Politics Ain't Beanbag
For those of you who have been part of this community for more than a year, you will recall that there were many moments during the Presidential campaign, when I had to tell anxious Obama supporters to chill–that Barack’s team knows what they are doing. So just chill
Here’s what I think. The next week, Barack is going to be on vacation and the news cycle will; be filled with George Bush scandal stories, starting with this doozy from Tom Ridge.
Tom Ridge, the first secretary of homeland security, asserts in a new book that he was pressured by top advisers to President George W. Bush to raise the national threat level just before the 2004 election in what he suspected was an effort to influence the vote.
After Osama bin Laden released a threatening videotape four days before the election, Attorney General John Ashcroft and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld pushed Mr. Ridge to elevate the public threat posture but he refused, according to the book. Mr. Ridge calls it a “dramatic and inconceivable” event that “proved most troublesome for all of us in the department.”
On Monday the CIA Inspector General’s Report on interrogation and detention programs will be released and word is that there may be some bombshells about Cheney. The Republicans will be back on the defensive and by Labor Day the White House will get everyone together and we will have a Health Care Bill by Mid October.
Easily the most important reading anyone will do tomorrow:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204683204574358281875211014.html
Easily the most important reading anyone will do tomorrow:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204683204574358281875211014.html
Morgan- Will you spare us posting junk from the notorious Neo-Conservative Wall Street Journal Editorial and Opinion Page. Just like during the election, you talk a good game, but your team is going to lose again.
Better to read this.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/19/AR2009081902901.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Morgan- Will you spare us posting junk from the notorious Neo-Conservative Wall Street Journal Editorial and Opinion Page. Just like during the election, you talk a good game, but your team is going to lose again.
Better to read this.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/19/AR2009081902901.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Okay, Morgan, I read it. Rich reinforcing rich people’s memes doesn’t make for “most important reading”.
Take a central premise in detail:
“A second thing progressives fail to grasp is the genius of the American health-care system: It unites rich and poor in a common private insurance system.
Here’s how it works. When a rich person rolls into the operating room, the nurse asks him: “Would you like a warm blanket? How about a pillow?” The anesthesiologist numbs his skin before putting in the I.V. Every effort is made to make him happy.
People in the operating room pay attention to a rich patient’s wishes because they know a rich person can make their lives miserable. He can complain to the hospital president, or call the mayor. But the side effect is that their high quality care becomes habitual, and all patients receive it. When a poor person complains in most environments, no one listens. But in health care, through a common private insurance system, poor people go to the same hospitals and doctors as rich people and thus enjoy the benefit of rich people’s power.”
The person who wrote that has never been a poor person trying to get care in a major metro hospital. It simply doesn’t work that way, especially in overtaxed ERs where the majority of uncovered patients get palliative health care at incredibly inflated rates. Staff empathy is largely a person dependent thing, but anyone who is working 24 hr. shifts isn’t saying “can I fluff your pillow, ‘cus you know, that’s just what I do as a result of doing if for the rich all the time.”
Doesn’t happen, and you can work backwards that the rest of the article has the accuracy of a plutocrat’s echo chamber: “Ain’t it a good thing we are so rich that the drippings of the luxuries we make possible in life trickle down to the little people.” BS is BS regardless of whether (or especially when) it comes from the WSJ.
Okay, Morgan, I read it. Rich reinforcing rich people’s memes doesn’t make for “most important reading”.
Take a central premise in detail:
“A second thing progressives fail to grasp is the genius of the American health-care system: It unites rich and poor in a common private insurance system.
Here’s how it works. When a rich person rolls into the operating room, the nurse asks him: “Would you like a warm blanket? How about a pillow?” The anesthesiologist numbs his skin before putting in the I.V. Every effort is made to make him happy.
People in the operating room pay attention to a rich patient’s wishes because they know a rich person can make their lives miserable. He can complain to the hospital president, or call the mayor. But the side effect is that their high quality care becomes habitual, and all patients receive it. When a poor person complains in most environments, no one listens. But in health care, through a common private insurance system, poor people go to the same hospitals and doctors as rich people and thus enjoy the benefit of rich people’s power.”
The person who wrote that has never been a poor person trying to get care in a major metro hospital. It simply doesn’t work that way, especially in overtaxed ERs where the majority of uncovered patients get palliative health care at incredibly inflated rates. Staff empathy is largely a person dependent thing, but anyone who is working 24 hr. shifts isn’t saying “can I fluff your pillow, ‘cus you know, that’s just what I do as a result of doing if for the rich all the time.”
Doesn’t happen, and you can work backwards that the rest of the article has the accuracy of a plutocrat’s echo chamber: “Ain’t it a good thing we are so rich that the drippings of the luxuries we make possible in life trickle down to the little people.” BS is BS regardless of whether (or especially when) it comes from the WSJ.
@Jon-
from you lips to the FSM’s ears!
I truly hope so. I’m pretty discouraged with what I hear out of DC these days.
I still think he put the fox in charge of the hen house with his economic team and we, of the middle class, have suffered – badly. A huge part of it is psychological – we had so much hope.
I used to be part of the loop in at least part of the DC circuit, and know the politics of the doable. I also know about daring great things and I don’t see that here. Much as I would like/love to.
@Jon-
from you lips to the FSM’s ears!
I truly hope so. I’m pretty discouraged with what I hear out of DC these days.
I still think he put the fox in charge of the hen house with his economic team and we, of the middle class, have suffered – badly. A huge part of it is psychological – we had so much hope.
I used to be part of the loop in at least part of the DC circuit, and know the politics of the doable. I also know about daring great things and I don’t see that here. Much as I would like/love to.
Ken, I don’t think for a second the poor dude gets his pillow plumped, the point is…
We have to accept that we will have TWO distinct levels of service…. bare bones, and premium… and I want the fewest number of people possible in the bottom system. And I’m concerned about the people who now have the first level of service, getting re-classified in the name of fairness.
I don’t know many people who want their kids to go to the public school, and certainly not the public school version of the hospital… unless as you say, the uninsured want to go there and drag a bunch of others down there with them.
What you read wasn’t a just a rich guy… it was an anesthesiologist,
“At the hospital where I work, two anesthesiologists work in obstetrics almost around the clock, so that a woman in labor need not wait more than five minutes for her epidural. Other hospitals are less fortunate, and have on staff at most one anesthesiologist in obstetrics. The economic crunch will eventually force these hospitals to cover obstetrics “when anesthesiology is available,” meaning in between regular operating room cases.
During an obstetrical emergency, these short-staffed anesthesia departments will scramble to send someone to perform the C-section. Don’t forget, a baby has only nine minutes of oxygen when the umbilical cord prolapses, so time is of the essence.”
This is what the entire health care debate should be, lots of rich doctors explaining that they’re likely to work less often, and put up with less shit, if they don’t get paid as much. Lots of stories like this that frankly terrify me, and the fact that you want to gloss over it because you figure it just has to get better for poor people in emergency rooms frankly freaks me out.
Ken, you know I’m asking for coverage for the poor, but just safety net care, outside emergency rooms in their own system – this article supports that.
Ken, I don’t think for a second the poor dude gets his pillow plumped, the point is…
We have to accept that we will have TWO distinct levels of service…. bare bones, and premium… and I want the fewest number of people possible in the bottom system. And I’m concerned about the people who now have the first level of service, getting re-classified in the name of fairness.
I don’t know many people who want their kids to go to the public school, and certainly not the public school version of the hospital… unless as you say, the uninsured want to go there and drag a bunch of others down there with them.
What you read wasn’t a just a rich guy… it was an anesthesiologist,
“At the hospital where I work, two anesthesiologists work in obstetrics almost around the clock, so that a woman in labor need not wait more than five minutes for her epidural. Other hospitals are less fortunate, and have on staff at most one anesthesiologist in obstetrics. The economic crunch will eventually force these hospitals to cover obstetrics “when anesthesiology is available,” meaning in between regular operating room cases.
During an obstetrical emergency, these short-staffed anesthesia departments will scramble to send someone to perform the C-section. Don’t forget, a baby has only nine minutes of oxygen when the umbilical cord prolapses, so time is of the essence.”
This is what the entire health care debate should be, lots of rich doctors explaining that they’re likely to work less often, and put up with less shit, if they don’t get paid as much. Lots of stories like this that frankly terrify me, and the fact that you want to gloss over it because you figure it just has to get better for poor people in emergency rooms frankly freaks me out.
Ken, you know I’m asking for coverage for the poor, but just safety net care, outside emergency rooms in their own system – this article supports that.
Actually Morgan, I do know you support that, and I suspect the difference is in where the line gets drawn. You are willing to allow an anesthesiologist, who probably has some level of class consciousness or he/she wouldn’t be writing opinion for the WSJ, and therefore probably has some vested interest in offering a reason to kill health care reform or supporting those who seem to want that. Why else would the subhead offer the clearly anti reform line “Expect a two-tier medical system and needless ER deaths if Congress and the White House have their way.”
I don’t trust and would not support such a person’s input on where the line is drawn in terms of how resources are divvied out to implement “coverage for the poor” and think it a little disingenuous. In Oregon there were years of long debate with genuine public input on how to prioritize care for Medicaid recipients. Doctors said much the same thing: limit anything and it will all fall down go boom. But… it had to be limited, was limited, and it works as well or better than most. When funds to buy medicaid match dry up, the line of care moves and fewer procedures are covered. Docs still give care. There hasn’t been a massive flight from the area that doesn’t match the standard disproportional loading of docs in the urban areas, and paucity of docs in rural areas, but that’s normal for all areas of the country.
You totally misinterpret what I am saying when you tell me that I “figure it has to get better for poor people in emergency rooms.” Where did that idea come from. All I’m saying is that letting docs alone vote where the line is on what gets paid for and how much a procedure costs is a sure way to make sure there will not be coverage for the poor. Period. As John P would say: Rent seekers all, and f-em in the ear if they want to move to some mythical place to get paid what they think they deserve.
It’s a contradiction to say that you support VA services for the poor and yet seem to support some self serving “rich doctor” threatening to take his ball and go home. It ignores such historical realities as how unrealistic similar assertions were each time minimum wage hikes took place (it’ll be the death of American small business), public health care was implemented (no doctor will work for that), and tax hikes are actually put in place to try to pay for what congress spends (see GHW Bush admin as a sample of world not ending because of). Self serving threats are self serving threats, as meaningful in the long run as increasing the national security color to ultraviolet or whatever, a week before a national election.
Freaking out because you chose to listen to self serving liars is your choice.
Actually Morgan, I do know you support that, and I suspect the difference is in where the line gets drawn. You are willing to allow an anesthesiologist, who probably has some level of class consciousness or he/she wouldn’t be writing opinion for the WSJ, and therefore probably has some vested interest in offering a reason to kill health care reform or supporting those who seem to want that. Why else would the subhead offer the clearly anti reform line “Expect a two-tier medical system and needless ER deaths if Congress and the White House have their way.”
I don’t trust and would not support such a person’s input on where the line is drawn in terms of how resources are divvied out to implement “coverage for the poor” and think it a little disingenuous. In Oregon there were years of long debate with genuine public input on how to prioritize care for Medicaid recipients. Doctors said much the same thing: limit anything and it will all fall down go boom. But… it had to be limited, was limited, and it works as well or better than most. When funds to buy medicaid match dry up, the line of care moves and fewer procedures are covered. Docs still give care. There hasn’t been a massive flight from the area that doesn’t match the standard disproportional loading of docs in the urban areas, and paucity of docs in rural areas, but that’s normal for all areas of the country.
You totally misinterpret what I am saying when you tell me that I “figure it has to get better for poor people in emergency rooms.” Where did that idea come from. All I’m saying is that letting docs alone vote where the line is on what gets paid for and how much a procedure costs is a sure way to make sure there will not be coverage for the poor. Period. As John P would say: Rent seekers all, and f-em in the ear if they want to move to some mythical place to get paid what they think they deserve.
It’s a contradiction to say that you support VA services for the poor and yet seem to support some self serving “rich doctor” threatening to take his ball and go home. It ignores such historical realities as how unrealistic similar assertions were each time minimum wage hikes took place (it’ll be the death of American small business), public health care was implemented (no doctor will work for that), and tax hikes are actually put in place to try to pay for what congress spends (see GHW Bush admin as a sample of world not ending because of). Self serving threats are self serving threats, as meaningful in the long run as increasing the national security color to ultraviolet or whatever, a week before a national election.
Freaking out because you chose to listen to self serving liars is your choice.
Oh, and I come from a world where the majority of kids go to public education and the families work their assess off with volunteer time and other forms of support to make it work. I suspect that’s why we keep seeing things considerably differently.
Oh, and I come from a world where the majority of kids go to public education and the families work their assess off with volunteer time and other forms of support to make it work. I suspect that’s why we keep seeing things considerably differently.
Hmmm, an anesthesiologist’s key point about the healthcare plan: the public option might reimburse anesthesiologists at too low a rate? Who knows, maybe he’s right. But that’s a pretty simple fix, no?
This article reads to me as “bored anesthesiologist thinks healthcare reform might be a good excuse to finally quit a job he doesn’t enjoy”.
Hmmm, an anesthesiologist’s key point about the healthcare plan: the public option might reimburse anesthesiologists at too low a rate? Who knows, maybe he’s right. But that’s a pretty simple fix, no?
This article reads to me as “bored anesthesiologist thinks healthcare reform might be a good excuse to finally quit a job he doesn’t enjoy”.
Ken, I come from a world where everyone goes to public school and everyone goes to one of the local hospitals. But after spending the last 15 years in LA, NYC, Miami and Austin… I don’t trust public education, and you make me nervous about hospitals.
You’ve got to get over “some rich self-serving doctor” – you don’t even want to hear his message – many folks today caught up in the rate race to make $325K, are TOTALLY comfy to go make $225K, when their tax rates drops 10-15% and they get to work less hours and relax. It’s a very compelling argument. And you not only poo-poo it, you regard the WSJ as if it isn’t THE mainstream. huh? Business is mainstream. Wall Street votes DEM. Eggheads are the left. Wall Street guys who RUN the Dem party read the WSJ – you don’t get to wave that shit away. It gets brought to the table and you eat it – you deal with it, you work with it. Like the middle does.
And you not only wave away doctor and the WSJ, you turn fairness INTO A TIMELINE thing…
“when medical funds dry up” – this is simply you not thinking – I don’t want my care to based on the budget, I want a guy who paid less than me last year to have died, so that this year the money is there for me to live.
Ken, I want people who pay more to get better treatment / live longer. This is what America wants: $ = life.
People with it get more of it.
Ken, I come from a world where everyone goes to public school and everyone goes to one of the local hospitals. But after spending the last 15 years in LA, NYC, Miami and Austin… I don’t trust public education, and you make me nervous about hospitals.
You’ve got to get over “some rich self-serving doctor” – you don’t even want to hear his message – many folks today caught up in the rate race to make $325K, are TOTALLY comfy to go make $225K, when their tax rates drops 10-15% and they get to work less hours and relax. It’s a very compelling argument. And you not only poo-poo it, you regard the WSJ as if it isn’t THE mainstream. huh? Business is mainstream. Wall Street votes DEM. Eggheads are the left. Wall Street guys who RUN the Dem party read the WSJ – you don’t get to wave that shit away. It gets brought to the table and you eat it – you deal with it, you work with it. Like the middle does.
And you not only wave away doctor and the WSJ, you turn fairness INTO A TIMELINE thing…
“when medical funds dry up” – this is simply you not thinking – I don’t want my care to based on the budget, I want a guy who paid less than me last year to have died, so that this year the money is there for me to live.
Ken, I want people who pay more to get better treatment / live longer. This is what America wants: $ = life.
People with it get more of it.
So then is the discussion on where the line gets drawn between bare-bones and premium? If bare-bones in the society was “good” or “satisfactory”, that’s one thing, but the same people advocating for 2 tier also seem to want to peg bare-bones as something between nothing and really crappy.
So then is the discussion on where the line gets drawn between bare-bones and premium? If bare-bones in the society was “good” or “satisfactory”, that’s one thing, but the same people advocating for 2 tier also seem to want to peg bare-bones as something between nothing and really crappy.
GregC,
Under basic care I want these horrible things happen:
- you get means tested, if you can pay for treatment and haven’t gotten insurance you pay 2x of more – and it is deducted by the IRS from your paycheck starting next week.
- you aren’t allowed to smoke. If you get caught smoking you go to jail.
- you aren’t allowed to drink or eat fast food. if you do, you go to jail.
- you will be weighed weekly. have your food intake managed. or go to jail.
there’s more, but you get the theme. if you are suffering a disease, or have a thyroid weight problem, or fall down, you get get decent care… within a global budget.
but if your lifestyle is causing your health issues (70%+), you just entered a communist state.
——
we want a public plan that TAKES YOU OVER, that chases you out of the PUBLIC PLAN unless you can’t get away – going public should feel like ripping out a stack of food stamps at the grocery. for those who really need it, god bless them, for everyone else – no fun for you!
GregC,
Under basic care I want these horrible things happen:
- you get means tested, if you can pay for treatment and haven’t gotten insurance you pay 2x of more – and it is deducted by the IRS from your paycheck starting next week.
- you aren’t allowed to smoke. If you get caught smoking you go to jail.
- you aren’t allowed to drink or eat fast food. if you do, you go to jail.
- you will be weighed weekly. have your food intake managed. or go to jail.
there’s more, but you get the theme. if you are suffering a disease, or have a thyroid weight problem, or fall down, you get get decent care… within a global budget.
but if your lifestyle is causing your health issues (70%+), you just entered a communist state.
——
we want a public plan that TAKES YOU OVER, that chases you out of the PUBLIC PLAN unless you can’t get away – going public should feel like ripping out a stack of food stamps at the grocery. for those who really need it, god bless them, for everyone else – no fun for you!
Morgan, why not simply kill anyone making less than $10,000.00 a year? Wouldn’t that be cheaper? Then you could ratchet up the rate year by year. Eventually you’d have nobody making less than 30 or 40 K a year, and they’d be the new poor, but they’d be able to spend 10 or 12 K a year for medical insurance. What a perfect world you’d have then…
Morgan, why not simply kill anyone making less than $10,000.00 a year? Wouldn’t that be cheaper? Then you could ratchet up the rate year by year. Eventually you’d have nobody making less than 30 or 40 K a year, and they’d be the new poor, but they’d be able to spend 10 or 12 K a year for medical insurance. What a perfect world you’d have then…
rick, why not read and answer? I know it is tough, but you are a grown man.. I just gave a clear concise method for having a public plan… take the olive branch and run with it.
rick, why not read and answer? I know it is tough, but you are a grown man.. I just gave a clear concise method for having a public plan… take the olive branch and run with it.
rick, why not read and answer? I know it is tough, but you are a grown man.. I just gave a clear concise method for having a public plan… take the olive branch and run with it.
I think you’ve stated a very common point of view very clearly with This is what America wants: $ = life. People with it get more of it.
And I get it that you feel it’s important that the system has to have mechanisms to push people away from the system so that they don’t drain it out of laziness, stupidity, greed, whatever.
But what society is really going to be able to create & run all the ratting-out services required to detect and adjudicate all those instances of smoking, drinking, fast fooding, plus whatever new thing is bad-for-you. And putting even more people in more jails? And with what we know about how well prohibition works?
And doesn’t this mean that if rich people can afford the subsequent health care, shouldn’t they be allowed to do any drugs they want, since they can pay for any of the damage?
Everything will just go off the wheels in another direction. Probably easier, cheaper, but WAY less satisfying perhaps, to provide a reasonable base level of care and shelve all the plans for the super surveillance, jails, false positives, false negatives, etc.
But I still appreciate being able to understand your point of view.
I think you’ve stated a very common point of view very clearly with This is what America wants: $ = life. People with it get more of it.
And I get it that you feel it’s important that the system has to have mechanisms to push people away from the system so that they don’t drain it out of laziness, stupidity, greed, whatever.
But what society is really going to be able to create & run all the ratting-out services required to detect and adjudicate all those instances of smoking, drinking, fast fooding, plus whatever new thing is bad-for-you. And putting even more people in more jails? And with what we know about how well prohibition works?
And doesn’t this mean that if rich people can afford the subsequent health care, shouldn’t they be allowed to do any drugs they want, since they can pay for any of the damage?
Everything will just go off the wheels in another direction. Probably easier, cheaper, but WAY less satisfying perhaps, to provide a reasonable base level of care and shelve all the plans for the super surveillance, jails, false positives, false negatives, etc.
But I still appreciate being able to understand your point of view.
I think you’ve stated a very common point of view very clearly with This is what America wants: $ = life. People with it get more of it.
And I get it that you feel it’s important that the system has to have mechanisms to push people away from the system so that they don’t drain it out of laziness, stupidity, greed, whatever.
But what society is really going to be able to create & run all the ratting-out services required to detect and adjudicate all those instances of smoking, drinking, fast fooding, plus whatever new thing is bad-for-you. And putting even more people in more jails? And with what we know about how well prohibition works?
And doesn’t this mean that if rich people can afford the subsequent health care, shouldn’t they be allowed to do any drugs they want, since they can pay for any of the damage?
Everything will just go off the wheels in another direction. Probably easier, cheaper, but WAY less satisfying perhaps, to provide a reasonable base level of care and shelve all the plans for the super surveillance, jails, false positives, false negatives, etc.
But I still appreciate being able to understand your point of view.
Warstler, why does anybody engage with you, you smarmy fraud? Is it the same attraction that picking scabs has, or pulling boogers out of one’s nose and eating them? You are as dishonest and condescending and smug as Sneering Charlie Krauthammer. “Answer all my points, or I WIN!” “Jon agrees with me — See? I’ve interpreted something he said to mean he’s YIELDED UP to my superior intelligence! I WIN AGAIN! I’M A PRESCIENT GENIUS!” “And (Since you destroyed the phony argument I just made or lie I just told, well, we’ll just ignore that and pop up another pious fraud and set of falsehoods over here, and wait for the idiots-of-good-will to waste their time trying to ‘convince’ me of the error of may ways!)”
You have many fellow skunks elsewhere in “debates”-space. Here’s a sample, from another ‘health-uncare’ soapbox platform:
“Yankee, the trouble with all of this back and forth is the ease with which people can slip flat-out falsehoods into the ‘debate.’ You say: ‘Relax, since 1965 no poor American has ever been without health care. Don’t believe everything you read. Medicaid covers 100% of poor Americans.’ And you reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicaid
“Which if you go read the article, you find right up front, in the first paragraph, the the following clear contradiction:
“‘It is estimated that approximately 60 percent of poor Americans are not covered by Medicaid.[3] Medicaid is the largest source of funding for medical and health-related services for people with limited income in the United States. Because of the aging Baby Boomer population, the fastest growing aspect of Medicaid is nursing home coverage.’
“Here in Florida, and in CA and so many other states, the theft of present and future resources by the greedy few has ‘de-funded’ Medicaid and will kill Medicare and is on its way to murdering any sensible repair of the medicine-delivery structures in this country. All so you tyrrany-of-the-privileged-minority can protect the channels of greedy bleeding of the last bits of real wealth in this economy.
“And you also find THIS text:
“‘Some states have incorporated the use of private companies to administer portions of their Medicaid benefits. These programs, typically referred to as Medicaid managed care, allow private insurance companies or health maintenance organizations to contract directly with a state Medicaid department at a fixed price per enrollee. The health plans then enroll eligible individuals into their programs and become responsible for assuring Medicaid benefits are delivered to eligible beneficiaries.’
“I’m sure the B-school types here see the opportunity to grab public money in this ‘case:’ ‘Fixed price per enrollee,’ all you gotta do is fiddle the regulations to maximize the per-capita payment on the argument that more money is needed to provide decent service, then ‘cut costs,’ and cut some more, and pay staff peanuts and provide the involuntary ‘enrollees’ less and less care due to more and more overwork, and Voila! big profits from the private miseries of people who can’t or don’t dare to complain or even just ask for a glass of water.
“As a nurse doing the kind of work I do, I know that your original post is pure BS. ‘Coverage’ of Medicaid is so far short of what you claim as to be weepable. And having a little experience in for-profit ‘nursing homes’ where Medicaid and Medicare are the funding sources. I can only hope that all the people dumping their bile on ‘socialized medicine’ get the chance to be tied, drooling and over-medicated, into a Geri-Chair by grossly over-worked nurses, to sit in their own excrement on their own bedsores, and have trays of pseudo-food put in front of them by grossly overworked aides, stuff they can’t even cut up and put into their own mouths, so they slowly starve and succumb to disease processes that with even just proper nutrition and physical care would not run their course.
“God help me for saying this, but may it happen to each one of you ‘privileged’ people, including so many ‘Prosperity Christians,’ who are doing your Damndest to keep screwing the least of these your brethren, and anyone else with less clout than you have, or wish you had.
“Your caution to ‘not believe everything you read’ applies with full force to what you and so many others cram fraudulently into this and every other space where humaneness is colliding with the greed and violence that dominate culture and politics now. The ‘health care debate’ just being the current shooting-war front for the ‘conservatives’ who ‘conserve’ only upward wealth transfer.
“A plague on you.”
Folks like you are kind of like the people who used the tolerance of the Weimar government to spread the mental poisons that brought a real Hitler and the kleptocrats around him to power, those same people who sent millions to die while stealing their gold fillings and artwork and them took off, conscience-unbound and consequence-free, for Argentina and other corruption-and evil-tolerant places.
Warstler, why does anybody engage with you, you smarmy fraud? Is it the same attraction that picking scabs has, or pulling boogers out of one’s nose and eating them? You are as dishonest and condescending and smug as Sneering Charlie Krauthammer. “Answer all my points, or I WIN!” “Jon agrees with me — See? I’ve interpreted something he said to mean he’s YIELDED UP to my superior intelligence! I WIN AGAIN! I’M A PRESCIENT GENIUS!” “And (Since you destroyed the phony argument I just made or lie I just told, well, we’ll just ignore that and pop up another pious fraud and set of falsehoods over here, and wait for the idiots-of-good-will to waste their time trying to ‘convince’ me of the error of may ways!)”
You have many fellow skunks elsewhere in “debates”-space. Here’s a sample, from another ‘health-uncare’ soapbox platform:
“Yankee, the trouble with all of this back and forth is the ease with which people can slip flat-out falsehoods into the ‘debate.’ You say: ‘Relax, since 1965 no poor American has ever been without health care. Don’t believe everything you read. Medicaid covers 100% of poor Americans.’ And you reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicaid
“Which if you go read the article, you find right up front, in the first paragraph, the the following clear contradiction:
“‘It is estimated that approximately 60 percent of poor Americans are not covered by Medicaid.[3] Medicaid is the largest source of funding for medical and health-related services for people with limited income in the United States. Because of the aging Baby Boomer population, the fastest growing aspect of Medicaid is nursing home coverage.’
“Here in Florida, and in CA and so many other states, the theft of present and future resources by the greedy few has ‘de-funded’ Medicaid and will kill Medicare and is on its way to murdering any sensible repair of the medicine-delivery structures in this country. All so you tyrrany-of-the-privileged-minority can protect the channels of greedy bleeding of the last bits of real wealth in this economy.
“And you also find THIS text:
“‘Some states have incorporated the use of private companies to administer portions of their Medicaid benefits. These programs, typically referred to as Medicaid managed care, allow private insurance companies or health maintenance organizations to contract directly with a state Medicaid department at a fixed price per enrollee. The health plans then enroll eligible individuals into their programs and become responsible for assuring Medicaid benefits are delivered to eligible beneficiaries.’
“I’m sure the B-school types here see the opportunity to grab public money in this ‘case:’ ‘Fixed price per enrollee,’ all you gotta do is fiddle the regulations to maximize the per-capita payment on the argument that more money is needed to provide decent service, then ‘cut costs,’ and cut some more, and pay staff peanuts and provide the involuntary ‘enrollees’ less and less care due to more and more overwork, and Voila! big profits from the private miseries of people who can’t or don’t dare to complain or even just ask for a glass of water.
“As a nurse doing the kind of work I do, I know that your original post is pure BS. ‘Coverage’ of Medicaid is so far short of what you claim as to be weepable. And having a little experience in for-profit ‘nursing homes’ where Medicaid and Medicare are the funding sources. I can only hope that all the people dumping their bile on ‘socialized medicine’ get the chance to be tied, drooling and over-medicated, into a Geri-Chair by grossly over-worked nurses, to sit in their own excrement on their own bedsores, and have trays of pseudo-food put in front of them by grossly overworked aides, stuff they can’t even cut up and put into their own mouths, so they slowly starve and succumb to disease processes that with even just proper nutrition and physical care would not run their course.
“God help me for saying this, but may it happen to each one of you ‘privileged’ people, including so many ‘Prosperity Christians,’ who are doing your Damndest to keep screwing the least of these your brethren, and anyone else with less clout than you have, or wish you had.
“Your caution to ‘not believe everything you read’ applies with full force to what you and so many others cram fraudulently into this and every other space where humaneness is colliding with the greed and violence that dominate culture and politics now. The ‘health care debate’ just being the current shooting-war front for the ‘conservatives’ who ‘conserve’ only upward wealth transfer.
“A plague on you.”
Folks like you are kind of like the people who used the tolerance of the Weimar government to spread the mental poisons that brought a real Hitler and the kleptocrats around him to power, those same people who sent millions to die while stealing their gold fillings and artwork and them took off, conscience-unbound and consequence-free, for Argentina and other corruption-and evil-tolerant places.
Warstler, why does anybody engage with you, you smarmy fraud? Is it the same attraction that picking scabs has, or pulling boogers out of one’s nose and eating them? You are as dishonest and condescending and smug as Sneering Charlie Krauthammer. “Answer all my points, or I WIN!” “Jon agrees with me — See? I’ve interpreted something he said to mean he’s YIELDED UP to my superior intelligence! I WIN AGAIN! I’M A PRESCIENT GENIUS!” “And (Since you destroyed the phony argument I just made or lie I just told, well, we’ll just ignore that and pop up another pious fraud and set of falsehoods over here, and wait for the idiots-of-good-will to waste their time trying to ‘convince’ me of the error of may ways!)”
You have many fellow skunks elsewhere in “debates”-space. Here’s a sample, from another ‘health-uncare’ soapbox platform:
“Yankee, the trouble with all of this back and forth is the ease with which people can slip flat-out falsehoods into the ‘debate.’ You say: ‘Relax, since 1965 no poor American has ever been without health care. Don’t believe everything you read. Medicaid covers 100% of poor Americans.’ And you reference
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicaid
“Which if you go read the article, you find right up front, in the first paragraph, the the following clear contradiction:
“‘It is estimated that approximately 60 percent of poor Americans are not covered by Medicaid.[3] Medicaid is the largest source of funding for medical and health-related services for people with limited income in the United States. Because of the aging Baby Boomer population, the fastest growing aspect of Medicaid is nursing home coverage.’
“Here in Florida, and in CA and so many other states, the theft of present and future resources by the greedy few has ‘de-funded’ Medicaid and will kill Medicare and is on its way to murdering any sensible repair of the medicine-delivery structures in this country. All so you tyrrany-of-the-privileged-minority can protect the channels of greedy bleeding of the last bits of real wealth in this economy.
“And you also find THIS text:
“‘Some states have incorporated the use of private companies to administer portions of their Medicaid benefits. These programs, typically referred to as Medicaid managed care, allow private insurance companies or health maintenance organizations to contract directly with a state Medicaid department at a fixed price per enrollee. The health plans then enroll eligible individuals into their programs and become responsible for assuring Medicaid benefits are delivered to eligible beneficiaries.’
“I’m sure the B-school types here see the opportunity to grab public money in this ‘case:’ ‘Fixed price per enrollee,’ all you gotta do is fiddle the regulations to maximize the per-capita payment on the argument that more money is needed to provide decent service, then ‘cut costs,’ and cut some more, and pay staff peanuts and provide the involuntary ‘enrollees’ less and less care due to more and more overwork, and Voila! big profits from the private miseries of people who can’t or don’t dare to complain or even just ask for a glass of water.
“As a nurse doing the kind of work I do, I know that your original post is pure BS. ‘Coverage’ of Medicaid is so far short of what you claim as to be weepable. And having a little experience in for-profit ‘nursing homes’ where Medicaid and Medicare are the funding sources. I can only hope that all the people dumping their bile on ‘socialized medicine’ get the chance to be tied, drooling and over-medicated, into a Geri-Chair by grossly over-worked nurses, to sit in their own excrement on their own bedsores, and have trays of pseudo-food put in front of them by grossly overworked aides, stuff they can’t even cut up and put into their own mouths, so they slowly starve and succumb to disease processes that with even just proper nutrition and physical care would not run their course.
“God help me for saying this, but may it happen to each one of you ‘privileged’ people, including so many ‘Prosperity Christians,’ who are doing your Damndest to keep screwing the least of these your brethren, and anyone else with less clout than you have, or wish you had.
“Your caution to ‘not believe everything you read’ applies with full force to what you and so many others cram fraudulently into this and every other space where humaneness is colliding with the greed and violence that dominate culture and politics now. The ‘health care debate’ just being the current shooting-war front for the ‘conservatives’ who ‘conserve’ only upward wealth transfer.
“A plague on you.”
Folks like you are kind of like the people who used the tolerance of the Weimar government to spread the mental poisons that brought a real Hitler and the kleptocrats around him to power, those same people who sent millions to die while stealing their gold fillings and artwork and them took off, conscience-unbound and consequence-free, for Argentina and other corruption-and evil-tolerant places.
Greg, I’m sorry, I was using short hand… no one is to go to jail for smoking.
But there are ways for hard choices to be employed… if you smoke or drink (we can test for this), you aren’t getting treatment for cancer, you are going straight hospice.
There are nudges to be employed, if you are gaining weight, your pharmacy is at the gym.
There are tough love policies, if your kid is gaining weight, he’s staying after school and being run hard in the 2 hour fat-camp run by the gym teacher.
What I’m trying to accomplish is a bit of logical judo. The fear most of us have of a “government takeover” should USED… take all the parts of a government plan that sound just horrible, and then do those to anyone who needs safety net coverage.
It can be humane, but still stiff. I truthfully think this would help pass health care. People understand the power of negative consequences. The left should simply commit to this policy:
Public care will be invasive enough, less than personal, aggressively cost driven, and outcome based, that no one sane would choose it. If anyone starts to choose it, here’s some other shit even more aggressive shit we can do.
That would pass.
Greg, I’m sorry, I was using short hand… no one is to go to jail for smoking.
But there are ways for hard choices to be employed… if you smoke or drink (we can test for this), you aren’t getting treatment for cancer, you are going straight hospice.
There are nudges to be employed, if you are gaining weight, your pharmacy is at the gym.
There are tough love policies, if your kid is gaining weight, he’s staying after school and being run hard in the 2 hour fat-camp run by the gym teacher.
What I’m trying to accomplish is a bit of logical judo. The fear most of us have of a “government takeover” should USED… take all the parts of a government plan that sound just horrible, and then do those to anyone who needs safety net coverage.
It can be humane, but still stiff. I truthfully think this would help pass health care. People understand the power of negative consequences. The left should simply commit to this policy:
Public care will be invasive enough, less than personal, aggressively cost driven, and outcome based, that no one sane would choose it. If anyone starts to choose it, here’s some other shit even more aggressive shit we can do.
That would pass.
Greg, I’m sorry, I was using short hand… no one is to go to jail for smoking.
But there are ways for hard choices to be employed… if you smoke or drink (we can test for this), you aren’t getting treatment for cancer, you are going straight hospice.
There are nudges to be employed, if you are gaining weight, your pharmacy is at the gym.
There are tough love policies, if your kid is gaining weight, he’s staying after school and being run hard in the 2 hour fat-camp run by the gym teacher.
What I’m trying to accomplish is a bit of logical judo. The fear most of us have of a “government takeover” should USED… take all the parts of a government plan that sound just horrible, and then do those to anyone who needs safety net coverage.
It can be humane, but still stiff. I truthfully think this would help pass health care. People understand the power of negative consequences. The left should simply commit to this policy:
Public care will be invasive enough, less than personal, aggressively cost driven, and outcome based, that no one sane would choose it. If anyone starts to choose it, here’s some other shit even more aggressive shit we can do.
That would pass.
Greg, I’m sorry, I was using short hand… no one is to go to jail for smoking.
But there are ways for hard choices to be employed… if you smoke or drink (we can test for this), you aren’t getting treatment for cancer, you are going straight hospice.
There are nudges to be employed, if you are gaining weight, your pharmacy is at the gym.
There are tough love policies, if your kid is gaining weight, he’s staying after school and being run hard in the 2 hour fat-camp run by the gym teacher.
What I’m trying to accomplish is a bit of logical judo. The fear most of us have of a “government takeover” should USED… take all the parts of a government plan that sound just horrible, and then do those to anyone who needs safety net coverage.
It can be humane, but still stiff. I truthfully think this would help pass health care. People understand the power of negative consequences. The left should simply commit to this policy:
Public care will be invasive enough, less than personal, aggressively cost driven, and outcome based, that no one sane would choose it. If anyone starts to choose it, here’s some other shit even more aggressive shit we can do.
That would pass.
I stand solidly behind war crimes trials for the entire Bush team. It would be the most healthy restraint on murderous, bankrupting foreign intervention since the abject failure of the Vietnam war.
Put them is jail and put the fear of god in Obama so that he’ll knock out the drone murder in afpak, the spying and the plans for “indefinite detention”.
On these things, our president is not nearly liberal enough. He is, however, quite “progressive” in that warmongering Woodrow Wilson kind of way.
I stand solidly behind war crimes trials for the entire Bush team. It would be the most healthy restraint on murderous, bankrupting foreign intervention since the abject failure of the Vietnam war.
Put them is jail and put the fear of god in Obama so that he’ll knock out the drone murder in afpak, the spying and the plans for “indefinite detention”.
On these things, our president is not nearly liberal enough. He is, however, quite “progressive” in that warmongering Woodrow Wilson kind of way.
I stand solidly behind war crimes trials for the entire Bush team. It would be the most healthy restraint on murderous, bankrupting foreign intervention since the abject failure of the Vietnam war.
Put them is jail and put the fear of god in Obama so that he’ll knock out the drone murder in afpak, the spying and the plans for “indefinite detention”.
On these things, our president is not nearly liberal enough. He is, however, quite “progressive” in that warmongering Woodrow Wilson kind of way.
I stand solidly behind war crimes trials for the entire Bush team. It would be the most healthy restraint on murderous, bankrupting foreign intervention since the abject failure of the Vietnam war.
Put them is jail and put the fear of god in Obama so that he’ll knock out the drone murder in afpak, the spying and the plans for “indefinite detention”.
On these things, our president is not nearly liberal enough. He is, however, quite “progressive” in that warmongering Woodrow Wilson kind of way.
I thought this was a post about Jon’s predictions on Obama’s political maneuvering, but in reading the comments we are once again railroaded by Warstlers incessant trolling.
I thought this was a post about Jon’s predictions on Obama’s political maneuvering, but in reading the comments we are once again railroaded by Warstlers incessant trolling.
I thought this was a post about Jon’s predictions on Obama’s political maneuvering, but in reading the comments we are once again railroaded by Warstlers incessant trolling.
I thought this was a post about Jon’s predictions on Obama’s political maneuvering, but in reading the comments we are once again railroaded by Warstlers incessant trolling.
Jon,
Meyerson’s article assumes that the progressive plan is good for this country or any country for that matter. Now it may be great for the control it will give progressives, to me it is apparent that he is merely trying to obscure the lens.
Where are we? Two providers, one sells a good product and the other provides a substandard product at a reduced cost or given away, being represented as free, until the provider that had to charge goes out of business and he will. Then and only then will it become apparent where the real value was.
Progressives have been buying the bid with our money for generations and sooner or later the other providers will be gone and that is when the American people will realize it’s too late. As is the plan. What will happen then? Only time will tell.
As for De Tocqueville, well……………… the left was listening and they have acted according to their ideology.
A prophylactic pardon my French.
Rino’s and Cino’s, and the rest of the republicans with the color of power, you truly are a collection of ASSHOLES.
In the real America, my definition not yours, the ones that buy bids always fail, except of course with government support they can live forever, The damage that they do to markets and individuals cannot be quantified.
I think I see the precipice…….
Jon,
Meyerson’s article assumes that the progressive plan is good for this country or any country for that matter. Now it may be great for the control it will give progressives, to me it is apparent that he is merely trying to obscure the lens.
Where are we? Two providers, one sells a good product and the other provides a substandard product at a reduced cost or given away, being represented as free, until the provider that had to charge goes out of business and he will. Then and only then will it become apparent where the real value was.
Progressives have been buying the bid with our money for generations and sooner or later the other providers will be gone and that is when the American people will realize it’s too late. As is the plan. What will happen then? Only time will tell.
As for De Tocqueville, well……………… the left was listening and they have acted according to their ideology.
A prophylactic pardon my French.
Rino’s and Cino’s, and the rest of the republicans with the color of power, you truly are a collection of ASSHOLES.
In the real America, my definition not yours, the ones that buy bids always fail, except of course with government support they can live forever, The damage that they do to markets and individuals cannot be quantified.
I think I see the precipice…….
Jon,
Meyerson’s article assumes that the progressive plan is good for this country or any country for that matter. Now it may be great for the control it will give progressives, to me it is apparent that he is merely trying to obscure the lens.
Where are we? Two providers, one sells a good product and the other provides a substandard product at a reduced cost or given away, being represented as free, until the provider that had to charge goes out of business and he will. Then and only then will it become apparent where the real value was.
Progressives have been buying the bid with our money for generations and sooner or later the other providers will be gone and that is when the American people will realize it’s too late. As is the plan. What will happen then? Only time will tell.
As for De Tocqueville, well……………… the left was listening and they have acted according to their ideology.
A prophylactic pardon my French.
Rino’s and Cino’s, and the rest of the republicans with the color of power, you truly are a collection of ASSHOLES.
In the real America, my definition not yours, the ones that buy bids always fail, except of course with government support they can live forever, The damage that they do to markets and individuals cannot be quantified.
I think I see the precipice…….
Jon,
Meyerson’s article assumes that the progressive plan is good for this country or any country for that matter. Now it may be great for the control it will give progressives, to me it is apparent that he is merely trying to obscure the lens.
Where are we? Two providers, one sells a good product and the other provides a substandard product at a reduced cost or given away, being represented as free, until the provider that had to charge goes out of business and he will. Then and only then will it become apparent where the real value was.
Progressives have been buying the bid with our money for generations and sooner or later the other providers will be gone and that is when the American people will realize it’s too late. As is the plan. What will happen then? Only time will tell.
As for De Tocqueville, well……………… the left was listening and they have acted according to their ideology.
A prophylactic pardon my French.
Rino’s and Cino’s, and the rest of the republicans with the color of power, you truly are a collection of ASSHOLES.
In the real America, my definition not yours, the ones that buy bids always fail, except of course with government support they can live forever, The damage that they do to markets and individuals cannot be quantified.
I think I see the precipice…….
When at war a poor soldier gets the same medic attention then a rich one. Back at home when they
are at peace they don’t. American should have the best healthcare sistem in the world so that other country can copy it. To be leaders is not only to produce the best weapons or cars…
When at war a poor soldier gets the same medic attention then a rich one. Back at home when they
are at peace they don’t. American should have the best healthcare sistem in the world so that other country can copy it. To be leaders is not only to produce the best weapons or cars…
When at war a poor soldier gets the same medic attention then a rich one. Back at home when they
are at peace they don’t. American should have the best healthcare sistem in the world so that other country can copy it. To be leaders is not only to produce the best weapons or cars…
When at war a poor soldier gets the same medic attention then a rich one. Back at home when they
are at peace they don’t. American should have the best healthcare sistem in the world so that other country can copy it. To be leaders is not only to produce the best weapons or cars…
Andy, then WRITE about it. Paragraphs and paragraphs. Here ya go… he’s dreaming if he (or you) think people are going to stop worrying about their health care decisions being taken over by social engineers, so they can worry about Tom Ridge’s new book… dude go read the article – Osama says blood will run in the streets, they say raise the threat level – big deal. As Jon says, “politics ain’t beanbag.”
Now I’m going to go back to ensuring everybody keeps their eye on the health care ball no matter what Jon wants the news cycle to be.
Andy, then WRITE about it. Paragraphs and paragraphs. Here ya go… he’s dreaming if he (or you) think people are going to stop worrying about their health care decisions being taken over by social engineers, so they can worry about Tom Ridge’s new book… dude go read the article – Osama says blood will run in the streets, they say raise the threat level – big deal. As Jon says, “politics ain’t beanbag.”
Now I’m going to go back to ensuring everybody keeps their eye on the health care ball no matter what Jon wants the news cycle to be.
Andy, then WRITE about it. Paragraphs and paragraphs. Here ya go… he’s dreaming if he (or you) think people are going to stop worrying about their health care decisions being taken over by social engineers, so they can worry about Tom Ridge’s new book… dude go read the article – Osama says blood will run in the streets, they say raise the threat level – big deal. As Jon says, “politics ain’t beanbag.”
Now I’m going to go back to ensuring everybody keeps their eye on the health care ball no matter what Jon wants the news cycle to be.
Morgan,
You get civil for a bit and I get sucked in, then you go back to being more interested in promoting yourself in your best sophomoric cum Bill O’Really style.
You don’t engage, you assault; Dead to me. No more.
Morgan,
You get civil for a bit and I get sucked in, then you go back to being more interested in promoting yourself in your best sophomoric cum Bill O’Really style.
You don’t engage, you assault; Dead to me. No more.
Morgan,
You get civil for a bit and I get sucked in, then you go back to being more interested in promoting yourself in your best sophomoric cum Bill O’Really style.
You don’t engage, you assault; Dead to me. No more.
Ken, no idea what was rude. Sorry.
Another rich doctor’s position:
“Today, 97 percent of Massachusetts residents have health insurance, the highest in the country. But less publicized are the unintended consequences that the influx of half a million newly insured patients has had on an unprepared primary care system.
The Massachusetts Medical Society reported that the average wait time for a new patient looking for a primary care doctor ranged from 36 to 50 days, with almost half of internal medicine physicians closing their doors entirely to new patients. And when you consider that Massachusetts already has the highest concentration of doctors nationwide, wait times will likely be worse in other, less physician-abundant parts of the country, should universal coverage be enacted federally.
When patients are forced to wait weeks to obtain medical care, they inevitably find their way into the emergency department for treatment that ordinarily can be handled in a doctor’s office.”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/20/pho.doctor.shortage/index.html
I like that we’re seeing more doctors speak out. More than patients. More than pundits. More than politicians. More than insurance companies. More than pharma. More than unions. Doctors matter most.
Ken, no idea what was rude. Sorry.
Another rich doctor’s position:
“Today, 97 percent of Massachusetts residents have health insurance, the highest in the country. But less publicized are the unintended consequences that the influx of half a million newly insured patients has had on an unprepared primary care system.
The Massachusetts Medical Society reported that the average wait time for a new patient looking for a primary care doctor ranged from 36 to 50 days, with almost half of internal medicine physicians closing their doors entirely to new patients. And when you consider that Massachusetts already has the highest concentration of doctors nationwide, wait times will likely be worse in other, less physician-abundant parts of the country, should universal coverage be enacted federally.
When patients are forced to wait weeks to obtain medical care, they inevitably find their way into the emergency department for treatment that ordinarily can be handled in a doctor’s office.”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/20/pho.doctor.shortage/index.html
I like that we’re seeing more doctors speak out. More than patients. More than pundits. More than politicians. More than insurance companies. More than pharma. More than unions. Doctors matter most.
Ken, no idea what was rude. Sorry.
Another rich doctor’s position:
“Today, 97 percent of Massachusetts residents have health insurance, the highest in the country. But less publicized are the unintended consequences that the influx of half a million newly insured patients has had on an unprepared primary care system.
The Massachusetts Medical Society reported that the average wait time for a new patient looking for a primary care doctor ranged from 36 to 50 days, with almost half of internal medicine physicians closing their doors entirely to new patients. And when you consider that Massachusetts already has the highest concentration of doctors nationwide, wait times will likely be worse in other, less physician-abundant parts of the country, should universal coverage be enacted federally.
When patients are forced to wait weeks to obtain medical care, they inevitably find their way into the emergency department for treatment that ordinarily can be handled in a doctor’s office.”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/20/pho.doctor.shortage/index.html
I like that we’re seeing more doctors speak out. More than patients. More than pundits. More than politicians. More than insurance companies. More than pharma. More than unions. Doctors matter most.
Ken, no idea what was rude. Sorry.
Another rich doctor’s position:
“Today, 97 percent of Massachusetts residents have health insurance, the highest in the country. But less publicized are the unintended consequences that the influx of half a million newly insured patients has had on an unprepared primary care system.
The Massachusetts Medical Society reported that the average wait time for a new patient looking for a primary care doctor ranged from 36 to 50 days, with almost half of internal medicine physicians closing their doors entirely to new patients. And when you consider that Massachusetts already has the highest concentration of doctors nationwide, wait times will likely be worse in other, less physician-abundant parts of the country, should universal coverage be enacted federally.
When patients are forced to wait weeks to obtain medical care, they inevitably find their way into the emergency department for treatment that ordinarily can be handled in a doctor’s office.”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/20/pho.doctor.shortage/index.html
I like that we’re seeing more doctors speak out. More than patients. More than pundits. More than politicians. More than insurance companies. More than pharma. More than unions. Doctors matter most.
Wait a second. You mean they manipulated the national threat level for political gain? I had no idea. I really honestly thought that, every time Goober’s poll numbers dropped, it just so happened that it was time to bump the threat level up to Scary Orange again.
Wait a second. You mean they manipulated the national threat level for political gain? I had no idea. I really honestly thought that, every time Goober’s poll numbers dropped, it just so happened that it was time to bump the threat level up to Scary Orange again.
People here engage with him because his arguments are easy to unravel, and it makes people feel good about themselves.
Guilty!
People here engage with him because his arguments are easy to unravel, and it makes people feel good about themselves.
Guilty!
People here engage with him because his arguments are easy to unravel, and it makes people feel good about themselves.
Guilty!
People here engage with him because his arguments are easy to unravel, and it makes people feel good about themselves.
Guilty!
As Homer so eloquently put it 3900 years ago, “Beware Morgans bearing apologies.”
As Homer so eloquently put it 3900 years ago, “Beware Morgans bearing apologies.”
Make that 3200 years or so.
Make that 3200 years or so.
Make that 3200 years or so.
You’re cherry picking Morgan. For every doctor that gets print time for denouncing the admin’s plan, I could show you ten for it.
You’re cherry picking Morgan. For every doctor that gets print time for denouncing the admin’s plan, I could show you ten for it.
You’re cherry picking Morgan. For every doctor that gets print time for denouncing the admin’s plan, I could show you ten for it.
So sure, if healthcare is treated as a charity or social safety net, then it can make sense to discuss the conditions under which you’re willing to shell-out for it (make it aggressive, invasive, impersonal, if that’s the will of the people).
But at some point advanced (?!) and prosperous (?!) countries treat reasonable healthcare as a right and a shared responsibility (more like how national defense and environment are treated). When it’s treated as a right, and not just like something else you can buy, then arguments about how rich people should get more (rights) don’t make sense (except in the most cynical, unsustainable way). Can’t control the costs? When it’s a right, people find a way (to compromise if nothing else).
Yes, rich people would still be able to buy more than reasonable healthcare, in fact they could always build and staff their own private medical facility. Don’t have a personal hospital? Just get richer!
So sure, if healthcare is treated as a charity or social safety net, then it can make sense to discuss the conditions under which you’re willing to shell-out for it (make it aggressive, invasive, impersonal, if that’s the will of the people).
But at some point advanced (?!) and prosperous (?!) countries treat reasonable healthcare as a right and a shared responsibility (more like how national defense and environment are treated). When it’s treated as a right, and not just like something else you can buy, then arguments about how rich people should get more (rights) don’t make sense (except in the most cynical, unsustainable way). Can’t control the costs? When it’s a right, people find a way (to compromise if nothing else).
Yes, rich people would still be able to buy more than reasonable healthcare, in fact they could always build and staff their own private medical facility. Don’t have a personal hospital? Just get richer!
So sure, if healthcare is treated as a charity or social safety net, then it can make sense to discuss the conditions under which you’re willing to shell-out for it (make it aggressive, invasive, impersonal, if that’s the will of the people).
But at some point advanced (?!) and prosperous (?!) countries treat reasonable healthcare as a right and a shared responsibility (more like how national defense and environment are treated). When it’s treated as a right, and not just like something else you can buy, then arguments about how rich people should get more (rights) don’t make sense (except in the most cynical, unsustainable way). Can’t control the costs? When it’s a right, people find a way (to compromise if nothing else).
Yes, rich people would still be able to buy more than reasonable healthcare, in fact they could always build and staff their own private medical facility. Don’t have a personal hospital? Just get richer!
So sure, if healthcare is treated as a charity or social safety net, then it can make sense to discuss the conditions under which you’re willing to shell-out for it (make it aggressive, invasive, impersonal, if that’s the will of the people).
But at some point advanced (?!) and prosperous (?!) countries treat reasonable healthcare as a right and a shared responsibility (more like how national defense and environment are treated). When it’s treated as a right, and not just like something else you can buy, then arguments about how rich people should get more (rights) don’t make sense (except in the most cynical, unsustainable way). Can’t control the costs? When it’s a right, people find a way (to compromise if nothing else).
Yes, rich people would still be able to buy more than reasonable healthcare, in fact they could always build and staff their own private medical facility. Don’t have a personal hospital? Just get richer!
I thought you were leaving?
I thought you were leaving?
I thought you were leaving?
http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?playerId=011008&streamingFormat=FLASH&referralObject=8459458&referralPlaylistId=b91bfb7497c00540ff84c65f474c804a116d1713
http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?playerId=011008&streamingFormat=FLASH&referralObject=8459458&referralPlaylistId=b91bfb7497c00540ff84c65f474c804a116d1713
http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?playerId=011008&streamingFormat=FLASH&referralObject=8459458&referralPlaylistId=b91bfb7497c00540ff84c65f474c804a116d1713
GregG ,
finally a real discussion! ok, you grant that rich people will have special treatment & you want health care to be a right.
ok, i’m not sure that delivers better care to the bottom tier, but i’m sure it puts more people in the bottom.
I’m willing to re-imagine that more people in the bottom adds up to better care for the bottom overall, but I’m stuck with analogies like the one from Dan: if we cut out the kids from school who don’t deserve to be at school, we’ll have a more fair school playing field.
That doesn’t mean we can’t care for the bottom, but does it serve us best to try and drag them all through 4 years of college, when they aren’t actually studying?
GregG ,
finally a real discussion! ok, you grant that rich people will have special treatment & you want health care to be a right.
ok, i’m not sure that delivers better care to the bottom tier, but i’m sure it puts more people in the bottom.
I’m willing to re-imagine that more people in the bottom adds up to better care for the bottom overall, but I’m stuck with analogies like the one from Dan: if we cut out the kids from school who don’t deserve to be at school, we’ll have a more fair school playing field.
That doesn’t mean we can’t care for the bottom, but does it serve us best to try and drag them all through 4 years of college, when they aren’t actually studying?
GregG ,
finally a real discussion! ok, you grant that rich people will have special treatment & you want health care to be a right.
ok, i’m not sure that delivers better care to the bottom tier, but i’m sure it puts more people in the bottom.
I’m willing to re-imagine that more people in the bottom adds up to better care for the bottom overall, but I’m stuck with analogies like the one from Dan: if we cut out the kids from school who don’t deserve to be at school, we’ll have a more fair school playing field.
That doesn’t mean we can’t care for the bottom, but does it serve us best to try and drag them all through 4 years of college, when they aren’t actually studying?
GOP NC Rep Virginia Foxx: “FOXX: The Constitution doesn’t grant a right to health care, and most of us are living as much by the Constitution as we can. It also doesn’t give the federal government the authority to deal with health care.”
So much for the CDC and Air Force. I guess we have to shut those down too.
GOP NC Rep Virginia Foxx: “FOXX: The Constitution doesn’t grant a right to health care, and most of us are living as much by the Constitution as we can. It also doesn’t give the federal government the authority to deal with health care.”
So much for the CDC and Air Force. I guess we have to shut those down too.
GOP NC Rep Virginia Foxx: “FOXX: The Constitution doesn’t grant a right to health care, and most of us are living as much by the Constitution as we can. It also doesn’t give the federal government the authority to deal with health care.”
So much for the CDC and Air Force. I guess we have to shut those down too.
GOP NC Rep Virginia Foxx: “FOXX: The Constitution doesn’t grant a right to health care, and most of us are living as much by the Constitution as we can. It also doesn’t give the federal government the authority to deal with health care.”
So much for the CDC and Air Force. I guess we have to shut those down too.
Mike, that’s nuts, I know maybe 15 doctors including my own.. NONE say they prefer what’s being discussed. Most say the care given to those currently covered will fall.
Seriously, show me. I’m not saying doctors are altruists and aren’t greedy. But if we were going to guarantee car care and not spend more money on it… I’d mainly ask the mechanics if this was doable.
(side note: if we provided car care to people who didn’t pay for it, I’d expect those people to treat their cars even worse. wouldn’t you?)
Mike, that’s nuts, I know maybe 15 doctors including my own.. NONE say they prefer what’s being discussed. Most say the care given to those currently covered will fall.
Seriously, show me. I’m not saying doctors are altruists and aren’t greedy. But if we were going to guarantee car care and not spend more money on it… I’d mainly ask the mechanics if this was doable.
(side note: if we provided car care to people who didn’t pay for it, I’d expect those people to treat their cars even worse. wouldn’t you?)
Mike, that’s nuts, I know maybe 15 doctors including my own.. NONE say they prefer what’s being discussed. Most say the care given to those currently covered will fall.
Seriously, show me. I’m not saying doctors are altruists and aren’t greedy. But if we were going to guarantee car care and not spend more money on it… I’d mainly ask the mechanics if this was doable.
(side note: if we provided car care to people who didn’t pay for it, I’d expect those people to treat their cars even worse. wouldn’t you?)
Mike, that’s nuts, I know maybe 15 doctors including my own.. NONE say they prefer what’s being discussed. Most say the care given to those currently covered will fall.
Seriously, show me. I’m not saying doctors are altruists and aren’t greedy. But if we were going to guarantee car care and not spend more money on it… I’d mainly ask the mechanics if this was doable.
(side note: if we provided car care to people who didn’t pay for it, I’d expect those people to treat their cars even worse. wouldn’t you?)
Morgan it’s not giving the rich special treatment; it’s that you don’t need to limit anyone from being allowed to buy more/better if they want to. It comes back to: what’s the baseline for reasonable care.
There’s nothing magic about healthcare in the U.K. or Canada, it’s good enough, always more expensive than you’d like, always could be better than you’d like, but what isn’t.
The easier it is for more of society to simply buy their way out of social issues, the less they solve the real issues. It’s a fascinating time for the US, some issues are going to be huge; if they’re huge enough (like creating flesh-eat blob monsters from bio-tech gone wrong, say), that’s what Amendments are for.
Morgan it’s not giving the rich special treatment; it’s that you don’t need to limit anyone from being allowed to buy more/better if they want to. It comes back to: what’s the baseline for reasonable care.
There’s nothing magic about healthcare in the U.K. or Canada, it’s good enough, always more expensive than you’d like, always could be better than you’d like, but what isn’t.
The easier it is for more of society to simply buy their way out of social issues, the less they solve the real issues. It’s a fascinating time for the US, some issues are going to be huge; if they’re huge enough (like creating flesh-eat blob monsters from bio-tech gone wrong, say), that’s what Amendments are for.
Morgan it’s not giving the rich special treatment; it’s that you don’t need to limit anyone from being allowed to buy more/better if they want to. It comes back to: what’s the baseline for reasonable care.
There’s nothing magic about healthcare in the U.K. or Canada, it’s good enough, always more expensive than you’d like, always could be better than you’d like, but what isn’t.
The easier it is for more of society to simply buy their way out of social issues, the less they solve the real issues. It’s a fascinating time for the US, some issues are going to be huge; if they’re huge enough (like creating flesh-eat blob monsters from bio-tech gone wrong, say), that’s what Amendments are for.
Morgan it’s not giving the rich special treatment; it’s that you don’t need to limit anyone from being allowed to buy more/better if they want to. It comes back to: what’s the baseline for reasonable care.
There’s nothing magic about healthcare in the U.K. or Canada, it’s good enough, always more expensive than you’d like, always could be better than you’d like, but what isn’t.
The easier it is for more of society to simply buy their way out of social issues, the less they solve the real issues. It’s a fascinating time for the US, some issues are going to be huge; if they’re huge enough (like creating flesh-eat blob monsters from bio-tech gone wrong, say), that’s what Amendments are for.
Personally, I find the advice of John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, light years more credible than any of the DC hacks and career politicians with their medical industrial complex lobby money flowing just below the surface. After all, he actually HAS EXPERIENCE providing healthcare insurance for a large, international staff and with a personal fiduciary responsibility for controlling costs… unless being in the Congress for decades or maneuvering the corrupt Chicago political machine secretly involves crucial healthcare decisions that effect thousands of people AND having actual personal accountability for them.
I don’t see why the President (or Congress) has any credibility or credible experience to warrant the re-engineering of our healthcare system. It appears that HR3200 deals with all of the hard issues by simply saying some technocrat will take care of it via as-yet-undetermined means using seemingly vast discretionary power.
Sorry. If you voted for corn syrup subsidies, you have no credibility on human health, just as a vote for ethanol subsidies ends any shred of credibility on the environment or compassion for the world’s hungry.
Speaking of which, there isn’t a single shread of discussion about the role of personal responsibility in this healthcare “debate”. It’s simply ludicrous.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32306655/ns/health-health_care
This president should be spending every second of his time disentangling our nation from it’s imperial oversees quagmire and leave allocation of scarce capital to people that have the experience and the information necessary to do it right: private enterprise and voluntary exchange.
Reform the government. Reform medicare. Reform the state mandates, taxcode nonsense and mountain of regulations and licenses that keep our system from being both the highest quality AND the most broadly accessible system.
Every private market is able to accomplish this, from cars to computers to the insurance you can buy for both. Health is only different because it’s in a regulatory straightjacket with an entitlement weight pulling it (and our national finances) to the bottom of the ocean.
Personally, I find the advice of John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, light years more credible than any of the DC hacks and career politicians with their medical industrial complex lobby money flowing just below the surface. After all, he actually HAS EXPERIENCE providing healthcare insurance for a large, international staff and with a personal fiduciary responsibility for controlling costs… unless being in the Congress for decades or maneuvering the corrupt Chicago political machine secretly involves crucial healthcare decisions that effect thousands of people AND having actual personal accountability for them.
I don’t see why the President (or Congress) has any credibility or credible experience to warrant the re-engineering of our healthcare system. It appears that HR3200 deals with all of the hard issues by simply saying some technocrat will take care of it via as-yet-undetermined means using seemingly vast discretionary power.
Sorry. If you voted for corn syrup subsidies, you have no credibility on human health, just as a vote for ethanol subsidies ends any shred of credibility on the environment or compassion for the world’s hungry.
Speaking of which, there isn’t a single shread of discussion about the role of personal responsibility in this healthcare “debate”. It’s simply ludicrous.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32306655/ns/health-health_care
This president should be spending every second of his time disentangling our nation from it’s imperial oversees quagmire and leave allocation of scarce capital to people that have the experience and the information necessary to do it right: private enterprise and voluntary exchange.
Reform the government. Reform medicare. Reform the state mandates, taxcode nonsense and mountain of regulations and licenses that keep our system from being both the highest quality AND the most broadly accessible system.
Every private market is able to accomplish this, from cars to computers to the insurance you can buy for both. Health is only different because it’s in a regulatory straightjacket with an entitlement weight pulling it (and our national finances) to the bottom of the ocean.
Personally, I find the advice of John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, light years more credible than any of the DC hacks and career politicians with their medical industrial complex lobby money flowing just below the surface. After all, he actually HAS EXPERIENCE providing healthcare insurance for a large, international staff and with a personal fiduciary responsibility for controlling costs… unless being in the Congress for decades or maneuvering the corrupt Chicago political machine secretly involves crucial healthcare decisions that effect thousands of people AND having actual personal accountability for them.
I don’t see why the President (or Congress) has any credibility or credible experience to warrant the re-engineering of our healthcare system. It appears that HR3200 deals with all of the hard issues by simply saying some technocrat will take care of it via as-yet-undetermined means using seemingly vast discretionary power.
Sorry. If you voted for corn syrup subsidies, you have no credibility on human health, just as a vote for ethanol subsidies ends any shred of credibility on the environment or compassion for the world’s hungry.
Speaking of which, there isn’t a single shread of discussion about the role of personal responsibility in this healthcare “debate”. It’s simply ludicrous.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32306655/ns/health-health_care
This president should be spending every second of his time disentangling our nation from it’s imperial oversees quagmire and leave allocation of scarce capital to people that have the experience and the information necessary to do it right: private enterprise and voluntary exchange.
Reform the government. Reform medicare. Reform the state mandates, taxcode nonsense and mountain of regulations and licenses that keep our system from being both the highest quality AND the most broadly accessible system.
Every private market is able to accomplish this, from cars to computers to the insurance you can buy for both. Health is only different because it’s in a regulatory straightjacket with an entitlement weight pulling it (and our national finances) to the bottom of the ocean.
Personally, I find the advice of John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, light years more credible than any of the DC hacks and career politicians with their medical industrial complex lobby money flowing just below the surface. After all, he actually HAS EXPERIENCE providing healthcare insurance for a large, international staff and with a personal fiduciary responsibility for controlling costs… unless being in the Congress for decades or maneuvering the corrupt Chicago political machine secretly involves crucial healthcare decisions that effect thousands of people AND having actual personal accountability for them.
I don’t see why the President (or Congress) has any credibility or credible experience to warrant the re-engineering of our healthcare system. It appears that HR3200 deals with all of the hard issues by simply saying some technocrat will take care of it via as-yet-undetermined means using seemingly vast discretionary power.
Sorry. If you voted for corn syrup subsidies, you have no credibility on human health, just as a vote for ethanol subsidies ends any shred of credibility on the environment or compassion for the world’s hungry.
Speaking of which, there isn’t a single shread of discussion about the role of personal responsibility in this healthcare “debate”. It’s simply ludicrous.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32306655/ns/health-health_care
This president should be spending every second of his time disentangling our nation from it’s imperial oversees quagmire and leave allocation of scarce capital to people that have the experience and the information necessary to do it right: private enterprise and voluntary exchange.
Reform the government. Reform medicare. Reform the state mandates, taxcode nonsense and mountain of regulations and licenses that keep our system from being both the highest quality AND the most broadly accessible system.
Every private market is able to accomplish this, from cars to computers to the insurance you can buy for both. Health is only different because it’s in a regulatory straightjacket with an entitlement weight pulling it (and our national finances) to the bottom of the ocean.
Two regulars from another planet now…wow!
Two regulars from another planet now…wow!
Two regulars from another planet now…wow!
Two regulars from another planet now…wow!
Liberals and Libertarians, UNITE! seriously though. We should be united.
End the single party of keynesian warmongering.
Liberals and Libertarians, UNITE! seriously though. We should be united.
End the single party of keynesian warmongering.
Liberals and Libertarians, UNITE! seriously though. We should be united.
End the single party of keynesian warmongering.
This is a key conceptual issue. You are presenting free enterprise doctrine as an article of faith rather than as a matter of empirical evidence or reasoned argumentation.
Insurance is quite different from manufacturing or conventional service industries because of the opportunity for fraud — absconding with the pot of money in various ways (eg. recission, denial of service, lifetime caps, unintelligible contracts, etc.) is very different.
Kenneth Arrow wrote insightfully on the mismatch of private competition to the problem of health insurance back in the 1960s, but our public discourse is far too dominated by media-generated distractions and shouting matches to allow anything resembling insight into the public mind.
Of course many of the people making the “free enterprise could solve this” argument actually are thinking of a quite different “problem”. For them the problem is mainly that too many people get too much healthcare. A truly free market would summarily cut off life support for anyone depending on Medicare/Medicaid to stay alive.
The pure free market: the ultimate death panel. What’s not to like?
This is a key conceptual issue. You are presenting free enterprise doctrine as an article of faith rather than as a matter of empirical evidence or reasoned argumentation.
Insurance is quite different from manufacturing or conventional service industries because of the opportunity for fraud — absconding with the pot of money in various ways (eg. recission, denial of service, lifetime caps, unintelligible contracts, etc.) is very different.
Kenneth Arrow wrote insightfully on the mismatch of private competition to the problem of health insurance back in the 1960s, but our public discourse is far too dominated by media-generated distractions and shouting matches to allow anything resembling insight into the public mind.
Of course many of the people making the “free enterprise could solve this” argument actually are thinking of a quite different “problem”. For them the problem is mainly that too many people get too much healthcare. A truly free market would summarily cut off life support for anyone depending on Medicare/Medicaid to stay alive.
The pure free market: the ultimate death panel. What’s not to like?
This is a key conceptual issue. You are presenting free enterprise doctrine as an article of faith rather than as a matter of empirical evidence or reasoned argumentation.
Insurance is quite different from manufacturing or conventional service industries because of the opportunity for fraud — absconding with the pot of money in various ways (eg. recission, denial of service, lifetime caps, unintelligible contracts, etc.) is very different.
Kenneth Arrow wrote insightfully on the mismatch of private competition to the problem of health insurance back in the 1960s, but our public discourse is far too dominated by media-generated distractions and shouting matches to allow anything resembling insight into the public mind.
Of course many of the people making the “free enterprise could solve this” argument actually are thinking of a quite different “problem”. For them the problem is mainly that too many people get too much healthcare. A truly free market would summarily cut off life support for anyone depending on Medicare/Medicaid to stay alive.
The pure free market: the ultimate death panel. What’s not to like?
This is a key conceptual issue. You are presenting free enterprise doctrine as an article of faith rather than as a matter of empirical evidence or reasoned argumentation.
Insurance is quite different from manufacturing or conventional service industries because of the opportunity for fraud — absconding with the pot of money in various ways (eg. recission, denial of service, lifetime caps, unintelligible contracts, etc.) is very different.
Kenneth Arrow wrote insightfully on the mismatch of private competition to the problem of health insurance back in the 1960s, but our public discourse is far too dominated by media-generated distractions and shouting matches to allow anything resembling insight into the public mind.
Of course many of the people making the “free enterprise could solve this” argument actually are thinking of a quite different “problem”. For them the problem is mainly that too many people get too much healthcare. A truly free market would summarily cut off life support for anyone depending on Medicare/Medicaid to stay alive.
The pure free market: the ultimate death panel. What’s not to like?
Seth, that’s not true. Not even close. The tragedy is how hard it is to create new kinds of insurance. And how hard it is to create tort-less insurance. Why can you opt to not have pain and suffering damages in auto insurance (to get a cheaper rate) and not in health care?
And yes there are benefits to requiring coverage of per-existing conditions, but to do that you HAVE to force everyone to have insurance, otherwise free riders wait till they are sick to buy insurance. Each can of worms begets another, and it is all so predictable.
On the spending side, the biggest issue we face is that we consume health care invisibly… going to the doctor should always be like getting your brakes checked (more than $100). Frankly, we really should just be focusing on just giving everyone catastrophic insurance (like a $5K deductible every year), and a savings account with maybe $3K in it that rolls over… so they have every good reason to price shop, scrimp, and save. We want people to CHOOSE less health care, not let the government decide who gets less.
Until the system is set back up so people consume it in a real market, don’t blame market forces, it is silly.
Seth, that’s not true. Not even close. The tragedy is how hard it is to create new kinds of insurance. And how hard it is to create tort-less insurance. Why can you opt to not have pain and suffering damages in auto insurance (to get a cheaper rate) and not in health care?
And yes there are benefits to requiring coverage of per-existing conditions, but to do that you HAVE to force everyone to have insurance, otherwise free riders wait till they are sick to buy insurance. Each can of worms begets another, and it is all so predictable.
On the spending side, the biggest issue we face is that we consume health care invisibly… going to the doctor should always be like getting your brakes checked (more than $100). Frankly, we really should just be focusing on just giving everyone catastrophic insurance (like a $5K deductible every year), and a savings account with maybe $3K in it that rolls over… so they have every good reason to price shop, scrimp, and save. We want people to CHOOSE less health care, not let the government decide who gets less.
Until the system is set back up so people consume it in a real market, don’t blame market forces, it is silly.
Seth, that’s not true. Not even close. The tragedy is how hard it is to create new kinds of insurance. And how hard it is to create tort-less insurance. Why can you opt to not have pain and suffering damages in auto insurance (to get a cheaper rate) and not in health care?
And yes there are benefits to requiring coverage of per-existing conditions, but to do that you HAVE to force everyone to have insurance, otherwise free riders wait till they are sick to buy insurance. Each can of worms begets another, and it is all so predictable.
On the spending side, the biggest issue we face is that we consume health care invisibly… going to the doctor should always be like getting your brakes checked (more than $100). Frankly, we really should just be focusing on just giving everyone catastrophic insurance (like a $5K deductible every year), and a savings account with maybe $3K in it that rolls over… so they have every good reason to price shop, scrimp, and save. We want people to CHOOSE less health care, not let the government decide who gets less.
Until the system is set back up so people consume it in a real market, don’t blame market forces, it is silly.
Seth, that’s not true. Not even close. The tragedy is how hard it is to create new kinds of insurance. And how hard it is to create tort-less insurance. Why can you opt to not have pain and suffering damages in auto insurance (to get a cheaper rate) and not in health care?
And yes there are benefits to requiring coverage of per-existing conditions, but to do that you HAVE to force everyone to have insurance, otherwise free riders wait till they are sick to buy insurance. Each can of worms begets another, and it is all so predictable.
On the spending side, the biggest issue we face is that we consume health care invisibly… going to the doctor should always be like getting your brakes checked (more than $100). Frankly, we really should just be focusing on just giving everyone catastrophic insurance (like a $5K deductible every year), and a savings account with maybe $3K in it that rolls over… so they have every good reason to price shop, scrimp, and save. We want people to CHOOSE less health care, not let the government decide who gets less.
Until the system is set back up so people consume it in a real market, don’t blame market forces, it is silly.
It’s the teachers, the kids, the parents, and the community that make a school, public or private, work. Neither one does so just because they have the envied label. What used to make me sick was the public school teachers I knew who couldn’t wait to place their kids in private schools even though they wouldn’t teach there themselves because of the low wage, the uncertain nature of the employment, and the lack of protection open-minded teaching styles recieved.
What has given our schools and our students such a bad rap is the fact the squeaky wheels always get the attention. The more attention they get the more they seem to squeek. Sort of like our friend, Morgan.
It’s the teachers, the kids, the parents, and the community that make a school, public or private, work. Neither one does so just because they have the envied label. What used to make me sick was the public school teachers I knew who couldn’t wait to place their kids in private schools even though they wouldn’t teach there themselves because of the low wage, the uncertain nature of the employment, and the lack of protection open-minded teaching styles recieved.
What has given our schools and our students such a bad rap is the fact the squeaky wheels always get the attention. The more attention they get the more they seem to squeek. Sort of like our friend, Morgan.
It’s the teachers, the kids, the parents, and the community that make a school, public or private, work. Neither one does so just because they have the envied label. What used to make me sick was the public school teachers I knew who couldn’t wait to place their kids in private schools even though they wouldn’t teach there themselves because of the low wage, the uncertain nature of the employment, and the lack of protection open-minded teaching styles recieved.
What has given our schools and our students such a bad rap is the fact the squeaky wheels always get the attention. The more attention they get the more they seem to squeek. Sort of like our friend, Morgan.
It’s the teachers, the kids, the parents, and the community that make a school, public or private, work. Neither one does so just because they have the envied label. What used to make me sick was the public school teachers I knew who couldn’t wait to place their kids in private schools even though they wouldn’t teach there themselves because of the low wage, the uncertain nature of the employment, and the lack of protection open-minded teaching styles recieved.
What has given our schools and our students such a bad rap is the fact the squeaky wheels always get the attention. The more attention they get the more they seem to squeek. Sort of like our friend, Morgan.
Education health care
Education health care
Education health care
Education health care
Crap. Education does not equal health care.
Crap. Education does not equal health care.
Crap. Education does not equal health care.
Crap. Education does not equal health care.
good argument.
good argument.
“I’m sorry Mr. Baker, but you failed your SAT. We can’t give you chemotherapy, but we can offer you an opportunity to join the exciting, fast-paced world of heating, ventilation and air conditioning.”
“I’m sorry Mr. Baker, but you failed your SAT. We can’t give you chemotherapy, but we can offer you an opportunity to join the exciting, fast-paced world of heating, ventilation and air conditioning.”
I’m sorry Mr. Baker but you haven’t been attending the daily weight loss sessions, and you keep eating more than your share of fatty meat products, so you can’t have the new hyper expensive diabetes drug, you’ve been slated to die instead. it doesn’t matter that you make 2x what the “performing” patient makes.
That’s you Dan. You just don’t see the similarities, because you NEED them to be different.
$ = extra life. That’s all we want. The only reason to be against it, is if you need to convince yourself most people haven’t earned theirs.
Reread that.
You’re talking out of both sides of your mouth as usual. Consistency is not your strong suit. But I welcome a few of these observations as compatible with a sensible mixed-economy approach to real world problems:
Yes “we” really should — a worthy focus of public policy. Ain’t never gonna happen otherwise.
You obviously haven’t taken on board one of Arrow’s key points: nobody “shops” for healthcare while they are unconscious in an ambulance. On of the most common complaints about the insurance plan I have (which is at least reasonably comprehensive) is that we get dinged over “picking” out-of-network anesthesiologists. None of us “picks” them — ever. They’re always assigned by unknown “bureaucrats”. But because these faceless bureaurcrats are private sector employees, I gather we mustn’t complain about a system that assigns us the “wrong” doctor and then punishes us for the “choice”.
Only a small portion of healthcare expenditures remotely fit the “select your choices from a menu weighing costs/benefits” model you’re describing. But those few dollars that fit this model could perfectly well be addressed with MSAs. Buying eyeglasses, or choosing bridges vs. dental implants, perhaps.
What’s silly is blustering on in the invincible conviction that ignorance is strength. Set back up by whom? To me the actor in this process of structuring the market to facilitate useful competition and incentives (vs. the value destroying incentives we have now) is precisely the government. But of course, you mean that we should abolish Medicare, the VA, etc. so that the same ethically nihilistic private insurance firms can triage us into the wealthy and insurable on the one hand, and the pesky bad-risks who might as well die on the other.
Insurance is just a bet. Thats it. You are hedging against future health issues.
Please give this a look over:
http://www.cahi.org/cahi_contents/resources/pdf/HealthInsuranceMandates2008.pdf
Both sides agree that in each state/region there are very few providers, and whats more each state mandates what will be covered. The effect is interesting to look at because it is 50 totally different “plans” if you put price tags on them, we cloud start shopping immediately. Go check it out.
Offering those 50 across state lines would likely be enough to drive prices down. Deregulation.
And I agree with you, end the concept of doctor networks. Another deregulation. Tax plans over a certain amount to fund basic coverage for those who can’t afford it.
I’d prefer a full VA style system for them to save money.
Lastly, its crazy that the left hasn’t yet offered to throw the lawyers under the bus on tort reform.
“$ = extra life. That’s all we want. The only reason to be against it, is if you need to convince yourself most people haven’t earned theirs.”
I hope you live a very long time, and become very wealthy, and I hope that all of the people in your life, especially as you grow old and feeble, see things exactly the way you do. I hope you end your days watching the people around you lick their chops and think about all of that money money money.
And now I’ve had enough of your adolescent twaddle.
What gets you so worked up about that phrase?
To me it is a statement of fact. Money buys things. Paint and canvas, food and drink, luxury and charity.
It is simply a store of time. A dollar buys how much of your time. How much of other people’s time is needed to create, make manifest, the thing you want.
It isn’t that big of a statement.
Exercise = life.
Eating less rather than more = life.
Having children = life.
Strong defense = life.
And you aren’t against any of those things. But somehow just seeing that evil dollar sign $$$, throws your brain all out of whack and you read it as lets kill the poor.
Critical thinking helps control for emotional outbursts. $ = life. That’s how it is. And there’s nothing you are actually saying except being all nasty with me. Do you really want to say, money shouldn’t = life? Is that your position?
There’ s anew phrase I just read the Angry White Liberal. It is some kind of syndrome.
$ = $. Life is equal to what you can put into it and what it gives you back. $ may give you time to explore life but not if you are spending $ trying to make more $. If you worship the almighty $ as some do, then you may also reap $s but only at the expense of your life.
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