The Kennedy Option; A Matter of Life and Death

I can imagine awful things. That's why I'm a terrible flier. This week, I sat across from something I couldn't imagine.

I remember the story. On December 1, 2007, a Palmer, Alaska man attacked his father and his father's fiancé with a machete in the middle of the night. Leaving them for dead, he drove to Anchorage and shot three people, killing one, injuring two.

Tuesday, I had lunch with Lennie. She survived the machete attack that killed her fiancé. The hospital stopped counting after fifty "chop wounds", from head to toe. One of her two uninjured fingers still wears the ring of the man she loved. She smiles a lot. While we were talking, she liked something I said and offered a "high 2 and ¾" instead of a "high 5".

She told me about that horrifying, long ago night. She described the sound a machete makes when it hits your skull. She didn't feel her ear being severed, or her fingers. Her funny bone is gone, but she joked about her sense of humor being intact. She recently lost her dog, Bear, who defended her during the attack.

Her assailant screamed while he chopped her, "Why are you making me do this?" over and over. Her voice hushed when she shared with me that an angel helped her reach the phone to dial 911. Unseen hands held her legs up to keep her from bleeding to death while help was on the way.

Lennie was released from the hospital with only five days worth of pain pills and the inability to feed, bathe, use the bathroom or dress herself. She didn't have insurance.

She told me she would rather be hit with a machete than go through the de-humanizing experience of not having health coverage. Lennie supports a public option. She doesn't want anyone to have to fight harder for health care than she did against a possessed man determined to kill her.

The man wielding the machete, Chris Rogers, is now serving time in prison. He's entitled to health care under the 8th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. His victim doesn't want the death penalty for him; she doesn't even want his health coverage taken away. She wants everyone to have the health care they need. The surgeries to repair her claw-like hand, like the leg brace that helps her walk, were pro-bono by doctors who were unable to watch the current system ignore her suffering.

"At least I'm not bitter," she likes to say, usually after some nightmare story about pain management. We chatted over chicken and grilled cheese about public option possibilities. I shared with her my meeting Howard Dean a few weeks ago. I told her how the message between President Clinton, Senator Kennedy, Dr. Dean, Valerie Jarrett, AFL-CIO leader Richard Trumka and others were rallying the grass roots across the nation for public health care. I assured her the public option was already a compromise from a single payer system...and we were going to win. We had to, it's a life or death matter.

"I sure hope so," she said. "I have a pre-existing condition. It's called attempted murder."

Lennie called me today. She said she'd thought of me when she heard of Senator Kennedy's death. I had thought of her, and her struggle to be healed; heart, mind and body.

Senator Kennedy, a man born into privilege, fought for the rights of others who were not. That made him a hero. For his decades-long fight, and the daily struggle of people like Lennie, a woman who sees her struggle over health care as more horrific than a machete attack, we must pass a public option; a "Kennedy Option."

"Some men see things as they are and say why; I dream things that never were and say why not?"

Follow Shannyn Moore on Twitter: www.twitter.com/shannynmoore

Comments

[hollybork]

Shannyn, very good article with a compelling central character. As some other comments below indicate, this nation needs to find its compassion, its sense of justice, and its commitment to the common welfare which was envisioned by the Founders. They were not utopians, and neither is national healthcare a utopian impossibility. It is a moral necessity, and the great civil rights cause of our lives.

[mamalisa38]

For profit health insurance is immoral. The only way to maximize profits is to raise premiums and deductibles and deny claims. The only reason I can see to have health insurance companies is to pay salaries and make profits for shareholders. The top 10 health insurance executives earned $85.6 million in 2008 and the top ten drug company executives earned $199.4 million. Don't get me started on the legalized bribery going on in Washington over health care reform, $1.4 million a day since January. Outrageous! DRUG & HEALTH INSURANCE EXECUTIVE PER HOUR PAY:
Miles White - Abbott - $17,395.00
Fred Hassan - Schering Plough - $15,677.00
Bill Weldon - Johnson & Johnson - $13,022.00
Bob Essner - Wyeth - $12,552.00
Ron Williams - Aetna - $12,656.00
H. Edward Hanway - CIGNA - $6,373.00
Angela Braly - WellPoint - $5,127.00

Single payer is the only answer to our health care crisis.

[Actongue]

A persons health should never be a way for another person to profit.

The one common denominator for,

Life
Liberty and
the Pursuit of happiness

Is a persons health. Without being healthy there is no way one can achieve those noble goals.

That is not to say, that people should not first look to their own personal diets and what put into their bodies.

[hollybork]

I disagree. There are two other ways to raise profits for private health insurers:

Government subsidies for poor people to buy private health insurance
Government support raising permissable profit levels from 30 - 45% of every dollar spent.

Both of these "options" are on the table. I leave to you why our Congress considers subsidizing private healthcare a better bet than helping people be part of medicare.

[miastella]

I continue to be absolutely blown over by the stupidity in this country. People have no thinking skills. The stuff they believe . . . .even well educated people boggles my mind. Hukabee saying that Kennedy would be asked to die sooner if healthcare was reformed? The Repugs saying Obamas coverage would be dienied to REPUGS? Anything like them denying it to everyone else? The truth is, this country lacks empathy and compassion. It's not a christian, islam or any other religion thing. It's a spiritual growth process that underlies true humanism and civilization. And, we don't have it. For those of us who consider ourselves more civilized, we need to overcome the ghosts of humans that run this country by shedding continued light on them. Thank you Shannyn again. We must all take the images of Lennie and others like her to protest; her humanity and her tribulations could easily. . . in a heart beat be each one of us. Who doesn't drive? Which one of us in a blink of an eye might not come home from picking up milk?

[vanmungo]

The sad reality is that even WITH the lobbyist-approved, shrunken public option being peddled by the Democrats, we will have no reform.

There are many different versions of the public option, yet Shannyn Moore treats it as though it were a single, well-defined entity.

The current, alarmingly shriveled version of the public option is nothing like Medicare. Unlike Medicare, it will be self-sustaining, not publicly funded; unlike Medicare, it will charge premiums and impose deductibles, making it unaffordable for the tens of millions most in need of help; unlike Medicare, it will have to negotiate provider fees on the same footing as HMOs--so no cost saving there, no cost savings of the single risk pool of single payer--according to the CBO, no cost savings period.

And no significant expansion of coverage, because it will be open only to those not already covered by employers, and even for them not until 2013! This is a gift to the HMO lobby, pure consumer fraud-- a public option that is neither really public nor an option for most people!

Even Dr. David Scheiner — a single-payer advocate and Obama’s personal physician for 22 years — said, “It’s a bad bill. No bill is better than this bill."

See this article from Physicians for a National Health Plan:

"Bait and Switch: How the Public Option Was Sold"

http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/07/20/bait-and-switch-how-the-%E2%80%9Cpublic-option%E2%80%9D-was-sold/

[Giglawyer]

Thank you for posting this. THis is the best article I have seen that demonstrates why the reform plan now being pushed by COngress will be a monumental failure.

[brt929]

Great post as usual, Shannyn.

I wish people like Lennie, could have their stories told at these town hall meetings. These are the stories that need to be put out there, not the diversions of non-existent "death panels."

My brother was shot and killed. He died at the hospital within the hour. He had no health care insurance.

Now that hospital continues to send out bills in the neighborhood of $65,000. I guess they expect my sister or brother or I to pay it, but none of us plan to.

If we had National Health-care, not only would that bill be far less, but the hospital wouldn't be scrounging around trying to recoup money for services, that they will never receive.

Further, it is hard enough to lose someone you love to unnecessary violence, but sending me a bill every month, that I have no way of paying, is just a constant reminder I don't need.

[camanokat]

I am sorry to hear of your loss. This is barbaric.

The hospital is in violation of FDCPA and you can sue them in small claims court. Read up on it.

[nicole473]

Great post, Shannyn. And so important. Give Lennie my love, and tell her I will be thinking of her as we continue to fight for the public option.

[northsongs]

Thank you once again Shannyn, for a well-written and well-intentioned piece.

[xango xango]

Amazing that we live in the USA and this is what victims have to go through every day throughout our country. My heart goes out to the women and children currently facing epidemic levels of abuse..

How about something simple like taking the amount of money spent on criminal's health care and giving half of it to victims this year?

I'd like to add my high five to Lennie and let her know she is in many Alaskan's hearts.

[biased2]

Shannyn,
I logged in this morning just to say thanks to you.
All your posts are a must read for me.
This one hits to the bone ( dark pun slightly intended).
Keep writing for us please.
Lennie is amazing isn't she?
And yes, single payer would've been the best, but...
I'll take a "public option" if it's any good - since I have no other,
like the other 47 mil.+ in the good old U.S. of A.

[MacGregor57]

Wow. Thanks Shannyn.

[Eykis]

Shannyn, thanks for another story that needs to be told and re-told.

We need healthcare, NOW.

If the best we can get right now is a public option, I will deal with it - SINGLE PAYOR is what we NEED.

Many millions of us have odd pre-existing conditions we gained from living LIFE.

[IzzyCA]

"The work goes on, the cause endures, and the dream will never die." - Senator Ted Kennedy

Support the public option. March on Washington for Healthcare and the public option.
Marches are being organized in all major cities.
Sign up at:
http://www.marchforhealthcare.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=118144661546

[gwashington1776]

Thanks Shannon for bringing this story to us!!!! It needs to be on the airwaves in all states!!!

[Jigglypuff]

The contrast of the attacker, (who has health coverage while in prison) and the victim he injured, (who is now inflicted with pre-existing conditions), who has no coverage is powerful.
What do victim's rights groups say about this disparity?

[CTtransplant]

Amazing, isn't it!

[aspiecelia]

I think Shannyn Moore is fabulous, but I have to say I disagree that Lennie's attacker will get medical care in prison. Whether you believe he deserves it or not, there really is no health care in the Alaskan prison system. They lie to the public about it and people buy into it. Then people are outraged by it when it is not true. It is rare to get to see a health care provider in prison here and when it does happen the inmate has to pay $20, a lot of money when prison wages start at .30/hr. They stop nearly everyone's medication, even people on antipsychotics and seizure medications. This is against their own policy which states inmates should get the same medical care they would get on the outside. There is a large number of people in this state who are in jail because they are mentally ill. There are a lot of malicious prosecutions also. The ACLU is writing a paper about the conditions, but since there is little support in Alaska due to misinformation they will probably not have the resources to file a lawsuit. The supreme court ruled that the 8th amendment allows for prisoners to have health care due to not being able to take care of themselves. They also ruled that prisons can't be held responsible if the legislature does not provide money for health care.

[DEJM]

Obama has a democratic majority in Congress...enough to pass
healthcare reform...so why does he care if the Republican support it or not?

President Obama, go ahead and do it....get the law passed.

Too many people are suffering.

[zanzig]

Yes there is a Democratic Party majority but they are NOT all on the side of the President as has become obvious over the past 2 months. There is no way to compel the Democratic Party to vote in lockstep and I am not sure that there should be.