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Special interests undercut the Constitution
Photo by Kenny Miller/flickr.com
Our corrupt system gives corporations and other special interests undue influence that undermines the Constitution. The ongoing health-care reform debate in Washington proves the point.
Some people don’t believe me when I tell them I don’t get too worked up about debates in Washington and Santa Fe over hot issues like abortion, climate change and health-care reform.
But it’s true. I’m a registered independent partly because my views are all over the map and I have a difficult time reconciling my beliefs with those of the Democratic or Republican parties. But there’s another, deeper reason I’m anti-partisan. I believe both parties, and the system in general, are corrupted by corporate and other special-interest money.
I think the genius of the U.S. Constitution is that it values the collective compromise of the whole over the beliefs of any individual. But our corrupt system gives corporations and other special interests undue influence that undermines the Constitution that created it.
The ongoing health-care reform debate in Washington proves the point. This discussion has been hijacked by a Republican Party that largely doesn’t want any reform – not because individual Republicans don’t see the need for reform, but because too many elected officials from that party are in the pockets of the status-quo health-insurance industry. Certain Democrats who are also in the pocket of the industry have also hijacked the debate.
Heath Haussamen
Our system is so corrupt that any debate on health care reform must take place within the framework of what’s acceptable to the health-insurance industry. There may be liberal and conservative options within that framework, but Congress is still working within the box created by the industry.
So, while the president wanted a debate on whether to enact a single-payer system, he was forced to accept a discussion that started with less — a public option. Even that has now been watered down into the creation of some new, bureaucratic federal agency that would oversee private insurance plans.
Meaningful reform on hold
Meanwhile, meaningful reforms that the majority of members of Congress could easily agree to – such as legislation that would forbid insurance companies from rejecting claims on the basis of a pre-existing condition — are on hold.
Instead, back-room debates about prescription drugs – a sacred cow of members of Congress who are owned by the industry – and other issues are bogging down debate. And members of Congress are quietly slipping industry friendly provisions into the bill, including one that would, in the words of The Associated Press, “let insurers place annual dollar limits on medical care for people struggling with costly illnesses such as cancer.” That provision is deceptively hidden in the section of the bill entitled “No lifetime or annual limits.”
If I’m battling a life-threatening illness, I don’t want a plan that is going to run out of money in September and not start covering my treatment again until January. Such a provision benefits the health-insurance industry’s wealthy benefactors, not the American people.
Congress has operated in a similar box on other issues. Certain viewpoints are off the table from the start.
For example, instead of a debate on whether to try to reverse global warming, we’re debating whether we should try to slow down the rate at which it’s happening. For those who believe that humans are causing the planet to heat up, that means instead of debating whether to stop killing the planet, we’re debating the speed at which we’re going to destroy it.
There are also proposals on the right that are off the table because of special-interest influence, such as Ron Paul’s push to abolish the federal Department of Education. Why can’t we have that debate? And why can’t we have an honest debate about whether to actually pay off the national debt – and how we would do it – instead of just debating the speed at which we increase the national debt?
Ethics reform is critical
I’m independent primarily because I believe in the system of government the U.S. Constitution intends. Get a group of people with varying backgrounds and viewpoints together to debate the merits of a proposal – with all options on the table and without undue influence from groups that have interests other than the good of the American people at heart – and you end up with something closer to the truth than any of them can find by themselves.
I’m just one person in a nation of hundreds of millions of people. And, because I believe in the truth that emerges from honest debate of the issues, I’m more interested in seeing our system function as the democracy it should be than I am in seeing my beliefs enacted into law.
It’s why I focus so much of my journalistic efforts on ethics reform. I don’t think anything is more important in America in the 21st Century than finding a way to create the system of government our founding fathers intended.
Until that happens, I don’t believe our political leaders can have honest debates about the other pressing issues of our time.
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I would like to suggest that power does NOT corrupt.
It is the opportunity to abuse power without consequence that corrupts, absolutely.
If there was no temptation, there would be no misconduct.
If power could not be abused without consequence, there would be no temptation.
Casino are not virtually immune to theft because they hire a better class of human beings,
but rather, because they eliminate temptation by eliminating the opportunity to steal
without being caught.
It is possible to make it impossibly difficult to hide corruption and incompetence.
When that happens, they will disappear. Sunlight is fatal to corruption and incompetence.
The fundamental ethic is truth telling. When we know as much about our government,
our politicians, public servants and their public service as the law will ALLOW,
it will be (nearly) impossible to hide corruption.
We need to give a great deal of thought to where the line is placed between the truth
we should know and the truth we needn’t. Right now the line is placed at the whim
of the powerful. We need to regain control over our power and our resources, and
that will begin when it is we, who decide where the line will be placed.
I too consider myself an independent and do not belong to any political persuasion. Personally, other than the rhetoric I do not see a dimes difference between the political parties’ for they have LED this nation into the current environment of nightmarish debt.
Ethics is a meaningless word if the definition of is not understood by the vast majority to be a specific such and such. The broad term “ethics” seems to be like a pair of shoes (high-heels, boots, loafers, sandals, etc) that may comfortably fit one but not another.
Business “corporations” are the progeny of the state that granted life to these charters. Being entities of the state they must do what the state demands or face death. There was a time (early 1900′s to 1960′s that corporations were not the majority of businesses, but have, like corporate government and special interest organizations become the dominate players that paved the way for thriving corruption. Corporations (managed business) are merely shells where immorality can flourish, because upper management (officials or officers) are for the most part shielded from legal responsibility. Clearly or at least hopefully not all of these entities are corrupt?
Governance or political stewardship is another term fraught with ambiguity that is dominated by Sun Tzu (Art of War -deception -divide and conquer) tactics. It’s sad that a significant portion of humanity cannot recognize that government has perfected the corruptive art of something for nothing. Throughout history – no government has legislated morality, yet, the masses have willingly been led to believe in control via fear.
To the best of my knowledge no one can accurately forecast anything, like forecasting the weather, which continues to confound these doctors of foretelling what nature may or may do. Global warming is merely another form of predicting the future and those who claim to know what tomorrow will be are at best foolish to out and out frauds perpetrating scams upon the controllable ignorant with a variety the non-empirical terms, such as may, might and could.
For a reality check read: http://www.gold-eagle.com/editorials_08/lundeen121309.html
Healthcare is a personal responsibility. Health insurance like a home, car, clothes and food is a personal choice as too how much of one’s potential income is to be devoted to these desirable lifestyles. To suggest that healthcare is a right to be granted and protected by govt for every American is not only appealing socialistic propaganda but another scam that eventually bankrupts everyone.
Hey Heath—
Interesting that you say health reform has been hijacked by the “Republican Party” but only certain members of the D’s are also in the pocket of corporations. R’s are in tune with a big majority in the country who oppose the current monstrosity that poses as reform.
Secondly, this constant refrain of “special interests” is misleading in my view. Is there something wrong with special interests? Unions? Trial lawyers? Teachers? Government employees? Corporations? Code-pinkers?
Corporations have as much right as anyone to lobby for their interests. They do more for the economy than govt employees. I want the corporations to make money. Where do liberals think retirement funds are invested? In a bank vault somewhere? IRA’s in the empty Treasury?
Finally, ethics is with the voters. Those politicians that you decry didn’t inherit those positions or get them by divine intervention. The situation we have in NM is directly the result of voters’ actions. Same for DC.
No doubt money corrupts our republic and we need ethical restraints.
But, unfortunately power corrupts and I’ve come to the disturbing conclusion
that power includes the power of the vote.
Voters are all too willing to unethically bankrupt future generations to feather the nest of today.
The growing unfunded mandates are exhibit A and will end America as we know it.
“The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public’s money” — Alexis de Tocqueville
I hate to disagree with you Heath, but the Republicans are against anything that takes away our freedoms and replaces it with government dictates and bureaucracy. Other reasons we are against the present Health care system, is we like our freedom of choice, lack of money to fund such a program and the rules that give the government too much power over our lives. How you can say the Republicans are in the pockets of the insurance companies is beyond me.
I, along with millions of others have never received a dime from the insurance companies, for anything except what our policies gave us, nor do we believe that anything under a government administration (Republican or Democrat ) will work with the efficiency or as cheaply as private enterprise.
You are right when you say we need ethics reform. We have needed it in this state for the last 70 years, but have been stalemated by people who want to pursue their own agenda. If one wants to solve the Health Care problem in this country, they need to revise the courts system, the tort laws and while they are at it, revise and upgrade the criminal laws of this country. It is ludicrous for anyone to be able to sue a doctor for an honest mistake.
The only person I know of that never made a mistake was Jesus Christ. Doctors are human and make mistakes, just as any other human being. We have become a nation of sue happy people, who have no tolerance for the other people’s honest mistakes, but think that we are perfect and should be recompensed for the honest mistakes of others. Anyone who thinks along these lines should read their Bible more often. It has all the answers, if you just look for them, and quit blaming other people for your own shortcomings.
If you are an independent Heath, God help us. You sometimes lean so far to the left you come close to toppling. If you are pleased with the way this administration has taken us, you need to do a little studying and soul searching. One thing that would help the elderly of this country is to put the Social Security back outside the General Fund and it would be fine with the money paid into it. When it is in the General Fund, for every politician to dip into and never repay, how can it be expected to survive?
God didn’t make us to be doubters; he made us to find answers to our problems, using the alacrity of the minds he supplied us with. If you are an Independent, why do you continually slam the conservatives? If you look back in history it has been the conservatives that have tried to conserve the Constitution of the United States, not destroy it as the present Federal administration is doing. For a man who is educated, you have a lack of understanding that appalls me.
Each time there has been a liberal in office, they have continually overspent on foolish pork barrel endeavors that cannot work. Look back at the history of this country my friend and give credit where credit is due. Just take a look at the global warming lie that has been perpetrated on the pubic and the cost of it. You’re a college graduate, use the math. Global warming is nothing more than unproven theory.
Keep in mind that the Natzi propaganda machine during the Second World War said: “if a lie is repeated often enough and with enough conviction, people will take it to be a truth.”