paper shuffler that is responsible for your coverage, and you will get a new card.
And they do not make more profit by denying to pay for treatment, they are not in the game to make a profit.
Since the new system is so much more streamlined many employees (on both sides insurance and providers) will not be needed anymore. The denial-to-pay-for-treatment departments, going with a fine comb over healthcare questions, complicated billing, telephone calls if certain procedures are covered - it all becomes obsolete.
These employees will be retrained (the MfA bills have budgets for that, a substantial number of people will not be needed after the 4 years rollout - it is testimony to the red tape they adminstrate in the current dysfunctional system).
All hospitals and most doctor practices will need to accept the contract with Medicare or they do not have enough patients. So no "networks", you can go to every provider that has a contract with Medicare. They will not be allowed to discriminate and they will not issue a bill.
Free at the point of delivery
And they for sure will not ask Medicare for permission to use certain procedures in INDIVIDUAL CASES.
If a drug or treatment is available in ONE case - it is on principle available for everyone, the doctors decide. The agency provides the framework (for instance negotiated drug prices).
The public agency negotiates, makes the contracts, arranges for preventive care, being up to date with medical developments and research. Collecting the mandatory contributions, usually wage related, and paying the bills of the providers on time.
No hassle, not for the doctors, hospitals or the patients.
That the system is so streamlined, simple and needs little overhead is one of the major cost saving factors.
And the task of the public non-profit agency does not require creativity or marketing or sales expertise. And not much medical expertise either * (there are no healthcare questions, pre-existing conditions do not matter). For negotiations, when setting up preventive care, the round table for new developments they need medical or even pharma expertise - but not for INDIVIDUAL CASES.
It is an adminstrative task - and public agencies can do good work in that area - they all do, spending is much lower in every other wealthy country. USD 4,700 - 4,900 spending per person in France, Belgium, Canada, Japan, Australia up to 5,700 in Germany. Most are in the 5,000 - 5,500 USD range. - Versus 10,240 in the U.S.
Keiser Family Foundation based on OECD data 2017
A part of the budget of single payer agencies is financed with the mandatory wage deductions. The deductions are very affordable, must be matched by employers, risk does not matter (signing up takes 5 minutes on the first day in a new job).
That is not enough funding - so those countries must of course subsidize - a lot - but since the system in general is so much more cost- efficient the governments still spend less per person than in the U.S. and the citizens spend much, much less.
Which you would expect when it costs roughly half compared to the U.S.
I live in a single payer country, citizens / patients have little to do with the public non-profit insurance agency (their employer sends the contribution at the end of the month, and healthcare providers have ongoing interaction of course).
The insurance agency has the legal obligation to serve the common good, they do not need to make a profit, and they do not answer to shareholders and "investors". They answer to the public and political oversight.
Patients go to the doctor and into the hospital and it is about the medical issues.
Since so many people are covered (low-income - upper middle class) that means enourmous political leverage. Much more than in the fractured U.S. system. Having the whole country (their employers, and all levels of gov.) involved has another advantage: no political party will dare attacking the system
(the Tories in the U.K. are the exception that proves the rule, must be the contempt for the lower classes. They have been defunding the NHS for 10 years, and it had a lean if sufficient budget to begin with. They spend ONLY 4250 USD per person (41 % of the U.S. spending) - but that is not enough for medical care in a first world country and the NHS is stretched thing.
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