Introduction

At this time, December 2009, I am focusing on two main issue, one local, the other national. 

The issue I have worked on extensively is the  Health Care Reform Legislation in Congress, presently being debated in the Senate.  The most important of my essays are on this personal blog, Healthcare Beyond Partisanship     I have an extensive analysis here of the non-partisan report by the Chief Actuary of CMS, the Medicare Agency, How to bury a warning to 45 million people, that explains why you have probably never heard about it.   And for my own personal expanding essay of the defects of the bill, including numerous references, there is this Heath Care Reform-Reality Ignored. V.3.0


I've written numerous essays on this subject recently (called diaries) on Dailykos.com under the user name ARODB, intermixed with essays on various sundry other subjects.   One that is meaningful, was this review of a  article on Health Care Reform by the oldest liberal publication in America, Harpers Magazine

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The one that is local, but with perhaps the most enduring importance, deals with the tension between religion and secularism in our national life.  It takes the form of a symbol on a mountain top in San Diego, known as the Soledad Cross.  My website on this subject is Soledad War Memorial.  A columnist for the metropolitan area newspaper, the San Diego Union Trbune, Logan Jenkins, wrote this column that described my position,  Get a war memorial we don’t have to fight over

He included part of a letter that I sent him about my hope, one that I would like to see mature into a proposal, and then , God willing, a movement that reaches fruition:

In urging a crusade for a replacement of the Mount Soledad cross, Rodbell asked me to imagine “a soaring work of art, abstract enough to represent the force of religion, the toll of war and the aspiration for peace. It would be a small example to the city, the country and perhaps even the world that there are ways to transcend the limits of a given political system. … The hardpan of congealed conflict has to be plowed, which will take many passes; and then perhaps, just perhaps, a symbol the entire city could be proud of could grace the highest point of ‘America’s Finest City.’ ”

Logan even provided this fragile movement with a name and a goal:

Support the Evolution of the Soledad Cross. Peace on Earth.

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And on a lighter note, I've been somewhat involved in the discussion about the management of the Poinsettia Tennis Courts in Carlsbad, which I discuss here.

A Human Face to the Culture Wars

 Too often when we look across the chasm to that other side, we see the snarling faces of Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Glen Beck or perhaps Pat Robertson.  We quickly decide whether something is from the "Great Right Wing Conspiracy" and if so to be rejected out of hand without serious consideration.  

It's a bit different when the voice is from an 84 year old woman, Kitty Werthmann whose antipathy towards the left is based on her own experiences as a child when Hitler took over her native Austria.  I have a good friend, Bill S., a bright man of generous spirit, who at my request keeps me up to date on the viral email that he gets as a bonafide Christian Conservative.

I read most of them, and when I point out those that are fraudulent he sends my "correction" back down the email chain, hopefully having some effect on the most extreme accusations.  Recently I recieved one that is the  basis of this diary:  

The email that was sent to me is long, so I made it available here.  After I wrote some pointed criticisms, implying that the whole essay was fiction, my friend sent me this site, which showed the actual woman giving a long speech, 45 minutes, that the original letter fairly condensed.

I watched it carefully, taking notes, doing research; and I want to share my response, not only with my liberal friends here on Dailykos, but to Bill, whose fairness and good will continues to provide hope that our political divide can be productively bridged.

I'll intersperse my comments in italics to her excerpted letter:

America Truly is the Greatest Country in the World. Don't Let Freedom Slip Away
 By: Kitty Werthmann

What I am about to tell you is something you've probably never heard or will ever read in history books.

I believe that I am an eyewitness to history. I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history. We elected him by a landslide - 98% of the vote. I've never read that in any American publications. Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force. In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression. Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed. We had 25% inflation and 25% bank loan interest rates.

-she then describes her home life, her mother helping those in need.

The Communist Party and the National Socialist Party were fighting each other. Blocks and blocks of cities like Vienna, Linz, and Graz were destroyed. The people became desperate and petitioned the government to let them decide what kind of government they wanted.

-she then described how much better things were in Hitlers Germany adding:

Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group -- Jewish or otherwise. We were led to believe that everyone was happy.

-Here was my first gotcha, so I thought.  Surely Kristalnacht would have been widely publicized.  So, I did some research and while the statement was too broad, since the Nuremberg Laws that restricted Jewish participation in German Society had been promulgated in 1935.  But in almost all of Eastern Europe such restrictions were not uncommon.  And Kristalnach, the beginning of Nazi homicidal antisemitism, was still eight months in the future. 

I happen to have a yellowing copy of Liberty Magazine, one of the most popular publications in the U.S., of May 1938, probably written almost exactly at the time of the Anschluss  Here's the conclusion of an article by Edward P. Bell, that is mostly laudatory of Heir Hitler: 
 

I left convinced of his sincerity, his rectitude of intention, his high purpose according to his light.  The international danger, such as it is, arises from suspicion and fear and misapprehension and their ugly, formidable children, hated and swelling armaments.

This was the conclusion of an American mainstream publication, that it was not Hitler who was the danger to world peace, but those who overreacted to this sincere man. The writer, and supposedly the American people were satisfied with Hitler's answer to the question of the "Jewish Problem" which was, " we are not against Jews, we are for the Germans as Germans"

Around this same time, people such as Winston Churchill and John Maynard Keynes among many others spoke kindly of Hitler, especially when he was seen as the bulwark against Stalin, who was considered the far greater evil.  So, Ms Werthmann's memory of Hitlers persecution of his people was not beyond belief.

I can see that this process of critiquing all of Ms. Werthmann's essay here, and her video would make this much too long, so I invite readers to go to the links above if interested.    In the process of responding to her position, I actually have discovered that many of Adolf Hitler's social policies were somewhat similar to those of progressive Democrats. (*do not stop to flame this diary, but please continue to the end) 

This is something like asking, "Other than that Ms. Lincoln, how did you like the play?"  Every reader here looks back at Nazi Germany with knowledge of the horror it would inflict on the world, and finds it difficult to go much beyond that.  As an aside, I will reference this article: Nazi Medicine and Public Health Policy By Robert N. Proctor

The Nazis...supported many kinds of science, left politics (as we often think of it) out of most, and did not abandon ethics. There was an ethics of Nazi medical practice -- sometimes explicit, sometimes not.
snip-
The story of science under German fascism is not, as conventional wisdom would have it, only a narrative of suppression and survival; a truthful account will explain how and why Nazi ideology promoted certain areas of inquiry, and how projects and policies were championed or disappeared because of political considerations.

This article was not from Stormfront.com or even National Review, rather it is from the website of the Anti-Defamation League, an organization dedicated to fighting antisemitism.

While Ms. Werthmann does make some errors of fact, after some careful analysis, acknowledging that I am not highly versed in this specific history, I believe that her writing and speaking for the Republican party, now going on for some two decades, is based on her actual memories of events.

In a certain slice of the left right economic spectrum both Adolph Hitler and Barack Obama were believers in a left oriented mixed economy.  This means that both of them favored more government participation, even control, of some areas of life than those of the right.  In this narrow spectrum Adolph Hitler was a progressive.

Here, of course, is where the similarity ends, and Ms. Werthmann makes assumptions that such similarity means that those of the left have the same intention, are of the same mentality of Hitler.  She is very careful, never to say these exact words, but the allusions are obvious, as I will show in this example from her video:

In her essay she wrote

Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women. Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home. An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn't support his family

In the video she goes on to say that this caused women to be drafted to fight along with other soldiers (which I doubt) but what was telling is she referred to Hitler's new rights for women as "The equal rights amendment" which, of course, was a provision that would have amended the united states constitution.  It is highly unlikely that Hitler, who at the time was ruling by edict, needed an amendment of anything to do this. 

This is just one clear example that Ms. Werthmann has managed to seamlessly merge in her own mind the most heinous man of the twentieth century with any Democratic Leader, specifically at this time, President Barach Obama.  I believe that to her the actual fact that Hitler removed the crucifixes from the public schools, means that being opposed to Catholicism is the necessarily and sufficient condition for brutal dictatorship. The counter example of Spanish Dictator Francisco Franco, who as a defender of Catholicism ruled as an absolute dictator for over thirty five years does not interfere in this belief, since she benefits from the simplicity of her thinking.

Conclusion:

What is important is not so much this one person, but that what she says resonates with many in this country.  They know how one political leader promised his people everything, eliminated all organized opposition, and then destroyed their country, not to mention a good part of the rest of the world.

While many here on Dailykos, can't understand why Obama would not make health care a national program with the simplicity of single payer, or why he did not nationalize the banks that were no longer viable economic entities....the answer lies in Ms. Wertmann's speeches, and the reaction of them to a fairly large following----currently under the banner of teabaggers.  

Hitler did (to the best of my knowledge) actually nationalize the banks, and in Austria replaced private health insurance companies with British Style universal care.  And this was a surprise to me--he believed in an activist government that in other ways would protect the people (well, not all people) in promoting epidemiological studies and preventing use of tobacco  (See ADL article)

The ADL article linked above actually describes the positive aspects of Nazi governance and refutes the illusion that since the regime was the apotheosis of evil, that nothing about it could have been positive.  I doubt that such an article could have been written much before now, after those who lived through the Nazi horrors are mostly gone. 

What I can tell Bill, and Kitty, were she ever to read this, is that she misses the essential quality of Hitler, that his quest for power was built on hatred--- of Jews, victors of WWI, Slavs, and all of those whom he saw as inferior.  He happened to have emerged at a moment of great distress of the Germanic people.  He was enough of an intuitive master of the art of politics to marshal this suffering to his own ends.

Hitler's job was made easier by the degree of hatred, the vicious murderous state of the Kulturkamph, a permutation of our own culture war that currently is on low simmer.  Ms. Werthmann equating Obama to Hitler, does a disservice the her adopted country, that I'm sure she loves. 

While it didn't come in the person of the previous president, as many on this site were sure it would, nor will it come in the person of our current president; the constant drumbeat that lawful exercise of Presidential power is a precursor to tyranny creates a dire risk.  That is that healthy heated political dialog becomes the vehicle for rabid mutual hatred, resulting in the chaos that opens the door to tyrants that promises vanquishing one side or the other.

Nazism has not become the epitome of evil because Hitler promoted equality of women, universal health care or secular public education.  We may or may not endorse these policies.  He will forever be equated with evil because of a remorseless hatred that was divorced from reality.  Our country has been immune to such excesses because with all of our disagreements about policy, we have preserved a common set of values, mutual respect for those whom we disagree with, that precludes such hatred. 

I somehow sense that Bill may agree with me.  I only hope that Ms. Werthmann and her many followers could understand this also.  

Kitty Werthmann-Right Wing Spokesperson Extraordinary

1938 Austria

 

America Truly is the Greatest Country in the World. Don't Let Freedom Slip Away

 

By: Kitty Werthmann

 

What I am about to tell you is something you've probably never heard or will ever read in history books.

 

I believe that I am an eyewitness to history. I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history. We elected him by a landslide - 98% of the vote. I've never read that in any American publications. Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force. In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression. Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed. We had 25% inflation and 25% bank loan interest rates.

 

Farmers and business people were declaring bankruptcy daily. Young people were going from house to house begging for food. Not that they didn't want to work; there simply weren't any jobs. My mother was a Christian woman and believed in helping people in need. Every day we cooked a big kettle of soup and baked bread to feed those poor, hungry people - about 30 daily.

 

The Communist Party and the National Socialist Party were fighting each other. Blocks and blocks of cities like Vienna, Linz, and Graz were destroyed. The people became desperate and petitioned the government to let them decide what kind of government they wanted.

 

We looked to our neighbor on the north, Germany , where Hitler had been in power since 1933. We had been told that they didn't have unemployment or crime, and they had a high standard of living. Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group -- Jewish or otherwise. We were led to believe that everyone was happy. We wanted the same way of life in Austria . We were promised that a vote for Hitler would mean the end of unemployment and help for the family. Hitler also said that businesses would be assisted, and farmers would get their farms back. Ninety-eight percent of the population voted to annex Austria to Germany and have Hitler for our ruler.

 

We were overjoyed, and for three days we danced in the streets and had candlelight parades. The new government opened up big field kitchens and everyone was fed.

 

After the election, German officials were appointed, and like a miracle, we suddenly had law and order. Three or four weeks later, everyone was employed. The government made sure that a lot of work was created through the Public Work Service.

 

Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women. Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home. An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn't support his family. Many women in the teaching profession were elated that they could retain the jobs they previously had been required to give up for marriage.

 

Hitler Targets Education - Eliminates Religious Instruction for Children:

 

Our education was nationalized. I attended a very good public school. The population was predominantly Catholic, so we had religion in our schools. The day we elected Hitler (March 13, 1938), I walked into my schoolroom to find the crucifix replaced by Hitler's picture hanging next to a Nazi flag. Our teacher, a very devout woman, stood up and told the class we wouldn't pray or have religion anymore. Instead, we sang "Deutschland, Deutschland, Uber Alles," and had physical education.

 

Sunday became National Youth Day with compulsory attendance. Parents were not pleased about the sudden change in curriculum. They were told that if they did not send us, they would receive a stiff letter of warning the first time. The second time they would be fined the equivalent of $300, and the third time they would be subject to jail. The first two hours consisted of political indoctrination. The rest of the day we had sports. As time went along, we loved it. Oh, we had so much fun and got our sports equipment free. We would go home and gleefully tell our parents about the wonderful time we had.

 

My mother was very unhappy. When the next term started, she took me out of public school and put me in a convent. I told her she couldn't do that and she told me that someday when I grew up, I would be grateful. There was a very good curriculum, but hardly any fun - no sports, and no political indoctrination. I hated it at first but felt I could tolerate it. Every once in a while, on holidays, I went home. I would go back to my old friends and ask what was going on and what they were doing. Their loose lifestyle was very alarming to me. They lived without religion. By that time unwed mothers were glorified for having a baby for Hitler. It seemed strange to me that our society changed so suddenly. As time went along, I realized what a great deed my mother did so that I wasn't exposed to that kind of humanistic philosophy.

 

Equal Rights Hits Home:

 

In 1939, the war started and a food bank was established. All food was rationed and could only be purchased using food stamps. At the same time, a full-employment law was passed which meant if you didn't work, you didn't get a ration card, and if you didn't have a card, you starved to death. Women who stayed home to raise their families didn't have any marketable skills and often had to take jobs more suited for men.

 

Soon after this, the draft was implemented. It was compulsory for young people, male and female, to give one year to the labor corps. During the day, the girls worked on the farms, and at night they returned to their barracks for military training just like the boys. They were trained to be anti-aircraft gunners and participated in the signal corps. After the labor corps, they were not discharged but were used in the front lines. When I go back to Austria to visit my family and friends, most of these women are emotional cripples because they just were not equipped to handle the horrors of combat. Three months before I turned 18, I was severely injured in an air raid attack. I nearly had a leg amputated, so I was spared having to go into the labor corps and into military service.

 

Hitler Restructured the Family Through Daycare:

 

When the mothers had to go out into the work force, the government immediately established child care centers. You could take your children ages 4 weeks to school age and leave them there around-the-clock, 7 days a week, under the total care of the government. The state raised a whole generation of children. There were no motherly women to take care of the children, just people highly trained in child psychology. By this time, no one talked about equal rights. We knew we had been had.

 

Health Care and Small Business Suffer Under Government Controls:

 

Before Hitler, we had very good medical care. Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna . After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone. Doctors were salaried by the government. The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything. When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a. m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full. If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn. There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine. Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and emigrated to other countries.

 

As for healthcare, our tax rates went up to 80% of our income. Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household. We had big programs for families. All day care and education were free. High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized. Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing. We had another agency designed to monitor business. My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables. Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners. Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities. It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar. He couldn't meet all the demands. Soon, he went out of business. If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control.

 

We had consumer protection. We were told how to shop and what to buy. Free enterprise was essentially abolished. We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers. The agents would go to the farms, count the live-stock, then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it.

 

"Mercy Killing" Redefined:

 

In 1944, I was a student teacher in a small village in the Alps . The villagers were surrounded by mountain passes which, in the winter, were closed off with snow, causing people to be isolated. So people intermarried and offspring were sometimes retarded. When I arrived, I was told there were 15 mentally retarded adults, but they were all useful and did good manual work. I knew one, named Vincent, very well. He was a janitor of the school. One day I looked out the window and saw Vincent and others getting into a van. I asked my superior where they were going. She said to an institution where the State Health Department would teach them a trade, and to read and write. The families were required to sign papers with a little clause that they could not visit for 6 months. They were told visits would interfere with the program and might cause homesickness.

 

As time passed, letters started to dribble back saying these people died a natural, merciful death. The villagers were not fooled. We suspected what was happening. Those people left in excellent physical health and all died within 6 months. We called this euthanasia.

 

The Final Steps - Gun Laws: Next came gun registration. People were getting injured by guns. Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns. Most citizens were law abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms. Not long after-wards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns. The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily.

 

No more freedom of speech. Anyone who said something against the government was taken away. We knew many people who were arrested, not only Jews, but also priests and ministers who spoke up. Totalitarianism didn't come quickly, it took 5 years from 1938 until 1943, to realize full dictatorship in Austria . Had it happened overnight, my countrymen would have fought to the last breath. Instead, we had creeping gradualism. Now, our only weapons were broom handles. The whole idea sounds almost unbelievable that the state, little by little eroded our freedom.

 

After World War II, Russian troops occupied Austria . Women were raped, preteen to elderly. The press never wrote about this either. When the Soviets left in 1955, they took everything that they could, dismantling whole factories in the process. They sawed down whole orchards of fruit, and what they couldn't destroy, they burned. We called it The Burned Earth. Most of the population barricaded themselves in their houses. Women hid in their cellars for 6 weeks as the troops mobilized. Those who couldn't, paid the price. There is a monument in Vienna today, dedicated to those women who were massacred by the Russians. This is an eye witness account.

 

"It's true.. those of us who sailed past the Statue of Liberty came to a country of unbelievable freedom and opportunity.

 

America Truly is the Greatest Country in the World. Don't Let Freedom Slip Away

 

"After America , There is No Place to Go"

 

Here is the web site - I encourage you to go here to hear Kitty speak.  www. sdfamily.org/Kitty+Wetrthmann

Compassion Trumps Incoherency in the N.Y. Times

Compassion Trumps Incoherency in the N.Y. Times

I have great respect for Nicholas Kristof, for his courage and dedication to the hidden masses of those suffering in the villiages of embattled Africa.  He goes where few venture, to shine a light on the most shameful aspect of our twenty first century world.  His recent column of November 30 turned to something closer to home, the suffering caused by poor health care in America in this column, Are We Going to Let John Die?

If Joe Lieberman or other senators came across John Brodniak writhing in pain on the sidewalk, they presumably would jump to help him and rush him to a hospital.
Unfortunately, an emergency room won’t help — indeed, the closest E.R. has told him not to come back, he says. So, for those members of Congress who are wavering on health reform, listen to John’s story.

He continues on for the full column describing John Brodniak's young happy working man's life abruptly transformed by a debilitating painful growth in his brain.   His message is clear, if only those wavering Senators could see his suffering they would pass the Health Reform Bill without a moments hesitation.

In reading the comments to his article on line, I haven't come across one that challenges Mr. Kristof's argument.

I sent this letter to the Times that did so:

To the Editor:

Nicholas Kristof expresses in his column, that if only "those members of Congress who are wavering on Health reform" would vote for it, suffering of people like John would be cured.   Unfortunately, such pleas to our primal human compassion only obfuscate the task of transforming a health care system of unfathomable complexity.

Ignored in the drama of this human tragedy is the most simple contradiction, actually mentioned in the column, that the generic "insurance" that Kristof presents as John's solution is already available in the form of the Medicaid program that he qualified for.  So, the expansion of Medicaid in the passed House Bill, would create 24 million people who would be covered by insurance. but with the same fate as John.

We are wired for empathy for those who suffer, but not for dissecting the hundreds of inter-related clauses of legislation that promise relief, that when carefully inspected fail at its audacious goal.

Al Rodbell

Mr. Kristof knows that sending money to those African villages means nothing if there are no supplies or doctors to provide the treatments for those who are dying.   He understands, and explains, that it is difficult to blame starving parents for selling their children, so perhaps others can survive, no matter how horrendous the act is in isolation.

Yet, in this particular column  he seems not only trivialized the complexity of this reform, but actually ignored the very contradiction of his own words.   He has done what comes naturally to us humans, defined good as "Health Care Reform" and evil as those who oppose it,  ignoring that even in his chosen example, 24 million people will remain in the same situation as his exemplar of why the bill should be passed.  (to validate the above number see addendum table 2 on this report by the Chief Actuary of Medicare)

Somehow, I'm sure that my letter will not be printed.