And that's why I'm looking into a second career, keeping medicine on the side as a part-time endeavor (or even a hobby, lol).

My numbers are correct. I said it was based on percent of their total expenses. You are talking about percent of their salary (which is a ridiculous thing to compare it to). What is your father and wife's rates compared to their total expenses? We are talking about two completely different statistics.

The point was that tort reform is not going to fix the problem with health care costs (might help but not going to fix). That the bigger costs in health care come from staffing and equipment.

In any event, here are my sources. The uber-liberal AMA and the pinko commie MedPac commission.

AMA survey from earlier in the decade.

http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi...urcetype=HWCIT

Here are the minutes from a MedPac metting where they actually quote a lower number in 2002.

http://www.medpac.gov/transcripts/12...ranscripts.pdf

Which is why your numbers lack any connection to the current day economics. More and more doctors are working as contractors rather than running offices on their own for that very reason. The reimbursement and malpractice insurance issues have become a problem to the point that it's not very profitable at all to run a business, while it's still very profitable to contract as an independent contractor to multiple entities. Those studies you cite from early in the decade were from a different time. Things have changed drastically in the medical field since 2003-2004 from a business perspective.

But come on fellas, we all know the 5 people MBBF surveyed for his 7% number represent the entire medical field. To think otherwise is just plain silly.

And no, things haven't changed that drastically in the medical field in the last 3-4 years that would change the numbers that much. But then again, we all know your definition of "drastic" and "large" changes.

If you'd like to add to the discussion, feel free. If you'd like to be a jerk just for sport, move along.

High oil price fears are popping up again. This is definitely a situation that the Obama administration doesn't want to deal with in addition to all the other issues with the economy........

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2...arket-reserves

Alternatively, if oil prices continue to rise and gas prices hit a high again it may just give more impetus to Obama's proposals vis-a-vis higher CAFE standards and exploring alternative energy.

I'm surprised how quickly the exploration alternative died out after the last spike. They need to continue to pursue it. Better to do it now when it's not a full-blown energy crisis. Exploration of oil reserves is just as important as exploring alternatives.

CAFE standards likely won't fare as well, due to the heavy price increases that they could create. That doesn't go over well in a down economy. Obama won't get anywhere near what he wants on that issue, if he even gets anything at all.

You are aware that they just pushed through higher CAFE standards (35 mpg by 2012, I believe) just last week (or so), right?

I'm confusing this with the 'Cap and Trade' initiatives. Thanks for straigtening me out. I'm supportive of increased MPG standards.

Not quite. I'm for legalizing pot because, frankly, I think it's stupid to put people in jail for it. As an aside, I changed my tune a few years ago when smokers started getting more and more ostracized- I'm allergic to smoke so anything that made it harder to smoke in public was good on me as "non-smoking" sections didn't work (still don't understand banning it from bars, tho- if you can't smoke in bars, where can you smoke??) and it was still commonplace and accepted to smoke anywhere and everywhere.

But taxing it is a drop in the bucket and raises some money but, no, nothing remotely close to a free health care system- less than 10%

File:U.S. Federal Spending - FY 2007.png - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Medicare and Medicaid: $682B - and just think- that enrolls about 100M of the 300M people in this country

Government Gets Hooked on Tobacco Tax Billions - NYTimes.com
State tobacco taxes: $19B
Federal tobacco taxes: $7B

So, even assuming a rate as high as cigarettes which is unreasonable, you're talking about $26B out of... $700B? Not even going to cover the basic bills.

SI

A lot of credit goes to Shep Smith, provided this was genuine and it appeared to be. As miked said, tho- a lot of that talk he is talking about is coming from the network he's on. However, he can only be responsible for his little corner of it.

SI

AMA has come out against the Democratic health care plan. Given the large amount of donations that they've given the Democrats over the past election cycle, this is definitely a big roadblock that will need to be navigated very carefully.

A.M.A. Opposes Government-Sponsored Health Plan - NYTimes.com

We need every billion dollar drop in the bucket we can get at this point, with or without extensive healthcare reform. Legalization ftw.

I have no doubt that medical malpractice costs have gone up since 2000 or 2002. But so have all the other costs associated with running a practice. Medical equipment and wages have skyrocketed (due to nurse shortages and such). So with those costs up, I don't think that the cost of malpractice is taking up a much larger percentage of total expenses. What percent is malpractice of your wife and dad's malpractice? I'd imagine it's closer in line to what I was saying.

The whole point was that some tort reform isn't going to fix the problem. Yes it may help a little, but the keyword is little. Until you can help doctors cut down on their other expenses that take up a much larger percent of their budget, you won't be seeing much change in the cost of healthcare. From what I've read online, the states that did implement tort reform are not seeing drops in insurance premiums for doctors. Perhaps a look at the insurance companies might be interesting.

And the other thing that bothers me is this idea that doctors are struggling right now. The low end of the average doctor salary is still over $150,000 a year. You have specialty doctors and surgeons making much more than that. Now I'm all for doctors getting their due for working hard in school and taking up such a demanding profession. But lets not pretend that these guys are sitting on street corners begging for handouts.

There's a huge difference between hospitals and private practice, which you don't differentiate in your post. Doctors in hospitals have the advantage of a salary that they know will be paid on-time regardless of the status of receivables that insurance companies may or may not be paying on time.

My father is a sole proprietor on a private general practice. When those same insurance companies refuse to pay bills or put off payments for months, it kills the practice financially. He's had to take out two huge short-term loans in the past to cover immediate expenses when receivables weren't paid. He was within a week of going bankrupt in one instance, despite having huge revenue in the form of accounts receivable sitting on his books. That's not going to get any better under public health care.

There's issues with the current system as I've said before. But changing the system just for the sake of change isn't the right move.

From everything I'm finding online, salaries in private practices for family doctors and internists are still quite high.

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/...Doctors/Salary

Physician Salary Survey - In Practice 3 Years

I have yet to find a site that doesn't list the average salary at 6 figures. And I'm sure private practice does have people making less than salaried employees at a hospital, but it also has doctors who make way more than those salaried doctors. My own personal doctor ran a practice for many years and eventually sold it to a major medical group. I know he drove a Mercedes and lived in a very wealthy part of the state.

Unemployment amongst doctors is much lower than the national average (and in the health sector in general). I don't know what case you are trying to make here. If certain doctors don't make as much as others, than I agree with you. But the average salary is what it is and that means that most doctors out there are doing quite well for themselves.

And none of this is a knock on doctors. They deserve to be paid well for going to medical school and spending their young adult life studying the crap out of medicine. It's a demanding occupation and they hold a lot of responsibility. I'm just trying to counter this claim that the average doctor out there is struggling to get by.

Zakaria: A Capitalist Manifesto | Newsweek Business | Newsweek.com

This is an excellent article by, in my opinion, one of the best journalists going right now.

I like Fareed Zakaria. He has a program on Sunday afternoons on CNN. I can recommend it. The only weakness is that he does tend to get bullied by the more strident interviewees in his attempt to be even-handed.

His take on the recession etc has been far more level-headed than most commentators.

You know the credibility of the media had plummeted when this guy starts being lauded as 'one of the best journalists going right now'. It's a sad statement on the industry.

*instantly regrets saying this*

What's wrong with Zakaria? I've thought him to be a fantastic voice, especially on international matters.

Have they changed the always in motion background? I couldn't watch him because that motion was so damn distracting.

:banghead:

its an opinion of one person and YOU credit it to the entire media...off of one person's opinion...wow. vast.

Fair enough, it's a statement on the ability of those posters to judge the abilities of Zakaria. He's a reporter who has used quotes without citing the source from a different article and he's made statements on Israel and Iran in recent days that have no basis in reality.

At one point, he was someone who reported with little political bias. Now, he reports from a left perspective, and it's often an opinion that is based on incorrect assumptions.

I wonder if his claimed 'move' to the left is in equal proportion to your assessment of his incorrect assumptions?

You see any issues at all with the following article?

Zakaria: What You Know About Iran is Wrong | Newsweek International | Newsweek.com

Do you mind pointing me to exactly what you're talking about, instead of vaguely pointing in some direction?

Well it starts with this so from that perspective he's probably right for most readers, no?


It's also an editorial {shrug}....and I assume by your judgment you know more about Iran than he does? Im not saying he's right or wrong in his opinion piece but he certainly knows more than I do.

So you see no issues with it. Fair enough.

How the hell is anything of this a "left" perspective? Are we really at a point where anything short of let's bomb Iran is leftist?

I wasn't referring to this specific article as THE example of him moving to the left. It's been a steady trend in his articles over the past couple of years.

And you second comment is just idiocy. It's a strawman argument with no basis. We aren't bombing Iran barring a launch of a nuclear warhead. But there are U.S. allies (Israel for starters) who could easily launch a pre-emptive strike, possibly even without U.S. approval.

Again, where is the "left" perspective? Even if the article you posted isn't the only evidence of Zakaria's leftward bias, it should be easy to point out the specific examples of his left perspective.

nope but you do and use it as a basis that he now is Leftist AND incorrect in his assumptions within his opinion piece.

Totally against Obama's effort to socialize healthcare. The money just isn't there. He talks about keeping the insurance companies honest, but when one looks at Medicare, Medicaid and the VA systems, one doesn't see a shining example that inspires confidence in the government's ability to "do it better."

He talks about wanting there to be a public single-payer system to compete with private insurers, but in the end, it will just drive private insurers out of business. Will companies continue to provide private health care plans for its employees if it is also paying taxes for the public option? Considering personnel salaries and benefits are the single highest expenses in operating a business, I think not.

He said that if we have a private plan we like, we can keep it. What he doesn't mention is that we'll still be paying for the public option whether we use it or not.

I also don't like the idea of health benefits and such being taxed as income that I've seen being floated around.

Right now I'm working four months out of the year just to pay all the taxes I owe. With all the new spending and taxes...That might now be expanded to five months. When it gets to six, I'm just gonna drop out and live on the public dime or move some place where a government can't rob me to enrich itself.

I find Zakaria to be left leaning but I also find him to be more balanced than just about anyone.

As for him slowly changing over the years, perhaps, just perhaps the Republican party is to blame? I'm a Republican but we do a terrible job of having people with CHARISMA demonstrate our values and that's the problem of the party. Regan was the last Republican with said charisma and guess what...Zakaria supported him and his ideas fully.

Just because someone is left leaning doesn't mean the reporter is bad. Zakaria is an EXCELLENT journalist...one of the few I actually make a point of reading.

Honestly, if you're not interested in taking a critical look and realizing that his coverage and commentary is very favorable toward the left, we have little to discuss. It's one thing to accept it. It's another thing to totally ignore it. You seriously believe him to be a non-partisan reporter? You've got to be playing stupid here. I refuse to believe you're this dumb. You'll get more credit from me than that.

Of course, it's always the Republican establishment's problem when all else fails. :)

I appreciate that you're at least open to the fact that he does lean to the left in his opinions. As you point out, that doesn't inherently make him a bad journalist. Using quotes without citation does. Also, the following quote from the article I cited above totally ignores what we know about this Iranian regime.......


He then builds on that assumption that Iran is not a threat. I'm sorry, but I cannot take a regime that violates human rights, rigs elections, and threatens its neighbors at their word. That just doesn't work.

Indeed...look at the presidency of GW Bush.

Just wanted to beat all the Dems around here to the punch.

You'll get no disagreement from me. The trust of Putin by Dubya is equally as baffling, which makes it worse that 'one of the best journalists' would make the same stupid mistake. It's ignorance defined.

So there's no need for evidence of his left leanings. He just is left and any need to provide a context is just further proof.

Zakaria is a natural moderate Republican; Reagan supporter, strong free trader, general supportive of an expansive foreign policy, etc. Booting him out of the party for heretical stances is exactly the problem with the current GOP.

I'd say more than left or right his foreign policy is marked by pragmatism.

It won't be a problem anymore when the party splits into two new parties.

I know this is nothing new, but listen, you're the one who posts an article and says "find the leftist examples here and if you can find nothing of fault, you're an idiot". Which that's funny in and of itself but even funnier when that's your response to "show me examples of why he's a lefty". Congrats, you basically said "find them yourself because I'm too lazy/can't be bothered/I'm sure they're there". Same old MBBF.

SI

Fixed. He's not anywhere close to that now. I'd also like to defend his right to change stances, but he's certainly left-leaning at this point. When you start referring to policies as a 'symphony', you've lost all critical credibility as a writer.

somebody on here cited Cato Institute as if they we're neutral party to a discussion. who was that?

I believe that Flere is your Huckleberry. You agreed with the point being made, which is surprising given that you hatred for them.

The Obama Presidency - hopes and predictions - Page 43 - Front Office Football Central

Metaphor usage is enough to lose credibility?

oh so this isnt you? ((POL) Stimulus'ed out yet? You ain't seen nothin yet... - Page 4 - Front Office Football Central) and please show me where I agreed with what was said by you or Cato or anyone else after that post is made. Again, youre full of shit and/or talking out of your ass!


culminating in you being shown, again, how you do the same F-in thing in that you cite (ive learned) a slanted, in your favor of course, document as being a 'large number' of blah blah blah (vast, polls, majority <---all shit you use wrongly and are almost always end up wrong in your extrapolations and prognostications but never admitted so when the data is borne out)... Its unreal that you do exactly what you accuse others of but fail to see it. I wonder if you just dont spout off for entertainment purposes and really dont believe half the shit you say.

Amazing that the things that 'lean' your way arent 'wrong' in their assumptions. {Faux Shock}

Remember, we're not allowed to go back and find evidence of MBBF's hypocrisy or else Cam will show up to criticize you and tell us all we're having a stupid argument.

Isn't this standard operating procedure on the right these days? If any reporter or news agency creates some work that is critical of a Republican policy, they are members of the liberal media or left leaning. As an observer of political theater, it's a brilliant strategy that ensures you always come out on the right side of the argument with your supporters. Not unlike MBBF's claim that if the economy gets worse it's Obama's fault, but if it gets better it's despite him. A win in any scenario setup.

The problem is that the argument doesn't work much anymore. Maybe in a more equal political environment, but a lot of moderates and moderate Republicans switched sides because they thought the Republican Party had turned to idiocy. So when you claim everyone who has a negative opinion of your policy as a liberal, you are insulting many of your old supporters.