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America's First Terror War
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Today's Stories May 25, 2007 Robert Jensen David Vest John Stauber Evelyn Pringle Corporate Crime Reporter
Franklin Lamb Corporate Crime
Reporter Robert Fantina Norman Solomon Dave Lindorff Sen. Russell
Feingold Fred Gardner Mike Whitney Kevin Parsneau, Arjun Chowdhury
and Mark Hoffman Caroline Paul Eva Liddell Website of
the Day
Patrick Cockburn Rev. William
Alberts Joe DeRaymond Sudhanva Deshpande
Paul Craig Roberts Glen Ford Rannie Amiri China Hand Zoe Blunt Nivien Saleh Website of the Day
Robert Fisk Joshua Frank Harvey Wasserman David Mos Masumoto Sonja Karkar Conn Hallinan Dave Lindorff Jeffrey Kolakowski Evelyn Pringle Jim Baumer Website of the Day
Patrick Cockburn Nicole Colson John Ross Stephen Fleischman M. Shahid Alam Ron Jacobs Peter Rost, MD Alan Farago Paul Buchheit Website of
the Day
May 19 / 20, 2007 Andrew Cockburn Uri Avnery Peter Gelderloos Saul Landau Robert Fantina Fred Gardner Ralph Nader Jean Daniels Reza Fiyouzat Missy Beattie Robert Alvarez Sonja Karkar Dave Lindorff Jeff Sher Julian C. Holmes Clancy Sigal Prairie Miller James Murren Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend
May 18, 2007 Adam Jones Sharon Smith Christopher Brauchli Peter Rost,
MD Denise Maloney Pictou David Swanson Ali Khan Susan Rosenthal,
M.D. Samer Assad CP News Service Website of the Day
May 17, 2007 Tariq Ali Yifat Susskind Dave Zirin Brian J. Foley W. John Green Eric Johnson-DeBaufre Badruddin Khan Martha Rosenberg China Hand Dan Vojir Website of the Day
Patrick Cockburn Ashley Dawson Joshua Frank Corporate Crime
Reporter Ray McGovern Glen Ford Joe Bageant Sonja Karkar Mickey S. Huff John Chuckman Kaz Dziamka Website of
the Day
May 15, 2007 Michael Neumann Patrick Cockburn Ashley Smith Marc Gardner Dave Lindorff Ben Terrall Ron Jacobs Harvey Wasserman Marcus Mabry Dr. Susan Block Website of the Day
May 14, 2007 Jennifer Roesch Jeffrey St.
Clair George Bisharat Diane Wachtell Ramzy Baroud Rosemary and
Walter Brasch Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed Roberto Rodriguez Jonathan Culp Website of
the Day
May 12 / 13, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Patrick Cockburn Jeffrey St. Clair Diane Farsetta Ralph Nader Jean Bricmont Marcus Breen Joe Bageant Conn Hallinan Fred Gardner Juan Santos
Eve Bachrach Missy Comley
Beattie Ron Jacobs Niranjan Ramakrishnan Susie Day Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend May 11, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Kathleen Christison Mike Ferner John Holt Laurie Hasbrook Christopher
Brauchli Margaret Kimberley Dave Lindorff Nicole Colson John V. Walsh Website of the Day
May 10, 2007 Tariq Ali Patrick Cockburn Neve Gordon Marjorie Cohn David Rosen Alan Farago John Hellman Kathy Rentenbach BANCO Richard Rhames Website of the Day
Jeff Leys Patrick Cockburn Glen Ford Paula Rothenberg Kathryn Weber John Chuckman Jordan Flaherty Dave Lindorff Stephen Lendman Website of
the Day
May 8, 2007 Dave Lindorff Patrick Cockburn Corporate Crime Reporter Ralph Nader Malini Johar Schueller Juan Santos Dave Zirin Joshua Frank Evelyn Pringle Eamonn McCann Website of the Day
May 7, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Monica Benderman Greg Moses Rannie Amiri Fitrakis / Wasserman Fred Wilhelms Ramzy Baroud Bruce K. Gagnon T. W. Croft Sonja Karkar Website of the Day
Alexander Cockburn William Blum Uri Avnery Franklin Lamb Fred Gardner Lawrence R.
Velvel Missy Beattie Robert Fantina Carla Blank Linn Washington,
Jr. Stephen F. Jackson P. Sainath Anthony Papa James T. Phillips John Ross Stephen Lendman Ben Terrall CounterPunch
Newswire Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend
May 4, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Col. Dan Smith Norman Solomon Azmi Bishara Ron Jacobs Dave Lindorff Kevin Zeese Bob Fitrakis Janet Kauffman Website of
the Day
May 3, 2007 Jeff Halper Christopher
Brauchli Dave Zirin Corporate Crime
Reporter Robert Fisk Mike Ferner Mike Whitney Pham Binh Dave Lindorff Michael A.
Johnson Website of the Day
May 2, 2007 Saul Landau Dr. Susan Block Carla Blank Margaret Kimberly Kevin Zeese Carlos Villareal Michael Dickinson Tim Shorrock Alevtina Rea William S.
Lind Website of the Day
Andrew Cockburn Fred Gardner Chase Madar Ralph Nader John V. Walsh Joshua Frank Leslie Radford Shaun Harkin Dave Lindorff Peter Rost,
MD Peter Linebaugh Website of
the Day
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May 25, 2007 Illness and InequalityWhat's Missing from the Health Care DebateBy SUSAN ROSENTHAL, MD The latest report by the Commonwealth Fund confirms what we already know; Americans pay more for health care and have poorer health compared with people living in nations that spend less on health care yet enjoy better health. It is generally assumed that lack of access to medical care is to blame for America's abysmal health statistics and that improved access will remedy the situation. This is mistaken. Lack of access is just one indicator of the social inequality that is driving America's health crisis. The myth that good health is a product of the health-care system was fueled by the expansion of the welfare state after World War II. The establishment of the British National Health Service (NHS) in 1948 was accompanied by improved population health and a reduction in the difference in death rates between the social classes. Politicians claimed that the NHS had produced these benefits, but later studies revealed that improved health follows a rise in the general standard of living and a reduction in class inequality, as occurred in Britain after the war. To investigate the link between health and inequality, researchers examined workers in the highly stratified British civil service. Despite all the subjects enjoying decent pay and equal access to health care, the risks of illness and premature death increased as one moved down the social hierarchy. These health differences were significant and could not be accounted for by differences in smoking, diet or exercise. Over the past 50 years, numerous studies have confirmed that social inequality is not only an independent factor in determining health, it is the most important factor. As social inequality increases, health deteriorates. This holds true for everyone living in an unequal society, not just those on the short end of the stick. In 1998, the American Journal of Public Health published a study comparing income inequality with death rates in 282 American cities. Greater inequality was associated with higher death rates at all income levels. Areas with the greatest inequality suffered 140 additional deaths for every 100,000 people per year compared to areas with the lowest inequality. The difference in death rates was comparable to the combined loss of life from lung cancer, diabetes, motor vehicle crashes, HIV infection, suicide and homicide. There is no consensus on why inequality is so health-damaging, but there is no longer any question that it is. Class inequality in the U.S. has risen steadily since the 1970s, when Corporate America pushed to raise productivity by driving down workers' living standards. The result has been growing inequality, deteriorating health and the emergence of poverty epidemics like HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis in the world's richest nation. The U.S. has the worst health statistics in the industrialized world because it is the most unequal society in the industrialized world. This inequality is the source of America's economic success and its continued position as global super-power. Forced to compete with the U.S., other industrialized nations including the U.K., Canada and the European Union are dismantling and privatizing their own national health-care systems.
In matters of health, Corporate America is caught between a rock and a hard place. Increasing productivity requires a basic level of fitness within the working class; however, paying for this in the form of higher wages, employee benefits or higher taxes decreases productivity. This conflict finds expression in the demand for a more effective health-care system and the failure to provide one. Simply arguing that the current system is unfair, ineffective and overly expensive will not be enough to break this stalemate. In the past, universal health care was won through mass struggle. Germany established the first European national medical plan in 1883 to avoid a revolutionary upheaval like the one that shook France in 1871. In Britain, the 1911 National Insurance Act was rushed through Parliament during a mass strike wave. In 1943, a Conservative member of the British Parliament warned, "If you don't give the people reform they are going to give you revolution." The British NHS was part of a social welfare program to stabilize relations between capital and labor after the war. Canadian unions won a national health plan in 1972, the year of the Quebec General Strike. In the U.S., the Congress of Industrial Organizations and the American Federation of Labor pushed for a national health program after World War II. The ruling class preferred to build the world's biggest military machine. America's Cold War with Russia provided the opportunity to attack the unions and gut them of militants. That defeat explains why there is still no labor party in the U.S. and no national health plan. The accumulation of profit at the top of society creates an accumulation of sickness at the bottom. No form of health-care system can reverse the health-damaging effects of rising inequality. The current debate on health-care must go beyond discussions of the best way to manage the carnage created by capitalism. At the Cannes screening of Sicko, Michael Moore states, "The bigger issue in the film is, 'Who are we as a people?'" Human health is not a commodity that can be churned out by the right kind of health-care system. Human sickness is a product of sick social relationships, and human health is a product of healthy social relationships. The quality of our medical system is a result and a reflection of those relationships. Dr. Susan Rosenthal has been practicing medicine for more
than 30 years and has written many articles on the relationship
between health and human relationships. She is also the author
of Striking Flint: Genora (Johnson) Dollinger Remembers the
1936-1937 General Motors Sit-Down Strike (1996) and Market
Madness and Mental Illness: The Crisis in Mental Health Care
(1999) and Power and Powerlessness.
She is a member of the National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981.
She can be reached through her blog: www.powerandpowerlessness.typepad.com
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The Gang's All Here: Judy Miller, Bob Woodward, Jeffrey Goldberg, Rupert Murdoch, Bill O'Reilly...End Times Leaves No Reputation Unstained!  Buy End Times Now! CounterPunch Books! Saul Landau's Bush and Botox World with a Foreword by Gore Vidal  Click Here to Order!  Michael Neumann's Devastating Rebuttal of Alan Dershowitz Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair           The Occupation by Patrick Cockburn            CITY BEAUTIFUL By Tennessee Reed        Bruce Springsteen On Tour By Dave Marsh                   |
