Donna Smith is best known as one of the documentary subjects of Michael Moore’s 2007 movie, "SiCKO." Her journalism career includes 15 regional awards from the AP Managing Editors. Donna now works as a national single-payer healthcare advocate and community organizer for the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, and co-chairs the Progressive Democrats of America’s national "Healthcare Not Warfare" campaign.
Hospital Forms Need a 'Bum’s Rush' Clause
The forms we all sign as patients before we are admitted to the hospital or have surgery are inadequate and inaccurate. You know the forms. Those “assumption of risk” and “assignment of benefits” forms that supposedly disclose all the things that might happen to you during care so that the ...
Who knew? The poor did, that’s who.
Last evening, Tavis Smiley hosted a program that was broadcast live on C-SPAN live and that focused for two-and-a-half hours on the issue of poverty in America. It was terrific. The energy and commitment of the experts assembled to investigate and help alleviate poverty made the conversation rich beyond anything ...
2011: A SiCKO’s Year in Review
Thought I might pile on the end-of-the-year reviews with a regular soul’s view of 2011 and a bit of a look forward to 2012. I claim no special standing or expertise other than life experience and perhaps a healthier than usual dose of good fortune when I compare 2011 with ...
Un-Happy Holidays for Seniors and the Disabled – Here’s Your Donut
It isn’t sugar plums dancing in their dreams for America’s seniors and disabled who are covered by the Medicare program. It’s donuts. Donut holes into which many fall at this time of the year as they reach the maximum limits of the first tier of “Part D” prescription drug benefits. ...
Occupying Love and Joy for Nataline
Every year for the past four years around this time, Nataline Sarkisyan’s parents build toward an unimaginable anniversary filled with sorrow and pain. On December 20, 2007, they lost their only daughter, 17-year-old Nataline to corporate greed and insurance company cruelty. Nataline died after the insurance giant CIGNA initially denied ...
Power in Numbers: Millions Crowd to Occupy Life
One of the most powerful and interesting things about the Occupy Movement is its reach well beyond Wall Street or even the smallest tent encampments around the nation. The power to bloom and spread has been in its simultaneously coordinated actions combined with the movement’s lack of demands on its ...
We Shall Be Ashamed No More in Silence – Rise Up
Those who launched the Occupy Wall Street movement that has now blossomed into the occupations around the nation have many to thank for their inspiration. Those brave souls who were and are a part of the Arab Spring, the hundreds of thousands who marched and rallied in Madison, Wisconsin, in ...
Protestors' Message Pretty Simple and Clear: Enough is Enough
No matter how the media folks seem befuddled by what they claim is a lack of clarity from those at the Occupy Wall Street and its solidarity events throughout the nation, I hear one clear and concise message from them all. I am not speaking for them, but I live ...
Keep It Simple, Keep It Real – Hundreds Arrested on Bridge as Hundreds Die at Home
Hundreds of Wall Street protestors were arrested yesterday on the Brooklyn Bridge. Even the mainstream media is reporting that. That in itself is a milestone. For many years, groups organized by one faction or one political party or one self-motivated organization or special interest or another have tried to grab ...
I Am Not Your Austerity Measure or Your Entitlement Cut
I am a woman, a mother, a grandmother, a wife. I am not an austerity measure – in Greece or in any other nation. I am a caregiver. I am a worker. I am a patient. I am a taxpayer. I am not an entitlement cut or a medical loss ...
It’s a Haunting Time for the WC
It’s nearly fall again. That means if we make it through October and Halloween and early November, the holidays and all the expectations will be bearing down on us again. But, wait, those years are long gone. I failed to meet the expectations. I couldn’t keep a home for us. ...
America 2011: Whack-a-Mole (or a Poor Person) for Pleasure, Profit and Power
America 2011: Whack-a-Mole (or a Poor Person) for Pleasure, Profit and Power By Donna Smith The front page of the New York Times this morning said it all for me. Right column: 2.6 million more join the ranks of the poverty-stricken in America. Center-right column: Democrats see the perils of cutting healthcare ...
Worker’s Ode to Labor Day 2011
Work ‘till you drop. Stop. Drop. Get up. Do it again.Work. Be grateful to be working. Work harder. Work ‘till you drop. Stop. Drop. Get up. Do it again.Give up time with growing children. Work. Keep bills paid. Years pass. Chances pass.Work ‘till you drop. Stop. Drop. Get up. Do ...
The Hurricane’s Eye Wall: Andrew to Irene
As the early rain bands of Hurricane Irene inch into my neighborhood this morning, I am caught off guard by the flood of terror and emotion surfacing for me that is disproportionate to the impending threat (at least at this moment). The memories of the pain and the fear spent ...
Hurricane Irene: Finally A Jobs Plan We Can Believe In
While our friends on the left coast are chuckling about Tuesday’s 5.8 on the Richter scale earthquake on the East Coast and its apparent lack of sufficient disaster drama on the Hollywood scale, tens of millions of us are gearing up for Hurricane Irene’s strike. From North Carolina to Maine, ...
This Un-Labor Day: Disasters Natural and "Un"
Not earthquake, not hurricane, not blizzard, not dark of night – no, it’s not the Postal Service, it’s the nurses you and I expect to be there for us and with us and among us when health disasters strike us without any warning or with as much lead time as ...
Nurses say: Come Join Us on September 1 on Main Street, Don’t Return to DC
Main Street, USA – Nurses call their neighbors and their elected officials to come to Main Street on September 1, even as many of the elected officials continue chiding one another about returning to DC. Main Street is where the damage has been done and is being felt most deeply; DC ...
How Many Dead Children for Profit?
To the right is a photo of a dead child from Pakistan, Syed Wali Shah, 7, that Michael Moore’s site featured when showing the continued prospects of civilian deaths attributable to U.S. drone strikes. Syed is one of 168 children killed in seven years of CIA drone strikes, said the ...
Financially Motivated Murder-Suicides Trumpet Silent Suffering
Twice in the past week, those of us who live in the metro Washington, D.C. – Baltimore corridor have seen reports about murder-suicides that had at least some component of causation related to the dead families’ money problems. In one instance, a single mother who was also a psychologist killed ...
Making Ourselves Sick with Their Worry? Not Any More
For some time now, my disabled and retired machinist husband has watched with amusement when stock markets crash and rebound and broad financial indicators stutter and stammer. He has lived a lifetime of economic stress and difficulty and never once has he seen his personal wealth or lack thereof be ...
Dysfunction Junction Kills – Resolution is Not Absolution
By the time this is published anywhere, maybe the dysfunctional folks in Washington, D.C., will have reached some sort of deal that will prevent the second financial apocalypse the American people and the world have been threatened with in less than three years. But just because the current crisis reaches ...
Gaslight 2011: Making Us Clamor for Our Own Demise
Michael Moore is hosting his film festival in Michigan this week, and I sure hope they are showing “Gaslight” from 1944. The American electorate would be wise to watch it again and to put into context the messages of our elected officials as they work us to do their bidding ...
Why It All Sounds Like, “Blah, Blah, Blah”
When push comes to shove everybody gets their political cover moments in Washington, DC. Everybody, that is, except the average working-class American. The sound and fury surrounding debt ceilings and deficit reduction swirl on multiple levels, activists in the conservative right claim advancement and activists in the disenfranchised liberal left ...
‘Let ‘Em Eat Peas’ Can Be the Modern Age Elitist Mantra
It has been a challenging week for many people. While our elected officials have been broadly reported to be at odds about exactly how to raise the debt ceiling or not, millions of Americans have no work, are running out of ways to keep their homes – rented or owned, ...
Patients in the United States have known for a long time that they are not the decision makers in matters related to their personal health and well-being. Just as for-profit corporate interests control elections, candidates, public officials, policies and enforcement, for-profit health insurance companies control healthcare delivery. So when a ...
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January 25th, 2012
Hospital Forms Need a 'Bum’s Rush' Clause
The forms we all sign as patients before we are admitted to the hospital or have surgery are inadequate and inaccurate. You know the forms. ...
January 13th, 2012
Who knew? The poor did, that’s who.
Last evening, Tavis Smiley hosted a program that was broadcast live on C-SPAN live and that focused for two-and-a-half hours on the issue of poverty ...
December 31st, 2011
2011: A SiCKO’s Year in Review
Thought I might pile on the end-of-the-year reviews with a regular soul’s view of 2011 and a bit of a look forward to 2012. I ...
December 19th, 2011
Un-Happy Holidays for Seniors and the Disabled – Here’s Your Donut
It isn’t sugar plums dancing in their dreams for America’s seniors and disabled who are covered by the Medicare program. It’s donuts. Donut holes into ...
December 12th, 2011
Occupying Love and Joy for Nataline
Every year for the past four years around this time, Nataline Sarkisyan’s parents build toward an unimaginable anniversary filled with sorrow and pain. On December ...
November 19th, 2011
Power in Numbers: Millions Crowd to Occupy Life
One of the most powerful and interesting things about the Occupy Movement is its reach well beyond Wall Street or even the smallest tent encampments ...
October 30th, 2011
We Shall Be Ashamed No More in Silence – Rise Up
Those who launched the Occupy Wall Street movement that has now blossomed into the occupations around the nation have many to thank for their inspiration. ...
December 24th, 2009
A Patient’s View of the Senate Christmas Healthcare Gift
So, all the great fanfare and all the king’s horses. The great and almighty U.S. Senate has spoken. I will have to buy private health ...
July 15th, 2011
‘Let ‘Em Eat Peas’ Can Be the Modern Age Elitist Mantra
It has been a challenging week for many people. While our elected officials have been broadly reported to be at odds about exactly how to ...
September 5th, 2011
Worker’s Ode to Labor Day 2011
Work ‘till you drop. Stop. Drop. Get up. Do it again.Work. Be grateful to be working. Work harder. Work ‘till you drop. Stop. Drop. Get ...
January 11th, 2010
White House Believes “Liberal Angst” Over Healthcare Will Go Away
Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide ...
January 8th, 2011
The budget crisis in Arizona means the Republican Governor Jan Brewer and her Republican legislature have decided some death is preferable to more debt. Human ...
August 10th, 2011
Financially Motivated Murder-Suicides Trumpet Silent Suffering
Twice in the past week, those of us who live in the metro Washington, D.C. – Baltimore corridor have seen reports about murder-suicides that had ...
July 26th, 2011
Gaslight 2011: Making Us Clamor for Our Own Demise
Michael Moore is hosting his film festival in Michigan this week, and I sure hope they are showing “Gaslight” from 1944. The American electorate would ...
Home Front: Portraits from Sheikh Jarrah
Mike, was the triple overtime Outback Bowl come-from-behind win the greatest Spartans game ever?
Yes -- or at least it will be until their appearance in next year's Rose Bowl, a game which... Continue Reading
Michael Moore on Conan, 12/7/11
Michael Moore on The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, 11/21/11
Michael Moore on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, 11/15/11
Michael Moore on The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, 11/9/11
