US Presidential Election – The Health Care Blog

The Trump Healthcare Interview

Feb 14, 2016• 14

By IAN MORRISON

Donald Trump is leading in the polls and could become the Republican nominee and maybe even President. He has not been specific on healthcare. I asked Scottish-Canadian-Californian healthcare futurist Ian Morrison to conduct an interview with Trump, figuring that Morrison would have an in with Trump given Trump’s praise for Scottish and Canadian healthcare. Not entirely coincidentally Ian is my old boss & mentor and will be a keynote speaker at this Fall’s Health 2.0 conference–Matthew Holt

Ian Morrison: Thanks for making time Mr. Trump, I was asked to interview you on healthcare because I am Scottish and your mother was a Scot.

Donald Trump: Yes she was, a beautiful person. I love Scotland. I own Turnberry, the best golf resort in Europe. I built a magnificent new course near Aberdeen. The Scots love me, I get along with the Scots.

Morrison: Actually, Mr. Trump, with all due respect, they think you are a bit of an asshole and were offended when you told them not to build a wind farm off shore from your new golf course because you thought it would spoil the view for your American visitors.

Trump: (Angrily). Look, the problem with the Scots is they don’t win any more. When was the last time you won…Braveheart, right? When was that 1800 or something?

Morrison: 1305

Trump: See. Losers for 800 years. So don’t talk to me about the Scots winning.

Morrison: So why did you point to Scotland and Canada as good examples of healthcare.Continue reading…

Iowa Is Voting On Health Care Tonight

Feb 1, 2016• 61

By MARGALIT GUR-ARIE

flying cadeucii In his last State of the Union address, President Obama stated that “anyone claiming that America’s economy is in decline is peddling fiction”. I agree. The American economy has roared back from the Great Recession with 14 million new jobs, a ridiculously low unemployment rate, a booming stock market and 57 brand new American billionaires in 2015 alone.

The American people on the other hand are in a completely different boat. Almost a third of us are not working. Half of us have practically no savings and a record number is surviving on public assistance. Wages are stagnating and the middle class is shrinking. Student debt is skyrocketing and 20% of our kids live in poverty. Whereas in the immediate past the economy and the welfare of the people used to be one and the same, nowadays these terms have little if anything to do with each other.

The President did acknowledge that “the economy has been changing in profound ways” and therefore “a lot of Americans feel anxious”. To allay our collective anxiety, the President announced an unemployment program that will pay up to $10,000 to those who lose jobs to the economy fixing racket, money that can be used to retrain machinists, welders, builders and such, to flip burgers in the booming job market of the fixed economy. The anxiety reduction program will also ease the transition to a “work-sharing” economy, where lower wages and no benefits, augmented by public assistance, a.k.a. the Walmart and Uber models, are the new normal.