Middle Class Czar Joe Biden Hosts Exclusive "Stripped Dignity" Panel

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-2Truthy
(Special thanks to Sly and the Family Stone)

Middle Class Czar Joe Biden on Stripping American Dignity

Washington – Vice President Joe “Middle Class Czar” Biden hosted a live webcast today with a panel of scholars to discuss the demise of American middle class citizens. Biden is chairman of the White House Task Force on Middle Class Families, established by President  Barack Obama earlier this year. The task force was created “to ensure the administration’s economic recovery effectively raises the living standards of middle-class families and those aspiring to be in the middle class.” The site invites questions for the Czar, and LWOH has a few below. (Yours truly likes Joe Biden and hopes he will succeed by using his gilded pulpit to not only give himself something self-important to do but to actually get results for the greater good of the non-hubris class...some of whom might actually take his Czar position in all of its grand regalia seriously.)

During the speech, Biden observed that “people have been stripped of their dignity” but insisted that the administration is not interested in redistributing wealth. (h/t Sam Stein.) Hmm. Is he talking about more labor arbitrage to”level the playing field” by reducing middle class incomes for educated citizens to cap at the paltry $40,00 per year range instead of doing the smart thing by reinstating the 91% tax rate and relieving us of U.S. corporate cheap labor junkies? Queried the Middle Class Czar:

"We aren't talking about income redistribution," he said. "We are talking about a fighting chance to make a decent income... it's about fairness. It is about simple fairness. It is about an equality of opportunity. At least that's what we are searching for. We are searching for that Holy Grail. How do we establish that level playing field?"

Back to the pressing questions for the Middle Class Czar. Let's start with electronic health records (EHRs) and the Democrats' curious refusal to bring Single Payer to the table and worse, their lust for sticking it to middle class Americans via a cost prohibitive mandated health insurance scam that will, in the words of Obama, stop middle class Americans who don't have insurance because they can't afford it from “gaming the system.” Why is the Obama administration so hell bent on forcing Americans to buy unaffordable health insurance and to subsidize the same corporate technocrats who pander to the cheap labor lobby that refuses to hire educated Americans in favor of cheap imported labor? Read more on this research from yours truly in this recent article Electronic Health Records (EHRs) No Cure-All.)

There's a gold rush in them thar hills, and a few technocrats smell a big, fat taxpayer-funded bonanza at the insufferable elitist BBQ pit – at the expense of the jobs and health of educated America's beaten down middle class. The creation and taxpayer subsidization of half-baked venture backed technologies is nothing new, but when it comes at the expense of health and jobs for middle class Americans, its forced expansion into the domain of health care providers has raised concern from some of the nations finest physicians and organizations. Indeed, the shake down on the nation's physicians is so mighty that even the Huffington Post's “Investigative Fund” has teamed with American University's Investigative Workshop in today's post entitled Stimulus fuels Gold Rush for Electronic Health Systems. (h/t Fred Schulte.)

What could Biden really do to represent middle class Americans? As U.S. taxpayers bankroll or subsidize private electronic medical records technology firms (many whose employees and contractors are not U.S. citizens but imported workers), a few elementary questions for Czar Biden include: “So, to the tune of an estimated $50 billion, where is our Single Payer health care bill?” And “Does Biden represent the portfolio class of corporate technocrats whose business plans revolve around kicking America's educated white collar middle class to the curb via offshoring/onshoring U.S. jobs to foreign workers?” Naturally, the next question is “What are you doing to stop these corporations from importing cheap labor so Americans can get back to work to pay for this craptastic, cost-prohibitive mandated coverage?” Finally “Since most doctors don't want these EHRs, why are you meddling?”

Of all the pressing needs that middle class Americans face today, access to a non-mandated, universal health care system and good paying jobs for its citizenry displaced by imported workers are most critical. Both issues are intrinsically related. Now that the Huffington Post's tentacles have finally gripped the ongoing research of yours truly regarding the stealth taxpayer funded EHRs diverting money from universal health care coverage for all, the corporate sponsored nature surrounding the “health care debate” appears to have much more to do with taxpayer funded, private corporate welfare sponsored growth than preserving health and avoiding financial ruin via a much overdue Single Payer health care system.

Schulte describes the voracious corporate sales push to hustle the same physicians that American middle class citizens depend upon to provide them health care here:

“A super group of major tech firms has banded together and hit the road with what they call a "stimulus tour" to boost sales. So far, the tour, which includes officials from Microsoft, Dell and Allscripts-Misys Healthcare Solutions, has played in more than 30 cities. It stops at local convention centers and hotels, where it holds seminars for doctors. Those who attend receive a "customized stimulus analysis of how much money your practice could earn in federal incentives."

Perhaps Czar Biden, in his role of middle class protectorate can explain how to bust up the toga party between this taxpayer funded, consumer driven private health care medical industrial complex and its evil twin, the American job sacking machine (h/t to EndH1B.com) to restore community and civility to our country's broken, for-profit government run by neo-frat boy corporate elites. Until Biden proves otherwise, that's the group our Middle Class Czar appears to represent.

-2Truthy