The Crossroads

Is America Great Again?

Not even close.

We are one year into Making America Great Again and seven years into the Wisconsin Taxpayer Revolt. We know what this looks like and have reached the crossroads. Is this what we want to become?

Do we want to be a society where everybody is out for himself or herself, looking to amass as much wealth as they can at the expense of those less able or fortunate?

Do we want to live on planet with less clean air and water with a dwindling food supply and a climate that grows ever harsher to human existence?

Do we want to live in a society where the elderly, disabled and different are deemed disposable and expendable?

Do we want to live in communities where women are second or third class citizens whose job it is to pleasure men and have their babies?

Do we want to live in a society where those at the top of the chain are automatically deemed more valuable than those in subordinate positions?

Do we want to end our commitment to universal quality public education?

Do we want to return to a system that only allows white male property owners to decide who gets to govern the country?

Do we want a country that is not respected or supported by the international community?

Do we really want one-party rule in the halls of government?

2018 must be the year we turn away from these goals of Republican governance and return our society back to one based upon mutual respect and taking care of each other.

We need a tax code which requires everyone to pay their fair share to support basic human needs for food security, adequate universal healthcare, a secure infrastructure that supports business ventures and safe commerce, a stable defense for a peaceful world.

We need to protect Social Security and Medicare to make sure that seniors and the disabled do not go back to impoverished lives and dying in back bedrooms. We need to protect retirements for those who can no longer work.

We need to protect the world we live on by doing what science demands to clean our air and water and minimize the disruption of climate change. We need to maximize the use of renewable energy sources to stop the use of fossil fuels.

We need to value those who work by providing safe working environments, family supporting wages and benefits, collective bargaining rights and reasonable working conditions. Family and medical leave policies must recognize the importance strong families play in productive work.

We need strong public schools that support and educate every child to the best of their individual abilities so they can become productive and intelligent members of our communities. We need to recognize that professional and well-supported teachers are critical to the success of their students and compensate our educators accordingly.

We need to finally recognize and promote the equality of women in the workplace and the rest of society by guaranteeing equal pay for equal work and equal access to opportunity. We need an end to sexual harassment and assault everywhere.

We need to end income inequality and value each member of the community for the contribution they can make. The value of one’s opinions should not depend upon the amount they have in the bank. Everyone should be eligible to and encouraged to vote in fair elections. Election districts must be drawn to encourage competitive elections, not to favor incumbent politicians.

We need to expand protections for America’s natural wild areas and make them accessible for all to see and enjoy. Our National and State Parks are the envy of the world and need to be expanded.

We need a return to respectable diplomacy that respects other countries and their cultures and does not seek to impose American values by might.

2018 is the year we can restore the democracy to end the one party rule that favors the few over the many, but only if you vote. Those who stay home elect tyrants and dictators.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney who serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.

End One Party Rule

The Alabama Miracle

If they can do it, we can too

We witnessed a political miracle this week when traditionally Republican Alabama voters elected a Democrat to the United States Senate. The demographics of the Alabama areas that shifted political allegiances are fascinating. Many who voted for Donald Trump in the last presidential election switched parties to vote for Doug Jones.

African-American Alabama voters, who apparently stayed home in the last cycle, came out in droves to vote for Doug Jones. They saw through Moore’s racially charged speeches and resisted at the polls. They joined the many disaffected white moderates and independents that voted for Trump and soon saw how he and the GOP sold them out. They were not going to be duped again.

Many will claim that Roy Moore lost because he was a deeply and personally flawed candidate. That he was, but a lot of white, Evangelical Alabama Christians voted for him anyway. They were willing to look past Moore’s accusers who credibly claimed his sexual predilections for young girls, believing instead his professed belief in a Christian God and claims to biblically based racial superiority. For these supporters, his condemnation of abortion and same sex marriage and orientation coupled with his belief that slavery was a hallmark of a great society showed that he shared their moral values.

That President Trump came to embrace Roy Moore in order to salvage his failing efforts to get the GOP tax reform scam through the United State Senate was not enough to swing the election to Moore. Trump’s public support and robo call for Moore appears to have turned the election into a referendum on Trump’s presidency, a presidency has the lowest approval rating of any president in modern American history. Those who might have been willing to close their eyes and vote for Moore were probably pushed to vote for Jones or write in someone else when they realized they would also be supporting a very unpopular and unpleasant president and his failing agenda.

Steve Bannon, the outcast braggart of the alt-right, could not rescue Moore’s candidacy either. Try as he might to rally the white supremacist Alabama Klu Klux Klan believers to support to Moore’s campaign, it was not enough. Bannon’s resort to scare tactics showed he has lost whatever teeth he had when Moore lost. Bannon’s endorsements have now rightly become the kiss of death for anyone seeking political office.

In the end, the Alabama Senate election exposed just how far down into the sewer the alt-right majority in the GOP was willing to go to advance their corrupt agenda. It also showed there is great hope for good Democratic candidates with a message of working together to solve common problems.

Doug Jones has solid government service credentials and a proven record of standing up for justice and equality. He celebrates Alabama’s diversity and brought together a winning coalition of African-Americans, Latinos, middle and working class whites, all of who were undeterred by GOP voter suppression tactics. Without a strong state Democratic Party, he put together a great grass roots campaign that reached into every corner of Alabama with his positive message of inclusion and improving the lives of working families.

The baffling part of the Alabama election is why so many white women and men who call themselves Evangelical Christians supported Moore so fervently. Given the credible accusations of sexual misconduct in his past, I do not understand Moore’s support by so many women. Given Trump’s failures to deliver on his many promises to help white middle and working class men, I find it difficult to understand why they continue to vote against their economic interests. Perhaps his messages of racial superiority and religious purity were enough to blind these voters to the loss of their healthcare insurance, destruction of public education and steep cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security looming on the horizon.

The Alabama election outcome has reinforced resistance to the GOP agenda. Solid Democratic candidates are stepping up to offer meaningful alternatives to that agenda in traditionally republican strongholds, including our own. Just in Washington County, there are two Democrats running for seats in the Assembly.

Dennis Degenhardt, the newly retired CEO of Glacier Hills Credit Union, is running in the special election for the 58^th Assembly seat in January. His campaign stresses fiscal responsibility to fix crumbling infrastructure, healthcare as a right not a privilege, support for increased funding for public education, a re-examination of the Foxconn fiasco and working hard for everyday people and their concerns. Learn more at degenhardtforassembly.com

Chris Rahlf is running a strong campaign for the 60^th Assembly seat, stressing healthcare, public education and infrastructure repair with a return to leadership that listens. Chris is already pounding the pavement in anticipation of her 2018 election in the eastern parts of Washington County. Learn more at chrisrahlfforassembly.com

If you are tired of one-party control of our government, there is an alternative and that is bringing back two-party cooperation to address mutual concerns. Alabama has shown the way, it is now up to us.

Waring Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.

Graham-Cassidy will Kill People

Trumpcare 3.0 will kill people

Single-payer deserves consideration

Just when you thought that the health insurance you could finally afford under the Affordable Care Act was finally safe, two heartless and downright cruel Senators bring up one last repeal and replace bill with the sole justification being, “that’s what we campaigned on.”

The latest edition of Trumpcare 3.0 is decidedly worse than any of its predecessors when measured by the damage done to the 25-35 million people stripped of health insurance, those stripped of basic healthcare all together and the families who will have to pick up the care costs for their young, disabled or elderly parents. All this on top of further restrictions on reproductive healthcare and reductions in other healthcare programs for women

The Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill is being ramrodded through the Senate by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who will stop at nothing to undo everything the Black former president put together. They need to get it done before the end of next week when the Senate rules revert back to a 60 “yes” vote requirement for any bill to pass.

Putting the bill together behind closed doors with no public, much less Democratic, input or review, it is being cast as a choice between states rights and the dreaded socialism of the government run single-payer Medicare for All healthcare system gaining increased public support daily. It is being rushed to a vote, before the Congressional Budget office can complete its review and provide the impartial numbers on the damage it will do and the costs involved. It is a true pig in a poke.

What we know is that Graham-Cassidy will roll back Medicaid expansion that gave 14 million Americans health insurance coverage for the first time. The rest of Medicaid, care for the elderly in nursing homes, the disabled, young people in poverty and others, will also be trimmed and converted into lump sum payments to the states with insignificant controls on how each spends the funds allotted creating 50 different healthcare systems for the sickest and most vulnerable. The savings will go to fund GOP tax cuts for the wealthiest and corporations who need them the least.

With insurers being allowed to charge sick people more, health insurance premiums for those still covered will skyrocket. With the elimination of required coverage for pre-existing conditions, the cost of insurance will quickly rise to levels that most Americans cannot afford. One analysis puts surcharges, in addition to the regular premiums, for opioid addicts and those with rheumatoid arthritis at $20,000, $50,000 more for those with serious heart conditions, and over $140,000 for those with metastatic cancer. Another puts a $4500 surcharge on asthmatics, $17,300 on pregnancy and a $72,000 bump on lung cancer.

The state block grants would punish the Democratic states that took Medicaid expansion dollars and reward the GOP states that did not. States receiving the grants will be allowed to apply for waivers from many of the Affordable Care Act requirements that the bill does not repeal directly. If you need a service not covered, you will have to pay for it. ACA premium subsidies will be phased out by 2020. The slow death of federal healthcare funding will continue to 2027 when all federal dollars for the nation’s health will cease.

The deadlines for figuring out your insurance for next year loom. Insurers must sign final contracts for 2018 by the end of next week. If ACA subsidies vanish next year, premiums will explode.  ACA enrollment starts November 1^st. The new bill will eliminate the requirement for everyone to have insurance or pay a penalty. With that gone, many believing themselves to be healthy might not buy insurance at all. That too will drive up premiums as insurers scramble to cover a larger pool of sick people with fewer premium dollars.

Even with the developmental secrecy, negative reaction to the latest

Trumpcare has been swift and severe. Governors from both parties have condemned the bill. The American Medical Association, AARP, the America Hospital Association, most of the major disability advocacy groups, and representatives from just about every significant healthcare organization have urged Congress to reject the bill. Health insurers oppose it too. All 50 of the state Medicare directors oppose it too.

The three holdout GOP Senators’ objections to Trumpcare 1.0 and 2.0 have not been addressed in the new legislation. Hopefully, they will continue to stand up for their constituents like all of the Democrats in the Senate who will vote “no.”

This bill must fail, paving the way for serious consideration of a universal single payer system similar to those used for decades by most of the countries on the rest of the planet. It is time to stop the madness spawned by hatred of all things Obama and for bi-partisan solutions for America’s health.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the disabled and the elderly.

Predatory Healthcare

Predatory Healthcare Pricing

“Because I Can”

Remember Martin Shkreli? He is the New York vulture capitalist who bought the drug company that makes EpiPens, inexpensive devices that can save your life if you get stung by a bee and go into anaphylactic shock. That would have been acceptable, except that Shkreli then jacked up the unit price five hundred plus percent, putting Epi-Pens out of reach of many who need them. His justification essentially was “I did it because I can.” He instantly became the poster child for all that is wrong with American healthcare.

If you think predatory healthcare pricing is limited to big cities in the East, let me introduce you to Ascension Senior Living, a Catholic healthcare system that provides long term care to the elderly, especially those with debilitating diseases like Dementia, Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s and other independence robbing cognitive maladies.

Those who have lost the freedom to come and go to the fog of brain disease or injury are often placed in long term care facilities called “assisted living” or “memory care” units when they can no longer safely be cared for in the community. Those confined to these facilities who have no money or limited incomes can receive government assistance, usually funded by Medicaid, to pay the cost of their care.

If your grandmother was able to amass some retirement savings before becoming afflicted with memory loss or the ability to make rational decisions and has to be placed in “assisted living,” there is no government assistance until her savings are depleted, so she pays the full cost of her care until her money is gone.

Most “assisted living” facilities accept both Medicaid funded and private pay residents. Both are supposed to receive the level of care appropriate to their individual needs without respect to who pays the bills. The rates charged to Medicaid funded residents are regulated by state and federal rules. The rates charged to those who pay their own way are not.

In my retirement, I work part-time providing guardianship services by court appointment for those suffering from diseases that impair their ability to make decisions on their own and need someone to make fundamental decisions to make sure they receive adequate care and treatment. Guardians can also be appointed to manage the financial assets for those in their charge. Guardians must follow an objective standard with respect to decisions made for their wards, both personal and financial, that requires them all to be made with the ward’s “best interest” as the foremost consideration.

In these dual roles as a guardian, I am responsible for an 80 plus year old person with dementia who has been placed at Alexian Village, an “assisted living” facility in Northern Milwaukee County, for several years. My ward’s condition is stable and no one anticipates that the level of care provided by Alexian Village staff will increase substantially in the near future. The level of care and the quality of life provided has been excellent. Because my ward has money saved, the rate charged by the facility for services provided was about $5,400 per month, which is average for similar facilities in the area.

Ascension Senior Living recently purchased Alexian Village. The new owners decided that they needed a greater profit margin from Alexian. In order to justify rate increases, they came up with an 11 page assessment questionnaire that purports to measure how much staff time a resident will need to receive the care they need. After “assessing” my ward, without my knowledge or consent, the new managers decided that my ward was on “Level Two” and would be required to pay an additional $1,200 per month.

The problem with this 20+% bump, $14,000 more per year, is that Alexian Village is not going to provide any additional services or staff time to my ward for these additional payments. After I complained about the arbitrary and unconscionable increase, the regional vice-president asked for a meeting where they announced they had recalculated the assessment and figured out my ward was really at “Level One,” lowering the additional payment for the same level of service to a mere $800 more per month or $9,600 more per year. The justification offered amounted to little more than a Shkreliesque, “Because we can.”

Ascension management knows they have a captive and vulnerable population. They know it would be terribly disruptive and damaging for those in their care to be uprooted from all they currently know and moved to a more reasonably priced facility. Ascension raised the unregulated rates for those who can pay just to turn a larger profit.

If you need to start looking for “assisted living” for an elderly parent or grandparent, consider anyplace else other than Alexian Village or any other facility connected to Ascension Senior Living. Their pricing philosophy is anything but Christian and they do not seem to care. Shkreli would be proud, but probably say they did not raise the rates enough.

Waring R. Fincke is a retired attorney and serves as a guardian for the elderly and disabled.