But the opposing viewpoint on this would be...where do you draw the line on predisposition? I think that leads to a very slippery slope.

So, if somebody has a predisposition to diabetes and continues to maintain an unhealthy lifestyle for somebody with their predisposition, why should you and I pay for it? No? How will we monitor such people? If the government is doing it, how many more "lifetime employees" will we need to hire in order to track such things in the name of reducing waste or cost (i.e. read the irony)?

What about mental predispositions to all kinds of unhealthy activities? What if I can find a doctor who says that my diffcult childhood has "predisposed" me to an addictive personality which is a direct causation for my smoking cigarettes? So do me and all the crackheads get to do what we want because we have an "out"?

I realize the mental predisposition argument is highly improbable today...and I really don't mean to poke at people with real medical issue that lead them to health issues...but we continue (as a country) to find reasons why everybody "can't help it" that they have issues(not just healthcare). We have to help those that cannot help themselves...but IMHO we cannot help ALL who have some issues helping themselves.

But we cannot do either one of those if there is no reasonable way to afford it. Can we afford Universal Healthcare? Sure we can...we just need to cut the living shit out of that federal budget and we'll be all set.

I have already started seeing commercials fighting the proposed 3c per coke tax to help pay for health care. It's kindof an interesting premise and it has some interesting sides lining up on each side. On one hand, you basically have people having to pay additional for their "bad habits" but on the other, is it some sort of intrusive government "interference"?

SI

Don't worry. Obama already has the Death Doctors lined up.

Thanks for the link.

No real surprises or eye-openers that I could see.


Anybody know what this means? In my (admitted) distrust of government...this sounds like a way of trying to make hospitals accountable but just ends up requiring patients to stay longer. Thus (a)increasing costs or (b) requiring longer waits due to too many people being left in the hospital because they'll get paid more if they just keep people than if they release and readmit.

I think we need more information about these death panels!

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Healther Skelter - Obama Death Panel Debate
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance

SI

Not to worry... Obama says that private insurance plans aren't going to be phased out.


Uhh... you might want to massage that message a little more, Mr. President.

That's funny.

Maybe "government healthcare" will just become the really, really, really expensive version of public defenders - where you go when you have absolutely no other option.

Which on its own isn't an offensive idea, if it was cost-appropriate for that purpose.

so the opponents will start to say:

"Yeah y'know he's right. The insurance companies will prosper under such a plan and the Gov't option will be shit so we shouldnt support this change."

instead they will use the above in conjunction with also, depending on the audience, going with the:

"The insurance companies wont be able to compete with the Gov't plan. The Gov't option will always squeeze out private companies."

So you get to have both the cake and the fork too!

Given the dearth of public defenders (and prosecutors) in this country, I'd actually much prefer to see a few billion dollars used to hire more so we could cut down on the number of plea bargains. If we want to talk about broken systems, I think the criminal justice system is far more broken than health care.

Hey, not my fault the President used a really bad example to promote his ideal system. Take it up with the man in the Oval Office.

Isn't that exactly what's Obama's doing with that quote? He tells us that the government is the answer to our problems, but don't worry about private companies, because they're better run than government agencies. Huh?

well which one is it, though?

Will the new govt plan be like the USPS and thus private insurers will do great

OR

Will it squeeze out the insurers since they wont be able to compete?

--

Mol his quote is the former so insurance companies should love the new plan right (If change is needed which a large, VAST, majority of the country agrees is needed)? However I hear the opposite, they wont be able to compete with the gorilla in the room.

Maybe Obama is wrong with his example but I'd like to know which side of the coin the opposition wants to place their bets on.

Then again, the vast majority of the country is too fucking stupid to come in out of the rain, so I'm not sure that's exactly a standard to base massive government intrusion on.

:) At least I use 'Vast' when empirically it should be used instead of some who use it at 50%+1 :)

aaah but isn't that all dependent on which side of the fence you're on?

i'd argue that the vast majority of the country finally woke up from their collective stupidity and came in out of the rain. :D

I wasn't saying a thing about any election past, present, or future.

I've just been to Kroger, my opinion of humanity is not even at it's usual lofty levels right now.

you know you and me share that in common.

honestly, with the exception of my close family and my single-handful (less than 5) friends, I pretty much could do without the rest of humanity.

It's your party that is made up of people who think the Earth is 6,000 years old. Dems have some loons too, but that's still pretty bad when most of the party base thinks the Flinstones was a documentary.

No offense Flasch, but I wouldn't start bragging about your mastery of the English language quite yet.

The vast number of regular citizens use the USPS and it gets their mail delivered and pretty efficiently for the most part. Businesses with different requirements/needs etc. use FedEx UPS (e.g. I don't think they can even deliver regular mail for 44 cents each).

His example does not make the proposed public option invalid/worthless, he just did not present the context well.

Specific to the 40M+ that don't have insurance for various reasons (most of it probably economic), how do any of the 3 options help them?

But in John's party, you won't find too many self-proclaimed smart people saying it's murder to eat eggs but it's fine to destroy a human embryo three months before it's born.

Seriously, at least half of your arguments end up with (or start out at) "Well your side has the crazy religious folks!" Sure, you throw in the caveat of "Dems have some loons too" to give you cover, but you don't give a rats ass about that.

The Democratic party is the party of identity politics. How many different "Hyphenated-Americans for Obama" bumper stickers did the campaign print up? One of the benefits of that is that the nutballs tend to be dispersed among the various interest groups. Still, if you add up all the different nutballs in the Democratic party, I'm fairly certain it'd be roughly equal to the number of Republican wingnuts.

To put it another way, if the nation had elected John McCain and Sarah Palin, conservatives would be writing in this thread about the "birthers" like Andrew Sullivan, who just wouldn't let go of his theory that Trig Palin wasn't really the Vice-President's son. The same hard-core nutballs on the left that were talking about this pre-election would still be going at it just as hard. And people like JPhillips or Flasch would be making very calm and rational arguments about why things like this need to be fully investigated, because this woman may running for president four years from now. The sides would be flipped, but we'd still be arguing about the dumbest shit possible.

RM, you seem to have a very big problem with people who have fundamentalist religious beliefs. In fact, if you were this freaked out about gay people, I'd call you a homophobe. If you were this obsessed with making cracks about black people, I'd call you a racist. You seem to be less of an atheist than you are simply anti-Christian. There are millions of Americans who believe that the rock in their garden cannot be more than 6,000 years old. There are also millions of Americans who believe that the rock in their garden has mystical healing powers. Maybe that doesn't offend your sensibilities the way fundamentalist Christianity does, but for cryin' out loud not everything has to be spun back towards a "fundies are bad" message.

Whew. Sorry about the rant. :)

If this happened it would require an ADA-like effort. If people were going to be penalized for their choices it would have to be made certain that they had equal opportunity to other/healthier choices. Such as having large chain grocery stores within reach of every person, and being the same relative price.

IMO, I think its messed up enough where there should be significant change.

The US Postal Service is running well in the red right now and has recently discussed switching to a 5-day a week delivery system. They also are looking at shutting down 700 post offices around the country. They are hardly an example of a well-run government enterprise... in large part because of the retiree health pension plans they're forced to pay into. In other words, the government agency is losing money every year because of the unsustainable cost of its health care plan.

It's kinda funny... when I first saw the Obama quote I just thought it was amusing. After doing a little bit of research, it's actually a much bigger gaffe.

Jon said that there are a lot of stupid people out there and the direction of those comments have been toward the left side of the aisle. I'm simply pointing out that his side of the fence has an awful lot of people that believe the Earth is 6,000 years old.

I don't have a problem with religious people. Pray to whatever you want in the sky and do whatever ceremonies you want. I have a problem when their beliefs get thrust into policy. I don't want people who believe cancer can be cured by praying real hard deciding our health care situation. Just as I wouldn't want a high school dropout running our Treasury Department.

Did you happen to catch the part that followed about Kroger? DT did and he seemed to get the anti-political nature of the remark. But that wouldn't serve your purpose to acknowledge.


Nah, you're just showing yourself for the bigoted SOB you are. But hey, you wouldn't be a challenge to my own faith (or more accurately such a challenge for me to live up to my faith) if you were anything else. If it's true that everybody has a purpose, perhaps I've found yours.

I don't know that I've seen a single sign promoting prayer over healthcare, but perhaps you could point me to one. I do know that by your standard, any person who is a pacifist for religious reasons should be ignored when they're talking about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan though. After all, they're thrusting their religious beliefs into policy, right?

I'm curious if it freaks you out that we have a president that prayed, in a private written prayer that was stolen and leaked, for god to protect his family, and to make him an instrument of god's will. Should that kind of person be running the country? He's trying to carry out god's will! I'm just trying to see if it's an anti-religion thing or just a pro-Obama thing we're dealing with.

Of course, nobody's even talking about religion and its role in healthcare, and I don't think anyone is opposing this particular plan on religious grounds, so I don't even know what that was all about. Is there a particular opponent of this plan that you think is trying to force fundamental religion into the equation, or is simple the label of Christian enough? And wouldn't that include Obama?

It's just more generalizations. I don't think think the world is 6,000 years old and I'm concerned about the current healthcare plan.

BTW, this was totally going to be in Bush's health-care overhaul as the "faith-based option". As I understand it, you'd even get a tax credit for prayer beads as medical expenses.

As I said, my comment wasn't initially about health care. Jon has made numerous cracks about how everyone on the left and anyone who voted for Obama is an idiot. I simply was pointing out that the base of his party believes the Earth is 6,000 years old. Take from that what you want.

Religion has played a large role in the debate. Two of the largest Christian organizations have vehemently opposed Obama's plan and spread disinformation about euthanasia and more (Family Research and CCA). The Liberty Counsel (part of Falwell's group) was the group that sent out that viral e-mail about how old people and the disabled will be killed, forced abortions for families, and more. These groups have been all over the TV networks this past week.

I'm sure there are a lot of people that are against the costs of the health care bill (like myself), but the stories about death panels and other moral issues have been put out by religious organizations.

Heck, MBBF's talking point of the day is religiously motivated.

Angry Man Tells Specter: God Will Judge You - Political Hotsheet - CBS News

That is funny.

No, but he did stop funding on embryonic stem cell research. An important area of science that could save many lives. He helped push to make it tougher to acquire Plan B. He also was a proponent of intelligent design which is dangerous for the long term development of our scientific and medical research.

He did set back aspects of medicine and science for his faith.

Since you must have missed the serious comment and read the joke instead, I'll repeat myself:


And don't get me started on those 19th century wackos who believed in abolition on religious grounds.

I agree with your statements about pacifism. Policy should be made in respects to the best interest of the people. Not to justify one's own moral beliefs.

none taken, im a master of nothing.

:D

SI

In the case of abolition (and civil rights in the 1950's), the argument over who comprised "the people" was largely the basis of two competing schools of moral/religious beliefs. What then?

Is Obama way off here?

hxxp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG56B2et4M8&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fhotair.com%2Farchives%2F2009%2F08%2F11%2Fmore-obama-my-plan-might-stop-doctors-from-cutting-off-your-foot%2F&feature=player_embedded

Also, did the government just take over the student loan industry?

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com...ent-loans.aspx

It's a confusing industry. Can someone explain it a little more?

Word, the government needs to take over the student loan business. My Stafford loans rocked. I tried to go the private route initially, but there's a ton of really shady, loosely regulated loans and companies out there. Some of these kids get little help from their parents or an adult and get taken to town. The way college costs are ballooning, I'd much rather have a government student loan bank than a bunch of private companies giving out T-shirts and coffee mugs for signing up.

So I make a comment that people should listen to some of these meetings in their entirety to see that there are a lot of people who have good questions that merit discussion and I cite Arlen Specter's comments at the end of his meeting that he was impressed with the well-informed questions during the meeting. As a result of these two comments, I'm endorsing the thoughts of a nut job who snuck in a rant? If anything, my comment to listen to the entirety of the meeting and take in ALL the opinions went right over your head.

I was wondering about the AARP support claim yesterday from Obama. They may yet endorse a final bill at some point, but right now, they're not going to give any nod until the Medicare borrowing is removed and a final version of the bill is selected.

Obama Claim of AARP Endorsement 'Inaccurate'

MBBF, good for you to be on it yesterday....you scooped the news agencies AND all the blog sites out there. Its amazing that the blogs, pundits, news, and talking points for the GOP come from you and not vice versa. That being said, I cant find where the AARP supports any bill in congress at this time so you may be right about Obama and that portion of the speech/townhall.

No. I didn't say you endorsed anyone. Some asked where religion was in any of the debates and I was posting evidence that it's at the forefront of the debate. Wasn't saying anything about you, just the story.

I got really hammered by a company when I was young. They made it seem like they were part of the government. Had official seals and a name that was government sounding (Something like United States Loan Association, I can't remember it off the top of my head). I was 19 at the time so I wasn't at that stage in life where I realized everyone was trying to fuck you over. Got my loans that semester through them and found out later it had all these loopholes and fine print that I don't even think a lawyer could figure out.

Sounds like a good change. Saves taxpayers cash and stops giving banks (more) free money.


I love the bank speak of 'You know how we were overcharging almost $10B per year in debt to young borrowers? You aren't going to turn that 100% back into grants and instead paying off other parts of the budget so you're just screwing people!'

No, if you hadn't been badly screwing people or even screwing them less in the first place, you'd still be in control.



The only services I got were lots of junk mail and no notice when my loans were about to reset up 2% from about 5% to 7%. I only found that out from all the junk mail from refinancers (one of whom I took up on their offer so I locked in at 5.25% for the life of my loan, which I just paid off last month. Huzzah!) and a story on NPR.


SI

Which is totally incorrect. A nut job ranting at Specter's odds of going to hell doesn't mean that religion is at the forefront of the health care debate. It just means that a nut job told Specter to go to hell.

i must confess that i didn't see any of obama's townhall...i didn't dvr it and last night i had a sick puppy (ate something bad) and didn't think to look for it. and i didn't even get to see a recap on any of the shows, so i don't really know how it went.

*shrugs*

Well, there's two more scheduled for today. Fire up that DVR! I can't think we'll hear much that was different from yesterday other than clarifying the AARP comment.

I noticed no answer as to whether the Insurance companies could compete against the gov't plan (a la UPS/FedEx) or not as claimed in other arguments. I want to know where the bets are.

Everyone does that, you can't seperate them that easily. Isn't the idea that everyone should have free health care a moral belief? Or the idea that murder should be illegal, or that gays should be allowed to marry? Or that we should tax the rich to subsidize people that are deemed "disabled"? Or that we should end the war in Iraq? The fact that one person utilizes the structure of religion to express and find their moral beliefs, and another gets them from the Daily Show or their parents doesn't immediately invalidate the former.

Cute, but disproven in the very same post you quoted, where I said I respected the differing viewpoints from mine on this issue that were based in real fiscal concerns about the plans being discussed.


Not all of BCBS is non-profit.


Surely Palestine/Israel is more difficult....


Very broadly speaking I believe the crux of that argument is:

economies of scale + greater preventative treatment vs reactive (and expensive) critical treatment = savings when compared to projected escalation in costs of the current system

Any one of those points can be argued, but in general I think that's the basic formulation.


Quality contribution. :thumbsup:

A real world example would be if a generic version of Lipitor was sold for a fraction of the price, and worked exactly the same, why wouldn't you buy it?


This, actually, is exactly the kind of privatization of government services I can completely support. A core business of banks is executing financial transactions, like loans, and it stands to reason they can do this more efficiently than the government. The problem, in my opinion, is likely to be poor, sporadic and/or misguided oversight by the relevant government agencies.

In fact, in my experience the problem with most privatization enterprises is rooted in government oversight (or the lack of competency thereof). Most government oversight is process-based (as long as you're filling out form X and then filing form Y, we're OK with anything else you do) as opposed to results-based (your contract is contingent on fulfilling the following metrics for efficiency, cost, and quality as well as not doing anything illegal or unethical).

Does anybody know how I could get on one of those Death Panels? I donated money to Obama so I think that would qualify me, wouldn't it?

Of course, because you are a moderate between liberals and conservatives. We get what you are selling, but who's buying that crap?

This.

When religion is discovered as a foundation for a morale belief, that belief is inherently flawed. When someone's personal experiences/family beliefs (often just as tainted) are used as a foundation, the belief is completely fair. I don't think I will ever understand this line of thinking.

Either it's OK for personal morality to be a part of a governing person's decision making or it isn't. It doesn't matter if that morality comes from a belief in Jesus Christ or the Spaghetti Monster. The focus should be on the decisions made as a president/governing leader, not on how much his morale values/religion played a part in those decisions.

Have I ever claimed to be a moderate, overall?

Eh, good point.

Everybody and their mothers know that flere is a pinko commie bastard. ;)

And Flasch is Captain Hyperbole®! :D

Interesting article.

Analysis: Press Largely Ignored Incendiary Rhetoric at Bush Protest
Analysis: Press Largely Ignored Incendiary Rhetoric at Bush Protest - Political News - FOXNews.com

People will disregard that because its FoxNews but that certainly wasn't a one-time event. The Bush hatred was wildly over the top and calls for assasination and chants of terrorist were pretty common. If that happened to Obama to that degree, the spin would be that the protests were racist. Hell, when someone calls him "socalist" it's considered over-the-line.

Wait, now the right is bring up Bush? Can you only compare Bush to Obama when it makes the point you want?

I don't know, all this muddling from both sides seems to be a clever plot to just annoy us into submission where we finally just throw our hands up in the air and tell the politians to just get it over with already no matter how crappy of a deal it is.

If the people who don't have health care want free health care, give it to them. Just don't screw with what I have.

And that's my opinion on this day, August 12, 2009. Good day.

It'd be pretty weird to randomly bring up Bush if it wasn't to make a point. That'd be like bringing up Christian fundamentalists every time someone disagreed with them.

I know, it's a bit snarky but I love Nate Silver's Canada vs England socialist health care comparison (and who doesn't love making fun of our two closest "neighbors")

FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right: Not All Socialist Countries are Alike

SI

Damnit, with the Restricted symbol on it Ill have to cancel my Cafe Press T-shirt order! :p

Head over to the major Christian groups websites and tell me what you see. Tell me where that huge viral e-mail that started the nonsense about death camps, forced abortions and euthanasia came from.

So you're pointing to a group of nut jobs similar to this man as proof that religion is at the forefront of this debate? If your dumb enough to buy into their perceived self-importance that doesn't even register with most Americans, then we have little to discuss. They can send all the e-mails they want. They aren't the reason for most of this dissent. They're just responsible for the goofballs that honestly hurt the good arguments against this bill being made by the rest of us with some form of common sense. They provide fodder for people like you who actually believe that anyone of note takes them seriously and distract from the real argument.

As for the student loan business, I say, cut out federal aid from the whole situation and be done with it. Student loans are a boondoggle, college costs have risen out of control due to the fact that schools know the money is subsidized from the government.

It's the biggest scam ever and a degree is hardly worth what it used to. It'll never happen, but getting government out of higher education finance would do more to help kids than making Uncle Sam a direct lender.

(Though it is indeed better than the status quo, it's a half measure)

Only make federal aid in the form of grants, if anything, cap the amount and schools will start merging and lowering tuitions and using their endowments for things like actually benefiting students, rather than building palatial campuses aimed at attracted faux blue bloods who want nothing to do with their third tier selves.

It's not like I was making that up. This is from The One himself.


Here's another. From the New York Times coverage of the health-care townhall in N.H. yesterday.


Perhaps you should be sending your suggestions of better examples to the White House. They could use it more than I could.

I saw porn, but I think I may have typed in the wrong address.

It's such a double-edged sword but I almost agree with this. Endowments now are basically to make campuses look pretty and cater to rich alumni rather than actually pouring the money back into education. But, we all know that a college degree has basically become the equivalent of a high school diploma 30 years ago and, heck, even more valuable as we have gotten more and more service-oriented.

SI

Endowments do a lot more than make campuses look pretty and cater to rich alumni, at least at the two schools I am most familiar with. *shurg*

Wrong heavenly bodies, Cam ;)

SI

Well right, they use their endowments to fund the school's expenses from year to year (at private institutions anyway, depending on the school it's about 3-5% of the endowment. at smaller, tuition dependent schools it's a lot more than that..) but a lot of the money isn't devoted to helping students afford to go there and so forth. And it probably shouldn't be. But a lot of the direct giving these days is aimed at facilities and the "arms race" that's gotten completely out of hand and doesn't as much as it should trickle down to students.

Let's put it this way. If higher ed were another industry, people would be outraged at the way things have escalated. If private, independent schools (K-12) can survive without the largess of a federal system aimed at propping them up and have endowments that in most cases dwarf colleges and universities, then I think the government can better allocate resources at helping students get educated and contribute in fields where we need them, rather than trying to prop up largely private institutions who are just focused largely on keep up with the Joneses.

And this is after spend close to a decade in higher ed.

Actually, I think my laptop is possessed by Jimmy Swaggart.

Or Jim Bakker :)

SI

Get with the times! It's Reverend Haggard!

So how do you explain non-religious people that have concerns with Obama's plan? Are we just some kind of anomoly? What does it say, at all, about my opinion, what someone on a Christian group website says? Does it say anything about your opinion that many people though Bush planned 9/11, was going to invade Syria, Iran, and North Korea, declare martial law and then stay in power after 2008?

I don't know what you're trying to argue here. I said religious groups have had a big impact on the debate. I never said they were the only voice and I never said there weren't people who aren't Christian but still had doubts.

What are you trying to argue about my statement that religious groups have been pushing heavily against health care reform?

Umm, just out of curiosity ... am I overestimating the collective endowment funds at the average university, are you overestimating the collective endowment at the average K-12 private, or are you thinking more about the elite (and predominantly northeastern) private schools/prep schools?

I'll go ahead & give you my portion of that so you can compare.

As far as I'm aware, the school my son is at now would be the envy of 90%+ of the private K-12's in Georgia because they're finally (after 20+ years) getting within sight of their $5m sustaining endowment goal; i.e. neither the principal nor the interest in that fund has ever been touched for any reason, and only after they hit $5m will they begin to use the interest to help fund other items like projects targeted by the capital fund, which rolls largely from year to year or at least project to project.

Given the size of any number of endowments and/or sustained giving to most state universities, I'd have to think the average is larger than $5m and would really think the median is too.

Well maybe I'm just recalling your previously common refrain, "these are the same people that...", where you take the opposition, highlight an unflattering characteristic that a few of them have in order to invalidate those with that opinion on the whole, whether they share the characteristic or not. Then, such a member of the opposition (usually me) will say, "that's such a tiny number of people, and anyway, liberals have their kooks too", and then you and others will respond with examples of said characteristic in the "mainstream" (usually a reference to a blog), then there's a debate about whether there's more crazy people on the left or right. That's happened at least 3-4 times in this thread. Maybe I jumped the gun a little here, but I think, am using a less tiring approach - Christian fundamentalism has nothing to do with my concerns about Obama's plan, nor anyone's that's posting here. Surely it has something to do with someone's view in America, both for and against. But when you bring it up, it just sounds like an attempt to group people and invalidate them. What else is the intention?

Some data:

At Elite Prep Schools, College-Size Endowments - New York Times

Boarding Schools with the Largest Endowments - All Schools

List of Colleges and Universities in the United States by endowment

Edit: I haven't analyzed this too much, but in the list of boarding schools you hit $5 million or less in endowments after about 150 schools whereas you don't hit the same level for colleges until after 777. Unfortunately I don't have a list for non-boarding private K-12s, so I don't know how that would skew the number.

Thanks, that makes more sense to me if we're talking in terms of the elite schools (and apparently even more specifically the elite boarding schools based on things in the article you linked). It was just so contrary to my experience with the majority of private schools in Georgia that I was having problems getting my head around it being anything like the norm/average nationwide.

It wasn't gay porn.

All groups are heavily involved because it impacts everyone. Pointing to a group of Christians with poor arguments is as useless as me pointing to a group of natural healing medicine atheists.

There's too much focus on the source in these debates and not enough on the arguments. I am more interested in an atheist with an interesting opinion on the health care bill/agenda than I am in a very religious person spouting off gibberish (and vice versa). All focusing on the sources does is allow people to toss out certain interesting viewpoints because some people like them are kooks. It's the lazy way of dealing with an issue.

Here's the main issue I have with this health coverage/insurance debate: I have yet to see any data/information/studies on how the suggested changes in the bill will keep the current level of care for 80+% of the people in the US (with current health coverage) at or above in quality compared to what they have now as we move ahead. If a strong case cannot be made that those with coverage will not see a decrease in care quality (wait time, doctor quality/workload, ...) then the argument is moot. Reducing the quality of care for 80-85% of people with coverage to marginally improve it for 10-15% without is a tough sell for me. Yet, this idea that we will cover an additional 15% of the American people without seeing additional waits, reduced care quality or increased cost seems nonsensical logically.

Public education and medicare are the only remotely close comparisons to a public health care system. Public education has increased by 300% per pupil the last 20 years (when adjusted for inflation) and we perform even worse than we did in the early 1980s when compared to other countries. Medicare has already passed the 45% trigger (warning for general spending required) and is costing much more than anticipated in the 2003 reform bill. If these two systems are a harbinger of what is to come for a public health system, we are in big trouble.

The religious knock had nothing to do with health care. Jon made multiple statements about all the idiots on the left and everyone who voted for Obama being a moron. I simply pointed out that the party he is behind is made up of a majority of people who believe the Earth is 6,000 years old.

You are really stretching to turn the statement into something it's not.

Your questions about the health care plan is in regards to quality yet when you bring up medicare you only mention its cost. You're skipping over the fact that from a consumer standpoint medicare could very well be the best healthcare plan in the country. 60% of people with medicare rate their coverage 9 or higher out of 10 (public healthcare average is around 35-40%) and 84% rate it as a 7 or higher.

Spending is a concern with both Medicare and this healthcare plan, but if your concern is quality of care you can do a hell of a lot worse than medicare.

Do you really believe the majority of Republicans believe that? Or, is it that they get the most attention in the media? Hey...look at these crazies.

The problem is we don't have a "general fund" to bail out a public health care system (potentially for 300 million people down the road) once it greatly exceeds it's funding caps. If we had an unlimited supply of money, I would expect that a national program would be comparable to medicare. But, given none of us want 70% tax rates to pay for it, cost becomes an issue in that it will tax an extremely high cost to keep the quality of care similar to what it is right now for the 80-85% with health coverage.

There are two arguments I see for national health care. One is that it will allow price controls and get overall cost of health care down. The next is that everyone will be covered. For the first to occur, some kind of rationing needs to occur and it will certainly cost more to the average employed health care recipient (I pay $150 pretax a month total in premiums for PPO coverage). For the second point to occur, you will see a large increase in stress on our infrastructure (wait times, access to services) and an increased cost (to cover the 40 million uninsured).

The end result is no plan from Washington will get me the high quality of care I have for myself and my son right now at a price anywhere near $150 a month (plus copays). But what's worse is that there's a real strong chance that I will see longer doctor wait times and risk my company (not a huge company) potentially dropping health benefits because of the government option. So, there's a good chance that if this bill gets enacted, I will face the following scenario a few years down the road:

A. Pay more
B. Wait more
C. Have less access to specialists/coverage than I do now

Seems to me like this is something worth fighting against.

Great post!

you posed questions, analyzed, and not once lost focus on the bigger garbage that is bastardizing the issue at hand.

The problem with endownments is that the money is usually restritced (in general). A school could have a $1-billion endownment, but they can't spend it freely. The gifts usually come with restrictions, such as it may only be used towards one department, may be used to support a specific type of scholarship fund, used towards a certain project/building, ect.

They also could have spending requirements.

I'm a disabled Vet lucky enough to live on a military installation right now so I really haven't read too much about the health care plan as its unlikely to ever apply to me. However, I have concerns over how it will paid for along with questions on how it would effect those that don't opt for the public option. Essentially the same questions and concerns you have. I've just been annoyed that instead of attacking the plan with facts the vocal minority is simply making shit up and using scare tactics to generate public fear. You have valid concerns, but I honestly don't think they're being heard.

As you mentioned, about 80-85% of the people in our country have health care. Ideally, that number would 100% but I don't feel we have the health care infrastructure to serve that many people in any efficient way. There would have to be major changes in the way we do things that go beyond what this plan seems to offer (more doctors, more clinics, less bullshit tests/exams to drive patients bills up, ect).

If this plan passes, and the numbers I've seen show that it will come down to those on the fence, those that are against it have the vocal minority to thank for it, IMO. Its really hard to take a cause seriously when your talking about death panels and euthanasia for the elderly because they're no longer productive members of society. As unfair as it is, those that have rational, well-reasoned issues with the proposed plan are getting lumped together with these idiots and it brings those that are for it together along with many on the fence who don't want to be identified with the vocal minority.

Sorry for getting slightly off topic, but watching videos from these town halls is sickening.

When you are dealing with a passionate issue, you will often have a vocal minority that is easy to setup as a scarecrow. The Bush administration and others did it on the war in Iraq and Obama and the democrats are doing it here. It's not all that difficult to find people like that and set them up sacrificial lambs/scarecrows to deflect from the issue at hand. Politicians have been doing it for years on every major issue.

The main change in this instance is the shock and surprise by many reporting the story. They act as if this is the first time in recorded history that organized protests have occurred against a divisive public policy initiative.

And how do you prove that the Earth is older then 6,000 years old?

By using tools of the devil. Like science.

Great points you brought up, Arlie. Here's my take on a couple of your concerns.

I agree that the current medical infrastructure will not be ready on Day 1 for 40+ million new patients. I also don't think that there are 40+ million people putting off doctors visits, waiting for universal coverage to become a reality before seeing a doctor. Urban centers are probably the most ready for the new patient loads. The problem is going to be more pronounced in rural areas. Since the medical industry isn't going to be nationalized (a common misconception about the current reform proposals), doctors will go to where they can make money. I think it would take two, three years at the most for the infrastructure to grow to the size needed. The infrastructure isn't going to grow until the funding is there.

As for the costs, I can easily see a scenario that will cause costs to go down with universal coverage. Right now, a hospital has to treat someone who comes into the emergency room, regardless of their ability to pay. People that need urgent care aren't going to simply decide to wait it out. The costs are passed on to those who can pay, in the form of higher charges across the board at the hospital. ER visits are among the costliest visits. Patients declaring medical bankruptcies are a significant hit to revenues of medical professionals and instiutions. This is one example I could think of off the top of my head.

As for the concerns about your company dropping health care for the government option, your employment and health coverage aren't guaranteed right now. A company can go out of business or restructure, and your current coverage can either change or get canceled. At least with an universal option you aren't exposed while looking for a new job or an alternative insurance offering.

Science, huh? So you just buy into whatever science says is true?

On this topic, certainly. More so than some book written a few thousands years ago. Again, talking about this topic. Not dismissing what that book has to say in its entirety but on this topic I certainly do find the scientific evidence a hell of a lot more compelling.

So just to get this out of the way... Are you one of those people???

Ever thought about how you are communicating at this very second?

I dont believe the Earth is 6000 years old. But I do believe God created it.

So how did humans come about?