Weatherman terrorists: Obama's centrism a 'smokescreen'

[techres]

-removed-

 

[danielocean03]

Because it takes away our right, as healthcare consumers, to pick and choose as we see fit.

Because it takes away the right of healthcare providers to charge what they wish to charge.

Because it increases dependence upon The Government.

Because socialised medicine will ultimately become a "whose health can most benefit society"-type situation. FYI, it's easier for a 30-something to get preventative care in the UK than it is for a 80-something.

Because by putting healthcare in the hands of the government, you subject it to one of the most bloated and inefficient beaurocracies on the planet. Name me some things that The Government does better than Private Industry? (better = less expensively and/or more quickly)

-J-

That's what you need to know, well said my friend, well said.

 

[03mustgt]

I didn't say it was worse. I said the situation is more complicated than you presented it.

People can't get a colonoscopy at all? How many (compared to the number who actually need one)?

"National Coalition on Health Care" a group specifically advocating "universal health care" is going to be _so_ unbiased, I'm sure. One doesn't have to be "wrong" to present a biased picture.

The group is not for government sponsored healthcare, the web site says that they are for healthcare coverage for all, not government managed healthcare coverage for all.

Consider:

"Nearly 47 million Americans, or 16 percent of the population, were without health insurance in 2005, the latest government data available.1"
Now, how many of those folk could have insurance if they changed their priorities a bit? I've known people without health insurance (I was one for some time). I've also known people who were worse off financially than those people who opted for health coverage rather than the TV set, the cable connection, the newer car, the extra alcohol and cigarettes. In short, I knew people who made health insurance a priority had it. Second, lack of health insurance is not the same as lack of coverage. You are aware, are you not, that hospital emergency rooms are required by law to provide medically necessary care. This has become a problem of its own in some areas as illegal aliens (who wouldn't, or shouldn't, be covered by "universal health care anyway) use emergency rooms as their primary care provider for every sniffle and hangnail. Tying up ER facilities for these folk who won't pay is part of the reason that health care costs are so high--the money has to come from somewhere. In addition to Medicare, you are aware that there is a program called "Medicaid" which provides health coverage for the truly poor. So a good many of those 47 million people either do have health care available or could if they actually made it a priority. You site is silent on that. Wonder why?

First, Please do not talk to me like I am ignorant, I am not treating you like you are ignorant.

Now, who do you think pays for medicaid, medicare, the illegal aliens, and the uninsured when they go to the hospital? You do, oh and you graciously get to pay for your own health care as well. I do know that doctors are required to treat patients, but that cost is placed upon us as taxpayers and health care consumers.

So you complain about people going to the doctor for a sniffle and a hang nail, and yet you preach about how health care should be unregulated?

Consider:
"Nearly two-fifths (38 percent) of all workers are employed in smaller businesses, where less than two-thirds of firms now offer health benefits to their employees.7 It is estimated that 266,000 companies dropped their health coverage between 2000-2005 and 90 percent of those firms have less than 25 employees."
Smaller companies that don't offer health benefits. Yep. That described me (and still does, actually, although we have insurance through my wife's company now). Yet, strangely enough, I had health insurance from the time I entered college (student plan available at remarkably low cost) until my wife started her current job which offers a reasonably good health plan. How did I manage that, you ask? Very simply: I looked around at different insurance companies, got quotes from them, and paid out of my own pocket for the insurance. Surprise! Health insurance. To keep the costs down, I limited the frills and went for a large deductible--the insurance was meant to cover It meant there were some other things I couldn't buy, but that's part of prioritizing.

Then you truly are a lucky person. Just be glad you were not born with a chronic disease. Try shopping for affordable insurance with a pre-existing condition.

In addition, even if we concede that there is a problem, there is more than one possible approach to solution.

Consider: IIUC, Lawyers are required to do a certain amount of "pro bono" (meaning "for good" rather than "for free" as some people interpret it) work. It would be a relatively modest action to require doctors to provide a few hours of "pro bono" work each month, with things like working in free clinics or treating indigent patients counting toward that requirement.

Or making it a requirement might be too much for some to go for, so how about a tax incentive. Most years businesses get an R&D tax credit. They do R&D work, they get a break on their taxes. Do something similar for medical professionals: they provide services to the poor, they get a break on their taxes.

That factor can be extended. While free clinics are generally tax deductible, make donations a tax credit and see those donations boom.

All of that can be done without coercive government programs and without the waste and overhead that a government provided/paid for health care would entail. More efficient and working by creating situations where people are _willing_ to provide the money, not by taking it from them by, essentially, force (as all taxes are).

Very good ideas^^^, but why has our country not done any of these on a national scale yet?

 

[dburkhead]

The group is not for government sponsored healthcare, the web site says that they are for healthcare coverage for all, not government managed healthcare coverage for all.

Do they offer any option other than some form of "single payer" socialized healthcare? If not, then this is a distinction without a difference.

First, Please do not talk to me like I am ignorant, I am not treating you like you are ignorant.

Now, who do you think pays for medicaid, medicare, the illegal aliens, and the uninsured when they go to the hospital? You do, oh and you graciously get to pay for your own health care as well. I do know that doctors are required to treat patients, but that cost is placed upon us as taxpayers and health care consumers.

The point is that many of these "uninsured" already have some level of healthcare.

So you complain about people going to the doctor for a sniffle and a hang nail, and yet you preach about how health care should be unregulated?

You want me to not treat you as if your are ignorant. Then please don't put words in my mouth either.

Co-pays and deductibles work wonders for keeping people from running to the doctor and tying up medical resources for every trivial thing.

Economics 101: resources are limited, wants are not. There must be some way to limit those items. In a free-enterprise system people largely make that decision for themselves. In other systems it is a government bureaucrat who decides for you. I know which I prefer.

Then you truly are a lucky person. Just be glad you were not born with a chronic disease. Try shopping for affordable insurance with a pre-existing condition.

BTDT. You really keep making assumtions about my past, and the past of my family, that are unjustified.

Yeah, the cost of covering pre-existing conditions drove the cost of insurance up. Duh. A person with pre-existing conditions costs the insurance company more (Indiana state law does not, or did not, permit simply excluding coverage for the pre-existing condition so the insurance had to payments had to cover the expected costs of the pre-existing condition). That money has to come from somewhere.

More economics 101: bad money drives out good. If insurance companies were not allowed to exclude pre-existing conditions or adjust the premiums to cover the cost, then you'd have a situation where people who are healthy with no expected problems would find it in their interest to gamble on not having insurance. After all, if they develop a serious illness they could always get insurance then (remember, the premise is that insurance cannot exclude or increase rates for pre-existing conditions). Insurance would have to raise rates for everybody to cover those cases, resulting in more people making the decision to not carry it unless they actually get sick, leading to insurance raising the rates for everyone else again, leading to . . . well, you can see how that goes.

Very good ideas^^^, but why has our country not done any of these on a national scale yet?

Most anyone on the conservative side of the political spectrum (and I lean more toward libertarian than strictly conservative--falling somewhere in between the two) would jump on those ideas. The trouble is, the only "national health care" that anyone like Clinton, or Obama, or Pelosi ever talks about is the socialized medicine model.

If you can convince the T&S* people in Washington to look at some option other than taking money from people at gunpoint (don't think it's at gunpoint? Try not paying sometime. Remember, Waco was about failure to pay particular taxes) and have some government bureaucrats decide how and where it gets spent--after putting a liberal (pun intended) portion into their own pockets.

*T&S = "Tax and Spend" and it includes the majority of both Democrats and Republicans these days.

 

[antsi]

It would be a relatively modest action to require doctors to provide a few hours of "pro bono" work each month, with things like working in free clinics or treating indigent patients counting toward that requirement.

This is already happening on a slightly different system. National Health Service Corps will provide student loan repayment for physicians and mid level providers (like nurse practitioners) who agree to work in HIPSAs (health provider shortage areas).

They also have a program for FQHCs (federally qualified health centers). These are private, nonprofit community health centers that meet government criteria for providing low-cost health care in low income neighborhoods. If the health center meets the criteria, they get preferential reimbursement rates from Medicaid and Medicare. Under the Bush administration, this program grew by 33% in terms of the number of health centers out there.

I think the FQHC model makes a lot of sense. FQHCs deliver care that is more cost-effecient than other providers. Private industry is generally more effecient than the government and FQHCs are a prime example.

I used to work at Cook County Hospital in Chicago - a pure "government provides the health care" model (government owns the hospital and the clinics, government appointees run it, government hires the doctors and nurses, etc.). It was a freaking mess. A group of rebels on the county board ran a cost analysis that showed CCH was providing the most expensive health care in the world. Meanwhile, we were very marginal on quality measures. We frequently had to apply for special exemptions from JCAHO to be allowed to stay in operation because we had violations where technically we should have been shut down. Similar stories are encountered wherever the government is directly in charge of health care, like the VA. You generally have very high cost care and the quality tends to be marginal at best.

FQHCs function by providing incentives for private organizations to meet goals the government sets. However, talk to anyone in an FQHC about where thier biggest problems and obstacles come from, and they will tell you that arcane government rules and micromanagment frequently force them to do silly, wasteful things. Overall, though, FQHCs provide the best mix of low cost and high quality in the entire health care industry.