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Health Care and its related industries are all over the Fortune 500. Folks are making a fortune controlling who lives and who dies in America. PFIZER is #6, and United Health Group is #21, with revenues over 71 billion a year now. It's Social Darwinism at its finest. And what's wrong with that?, you may well ask. This is a capitalist country after all, not a socialist one. Right? That's right, Jack. And don't you forget it. Problem is, when it comes to a few bottom-line survival issues like pensions and housing, we've decided in the past that it's better to help people eke out an existence, rather than have starving, diseased beggars cluttering up the streets like they do in Calcutta, or have people doing home amputations on their kids to improve begging revenues like they do in Mexico. Henry Ford was famous for saying, "If my workers can't buy my cars, what's the point?", but that statement dated to a time when a car was both made and sold in America. My question is this: in a Global economy, will the fate of individual Americans have even that much impact on Corporate decision-making? I don't think it will. I think that if we want to keep our society decent and safe we must do it ourselves. The more the corporations become based in the Third World, the less they will care about what goes on here. It's up to us, the American People, to bring about necessary, humane changes to our social structures, and not rely on the all-poweful Market Forces to do it. I tink we will do it because we want a decent country. I think we will do it when we get sick of seeing companies like CIGNA basically give the thumbs-down to someone's daughter simply because it doesn't mesh well with their bottom line. I think we will do it because we're tired of having doctors who get their Continuing Medical Education from the Drug Companies, and are heavily invested in rings of Procedure clinics that tout one company's 'latest fad marvel' over another's. I think we're tired of having half the FDA on Pfizer's or Monsanto's (or equivalent's) payroll. Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. When have you last seen a Corporation provide that? Instead, they try to convince you that Happiness is the latest widget, that Life is the perogative of Those Who Can Pay, and that Liberty ain't all it's cracked up to be if you aren't driving the latest model and eating at the latest fashionable restaurant. You decide, America. I hope you decide right.
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