An alternative to Obamacare, starting with advice from Whole Foods

From Websters: "number or percentage equaling more than half of a total"

46%+23% = 69% - a majority who think health care reform is either very or somewhat important.

Perhaps you hit the multiplication key instead of the addition key. A simple enough mistake to make. In fact, that must be what Rush and his ilk are doing! .46 * .23 = only 10% of the US population supports health care reform!!

 

Really? I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone that lives in a country that is not free agree with you on that one.

It's a privilege. What you do with that privilege is your "choice".

Like I said, what you "choose" to do with at that privilege is entirely up to you.

No, its a privilege. The "burden" is something our servicemen and women carry for us.

Absolute freedom carries with it, absolute irresponsibility. Why would anyone seek to be anything but? With total freedom, no laws? All you would have is utter chaos.

No, its called a respect. Respect for what you take for granted. Respect for what countless people have fought and died to protect for you. What's delusional is that you think freedom can just be ordered up at any time by anyone anywhere. I'm gonna assume you are pretty young yet. You'll figure it out eventually.

WTF are you talking about? BTW, that's a rhetorical question.

Perhaps the problem is you are getting "free will" and "free dom" confused here? Are you looking more at the theological or religious act of freedom, or the Constitutionally protected act?

If its the religious take, and you are talking about free will, I guess I can hear some of your points. I'm not sure that's what you are getting at though. People do not choose to be free. They are born with it, or fight for it. PERIOD... That's just history.

You are all over the place kiddo.

 

From the same poll I referenced earlier:

"Sixty-three percent said they would support providing health-care coverage for all Americans, even if the government had to subsidize those who could not afford it. Fifty-six percent said they supported a "public health insurance option" to compete with private plans."

It is often better to do a modicum of research before making bold statements lest one find their foot in their mouth.

 

"The essential consequence of our earlier remarks is that man being condemned to be free carries the weight of the whole world on his shoulders; he is responsible for the world and for himself as a way of being." - Jean Paul Sartre

"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." - Victor Frankl

"We could not prove freedom to be something actual in ourselves and in human nature. We saw merely that we must presuppose it if we want to think of a being as rational." - Immanual Kant

How about three? I could provide more...

 

Or one could simply google out more un referenced quotes to polls.

Of course you are still missing the point. Its not a question of whether someone would "support health-care coverage", its more a question of who will do it and how, and what plan will be used. When we're not looking at skewed poll data which was articulated to garner a desired result, the reality is, more American's have health care coverage than do not. I find it really hard to believe that when there are only some 5 million uninsured people out of 300 million people that more than 50% of the population would want to pay for them, and themselves.

This whole health care thing is a moot point anyway. Its not going anywhere, its not going to pass. All its doing is creating more waste. More wasted time, more wasted money, and more stupidity in Washington.

I'm gonna guess you are too young to understand that this "health care" reform has nothing to do with "reforming" health care and everything to do with controlling that which you think you "choose". You're freedom kid.

 

Here's a more recent one for you from Aug 10th:

32% Favor Single-Payer Health Care, 57% Oppose

Fifty-two percent (52%) believe such a system would lead to a lower quality of care while 13% believe care would improve. Twenty-seven percent (27%) think that the quality of care would remain about the same.

Forty-five percent (45%) also say a single-payer system would lead to higher health care costs while 24% think lower costs would result. Nineteen percent (19%) think prices would remain about the same.

There's wide political disagreement over the single-payer issue. Sixty-two percent (62%) of Democrats favor a single-payer system, but 87% of Republicans are opposed to one. As for those not affiliated with either major party, 22% favor a single-payer approach while 63% are opposed.

 

Perhaps you are getting freedom confused with legislated rights?

The freedom you speak to is the patriotic tripe taught in elementary school. It appeals to those of weak moral character since it absolves them of responsibility for their choices.

Earlier I asked how much imposition on your freedom you would tolerate. You never really answered that question, except to say, "Law and Order."

Do you recognize these words - "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed."

Rights (what you refer to as freedom) are seldom taken en masse. It is a slow corrosion that works best.

 

You already are paying for them and yourself. How can you think otherwise?

Where do you think reimbursment of the unpaid costs associated with the uninsured come from?

 

Yes, it is always risky using poll data to support an argument, but it does move it a bit further from personal opinion.

I will admit that I am one that supports a single payer system.

That said, what does the more recent poll have to say on the overall issue of the need of reforming the health care system. (I read the linked article, and that question was not included in the reported results - although it did say that only 48% see the US health care system as "good or excellent".)

 

Poster I made tonight for tomorrows demo

Dems WON
GOP Lost
Health Care
NOW​

 

its beautiful
somebody should tell them i hear you but respectfully disagree. i am the decider.
there is no point of debating with the pugs. they just repeat what they hear on the radio.

 

Back to the off topic auto insurance again???

Dems WON
America Lost
Health Care
GONE​

 

Again you avoid answering a question?

When a person without health insurance finally goes to an emergency room they incur expenses well above what they would hve if they had access to an office visit. Further, they often are unable to pay those expenses.

Shucks, when a person with health insurance hits the coverage limit and are forced into bankruptcy (not all that uncommon) the medical providers have non-recoverable expenses.

Do you think that these are not passed on to those that have coverage?

You cite malpractice as one example of expenses that driving up costs. Are you not ignoring another whole set of expenses? You are opposed to deficit spending, yet here is an example of exactly that (though not governmental).

When it comes to medical care you are already paying for "them" and yourself - and at an inflated rate. How can you see it otherwise?

 

Did not realize you were asking one.

No, they pay their fucking bill. I've been with and without insurance. When without I had a rather costly operation. I paid every penny of the bill. People that do not pay their bill end up sued and in collections.

Again, you are thinking of auto, not health.

People with health insurance rarely if ever hit their limit. When they do, they are obligated to pay. Don't pay? End up in court or in collections.

There are a lot of things that are passed onto people that have coverage. The, however, its not like you think. Health coverage consists of pools, not statistics or recovery costs. You are thinking about auto again. Two entirely different animals.

The costs that are passed on are passed on by the provider of care, not the insurance carriers. That's the difference.

No, I cite a lack of tort reform as a key component of the problem. Not malpractice insurance. I think you are confused.

Because right now its not mandated by the government. In other words, I am not forced to pay anything for anyone else. Under a government plan, I am.

At best I pay for 5% of the loss, spoilage, whatever you want to call it. This is not much different than the loss one pays at a Wal-Mart do to "theft", which IS included in the overall cost.

What I have a problem with is the government asking me to pay 100% of the cost of someone else, and myself.

The fact that you cannot see the difference makes me wonder if you are not reading too much union propaganda, or live in Canada.

 

I'm not gonna sound like one of the conservatives in this group when I say that our our healthcare system as-is is pretty much a clusterfuck in dire need of some kind of reform. That said, much of the problem with the current system IMO derives from two primary issues:

1. Widespread defrauding of existing government and insurance programs by the medical community
2. An abysmal lack of tort reform that drives up real costs to the medical community

Widespread defrauding of existing government and insurance programs by the medical community
Anyone that ever looked at an itemized hospital bill can attest to this one. You may pay $20 for an aspirin. They bury more bullshit in the bill than is available in the average feedlot. Knowing the guy getting the bill is probably just passing it to the insurer, they figure he doesnt care or cant do much about it because if they do it to everyone it becomes "reasonable and customary".

This is NOT free market capitalism as the system is done now... so I feel no need to defend it. It's widespread and systematic theft perpetrated on those that require medical attention.

An abysmal lack of tort reform
The "lawyer lottery" is a tried and true method of getting rich in the US. If a tragedy befalls and there are doctors involved... there's a legal professional right behind the ambulance telling the loved ones or the injured party to "get what they deserve".

It was hillarious to see John Edwards banging the drum for health care reforms seeing as how he got rich getting huge settlements for people in lawsuits of this nature. If there's anything the doctor *might* have done differently... why not go for the malpractice lotto? I had a guy on my ballteam once that wore his neckbrace to a softball game (in which he played) just in case he was seen leaving the house (in the new car that he got courtesy of the insurer of someone that hit his car in a minor fender-bender).

Juries are more than happy to award millions, hell doesnt the poor guy *deserve* to get something from those rich bastards charging $20 for Aspirin. Doesn't cost the jury a dime to make him (and consequently, his lawyer) rich beyond imagination in return for his loss.

These two feed each other
As a result of the "rich" doctors getting to pay out millions if there's even a chance they might have acted differently, real costs rise. Their malpractice insurance costs more than most of us will make this year. They raise fees to pass it on, and juries award bigger fees to the plaintiffs the next time.

Congress?
Congress is the only body that can accomplish real tort reform... and as they havent done so (think really rich lobbyists spreading money like butter)... we oughta jerk the plug on their personal medical benefits and let them pay their own way. Getting to experience the system instead of walking in and outta Walter Reed for free might be a great motivator.

The current system prices medical help outside the range of many that cannot afford or the rising health insurance costs. I'm all for looking for a good solution. I just happen to think the assholes we have in Washington (on both sides) are a poor source for real reform. Too many of them in the pocket of the people that have every reason to avoid a working solution.

I have a feeling we've screwed the free market approach up so badly it isnt gonna fly. If we have to go to some kind of socialized (shudder) version in order to make it tenable... Congress absolutely should be on the exact program as their constituents.

My 2 cents... I don't know the answer on this one. I suggest we start with Shakespeares words... "First... we kill the lawyers."

 

I agree with robjones.

Quote this before I change my mind and delete it...

 

ROFL. Doncha hate it when that happens. I almost agreed with one of yours yesterday, but I dont have your balls.

 

BLAST IT!

Oh well, when you're right you're right. We all agree it needs to be fixed. If we can get past partisanship (and a pretty deep seated hatred of Obama) we might actually agree on a lot of things and *gasp* pass a bill.

The problem is... liberals don't trust human greed within the free markets and conservatives don't trust human greed within the government. This crap is never gonna end...

I just don't see why we can't pass a bill that includes a properly regulated public option AND includes legislation for tort reform.

 

One of the major things holding the US back is health care. It is sad that the special interest groups of the insurance companies and pharma, can sway the population from what should be a basic right in a developed country. The greed is shameful.

 

To the contrary, you sound very conservative... I believe this is essentially what most Americans believe.

The problem is, all the moonbats out there think if you do not agree with Obamacare that you think everything is fine.

The reality is, there IS a problem. Something IS broken. And there IS a solution. The key is recognizing the two things that are broken (thanks RJ), and then fixing them.

How can you not? Most of America does!!!