Beth Klein

Unlike the powerful posters here I am not famous or particularly notable; I am a lawyer in private practice. It is my life's humble work to make certain that every child has the opportunity to have a fulfilled life. I am blessed to have the opportunity to serve these clients.

Several years ago I was called to a modest home to meet with a family who needed help. I was greeted by an obviously overwhelmed and drained Mom and Dad and two teenage children. The third child, a twin son, was bound in a wheel chair, completely immobile with a brace holding his head steady. Two years earlier, he had sustained a gun shot wound to the head. He was now 21, a full grown man who lived in the coffin of a body what was slowly stiffening and dissolving. This young man who now could only cry the word "maaaaaa" became my client in a battle for insurance coverage and resources for his family.

I sat with the family, and for the afternoon, we went through family albums together. I held the red leather books on my lap, and the pictures on the pages were like those of my life, and probably yours.

In the beginning there were old black and white Kodaks of a beaming, but a little scared, brand new mom and dad holding their twin baby boys. There were pictures of the first steps. There were faded color Polaroids of first birthdays showing frosting faces from birthday cakes that depicted Grover in a deep blue.

Turning the pages I saw sons growing, riding bikes and driving their first cars when they got their driver's licenses. There were prom pictures showing the boys becoming young men and the awkward graduation photos of the twins in purple flat hats and robes with an aunt pinching their cheeks for fun. Then as the pages turned, there was the picture of my client in a rehabilitation clinic frightened, disoriented and grimacing in pain as he tried to learn to swallow again. His head bandaged from a recent brain surgery.

I worked with members of the family to understand their daily lives. I learned how they cared for their son. They fed him like an infant making sure that every bite was swallowed. They changed him. They shaved him. They lifted him to bed and to wheel chair. They spoke to him softly. They put the little white dog "Shug" on his lap, and he would sense the fur and the warmth, and he would smile. They gave him a little chocolate on his tongue, and his body relaxed as he tasted it.

He exhaled with relief when his Mom kissed his cheek. He knew they were there for him.

Two years earlier, my client had gone to a high school party to pick up his twin brother. As he walked up the driveway to the home, another angry young man shot a gun from the street. The bullet ricocheted off the sidewalk and hit my client in the back of the head. The bullet traveled into his brain and it destroyed all of the possibility and hope that was my client. But my client lived and was loved and wanted by his family.

For two years through multiple brain surgeries, the parents and siblings had worked around the clock to make sure that my client had love and care. They had insurance, but the carrier soon denied coverage. My client was uninsurable. The federal programs for the catastrophically injured were a mire of contradictory red tape and had few services to offer. The system is broken.

The family educated themselves in health care so that my client would have some therapy and his joints would not freeze with the insidious cancer-like scar tissue that builds between and breaks the joints of quadriplegics. They made sure that a member of the family was with my client 24 hours a day so that he could be fed, relieved, and turned in his bed. They had no help, and they have no way out.

This story constantly repeats itself with every day in my practice.

The story of a hard working good family who had insurance, but coverage was denied. It is the story of a hard working good family due to circumstances that they did not cause. It is the story of loving families that have been destroyed financially. It is the story of people who have no help or no hope. For me, the worst cases are the ones where one of my child client dies wanting of simple things because they do not have health care coverage. It is happening more and more frequently.

I am committed to change of a health insurance system so that entire families are not wiped out financially and emotionally. Every time this happens, we all loose. We loose the potential, the productivity, and possibility of so many people because they cannot get simple things.

As this is a very important issue to me, I have read the proposals of both candidates very carefully. I have given careful consideration how each proposal will impact the law, ERISA, state regulations in place to protect the consumer, and the outcomes of everyone, not just my clients. The conclusion is inescapable.

An Obama administration will be committed to the reform that we need and will instill basic fairness and common sense into the health care system. Everyone should have access to health and well being, and I am committed to a President who understands this basic principle that benefits us all.