I heard the train whistle tonight

[The Straight Story]

I used to play at the train trestle over the creek with my friends. My best friend I played there with was Scott.

So many memories. Hearing that train tonight made me cry. I hear it all the time now, ignore it mostly, but for some reason tonight it hit me hard.

When Scott was 27 I was back here in Ohio (was living in CA at the time) and he was in a bad car accident. Hit the guardrail, laid in the hospital and basically bled to death.

That train whistle - we used to hear it while we played down at the tracks. Made a movie there in 8mm. Had many a good times there.

When he got in the accident and I got the call I did not think at all about health care. He was injured and was rushed to the hospital. I still remember that day and night clearly. As do so many others here who knew him.

Looking back I guess I was a little naive about things. You were injured (sick, have cancer, etc and so on) and I never really (back then) thought about whether or not you would be cared for.

No idea what insurance he had back then. Did not care to even ask or wonder about it.

There are people here in the US who are not in car wrecks. They have people that love them and need them. And they are dying not because of a massive injury, but because they are just not deemed worthy of care. Money is involved, investors, stocks, etc.

Tonight while I am typing this, and ranting on other threads about some things, someone is dying and leaving behind loved ones over money. Cash. Dollar bills that the people in high positions gladly let go of for a bowling alley in their basement, or happily part with by stuffing said money down the pants of someone in a strip club.

"Don't worry, if it is an ER case we will handle it" they tell us, all the while there are people passing away over not being able to get treatment or tests they need because some feel it may not be warranted and it may cut into their profit.

Go to war and die for us, work your ass off and get no care, while we in power get all that we need and want.

Who are YOU that you are worth so little to the people in power? We give them health care, passes on going to wars they promote, and in the end they pour their wealth into stocks that make them even more wealthy.

They gain, they win, and what do we get? No health care and wars.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. Perfectly and beautifully said...

K&R

:cry:

:hug:

[HillbillyBob]

2. Very well said.

From Dec 94-April 95 I attended 16 funerals of friends who had died of HIV/AIDs I can't even remember the names now, because it is so painful to remember how sick I was too and the horrid Phelps family were picketing most of them. There have been a lot more funerals, I had kept pictures and obit notes in a photo album that got gone when packed in a box to move house in late 96. Its like PTSD I still wake from night mares crying.

There were so many funerals before then, days spent sitting at a hospice waiting , trying to do some things to help or just be company.

All this teabagging shit from the reichwingers just brings back all that pain and anguish since it was the same pricks that claimed they were Christian and that us homos deserved to die for flouting gawds will.

I am sorry to make this about me, its not just me, its that I have seen the need all for universal care since my first friends started to die in 1983. We had a roomie who started locking himself in his room, dropping weight finally he was vomiting and some times bloody vomit, we got him to the hospital and they did not want to treat him because we did not have his proof of insurance(the ins co denied payment too). The put him in an isolation room and pretty much let him die alone.

[KelleyKramer]

3. well done!

KnR

[demodonkey]

4. Rec #15.

I have no insurance and as much as I care for my fellow human beings it has started to hit me hard lately that a lot of people in my country simply do not think I am worthy of living.

In return I am starting to sometimes think that maybe we, as a nation, are not worthy of fair and accurate elections and why have I been knocking myself out for years to protect the votes of people who would see me dead with nary a second thought.

So far I have been able to talk myself down every time; I still believe in humanity and its greater good and higher ideals, but as time passes this gets harder and harder and harder..........

:cry:

[Laelth]

7. Same here. Many people on this site, in fact, will call us freeloaders.

Because we can't afford insurance.

Why should I bother fighting for these people. :shrug:

:dem:

-Laelth

[The Straight Story]

8. These same people who don't want their money going for health care, want our kids to go to war

On the backs of us all. Our taxes pay for their defense, and they readily accept that as something for 'the common good'. But when we say more die from lack of health care here in the US than terrorist attacks and such, they just clam up or claim we want socialism, etc and so on.

We are a Super Power in terms of military because we have spent so much, we can be a super power in terms of health care as well - but some fight against that and I have to wonder WHY??

Defense spending keeps going up, but care for our citizens is always a major battle.

The wealthy have the care they need, the congress does, state legislators do as well, and they all also have our money for defense.

And we get what? Endless debates on the merit of care and paying for it? Banks need money, we toss it to them quickly and with little to no over site.

We the people seem to be more expendable each day, while money is something to be cherished and worshiped.

Money, as the old saying goes, IS the root of all evil.

[TexasObserver]

5. "Daddy, what was it like to ride a train?"

--- Johnny Cash

Trains are awesome for traveling through beautiful country, particularly mountains.

[Laelth]

6. k&r for the truth. n/t

:dem:

-Laelth