By Carter Bundy
Paul Krugman had a great line this week. One of the top “failures” anti-government extremists like Grover Norquist point to is
But Krugman points out that “the large majority of hip replacements in the
But our Decider-in-Chief is cocksure that only the private sector can deliver health care. So cocksure is W (is he ever not?) that he’s vetoing health insurance for poor kids, based on his rock-solid, blanket belief that the government is less efficient than the private sector.
But on health insurance, as with many other areas, not only is W’s confidence in private sector “efficiency” misplaced, but he forgets the value of transparency and accountability that are more easily found in the public sector.
Bank has done nothing to protect my credit
Wells Fargo has, for several years, been sending mail to my address for a woman with my last name. Don’t know her, never heard of her, no relation, yada yada ya.
When I accidentally opened a letter from Wells, there was a credit card in Ms. Bundy’s name (I won’t use her first name here for privacy reasons). I called the bank and they assured me that they would track her down and note the bad address. Please cut up the card. Done.
But a funny thing happened: Turned out Wells Fargo did about as much to protect my credit as the Houston Texans’ O-Line has done to protect David Carr. Translation: Nada.
Over two years, I continued to get mail for Ms. Bundy and continued calling Wells. Nothing. Finally, this week, Ms. Bundy received a notice from a collection agency. So I called Wells for the fifth time in two years and was routed to nine different people in the course of two hours. I was polite, but several phone center managers hung up knowing there’d be no repercussions, and twice I was “dropped” while being transferred.
Meanwhile, my credit may be getting dinged, and it’s only the recently-enacted credit protection bill from the Roundhouse that’s going to protect me – not Wells Fargo.
Grover’s recipe for disaster
Anytime something goes wrong at a government agency, we hear that “Government is evil.” That’s been the far right’s favorite mantra for the last 30 years. That and “Hurricanes are how Jesus punishes poor people.”
Wait for 15 minutes at the MVD, and the refrain is “the public sector is bad.” Ironically, Grover and his minions rant against MVD waits, and then demand more tax cuts for billionaires and lower MVD fees. You do the math.
But for some reason, when you can’t find help at a department store, nobody says “see, the private sector is jacked up.” It happens to every single one of us on a regular basis. Maybe this week it was at Sears, maybe last month it was at a car dealer or auto mechanic, maybe your cat food got recalled, maybe the contractor who did your deck left it wobbly. It happens.
The difference is accountability. It’s easy to get information about the agency with which you have problems. Not so with Wal-Mart. It’s easy to find the name of a public entity’s department director. Can you tell me the name of the Wells Fargo fraud center supervisor?
In the public sector, you can call a
As a last resort, you can elect someone else next election day.
By contrast, what am I going to do with Wells Fargo? I don’t even have an account with them, so it’s not even like I can take my business elsewhere. To paraphrase Joe Pesci, “they always XXXX you on the customer service line.”
Free immunization
Here’s a fun exercise for the next week: Every time you wait in line at a cell phone store, get a salesman who doesn’t know plasma from LCD or get XXXXXX at the drive-thru, say Pesci’s line. Clean it up if the kids are around, but actually verbalize it.
During the same week, make a mental note when your trash is picked up. Or as you get the mail. Or when you get running water from the tap and showerhead. And especially when your, ahem, solid waste goes out of your house with every flush.
All I ask is one week. Try it. I guarantee you’ll be surprised how often Grover and W’s blind faith in privatization disappoints, and how often the public sector delivers. The point isn’t that the private sector is always bad; it’s that some things are better done by the public sector, health insurance and credit protection being two of them.
The exercise may even immunize you from W’s contempt for kids’ health care.
Bundy is the political and legislative director for AFSCME in