Thank God for Obama
Good morning,
Democrats and Republicans agree -- the health care status quo isn't working for the American people.
Health insurance is growing more and more expensive by the day. Too many of us can't afford it -- not middle class families, not businesses, not the Federal Government. Insurance companies have too much control over health care decisions that should be left between a patient and their doctor. They freely ration care based on who's sick and who's healthy; who can pay and who can't.
On both sides of the aisle, we all agree that if we do nothing, the problem will just get worse. Now, after a long and wrenching debate, it's time to make a decision. Yesterday, President Obama called on the United States Congress to cast a final up or down vote on health insurance reform in the coming weeks and pledged to fight for it every day until that happens.
Watch what the President said yesterday and learn more about what's at stake:
The President's final plan for health insurance reform puts control of health care where it belongs -- in the hands of American families and small businesses, not health insurance companies or government.
His proposal takes the best Republican and Democratic ideas and changes three main things about the current health care system:
It ends the worst insurance company practices and outlaws discrimination against Americans with pre-existing conditions.
It reduces costs for people with insurance and makes coverage more affordable for people without it today.
It sets up a new competitive insurance marketplace where small business owners and families can shop for the insurance plan that works best for them, giving them the same buying power and insurance choices as all members of Congress.
We've debated the issue of health insurance reform thoroughly, not just over the past year, but over decades. It's time to make a decision about how to finally reform health care so that it works for America's families and businesses -- not just for insurance companies.
Let's get it done.
Nancy-Ann DeParle
Director, White House Office of Health Reformthe solution is LESS government, not more.
I fail to understand how giving my money to the government so that they can decide how to spend it for me in anyway benefits me. We really need to just go back to a market based economy... can you imagine it? people ACTUALLY asking their doctors how much the procedures would cost? Doctors ACTUALLY competing for money (thus raising their quality and care and reducing prices)? and people ACTUALLY saving up their money for the future?
... this last statement i made just rocked my world... Inflation has been out of control this past century (a current dollar is able to buy 4 cents of a 1913 dollar).. perhaps this is the reason why people fail to save their money for medical emergencies?...
HUBBERS
FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH.
Medicare ( healthcare for the retired ) is going broke .In the presidents plan, medicare will be cut $500 billion and we will be taxed $250 billion.
Taxes will be collected for 3 years before services will be provided.
everyone will be forces to pay for insurance under penalty if they don't buy in.
THE MONIES WILL BE PLACED IN A TRUST FUND ( ????LIKE SOCIAL SECURITY ???) Can you trust your government ?????????? really
Obama and the democratic congress don't point out the bad contents of the bill.Tthe American public 65% don't want this bill passed in its present form.
There has been no public debate as what occurs when large legislation is proposed.and transparency is on vacation. NO C-SPAN TELEVISION
The American people want Washington to tell the truth!"There has been no public debate as what occurs when large legislation is proposed.and transparency is on vacation. NO C-SPAN TELEVISION
The American people want Washington to tell the truth"
The Bush Tax Cuts were passed the exact same way! Cut and paste the letter you wrote to us DEAR HUBBERS back then.That may be true but Bush never said his was going to be the most transparent administration ever, Obama did.
Hm. Somehow I can't get as worked up against "secretly passed tax cuts" that save me money as I can against "secretly passed mandatory insurance" that will cost me money while at the same time ripping off my freedom of choice...I'm missing something here?
So you think the government should keep digging the hole because Bush digged it first?
Sounds logical.
I have to agree with that. I'm living on a fixed income (retired) with 65% of my monies going to rent. And I'm living as frugally as possible. To put it simply, I can't afford Obama's mandatory health plan especially if I'm putting in money for three years and getting nothing back. I haven't been sick in years because I take care of myself. When I do need a doctor I pay cash. Over-the-counter medicines take care of my needs. I realize that others aren't so lucky. But there are too many unanswered questions about this mandatory federal "plan," and focusing on this rather than jobs seems very odd.
I think I misunderstood your last reply. I think you are correct.
I find it hilarious that liberals hated conservatives that said Bush was chosen by God and now they're saying the same about Obama.
Forcing an insurance company to cover pre-existing conditions increases costs, which will increase premiums. This mandate is socialist because it spreads the increased costs among health insurance policy holders.
It's not as if the insurance company will say "OHHH! Wait we were wrong in denying you coverage, Mr. Pre-existing conditionman! Now that the government has forced us to cover you, we will do so with our profits, out of the goodness of our hearts!"
In business, discrimination is good, especially when the customer refuses to pay, and the discriminating businessman refuses to serve him. The businessman is not a slave to the customers whims.let's go through and analyze what the new 'fantastic' plan will do, economically, with what was posted only on this forum.
"It ends the worst insurance company practices and outlaws discrimination against Americans with pre-existing conditions."
- If I were to get into a car accident on monday, then buy car insurance on tuesday, why should the insurance company pay for the crash?
"It reduces costs for people with insurance and makes coverage more affordable for people without it today."
- I'm curious as to how making coverage more available to everyone will lower the price of health care. This really doesn't make sense and insults everyone's intelligence. If more people can pay for a limited supply of resources (doctors, medical time, hospitcals) then prices go UP, not down. If the government ACTUALLY plans to implement this policy and ACTUALLY expects to reduce the cost of insurance across the board INCLUDING taxes and the borrowing of money, then that SIMPLY means they'll have to inflate the money supply... time to buy gold and silver!
"It sets up a new competitive insurance marketplace where small business owners and families can shop for the insurance plan that works best for them, giving them the same buying power and insurance choices as all members of Congress."
- Congress gets some of the best health care in the country for their entire lives and family members, and it is heavily subsidized by the taxpayers. I REALLY doubt, by definition, that we can get the same 'buying power' as Congressmen... If I pay for congress' medical care, then I have less money to spend on myself, which means I can't pay as much; it's not a hard task to see that this is a lie, or at best a completely illogical statement.
"We've debated the issue of health insurance reform thoroughly, not just over the past year, but over decades. It's time to make a decision about how to finally reform health care so that it works for America's families and businesses -- not just for insurance companies."
- we just keep blaming the marketplace for governments mistakes, eh? The 1942 Stabilization act limited the amount of wages an employer could pay to their workers - thus was born the employer-provided health insurance. Then government made wages taxable (income tax), but excluded insurance policies - thus making insurance a more efficient way of receiving money. And in addition to this, there have been in place severe restrictions too numerous and varied to hope to list (such as ridiculous rules like forcing every health insurance company to have to offer coverage to a tri-state area) that have made it practically impossible for entrepreneurs to enter the market - thus raising prices drastically because of reducing the ability of increasing supply of insurance companies.
the GOVERNMENT is the problem, not the free market, and this post by Nancy-Ann DeParle is an insult to Americans' intelligence. I'd love to see how many individuals working on this legislation have a vested monetary interest in its outcome.
With simply a basic amount of Economic understanding, all of these arguments made by the government are shown to be completely illogical at best, sophistic on average, and at worst utter lies. If anyone wants to actually gain the knowledge necessary to shoot down these arguments, please visit mises.org, or just read my Evan's Easy Economics - here on hubpages.i see that no one "for" the health care wants to respond to this...
Perhaps you would try posting something worthy of response? Just a suggestion.
He seems to be enjoying a good conversation with himself, why interrupt?
I think mental masturbation is a sin. I'm trying to save souls here.
He had an excellent point, backed up with good quoted from the "opposition". I noticed that often when no one wants to reply to something it's because they can't argue because it was written so well or else it was written with such poor language skills and no proof that no one even cares to argue because it makes no difference to them. Since this argument was well written and well backed up, I can't find any other reason for no comments on it other than my first point. I find it interesting that no one can argue with Evan's comment but instead resorts to simple insults, none of which are relevant to the discussion.
Who in their right mind wouldn,t want health care for all?
Are we so noncaring for those around us who have less?
Can we not see how the other countries are doing well with socialized medical care?
Can you not see how the insurance companies own our politicians who are against health care for all?
Open your eyes and your hearts.No...., Ralph. Save your breath. They have Sarah Palin now. The poster child for Republican "Family Values."
I have a reason to not want universal health care: it's socialization and will raise prices, and bankrupt our country. Aren't we already trillions in debt? and now we're going to pay billions of dollars to get another million people insured?
Sounds pointlessWorks here! We have had free health care for half a century.
An old age pensioner will get the same care free as the richest person in the country will.
It has saved billions because people here go to the doctor early in their illness and that reduces costs enormously by avoiding all the expense involved in late intervention.
Time to grow up America, and care about others.Free medicine is the signature of a modern democracy.
A country is only strong when it supports it's poor.
It is not what Obama says, or for that matter what any member of the House or Senate says.
It only matters what they do. And what they do is what they will continue to do. Spend
Granted, the President can't spend a dime, but the President holds sway over how that some of that dime is spent.
We have almost 13 trillion dollars of debt from past and present administrations.
We have 100+ trillion dollars worth of unfunded liabilities in Medicare and SS from past and present administrations who did not have the foresight nor the willingness to fix these programs other than to raise taxes. Besides the government has been borrowing from SS surplus of revenue for years and leaving little white slips of paper that says "we got it, go find another way to pay it back."
As citizens of this country, what are we supposed to believe?
I know I am going to say something that may sound "revalatory" to you and the politicians but it is not that prophetic or revealing.
I trust our government with all my heart.
I just don't trust those who are in stewardship over my government to do the right thing.
I do trust their motivation is "good intentions" but as anyone can see, the road of good intentions is paved with 13 trillion dollars worth of debt that we will not be able pay back.
It is that simpleYou have to be joking, the people have no say. Obama wants people to vote, and the bill will be changed later. Have you ever talked to a used car salesman?
Nancy at the Whitehouse
Are you writing this post on taxpayer time?
You state
'' The President's final plan for health insurance reform puts control of health care where it belongs -- in the hands of American families and small businesses, not health insurance companies or government.''
That statement is false,please tell the American people the truth.
The president's bill has not been written and or given to congress to debate and vote on.
Let's get the 14.9 million unemployed back to work so that they can start paying into the insurance pool. Increasing more people to be insured will bring down the cost of insurance. President Barak Obama said so.Yes, the healthcare industry in this country needs to be overhauled and made to work for the average citizen. What has most people up in arms is that this program was rammed down our throats when we said NO loud and clear. It seems that the Obama Administration thinks of the American Public as a bunch of children that cannot think for themselves.
When "Hillary" care was being crammed down our throats and the public rejected it, the Clinton Administration has the smarts to drop the subject.
This adminsitration is not that smart. It is run by the "DC Group of Three",
King Obama, Queen Pelosi and Court-Jester Reid. This administration is so self-centered, egotistical and self-serving they can't see things as they are and that (I hope) is going to cost them in the mid-tem elections coming this November. If the Democrats get soundly defeated in the upcoming elections they have their own leadership to blame. The American people are tired of being treated like a bunch of cattle and they are going to revolt and the revolt is going to come at the ballot box in November. And watch how long it will take a GOP majority to repleal this unjust, probably illegal and unwanted financial burden from the American public.I ..would..die..for..your..courage..to...write..this..! Obama is a blessing to this nation! A real, feeling, human, being, as Commander in Chief! The last was JFK!
Here's a story about health care out of control in the United States--
"What Broke My Father's Heart" by Katy Butler
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/magaz … ed=1&rIt is government who started control nonsense. Insurance companies only fallow suite. Also materialism coming from Marx philosophy produces money hungry nation. It started in the government. How somebody can say: Thanks God for Obama?
I am in medical profession and I see evil control.I don't get this whole idea that creating equal opportunity in medical insurance purchase is going to fix health care. They are two wholly different objects and for some reason, the people who create law and policy in this country seem to have no common sense. Actual medical services may in fact be costly. When uninsured people do not pay hospital bills, the hospital must make up for losses by raising the price of their product and/or service. This should in no way reflect upon the cost of medical insurance but it does. Insurance prices go up to cover the cost of higher hospital service prices. But what about those who pay their hospital bill out of pocket by choice? They pay a price per service higher than the rate negotiated by the insurance providers. You - as an advocate for this lunacy - need to look into why hospital rates are irrational. A good place to spend money might be to compensate/subsidize hospitals when they are not paid. Subsidize the uninsurable (for whatever reason) for care over and above what the insurance company can cover but don't punish the insurers by forcing them to cover these people for the same price they cover simple care. This will raise rates across the board (illogically). You subsidize farmers when their product is not in demand. Maybe they can grow something else and earn an honest living all the time. But that is another subject. You people in Washington always make things far more complicated than they need to be.
??? I'm hurling in my waste paper basket...as I try to type this.
Translation: "Ok, we've given you ignorant slobs enough of our valuable time, now get with the program or we will do it for you!"
Good point. Private health care insurance is a scam, a parasite without which the country would be better off. Fee for service pay to hospitals and doctors by insurance companies and Medicare has been a major driver of health care cost increases.
Ralph,
Why are most doctor's (especially the good one) against the bill? You will answer; money. I will say; aren't we a capitalistic country? Your reply will be; maybe we shouldn't be?
I have enjoyed our conversation. I will never be a Progressive or a Communist, it's not the American way!Harvey, what is the basis for your assertion that the majority of doctors oppose the health reform proposals? The bill is supported by the American Medical Association, the largest organization of M.D.s in the country.
Ralph,
With my health condition and my wife being in Pharma, I know many doctor's at the top of their fields. My wife lectures on new drugs to doctors. The drug CEO'S I know have told me this also.
This comes from doctor's all around the country. Please don't count on what the AMA says, most good doctor's do not belong to the AMA.
Also a good friend that helped found the Endontal Society of Illinois told me; those in my field are against it.
The AMA is only made up of around 20% of doctor's. They are usually not the cream of the crop.Here's a link to a poll of doctors' views on health reform conducted by the New England Journal of Medicine. It indicated that 62.9 % supported providing private and public options. Only 27.3% supported offering private optins only:
http://healthcarereform.nejm.org/?p=1790
Overall, a majority of physicians (62.9%) supported public and private options (see Panel A of graph). Only 27.3% supported offering private options only. Respondents — across all demographic subgroups, specialties, practice locations, and practice types — showed majority support (>57.4%) for the inclusion of a public option (see Table 1). Primary care providers were the most likely to support a public option (65.2%); among the other specialty groups, the “other” physicians — those in fields that generally have less regular direct contact with patients, such as radiology, anesthesiology, and nuclear medicine — were the least likely to support a public option, though 57.4% did so. Physicians in every census region showed majority support for a public option, with percentages in favor ranging from 58.9% in the South to 69.7% in the Northeast. Practice owners were less likely than nonowners to support a public option (59.7% vs. 67.1%, P<0.001), but a majority still supported it. Finally, there was also majority support for a public option among AMA members (62.2%).WURD.
I was going to say... why the hell would doctors oppose having their customers pay them through government money? that would be awesome (for the doctors)!!! Imagine if you went into a store and the government had to pay 75% (or whatever) of the bill? I'd go nuts on potato chips, sirloin steak and anything i could grab while the gettin's good!
... I also like the idea of 'decreasing the government's hand in health care' was some how turned into being a socialist... How does that even work? I'm mesmerized at Stelman's logic!Because government decides what the price of that service will be. Would you also like (as you are gorging on chips and setting yourself up for a visit to the doc)to be told, after you've acquired a Masters Degree in Business and spent a lot of money setting up your own business, that you must sell your product for only a certain amount and no more? Think about it that way. Once people have no incentive to do their best work with the intention of selling/bartering that work/service to support their habits, they will not do their best work. They will grow morose, lazy, and dependent. This is part of human nature. We have a thinking mind. We are meant to grow in awareness, not decay in idleness.
Ralph,
I found a typeo....
"Good point. Private health care insurance is a scam, a parasite without which the country would be better off."
Should read
Good point. Insurance is a scam, a parasite without which the country would be better off.A little harsh but maybe true to a large degree. The idea of insurance is a good one but the costs are driven up by people who don't pay for their hospital services. Hospitals raise prices to cover for this and insurance prices go up to pay for the inflated hospital costs.
I don't understand how insurance became a scam. Pay for something for years and then don't get what you paid for when you need it.
But I guess when it comes to someone's "bottom-line" anything is fine...even if it's not ethical or moral.I don't understand how campaigning for the Presidency of the United States of America became a SCAM!
I don't understand how voting in the USA became a SCAM!
And I certainly agree that health care and insurance are two different things -- two different issues, and our lame media has failed to continue to distinguish between the two.
Health insurance has gotten way out of hand -- but to socialize health insurance, and health care as just an aside, is what has happened with this bill -- in a few years it will all come home nice and cozy to roost.......and daily crap and sing cock a doodle doo ........and there won't be a thing anyone can do, it won't even matter so enmeshed with other 'welfare programs' will be our world. We will all be thankful and happy and bake cookies for everyone........"even if its not ethical or moral".
Motto of the year -- "...even if it's not ethical or moral." Fits with what that Democratic Senator said about no rules applying, they will make them up as they go along to get what they want. Gee, that gives me the warm and fuzzies, and I really want to put on my gold loops.......they're old but comforting in these trying times.Clearly you haven't read the bill.
Most of what's in there reins in the insurance industry.
By 2014 insurance companies will be limited to 15% profits on large group policies, but it only applies to new policies; not existing ones.
By 2014 insurers will be required to give the Secretary of Health and Human Services a full accounting of their payouts for claims, administrative costs, and profit. That data will then be published on a publicly accessible web-site. It will allow the consumer the ability to view the performance of all insurance companies. Also by that year insurers will not be allowed to; deny coverage, set payout caps, or refuse coverage due to pre-existing conditions.
Many of the provisions of the bill specifically protect children.
There's also a provision in there to reward innovators who can demonstrably prove a device or procedure that both saves money and maintains a high level of care to the patient. I believe the reward is tax credits.
By 2014 the remaining uninsured can be penalized by the IRS. There are two exceptions; poverty or religious belief.
Were you this upset when auto manufacturers were required to install seat-belts and airbags?
This is nonsense. The Insurance companies are either going to make a fortune or break even on this new system.
Let's review:
1- Everyone HAS to have health insurance APPROVED by the government, or else they get fined.
This means that health insurance companies will now have a whole lotta new customers.
This also means that the government is allowed to choose WHICH companies are allowed to operate in the health care market. This means a cartel-esque system which means a strict restriction of entry into the market of providing health care, which NECESSARILY means increased prices. (as scarcity and restriction of free-entry into the market increases, so do prices).
2- People who are already sick cannot be refused health insurance
This sounds like it would be bad for the insurance companies, but ... I'm sure they would EASILY trade "having new customers who, at best, would generate profit or, at worst, break even." for "having a government sanctioned cartel in the industry of health care".
This also means that it is no longer health INSURANCE. By definition, forcing everyone to have health 'insurance' AND allowing those with the greatest risk to be forced to have 'insurance' NECESSARILY means that it can NOT be "insurance"!!! The system will be nothing more than a third party payment system - I get sick, the doctor treats me, and then some-cartel-that-the-government-forces-me-to-give-money-to pays the doctor. This system necessarily will raise costs because the patient no longer cares as much about how much things cost.
3- as prices increase out of control, as they surely will, government will begin to establish price controls.
This is just how governments operate - "prices are out of control... let's just force them to be X!"
This will make queues and lines.
It's inevitable at this point, unless the bill is repealed.
Excellent point. Nothing addresses the sky rocketing health care costs. There's just a bunch of new taxes and deferred payments to insure everyone, high costs and all.
A sick person does not need health insurance. A sick person needs affordable health care.
A person with their house on fire doesn't need a homeowners insurance policy against fire. They need the fire department.
The only positive thing that Obama will accomplish by pushing this disaster through will be to make sure that the Dems loose the House and Senate in 2010 and that he will be a one-term failure. Jimmy Carter must be smiling, knowing he's now no longer the most pathetic excuse for a President ever to inhabit the White House. Hope he has an extra hammer for BO after the 2012 election.
How is mandating insurance going to "fix" health care?
Is bad legislation a "fix"?
Who will see patients when the Medicare Reimbursement is cut? Will they mandate Doctors to take on Medicare patients or fine them? Have you noticed how hard it is to find a Doctor who takes Medicare now?
The Obamacare Plan forces people to buy insurance. Turns out they can already buy insurance now.
Stuffing people with known medical conditions into "Risk Pools" won't reduce the costs... it will increase them. When a person has a known medical condition that requires expensive treatment ... well you can do the math!
The problem is this mega bill approach does more to pave side walks than truly address the issues. It's 2,700 pages of pork filled disaster.
I'm very much for Reforming the System. Opening new markets.
But the reality is "healthcare" is not free. And there is nothing "affordable" about forcing people to buy into programs. Tax credits do not pay for the coverage... tax credits only come AFTER you file your taxes. Who will pay the premiums until then?
True health care is not about fixing health problems AFTER they occur... it's about preventing them in the first place.
Obama just doesn't get it. This issue is one that MUST be addressed for the people by the people... with both sides in agreement or it will never work.
If a Republican was pushing this agenda I would be equally opposed.So what is your solution MikeNV?
Who pays for the uninsured uncompensated medical care (or medical care not paid for either out of pocket or by a private or public insurance source)?
You know health care institutions and professionals do not provide health-care for free. They have bills to pay as well.Kenrick
your remark ------------------
Who pays for the uninsured uncompensated medical care (or medical care not paid for either out of pocket or by a private or public insurance source)?
Your tax dollars pays ( the government pays a portion,insurance companies,and the insured people )
That's why the insurance costs are rising.
The more people not paying (the pool ) raise costs to insurance companies which a portion again gets passed down to the paying people
President Obama said , we need to have everyone pay for healthcare,that way the cost will come done.
Very true is to increase the paying pool.
Unemployment is related to insurance rising cost.because the paying pool gets smaller hence a rise in insurance costs.
Wake up congress and the president .In 2006 unemployment was 4.6 , in 2007 ( democrats take over congress )went up to 6.2% and then to 7.4%. Get the picture?
2009 with a super majority and a president unemployment went to 9.7% plus. In some parts of the country up to 20%.
Healthcare is not the problem,the problem is health insurance costs.
Have you got it now ?This bill is a government sham. a solution is jobs jobs.
THE PROBLEM IS THE GOVERNMENT, PROVIDE THE JOBS NOWBill Clinton - 20M+ jobs over 8 years (more jobs created than the previous two presidents combined) and a budget surplus. 92% of jobs from private sector.
George W - ~3M+ jobs created over 8 years, deficit (wealthy tax cuts decreased revenue and unfunded Iraq War increased spending that we are still paying for today) , and the worst economic crisis since the 1930s...
Thus far, 8M+ net job losses have occurred since the Great Recession started in December 2007. The economy almost collapsed in the Fall of 2008 and by the time President Obama was elected in office, the US was on the verge of experiencing a net job loss of 740K+ jobs for January 2009.
Yes we need jobs. We need the private sector to start back hiring... However it is going to take a few years to replace the jobs we lost during the Great Recession and to create jobs for the increasing amount of workers entering the workforce....
Let's wait and see what the total amount of jobs created will be during Obama's 8 years in office. Right now the job growth numbers are in the red."8 years"?!
hahahahaaahaahahahahahahhaaaa!!!!!!!Presidents, Congress Nor the Supreme Court create jobs - the market does.
In order for the government to pay for ANYTHING it has to take the money from someone else who would have spent it on something else. What was it? Obama blew some 2 billion dollars to give like 3,000 people jobs? Give me a god damned break.hey Kenrick, remember that whatever Prez is in the office at the time, we dont actually see the BS from their terms until at least 4 yrs after they are gone. SO, the BS you are trying to give to Clinton, that actually goes to the previous administration. Then the BS you are trying to give to Bush, well, sorry but that is actually going to be the result of Clinton (he was WAY too busy didling around to create that many good jobs anyway~you know it's true) then the BS that we will see happening in Obama's years are from Dubya. So we will not really grasp the full weight of the things the Obama admin will do until after 2014. Shit always rolls down hill like that.
Raising my price because people are not 'buying' my product is illogical. Supply and demand is logical but should be considered immoral when it comes to health care. If the actual cost of the care (E.E.G, blood test, whatever)is high, so be it. That's why people 'purchase' insurance. The more expensive my car, the higher my insurance. The more medical insurance I want, the higher the cost of the package I purchase. They are two wholly separate products - one is care, the other is insurance to help pay for the care once a bill is incurred. People who do not pay hospital bills cause unpaid balances in hospital budgets. Hospitals raise rates to cover this. It should in no way reflect insurance rates but it does. The illogical result is that if insurance companies pay out more for each service (more than the actual value price)then this will cover the uninsureds who do not pay. What about the uninsureds who do pay? They are required to pay a price even higher than the insurance company payout per service because the insurance company negotiates a rate with the hospital. Creating jobs is wonderful but it's not the governments purpose. Creating jobs has always been the result of enterprising individuals. But that is another subject.
Here's the solution -
GET THE GOVERNMENT THE F OUT OF THE BUSINESS.
Everytime you see a problem with health care, you find government's hand - 1942 stabilization act, employer-provided health insurance being tax free, medicare medicade and social security, the numerous laws practically making it impossible to enter the health insurance markets, the hundreds of laws making it impossible to pay insurance on only that which you actually want to pay for...
Gov't is the problem, and health care is NOT a right.
Just out of curiosity, isn't this a form of "bundling." Like when the bad subprime mortgages were bundled with the good ones and sunk the financial industry? Anyway, sure seems like it. And, if that's the case, then this healthcare plan is doomed for failure as well.
Mike,
I add to what you say, health-care is not a right! I would like to see it for all (I am handicapped), but not this way.I think this is another coverup for the pharmaceuticals and FDA pushthroughs. There is no money or campaign funding to be had in disallowing food additives and molecularly distorted ingredients in our food, no money in banning insecticides and fumigants in crops, and no money in healthy, slim livestock. The human body is highly adaptable but it doesn't recognize altered and chemical substances as nutrients. So the bandaid policys continue to snowball. I agree with you. Let's correct our food supply, eat responsibly, and lessen our ailments and reliance on getting fixed.
I was laughing at amount of jobs created
Oh that's right he has a new category called jobs saved or created. 
He uses that to measure the performance of the Stimulus bill. The CBO projected up to 2M jobs have been created and expect better results this year.
However, we do receive monthly net job gain/loss reports.
November 2009 was the only month we have experienced net job gains in a while (probably due to companies hiring temporary workers for the holidays).That term is meaningless, there is no way to gage one from the other, it's just another way to bullshlt his way out of accountability. He's very good at it.
I do not keep track of what the White House projections are. However, here are the CBO projections:
CBO: Stimulus bill created up to 2.1 million jobs..
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co … 02675.htmlThe CBO created says it created between 1 and 2 million jobs when over 8 million jobs were lost? Hmmm, sounds like a pr job to me.
Net job losses or gains mean this Flightkeeper... [job gains + job losses]...
So job gains + job losses = 8M+ jobs lost... since the start of the Great Recession.. We are shedding more jobs than we are creating...
Likewise, the stimulus bill has helped some.Thank you for the clarification, my mistake, but your clarification just made the picture worse. Jobs are still being lost at a cost of trillions. Tell me again what kind of stimulus that is?
A stimulus dealing with the worst economic crisis since the 1930s...
Some economists thought that this stimulus was not big enough... A good portion of it will be spent this year.
So we will see what projected, additional jobs will be created from it once the CBO conducts another estimate.
Hopefully we start to experience monthly job gains sometime in 2010 as well.
I just afraid of the potential commercial real estate crisis.Ken -
It's impossible for the government to create wealth.
In order for the government to pay for anything, it has to take the money from someone else. It is aggression, and it is not a true trade. Also, even if there is a new job 'created', the job NECESSARILY has to be at the cost of something else that could have taken place had the 'created job' not been created - i.e.: take 30,000 bucks from peter, and give paul a job for a year... but peter could have used that money to start a restaurant and could have created numerous other jobs.
President X (you choose) can claim to create however many jobs he wants - he hasn't generated any wealth.
once again, the government CAN'T create wealth - this is why the Soviet Union failed. This is why China is giving up on Socialism/Communism. This is why, even in so-called "Socialist Countries", only about ~40% of the companies are run by government: there HAS to be private enterprise.
Higher math is apparently hard for some Hubbers to follow!
The stimulus bill has not helped at all. This is a common misunderstanding that governments use to trick their populace.
In order for a stimulus bill to do anything, it first has to take X amount of money from the population. Then, it spends exactly the same amount of money elsewhere in the population. The decisions made on how to spend the money are made POLITICALLY and not Economically.
Translation: money that WOULD have been spent on what people normally would have actually WANTED, is now being spent completely arbitrarily and inefficiently on things that help out politicians.
This is the ancient economic fallacy of 'the seen vs. the unseen' from Frederick Bastiat, Henry Hazlitt, and just about every other economist. Please look up Bastiat's 'Broken window fallacy', and read 'Economics in One Lesson' by Henry Hazlitt. Great Stuff!
Ken,
The page of your link has been removed.
Oh please, it is not the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, that's just another attempt of Obama's to make things worse than it is so that he can look like he's doing something when all he's done is added more debt for future generations to pay off.
A stimulus is supposed to be short quick shot at the economy to kick it back to life, it hasn't done that because it's not a stimulus. It's a political strategy to spread out that money over a four year period to make sure that the democrats will stay in power come 2012. No one is buying your schill."The financial crisis of 2007–present is a financial crisis triggered by a liquidity shortfall in the United States banking system. It has resulted in the collapse of large financial institutions, the "bail out" of banks by national governments and downturns in stock markets around the world. It is considered by many economists to be the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_ … %80%932010
The 10 Worst Things About the Worst Decade Ever
http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0 … 49,00.htmlWell that settles everything because it's in wikipedia
NOT!It's in the WSJ, Economist, and other places... So tell me why this is not the worst economic crisis since the 1930s?
"a liquidity shortfall"...
give me a break. IT was caused because of the community reinvestment act - "hey, let's force banks to give bad loans, otherwise we'll fine them horrendously for racism." ... and then when the inevitable collapse ensues... "there just wasn't enough money for everyone to pay back! Let's TRIPLE the money supply in under 2 years... and in the process alter the base interest rate to 0%... that makes sense, right?"
ermmm.... it ain't over!
You're using wikipedia as a source? Man you are grasping at straw, the Carter recession was worse than this. We would be coming out of it about now if nothing had been done, instead we have hyperinflation to look forward to, Obama is great
Even as many Americans still struggle to recover from the country's worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, another crisis
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/economis … id=9990828
Worst Crisis Since '30s, With No End Yet in Sight
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122169431617549947.html or
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,424361,00.html
Economists generally agree this is the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, but they say despite pain, another depression isn't likely.
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/25/news/ec … mparisons/
World Bank: Economy worst since Depression
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/09/news/in … orld_bank/
Three Top Economists Agree 2009 Worst Financial Crisis Since Great Depression; Risks Increase if...
http://www.allbusiness.com/economy-econ … 365-1.html
We are in the worst financial crisis since Depression, says IMF
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008 … rimecrisisAnd? their opinion is their opinion, I lived through that time and can say this is not even close to how bad that was!
You're one of the fortunate individuals A Texan. TARP, the Stimulus bill, 8M+ net job losses, long-term unemployed at its highest rate since 1948, up to 99 weeks of unemployment benefits, ~2.5M jobs and ~15M+ job seekers, and so on should let people know that this is a nasty Recession we are dealing with.
if you want to fix the economy, get government out. Then, abolish the fed, and return to gold and silver - as per the constitution of the US.
...only in the sense that he is looking at an ultimate goal, instead of the steps to attaining it
I might be off the map, but the map is wrong. If my views are right field, that's because you're out in left field. Most people who are in the right field claim that I'm in left field.
The Simple argument that I'm making is that MY Constitution didn't come with an expiration date: Article 1 Section 8-9, along with the 10th amendment, make PERFECTLY clear that these United States' money is supposed to be gold and silver coin.
My claims that government needs to be out of the health care debate can easily be seen to anyone who's studied the history of health insurance in the US. The gov't created employer provided health care in 1942 with its Stabilization Act (which was a reaction to the depression, which was a reaction to inflation, which is a reaction to not following the Constitution's demand for gold and silver coins). The gov't then compounded the issue by making employer-provided health insurance tax-free (which ultimately was a reaction to the recently passed amendment to tax incomes, which was a reaction to the need for more gov't revenue, which was a reaction the new deal, which was a reaction to the great depression, which was a reaction to inflation, which was a response to not following the constitution's mandate of gold and silver coin). Then the gov't made numerous interferences into the market making it very difficult to enter the health care market (shall I do the chain of events back to gold and silver again?)
Anyway - i can make distinctly correct and accurate claims supporting my arguments. Other people just say things like 'health care is a right!' (even though it wasn't a right, apparently, for the first 230 years of our country), and things like 'you're just a right wing nut' (even though I'm very much NOT a right wing nut - republicans and democrats are both idiots)."My claims that government needs to be out of the health care debate can easily be seen to anyone who's studied the history of health insurance in the US."
Are you proposing that Medicare be repealed? Most people think it works pretty well. However, cost controls are needed.
"Anyway - i can make distinctly correct and accurate claims supporting my arguments."
Let's hear 'em!
But it would be more interesting if you would tell us about Japan or something you actually know something about."most people think it works pretty well. However, cost controls are needed"
Those two sentences cancel each other out. It can't 'work well' but also be in need of 'cost controls'.
And another thing - 'cost controls' are the exact same thing as 'price controls' and these tend to lead to horrendous scarcity. Please read up on my discussion of this in my Evan's Easy Economics.
"let's hear 'em"
Alright... here we go again!
1- Health care is not a right. If health care is a right, then I fail to see why it was not only left completely out of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and just about every other rights-related document relevant to history.
Health care can not be a right because, by the very nature of insurance (the means of delivering health care), you are using other people's money. This means that your 'right' is actually a right to use other people's money as you see fit; This means that you are claiming the right of health care at the expense of someone else's right of property: a right that IS actually spelled out in the Declaration of Independence. This seems to be the most overlooked part of this whole debate! Sure, we can insure 30 million more people, and if half (or whatever the number is) of those 30 million DEFINITELY have health problems, then prices for everyone will have to increase - this means that Jim will have to pay MORE for health insurance, thanks to Mary.
2- The problems with health care can be directly linked to government intervention (this is like the 19th time I've written about this, and it was in the above statement that you responded to, but... I guess you didn't read it...).
During/After the Great Depression (which was so horrible because of government implementing 'price controls'), Congress passed the Stabilization Act of 1942 (a giant 'cost control') which in practically forced companies to supply health insurance for their employees. THIS is why you almost always get insurance from your employer.
Because the federal government is, in EVERY meaning of the word, UNABLE to balance budgets, they passed the 16th amendment which allowed for income tax. Then, the Supreme Court declared that employer based health insurance is income-tax-free. But employer provided health care was exempted - this is why health care is provided by employers is so common. Basically simple math can show this: if you make $50k, and 30% of it is income-taxed-away, you would end up with $35k (50 * .7)...if you make $50k, but $10k of it is paid to you as health care that is untaxed, you end up with $38k. ((40*.7) + 10).
Since then, we have had numerous pieces of federal and state legislation that have put major restrictions on start-up insurance companies. Anyone familiar with economics will tell you that the freedom to start a new business to provide services is one of the staples of true Capitalism. But the restrictions set in place SEVERELY limit an entrepreneur's ability to start a business - a newly starting business is required to make their services available to tri-state areas, or they are forced to cover a minimum of 1,000 people from the start, or they are required to cover certain minimum numer of types of procedures... etc. etc. This limitation of competition is a reason why prices are so high.
3- ALL of this entire problem can be linked back to the abandonment of the gold standard. Indeed, we didn't leave gold until 1933, and then permanently 1971, but we were pretty much ignoring the standard ever since 1913. This was the government's fault. The supply of paper money began to be grossly increased when the Federal Reserve was created... I'm on a computer with restricted access to the internet, so I can't link any graphs of the money supply... But the current dollar can only buy about 4 cents of the 1913 dollar - inflation has been out of control! (96% in under a century! astonishing!). The inflation let to horrendous signals being sent througout the interest rates and it mismatched future production and current spending (once again, check out my Evan's Easy Economics), which caused a massive economy-wide failure of business. During depressions, Deflation becomes almost-always necessary, but Hoover and FDR didn't want deflation on their watch, and so they established price control after price control... things went poorly for almost over a decade thanks to their idiotic policies. And we're still dealing with it today.
4- Health insurance companies would LOVE to be forced to insure those with pre-existing conditions!! The simple fact is that it is highly uneconomical to do so in a free market; those companies that would provide care to pre-condition customers would be eaten alive by their competitors who wouldn't. But if the government is forcing them ALL to cover them, then THEY ARE ALL ALLOWED TO RAISE PRICES!! - The government basically creates a giant health-insurance cartel.
Unless someone can explain to me how 'being forced to raise your prices, and forcing your customers to PAY those prices, AND forcing EVERYONE to be your customer' is in anyway bad for an insurance company, the argument that 'health insurance companies hate this legislation' is COMPLETELY bullscheisse!
5- Why are prices so out of control? Well, with everything that I've written so far it should be clear - if more people are getting more money that is to ONLY be used for one purpose, surely that thing's price will increase.
But aside from that - when was the last time anyone actually went into their doctor's office and asked how much something was going to cost? or if there were any cheaper alternatives? The simple truth is that insurance is just a bad way to pay for things! I can sum up the argument with the 'tragedy of the commons' - look it up.
---- That's enough for THAT response ----
You want to learn about Japanese health care? It's pretty god awful. When I go to the hospital to do something like get a physical or have a test run (I suffered from panic attacks - I thought I was having insulin shock or something!!)... it takes hours! You have to see like 5 different doctors, and there's an hour long wait in between each one, and each one wants to prescribe you medicine (which 50% or so of the cost is covered by the government - this allows them to prescribe twice as much without angering the patient/customer. This is actually a joke in Japan - 'man, i went in for a cold and got 5 different medicines' ... if you know any japanese people, g'head and ask them!)
With panic attacks, it feels the same way that you might think a heart attack might feel - so i went to a heart hospital. The doctor diagnosed it as a panic attack (after running a test or two. Not complaining about this)... but then he told me to stay home the next day with a heart-beat monitoring device to check if i was having heart palpitations... THEN he also prescribed me BETA BLOCKERS!!! - he knew that someone else was paying for my treatments, so he went nuts in prescribing medication and tests. It really is that simple.
... This is about the same thing as diagnosing a cold, and then prescribing anti-biotics.
The doctors get away with murder over here, but because the people don't pay full cost, it doesn't matter!
....
Your response?
Unemployment reached almost 11% at one point during Reagan's era. Inflation topped almost 18% at one time during Carter's era. So now, this is not the worst. It's all hyperbole that Obama is promoting
Inflation under Carter was 21% and so was the misery index! Gas lines, no gas, it was a shitty time!
I didn't know it was that high Texan. Your money doesn't buy anything when prices go up by 20%. That really sucks!
You know what, I think your right, it was interest rates that were 21%. Again, my bad!
Keep telling yourself that. If I had to believe you or experts. I will choose the experts. None of them are stating that this is the worst crisis since the one under Carter.
When banks crash and the credit markets freeze... you have a major problem.
Greenspan Says Crisis ‘By Far’ Worst, Recovery Uneven
"Greenspan said that while the economy was in worse shape in the Great Depression, the recent financial crisis was potentially more harmful than that in the 1930s because “never had short-term credit literally withdrawn.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid= … lpUmEdbebw
Here is a bonus article about George W who joins the ranks of Herbert Hoover according to historians and probably many Democrats.
Historians Rank George W. Bush Among Worst Presidents
http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/his … dents.htmlGeorge W Bush is one of the worst Presidents, but he ain't as bad as Carter or the Bamster!
Tex,
You made a statement of 21% inflation under Carter, I remember it well. The long lines to get gas, and people fighting and syphaning it.
California has many cities with over 20% unemployment. Detroit may have hit 20%. If our gov't gave out real figures we would all be amazed.
Keep watching the inflation rate.
They said the world hates us because of Bush, but they feared us. Now a great friend, Israel is being forced to think of us differently. Is anyone affraid of us?i remember that too and it was horrible. we had to ration our water, our gasoline, dang near everything. thank goodness we had a garden and enough people in our family to work that garden so we could eat. we walked most everywhere to save gas and we had fans instead of air conditioning (in oklahoma that gets pretty dadgone hot), so yep it was much worse than now. and another thing, my husband and i are both doctors and i have to say that we are against the healthcare reform bill as it stands currently written and ALL of our friends that we know who are also doctors are against it. the AMA is not the be all and end all of the medical society. as mentioned before they are a small group. and also i agree with EVAN. thanks for the interesting reading. I am planning to look up Evans Easy Economics soon.
Just looking for a perspective - why was George W. one of the worst presidents? Facts please, not opinions or emotions. I'm always curious about this because I don't think he did much outside of the war. Congress kind of tied his hands after that. And I'm not blaming him for this, just looking for some answers.
Lets see why did the banks go under?? hmmm because Chris Dodd and Barney Frank "government" mandated that the banks give these risky loans********please place the blame where it belongs*****As Government expands....liberty contracts......
God had nothing to do with Obama, trust me, but God bless you! We need more like you and me. http://hubpages.com/t/1257e7
Kudos to Kenrick Chapman for citing sources for his post. This takes some work, and research, and indicates he's been studying the issues. I'm not saying that proves he's right, but it makes his position 10 times more authoritative than those who pluck their opinions from - the ether. (That's a sanitized version of where most casual opinions come from.)
I hope that readers with an open mind will consider the sourcing - the evidence - the facts - provided by the writer when considering the merits of the post.Doug, the facts are easily accessible to anyone with an internet connection so I don't feel I have to provide any sources. If you dispute the facts that I laid out then do so, but providing links to newspapers with an opinion is not proof.
Especially if these opinions come from the lamestream media outlets
Wikipedia is probably more reliable than Fox News...
"A 2005 study by the journal Nature found Wikipedia roughly as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britannica, and a 2008 study in the journal Reference Services Review pegged Wikipedia's accuracy rate at 80 percent compared to 95-96 percent among other sources — not bad for a free, crowd-sourced encyclopedia.""Wikipedia is probably more reliable than Fox News..."
No it isn't but probably more reliable than MSNBC.I do not watch MSNBC but CNN. I do watch Fox News for laughs and since it is always on one of the TVs at one of the gyms I attend.
Still doesn't change my assertion about MSNBC, CNN can be trusted for the most part, but you don't watch fox news or you would know the hard news side of it is not biased either way. The punditry does lean right but that just counters what the other channels are doing, and I'm afraid that again a majority of news watchers are tuning into fox news, because they will get the truth!
MSNBC is sort of similar to Fox News... CNN tries to play the middle ground although it still has its Clinton News Network roots.
Every once in a while I get to see or hear hilarious things like this on Fox News at the gym...
Caption labeled Michelle Obama as Obama's Baby mama.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvZEZL2LmA8fox news is a right wing propaganda machine. if they are talking they are slanting. if two people are in a race . they ask the loser to tell them how the winner is ha ha ha.also, they let people come on and flat out lie on their news program. msnbc fact checks everything and busts them the same day. like the stimulus, they(right wing) didn't like, voted against it, said it wouldn't do any good. msnbc got pictures of 116 of them telling their constituents how great it is to get the tarp money in their community and the tremendous amount of good it will do. i could go on and on. now romney is touting a healthcare reform that is exactly the same as President Obama
I'd like to protest what you wrote.
Instead of "if [fox is] talking they are slanting"..
please change it to "if it's a TV-news program, it is slanting, inaccurate, unfact-checked, and also not worth watching. Also, all the 'news reporters' are just bimbos or dim-witted hunks who regurgitate whatever is written in front of them".
In a recent news program, It was CNN, they showed a video. The news reporter actually said "we can't verify where this video was taken, who's in the video, or the authenticity of the video, but..."
...
YeeshFoxnews is right wing propoganda, but that's a by-product. Rupert Murdoch is wise enough to know a good thing when he sees it, and Foxnews is in it for the money. Foxnews hit the mother load by appealing to conservatives who felt isolated because of liberal bias found in most media outlets. I don't think anyone believes the crap they spout on Fox. Glen Beck, Bill OReilly and the rest of the gang are simply smart enough to know which side of the bread is buttered.
Look at Ann Coulter. I remember when she first started appearing on TV on several networks. She actually debated and had thought provoking commentary. Now, she's discovered how lucrative it is to be a nutjob, so guess what, she's a nutjob. Nobody takes her seriously anymore, right?
And FYI: Romney created state wide healthcare in Massachuetts years ago.
MSM is far from perfect, but it's better than most of the loony tunes conspiracy/rumor/extremist sites on the Internet.
Ralph,
Can you name me any time Progressivism has worked in the U.S., when our leaders were taking us there? You can even name a country if you can.Harvey, as I'm sure you know we've had a number of "progressive" presidents many of whom rank by historians among the very best presidents--Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, Wilson. FDR is the most noted progressive in the group because of the many progressive actions that passed with his support--Social Security, the right of workers to organize and bargain collectively and a bunch of regulatory agencies that we now take for granted--FDIC, SEC and others.
Good ol' FDR - he took a mild depression that was nothing near as bad as the depression of '20, and turned it into a 15 year-long grinding halt of human progress!
Only government can create that kind of efficiency!
"Doug, the facts are easily accessible to anyone with an internet connection"
Or a memory
The best solution is to make all congressmen, their families, the presidential family and all fed employees to live on the same insurance plans as us "commoners" do. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, so to speak.
If they all had to live as we do, with no preferential treatment, then I think a lot of things would change.
But I don't see anyone in Washington willing to put our shoes on and walk a mile. After all, their health plans are far better than what's being served to the rest of us. And so are their payscales, which they control, their pensions, and more.
Elitism at its best.It says right in the bill that the Congress is exempt
The final reconciliation bill has not been finalized as of yet.
I see I opened a hornets nest with this one - I just love America
I think that so much of what has been said on both sides is bull... First of all, I don't know why we went from discussing health care reform to the financial crisis. It is amazing to me how many people are just determined to hate our new President. I do not idolize him myself. I think that he is putting forth a good effort. I mean who really has all the answers, but I believe that as Americans we SHOULD SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT NO MATTER WHAT... that's just me. Maybe if we weren't so caught up in being liberal & conservative we could actually begin to use some good old common sense.
Second of all... let's get real here. I am tired of everyone blaming our President for the economic crisis. As with all things history it happens in cycles. We were up for a very long time... but with the good you must take the bad. It is a cycle... not Bush... not Obama... just life.
Thirdly and back to the topic in hand, I am a firm believer that Heath Care should be a civil right... Not big business, but a social service... sorry.. just my opinion... so let's quit being stupid and get SOMETHING DONE!!!! Maybe if we could unify we could come up with a workable plan... In my eyes... what America needs more than anything is UNITY!!!"I believe that as Americans we SHOULD SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT NO MATTER WHAT... "
Did you believe that under the last president?She said that can't you read !!
she said: "but with the good you must take the bad. It is a cycle... not Bush... not Obama... just life."A) I don't believe it
B) It is not a good idea in any case
C) I enjoy reading your hubs!Sab,
Why do so many HATE you so much? China, Mike and others act like they are looking for anything you say. It doesn't seem like the will give you an inch.
Wrong, We need to let our president what we want, and he should support us. He works for us! Not the contrary.
"I am a firm believer that Health Care should be a civil right... Not big business, but a social service . . ."
That opens up real problems. First, I am retired and healthy. I have no interest in paying for somebody's long-term care when I don't need it. Second, if healthcare falls under the social services category, that would make it mandatory for illegals to get healthcare -- more than what they're getting now for free. That's why the illegal population is getting all this welfare because it falls under social services. That's why La Raza is so pissed off because at present healthcare doesn't include illegals."but I believe that as Americans we SHOULD SUPPORT OUR PRESIDENT NO MATTER WHAT."
... What if he asks to rape your daughter? Not that he would, but would you still support him no matter what?
This simple statement, to support someone no matter what, belongs in a tyrannical dictatorship, not a free society.
"As with all things history it happens in cycles. We were up for a very long time..."
Please read up on the Austrian Business cycle - the reason why we have booms and busts is actually because we have a Central bank messing with Interest rates. We now have had 0% base interest rates for about a full year ... things are gonna get worse. Interest rates are fascinating - please read my "Evan's Easy Economics" hubs.
"I am a firm believer that Heath Care should be a civil right... "
It can NOT be a right. For it to be a right, it would mean that you have the right to someone else's property, which is expressly at odds with western philosophy - LIfe, Liberty and Property are inalienable according to John Locke; he heavily influenced all of our founding fathers.
Think about it - universal health care can't be provided by all countries. No one in 3rd world countries could expect it to be a right. So, if it were truly a right, we should all be shoveling our money into Mexico and other countries to give them their rights.
Also, for it to be a right it would mean that if you can't pay, someone else HAS to pay for you. You would be entitled to other people's money.
It just simply can't be a right. Your life is a right, but not your health care. Your liberty is a right: being forced by government to pay for someone else's health is a severe restriction on liberty. And you have the right to your property and pursuit of happiness (amongst other TRUE rights)Couldn't have said it better myself! Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, NOT the pursuit of someone else's property if I can't pay for insurance. That just screams of SOCIALISM!
If your place catches fire do not call the fire department. If you are the victim of a crime do not call the police. You should not enjoy public parks or go to libraries either.
All "socialist" systems.Hey Grandpa Liberal! It's past your bedtime.
actually, lima, we SHOULD call the police and fire departments - the government stole our money, so we are entitled to our services.
The REAL way things should work is that we should privately hire such groups of fire departments etc.
I WILL call the fire department, because we HAVE ALREADY been forced to pay them.I'm merely pointing out that both the police and fire departments are socialist systems in their own rights. You are forced to pay for something that you may never need or use. I contend that you are so used to having these that you don't think about it for what it really is.
Libraries and public parks fall into the same category.
The Romans had "private enterprise" fire departments. When there were long lulls between call to put out fires these paid professionals would see their incomes fall. Some would start fires to demonstrate the need for a private enterprise fire department. Yup, that's just what we need.
So I guess, by this reasoning you'll make use of the health-care reform provisions because in a sense you've already paid for them.
I'd like you to explain how psychologists and psychiatrists perform controlled tests on the human psyche.
Gold has monetary value simply because humans assigned it that value. By the way, just because you wrote a hub doesn't make you the defacto expert on a topic or the ultimate authority.
Finally, you asked me to respond by telling you how you are wrong. In a sense you are not.
Gold has long had a value simply because humans decided it should. But there have been many other cultures who used gold simply for decoration or as a metal exclusive to their royalty. In that way gold had no value to the vast majority of people.
A person's labor, skill, craftsmanship has a value. Transferring that value to a metal or paper is an excellent way to also transfer that person's worth to someone whose only skill is appropriating that labor as their own. Even if they did nothing substantive to "earn" it.not being a psychologist nor having studied psychology at all, I can't answer such a question. But, I have studied medicine a little and other such studies, which is somewhat similar. You can perform double-blind controlled placebo studies on individuals to study cause and effect in medicine... i would imagine that psychology has a similar system.
Economics, on the other hand, is a study of massive number of people where no Economist has any control over the subjects. It's just looking at massive numbers of people acting in a certain way, and then trying to find causes and effects throughout the whole system. There's nothing to compare to, there's nothing to control, there's millions upon billions of causes and millions upon billions of effects. It's NOT science because there can be NO controlled, independently verifiable tests. Tests are what separate the Scientific method and other ways of thinking.
"Gold has long had a value simply because humans decided it should."
very well said indeed! I believe we might have an Austrian Economist here who just doesn't realize it! Gold is valuable simply because humans think it should be valuable! Indeed! well said! nothing but net!
But, gold has a fantastic array of benefits other than just this - it is malleable, it is divisible, it is sturdy, it is VERY easily identifiable, and it is un-inflatable, amongst other qualities. All of these are outlined here :
http://hubpages.com/hub/Evans-Easy-Econ … And-Silver
"A person's labor, skill, craftsmanship has a value."
Oh no, maybe you aren't an Austrian after all!! Intrinsic value is a dangerous slope to slide down, beware! It is not that gold, or oil, or a dorito is inherently valuable, it is as you said with gold - people want these things, so they have value.
Labor, and any other commodity for that matter, doesn't necessarily have value! If I sit around all day picking my nose and farting, ... i don't think that this labor has any value other than if there were a market for human-methane and human-boogers. I suppose that this labor MIGHT be considered valuable if the person highly enjoys farting and picking his nose...
Labor only has value if it is being applied in a way that people value their actions. Leisure DOES have value - after all, who doesn't like a good day off. But I don't think that this is quite what we mean by "labor".
"I'm merely pointing out that both the police and fire departments are socialist systems in their own rights. You are forced to pay for something that you may never need or use. I contend that you are so used to having these that you don't think about it for what it really is. Libraries and public parks fall into the same category."
Indeed, this is accurate. these ARE socialist systems. I would much rather have a private enterprise doing these things. I would imagine it wouldn't be a "pay-per-fire" system that would prevail in a free market, but rather a "fire insurance/protection" system that would prevail. I'm certain that your example of Rome had the evil-tentacle of government influencing it.
"So I guess, by this reasoning you'll make use of the health-care reform provisions because in a sense you've already paid for them."
indeed, i will! But that doesn't mean that I WANT to use this system! they are forcing me to pay money for a service I don't want or need! it's aggression, coercion, evil, bad economics and, ultimately, unconstitutional. Just because I am forced to pay for something, and then i go about using the service that i HAD to pay for doesn't mean that I agree with that system. After all, I'm paying for the iraq war, the afghanistan war, the soon-to-be-pakistan and maybe iranian war. I'm paying for the lobbyist paradise that is congress, and I'm paying for the Department of Homeland security...
I would love to abolish all of these things! But i can't! That doesn't mean that i like them.I wanted to comment on this once again, although Liam doesn't want to respond to what I wrote.
A thought occured to me as I was sitting around thinking of what liam wrote:
"The Romans had "private enterprise" fire departments. When there were long lulls between call to put out fires these paid professionals would see their incomes fall. Some would start fires to demonstrate the need for a private enterprise fire department. Yup, that's just what we need."
This is a completely nonsense bullscheisse argument.
We have private hospitals today, but not a single one is spreading diseases.
We have private security, but non are commiting crimes.
We have private internet-protection service providers, but none are creating computer viruses and the sort.
We have private entertainment industries that don't attack one another. (i.e., I've never seen CBS bomb a bookstore or movie theater).
Your argument is nonsense. You don't even cite the source of your claim, and then use the non-cited episode as a reason to completely give up on capitalism.
You are, again, thus refuted.
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America"
the general welfare argument? Really, you're gonna pull that?
If we are to assume that the Congress has the ability to allocate money based on anything that would be assumed to be "general welfare", then why would the founders have included a specific list of things that Congress is allowed to allocate money towards? article 1 section 8 SPECIFICALLY has to give Congress the ability to use tax revenue to make roads - but only roads for post offices etc.:
"...To establish Post Offices and Post Roads;"
Are we to assume, that in ALL of the completely random things that the founders who wrote the Constitution COULD have included in Section 8, they would SPECIFICALLY tell congress that they were allowed to make Post roads?
James Madison's , who is called the father of the constitution, final act as president was to actually veto a bill by congress to allocate money to an interstate road. Why would he have vetoed "interstate roads" as unconstitutional if it were "General Welfare"?
Why, if ANYthing that is pertaining to the "general welfare" would they bother to write "post roads" instead of something along the lines of "food production regulation" or "subsidies for medicine" or "help towards the steel industry"... or any other countless other powers that could have been directly appointed to congress...
... but they chose POST ROADS?
The "general Welfare" argument is Dead, please give it up.
To further my argument, i'll include the 10th amendment:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
which means (as you can plainly see) that health care is, at best a state issue.What do you mean "pull?" If you are going to argue against something you should at least be aware of the counter-argument.
Yup, states rights vs. federal rights. It's a very very old argument. The bill of rights was a concession to states and states rights.
This is a very weak argument. And you know as well as I do that a national highway system was finally passed under the Eisenhower administration as a means of defending the country.
You are starting to rant here.
Yup, that's why there are laws regarding the manufacture of automobiles to include safety devices, which are enforced nationally, and laws regarding interstate transportation.
Was a state issue.I am FULLY aware of the "general welfare" argument. that's why i was able to demolish it so easily.
hahahahah- i can't help but laugh at "This is a very weak argument. And you know as well as I do that a national highway system was finally passed under the Eisenhower administration as a means of defending the country."... who the hell were we fighting? the reds? give me a damn break. there hasn't been an enemy on our soil since... .... the british?
I think your argument completely shows how foolish your argument is: "we survived for almost 200 years without a national roads system, but then we suddenly needed it because we weren't at war with anyone!!!"
"that's why there are laws regarding the manufacture of automobiles to include safety devices, which are enforced nationally, and laws regarding interstate transportation."
these laws are unnecessary. People are perfectly capable of choosing safe cars on their own. Interstate transportation could easily be handled by the private market.
My argument is not weak - yours was. I was able to abolish it easily and without problem or contradiction.i wanted to tack one more thing onto my argument:
The bill of rights technically was a concession to the states, but the Constitution itself was a concession to the Union/federal government. The states created the Federal government.
Thus the bill of rights was ACTUALLY a concession to the states by the states to further limit the federal government.
The present health care bill does nothing that will lower health care cost. It is a 1500 page junk bill that no ones wants to pass.
They need to start over and do it right. Government seizure of the healthcare industry is not the answer. This is just a power play for more socialism. It is also a wealth redistribution bill. These are two facts that cannot be denied no matter what you opinion is.
Polls are showing that the majority of the people of the United States do not want this bill. Why is congress going against the will of the people? Are they trying to insight a civil revolution? They may get it at the next elections.I keep hearing the argument that the current healthcare bill is too big and that we should start over. However if our current healthcare system were to be written down with all its insurance technicalities, it would be considerably longer. And why is a long bill a negative quality? Would you really trust a ten page bill to fix such a huge problem? If there is one thing the insurance companies are good at, its finding loop holes. A larger bill allows them to close the most amount of loop holes possible.
And scraping the bill is not an option. The debate for this bill has lasted over a year. Does anyone really believe that starting over would produce a better result? It would just give lobbyists more time to rip it apart. People will eventually lose the will to fight for reform, but money never gets tired. Besides, I think we all know that with the way republicans have been acting, they won't vote for any bill but one that is exclusively theirs; no bi-partisanship at all. The American people want solutions from both sides, not just one and the current bill has elements from both sides, the republicans just refuse to break their 'no' stance because it would hurt their political careers to side with Obama, even if they agree with him.
There are only two reasons some people are opposed to this bill. The first is that they benefit from the current system (because they make more money) or because they have been mis-informed by all the hateful propaganda generated around it. It's all in the wording. The idea of socialism has been turned into some sort of insult, like calling someone a Nazi. When we already have socialist things in America like Libraries, post offices, Medicare and social security.
American NEEDS this reform, even if some people think they don't want it. There were people who violently opposed equal rights too, but that worked out pretty well for us. It's just a shame that some politicians fighting for basic human decency are demonized and torn down by a status quo fueled by money and hatred.I could fix this whole problem with just 1 page of law:
"we're going to ACTUALLY follow the constitution and get the government COMPLETELY out of the health care industry."
... heck, I just did it in one sentence.Are you kidding? The reason the current healthcare system is so screwed up is because there is no regulation. The insurance companies can do whatever they want. At least with the government we have the option of voting someone out. We have no control over what the insurance companies do and they've made it quite clear that they'd rather have our money than keep us healthy.
Everyone is so terrified of having the government involved in anything. Oh no, a letter in the mail must mean the government wants to control everything you do. And don't even think about letting your children check out books at the library; they might actually learn something.
There are certain things in this world that shouldn't be left to a free market and one of those is healthcare. This isn't about profit, it's about saving peoples lives."There are certain things in this world that shouldn't be left to a free market "
Whenever people say that they are usually talking about the things that most need to be.NO REGULATION?!?!?!
Ok, here we go. I will begin with the simple statement that the fact that employer-provided health care is non-income-taxable, and this is a form of regulation.
Now I will quote people showing that health care is regulated. your claim is completely baseless.
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Thomas DiLorenzo: (http://mises.org/daily/3793)
"Layers of regulation plague every aspect of medical care and health insurance in America. In the health-insurance industry, for instance, each state imposes dozens of regulatory mandates on health insurers, requiring them to include coverage of everything from massage therapy to hair implants. The reason for mandates is that the message-therapy and hair-implant industries (and many others) hire lobbyists to bribe state legislators to require insurers to cover their particular practice if they want to sell insurance within a state. Among the states with the largest number of mandates as of 2009 are Rhode Island (70), Minnesota (68), Maryland (66), New Mexico (57), and Maine (55). Idaho has the fewest mandates (13), followed by Alabama (21), Utah (23), and Hawaii (24).
Each mandate increases the cost of health insurance and probably increases the typical health-insurance policy by hundreds, or thousands, of dollars yearly."
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Gilbet G Merdine, M.D.: (http://mises.org/daily/3799)
"The United States has a system where the government guarantees payment for some people (Medicare). Any healthcare provider can choose between leisure time and providing for more people. One can easily see why providers will divert leisure for someone covered by Blue Cross but refuse to do so for someone without means of payment. Government payment therefore determines how healthcare providers will spend their time and effort."
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Here's an entire article talking about regulation of the markets: http://mises.org/daily/3727
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Here's a blogger, namend 'Bogart' discussing the myth of lack of regulation:
"Here are my top 5 reasons in order of most significant to least significant. These are all caused by government intervention in the marketplace for health care:
1. Price/Payment Fixing by Medicare, CHIP, Medicaid, etc make it difficult for people without insurance to afford health care. Moreover the government has laws about who care providers can serve and what they can charge if participating in these programs. So health care providers have no reason to to compete on price as all the folks using these services have no incentive to economize. The result of this fascism is predictable: Higher prices and Fewer Choices.
2. Regulation of the development, manufacturing, marketing, distribution, advertising, etc of medical devices, pharmaceuticals, alternative medicine etc only helps those large organizations who have expertise in managing the process over those other providers. For example: Kellogs is removing a claim on cholesterol reduction under pressure from the FDA. Why, who does this help, it certainly does not help consumers of food. It does help cholesterol reducing pharmaceuticals.
3. Licensing of doctors, nurses, etc. These licenses are extremely difficult to get. They are given out by "accredited" agencies to people they favor only. The medical industry would save billions by letting the licensing be done by private organizations. Then people would have the ability to request the certifications of their providers. You can have the following done by non-certified people: parenting, educating, communicating, manufacturing, producing food, etc. Why does the government need to license doctors when it does not license who makes your food?
4. Regulation of insurers, people are not allowed to buy insurance across state lines and insurers have lots of mandates on them that increase costs. If the mandates were removed and people could buy insurance across state OR BETTER YET INTERNATIONAL boundaries then the price would be dramatically reduced.
5. Insane liability system for negligence. This part is completely nuts. There is a weird lottery where the whole system is at the whims of a jury. How about a system where the two parties the plaintiff and defendant each select an arbitrator or agree on one to hear the case. Then the arbitrators would pick a third who has binding authority. This would not only save billions but would be much fairer to those who have been damaged."
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And even Milton Friedman (anyone who has studied economics would know this name - but, no offence, it seems that you guys might not know who he is) has spoken out against 'government reform'...
http://raymondpronk.wordpress.com/2009/ … st-videos/
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ALRIGHT!!! I'll be done for today, but I clearly have made an argument for myself... still waiting for an actual argument from you guys.I wanted to add to this : the AMA - the american medical association - is a government granted monopoly. They have the monopoly on deciding how many doctors there are, amongst other things.
If that ain't regulation, i dunno what is.
But it seems that no one is bothering to respond to my valid arguments.why does no one reply when I provide a mountain of evidence that completely destroys their argument?
Yes, I suppose you're right really.
I can see your point but if Kellogs' claim was misleading (I don't know if it *was* misleading, but still), then it shouldn't be touting its cereals as cholesterol-reducing.
How do you know this?
OK then, so what's to stop private organisations from selling certifications to the blatantly unqualified?
And in the absence of any legally-enforced licensing system, what's to stop some unqualified quack from setting themselves up as a doctor, without any comeback?
Yeah, if you're going to have an insurance-based healthcare system at all then I agree: give people as much choice as possible and they've at least got a fighting chance of not being financially crippled when they suffer a serious illness.Hey empress,
Sorry i didn't reply to this earlier, ive been on vacation and other stuff.
Also, im using a weird keyboard ATM so please forgive weird typos and punctuation.
Indeed, if Kellogg:s is lying about information on their products, it is indeed fraud. I suppose this is a bit of a bad example. I was just trying to point out that the FDA was spending it's man hours worrying about whether Kelloggs could fully support a claim it made on a box of whatever. It could be doing other more important things, but this is, again, not a very solid argument, because fraud is as fraud does.
Next you asked me 'how do i know' about the medical licensing. Milton Friedman and Walter Block talk about this subject in length. The Government has awarded the AMA with the monopoly power of granting the licensing to practice medicine in the US. Thus it controls how many doctors there are and a whole lot longer list of things. If you look up on a google video search "milton friedman AMA health" or something along those lines, i:m sure you:ll find it. If you don:t, i have a link on this forum when I yell at Deeds and MT for claiming that there is no regulation in the health care market - a claim that is easily demonstrably false.
Now the quack question - yes. there might be an increase in the number of quacks, but let:s be honest: it wouldnt be as bad as everyone might think. If we got rid of monopolistic licensing practices of the AMA, and instead moved towards a system of Certification (i.e. Bill gets a certificate saying he's a good doctor, but jimmy doesn't, but they are both allowed to freely open their own medical service with/without the certification) people will be hesitant to go to doctors who can't prove they aren't quacks, and - just as we have rankings for hospitals and other numerous things - we;d begin to have rankings of doctors that patients could look up before they go to the doctor. The quack problem would solve itself because people wouldn't go to quacks.
Also, I:d like to add that we should try to reduce the number of malpractice lawsuits - upwards of 30% of the costs of surgeries etc are because doctors have to defend themselves against lawsuits for trying to help people.
Anyway, thanks for ACTUALLY ADDRESSING WHAT I WROTE!!! it:s a breath of fresh air compared to ralph deeds! ... I finally got him to respond when i told him his mamma was fat.OK, I found an article:
http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/25/americ … almia.html
That bit about the midwifery did take me aback somewhat.
Who would award the certificates under your system though?
That article I posted seemed to think it was less - 25% at the most (see the 6th paragraph).
Yeah I know, shocking isn't it - actually discussing issues on their own merits rather than just parroting slogans.
General observation here, not just specific to the healthcare issue: I can't help noticing that Americans are far more politically polarised than people in my country (Britain). In Britain there's a general attitude of "Oh sod it, who cares whether Labour or the Conservatives get in power - they're both the same anyway" (at least that's the attitude among the people I know personally). This carries its own dangers - apathy is a very convenient route to tyranny IMO.
But when it comes to you Americans - going by this forum anyway - there seems to be a real divide between "liberal" and "right wing". "Liberal" has one set of beliefs associated with it, and "right wing" another. If you happen not to fit neatly into either of those two pigeonholes, then people don't know how to deal with you. And it's almost as though Americans (not you Evan but most of the ones on this forum) actually prefer it that way. It's almost as though they want to cling onto the polarisation, because if you took it away from them, they'd have to wake up to the fact that they've been "played" by both political parties for decades (same as we have in Britain).
That's my take on it anyway - does it make sense to you?
"at leats with the government we have the option to vote someone out"
Every time you pay someone money, you are voting. You are voting, with your money, that you like this company's services. Thus, your statement is actually completely reversible and shows that government is less effective than the private sector.
For example, if you agree with politician A's stance on issues 2, 4, 6, and 8, but don't agree with him on 1, 3, 5, and 7, then, by voting for him, you are inadvertantly voting for 4 things you don't like (or whatever the number is).
But with money, in a truly capitalist society where companies are free to enter and leave the market at will or through bankruptcy, you are provided a MUCH wider array of choices - just look at hamburgers: McD's, B-King, Wendy's, Max and Erma's, TGIF, and just about every restaurant in the States. With health insurance each company provides you with your own choice of multiple plans that you can take, and there are numerous companies! With the free, unregulated market you get not only better service (the post office... ) but you also get more say in what you are able to vote for.
Companies are always bending over backwards to figure out what customers want... politicians on the other hand...."Every time you pay someone money, you are voting. You are voting, with your money, that you like this company's services."
You're right, but when I buy a hamburger I expect it to be a hamburger. It might not always taste the same (variations of cooking) but it's still a hamburger. If I pay for a hamburger and they deliver me a half eaten taco, I'm going to demand my money back. That's why so many people are frustrated with health insurance companies. If they were giving us what we pay for, it would be a different story, but coverage is changed constantly with little to no warning. You don't go into McDonalds and get told that you can't have a hamburger because eating one last week was a 'pre-existing condition'. We are paying for a service and these companies are delivering whatever they want, not the product we think we're paying for.
Not all health insurance companies are evil empires, but there is a noticeable lack of consistency between them. I could be under one plan that covers all routine checkups while a friend of mine has to pay 50% of the bill for all of his routine checkups. It shouldn't be that way. You can make all sorts of arguments about how they should get a better job, but it isn't about how good of an occupation you have, it's about all of us being Americans, and how we should have basic decency when it comes to our health. If you feel sick you should be able to go to a doctor no matter who you are.
You can blame the current failure of health insurance on the government regulations if you want, but when I say that I'm for health insurance reform its because I want our country to move towards universal healthcare. And I want our country to move in this direction because so many other modern countries have working universal healthcare. There are even select states like Hawaii and Massachusetts that have better healthcare systems, so why is it such a horrible thing for all of America to have it?"there is a noticeable lack of consistency between them"
Variety is the spice of life. And this is also what a free market is all about - you have the right to choose if you want one type of service or another. Claiming that "it shouldn't be this way' is the same thing as saying that all tacos should be the same, that all cell phone service providers should be the same, and that all [insert any type of service or product] should be the same.
The fact that you're allowed to choose is fantastic! why is this a bad thing? Of course, as you say "if they were giving us what we pay for...", if the company doesn't deliver on its contractual agreement, it should indeed lose business and go under. This is how Capitalism works. But I'm not so sure that the companies aren't providing what they promise, i think it might be just that people aren't familiar enough with their own contracts.
"Why is it such a horrible thing for all of America to have it?"
The Constitution for these United States of America does NOT give the power to provide health care to the Congress, President or Supreme Court. I wouldn't be as opposed to the issue if it were done Constitutionally, but, without a Constitutional ammendment, UHC would be unconstitutional.
Also - your statement showing that "Hawaii and Massachusetts ...have better healthcare systems..." is at direct odds with your claim that health care in the US is unregulated.
I'm not trying to be evil. I want everyone to have health care... But I also want everyone to have the right to their own property - I go to work, and then I decide how to spend my own money. If I spend my money poorly, and then can't afford health care, then that is my own fault - the same for everyone else.
You did not make this claim, but I want to reiterate this: Health Care is NOT a right. If it were a right, then it would be a right to other people's money and property, which infringes on others' rights. It can not be a right."Variety is the spice of life. And this is also what a free market is all about - you have the right to choose if you want one type of service or another. Claiming that "it shouldn't be this way' is the same thing as saying that all tacos should be the same, that all cell phone service providers should be the same, and that all [insert any type of service or product] should be the same."
I don't think that every taco should be the same, but there are certain things that constitute a taco. Usually there is some sort of shell, a meat/bean product and a series of toppings. They can vary greatly, but they're all still tacos. If someone is providing medical insurance it should be able to at least fall under the category of actual medical insurance, rather than saying you have it one day, then having it disappear when you break a leg.
And variety would be a good thing if we actually had it where health insurance is concerned. A lot of people are forced into one plan because that's the only plan their employer offers. To go to an outside company not only costs more, but again its no guarantee that the company will actually give you better service. Even if you manage to get into their program (assuming you have no pre-existing conditions) there is a very real chance that they could drop you entirely when you get sick. The problem is that no matter what healthcare plan you manage to purchase under the current system there is no reassurances that they will actually cover you when it comes down to it. Some companies do, some don't and it is a very dangerous game to play when you're trying to figure out which ones work.
Everyone should have a right to their own property and their own money, but the problems surrounding healthcare aren't just poor people who can't afford to get it. It's the people who think they have a good plan and are just going about their lives until a disaster strikes and they need to go to the hospital. Only when they get there do they discover their insurance won't cover their bills. You can be well-to-do and still get crippled financially from medical bills.
It might not be in our constitution that free healthcare is a human right, and there will always be people who spend out of their means or put themselves in danger (health-wise) who might not deserve the free care. But when you get cancer, even after living a healthy life, do you really deserve to die because you don't have enough money? If a car plows into yours at an intersection, even though you had the green light, should you be rushed to the emergency room only to be wheeled back onto the street because you aren't covered?
We can be rugged individuals who earn and spend our own money, but who are we to play god in deciding who lives and who dies?1) Once again, I'm not entirely sure that these claims of "they'll just drop you when you get sick" can be accurate : if a company breaks its contract, it should have the full force of the law thrown up against it and it should lose. We can both agree with this, I'm sure; but if a company doesn't break a contract, then it is allowed to do what it must, the same is true for all parties of all contracts.
2) If your employer only offers you a certain type of insurance, and you don't want it, I'm sure you can negotiate with your employer. If you then can't find a proper type of insurance outside of your employer, then you shouldn't pay any of them money. You should save up your own money and pay for things yourself... or you could just start up your own insurance company that wasn't "evil" (that is, if the government would let you): if people truly have a need for insurance, and they are willing to pay for the such an insurance, then a company could easily make a killing providing that insurance.
And this brings us to the problem with the currently proposed health care: if you don't have insurance (surely this also means 'insurance recognized, licensed and regulated by the government), then you have to pay a fine; you are losing your liberty to choose what you want to do with your own property (money), and you aren't really gaining anything.
UHC, on the other hand, simply means that all insurance companies are FORCED to cover people, and the people are FORCED to pay for everyone else. This is clearly a good thing for insurers - people are forced to pay higher fees to pay for the chronically ill, and the incentives to live a safe life are reduced. Why the hell do I have to pay for smokers' lung cancer treatment when they've been informed that smoking causes lung cancer? -- the health companies, doctors, and drug companies win.
3) If it ain't in the Constitution, but you want the federal government to rule on it, then CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION - there is a system designed for doing such a thing (they are called "amendments"). Without an amendment the entire argument is moot.
The. Federal. Government. Does. Not. Have. The. Power. To. Provide. Health. Care.
4) "when you get cancer, even after living a healthy life, do you really deserve to die because you don't have enough money?" ... "If a car plows into yours at an intersection, even though you had the green light, should you be rushed to the emergency room only to be wheeled back onto the street because you aren't covered?"
Listen, I'm not God, so don't ask me why he gives people who are nice cancer, or why he lets people get plowed by cars even though they're modern day saints. If someone has cancer, or gets run over, and the procedure to heal them takes a certain amount of resources to undertake, and no one is willing to give that person the money necessary to acquire the resources (i.e. Churches, family, nor friends give them money, and doctors refuse to work for free, and drug companies refuse to give the medication for free), then they may not DESERVE to die, but they don't have a choice -- If it takes a million bricks to build a hospital, but you only have 50, then... sucks for you!
I know it sounds cruel, but if people don't WILLFULLY want to save everyone else's lives, why should they be forced to? YOU CAN, RIGHT NOW, GO TO A CHARITY AND GIVE THEM MONEY. Are you doing it? no. should I hire police to force you to give them your money? of course not.
UHC is just forced charity. Your argument here is complete nonsense simply because charity still exists - and those who wish to help people should be free to do so. Those who don't want to help their fellow man beyond what they do with their labor, shouldn't have to.
UHC is FORCED CHARITY, aka, INVOLUNTARY SERVITUDE... i would go one step further, but I'm not sure if it's justified.
Your argument, if taken into another direction, seems to claim that hospitals should be built everywhere and en masse, and people should be forced to become doctors because we need to be able to treat anyone at any time for any reason. This is obviously ludicrous.
"We all know of a certain road that was paved with good intentions." - Milton Friedman.
5)"who are we to play god in deciding who lives and who dies?"
If you want to invoke the "God Argument", then we need to realize that we would be playing god to force people to pay to treat people with cancer!!
GOD (if one exists, but this is a side argument) is the one that gave the people cancer; GOD is the one that ran the person over with a car; GOD is the one who made the people poor; GOD is the being who made diseases; GOD is the one who causes mothers to die in childbirth; GOD is the one that strikes people with lightning!!!!!!
WE ARE PLAYING GOD BY SAVING THEM!!! -- and you're playing slave-master by forcing me to save them.
(side not: south park has a funny episode on this called "Best Friends Forever" - season 9 episode 4, you can watch it for free, and not illegally, at Southparkstudios.com)
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In conclusion: yes, I want to save people's lives. Yes I want to end hunger and end disease, and make us all ride on magical ponies to the land of infinite food and no hunger. I REALLY do. I know that you do to: your heart is in the right place. But the best way is NOT to force people to pay! The best way to accomplish this is to let people decide how to spend their own money.
When you discuss "employer-provided health insurance" you also NEED to recognize that the only reason why it's employer-provided is because of government intervention since 1942 (i didn't talk about this in this response, but I did in just about every other response on this argument).The arguments you're making are based on an ideal vision of our old healthcare system. These are all the things it was supposed to be doing. If it WAS doing them, we wouldn't be having this conversation. The problem is that they weren't doing what they were supposed to be doing, which was providing coverage to Americans who could afford it.
When I say that people get dropped for no reason when they get sick, I'm not just making it up. Countless stories have surfaced over the years from countless different sources, detailing how people have been getting screwed over by the healthcare industry. (not to mention the stories I've seen first hand in my life). Now we could look at those cases and say too bad so sad; there were no resources available to help you, but if we have the opportunity to help, shouldn't we? There are lots of charities in existence that strive to help people, but the amount of money they receive in donations is a paltry amount compared to what health insurance companies are pulling in each day. And despite all of this money, America still ranks below a handful of other advanced nations for healthcare.
The politicians in washington agreed (even the republicans) that the current system is broken, they just disagreed as to how to fix it. The insurance companies have had decades to make this system into its ideal, but instead they have abused it and done irreparable damage to millions of Americans. This bill was created (and passed) because we had no other choice. We could either let the system keep bleeding us to death, or we could make a change.
Under the current bill you'll only see higher taxes if you make a certain amount of money (I believe its over 200,000 a year). And if you can't afford healthcare with your income, you have the option for government aide to get healthcare or you can fall under an umbrella of exemptions. The only reason people are afraid of being 'forced' into getting healthcare is because they're thinking of healthcare as it is now; which is flat out way too expensive. Once the government programs are locked in place, you won't be forced to chose between eating and getting medication (which is what many people were doing under the old system).
I could keep arguing with you, but it's clear neither of us are going to suddenly change our opinion. But you know what; that's fine. In fact, out of all the people that I've argued with, you've actually put up the best case. I may not agree with it, but at least you haven't dissolved into the shouting talking points that most news shows resort to. Now that the bill is passed, I just hope that those who opposed it are willing to give it a chance. The old healthcare system had plenty of time to prove itself to us, now this new system will have an opportunity. Maybe we will discover over the next decade that it was the wrong decision. And maybe we will discover that it was the right decision. I personally believe that it was the right decision, but only time will deliver the final verdict."The problem is that they weren't doing what they were supposed to be doing, which was providing coverage to Americans who could afford it."
You're right - they shouldn't provide health care to people who can afford it... ... that's a GOOD business model! ... And, because your business model is a good one, we should force EVERYONE to have health care.... even though they can't afford it... we'll just steal from the rich... which won't be evil... at all... ...
this obviously is wrong
"When I say that people get dropped for no reason when they get sick, I'm not just making it up."
I'm not claiming you are. But you've failed to 1- provide a single example, 2- discuss whether the drop was contractually valid, 3- discuss at all if there were charges brought against the companies, nor have you 4- discussed who won those court cases.
"but if we have the opportunity to help, shouldn't we?"
Sure, if you're into helping people! Isn't the lesson of the Good Samaritan that he was a good man faced with a problematic situation and chose to remain good? Imagine that lesson today - "we must help the poor person... because if we don't we'll be thrown in jail by the tax collectors..." It's ludicrous.
Charity is charity NOT because you're forced to do it, but because you willingly offer to make yourself worse off to help the needy - that's why it's a good thing. With UHC, we've killed an entire category of charity.
"The politicians in washington agreed (even the republicans) that the current system is broken, they just disagreed as to how to fix it. "
I agree that it's broken. I've shown, probably, 19 times that it's broken because of government intervention. No one is even addressing my claims. No one seems to care that the government is the culprit... I'm very shocked that no one is even addressing the fact that government's fingerprints are on every single bad aspect of the current system.
"The insurance companies have had decades to make this system into its ideal, but instead they have abused it and done irreparable damage to millions of Americans."
No, actually, they haven't. If you've read my other posts, you'll see that government was preventing them in very sever ways from running good health care.
"Under the current bill you'll only see higher taxes if you make a certain amount of money (I believe its over 200,000 a year)."
... people who are rich aren't rich for a reason, right?! they've obviously just stolen all their money from someone else, right?... Even though the only way to gain money in a market is from voluntary trade, they still must have stolen the money, right?... even though the only entity that will arrest you and throw you in jail for not paying it money is the government (and mafia), we should hate the rich people... right? I mean, come on, has Bill Gates ever helped ANYONE? Even though he's revolutionized modern .. everything... he still owes me money!!... right?
This is clearly ludicrous.
Price controls won't work. The system will fail. And so will our dollar.
---
thanks for the respect! I'm afraid that if the system fails... it will fail MONUMENTALLY. We're in 3 wars we can't afford, and now we're launching a fourth. Our money is going to be ruined soon.
"American NEEDS this reform, even if some people think they don't want it. "
That is exactly the attitude that is going to put a bunch of dems out of work come November.A great deal of people opposed civil rights. Yet the government took a stance because they knew the people NEEDED it. It was wrong to deny basic human rights based on race or gender. Just like it's wrong to deny someone healthcare because they don't make enough money or because it would be more profitable for the company if they didn't help you.
When social security and medicare were first proposed, people were violently against those too, saying they would destroy america, and yet now everyone just accepts them as the norm. If this bill makes it through to Obama's desk, the DAY AFTER everyone is going to forget about this whole argument. And then, five or ten years down the road, people will be using the current healthcare system as an argument to block some other bill working through congress. "Don't touch my healthcare exchange" they'll say, like they say "Don't touch my medicare" now. This kind of thing happens all the time.
A lot of politicians probably will suffer from voting for this, but it's because they put themselves on the line to do what was right.
Your ideology is commendable. The idea of socialism for the common good is one which works as in the example of libraries. But if I were forced to go to the library and read, the idea fails. It is not fair to say that since we have already tried socialism in the form of S.S. as you exemplified, that this bill is logical and moral. That's not to say it isn't either. The problem as I see it (and I am a laymen)is the complexity of the issue. There is no way that the 'fix' can come in the form of a bill. Issues need to be taken up individually addressing hospital costs, inflated rates to cover non pays, rates reflected in insurance provider premiums and maybe even agricultural practices and food additives including pesticides and substances which are not recognized as nutrients by the bodies highly efficient system. Relying on government to care for us is a moral given in times of great need. But when my mother continues to cook for me and make my bed, I don't learn to do it for myself. This country was built on the backs of those who worked to build it, who refused handouts, not on the benevelence of a royal class (congress).
His amazing leadership has sparked the greatest period of sales of firearms and ammunition this country has seen. Law abiding citizens have rallied and have provided a “stimulus” to the sporting goods field while other industries have failed, faded or moved off-shore!
Two weeks ago since I posted this thread and it is still going - health care must be a real problem in the US
...it's not health care, so much, but government takeover and forced actions upon the citizenry...unconstitutional acts
...it's people deciding who is in charge of their life's aspects, them selves or the government
...it's fiscal responsibility of government spending the taxpayers money without representation
...it's government usurping citizens moral and ethical conscience, because they think they know better
...it's having watched government grow like a cancer through the decades under the manipulation of banking and financial systems and the elites that run them
...it's...need I go on...?
thank God people are waking up, and thank God Obama was put in office to show us the error of our ways enough to wake us up and demand action for Constitutional liberty to be reestablished!
I'm with all you Obama supporters!
Finally--a president who is looking out for the have-not's, as opposed to the have's and the have-more's!
"The President has adopted an idea that CTJ (Citizens for Tax Justice) has championed for months, to change the Medicare tax so that it no longer exempts investment income and to make the tax more progressive. The President would raise the Medicare tax rate for earnings exceeding $200,000 for unmarried taxpayers and $250,000 for married taxpayers, and he would apply the existing 2.9 percent Medicare tax to investment income for those with adjusted gross income (AGI) above $200,000/$250,000.
CTJ's recent report on this proposal found that only 2.3 percent of taxpayers would be affected by this tax in 2014. (The tax would go into effect in 2013)."
2.3% affected, and how much revenue brought in?...A lot! They take everything from working people and the Paris Hilton's of the world are breezin on easy street. And that's nothing against them--but come on! Pay your fair share!
Income is taxed at 35%, while investments or inherited wealth at 15%??? Come one!
Anyway- go to the web-site Citizens for Tax Justice...you will have your eyes opened...WIDE.
Great post irish!You're kind of on the right track, as I see it, but just a couple of possible flaws. There are far fewer Paris Hiltons in the U.S. than there are Joe the Plumbers. So the majority suffers based on the most fortunate few. Double and triple taxing is a big issue with me. I pay income tax, buy a car and pay sales tax, then sell the same car and pay tax on that income which has already been taxed. My immigrant grandfather started a pizza parlour and left it to my father who sold it and left the money to his children. It wasn't much in the big picture but to have to pay tax on it is akin to gouging. There should be no tax at all on inheritance providing the payor is already deceased. No trusts to hide money and not have it taxed. Pay as you go. The other flaw has to do with small business. There are millions of sole proprietorships, companies whose taxes are not paid for by the company, but by the individual owner. How should we deal with them?
And for those lucky "have nots". Get ready to fork over your MANDATED MONTHLY PREMIUMS.
Yeah Team Obama Rocks.
Oh wait you don't have the money. No problem Team Obama has you covered. They will simply tax other people more to pay for you! Yeah... awesome.
What you won't get a monthly "Tax Credit" check in the mail box to pay the premiums which are due now... you'll have to wait until next year at tax time to apply for your rebate but your premiums are due now? No problem. Jail is free. Room and board. So what if you have a record now and no one will hire you.
Raw Raw Raw... team Obama!
edit: moved the rest to a hub.I think that the health care system needs to be reformed. There are people out there who are dying because they do not have health insurance or because they can't get coverage due to a pre-existing condition. I bet that if you talked to many cancer patients, for example, they could tell you the problems they have had with insurance and coverage or lack thereof. I know because there have been many people in my family who have had cancer and struggled with the insurance companies and their “policies”.
If the health insurance companies didn't charge $500,000.00 for a band aid (I am exaggerating of course but not by much), there wouldn't be a need for health care reform. It isn't just the health insurance companies but the entire health care industry itself.
They feed off the sick and the terminally ill. It is disgusting and I think that something should be done about and that it should have been done a long time ago.
Thirty-two out of thirty-three developed nations have universal health care. The United States is the exception. Hmmm, and we are how much in debt? I don’t understand why people are so against the health care reform. What is bad about the following? ...
•It makes insurance more affordable by providing the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history, reducing premium costs for tens of millions of families and small business owners who are priced out of coverage today. This helps over 31 million Americans afford health care who do not get it today – and makes coverage more affordable for many more.
•It sets up a new competitive health insurance market giving tens of millions of Americans the exact same insurance choices that members of Congress will have.
•It brings greater accountability to health care by laying out commonsense rules of the road to keep premiums down and prevent insurance industry abuses and denial of care.
•It will end discrimination against Americans with pre-existing conditions.
•It puts our budget and economy on a more stable path by reducing the deficit by $100 billion over the next ten years – and about $1 trillion over the second decade – by cutting government overspending and reining in waste, fraud and abuse.
*Bulleted points have been taken from http://www.whitehouse.gov/health-care-m … w/overview
Just another point of view …thank you for showing the point by point of what the bill does.
I want you to re-read each one and think closely about the adverse effects of each one of these claims.
If you do so, you will notice that each one benefits insurance companies in some way (by forcing people to pay them, or creating new customers, or it creates a government-granted cartel to the industry).
I think i've written about this somewhere on the forum, just do a search for my name on this forum or check out my hubs. Each one of those points is bad for the people.
"Article 1 Section 8-9, along with the 10th amendment,make PERFECTLY clear that these United States' money is supposed to be gold and silver coin."
If you want to take everything literally then you'd better burn all the paper money if you want everything to remain the same as the past 230 years. But wait...an amendment? Why are amendments allowed if you want everything to remain the same as the original constitution?
You can't stop progress or time from passing, nothing in this world ever remains the same. Every country has a constitution but no country is living exactly the way they did 230 years ago.
Some people who pay taxes would rather their money go to help their fellow citizens than line the pockets of millionaires alone. Yes, fellow citizens. Not enemies; your workmates, your neighbors, your friends. Some people who pay taxes think they should have a say where their money goes, and many want it to go to health care. Those people have as much right as you do to see their country go the way they want it to go. I believe that is why many of them elected Obama.
Besides, the insurance companies do quite well under socialized medicine. There are lots of other things to insure and some do buy supplemental insurance. And doctors do okay also. Don't weep for them...
Some of you people sound like a bunch of vultures constantly picking picking picking. You start thread after thread after thread on the same tired subject and nothing is ever resolved because you are all so selfish. Me me me... "I'm not going to help anyone but myself" "My tax dollars should not help anyone but me", "Everyone but me is a mooch on society"
Like it or not, it looks like health care will happen in your country. Of course, if there had been cooperation on all sides it would be a much more attractive plan. But, the insurance companies and big pharma and their lackeys have made sure it is a watered down piece of legislation in order to protect their own interests.
Anyway, that is my last statement on health insurance. Don't bother attacking me because I won't be back to this thread. There will be nothing new to read...
"Some people who pay taxes would rather their money go to help their fellow citizens than line the pockets of millionaires alone."
"nothing is ever resolved because you are all so selfish. Me me me... "
"Anyway, that is my last statement on health insurance. Don't bother attacking me because I won't be back to this thread."
LOL @ people who drop emotion-bombs then run away...ermm...... what?
You agree that UHC is unconstitutional, but then you ... say that it isn't?
Then you say that amendments are perfectly valid ways of giving the Federal government the power to something, but then you... say to NOT amend the Constitution?
What the hell are you smoking?I was responding to the person who wants the constitution to remain the same but yet also talks about how good a certain amendment was. That seems like a contradiction to me.
And I never said anything was unconstitutional...You were responding to me, apparently, but I had trouble seeing your reply because it was 8 miles away from my post. Helpful hint: to reply to a person directly on the forums, use the "reply" button under their post.
First let me respond to your latest response, and then i'll defend my original post (the one you are responding to).
When i claimed you thought that UHC is unconstitutional, I have to admit that I kind of took that view because you agree that the Constitution was amendable, but because no one was amending it, UHC would HAVE to be Unconstitutional. Your argument was (i'm paraphrasing) that the Constitution CAN be amended, but it doesn't need to be, and even if it isn't amended, if Congress passes a law that ignores the Constitution, the law is Constitutional...
Which made no sense to me, and I translated that as you saying that UHC was unconstitutional, but that it wasn't.
Now, to defend my statements. UHC is Unconstitutional. paper money not backed by gold and silver IS unconstitutional. Just because we've been ignoring the Constitution for X amount of years doesn't change the fact that we've completely given up on the idea of contractual government. The idea of the Constitution was that it was the closest thing to an Agreement that citizens of a country could come to.
For example,if I were to be born in a country, I should have the right to choose if I agree to their laws. but because this would be such chaos, we'll just make a Constitution instead that makes clear what the government CAN do, and CAN'T do. (this was Lysander Spooner's argument).
The other idea behind the Constitution was that it was to be an UNCHANGEABLE list of powers given up by the people, and the states, to the state, and federal governments (respectively). It was allowed to be amended, and a system was put in place to allow such an action.
No one has bothered to amend the Constitution in these subjects, and thus, Congress has become George Orwell's Animal Farm's Squeeler - rewriting the Constitutional laws and just relying on everyone's blind obedience to not demand accountability.
Now, to further defend my statements, why do people get so angry at the government over things like UHC? well, obviously, it's because I will now be forced (the bill passed thanks to horrendously unconstitutional methods of Executive order) to pay for other people at the point of a gun and the threat of jail time: If I don't have insurance, and I refuse to pay the fines, or i don't pay taxes... it's jail for me!
Congress has managed to actually convince everyone to sell their liberty for absolutely nothing in return. It's absolutely amazing.
Hubbers
CONGRESS AND THE HEALTHCARE DEBATE
On Saturday 3/20/10 EXCLUSIVLY on Fox News cable at 10:00am to 12:00 ET time NO OTHER PLACE BUT FOX NEWS
A special '' LIVE AND UNCUT '' direct from Washington , hosted by Neil Cavuto.
Members of both parties will be interviewed.
FOX NEWS '' WE REPORT YOU DECIDE '' '' FAIR AND BALANCED ''
Try not to miss the program, it's for Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Conservatives, Liberals and all Americans.
I don't believe I missed anyone.
Looking forward to comments.It's being hosted by Fox news, so we can be sure that it won't be slanted against the President!
We all know that Fox is nothing but patriotic, so attacking a sitting President while our nation is in crisis would never be tolerated!
Oh.. uh... wait... I forgot that it's not 2004 anymore.
It is our patriotic duty to question and challenge THIS President!
Got to read my talking points more often
"There but for the grace of God go any one of us"
Good afternoon,
If you’re an American under the age of 65, there's roughly a 50/50 chance that you will find yourself without coverage at some point in the next decade.1
Simply put, losing insurance can happen to anyone.
At yesterday's health reform event, President Obama told the story of Natoma, a self-employed woman in Ohio who found herself in the position of losing her health insurance after yet another rate hike from her insurance company:
"She realized that if she paid those health insurance premiums that had been jacked up by 40 percent … she couldn't make ends meet. So January was her last month of being insured. Like so many responsible Americans -- folks who work hard every day, who try to do the right thing -- she was forced to hang her fortunes on chance... And on Saturday, Natoma was diagnosed with leukemia…
"Part of what makes this issue difficult is most of us do have health insurance, we still do.... But what we have to understand is that what's happened to Natoma, there but for the grace of God go any one of us."
For Natoma and the millions of other Americans forced to face the burden of medical bills they can't pay while at their most vulnerable -- the time is now for health insurance reform. Watch the video of Natoma's story and learn what more you can do to help spread the word about the need for reform.
50/50 is the latest number in 'Health Reform by the Numbers,' our online campaign to raise awareness about why we just can't wait any longer for health insurance reform. Help spread the word by sharing this message with your family, friends and online networks.
Let's get it done.
Nancy-Ann DeParle
Director, White House Office of Health ReformGood morning,
3 million -- that's the decrease in the number of middle-income earners who obtained health insurance from their employers from 2000 to 2008.1
And 3 times -- is how much faster health care premiums are rising compared to wages.2
While our broken health care system is hurting everyone, it's the middle class that's feeling it the most. A report just out from the non-partisan Robert Wood Johnson Foundation shows that the middle class became uninsured at a faster pace than those with less or more income. And if we do nothing, the problem will only get worse.
But there's hope. Health insurance reform will lower costs and put America's middle class and small businesses back in the driver's seat of their own health care. The stakes are just too high for the millions of Americans who are hurting because of the way our current health care system works. The time is now for health insurance reform.
3 is the latest number in ‘Health Reform by the Numbers,' our online campaign to raise awareness about why we just can't wait any longer for health insurance reform. Help spread the word by sharing this message with your family, friends and online networks.
Let's get it done.
Nancy-Ann DeParle
Director, White House Office of Health ReformWe are so screwed.... Obama is a puppet, working towards human enslavement just as much as Bush was.
Wait, I have to go puke.....Okay I'm back.......Oh No I got to go puke again
This bill isn't perfect, but it's the best start we've had in over 100 years. What kills me is how it's being attacked and how many people line up behind the rhetoric.
Yes, Thank God for Obama! Finally a leader doing what’s right for all of us!87The Dix View
OBAMA don't believe in God ! OBAMA is a Muslim. How do i know?
During the campaign when being interviewed, he slipped and said '' i am a Muslim ''.
Sorry ,the main street media never reported it.
The bubble will soon break and the people will open their eyes to the real Obama.TWo things I'd like to debunk.
Obama is a christian, not a muslim, and the muslims believe in much the same god as you do.
You are just not bright enough...
I am writing this because in the latter stages in my life I have realized that, one, I am not bulletproof (darn), two, that my body is not going to last forever (crap), and three, that our government is just so much smarter than we are. Thats it - the three revelations that all Americans need to have, and have quickly.
There is so much that those in government need to choose for us, as we are lacking in the intelligence to make those choices on our own. Spare me the gene pool argument, I am now with them! How could I have been so blind for so long?? I have always thought that I know whats best for me. Big surprise. I don't. Nor should I be allowed to make those "oh so important decisions" without either help, or mandates.
I might be running with scissors right now!
We have banned smoking in restaurants, because we are not smart enough to go to restaurants that don't allow it. We have stopped people from driving without seat belts, even though we have required insurance coverage. We have stopped trans fats, helmetless riders, toys with small parts and companies who deny health insurance.
But hear me out...
We have not gone far enough! There are so many other issues that need to be decided so that all Americans are safe, and happy. For starters:
1. The state of New York has impending legislation that would ban salt from restaurants. They have not gone far enough! People might even have salt in their homes!
2. We need to limit the colors that people choose to paint their homes. I think to shades of tan. How dare that next door neighbor sport a color that I don't care for?
3. Cars. Cars need to have color restrictions too. The yellow ones? Too many rubberneckers involved in accidents due to those. 78%, I believe. Outlaw yellow cars.
4. Breakfast should no longer have sausage or bacon. Way too much fat. This should be easy given the smoking ban.
5. Alarm clocks should not have buzzer alarms - don't you hate that? It would be much more soothing to awaken to the sound of the surf.
6. The color red has to go. It has been proven to increase tension and bulls hate it. This one is too easy.
7. Gum chewing. There are far too many people that can't chew gum, and do ANYTHING at the same time. Its not fair that there are people that can. To redistribute this ability, gum chewing must be banned.
8. Heavy people. Heavy people and their carbon footprint. Now how can we legislate what is "heavy"?
9. Air bags. For outside the car. There are far too may animals getting unnecessarily slaughtered by irresponsible drivers. Auto companies, therefore, must be required to install rodent deterent airbags all around each vehicle. Given the government owns General Motors, this should not be a stretch.
10. What is with this "pursuit of happiness" anyway? Thats just because they didn't have "Zoloft" back then. You shouldn't have this right - just medicate it!
We have been far too conservative in what we dictate that our citizens do, as we are all to foolish, dumb and out of touch to take care of ourselves. But I'm curious... What else is there? Running with scissors is a no brainer and can't even make the top ten. Swimming after eating doesn't count. Using weather ballons and a lawn chair to enjoy the LAX airport is already taken. Got a more creative idea? Disagree? I dare ya!
Vernie ChambersBrilliant!
I want to go one step further, though.
If everyone demands that Health care is so important that the government needs to legislate on it, why don't we have government legislate on EVERYTHING that's important?
Food is quite possibly the most important thing! I demand that government grow, harvest, butcher and sell all our food for us! It worked so well when they tried it in Russia!
Housing is very important - I want government to take control of the lumber, stone and metal industries, let them decide where to build the houses, let them decide HOW to build the houses, and then let them decide who gets to live where! The Russian government did such a great job back in the 40s-90s that we need to reinstitute such programs.
Americans are apparently too dumb and ignorant to provide our own services, but... we're ... smart enough to vote for politicians who will implement everything for us?... what?You do realise that Soviet Russia worked quite well, if it was not for the problem that despots like Stalin went power mad and wrecked the system then in my opinion Soviet Russia would still be around.
Communism is working excellently in China, they are going to be America's great rival of the 21st century.They might even become the worlds dominant superpower, suceeding America.
You cant really tell me Communism is a failure and speak of China in the same breath.
The point of this is that (while I peronally prefer democracy) there is not one way in which to run a country, and some ways may be even better and more efficient than democracy. So open your mind a little."Communism is working excellently in China"
LOL! You need to inform yourself better. China hasn't been communist in anything but name for a long, long time.oh for the love of pete. you love russia so much? move there. dang
not only are you missing the whole mark on Communisim and Socialism, etc. but this... the USA which is the United States of America.... we are a REPUBLIC, NOT a Democracy. This is a REALLY common misconception.
China is still Communist - the Party runs everything and is the Government.
The Communism of today is not the same as yesterday and it is evolving into something new as we speak, but it is still Communism.
The difference is that tomorrows western societies are founded in a history of conquest, expansionism and colonialism, The most recent major impact on society here has been the Revolution that has led to social improvement. The most interesting aspect of being here at this time is to be able to watch the different responses to events from both sides."China is still Communist "
Not economically. Not for a long time. And even politically there have been siginificant changes in the past decade.THE Party - THE Communist Party - runs China and China still has the same name it started with in 1949. You can't change what it is because you have a different opinion of it - as much as you like to try.
It is still a deeply Communist country that is taking on economic reform and modernising the way its political system works - modernising the Communist political system.OMGFG no wonder Sab Oh is so disliked, she can even tell the communist party of china that they are not communists. LOLLOL
How do you know so much Sab Oh"THE Party - THE Communist Party - runs China and China still has the same name it started with in 1949. "
The name is about the only thing about it that is the same as in '49. Find an older person and ask them about it (if you can find one who speaks English) and they will tell you.
"The most recent major impact on society here has been the Revolution that has led to social improvement"
Oh really? The Cultural Revolution led to social improvement? The Great Leap Forward? Or are you referring to the communist revolution generally that eventually resulted in the deaths of untold tens of millions of Chinese? And ask the Tibetans, the Uighurs, the Indians, the Vietnamese, etc. about conquest and expansion and such.
Fight your programming, pengyou."ask the Tibetans, the Uighurs, the Indians, the Vietnamese, etc. about conquest and expansion and such."
What do you think america is founded on, ask the tribes of native american indians if we killed them. LOL. No nation is perfect, no nation is the devil. Open your mind to whats outside your little gated community Sab Oh.We weren't talking about the US. Try to focus.
No, you were complaining china was built on the destruction of other cultures, and I pointed out that america was built on the same.
Where do you get your drivel - Fox News I guess, with a spatter of Youtube. The old people here talk with admiration of the National situation after 1949, millions starving and they managed with central planning etc etc to get everyone fed and keep people alive.
The reasons for, and the conduct of, the Cultural Revolution are debated still, the arguments that I sat in on, of Chinese Professors who discussed this, were split about 50/50 for and against - a good friend who was sent to the fields for 3 years talks about how it was the best thing that could have happened to him. He is now a big cheese in the Party.
Almost related, my partner's Uncle, who was in the 'white army' and a vocal politician against the Communists, gets a state army pension here."The old people here talk with admiration of the National situation after 1949"
You have got to be kidding me. The 'nostalgia' thing is for old songs and theme restaurants. Millions died because of that cultural revolution crap. Millions of human beings. You either haven't really spoken to anyone or are getting the 'let's put on a happy face for the waiguoren' thing (which suggests you aren't close enough to anyone from that time to be spoken with frankly - which would be in keeping with what you have demonstrated so far).
What a lot of people don't realise is that there were a number of Soviet agents in key government positions, who played a big role in giving the Soviet Union a helping hand (see link below). You have to wonder whether the Soviet Union would have lasted nearly as long as it did, without such help.
http://www.goofigure.com/UserGoofigureD … ooID=10569
"One of the more controversial, and powerful, figures of the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt was Harry Hopkins. FDR Biographer Robert Sherwood noted that even partisans of the President "disliked Hopkins intensely and resented the extraordinary position of influence and authority which he held." Journalist Jay Franklin labeled him "one of the guiding intelligences of the New Deal," while John T. Flynn dubbed Hopkins "Roosevelt’s alter ego."
During his years at the White House, Hopkins did some very strange things. Despite the protests of military officials, Hopkins demanded that the American government give the Soviet Union a large amount of uranium as part of the Lend-Lease program. On a diplomatic trip to the Soviet Union in 1945, he shunned the American position of free elections for Poland and told Stalin that America’s goal was actually to have a post-war Poland that the Soviet Union was comfortable with. Earlier, when a government official defected from Stalin’s prison-state, Hopkins unsuccessfully urged Roosevelt to return the man to the USSR even though he knew that it would mean the man’s certain death."You're channeling Joe McCarthy, one of the most shameful senators in the history of the body.
People forget McCarthy was correct in his suspicions at least some of the time.
McCarthy was a monster who hadn't a shred of decency. Joe Stalin was probably right once or twice in his life as well.
He wasn't the most charming fella in the world (although he probably was to his friends), and he did overreach (where have we heard that word recently?) but you can't deny that some of the people he accused of being communists were in fact communists.
http://www.aim.org/aim-report/aim-repor … was-right/McCarthy was a hopeless alcoholic. He may have been charming to his accomplice character assasin, Roy Cohn, another "charming" individual. One of the people whose career was ruined was my wife's godmother's nephew, John Paton Davies who was run out of the State Department because he criticized Chain Kai Chek and correctly predicted the takeover of China by Mao. I have no doubt that there were a few holdovers in the government from the 1930s who were no longer a threat but who had provided information to the USSR. Ninety-eight percent of McCarthy's accusations were false. Nearly everyone agrees that the incredible harm McCarthy caused greatly exceeded any value he produced.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Paton_Davies,_Jr.
Here's a recent article from the LATimes entitled "Glenn Beck: Joe McCarthy Lives!"
http://www.latimes.com/sns-200909101253 … 1894.story
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Cohn
Army McCarthy Hearing "Have you no decency?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAur_I077NA"McCarthy was a hopeless alcoholic."
What does that have to do with it?Most hopeless alcoholics aren't very charming to anyone as you asserted McCarthy was, and their judgement is often impaired as McCarthy's clearly was.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4N46jLdhCU&NR=1
BTW, belonging to the Communist Party was and continues to be legal in the United States.
Don't worry, I wasn't about to send the police to your house.
As long as it never becomes our form of government. It is stated in the Constitution that we are guaranteed "a republican for of government".
Not republican as in republican vs. democrat, but as a Republic.
So they're wasting their time - here in America anyway
I haven't been the only person to point this out... but McCarthy being a nasty person is completely irrelevant to the fact that there were Communist sympathisers in high office in your government (and probably mine and loads of other Western governments as well), who supplied secrets to the Soviet Union.
no - it didn't work well. Please realize that socialism can't work. Mises proved it without recourse in his book Human Action.
yes actually he does.
Socialism creates monopolies, which prevents benefits through trade. How can you know if you're benefiting society if there's no such thing as profits?
A lack of profits also prevents people from knowing where to allocate resources effectively. people want to make money, so they invest capital in a certain field.
Also, if there is no such thing as money or profits or trade, why would anyone bother taking out the garbage? Or even working for that matter? I sure as hell wouldn't mind sitting around loafing all day if I got paid the same amount no matter what i did!
And many other arguments can easily destroy socialism.
yes, sometimes, its the people in the system, not the system itself. A dictator, right or left, is still a dictator.
I must admit, I prefer our system of government (australian) to the chinese model, where they elect representatives, to vote on who to vote in as politicians.
I would actually like to see elections more policy based than in the past and understand who my representative is as many now carry agendas other than what you see on their banners.Mises followers are like evangelicals who believe that the Bible is literally the revealed word of God. Mises was a brilliant economist who correctly pointed out the superiority of market capitalism over socialism. But if he were alive today he would be a middle of the road neo-Keynesian as are nearly all economists today.
that MIGHT be right, but it doesn't matter. You agree with me that Socialism is worse than markets. Thus he was right...
thus... why are you arguing against him?
Oh, and you still haven't responded to my arguments even after you asked me to type them out for you.I'm not arguing against Menger, Mises and Hayek, but rather against people like you who continue to blindly apply their theories in an extreme way to a changed, inter-connected domestic and world economy which requires, new institutions, greater cooperation and regulation than the world of Mises, et al. Socialism is a dead issue these days, except perhaps in Cuba and Venezuela.
applying their theories "to a changed, inter-connected domestic and world economy which requires, new institutions, greater cooperation and regulation than the world of Mises, et al."
The good ol' "everything is completely different than it was 50 years ago, and so nothing written 50 years ago is valid" argument, eh?
The theory of relativity was developed 100 years ago, but things are so much different now, i suppose that Einstein is a moot point.
The theory of Evolution was developed over 150 years ago, but i guess that Darwin is moot as well.
Locke, Jefferson, and all our founding fathers existed over 200 years ago, but i guess - in our newly changed interdependent world - their thoughts and arguments are completely moot.
The idea of a government restricted by a Constitution was developed over 200 years ago, but I guess that too is moot.
the argument that people's rights to life liberty and property were granted to them by nature was an argument that was developed over 200, maybe even 300 years ago... but i guess it's moot, too.
The idea of Christ being our savior was developed some 2000 years ago, but I guess he's moot, too.
... Your argument is thoroughly ridiculous. "I'm not arguing against X, but rather against people like you who blah blah blah" is a ludicrous argument. In order for it to be valid you would have to completely dismiss the idea of education - for my ideas and arguments have been developed from the accumulated writings of the last millenia.
I know you weren't arguing for socialism, but others were. And I was using the argument of Mises to show that he was wrong... but then you dismissed Mises because IF HIS ENTIRE LIFE WERE DIFFERENT, he would be a different person.... how do I argue with such logic?
I'm STILL waiting for an argument against what I wrote above. You asked for my arguments, then i gave them, but you have yet to respond to them.The difference between me and you, pal, is that I've studied economics from some of the best professors in the country and I actually know something about the subject.
Is it just me, or does Deeds just completely ignore my arguments and just talk about either 1- how awesome he is, 2- how hopeless i am, or 3- how hopeless those that I base my arguments off of are?
OK, well, even though Deeds seems incapable of it (and i understand that this is phrased insultingly, but please remember, "pal", that you started the insulting language), I'll bother to respond to HIS arguments.
"I've studied economics from some of the best professors in the country and actually know something about the subject"
Oh, you mean the same economic professors who are completely and totally stupified at what just happened to the economy and are incapable of explaining the root causes of the current Depression? (Those who have never heard of Hayek - and this would cover a LARGE number of professors; a fact that is being uncovered thanks to the Keynes-Hayek Rap)
The same professors who just can't seem to see how inflation, low interest rates, and production are coordinated? (everyone who hasn't studied the austrian school)
You mean the same professors who, apparently, haven't bothered to read (let ALONE comprehend) Frederick Bastiat's "Broken Window Fallacy"? 'gee whiz, if the government takes 20 dollars from jimmy and spends it for him on things he doesn't actually want as much as other things, it'll be GOOD for him!!" (keynes, and many other contemporary economists)
The same professors who still think that WWII ended the great depression? 'der, if we spend money on tanks, guns, ammo, and submarines, life will be good for everyone!' (Keynes, Krugman)
You mean the same professors who still haven't figured out that Economics is NOT a science? it's untestable. Imagine a double-blind controlled study of communism vs. Capitalism - it's an impossible task.
.....
Anyway, pal, i could go on, but it doesn't matter - you think you're awesome, even though you haven't made a coherent argument against ANYTHING that i've argued for here on this forum or in my hubs, pal.
I guess all those professors forgot to teach you how to have civil discussions and arguments with people who disagree with you.
LOLOLOL. I'm curious - how do you know this? Have you been holding a seance?yes, i was curious about this as well.
Also, doesn't the arguments "if he lived today, he'd be completely different" means completely nothing and have no relevance to the debate? Who cares IF he would be different, he still revolutionized the thought of economics...Mises' views would be somewhat different today wrt the need to regulate business and stabilize the economy because he was a very smart man who would recognize that conditions in the U.S. and the world have changed significantly from those prevailing when he produced his work. I agree with his conclusion that democratic market systems produce better results than democratic, centralized socialist systems. However, a complicated, inter-related, inter-dependent economy like the U.S. and the world today requires a certain amount of regulation in order to make sure it yields the promised benefits.
Here's a link to what Gregory Mankiw, Bush's economic adviser, Gregory Mankiw, who is a conservative conventional economist. had to say in today's paper:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/28/busin … amp;st=cse
Mankiw is probably close to where Mises would likely be if he were alive today.Let's see... I, the low-life loser who apparently knows nothing about economics whatsoever and is hopeless to ever learn anything about the subject, shall see what I can do - single-handedly - against Mankiw.
1- Mankiw makes the mistaken statement that few could foresee the recession coming:
"One thing we cannot do very well is forecast the economy. The recent crisis and recession caught most economists flat-footed."
Actually, the entire Austrian School of Economics not only saw it coming, but is/was able to describe why it happened, how it will happen again, how to fix it, and also the root causes.
2- why does mankiw not want to speak the name of the Austrians?
"Some critics say the Federal Reserve should have foreseen the bursting of the housing bubble and its financial aftershocks. A few of them, having made the correct call themselves, are enjoying newfound celebrity."
For some reason, makiw seems to not want to mention the Austrian School whatsoever in his article, despite talking about it directly.
3- "After the fact, a few will turn out to be right, and many wrong."
Well, yes, but it seems that the same few people routinely get it right, and are able to explain very well WHY it is happening. AUSTRIAN SCHOOL, BABY!!!
4- "Policy makers at the Fed don’t know in advance who will be the lucky few."
it's actually next to impossible to know if this statement is true or not because the Fed is Highly secretive and can put their newly created money anywhere they want to, and they can make secret deals with foreign governments/banks without informing the media or even congress.
5- "When I was chairman of President George W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers from 2003 to 2005, I spoke openly about the need to reform regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. I did not know when or how these government-sponsored enterprises would come crashing down, but I thought they posed undue risks for the economy and for taxpayers. "
Regulation wasn't the problem - those companies were "GSE"s, which means they were OWNED By the government (practically). If lack of regulation in a GOVERNMENT subsidized enterprise is insufficient, no amount of regulation would be sufficient.
6- "He shared precisely my concerns, as did Alan Greenspan, who was then the Fed chairman"
I just wanted to remind everyone that Alan Greenspan was once an ardent and unwavering Libertarian Economist. He supported the Gold standard (and even told ron paul that he still agrees with the gold standard), but, apparently, sold his soul for power. He was a strong and ardent follower of Ayn Rand.
7- "...while the sheer complexity of these institutions made it hard for legislators to appreciate the enormity of the risks. "
... so... why were legislators involved in the first place?
8- "We should certainly aim for better financial regulation, especially for institutions with government-insured deposits."
Mankiw - you've actually disagreed with this point already. (my) Number 7 shows that regulation is hopeless, and number 5 shows that even institutions practically owned by the Gov't couldn't be 'regulated' properly.
9- "Higher capital requirements would be a step in the right direction. "
This actually can be rewritten, without any loss in meaning, as "we need to be able to exclude new institutions from the market." which necessarily means that they are creating cartels. - expect more problems in this sector.
10- "Whatever we do, let’s not be overoptimistic about how successful improved oversight will be. The financial system is diverse and vastly complicated. Government regulators will always be outnumbered and underpaid compared with those whose interest it is to circumvent the regulations. Legislators will often be distracted by other priorities. To believe that the government will ever become a reliable watchdog would be a tragic mistake. "
again!! You argue that regulation is hopeless!!! Give us a straight answer, Mankiw!!!
11- "If federal authorities are responsible for troubled institutions, creditors may view those institutions as safer than they really are. "
AGAIN!!! you argue that regulation is hopeless!!!
12- This argument just makes NO sense whatsoever:
"Another idea is to require financial firms to write their own “living wills,” describing how they would wind down in the event of an adverse shock to their balance sheets."
Why should we expect an institution that is completely incapable of foreseeing a horrendous loss in revenue/business to be able to foresee how it should react to such a situation? If they can't see the hit coming, why should we expect them to know how to respond to it?!
13- Mankiw also argues that we need "to require banks, and perhaps a broad class of financial institutions, to sell contingent debt that can be converted to equity when a regulator deems that these institutions have insufficient capital. This debt would be a form of preplanned recapitalization in the event of a financial crisis, and the infusion of capital would be with private, rather than taxpayer, funds. Think of it as crisis insurance. "
which "...would also give bankers an incentive to limit risk by, say, reducing leverage."
If this were a good idea - to force banks to do something - wouldn't the banks ALREADY be doing it? Have we really given up on free-choice and the markets?
------------------
Anyway, that was just lowly-ol'-me, who knows NOTHING about economics WHATSOEVER... right, Deeds? I didn't even look anything up - that was straight off the noggin'.
But, i guess i'm just a hopeless illiterate who has no chance.
... Mankiw is just calling for more of the same crap that the people who didn't see the current crisis were calling for BEFORE the crisis.
If you follow the values of the stock markets in Gold, you'll see that the current mess actually has some connection to the Dot.com bust of the late 90s, early 00s. The economy is just simply trying to correct the malinvestments caused by inflation from the Fed - this can be seen with the deflation that has been occuring since the late 90s (when measured in true money).
Please read "Economics in One Lesson", and "Meltdown".You are what Eric Hoffer called a "true believer." This malady is shared by creationists, worshippers of Ayn Rand, people who believe the Bible is the literal revealed word of God and so forth.
.... ok...
once again...
Didn't argue against my arguments...
... you just insult me...
...
...
Alright, I guess I'll just have to retort to you in kind.
"You are a left liberal hippy loser who thinks that GDP actually means something!"
or...
"Deeds, you're blind to the fact that what you've learned could be wrong"
or... i suppose, since we're just degenerating down to the level of 'incoherent child', i might as well pull out the epic-never-fail argument:
"Jo mamma so fat, when she sits around the house, she sits AROUND the HOUSE!!! OOOOoooooohhhhh, BURNED!!!!"
...
Deeds, please argue against my points rather than call me a twit. If you disagree with someone, try to show them why they're wrong. That's what I've been doing all this time, but you fail to reciprocate. If you really want the argument to just turn into insults and the sort, I can exchange in kind - just let me know ahead of time so i don't waste my time arguing with you."Actually, the entire Austrian School of Economics not only saw it coming, but is/was able to describe why it happened, how it will happen again, how to fix it, and also the root causes. "
Like the above, your "points" were unsupported assertions. Did you have anybody in particular in mind when you said "the entire Austrian School of Economics?"
You disputed a number of points made by Mankiw but only by assertions on your part that he was not correct. Besides, I don't agree with Mankiw entirely either. I cited him because he is a respected rather conservative economist. Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Samuelson come closer to my views. All three are modern mainstream economists who won the Nobel prize in economics. As I said Mises views, were he alive today, would probably be somewhere in the ballpark with their views. Perhaps not. Who knows for sure. He was a libertarian. You are apparently a libertarian which is a fringe economic and political group. I am not although I agree with Ron Paul that fighting unnecessary wars as Vietnam, Iraq and probably Afghanistan is a big mistake. I also like some of his ideas about keeping the government out of people's personal lives as much as possible. But his ideas about economics are quite impractical and unrealistic. I don't see any point in continuing our argument.Sounds like you can't continue the argument because you can't refute his points.
"I am not although I agree with Ron Paul that fighting unnecessary wars as Vietnam, Iraq and probably Afghanistan is a big mistake. I also like some of his ideas about keeping the government out of people's personal lives as much as possible. But his ideas about economics are quite impractical and unrealistic. "
You can't "agree" with Ron Paul about anything and still 'believe' that his ideas about economics are impractical, etc... You've made yourself quite clearly one who believes in government intervention in every aspect of the personal American life.
I found your comments shocking in light of your dogged support of the current liberal agenda which does nothing but put the government ever more deeply involved in our personal lives. As a self made person who pulled my own family into a new income class, only to fall back again and continue to struggle, never have I expected any one person or entity to step in and prop me up, my life should be what I make it, mistakes and all. My Fullblood Choctaw Gr. Grandmother lived her life with the same attitude, and her life was hard but quite rich.
If you don't revel in the struggle, you don't appreciate or deserve the reward.
Again, you can't respond, because you can't argue the points. That is satisfying to see.holy crap, you addressed what i wrote!!!
I guess the "jo mamma" joke got you to respond!... i'll have to use this more often...
"Like the above, your "points" were unsupported assertions. "
So were mankiw's.
"Did you have anybody in particular in mind when you said "the entire Austrian School of Economics?"
hazlitt, hayek, rothbard, block, paul, they all saw it coming. The only problem is declaring exactly when it's going to hit. I'll fully admit that they were unable to predict the time and everything, but the Austrian theory clearly predicts that the low interest rates and government whack-job interference leads to catastrophes.
I will go out on a limb (it's a thick limb and is actually not very dangerous to be on... it's almost as safe as a sidewalk) and claim that the recent 0% interest rates that have been implemented for about a year+ are going to lead to another round of horrible problems. We will experience another crash within 10 years or so (once again, predicting the date is impossible because i'm not privy to all the information that the central banks make - they tend to keep all this information hidden)
"You disputed a number of points made by Mankiw but only by assertions on your part that he was not correct"
...you're doing the same thing to me... that was kind of the point of my responding to mankiw.
Your buddy Krugman seems to think that if the government takes money away from jimmy and spends it for bob, they create wealth out of nowhere. "the multiplier effect", i believe it's called. It's nonsense.
"All three are modern mainstream economists who won the Nobel prize in economics"
Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize even though his administration is presiding over 3 wars... the nobel prize kind of ... doesn't mean anything...
But if you want to further the argument with Nobel prizes, Hayek won one. Those awarding the prize refused to give one to Mises, so they waited till he was dead to award Hayek.
"As I said Mises views, were he alive today, would probably be somewhere in the ballpark with their views"
I highly doubt it. I don't want to hold Mises up to some sort of unwavering light, or to some angelic saint-like position, but your argument that "if mises were a completely different person, he would be different" really doesn't mean anything to anyone anywhere.
Mises MIGHT be a different person had he been born now, but he wasn't. he was born then. and his work "human action" was fantastic and even earned him a special little place in the heart of Hitler, who wanted to kill Mises.
What Mises ACTUALLY thought, in reality, and not in the bizzar-o world that you're creating, was light-years away from what krugman and the others today are writing. They are very very very different.
"I agree with Ron Paul that fighting unnecessary wars as Vietnam, Iraq and probably Afghanistan is a big mistake"
Hear hear!!! At least we have something in common!
"I don't see any point in continuing our argument."
To be honest, the argument just started - you haven't responded to anything I've written until i insulted Jo mamma. I'd love to debate economic logic with you - please try to convince me i'm wrong. Let's see if either one of us can 'convert' the other. Show me, and the others on this forum that we're wrong.
I CAN admit that I've made mistakes - I've apologized to all my friends and families I've debated with because I used to be a liberal-socialist-'government-needs-to-fund-everything'-nincumpoop.
oh, and you make fun of me, and how i just assume things are wrong.
Earlier I showed you and M.T. just how "under-regulated" the health care industry was...
... you didn't respond to it.
Regulation is not EVER the solution, it's almost always the problem.
Evan, you're going to have to get used to this sort of dodgy reasoning here on HP's forums. It's a typical example, along with "I've studied economics at university so my statements automatically carry more weight than yours, even though I can't actually back them up or anything."
::sigh::THANK you for noticing his argument against me. THANK You!!! I'm glad it's not just me who found it rude.
I'm not sure if it's deliberate rudeness - I think it's an automatic response to your challenge to his entrenched position. I mean, you're questioning the assumptions that he holds dear and which have been handed to him on a plate by the media and politicians (the media/politicians on his "side", that is).
If he actually tried to engage properly with your arguments and have a real debate, it might mean he'd have to use his brain and that would never do, would it?My "entrenched position" isn't my position. It's the position of 80 or 90 percent of economists in the world.
So because 80 or 90% of people have a certain opinion, that automatically makes it right? Have you ever heard the phrase "bandwagon fallacy"?
Yes I have, but it doesn't apply in this case. Conventional wisdom perhaps, but not bandwagon fallacy. You appear to be asserting that you and Evan and ledefensetech and other blind, cult-like followers of Ayn Rand, Mises or whomever know more than a bunch of Nobel prize economists and professors who have devoted their careers to looking at economic data, performance and issues such as the current crisis, its causes and cures.
I'm not a "blind follower of Mises", although I am interested in the theories and I'm coming to the realisation that in a lot of cases, government regulation doesn't solve problems, it either makes them worse or converts them into a different problem.
And it strikes me that a school of economic thought which successfully predicted the crap that's going down in our respective economies is at least worth listening to. You just seem to have a completely closed mind - you don't listen to anyone unless they've got the "correct" credentials. Which in the case of - say - the Nobel Prize-winning Al Gore, mean s*d all.
:sigh:
Alright, so your screen name (Liam Bean) indicates you might possibly be of Irish descent. Suppose that in your country, 80 or 90% of people voted to make all people of Irish descent wear green shamrock badges, and restricted the jobs they could have and the schools they could go to and the clubs they could join. Would it be right just because the majority had voted for it?
I am using an emotive example, but I'm doing so in the hope that you at least will get my point.I got your point. You don't understand mine.
I don't think the bill was a good idea at all. But, by the very same token, many of you haven't bothered to read it (you really should you know) or read a summery or analysis of it.
Bad for you. It will most certainly affect you and you should know how instead of wailing and moaning without really knowing what you are wailing and moaning about.It won't affect me directly, because I'm not American. By the time I got into this thread, the discussion had widened out beyond Obama's health bill and into general economics - that's what I was responding to.
Do you live in the U.S.? If not what is the health-care system like where you live.
I'm British and living in the UK.
We have a national health service - i.e. a "socialised" medical system which is free at the point of delivery and paid for out of taxes. There is also a private system running alongside the NHS for people who have private health insurance or who can pay upfront.
From what I've heard from Americans on this forum and elsewhere, we in Britain are better off than you are. Although there are major caveats WRT to the NHS: long waiting lists and a stupid "target culture" being two (the waiting lists are supposedly at their shortest ever but you can't help wondering if there's some figure-fiddling going on).
Another problem is the proliferation of hospital managers (the NHS has something like 40,000 of them!), and lack of cleanliness in hospitals. Many people think this is partly due to an attempt on the part of the government to cut costs, by making hospitals contract out their cleaning services to private firms who it's alleged aren't as conscientious. I know several people who contracted MRSA while in hospital, so it's no joke.
Another bugbear of the NHS system is the fact that your GP is your "gateway" to being seen by a consultant - you can't just go and see one off your own bat, unless you're prepared to go private. So that creates delays in itself.
There is also an organisation called NICE (the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) which recommends what medicines the NHS should fund. That in itself creates controversy, as you might imagine!First, hospitals should be avoided unless it's simply not possible to avoid one. Think about it! You've got a bunch of sick people crammed together spreading disease amongst themselves and staff.
There was a strong argument made some years ago that semi-private and barracks style bedding lead to more disease than most hospitals are capable of preventing. That in the long run, private rooms were actually cheaper because the spread of disease was easier to manage.
If true it's just another indication that an attempt to cut costs is actually more costly in the long run. Higher mortality rates, higher infection rates, and higher patient return rates are the result of crowding the sick together. This hasn't caused the creation of more private rooms; rather it has led to band-aid fixes and stop-gap measures that ultimately cost everyone and damage health-care.
Back on topic: I've read here and many other places that the average Brit sees something like 50% of their income taken in taxes. If true I'm quite certain health-care is a substantial portion of that 50%.
But what I'm reading in your post is that one of the problems with U.K. health-care, regarding cleanliness, is due to private contractors. Doesn't that fly directly in the face of what you and others are touting as what's good for health-care?
More preventative care is what's needed to prevent or forestall emergency room visit. Emergency room services are stretched to the point of breaking and that's because many Americans (a substantial portion of them middle-class) wait until they just can't put off medical visit until it's critical.
Emergency room services are NOT profitable. They are a drain on the health-care system and many hospitals (quite a few on the West Coast) have shut down their emergency rooms to cut costs. This is the land of the major earth-quake too. We are a disaster waiting to be exacerbated.
This in turn has put an enormous strain on the few that remain. And those that do remain are subsidized by other more profitable hospital operations. Which in turn, puts the hospital at risk of insolvency.
It's a system that will fail spectacularly and rather sooner than later.
Will the health-care reform bill reverse this trend? I honestly don't know. But I do know if we maintain the status quo we may as well not have health-care at all.You'll get no argument from me on any of these points!
Yes, we do pay a stonking amount in taxes, certainly if you factor in things like VAT and council (=local government) tax. According to this, healthcare is actually about 15% of our overall national spending:
http://www.debtbombshell.com/public-spending.htm
That's what some people say. I think it's a factor but in my (admittedly non-expert) opinion it's also things like resistance to antibiotics and - as you pointed out above - cramming people in together.
Actually, healthcare is one area where I don't know WHAT to think WRT to the private-versus-public debate. I do think that our NHS suffers from inefficiency and bureaucracy, but I wouldn't want a system like yours - where so much depends on insurance companies - either.
Another option would be to bypass insurance and just have private, pay-as-you go healthcare. Again, there would be problems inherent in that - the individual treatments/therapies would almost certainly be cheaper, but would the poorest people be able to afford them even so?
No system is going to be perfect, that's for sure.Cool! I like it when we can discuss rather than label.
I agree that no system will be perfect. We'll only know if it is perfect when it actually works.
I doubt this health-care reform will have the end result everyone thinks it will...either way.
I can't begin to predict the overall effect, but I can predict some changes.
Since the 15% profit cap only applies to new policies and then only to large group plans, insurance companies will work hard to retain existing clientele. Sales commissions on new policies will be impacted. We may even see the commission on retainer disappear.
Departing an existing carrier will only work (as the bill intended) if insurers lower their rates, thus attracting new policy holders. There may not be incentive enough to do that.
Will it spur new competition? I don't know. I can see a lot of reasons why it won't.
There may even be an overall trend to not write new policies. There's no provision in the law that says an insurer has to.
Am I safe in assuming the sigh implies that you are talking to someone who cannot comprehend your vastly supeior position?
Mighty full of yourself aren't you?
This is a perfectly horrible example. The bill does not restrict who you buy insurance from. It does not even force you to buy insurance if you are object on religious grounds or plead poverty. You can even pay a fine.
Dragging someone's ancestry into an argument is a weak move at best. In my case it's so far afield that it's laughable. I don't identify myself as Irish. I identify myself as American.
Now I suppose I'll be attacked for claiming my nationality.I'm not attacking anyone's nationality.
I deliberately used the example to show that believing something is right/correct just because the majority think it's right/correct is at best foolish, and at worst dangerous.
But your reply to my post has made me realise that you'll never get it, so I'm wasting my time here.
deeds, this will be the last time that I attempt to argue against you. I will only show WHY the contemporary economists are wrong in numerous aspects. I know DAMN well you won't bother reading what I write, NOR will you attempt to argue against me, but I'm still going to write this response to you in an attempt to perhaps change the minds of other people who read this.
1- Economics is not a science, there is no testing of any sort to prove accuracy.
2- GDP means nothing - if the government stole everyone's money, and then use the money to build tanks and submarines, and then blew them all up with dynamite, we'd have a large GDP but we'd be horrendously poor.
3- There is no inherent value to an item - the item gains its value when an actor (person, animal, plant) wants an item.
4- Gold and Silver are the only true money on this planet - Even Alan Greenspan agrees: it's the strongest and most powerful check against tyranny.
5- Government CAN'T provide what we need simply because it is incapable of using the price system.
6- a healthy economy is NOT based off of housing, gdp and other gobbledygook - it's based off of whether the people in the economy are able to get what they want when they want it and in the quantities they want.
7- inflation causes severe problems throughout the economy - if the amount of money increases then investors think there is more capital that there really is and invest their money improperly.
8- deflation is NOT a bad thing - we've had deflation in the computer industry for over 30 years and yet it's survived with ease.
----------
Anyway, I could go on.
I await your response, but I already know what it's going to be: "Evan you an idiot!"You lost me right there. When your first "point" is so obviously wrong there's little point in reading the rest of what is certain to be equally wrong.
Go back go school or study to enlighten yourself.
Gold's only true value is as a non-tarnishing, electrically conductive element. Everything else about gold is a creation in the minds of wo/men.Did you have a point to make? Hmmmm. Beyond not understanding Evan at all, you also denigrate my love of my old pair of gold loops that are back in style...........okay, if that's what you wanted to convey, I'm there, a little...........
..but on second thought, not really, sounds quite sexist, you should go back to school and enlighten yourself and your life and your relationships, and most assuredly your politics as a secondary matter.When bereft of facts...attack, attack, attack.
What sexism? Rather than write women or men I wrote wo/men. I do the same thing with s/he.
I guess "education" is a relative term. Or did you mean to say "edumakayshun?"Gee, you've learned well these past several years. Attack and mangle and twist up your labels to suit your purposes rather than the essence of what you say.
Well done!Gee, so personal, and just what happened to your 'dolt' comment, or was that a figment of my conservative imagination........
Must have been!
How interesting the effort to say absolutely nothing to myself or anyone else..........
Evan, if nobody wants to talk to us, we're going to have to talk to each other
Agreed.
Thank you for making the same point I myself have been trying to make (unsuccessfully) on these forums. But surprise, surprise - I just got given the same old "Well, respected economists use it so it must be right" bullsh*t.
It goes very much against my inner grain to say this, but you're right. I would love to believe that the hand-crafted fair trade sweater made from pure cashmere has more inherent value than an £8 acrylic one from Primark. But it doesn't if nobody wants it, and instead everyone trots down to Primark to buy the £8 one.
This is where I'm more sceptical. Personally I think it probably doesn't matter what you use for money - even paper would be OK if it wasn't inflated via a fractional reserve system.
I think I know what you mean, but can you elaborate?
Yes, absolutely.
Added to which, people can't afford to do what you said in point 6.
Interesting point.i can't seem to respond to anyone here, so i'll just respond to myself and hopefully people will notice what i write
Everyone who can't see why gold has value, please read
http://hubpages.com/hub/Evans-Easy-Econ … Good-Money
and
http://hubpages.com/hub/Evans-Easy-Econ … And-Silver
and then get back to me.
Liambean has yet to show me how any sort of controlled experiment in Macro Economics is possible. However, i did LOL when she wrote "edumakayshun"!! that was pretty funny. I'd like to point out that i'm not attacking anyone except those who attack me! don't hate, don't hate!
Antecessor.:
"You do realise that Soviet Russia worked quite well, if it was not for the problem that despots like Stalin went power mad and wrecked the system then in my opinion Soviet Russia would still be around."
I just want to point out that this is evidence that Economics is NOT a science. We've had numerous 'tests' throughout history between Capitalism and communism - east and west germany, north and south korea, russia before and after socialism...
... and yet no matter HOW MANY TIMES IT FAILS, Communism is still seen as a safe system of economics "if only we had the right kind of leaders!"
This is evidence (or maybe simply an illustration of) the praxaeological statement that Economics can not be tested, and thus it can not be a science.Once again, by that standard, much of medicine and all of psychiatry are not science. A very weak argument.
Actually I would say that we have never seen true communism in action. In no communist state have we ever seen true worker control of production and assets. In Soviet Russia the workers had no control, everything was centrally controlled by the Communist Party. This is not communism. North Korea is not Communism. Cuba is kind of communism but not really, and they are doing pretty well if you consider the crushing economic sanctions that have been on them for decades. China is not communist either, although the actual Revolution was communist in intent and effect, and had a good effect for many of the poor (the ones who didn't starve to death...).
The problem is centralized control of the economy, not the theoretical system of communism. Just because a country calls itself communist doesn't make it so. Else N. Korea would be a democratic republic.that's because it's impossible.
I've shown that "having each worker own the means of production of his factory" means that there has to be massive government intervention which ultimately leads to the end all TRUE definition of socialism/communism - government ownership of the means of production.
If everyone at a company owns everything in the company (the means of production), and such a situation is voluntary, then what does this mean?
It means that some one put up his own money to start a factory, then gave up that money to the people he hired. I.E., i start a business with $30, then hire 29 people; if everyone owns the means of production, that means i just willingly gave each person in the room $1k (myself included).
Who would ever do that? -- "i want to make money... i know! I'll give everyone else my money, and then let them tell me how to spend my money! BRILLIANT!!" .... this would obviously never happen.
BECAUSE it would never happen, and, apparently, Wilson thinks it should happen, we need to force people to either 1- spend their money on specific projects, or 2- gather everyone's money together and have them all determine how to spend it together.
if 1- we need police and guns and all that bad stuff to force people to pay their money.
if 2-... we need guns and police and all that bad stuff to force people to give up their property.
In both cases, who decides? Do we really expect to have the whole company / state come together to vote on how much steel to buy every week or day in their industry / every industry? NO. This just can't work.
What happens next? someone takes charge!
The End.Why argue Communism or Captialism? The one political system that has been implemented far more than any other system is fascism. It's time tested.
"You do realise that Soviet Russia worked quite well"
You're joking, right?If it didnt work then how come they were the first to launch a sattelite into space, the first to put a man into space, they had the first modern fighter jet, the first ICBM. If Soviet Russia didnt "work" then how were they capable of rivaling america for so long? Why was America THE ONLY nation on earth that did surpass the Russians, Russia was second best, I dont think second place is "not working".
Keep telling yourself that docsal, maybe you'll be able to believe that little conservative myth. Obama says America is a democracy, so thats what it is."If it didnt work then how come they were the first to launch a sattelite into space, the first to put a man into space, they had the first modern fighter jet, the first ICBM. If Soviet Russia didnt "work" then how were they capable of rivaling america for so long? "
Because they impoverished and terrorised their people in order to divert all resources towards those ends. It is the same thing that ultimately broke them. Is North Korea 'successful' because they acquired nuclear weapons when their people are starving to death and their capital is an empty 'show' piece?You have an extremely naive and simplistic view of things. The west broke the Russian economy by preventing them from trading properly and by making them spend beyond their means on the arms race. Very simple and not too hard to understand.
Sab Oh's view is naive and simplistic indeed.
How can North Korea be successful, they have only just invented technology the invented 70 years ago. Have they accomplished any firsts?
The russians are a completely different story. Just look at the strength of their economy, they were second only to america in production of everything from steel to grain, in fact in 1979 russian steel producation peaked above american steel production.
The russian populace were starving not because of a lack of food, but because of the dictator stalin who withheld the food from them."The russians are a completely different story. Just look at the strength of their economy"
The 'strength' of their economy was, like all centrally planned economies, artificial and doomed to collapse."The russian populace were starving not because of a lack of food, but because of the dictator stalin who withheld the food from them."
No, there was a lack of food because that is what happens when a central government tries to 'plan' and 'control' agriculture according to political ideology. Same thing happened in China under Mao - another murderous communist dictator who was responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of his people.Then why isnt china starving today?
Why the reports of grain being left to rot in soviet silos, hundreds of thousands of tons of it. Where in communist ideology does it mention purges? Soviet Russia lost, not because of communism, china proves communism works, but because of stalin AND VERY IMPORTANT, the efforts of the WEST to send it broke. What do you think would happen if all the nations of the world decided to stop trading with the US, the US would go down the toilet within a week. That just shows how strong the Soviet system is. It stood up to 50+ years of the entire world trying to destroy it. Without that, it may have been even stronger than the US. Planned economys are always more efficient than free market, because free markets dont always value goods correctly whereas planned ones do. Planned economys come at the expense of individual freedoms. Planned economys should be avoided not because they dont work, they actually work better, but because they compromise individuality.
You go on and on about how wrong it is for the government to control things, and that sounds liberal, and then you go on and on about all the things you believe are immoral and want the government to control. Which is it you want, should the governement be able to lock up gays because you hate them, but not able to give everyone health care because you dont like that? Your views are contradictory, and hypocritical, and fit only one model of governement, a theocracy.
Sorry to tell you this but America WILL NEVER BE A THEOCRACY."Then why isnt china starving today?"
Because they are no longer really communist. And the money they are making via capitalist practices enables them to buy and import food.Thats known as the "no true scotsman" fallacy. Self identification is all thats neccessary to establish such things. Example, muslims say that terrorist muslims are not true muslims, but they actually are. Any sect of christianity will claim they, and only they, are "true christians" all others are not "true christians".
The chinese government self identifies as communists, they enact communist policys, they do not have a democracy, theocracy, monarchy or any other form of government other than progressive communism, ergo, they are communists. End of story. No they are successful, highly successful communists. They have struck the right balance between personal freedom and a planned economy.
The future is likely a chinese world hegamony."The future is likely a chinese world hegamony."
Are you feeling alright this morning?"End of story. No they are successful, highly successful communists."
You are misinformed. Even Deng Xiaoping recognized that a communist economic system won't work long-term.There is no need to make personal attacks of this kind - you may not agree with his point of view but your normal flip pointless personal attack add nothing to the discussion.
"Why the reports of grain being left to rot in soviet silos, hundreds of thousands of tons of it. "
Woeful mismanagement, which always comes with a centrally planned economy.
"china proves communism works"
Exactly the opposite. I'm sorry that the reality does not support your ideology.
"What do you think would happen if all the nations of the world decided to stop trading with the US"
All of those nations would suffer devastating economic hardship.
"Planned economys are always more efficient than free market"
Exactly the opposite. I'm sorry that reality does not support your ideology."you go on and on about all the things you believe are immoral and want the government to control. Which is it you want, should the governement be able to lock up gays because you hate them, but not able to give everyone health care because you dont like that? Your views are contradictory, and hypocritical, and fit only one model of governement, a theocracy.
Sorry to tell you this but America WILL NEVER BE A THEOCRACY."
Ok, I have no idea what the hell you are talking about now. Maybe you have me confused with someone else?"then why isn't china starving today"
... didn't over 50 million people die in communist China?
... maybe that's why.And the Chinese are starving still. Just not the rich ones!
Take a look outside the cities at the small farmers in rural communities today.
They still cannot even feed their families and have to send their children away to the cities to work just so they can get a couple of bowls of rice a day instead of one.
That which is not seen appears to not exist in China.
I adopted a child from there 14 years ago. Ask him if he would like to go back there!
"The west broke the Russian economy by preventing them from trading properly and by making them spend beyond their means on the arms race. "
Not "the West" 'mate,' the US. And the fact that they were undone by being drawn ever deeper into an arms race they couldn't sustain fits exactly what I just told you.Is that what they are teaching in your backwoods along with creationism - the west, as in Europe plus the UK with the US were responsible for the economic collapse of Russia - and the arms race? you really know so little - I was part of that, I was in the forces at that time - and that was the UK forces playing threatening games all around the Russians and their allies, 'mate'. The US were too busy losing Vietnam to play on their own at that time.
You forgot to mention an interesting yet very relevant fact:
at LEAST 10 million people died as a direct result of the policies of the communist regime in the USSR, and some estimates put it about 55 million.
Just thought I'd remind everyone that that's about the same amount as the number who died in the Holocaust (if you use the bigger number it's 5 times as many)
Our other communist friends in China (Mao Zeodong) are DIRECTLY responsible for 50-70 million people!
And tens of thousands have been murdered because of communism in south america.
And this is NOT counting the millions who have died because of the indirect causes of communism. I.e. Because of all the technological advances that DIDN'T happen that would have happened without communism.
Everywhere that communism has been tried, it has failed. please realize that it is not because of the tyrant in power, it is because of the system.
- Ghost32posted 14 years ago
0Actually, I am kind of thankful for Obama. Our Congressional Representative from District 8 here in Arizona is Gabrielle Giffords, who is cute as the dickens and who needs to be defeated in November. If not for Obama pushing health care through, and Giffords being on TV all gooey and gushy, I might have missed the opportunity to make a commitment toward helping her retire...and even coming up with a slogan:
GIVE GIFFORDS THE GAFF!!!
So, yeah, thankya, Hussein. What is the difference between a Republic and a democracy - honest question
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic
A republic is where the people vote to elect a representative/s to make decisions on their behalf.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy
A true democracy is where the people directly vote on decisions.
America is actually a mix of both to be honest, Obama is our top representative, but he also gets us to vote on issues, like the upcoming healthcare reform.
What makes me laugh, is all these conservatives complaining that Obama SUPPOSEDLY wont let them have their vote on healthcare reform, then turn around and fight about calling america a republic, WHICH BY IT VERY DEFINITION DOES NOT ALLOW VOTING ON DESCISIONS by citezens. Just another bit of contradiction by the mental right. LOLOLOL
10.10am here in Ireland and this thread is hotter than our weather
Great discussion - lets keep it friendly and informative
Let's set aside the fact that we are going to be forced to pay for abortions. Personally, I do not want to pay for them. Abortion is an immoral unjustified form of birth control and murder. That is my opinion. As well as it is in direct conflict with my religious beliefs. So how is forcing me to pay for it with my tax dollars taxation with representation?
I know that there are millions of Americans that agree with me on this and millions who do not. So again, how is this representative?
It's not.
But aside from that issue bottom line is, my family cannot afford this bill!
And I believe that there are countless numbers of people comprised of all the political parties who cannot either. So how does congress even begin to justify their actions in forcing us ALL to pay for this bill?
Do they represent the 72+ percent of Americans who do not want this bill?? I think not.
I live in a county in Michigan which is the worst in the entire state economically. WE NEED JOBS not a costly, massive health care bill!The bill will provide important benefits for unemployed workers and others who can't afford health care under the current broken system. I live in Michigan also. Once people find out what's really in the bill and what's not in the bill (death panels, taxpayers' money for abortions) they will support it.
Victory for all
No, the health insurance reform isn't perfect. But it is better than what we've had.
By Jack Lessenberry
SEE ALSO
Politics and Prejudices ARCHIVES
More Politics Stories
Hey, Soul Sista (2/24/2010)
A lyrical look at what Sam Riddle might sing
Single-Payer-Minded (2/24/2010)
Health-care practitioners explain why they're willing to go to jail in the name of health-care reform
Too little, too late? (2/17/2010)
Granholm's leadership should have come sooner and stronger
More from Jack Lessenberry
Independents day? (3/17/2010)
Don't think the governor should be your best buddy? Here's your man.
Trolling for a governor (3/10/2010)
A shortlist of gubernatorial contenders
ACLU: Saving our asses (3/3/2010)
Sometimes they're all that stands between us and the jackboots
Tonight ... we rose above the weight of our politics. We pushed back on the undue influence of special interests. We didn't give in to mistrust or cynicism or to fear. Instead, we proved we were still a people capable of doing big things and tackling our biggest challenges.
—President Barack Obama, March 21, 2010
Finally, amazingly, thanks to courage and legislative skill, health care reform is going to happen. The president and most of his party held firm, despite having their jobs threatened by relentless, sneering, ruthless and furious foes, for whom no lies were too great.
No, it isn't perfect. But it is so much better than what we've had, and as time goes on further reform will broaden and deepen and improve and extend these reforms.
"This is not the end," Churchill said after the Allies won their first victories against the Nazis. "This is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."
Think of it. Most Americans still don't understand what this bill does. Thirty-two million people who have no health insurance will be able to get it. Sadly, some will have to wait four years or even longer. Starting this year, however, insurance companies will no longer be able to cancel policies because people get sick, or charge women more than men. More poor people will be able to get Medicaid.
Though all the features in this health care reform bill won't be fully phased in for a decade, some people will find relief pretty much immediately. Within three months of the law going into effect, those who haven't been able to buy any insurance at all because of a "pre-existing condition" will be able to get subsidized coverage.
Buy it, that is, through a private, for-profit company that will now be required to sell it to them. That was denounced as a "government takeover of health care" by House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio, a sleek, tanned pseudo-fascist, who naturally, as a congressman, gets excellent government health care.
It was a bad night for Boehner; he knew he had failed his real constituents — the insurance lobby and other special interest groups.
"If you don't stop this [so-called health care reform] and I don't do it, one of these days you and I are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it once was like in America when men were free." But oops; that wasn't Boehner; that was Ronald Reagan in the 1960s, talking about Medicare, which George H.W. Bush called "socialized medicine," in 1964.
Interesting that neither of them breathed a word about repealing it when they got to the Oval Office. Bush minor did start muttering about making Social Security "voluntary." That made sense to him. After all, Republicans had denounced Social Security as a plan right from the Kremlin when it was passed in 1935. Yet when Bush started talking about getting rid of it, Republicans, who then had a majority in Congress, sent him a message even he could understand: Shut up.
Every year since I started to teach at Wayne State University, I have run into desperate students who have no health coverage at all, because they are legal adults and had been knocked off their parents' policies. Some tried to medicate themselves when sick, or just showed up at the ER. Some later took crappy jobs they didn't really want, jobs outside what they'd studied, just for health care.
But within six months of this bill becoming law, they will be once again eligible for health care under their parents' plans.
For many members, voting for this bill took courage. The torrent of lies about it was formidable, and the Republicans did an admirable job of brainwashing the country, from the men in the boardrooms who should know better, to the trailer park trash who regard Sarah Palin's reckless contempt for knowledge as profound.
Some courageous Democrats may well be defeated in November, partly as a result of their vote on this bill. That's also a risk that goes with leadership. Some senators who dared to oppose the outrageous impeachment of President Andrew Johnson lost their seats afterward. Those who do the right thing are always threatened. But nobody who isn't willing to do that should be in Congress.
But while passing health care reform was a victory for the people, and for common sense, we should be vaguely uneasy that the Republicans are behaving more like a gang of street thugs than statesmen. It wasn't that they just opposed the bill in lockstep, after their leaders made clear that not to do so would be political suicide. The problem was that their arguments against the bill were largely a tissue of lies.
At the end, after the bill passed, U.S. Rep. Dave Camp of Midland, one of Congress' richest members, tried a parliamentary trick to get it sent back to committee, claiming it wasn't anti-abortion enough. His fellow Michigander, the hard-core "pro-life" Democrat Bart Stupak, got up to say that indeed it was. At that, some Republican congressman shouted, "Baby killer!"
Classy, eh. This health care reform package relies entirely on the private sector to take care of the nation's health care needs.
If that's socialism, let's make the most of it.
Here's something to think hard about: Though we've all been endlessly worrying about President Obama's health care bill, the local business community and media have been starry-eyed true believers over the deal to sell the Detroit Medical Center to a private, for-profit Nashville company called Vanguard Health Systems. Hearts were fluttering when they promised to keep everything open for at least a decade, assume old debt, and plow in $850 million to upgrade facilities.
But has anyone asked why they would do this — or even if they can? One story, buried deep inside the Saturday Free Press, noted that Vanguard is "a relatively small hospital operator burdened by high debt." The story quoted a senior financial expert in New York as saying Vanguard "lives on the edge ... nothing better go wrong."
Whew. Now that's reassuring.
Just wondering aloud: Everybody was sniggering a week ago, after the governor awarded a $9.1 million state tax break to one Richard Short, who claimed to be on the verge of starting a new company in Flint that would hire hundreds of workers and make environmentally friendly stuff for poverty-stricken Africa.
Unfortunately, nobody in the Michigan Economic Development Corp. checked Short's credentials. Turns out Short is not only a convicted felon and embezzler, but he owed $96,000 in restitution payments for his past crimes, and had failed to make payments.
When this was learned the next day, they immediately threw Short back in the can, where he will likely be for some period of time like, say, infinity. All well and good, except, ...
Isn't not making your restitution payments what got the Kingfish, er, Kwame Kilpatrick, in trouble? He owes quite a bit more than the Flint flim-flam man. So why isn't the mayor in jail too?
I can't wait to see who comes up with the most creative answer.
Jack Lessenberry opines weekly for Metro Times. Contact him at letters@metrotimes.com.
No federal monies pay for abortion, since the Hyde Amendment...way way back. Although they should. It is a legal medical procedure, which half the population is being denied because religious people don't like it.
Constitution...HELLO? Separtion of Church and State, HELLO?
In fact, the Blue-Dogs wanted to go as far as to say even if a woman paid with HER OWN money, she should not be entitled to an abortion on any insurance plan. Talk about restricting freedoms.
Leagl, Constitutionally allowed, but denied on religious grounds. Don't talk to us about freedom--you don't practice what you preach.
And you're right... it is not representative. Women are being sold out. Sold down the river so you can be pacified and this much needed bill can pass.
Don't ever say we didn't do anything for you lol!
Not to be rude, but keep your church where it belongs.....in the church.
I have a high regard and respect for religions, but not in determining public policy. Even though I know it happens all the time.
You know what else??
Henry Hyde's wife had brain surgery. On the public dime. Must have cost a fortune. She wasn't paying into the system....
Why does no one ever protest vociferously when things like this happen?
Why is she so entitled to tax money, but others are not?
Question, Grasshopper.What is the answer?" It is a legal medical procedure, which half the population is being denied because religious people don't like it."
One need not be particularly religious to oppose the deliberate killing of the unborn. There are lots of "religious people" who support abortion and non-religious people who oppose it. Don't feel like you have to bring your anti-religion bigotry into every single discussion.
I just got an email from White House - will pop back and get it for yee
The only people that could be happy about this are lazy poor people, oh and immigrants.
What Happens Next
Good afternoon,
Since the House of Representatives voted to pass health reform legislation on Sunday night, the legislative process and its political impact have been the focus of all the newspapers and cable TV pundits.
Outside of DC, however, many Americans are trying to cut through the chatter and get to the substance of reform with a simple question: "What does health insurance reform actually mean for me?" To help, we've put together some of the key benefits from health insurance reform.
Let's start with how health insurance reform will expand and strengthen coverage:
This year, children with pre-existing conditions can no longer be denied health insurance coverage. Once the new health insurance exchanges begin in the coming years, pre-existing condition discrimination will become a thing of the past for everyone.
This year, health care plans will allow young people to remain on their parents' insurance policy up until their 26th birthday.
This year, insurance companies will be banned from dropping people from coverage when they get sick, and they will be banned from implementing lifetime caps on coverage. This year, restrictive annual limits on coverage will be banned for certain plans. Under health insurance reform, Americans will be ensured access to the care they need.
This year, adults who are uninsured because of pre-existing conditions will have access to affordable insurance through a temporary subsidized high-risk pool.
In the next fiscal year, the bill increases funding for community health centers, so they can treat nearly double the number of patients over the next five years.
This year, we'll also establish an independent commission to advise on how best to build the health care workforce and increase the number of nurses, doctors and other professionals to meet our country's needs. Going forward, we will provide $1.5 billion in funding to support the next generation of doctors, nurses and other primary care practitioners -- on top of a $500 million investment from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Health insurance reform will also curb some of the worst insurance industry practices and strengthen consumer protections:
This year, this bill creates a new, independent appeals process that ensures consumers in new private plans have access to an effective process to appeal decisions made by their insurer.
This year, discrimination based on salary will be outlawed. New group health plans will be prohibited from establishing any eligibility rules for health care coverage that discriminate in favor of higher-wage employees.
Beginning this fiscal year, this bill provides funding to states to help establish offices of health insurance consumer assistance in order to help individuals in the process of filing complaints or appeals against insurance companies.
Starting January 1, 2011, insurers in the individual and small group market will be required to spend 80 percent of their premium dollars on medical services. Insurers in the large group market will be required to spend 85 percent of their premium dollars on medical services. Any insurers who don't meet those thresholds will be required to provide rebates to their policyholders.
Starting in 2011, this bill helps states require insurance companies to submit justification for requested premium increases. Any company with excessive or unjustified premium increases may not be able to participate in the new health insurance exchanges.
Reform immediately begins to lower health care costs for American families and small businesses:
This year, small businesses that choose to offer coverage will begin to receive tax credits of up to 35 percent of premiums to help make employee coverage more affordable.
This year, new private plans will be required to provide free preventive care: no co-payments and no deductibles for preventive services. And beginning January 1, 2011, Medicare will do the same.
This year, this bill will provide help for early retirees by creating a temporary re-insurance program to help offset the costs of expensive premiums for employers and retirees age 55-64.
This year, this bill starts to close the Medicare Part D 'donut hole' by providing a $250 rebate to Medicare beneficiaries who hit the gap in prescription drug coverage. And beginning in 2011, the bill institutes a 50% discount on prescription drugs in the 'donut hole.'
Thank you,
Nancy-Ann DeParle
Director, White House Office of Health ReformGood morning Irish - though it is evening here and I am just off to play pool and grab a few beers
8.50am here in Ireland on this fine Friday morning - hope you are all well what ever your view on Obama
you can always refine/revise/update/review and change the system as you go... we are working on ours all the time.. one bill is not a life sentence..
so debate is good... threats bad, dont panic...you are bright americans, you can work this out.I believe this United Health care will create a United World situation.
Obama getting alot of good press in Europe for his Health care reforms
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