(11-13-2011 08:04 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  For discussion.

I wish we would equate health care to utilities. You need electricity and you need health insurance. No one thinks twice about paying their electric bill and probably somewhere in there we are subsidizing someone who can't float their own boat. I was invited to a Notre Dame game a couple of weeks back and for four hours I had to defend Obamacare to a vanload of conservatives. I find it easier to defend it against the old system where there was a cap on your insurance and the only people paying for THE WHOLE system were the ones with insurance who themselves were sick or had a sick child. It's not a perfect system by any means, but if you had a child who ran over their cap. This is by far a better system than the one before. When it's repealed or reformed I don't think we will go back to having caps on insurance. I think our cell phones have a tax on them that pays for people who can't afford them either. That's the tack liberals should take.

Utilities and Healthcare have nothing to do with your later agrument and where my wife and I still have family there are people who live without buying elecricity and grocery shopping. What about the people who have solar cells on their house. Should they be forced to buy electricity? No one argues that healthcare needs reform but requiring people to purchase insurance or pay a tax is illegal. This is a massive over reach of government power.

Why don't people complain about their electric bill subsidizing the poor? If someone could compare the numbers I would bet they are in the same ballpark. As in costs for insurance and your monthly utitlity bill. Maybe if we tied it to a sales tax. Two things I think are important.

1. Everybody pays into it.

2. You have a certain basic level that you can upgrade.

(11-14-2011 11:12 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  Why don't people complain about their electric bill subsidizing the poor? If someone could compare the numbers I would bet they are in the same ballpark. As in costs for insurance and your monthly utitlity bill. Maybe if we tied it to a sales tax. Two things I think are important.

1. Everybody pays into it.

2. You have a certain basic level that you can upgrade.

I prefer liberty.

(11-11-2011 01:48 PM)Jugnaut Wrote:  How about it is unconstitutional

This.

(11-14-2011 11:12 AM)Machiavelli Wrote:  Why don't people complain about their electric bill subsidizing the poor? If someone could compare the numbers I would bet they are in the same ballpark. As in costs for insurance and your monthly utitlity bill. Maybe if we tied it to a sales tax. Two things I think are important.

1. Everybody pays into it.

2. You have a certain basic level that you can upgrade.

Because people aren't forced to buy electricity. Its a choice.

(11-13-2011 08:04 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  It's not a perfect system by any means, but if you had a child who ran over their cap. This is by far a better system than the one before.

This is where you are wrong. What will happen is that when your child runs over his/her cap, you'll just be told to let him/her die. He/she will be too expensive to save. And there won't be anything you can do about it. I know you don't believe me. You'll just have to experience it for yourself. I'm sorry.

Mack, It is a fallacious comparison.

(11-14-2011 02:56 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(11-13-2011 08:04 PM)Machiavelli Wrote:  It's not a perfect system by any means, but if you had a child who ran over their cap. This is by far a better system than the one before.

This is where you are wrong. What will happen is that when your child runs over his/her cap, you'll just be told to let him/her die. He/she will be too expensive to save. And there won't be anything you can do about it. I know you don't believe me. You'll just have to experience it for yourself. I'm sorry.

The cap is in the current world. Would be eliminated under obamacare.

I do not understand all the details of obamacare, but think it is a step in the right direction. I would consoladate all the gov run programs (medicare, medacade, tricare) into insurance policies people can take with them.

I also believe everyone should have access to healthcare.

If there is no mandate to buy insurance, then the unpaid medical bills continue to get passed on and rises health care cost.

(11-14-2011 08:05 PM)dcCid Wrote:  The cap is in the current world. Would be eliminated under obamacare.

Bullsh*t. That's the lie you have been told to get you onboard. If you're stupid enough to believe it, you'll just be disappointed later. But there's not a single-payer (their stated goal, like Canada) or single-provider (which is more correctly what I think they really want, like UK) that doesn't impose draconian limits to control costs. If you think it's not going to happen under Obamacare, you're naive. Why would there be any reason for a Council on Comparative Outcomes or Health Choices Commission or Independent Payment Advisory Board if that weren't where this is going to lead?

Quote:I do not understand all the details of obamacare,

Obviously. Sorry, that was teed up too well to resist. If I thought Obamacare had a ghost of a chance to deliver all that is claimed for it, I might actually support it. I do see the appeal of universal systems, at least for basic coverage. But believe me, Obamacare combines the worst of our current system with the worst of single-payer/single-provider systems. It will be a disaster. We will pay more for worse health care. If you have to see it happen to believe it, so be it. I plan to become a medical tourist, just like the Brits and Canadians do.

(11-14-2011 08:29 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(11-14-2011 08:05 PM)dcCid Wrote:  The cap is in the current world. Would be eliminated under obamacare.

Bullsh*t. That's the lie you have been told to get you onboard. If you're stupid enough to believe it, you'll just be disappointed later. But there's not a single-payer (their stated goal, like Canada) or single-provider (which is more correctly what I think they really want, like UK) that doesn't impose draconian limits to control costs. If you think it's not going to happen under Obamacare, you're naive. Why would there be any reason for a Council on Comparative Outcomes or Health Choices Commission or Independent Payment Advisory Board if that weren't where this is going to lead?

Quote:I do not understand all the details of obamacare,

Obviously. Sorry, that was teed up too well to resist. If I thought Obamacare had a ghost of a chance to deliver all that is claimed for it, I might actually support it. I do see the appeal of universal systems, at least for basic coverage. But believe me, Obamacare combines the worst of our current system with the worst of single-payer/single-provider systems. It will be a disaster. We will pay more for worse health care. If you have to see it happen to believe it, so be it. I plan to become a medical tourist, just like the Brits and Canadians do.

It is like most bills whihc go through congress that are cobbeled together to meet different interest groups without a common vision.

I am still glad it passed. It is a step in the right direction. Having it there may help it evolve into something better. It has some good provisions.

(11-14-2011 08:39 PM)dcCid Wrote:  I am still glad it passed. It is a step in the right direction. Having it there may help it evolve into something better. It has some good provisions.

I am not glad it passed. And you won't be either, once it is fully implemented.

Obviously it will have to evolve to something better, because it will be an unmitigated disaster. It won't bend the health care cost trajectory downward; there is absolutely nothing in the bill to accomplish that, except using the CCO, HCC, and IPAB to drive draconian cuts to quality and availability of health care. CBO said as much, in their report that was spun to say Obamacare "would reduce the deficit." Under a set of highly unlikely circumstances, yes it would. But again, CBO noted that those circumstances were pretty unlikely to occur. Of course, nobody actually bothered to read the whole report to see what CBO actually said.

I agree it has some good provisions. The individual mandate is one of the best. Unfortunately, that's the one that's vulnerable to constitutional challenge. Overall, it's way, way more bad than good.

Consider this, the left professes to want "single-payer" and glorifies the UK (which is not single-payer) and Canadian (which is) systems. News flash. Both Canada and UK are TERRIBLE systems by world standards. Worse yet, various analyses and comparisons of health care systems worldwide over the last 10-15 years consistently indicate that the larger single-payer/single-provider systems get, the worse they perform. And nobody has ever tried it on as large a scale as the US.