Welcome to Suspicious Angels

Once upon a time a very large country found itself nestled between two great oceans which protected it from attack. As the self-described hegemon of the world, it was always on the lookout for real or imagined attacks (mostly imagined it must be confessed). Since its founding 250 years ago, it has been at peace less than 20 years, The present Secretary of Defense has rebranded himself the Secretary of War. To give you an idea of how war-obsessed its leaders are: for 2026, its defense budget is $1 trillion ($1.5 trillion in 2027). Curiously enough, it has not been able to win a war (with the exception of its “glorious” crusade against the 1,500 soldiers of the Granada military) since it helped defeat the Axis powers in 1945. Still, there’s no denying that it is a hydra-headed colossus with 800+ military bases around the world that threatens on a regular basis to rain death and destruction down on weaker countries either directly or through one of its proxies (Ukraine for example). Wait a minute with all this aggressive militarism, veterans must be revered and honored. Not exactly. Beyond a careless “thank you for your service” in the grocery store check-out line, most ignore the 33,000 veterans who are homeless every night in America.

It calls itself the United States of America but that’s a misnomer. With the highest rate of inequality among advanced nations, the majority of its people (the 99%) are united only by their misery— rising prices, an uncertain job market. rising inflation, health insurance premiums going through the roof particularly for 22 million Americans whose insurance premiums doubled or tripled as federal ACA subsidies expired (nationally 14% missed their January premium payment), and skyrocketing housing costs.

The subject of this post is perhaps the biggest scam of all the scams that bedevil most Americans. No, it’s not having a president whose actions and statements (making Canada the 51^st state, annexing Greenland and picking doofuses and baboons as his advisors and cabinet secretaries) suggest he is mentally unhinged. It’s not having participated in the use of sanctions [joining his three predecessor presidents] to kill 38 million people (60% of them children and women) worldwide since 2002. It’s not the U.S. having an educational system that produces American adults able to read only at a 7^th to 8^th grade level while the literacy rate among the people of Russia and China is close to 100%. It’s not even knowing that another in a long line of criminogenic congressman (former Speaker Nancy Pelosi heading the list) used classified information that he received as a member of the House Intelligence Committee to make a killing on the stock market (aided by his wife). It’s called insider trading and if the average American did it, a hefty fine and time in the slammer would be waiting. But for elected officials, it’s the road to riches.

Of all the immoral, often illegal plunder of the public purse, what stands out as the biggest con of all? It’s no secret. The United States has the most expensive healthcare system in the world raking in $5.6 trillion or $16,000+ per American (2025) consuming 20% of GDP. Yet in its primary obligation —the ability to keep its people healthy — the U.S. continues to fail. [Mirror, Mirror 2024 A Portrait of the Failing US health System by The Commonwealth Fund]

The secret sauce that makes possible such stupendous profitability (increasing year after year – up 7.1% in 2025, 8.2% in 2024 – more than three times GDP growth) is the time spent cozying up to elected officials. Not limited by party affiliation, it’s a bipartisan shakedown. At the end of 2022, Joe Biden (who was one of the biggest beneficiaries of Healthcare’s largesse) signed legislation kicking 25 million Americans off Medicaid as a thank you for the “generous” support from the healthcare industry which for his 2020 election campaign topped $13 million. Coincidence? You decide. What about a denizen from the other side of the aisle —President Trump? He has lots to be thankful for. For openers, a rollicking good inauguration (2025 Trump-Vance) made even better with the $11.5 million the healthcare industry kicked in. That’s just the tip of the golden goose. Separately, for the 2024 Trump-Vance campaign, these same gangsters contributed $16.5 million. [Open Secrets]. How altruistic of them. No wait like all the presidents before him, Trump knows that one good turn deserves (demands) another. His good turn happens to be bigger than most other good turns. His OBBA (One Big Beautiful Bill Act) subtracts $1 trillion from Medicaid devastating tens of millions of low-income families, at a cost of 50,000+ lives a year while at the same time gifting $1 trillion in tax cuts for the top 1 percent of Americans.

Healthcare lobbying expenditures rank #1 among all industries, a whopping $867,539,940 (Open Secrets) within striking distance of $1 billion. Equally unsurprising to learn that almost half (44%) of the lobbyists shilling for their healthcare masters are ex-government employees.

U.S. healthcare is a cave-dwelling mutant with three heads: Big Pharma, Big Med and Big Insurance and all three have their tentacles out. The Midas touch has new meaning when it comes to these chiselers. In this article we are marveling at how greedy and corrupt this spawn of empire is. A true triad of horrors.

Let’s look first at Big Pharma and its business model — “Drug companies maximize and exploit research financed by taxpayers to generate marketable new drugs. Then they price their wares to maximize returns for shareholders [Davos Man: How Billionaires Devoured the World”] In the process of their dash to trillions guess who are their biggest suckers (aka customers)? Every American taxpayer, at least those who have tangled with the healthcare empire, which is probably everyone. Decades of systemic propaganda have made them true believers. Often they arrive at the doctor’s door with a list of the drugs they saw advertised on TV. As one of only two countries who allow pharmaceutical DTC (direct to consumer) advertising (New Zealand is the other) the drug companies spent over $7 billion on TV advertising in 2025, a 16% increase over 2024. In 2025, globally Big Pharma raked in $1.7 trillion). Their biggest score was in the U.S. where Americans pay two to three times more for the same drugs as the rest of the world cashing out at more than $720 billion in 2025. [Prescription drugs in the U.S. cost 278% more than in other countries. Big Pharma charges us outrageous prices and then spends more on stock buy-backs and executive pay than R&D—Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib].

Every day is a payday for the executives, investors and owners of Big Pharma. What blessings do the rest of Americans get? For the most unlucky—death. As the third leading cause of death (after heart disease and cancer) 100,000-250,000 die every year taking prescription drugs as prescribed.

Even the feds give Big Pharma a pass. For violations like illegal marketing, kickbacks, and price fixing, Big Pharma has paid $127 billion in penalties since 2000—a mere rounding error.

What about the most corrupt unholy menace—Big Insurance? Maybe their business model will give you a hint: “The uniquely American health insurance system is a business designed to extract profit by maximizing cost and minimizing care to reward owners and shareholders with financial gain” [HC4US.org]. Like the other two big dogs of the healthcare mafia—it’s all about the money and they are rolling in it. In 2025, Big Insurance matched Big Pharma’s profits collecting 1.7 trillion ($54+ billion profit), most of it going into the pockets of owners, executives and investors. They beat their own record, bettering their 2024 performance by $175 billion. With ten million fewer suckers (aka customers), what’s the secret sauce that kept those billions rolling in? Hiking premiums (for both private paying customers and those enrolled in government programs like Medicare and Medicaid and employer sponsored insurance plans), erecting new and more onerous barriers to care and shepherding people into companies they own (especially doctors’ practices). This year premium increases for Obamacare plans rose between 22% and 28%. The effects of this wholly undeserved increase are catastrophic for the 99%—25 million cannot afford health insurance and “nearly 1 in 4 (23%) U.S. working-age adults—approximately 30-31 million people—are considered underinsured, meaning they have health insurance but high deductibles and out-of-pocket costs restrict their access to care.” [2024 “Mirror, Mirror: A Portrait of the US Failing Health System, Commonwealth Fund]. Even the mainstream media, their long-time vassals, are feeling the heat of their viewers’ ire. Every evening nightly news shows recount the stories of patients who have been refused coverage for life-saving treatment ordered by a doctor [NBC Nightly News: The Cost of Denial]. The largest health insurance company in the U.S, UnitedHealth (2025 revenue $448 billion) regularly denies coverage for one-third of the claims submitted to it, one of the highest denial rates in the industry. To make matters worse they lie about it and claim a 98% approval rate contradicted by reliable third-party reports of impartial agencies.

When it comes to Big Med —welcome to the privatized health care system in the U.S. where market metrics (the most important being profitability) dictate the standard of care. Want to know what the P.E. invasion has wrought? 68,000 poor souls die every year because they cannot afford the medicine or medical treatments they need. 25% of cancer patients (1 in 4) die or go bankrupt with the out- of-pocket expenses privatized hospitals and doctor’s practices charge. Medical debt is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the U.S. Raising prices is the sine qua non of private equity healthcare. Price go up 7% to 16% at hospitals acquired by private equity firms and 4% to 20% at the doctors’ practices they take over. Wait, it gets even more outrageous. Unnecessary, sometimes life-threatening procedures become the norm to jack up the bills. At privatized nursing homes the situation is even worse – mortality rates increase after takeover by 11%.

The private equity capture of America’s healthcare system shows no signs of slowing down, In the past decade alone these soulless corporatists have poured more than $1trillion into the healthcare industry. It’s the investment opportunity that is most attractive to greedy capitalists where the market is immense (every American needs medical attention at some time), the rewards in an unregulated market limitless, and the pushback to tame the ever-growing greediness of the purveyors of this wild west atmosphere nonexistent.

U.S. healthcare has become a corporate boondogggle, a multi-payer system that preaches the gospel of cascading profits achieved by a few billionaires at the expense of the rest of Americans. Meanwhile, the American health report card gets a failing grade year after year. Is there a solution?  What about elected officials? No dice. A succession of post-World War II presidents, both Republicans and Democrats (Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, LBJ, Clinton, and Obama) have tried to enact a less inequitable healthcare system and failed. What about Congress, particularly the “Progressive” Caucus? Forget about it. They may talk a good game but when it comes to action, they are MIA. Ever mindful of the massive bribes, the healthcare industry, the lobbyist-in-chief, is capable of throwing their way or of withholding should they deviate from the official healthcare line, they stand four square with the industry and salute.

Maybe the American people need to wake up, shut off their phones, open their eyes and their windows and shout in unison “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore. [Network, 1976]

On March 28, 2026, POTUS announced to a war-weary American electorate and the rest of the world—”The U.S. military began major military operations in Iran. The U.S. military has undertaken a massive and ongoing operation to prevent this very wicked, radical dictatorship from threatening America and our core national security interests…

A brief look down the historical runway.

In 2016, as he was campaigning for the presidency (his first term) he made the America First pledge to his MAGA base—”We will stop racing to topple foreign – and you understand this – foreign regimes that we know nothing about, that we shouldn’t be involved with.”

In 2020 he doubled down on that promise—”We’ve spent $8 trillion in the Middle East, and we’re not fixing our roads in this country?… How stupid is it? And we’re not fixing our highways, our tunnels, our bridges, our hospitals, even.”

In 2024, at every campaign stop on the way to his second term, he described himself as the “president of peace” and diving deeper into delusion predicted that he would end the Ukrainian conflict within “24 hours.”  

Even before his presidential ambitions surfaced, he was busy singing the same tune. In 2011, Obama was his target—”Our president (Obama) will start a war with Iran because he has absolutely no ability to negotiate. He’s weak and he’s ineffective.” Same war, different president.

He reiterated his “president of peace” mantra in his November 2024 victory speech—”I’m not going to start a war. I’m going to stop wars,” A year after entering the White House, he sent the military to Venezuela, Yemen, Nigeria, Syria, Somalia, currently Iran in addition to his strikes on boats in the Pacific and Caribbean that have resulted in the deaths of well over 100 innocent civilians. Putting icing on the cake in a Truth Social post on March 6, Trump boasted that “Cuba would be next.”

And let’s not forget his fantastical plan to seize (aka annex) Greenland “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security…It’s so strategic…

With President Trump reaching new heights of lunacy, his every utterance betraying a man who has left the real world for a private paradise where does that leave most Americans? Can they mount the enthusiasm and energy to challenge their government’s misdeeds in the streets of major cities? Will it make any difference? Subjects we’ll tackle in this post. But first a brief look at the highways and byways of the empire’s history of mindless aggression against countries they foolishly and tragically thought would be “pushovers” for a US takeover either by regime change or total destruction. One has only to remember the long history of unsuccessful invasions of Vietnam, Afghanistan (20 years of failed war making), Libya (destroying a thriving economy) and Iraq (murdering the sovereign leader and never finding the illusory WMD’s) and it becomes apparent that the current emperor’s conduct of foreign policy is part of a “grand” old American tradition.

How have people responded to these blunders? In past failed wars of aggression Americans had a rich history of displaying their disagreements with the empire’s power elites.

Americans are not a particularly warlike people, although they do have their moments of blood thirsty enthusiasm for one or another of the empire’s wars of choice. At least initially, at the first hint of war, cries of “USA, USA” dominate the news media and are celebrated by the Washington elites as a stirring affirmation of American democracy at work. That moment passes as the body bags start arriving at Dover Air Force base in Delaware. Chants of “USA, USA” transmogrify into “Hell, No We Won’t Go”   But even with the threat of mandatory service gone the way of 23 skidoo (aka get lost), Americans quickly saw how wars were the BFFs of the 1% who amplified their fortunes while the 99% did the fighting and dying and saw their lives upended by the economic consequences of another “glorious war”.

Americans have a rich history of going public with their protests against the wars of choice the US has started. Lest you think the coming of age of twenty-first century young people was the great awakening, over ninety years ago US student activism was alive and well as hundreds of thousands of students participated in anti-war demonstrationss, protesting the gathering war clouds of World War II, a repeat of World War I.

Even World War II saw its share of protest activity particularly before the Pearl Harbor attack in December, 1941. “The Yanks Are Not Coming” argued thousands of demonstrators gathered in cities like Los Angeles and New York for peace rallies opposing American involvement in European conflicts. The Korean war which President Truman dragged the US into in 1950 saw relatively tame protests unlike the vigorous protests which accompanied succeeding wars. Polling indicated that although 36,574 (US Department of Defense) young Americans died while fighting in a civil war that was none of America’s business, public opinion remained closely divided with slightly more than half (56%) thinking the war was not worth fighting. What happened in that war to the self-described most powerful armed forces in history was repeated in all subsequent wars the US started. Despite destroying most of North Korea, the U.S. was unable to achieve victory. President Eisenhower was forced into an armistice to stop the slaughter of American troops.

The Vietnam War was a high-water mark in Americans taking to the streets to vent their outrage. The demonstrations started mainly on college campuses to protest the draft (1.8 to 2.2 million American men were drafted from 1964 to 1973) “No, No, We Won’t Go” became a popular refrain. As the revulsion against the senseless brutality that highlighted US conduct of the war (for example the 1968 US massacre of 300 unarmed old men, women and children in the Vietnam village of My Lai), protests against the war multiplied. On November 15, 1969 a massive demonstration, Moratorium to End the war in Vietnam, was attended by over 500,000 anti-war activists in cities throughout the country and the world. Other demonstrations and rallies occurred including 50,000 people who stormed the Pentagon on October 21, 1967.

Before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, many Americans knew Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction as the politicians including the president were claiming. They also knew that the US government, along with its vassals (the UK being the most outspoken cheerleader) were lying us into this war.  On February 15, 2003, millions of people in 600 cities worldwide took to the streets to protest. In NYC 200,000 demonstrated outside the U.N., three million in Rome, 750,000 in London. Protests be damned the U.S went on to fight and lose) this misbegotten war.

Which brings us to the present catastrophe —a war of aggression against Iran (according to international law a war of aggression is “the supreme international crime”— American Justice Robert Jackson, chief prosecutor at Nuremberg). Using the now familiar American playbook —a surprise attack war launched in the midst of peace negotiations on a country (Iran) that was negotiating in good faith, the US attacked Iran on February 28.

The war has been going on for over a month and the streets of most American cities are eerily quiet. It appears that many Americans are okay with this latest example of misdirected U.S. aggression. The polls bear this out. According to a March 9 Quinnipiac University National Poll only 53% of voters oppose the war against Iran, while 40 percent support it.  New polls (3/26) show that opposition to the war has remained steady despite the economic pain Americans are feeling.

After the Vietnam war and the end of the draft, the participation of young people, the main drivers of the peace movement, dwindled. An organized youth movement against the war on terror (2001) never really materialized. Why, you may ask? Reasons abound. Since 1973 when Nixon abolished the draft, those of draft age no longer fearing Uncle Sam’s clarion call, have turned to other what they consider more personal and immediate problems. Student loan debt being numero uno for over one-half of students today. These unfortunates owe an average of $32,000-$40,000. In the Vietnam era, the average student debt was $1,100 ($7,500 in today’s dollars). Burdened with a mandatory loan payment that averages $400+ monthly, the fate of a war fought thousands of miles away is hardly a major worry. Besides these young people have heard war drums beating since they were born. The empire had already started (and lost) two major wars (Afghanistan and Iraq) and at least four “little” wars (Syria, Libya, Somalia, Yemen) Another war in a country most of them couldn’t find on a map? Not interested. Finally like the majority of American adults they have other worries closer to home —the stratospheric costs of healthcare, the rising cost of food, the unaffordability of housing, the difficulty of living in a country controlled by 950+ billionaires with the highest level of income inequality among G7 nations as well as among the most unequal developed countries in the world.

What’s the problem, you may ask, of living in a country addicted to war with a president who has jumped the shark and descended into “malignant narcissism” (phrase coined by Eric Fromm to describe Hitler).In America’s unending pursuit of guns over butter with a trillion-dollar war chest (soon to be $1.5 trillion) militarized foreign policy has permeated our domestic policy. Storm troopers are loose on American streets, masked and armed to the teeth whose brutality has already caused the deaths of two Americans peacefully protesting the invasion of brutalized “policing” in their city. How about Trump’s Secretary of Defense who calls himself the Secretary of War describing the U.S. negotiating strategy under Trump— “when he [Trump] sends his war fighters out…he unties their hands [getting rid of such pesky regulations as the Geneva Convention and International Law]… to destroy the enemy as viciously as possible… We negotiate with bombs…” On the domestic side, although only about 7% of the general U.S. population are veterans, 20% are in domestic police forces across the U.S. many of them drawing on their foreign military service to handle community law enforcement.

Even before this calamitous show of unprecedented aggression, since 9/11 every U.S. president has been a war monger choosing to finance aggressive foreign policy goals over social welfare policies like universal healthcare, fixing America’s shabby infrastructure, providing free education for every American student, tamping down out of control costs in housing and every other aspect of Americans’ daily life.

We are all affected by U.S. leaders’ normalization of invasions into other countries (Venezuela and Iran current examples) in the form of preemptive war.

Ron Paul saw the danger of a continuous drift of U.S leaders into the madness of war over a decade ago in 2012 in his Farewell Address to Congress:

Undeclared wars are commonplace. Tragically our government engages in preemptive wars with no complaints from the American people. Sadly, we have become accustomed to living with the illegitimate use of force by government. To develop a truly free society the issue of initiating force must be understood and rejected. We ignore him at our peril.

P.S. On March 29 and March 30, the American people saw the cliff their leaders were driving them over and hit the streets protesting violence and war both oversea and domestically. Millions assembled in towns and cities across the U.S. in peaceful protests. What they want is what most Americans want — leaders committed to peace and justice across the globe. It would be quite a change after decades of wrongheaded decisions made by leaders whose only mission is to create an American empire and enrich their cronies. The Doomsday Clock is set at 85 seconds to midnight. We haven’t much time to save the planet.

Back in the bad old days of the Big Pharma COVID-19 get rich quick scam, Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart wanted a Covid test. If he weren’t a congressman, he would have had to get a note from his doctor for which he would be billed the equivalent of an office visit, call a testing site to make an appointment, drive to the site and wait in his car for (if he’s lucky) about two hours. Days or weeks later, he would get his results, provided he hadn‘t already died. Diaz-Balart merely walked down the Capitol hallway to a two-room suite of offices with the innocuous title Office of the Attending Physician (OAP). He was waited on immediately, the test was administered and in minutes, he learned he was positive. His total cost? Zero.
[2021 as the Big Pharma-induced COVID frenzy was gathering momentum]

He’s co-chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and a beneficiary of single payer healthcare, two good reasons for Rep. Diaz-Balart to champion Medicare-for-all. Instead, he’s a vocal opponent of what he labels “socialized medicine” (aka Medicare for All) — “The Members of this Conference [Hispanic Caucus] … will not support a bill that is being forced down America’s throat and that will take America down the path to bankruptcy.” You will note there are exceptions to every rule a bloviating congress person lays down. In Diaz-Balart’s case, the exception is — you guessed it — himself and his BFFs.

Rep. Diaz-Balart, along with every member of Congress, is the recipient of single payer government health insurance. Guess what? It’s not socialized medicine when Congress has it. The Office of the Attending Physician (OAP) is a full-blown hospital with branches all over Capitol Hill run by dozens of navy doctors, nurses and technicians. It has been described by a former OAP staffer as “the best healthcare on the planet.”

Not surprisingly Rep Diaz-Balert is not the only member of Congress whose hypocrisy is killing Americans. A far bigger fish, Nancy Pelosi [net worth $248 million] a Democrat who should know better but doesn’t, the first woman speaker of the House and the most powerful woman in the U.S. has a “simple” solution for the millions of Americans whose children don’t have enough to eat, whose bills, including rent, go unpaid, stuck in miles-long lines for free food or stuck in a minimum wage job. It’s not Medicare-for-All. Instead, the Former Speaker and her Republican successor, along with former President Barack Obama are singing the praises of Obamacare (named after its creator) —overpriced crappy health insurance which wouldn’t help them even if they weren’t broke. Average price of an Obamacare plan in 2024? $6,000 per year with deductibles (amount you have to fork over before your insurance kicks in ranging from $5,000-$8,000 per year). Amount each Congress person has to pay for “the best healthcare on the planet?” $648 per year. Zero deductibles. It’s pretty cushy all-inclusive medical care that includes coronavirus testing, flu vaccines, lab work, physicals, Xrays, and referrals to specialists. What’s more for the cheapest members non-payment doesn’t stop them from enjoying the service. Try that one out on your insurance company.

The OAP may be virtually free to members of Congress but someone has to pay the $4.9 million price tag (2025). Look in the mirror. You and every other tax payer is on the hook for the free ride given to Congress.

This year it was of $4.9 million. In 2020 when pandemic hysteria forced country-wide closures, 22.5 million Americans lost their jobs and their healthcare. In response Congress passed the CARES Act, a nothing burger for people who most needed relief but a boon for Congress as they furtively tucked into the budget bill a $400,000 subsidy to OPA.

Members of Congress live on an entirely different planet from the rest of us. The legislators we send to Congress generally wind up as millionaires if they’re not when they get there. The vast majority of both the Senate and House of Representatives has a net worth exceeding $1 million. Only 18% of the 132.6 million American households (2024-25) are worth one million or more. There’s no single payer concierge-level healthcare plan for them.

Typically, politicians do a lot of handwringing when the topic of single payer health insurance is raised as an alternative to employer-provided health insurance — “[with Medicare-for-all] we will no longer have private insurance as we know it. And that means that 149 million Americans will no longer be able to have their current insurance…I think it’s a bad idea.”

What’s so bad about employer-provided healthcare? Almost everything. For openers in a system, unique in the developed world, where healthcare is tied to employment, workers must toe the line or risk not only their jobs but their healthcare. Even with employers paying some of the cost (less each year), health insurance company greed has taken a larger and larger chunk out of workers’ paychecks. Over the last decade, employees’ share of premiums has risen by 71%. (Kaiser Family Foundation). Workers’ wages have not kept up. Real wages (after accounting for inflation) have been stagnant for the last four decades. The overall effect —while employees’ wages remain static, they are constantly paying out more for their health insurance. At the same time, insurance companies are flush with profits.

The inequality underlying U.S. healthcare is stunning— a single payer virtually free healthcare delivery system for elected representatives and a free-market, profit-oriented health industry boondoggle enriching healthcare oligarchs for the rest of us. The one paid for by American taxpayers but not offered to them is a luxurious on-call service, the other, employer-provided healthcare, fails to fulfill even modest healthcare needs. Obamacare, the third tier of the failed U.S. healthcare system, is a hodgepodge of unaffordable costs and substandard care. You don’t have to imagine a situation where the people are forced to pay for the most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet reap little benefit. You’re living it. The present healthcare system based on private profiteering cost American taxpayers $5.2 trillion (estimated) in 2024. Don’t forget the U.S. spends more on health care than any other country yet still ranks last among wealthy nations in overall performance, particularly in access to care and health outcomes. Is it any surprise that the American people face the shortest life expectancies in the developed world?

Bottom line: The U.S. healthcare system is a miserable failure and a total disgrace. It’s time to pick up a broom and sweep out the phonies (aka elected officials) who keep the present healthcare system chugging along and then elect men and women who will fight to make healthcare in the U.S. a human right. But like Diogenes, searching for an honest man (or woman) with a torch in broad daylight, our quest for integrity in a world of pretense is probably doomed.