As I read articles on healthcare in the United States, I’m amazed at the lack of comprehensive media coverage on the topic. There is a lot of discussion about American health care, yet it is all very similar in its surprisingly (if you have been outside of the United States) blatant consistency in how views on healthcare are presented. I’ll give an example.

I love reading the paper on Sunday morning and on one day as I was browsing around through the different sections, I saw a write up on healthcare in other countries around the world. (SpryLiving.com, February 2010, p. 18, insert in the Denver Post.) The amazing omission of information was that many of the other countries all have a type of healthcare that gives universal coverage to all citizens, and in a lot of cases, this extends to all people. This is an amazingly simple and humane concept. If a person is hurt, he or she should be helped. When Americans travel to other countries and get hurt in a first world country like Germany or Australia, they get taken into a hospital and receive care. Simple. Nice. When they go to pay, they are often amazed that either they pay a small co-pay amount, or they don’t pay anything at all.

All the developed industrial countries do have a universal coverage for their society. Yes. This is a type of socialism because it benefits everyone. In the United States, and in any society, there will be elements of socialism as a tax is collected, then redistributed to benefit society, hence the label of socialism. In the United States, we have schools (thank goodness) that benefit society. I personally, think that it is a very good idea to be literate, read, and have a common language of communication. Likewise, we, in the United States, like other developed countries have roads and an interstate transportation system (thank goodness) that allows all people to drive on the roads, regardless of the state that they are from. The United States, however, is vastly different when it comes to healthcare. While the American people voted for change in 2008, has it occurred?

One would think that this topic of health care and how the media covers it would be a very important and worthy topic to discuss because it affects everyone. It is a major topic. Health care is also an important topic in the light that our statistics, the difference between the U.S. and other developed countries are widening, while the American health care statistics slide toward being more in line with third world countries. Is corporate profit really that important to dominate over the societal or common good for all Americans?

How do you receive your information? What portion of your information do you get from the TV, radio, newspapers, internet and/or other sources? Do your friends, or those that you associate, get their information from similar sources?  Do you have good friends that believe very differently?  If so, what do you talk about?

On a slightly different note, do you think certain topics and questions are avoided on the news? If so, which ones?

I was fortunate to see Don Hewitt earlier this month when I was at the Washington State University Progressive Conference. When I first heard his name, I had to say, “Who?” in my ignorance. But when I learned that he was the man who envisioned, created and was the executive producer of 60 Minutes, I simply had to go see him speak. Currently retired and in his eighties, he still had a quick wit and spoke with both intelligence and charm. He hired and worked with Edward R. Murrow, the respected news anchor (who was the main character in the movie Good Night and Good Luck.) Hewitt produced the CBS news show in what can now be perceived as the golden era of television as he lamented the loss of investigative journalism in current broadcast TV news. Many people have recently talked about the increase of news anchor banter and how it really bothers them. It seems that news anchors currently spend a lot of time talking about what they like, if it makes them happy, if it gives them chills, if their pets like the warmer weather, commenting on what might be good for dinner, etc…perhaps some news, please.

It’s also telling of the times when it was recently revealed that the Bush administration, under their guidance and watch, perpetrated the acts of torture in the Guantanamo prison in Cuba. After pictures of heinous acts turned up in the international media, the administration’s immediate response was to send a team of retired officers to give an objective analysis of the situation. Only it’s revealed years later, in a patterned presidential administration action, that the retired generals couldn’t have been objective because they were or are direct representatives of government contractors, defense and security lobbyists, executives, board members or consultants for military contractors.

Also keep in mind that some of the media outlets – corporate conglomerates are also U.S. government contractors. (The number of government contractors in Iraq surpassed the amount of U.S. troops in July 2007, and get paid an astounding 4-10 times as much!) Doesn’t this serve as a direct threat and menace to American democracy? Remember to be empowered by information! Don’t let it get you down. Let’s start talking about it and figure out as an American empowered society about what to do about it, because really, their using our taxes! I’m not so sure that paying Halliburton large amounts of money (who is now based out of Dubai – partially in order to evade U.S. taxes) is a wise investment for U.S. policy. Let’s talk about where else could we shift the U.S. funding? Perhaps we could put a few billion toward education, or healthcare, or toward enacting legislated vacation time. (Why don’t you think I’m serious?) If we pulled out of Iraq, or at least banished the private contractors from siphoning U.S. dollars for questionable activities there, we’d have hundreds of billions of dollars to reallocate to other perhaps more socially beneficial areas of spending. Perhaps the media would like to do an investigative story on shifting some U.S. funds from the defense budget to universal, single payer healthcare. Would it happen? So then, is the U.S. media conservative or liberal? Just something to think about. And discuss!