Damn. I'm trying to find the exact quote but I can't. Apparently, when Kennedy left DC for Mass, he said something along the lines of "Get the best you can, but get it done. We'll fix the bad stuff next year."
This is the Kennedy we should be celebrating. The liberal lion was a pragmatist who was not afraid of compromise and knew that in extreme cases, any legislation was better than no legislation.
@meechybee: Perfectly said. Extremism is not going to win. Especially in this changing world and economy where more and more people will need healthcare assistance. COBRA and Medicare are not valid in today's economy.
Health care reform beat Kennedy to the grave, and the chances of it springing from the soil are equivalent to Ted's. The best you can hope for is horribly unlife in the shadow of being!
You can't do a public option without single payer - subsidized government entities taking on private corp(se)? The hue and cry from beleagured insurance firms already makes my mind ache. Plus the whole idea of public care has been death-paneled to, well, death, because the fact is that Congressional Dems and Nixon made damn sure in the 70's that nobody who is 40-65 today still trusts the government.
So maybe a few cost-cutty private measures will be implemented and that's probably the best you can expect, which is better than nothing but far from what anyone hoped out of the Obama Administration, which we Hoped would Change the fact that people are too stupid to vote for the most effective strategy for health care: turning it into a goddamn utility.
I'll never understand why people don't understand that, by sloughing off the responsibility of providing healthcare to America's employer's, our government is already taxing us for our healthcare. How? By making sure that every aspect of business, from the smallest mom & pop outfit to IBM, passes along the cost of paying for their employees' insurance to us?
Reducing the burden of healthcare from American business now is simply a matter of survival. As one of the people who has assumed his former employers' share of insurance costs to the tune of $1,600/mth for a year now, I can tell you that nothing will keep this economy in the crapper--and send more American families into financial ruin sooner--than not fixing this problem now. It's time.
Here in California we have a program that will insure kids under 18 years. One pays for either Blue Cross or Healthnet coverage. I think the family has to make less than 42K a year to qualify. The premium is just about half as much as it would be for the same policy if purchased from BC/Healthnet privately. But I would think that profit for the insurance company still happens because the risk is spread through a large population and offered to a group of people that might otherwise not have insurance at all.
Maybe a partnership between private insurance and public subsidy would work? It seems to work here for kids.
I'm self-employed and there just has to be a better answer than $690 per month premiums for a family of healthy people.
Not a proponent of national health care despite my family paying $1900/month for reasonable, but not fabulous insurance (my husband is self employed). One of my many reason for being against it is that I am concerned that once the gov't becomes involved that innovation will be thrown out the window. Plus, there is a difference between health care and health insurance and people keep forgetting that.
While my $1900/month is expensive, I suspect a national health plan will cost me even more and cover the same or less.
@momof3wildkids: I hate to tell you this, but innovation doesn't come out of the everyday health care system, but emerges more out of where health care meets education and research. Universities and sometimes specialty hospitals are the ones that do research. Not general hospitals. In Canada, we have plenty of innovation still.
Actually, in canada we have a government-funded body called the Canadian Institute of Health Research whose sole purpose is to fund medical innovation. So we have a socialized research system AND a socialized medical care system.
@Cookie Guggleman: My Dad who was denied his cardiac rx by medicare would disagree. Plus, if you don't have a supplement, you are screwed.
But hey, let's try this... let's put the senators and congressmen on the plan FIRST. See how they like it. Work out the kinks and then roll it out to the GP (general public). If they are willing to full embrace this plan, I'd be willing to give it a shot.
@momof3wildkids: Of course you will pay more and get less. Can you think of a government program that is run more efficiently than private sector? I used to say the military, but I was recently reminded that the military helicopter assigned to the President costs $800 plus billion and employees 800 people.
The problem is that once you invite the government to take care of your health, you invite them to dictate your health habits. Why should my tax liability for healthcare be based on my income? If I exercise, maintain my weight and eat right, then should I be taxed more than someone who is overweight and abuses drugs, alcohol and tobacco? The health insurance companies have a way to deal with that. They either don't insure that person or raise their premiums. How will the government incentivize good health habits?
@ChillbearLatrigue: That's insane, and not at all how socialized medicine works. Why don't you just claim that if government gets involved in medicine a seven foot tall man in a rubber coat will come to your house every week and jam a licked candy cane up your ass. It makes about as much sense as what you just said.
@ChillbearLatrigue: Can you think of a government program that is run more efficiently than private sector?
It would be easy to argue that, by pricing coverage beyond the means of so many people, the private sector is doing this job so inefficiently that the government couldn't possibly do it any worse and is overwhelmingly likely to do it much better.
All you have to do is incorporate a premise like "Access to a certain level of healthcare is a right of citizenship" into your definition of "efficiency" -- and boom, government would trounce the private sector on the efficiency question.
So I don't think "efficiency" is the word worth battling over here. I think it's probably something more like "right of citizenship." I think what people are arguing over here is whether health care, like equal marriage, should be a right of U.S. citizenship. I can imagine good arguments on both sides. And in this way, people don't have to obstruct and baffle each other with untenably narrow definitions of key terms.
That's my contribution. There's no practical reason why we as Americans can't make this work, once we decide that it's a right of citizenship: Other countries with fewer resources than we have manage it well enough, and I'm not prepared to say that our powers of ingenuity are so much weaker than theirs. (But feel free to argue that, if that's your view.)
To me the key question is, Do we really want access to a certain level of health care to be a basic right of citizenship? It's a good question. Worth arguing over.
@momof3wildkids: @ChillbearLatrigue: The amount of ignorance you folks are spouting is reaching the G.W. Bush level. You really need to look at what other wealthy countries are doing (higher life expectancy; much lower per-capita health care costs) and then wonder why it is that we in the U.S.A. are helpless to do anything comparable.
To choose one of hundreds of examples: infant mortality rate. According to the WHO we currently rank 19th worldwide. We are the wealthiest nation on earth. There is no excuse for this.
Do you think the goofballs like Octomom don't have anything to do with our infant mortality rate? We have a tremendous amount of reproductive technology than most of the world cannot access because they cannot afford it. That leads to an increase in infant mortality. It is much like penalizing a high risk ob who has the highest c-section rate because of all the high risk pregnancies.
Plus you are forgetting this statement: The research also found that poorer mothers with less education were at a significantly higher risk of early delivery. The study added that in general lower educational attainment was associated with higher newborn mortality. Blame the teachers' unions! (I am being sarcastic, just in case people get their undies in a bunch)
Listen, as a human being and a mother, I don't want any infant to die. I am all for safety nets for the uninsured and am open to expanding programs like Medicaid, HUSKY, CHIP, etc.. to increase access to health insurance/care to those who cannot afford it or have pre-exisiting conditions.
@skahammer: You make a lot of good points, as usual. I know our system is horrible, but I don't want to see it fixed at the cost of bankrupting the Republic. I gave a long answer before I saw it, so I will leave it at that for now.
@power_stroke: It is in my best interest to rehabilitate addicts. It's also in my best financial interest to intrude into all health related aspects of their lives to protect my investment. Kind of like when the government "bails out" a business and ends up taking it over.
@ChillbearLatrigue: I know our system is horrible, but I don't want to see it fixed at the cost of bankrupting the Republic.
If this statement can be interpreted as "I'm willing to see the system fixed in any way that doesn't bankrupt the Republic," I'd say that's a reasonable position that creates a lot of room to work with.
At that point you're left to define the terms "fixed" and maybe "bankrupt," which is a positive step toward framing the debate (I think properly) as one of priorities rather than "efficiency."
Again, there's no doubt that we can choose to guarantee our citizens some level of healthcare that will be compatible with current financial constraints -- even if it means taking a few beans from the "defense" priority and reallocating them to the "public health" priority. The question isn't completely controlled by practical limits, which we as a nation have often managed to transcend anyway. The question is to what extent such rejiggered priorities will reflect the interests of the population as a whole. Again, it's a good question whose time has come.
I note that an incremental solution as pioneered by Mitt Romney's Massachusetts seems like a good fit for an extended and complex debate like this one.
Aside from my small government beliefs, one reason I'm against socialized healthcare is because it puts the government in the position of deciding who gets treatment. If the government doesn't deem someone as "worth the trouble," it's free to act on that decision.
And before you say this won't happen, it already happens with Medicare.
@if_i_only_had_a_heart: What I'd like to see is insurance companies making payouts for conditions before they're preexisting. Say you're diagnosed with lung cancer, but want to switch insurance companies. Your existing insurance company would be liable for expected medical costs relating to the cancer, less co-pays, deductibles, and premiums for the rest of your expected lifespan--the net amount it would pay if you were to stay with that insurance company. You could then transfer this liability to a new insurance company.
It would essentially be a lump sum payout on a medical condition. When your house burns down, you get a check up-front for rebuilding, even though contractors will be rebuilding for a year. I'd like to see that system, but for health insurance.
@Banjo-Sea Kitten: The fun corollary to socialized health care is that recipients become analogous fetuses of government.
If an 18 year old girl not talking to her parents with a low-paying job and some deadbeat guy get pregnant, she's free to get an abortion.
If the government is running a $500B deficit, it's free to cut health care for some people, or maybe even limited euthanasia.
Is someone brain dead on life support paid for by the government really any different from a fetus and a woman? Granted, this is a reductio ad absurdum, but it's still worth considering.
@sample032: I don't understand everything about insurance, but "the net amount it would pay you if you were to stay with that insurance company" seems to be precisely what the question is. Insurance companies are companies. They make money. The point of @if_i_only_had_a_heart:'s comment is that these companies often try to avoid paying the excessive costs of long-term treatments, and so your argument that they'd simply pay you a "payout" and you'd go to another company (which wouldn't have you anyways) doesn't make much sense. You're still demanding that the insurance company pay in full.
And speaking from the POV of a citizen of canada, which has socialized medicine. Sure, the government had to make certain decisions about treatments. But every health system has to do this at one point or another. Even families. So again, your argument is pointless. You're basically attributing to socialized medicine a problem with the world.
To be frank, what socialized medicine provides is really just a baseline guarantee of being provided with "necessary" medical care. As long as you can show that what you're asking for is necessary to your quality of life, you can be assured of eventually getting that service here in Canada. Let's be honest, it's the only course of action for a truly civilized people who doesn't like watching people suffer from lack of medical care.
@sample032: That's not a corollary. A corollary is a conclusion that emerges naturally from a logical deduction. What you said is actually just a really really stupid analogy, since it doesn't emerge logically from anything.
Abortion is an issue of individual will and privacy. It's not a medical issue. Removing someone from life support is totally different.
@Pope John Peeps II: In the US, an emergency room cannot refuse to treat you because of no insurance if it is necessary. Not a great way to get health care, but is a safety net that is built into the system. Medicaid is also another option.
What chaps my ass is when people choose not to get health care when they can. Long ago before I had 3 wild kids, I worked for a health insurance brokerage in Il. I cannot tell you how many people who went without insurance but had a very nice apartment, went out to nice dinners, had a great car etc.... But a couple hundred bucks a month was too expensive for health insurance?
I am all for safety nets but not for assholes that choose to opt out of the health insurance system.
@sample032: Disclosure: I have a health savings account and a high-deductible health plan.
I want to have money saved for health-related expenses that can be used anywhere, and I believe insurance only makes sense for things you can't afford.
@sample032: " The fun corollary to socialized health care is that recipients become analogous fetuses of government."
Anyone who'd make such a ghastly inapt comparison has obvious pre-existing issues, and an undeniable slant to their thinking.
40 million Americans without access to health care will become "fetuses"? Of government? What a nauseating weird bit of imagery.
How about we think of them-the uninsured- as actual people, adults, who are being royally screwed by the stranglehold insurance companies have on Americans's health, denying treatment left and right, exploiting the flaws in the system for cash money by denying people access to the health care they need. That every human being needs.
Oh, that's "socialist". Because you believe in "small government", that weird fetish.
It's never explained why this is a good thing, these "small government" sorts, except by people who listen to a lot of right-wing drivel.
The Roman Empire thrived for centuries on a rather vast government- the British Empire thrived as well because of their extremely well-organized civil service, aka "government , for 300 years. It's never ever explained by the sorts who expound on this as to why smaller means better. Because there is no reason, no it isn't some empiric good. In the American sense, "small government", drownable in the bathtub, almost always exclusively means, -"get the government off corporations' money-making backs and let them do what they will."
Which is a pretty good description of the current US health care system. And it's why we're where we are today. Private interests have disrupted the common good, disastrously, and we all have to look at what a viciously mercenary spectacle as it is, a pitiless scene of Darwinian exploitation, the strong exploiting the weak for every last dollar.
@momof3wildkids: "In the US, an emergency room cannot refuse to treat you because of no insurance if it is necessary. Not a great way to get health care, but is a safety net that is built into the system."
Yes, and then people are sent to the poorhouse when they get bills for $90,000, $110,000, $150,000 dollars. What fucking planet are you living on that you think trips to the ER are free? Do you really think an uninsured person having a heart attack gets their emergency bypass FREE?
You worked for a health insurance "brokerage". Which is probably part of the problem we're talking about. Was it there you got such callous disinformation? Anyone who's been to an ER knows it isn't free by any means, and this weird lie keeps bubbling up, as if from GW Bush's speech that one time. It's a disengenuous lie.
@Baroness: Where did I say "free?" Good health care will cost and does cost a pretty penny and that will never change. I subsidize people w/o insurance every time I head to a hospital, doc, lab, etc...
What you are failing to understand is that gov't paid health care isn't free either. Someone, everyone, will be paying. Plus, I think the quality will go down as well.
I'm just trying to stop the lie that people have an appendicitis and die outside the steps of a hospital because they were kicked to the curb and their appendix burst. That does not happen, Baroness.
You are either not reading my post thoroughly or trying to spread the kool-aid that 'health care should be free.' It will NEVER be free.
@momof3wildkids: Re-reading your original comment, you're right, you didn't say it would be "free."
Saying this, though "In the US, an emergency room cannot refuse to treat you because of no insurance if it is necessary. Not a great way to get health care, but is a safety net that is built into the system " implies it, though.
@Baroness: The Roman and British Empires are your examples of why we should have large government? They both lived and died by imperialism. I can give you a few more examples of large government that worked (or didn't work) for a period of time: The USSR, Nazi Germany, North Korea, Cuba, The Peoples Republic of China... this is "why smaller means better." People live freely when the government is small.
These governments controlled many of the basic services that we let private industry handle. I'm not sure if I would have wanted to live in any of the big government nations that you mentioned. By the way, we revolted to leave British rule. Are you proposing that we were better off staying loyal subjects? Watch V for Vendetta. That doesn't look that fun.
@momof3wildkids: I like how your arguments aren't hinged on anecdotal hearsay of people opting out of health insurance to support their steak 'n' wet bar habits. It's refreshingly non-ass-chapping to hear a sound argument from one of the right wing charmers who have invaded this site as of late.
Also, assuming you're married, on what planet are you spending "a couple hundred bucks a month" on health insurance for a family of five?
@ChillbearLatrigue: Another logical argument from the right wing. Should we ever have socialized medicine, the United States will become like North Korea and also like an apocalyptic graphic novel? My counterpoint to your sound argument is this: you are wrong. When we have socialized medicine, the United States will become like a Xanadu orgy with Sanrio characters.
@momof3wildkids: You're right it will never be "free", but somehow societies in places like Yurrup have figured out that leaving the health of their populace at the mercies of the "free market" neither saves a goddamn dime and is in fact corrosively malevolent to society as a whole.
Kool-Aid? If anyone's drinking it, it's middle-class people like yourself who've taken it as their mission to defend the rights of HMO's and for-profit corporations. At the expense of a real change in how we treat our citizens. If anyone's drunk the Kool-Aid, I'd say it's people like yourself buying into trash from Fox News and talk radio, voting against your own self-interest like cattle.
You don't know the first thing about the European health-care systems you decry, just the scary stories that people with vested corporate interests tell you. Sad. And you do it for free, as those same people make millions.
@Private Hangnail: If that's the case, then I'm in. All that I'm saying is that the government can become "too big to fail" just like companies. What will you do if you expand the role of government and then you get another President you don't like, like Bush or worse. Don't you want the ultimate power to lie in the hands of the people?
@ChillbearLatrigue: The power will never lie in the hands of the people and it's remarkably naive of you to suggest that the systems of power and money in this country will ever turn completely downwards. What I find lamentable is that the power is in the hands of large corporations, who have no interest in those people that you're suddenly championing.
To sum up, we will continue smoking, drinking, and being uninsured, with the vague hope that eventually the government will take care of us, eventually.
08/27/09
This is the Kennedy we should be celebrating. The liberal lion was a pragmatist who was not afraid of compromise and knew that in extreme cases, any legislation was better than no legislation.
08/30/09
08/27/09
You can't do a public option without single payer - subsidized government entities taking on private corp(se)? The hue and cry from beleagured insurance firms already makes my mind ache. Plus the whole idea of public care has been death-paneled to, well, death, because the fact is that Congressional Dems and Nixon made damn sure in the 70's that nobody who is 40-65 today still trusts the government.
So maybe a few cost-cutty private measures will be implemented and that's probably the best you can expect, which is better than nothing but far from what anyone hoped out of the Obama Administration, which we Hoped would Change the fact that people are too stupid to vote for the most effective strategy for health care: turning it into a goddamn utility.
05/11/09
Reducing the burden of healthcare from American business now is simply a matter of survival. As one of the people who has assumed his former employers' share of insurance costs to the tune of $1,600/mth for a year now, I can tell you that nothing will keep this economy in the crapper--and send more American families into financial ruin sooner--than not fixing this problem now. It's time.
05/11/09
Maybe a partnership between private insurance and public subsidy would work? It seems to work here for kids.
I'm self-employed and there just has to be a better answer than $690 per month premiums for a family of healthy people.
05/11/09
05/11/09
While my $1900/month is expensive, I suspect a national health plan will cost me even more and cover the same or less.
05/11/09
Medicare is actually a great model of a govt-run program that works.
05/11/09
Actually, in canada we have a government-funded body called the Canadian Institute of Health Research whose sole purpose is to fund medical innovation. So we have a socialized research system AND a socialized medical care system.
So in conclusion, suck it America. Suck it good.
05/11/09
But hey, let's try this... let's put the senators and congressmen on the plan FIRST. See how they like it. Work out the kinks and then roll it out to the GP (general public). If they are willing to full embrace this plan, I'd be willing to give it a shot.
05/11/09
The problem is that once you invite the government to take care of your health, you invite them to dictate your health habits. Why should my tax liability for healthcare be based on my income? If I exercise, maintain my weight and eat right, then should I be taxed more than someone who is overweight and abuses drugs, alcohol and tobacco? The health insurance companies have a way to deal with that. They either don't insure that person or raise their premiums. How will the government incentivize good health habits?
05/11/09
05/11/09
It would be easy to argue that, by pricing coverage beyond the means of so many people, the private sector is doing this job so inefficiently that the government couldn't possibly do it any worse and is overwhelmingly likely to do it much better.
All you have to do is incorporate a premise like "Access to a certain level of healthcare is a right of citizenship" into your definition of "efficiency" -- and boom, government would trounce the private sector on the efficiency question.
So I don't think "efficiency" is the word worth battling over here. I think it's probably something more like "right of citizenship." I think what people are arguing over here is whether health care, like equal marriage, should be a right of U.S. citizenship. I can imagine good arguments on both sides. And in this way, people don't have to obstruct and baffle each other with untenably narrow definitions of key terms.
That's my contribution. There's no practical reason why we as Americans can't make this work, once we decide that it's a right of citizenship: Other countries with fewer resources than we have manage it well enough, and I'm not prepared to say that our powers of ingenuity are so much weaker than theirs. (But feel free to argue that, if that's your view.)
To me the key question is, Do we really want access to a certain level of health care to be a basic right of citizenship? It's a good question. Worth arguing over.
05/11/09
To choose one of hundreds of examples: infant mortality rate. According to the WHO we currently rank 19th worldwide. We are the wealthiest nation on earth. There is no excuse for this.
05/11/09
Do you think the goofballs like Octomom don't have anything to do with our infant mortality rate? We have a tremendous amount of reproductive technology than most of the world cannot access because they cannot afford it. That leads to an increase in infant mortality. It is much like penalizing a high risk ob who has the highest c-section rate because of all the high risk pregnancies.
Plus you are forgetting this statement: The research also found that poorer mothers with less education were at a significantly higher risk of early delivery. The study added that in general lower educational attainment was associated with higher newborn mortality. Blame the teachers' unions! (I am being sarcastic, just in case people get their undies in a bunch)
Listen, as a human being and a mother, I don't want any infant to die. I am all for safety nets for the uninsured and am open to expanding programs like Medicaid, HUSKY, CHIP, etc.. to increase access to health insurance/care to those who cannot afford it or have pre-exisiting conditions.
BTW, we aren't the richest country.. [en.wikipedia.org])_per_capita
05/11/09
05/11/09
05/11/09
@power_stroke: It is in my best interest to rehabilitate addicts. It's also in my best financial interest to intrude into all health related aspects of their lives to protect my investment. Kind of like when the government "bails out" a business and ends up taking it over.
05/12/09
If this statement can be interpreted as "I'm willing to see the system fixed in any way that doesn't bankrupt the Republic," I'd say that's a reasonable position that creates a lot of room to work with.
At that point you're left to define the terms "fixed" and maybe "bankrupt," which is a positive step toward framing the debate (I think properly) as one of priorities rather than "efficiency."
Again, there's no doubt that we can choose to guarantee our citizens some level of healthcare that will be compatible with current financial constraints -- even if it means taking a few beans from the "defense" priority and reallocating them to the "public health" priority. The question isn't completely controlled by practical limits, which we as a nation have often managed to transcend anyway. The question is to what extent such rejiggered priorities will reflect the interests of the population as a whole. Again, it's a good question whose time has come.
I note that an incremental solution as pioneered by Mitt Romney's Massachusetts seems like a good fit for an extended and complex debate like this one.
05/11/09
05/11/09
05/11/09
But the good states. The crispy edge states. Not the soggy middle ones.
05/12/09
05/11/09
/snark
05/11/09
And before you say this won't happen, it already happens with Medicare.
05/11/09
05/11/09
05/11/09
It would essentially be a lump sum payout on a medical condition. When your house burns down, you get a check up-front for rebuilding, even though contractors will be rebuilding for a year. I'd like to see that system, but for health insurance.
05/11/09
05/11/09
If an 18 year old girl not talking to her parents with a low-paying job and some deadbeat guy get pregnant, she's free to get an abortion.
If the government is running a $500B deficit, it's free to cut health care for some people, or maybe even limited euthanasia.
Is someone brain dead on life support paid for by the government really any different from a fetus and a woman? Granted, this is a reductio ad absurdum, but it's still worth considering.
05/11/09
And speaking from the POV of a citizen of canada, which has socialized medicine. Sure, the government had to make certain decisions about treatments. But every health system has to do this at one point or another. Even families. So again, your argument is pointless. You're basically attributing to socialized medicine a problem with the world.
To be frank, what socialized medicine provides is really just a baseline guarantee of being provided with "necessary" medical care. As long as you can show that what you're asking for is necessary to your quality of life, you can be assured of eventually getting that service here in Canada. Let's be honest, it's the only course of action for a truly civilized people who doesn't like watching people suffer from lack of medical care.
05/11/09
05/11/09
Abortion is an issue of individual will and privacy. It's not a medical issue. Removing someone from life support is totally different.
05/11/09
What chaps my ass is when people choose not to get health care when they can. Long ago before I had 3 wild kids, I worked for a health insurance brokerage in Il. I cannot tell you how many people who went without insurance but had a very nice apartment, went out to nice dinners, had a great car etc.... But a couple hundred bucks a month was too expensive for health insurance?
I am all for safety nets but not for assholes that choose to opt out of the health insurance system.
05/11/09
I want to have money saved for health-related expenses that can be used anywhere, and I believe insurance only makes sense for things you can't afford.
05/11/09
Anyone who'd make such a ghastly inapt comparison has obvious pre-existing issues, and an undeniable slant to their thinking.
40 million Americans without access to health care will become "fetuses"? Of government? What a nauseating weird bit of imagery.
How about we think of them-the uninsured- as actual people, adults, who are being royally screwed by the stranglehold insurance companies have on Americans's health, denying treatment left and right, exploiting the flaws in the system for cash money by denying people access to the health care they need. That every human being needs.
Oh, that's "socialist". Because you believe in "small government", that weird fetish.
It's never explained why this is a good thing, these "small government" sorts, except by people who listen to a lot of right-wing drivel.
The Roman Empire thrived for centuries on a rather vast government- the British Empire thrived as well because of their extremely well-organized civil service, aka "government , for 300 years. It's never ever explained by the sorts who expound on this as to why smaller means better. Because there is no reason, no it isn't some empiric good. In the American sense, "small government", drownable in the bathtub, almost always exclusively means, -"get the government off corporations' money-making backs and let them do what they will."
Which is a pretty good description of the current US health care system. And it's why we're where we are today. Private interests have disrupted the common good, disastrously, and we all have to look at what a viciously mercenary spectacle as it is, a pitiless scene of Darwinian exploitation, the strong exploiting the weak for every last dollar.
Oh, and fuck Facebook.
05/11/09
Yes, and then people are sent to the poorhouse when they get bills for $90,000, $110,000, $150,000 dollars. What fucking planet are you living on that you think trips to the ER are free? Do you really think an uninsured person having a heart attack gets their emergency bypass FREE?
You worked for a health insurance "brokerage". Which is probably part of the problem we're talking about. Was it there you got such callous disinformation? Anyone who's been to an ER knows it isn't free by any means, and this weird lie keeps bubbling up, as if from GW Bush's speech that one time. It's a disengenuous lie.
05/11/09
What you are failing to understand is that gov't paid health care isn't free either. Someone, everyone, will be paying. Plus, I think the quality will go down as well.
I'm just trying to stop the lie that people have an appendicitis and die outside the steps of a hospital because they were kicked to the curb and their appendix burst. That does not happen, Baroness.
You are either not reading my post thoroughly or trying to spread the kool-aid that 'health care should be free.' It will NEVER be free.
05/11/09
Saying this, though "In the US, an emergency room cannot refuse to treat you because of no insurance if it is necessary. Not a great way to get health care, but is a safety net that is built into the system " implies it, though.
05/11/09
These governments controlled many of the basic services that we let private industry handle. I'm not sure if I would have wanted to live in any of the big government nations that you mentioned. By the way, we revolted to leave British rule. Are you proposing that we were better off staying loyal subjects? Watch V for Vendetta. That doesn't look that fun.
05/11/09
Also, assuming you're married, on what planet are you spending "a couple hundred bucks a month" on health insurance for a family of five?
05/11/09
05/11/09
Kool-Aid? If anyone's drinking it, it's middle-class people like yourself who've taken it as their mission to defend the rights of HMO's and for-profit corporations. At the expense of a real change in how we treat our citizens. If anyone's drunk the Kool-Aid, I'd say it's people like yourself buying into trash from Fox News and talk radio, voting against your own self-interest like cattle.
You don't know the first thing about the European health-care systems you decry, just the scary stories that people with vested corporate interests tell you. Sad. And you do it for free, as those same people make millions.
05/11/09
05/11/09
05/11/09
Ow, my thongue