Obamacare Lite

[anatess2]

12 minutes ago, Mike said:

@anatess2 I didn't ask you to explain about EVERYTHING. And you still haven't given me anything to go on with healthcare. You've told me about lemonade, and you've decried government involvement. But healthcare isn't like food and nothing like lemonade; and market-based means no government involvement, or am I wrong?

Educate me if I'm wrong, but I'm under the impression that no country in the world has a market-based healthcare system. The closest thing we have is healthcare insurance, and experience has been that the market hasn't reduced the costs of insurance. I'm left wondering why the market can't seem to become interested in getting into the business of healthcare the way I perceive market-based advocates seem to preach. 

Replace lemonade with Flu Treatment or Cancer Treatment or whatever Health CARE example you want to use.  Same thing.

Healthcare Insurance is NOT Healthcare.  It is simply one form of healthcare payment plan.  The Philippines - a 3rd world country at that - has a market-based healthcare system.  So does most of Asia.  Many American vets go to the Philippines to get care. 

The American Healthcare System is BROKEN BECAUSE OF Health Insurance's corporatist grip on government.  It has made it such that Americans have this cultural thinking that healthcare insurance is supposed to pay for everything healthcare.  They don't have the same thinking for home insurance.  They don't expect home insurance to pay for a leaking sink.  They expect home insurance to pay for the house that burned down.  That's what insurance is supposed to be for.  Healthcare insurance should be treated the same.

Edited March 15, 2017 by anatess2

[Mike]

18 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

Replace lemonade with Flu Treatment or Cancer Treatment or whatever Health CARE example you want to use.  Same thing.

Healthcare Insurance is NOT Healthcare.  It is imply healthcare payment plan.  The Philippines - a 3rd world country at that - has a market-based healthcare system.  So does most of Asia.

The American Healthcare System is BROKEN BECAUSE OF Health Insurance's corporatist grip on government.

If your lemonade/flu treatment statement is an argument then I ought to conclude we already have market-based healthcare.  I didn't say insurance is healthcare, I said that the closest thing we have to market-based healthcare is health insurance (which is market-based, isn't it?). So are you advocating the U.S. emulate the Philippines? Is the Philippines still (as I read recently) examining Cuba's system as something to emulate? Which countries in Asia are rated as having the best market-based healthcare systems? 

You probably think at this point that I'm being obstinate. I'm really only feeling frustration, especially with our Current Occupant who after making so many empty promises recently told us that nobody knew healthcare was so complicated (even though *everybody* always knew that healthcare is so complicated). He's finally a self-confessed politician. 

Edited March 15, 2017 by Mike

[yjacket]

1 hour ago, anatess2 said:

 Gingrich BALANCED it... on a High Revenue era.  H

I swear, if one more person says we had a balanced budget in the 90s I'm gonna puke.  Anatass, please don't believe the lies and Washington doublspeak.  We did not have a balanced budget.

http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16

Once cannot have a balanced budget if the total debt owed by the US government increases!.  Balanced budget means income=expense.  I don't care how you account it but when you have the total debt increase every year we had a "balanced budget" that's not balanced.

It was only "balanced" if you don't count the interest on the debt (an expense) and "off-budget" items.  And who gets to decide what is off-budget, Congress.  The "balanced" budget was just accounting tricks and games.

Edited March 15, 2017 by yjacket

[anatess2]

24 minutes ago, Mike said:

If your lemonade/flu treatment statement is an argument then I ought to conclude we already have market-based healthcare.  I didn't say insurance is healthcare, I said that the closest thing we have to market-based healthcare is health insurance (which is market-based, isn't it?). So are you advocating the U.S. emulate the Philippines? Is the Philippines still (as I read recently) still examining Cuba's system? Which countries in Asia are rated as having the best market-based healthcare systems? 

You probably think at this point that I'm being obstinate. I'm really only feeling frustration, especially with our Current Occupant who after making so many empty promises recently told us that nobody knew healthcare was so complicated (even thought *everybody* knew that healthcare is so complicated). He's finally a self-confessed politician. 

Today is Trump's 54th DAY in office.  That's not even 2 months.  What promise has he not kept?  The President does not make laws.  Congress does.  Trump has no control over Congress - balance of power, remember.  But, even with Obamacare completely in the realm of the Legislative Branch and not the Executive Branch, Trump still managed to neuter Obamacare's individual and corporate mandates by instructing the IRS to ignore the Obamacare penalties.  So, what do you think Trump could have done that he didn't do?  "Nobody knew health care COULD BE so complicated" is a Trumpism.  You can't understand that statement without putting it in its context.  Trump was talking about Paul Ryan's balancing act on trying to get a healthcare repeal and replacement THROUGH Congress.  If you had 100 Tea Party Republicans in the Senate and 540 Tea Party Republicans in the House, and Trump as President, Healthcare is VERY simple.  You are frustrated because you watch the news.  It's like a person who gets depressed because he feels God has abandoned him.  He simply has not looked at the good things that has happened - he only sees the bad things or the things that he wants that has not yet happened.

We don't have market-based healthcare.  We have an extremely regulated quasi-market-based healthcare.  Let me ask you - when you go to the doctor, do you think the doctor decided what you need to do or do you think the insurance company decided what you need to do?  How about this... when you go to the doctor and he tells you, you need an MRI... do you then go and shop for the cheapest MRI that provides good service or do you go and get the MRI that your insurance covers?  Do you even ask how much that MRI costs?  Or do you only worry how much deductible you have to pay?  How did you get your insurance - did you shop for it?  Or did you just get the insurance your employer gave you?

You can't emulate the Philippines.  You don't have the same cultural trappings.  In the Philippines, the FAMILY helps each other in providing for the family's needs.  This includes healthcare.  So, for example, my dad had lung cancer.  Our entire family pooled our resources to get healthcare for my dad.  My brother became a doctor, my sister became a nurse for this particular reason - to provide healthcare for our entire clan.

Edited March 15, 2017 by anatess2

[anatess2]

10 minutes ago, yjacket said:

I swear, if one more person says we had a balanced budget in the 90s I'm gonna puke.  Anatass, please don't believe the lies and Washington doublspeak.  We did not have a balanced budget.

http://www.craigsteiner.us/articles/16

Once cannot have a balanced budget if the total debt owed by the US government increases!.  Balanced budget means income=expense.  I don't care how you account it but when you have the total debt increase every year we had a "balanced budget" that's not balanced.

It was only "balanced" if you don't count the interest on the debt (an expense) and "off-budget" items.  And who gets to decide what is off-budget, Congress.  The "balanced" budget was just accounting tricks and games.

Well, you just nuked your own argument.

[Guest Godless]

57 minutes ago, anatess2 said:

Mike... EVERYTHING is better in a market-based system.  That is why China, even as they are Socialists, released their Economy to Capitalistic forces instead of going all Communist like Russia.

1.)  Reduce Cost - this is simple.  You have lemonade stand A fighting with lemonade stand B over customers.  2 things will happen, the quality of lemonades will increase and the cost of lemonades will remain low because the lemonade stand that provides low quality at a higher price will go bankrupt.

2.)  Provide care to those who need it most and can least afford it - when the cost of lemonades go down while the quality goes up, more people will be able to afford it even the poor folks.  At the same time, lemonade stand C can come in and undercut the lemonade stand business by providing super low cost even if it is not very good quality because some people don't mind the low quality as long as they can buy lemonade for a nickel that is sufficient to quench their thirst.

But, but, but... what about those who can't even afford a nickel for lemonade?  If a person is THAT poor, he goes on State-funded Medicaid.

So then why is the GOP so reluctant to expand Medicaid and Medicare? That's really the bread and butter of the health care debate. A market-based system is fine for people who can afford it, but why wouldn't you support the government service that provides for those who don't have the luxury of shopping the market? 

[yjacket]

1 hour ago, anatess2 said:

Well, you just nuked your own argument.

?? Excuse me, how did I do that.

[Mike]

3 hours ago, anatess2 said:

We don't have market-based healthcare.  We have an extremely regulated quasi-market-based healthcare.  Let me ask you - when you go to the doctor, do you think the doctor decided what you need to do or do you think the insurance company decided what you need to do?  How about this... when you go to the doctor and he tells you, you need an MRI... do you then go and shop for the cheapest MRI that provides good service or do you go and get the MRI that your insurance covers?  Do you even ask how much that MRI costs?  Or do you only worry how much deductible you have to pay?  How did you get your insurance - did you shop for it?  Or did you just get the insurance your employer gave you?

I think your scenario illustrates why healthcare is so not like the commodities/services you mentioned earlier. Let's make it more realistic, not that it (your version) doesn't happen but that it only supports what you want it to support and doesn't include the just as frequent aspects of what we're discussing. Let's say the doctor is seeing me because of an extreme emergency. Like everything else in life I go by faith--this time in the doctor's integrity. I don't have the luxury of shopping for an MRI the way I might shop for a new car or even for an insurance policy. Because my life or a vital organ may hang in the balance I accept the doctor's wisdom. Unless I misconstrue where you're leading this narrative my answer could easily differ if we were talking something like a prostate biopsy or a vitrectomy. Again this specific part of our conversation seems to me to illustrate how a market-based healthcare system in terms of the meaning of that phrase appears to me to be unrealistic--unless you want to modify the definition of a market-based healthcare system. 

Edited March 15, 2017 by Mike

[Guest Godless]

26 minutes ago, Mike said:

I think your scenario illustrates why healthcare is so not like the commodities/services you mentioned earlier. Let's make it more realistic, not that it doesn't happen but that it only supports what you want it to support and doesn't include the just as frequent aspects of what we're discussing. Let's say the doctor is seeing me because of an extreme emergency. Like everything else in life I go by faith--this time in the doctor's integrity. I don't have the luxury of shopping for an MRI the way I might shop for a new car or even for an insurance policy. Because my life or a vital organ may hang in the balance I accept the doctor's wisdom. Unless I misconstrue where you're leading this narrative my answer could easily differ if we were talking something like a prostate biopsy or a vitrectomy. Again this specific part of our conversation seems to me to illustrate how a market-based healthcare system in terms of the meaning of that phrase appears to me to be unrealistic--unless you want to modify the definition of a market-based healthcare system. 

Well put. An MRI may not be the best example of why we need market-based healthcare. If I need an MRI or an X-Ray, I go where the doctor tells me to go. If I need a chiropractor, dermatologist, or other non-emergency specialist, I'm going to shop through my insurance network and find the best available option. Full disclosure: I have a pretty good insurance plan (through my wife's employer) that is accepted by most practices.

Many people don't have the luxury of shopping different options. My wife works with such people fairly regularly at her job. Many of them are on Medicaid. So they may not be able to get the newest insulin pump model, but they can still get a $3000+ pump without breaking the bank, but only if they submit 30 days worth of blood sugar logs and other medical test results. It's still much better than no pump at all, or having to take out a bank loan to afford one. On the other side of the coin, she has wealthier people complain about having to pay their $200 deductible so they can get an $8000 medically-necessary system without nearly as many pesky medical tests. 

[Just_A_Guy]

Simply put, consumers in a free market inevitably make trade-offs of quality for price.  But we aren't prepared to make the same sorts of trade-offs with our medical treatment that we would make in buying a car or a pair of pants or a lunch at McDonalds--when it comes to health care we demand the best; and if we can't afford the best, we have been led to expect someone else to buy it for us.  In economic terms, I believe the term would be "inelastic demand".

Other factors that gum up traditional free-market factors are inelastic supply (barriers to entry for potential new health care suppliers--lengthy licensing regimens, fear of lawsuits, high start-up costs); the lack of freely accessible pricing information so that consumers could make rational choices; and cartel-ish behavior by hospital/physician networks acting in concert with HMOs.  I continue to believe that we didn't need overhaul in 2008-2009; we needed some good old-fashioned trustbusting and deregulation.

Would some Medicaid expansion be a good thing?  Possibly--if it were demonstrably financially sustainable in the long run; and if it doesn't turn out to be a precursor to a single-payer system.  I have no confidence that either would be the case.  

And folks who really think that Donald Trump is the second coming of Adolf Hitler, should probably think twice before putting him in control of a system that decides whether Megan Kelly gets an epidural for her next childbirth.

Edited March 16, 2017 by Just_A_Guy

[anatess2]

16 hours ago, yjacket said:

?? Excuse me, how did I do that.

You said Ryan and Price are not conservatives because their budgets didn't balance the budget.  So I told you Balanced Budgets is nothing but political trickery.  And you just proved my point by saying Gingrich did not balance the budget.

Edited March 16, 2017 by anatess2

[anatess2]

16 hours ago, Mike said:

I think your scenario illustrates why healthcare is so not like the commodities/services you mentioned earlier. Let's make it more realistic, not that it (your version) doesn't happen but that it only supports what you want it to support and doesn't include the just as frequent aspects of what we're discussing. Let's say the doctor is seeing me because of an extreme emergency. Like everything else in life I go by faith--this time in the doctor's integrity. I don't have the luxury of shopping for an MRI the way I might shop for a new car or even for an insurance policy. Because my life or a vital organ may hang in the balance I accept the doctor's wisdom. Unless I misconstrue where you're leading this narrative my answer could easily differ if we were talking something like a prostate biopsy or a vitrectomy. Again this specific part of our conversation seems to me to illustrate how a market-based healthcare system in terms of the meaning of that phrase appears to me to be unrealistic--unless you want to modify the definition of a market-based healthcare system. 

You don't shop for a doctor when your guts are on the table.  You shop for a doctor the minute you establish residence.  This is why it is important to not have anything standing in-between the doctor-patient relationship.  Because, that's a relationship that is built on trust and is very personal.  It's not easy to find a doctor you trust.  So you don't go searching for one when your guts are hanging out of your belly.  That's what insurance policies are for.  For the extreme emergencies.  That's what fire departments are for.  For the extreme emergencies.  You don't shop for insurance policies when your stomach is spread on the table.  You shop before you get to that point.

This is really nothing different than anything else in life.  Food, water, gasoline, energy, transportation, housing, etc. etc. etc.

Market-based healthcare system is not some arbitrary definition one just pulls out of the air.  There's a specific definition for it.  Market-based - healthcare service is a commodity, you are a consumer, the healthcare provider is the producer.  It works in the same way as any other commodity - life-saving or otherwise.  Consumer behavior differs depending on need.  Provider behavior differs depending on need.  They all get to decide how to deal with life's situations and navigate through the market.  But in any case, the consumer has a myriad of choices among competing providers.

 

Edited March 16, 2017 by anatess2

[yjacket]

1 hour ago, anatess2 said:

You said Ryan and Price are not conservatives because their budgets didn't balance the budget.  So I told you Balanced Budgets is nothing but political trickery.  And you just proved my point by saying Gingrich did not balance the budget.

And yet you claimed Gingrich balanced the budget? Why claim it if you know it is political trickery? (one can actually balance the budget it is possible).

Lol . . .Gingrich a conservative.  Tell me another good one.  I don't think you know what a conservative really is:

1. Education — Gingrich backed federal education funding from his earliest days in office, though the Constitution gives absolutely no authority over education to any branch of the federal government. He helped garner support to create President Jimmy Carter’s Department of Education in 1979. Since then educational spending has soared while educational standards have plummeted. Things got worse when he was Speaker. In 1996, then-Republican Party Chairman Haley Barbour bragged that “education spending went up under the Republican Congress as much as it went up under the Democratic Congress.” That is a bit of an understatement since Gingrich’s Republican Congress increased education funding by $3.5 billion in 1996, the largest single increase in history.

2. Foreign Aid — Gingrich voted numerous times throughout his 20 years in Congress to increase and expand unconstitutional foreign aid and trade. He supported both subsidized trade with the Soviets and federally funded loans to foreign governments through the Export-Import Bank. Between 1994 and 1995, Gingrich voted for $44.8 billion in foreign aid. He also helped push through federally funded loan guarantees to China. 

3. NAFTA and GATT — In 1993, Gingrich proved himself invaluable to Clinton and the Democrats in Congress when he garnered enough Republican support to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the precursor for development of an eventual North American Union, following the same trajectory that has occurred in Europe with the emergence of the EU. (See the October 15, 2007 “North American Union” issue of The New American, especially “NAFTA: It’s Not Just About Trade” by Gary Benoit.) The next year he followed suit by supporting the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO). As Minority Whip, he could have postponed the lame-duck vote on GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) that subjected Americans to the WTO. Gingrich’s Benedict Arnold act helped to hand over the power to regulate foreign commerce, a power reserved in the Constitution to Congress alone, to an internationally controlled body, making America’s economic interests entirely at the mercy of the WTO.

Gingrich knew GATT sounded the death knell for American sovereignty. In testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee prior to the lame-duck session, he said, “We need to be honest about the fact that we are transferring from the United States at a practical level significant authority to a new organization.... This is not just another trade agreement. This is adopting something which twice, once in the 1940s and once in the 1950s, the U.S. Congress rejected.... It is a very big transfer of power.”

4. Contract With America — Another con-game Gingrich played was the much-acclaimed “Contract With America,” the Republican Party’s supposed answer to big government. It turned out to be a public relations smokescreen to cover various unconstitutional measures that Congress planned to pass under Gingrich’s leadership. The Contract included a “balanced budget amendment,” which amounted to a Republican excuse to continue spending while claiming to fight for fiscal conservatism. If the government only spent money on constitutional programs, the deficit would take care of itself.

And Gingrich isn't much of a conservative either.  He's an establishment guy too. The key with Gingrich though is that every now and then he throws out morsels of truth (such as his acknowledgement on national TV during the primaries of the Insiders/globalists who didn't want Trump to win.

If a conservative is someone who likes to talk small government but does the opposite then yes he is one; but the guy is a hypocrite, just like Ryan and Price.

or this:

https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/newt-gingrich-is-no-conservative

anatess, I know you believe in conservative principles, I just don't get why you let the so-called "conservative" Representatives skate on actually doing conservative things.

As far as your Ryan's "process", it passed the committee, now it goes to the full House.  If you think the full House will change the bill wholesale, you have no clue as to how committee's work and why they have them. The committee is where the nitty gritty work on the bill is done-it's where it gets modified. Yes it can get modified by the full house-but that is a much harder process and generally only results in very minor changes to the bill, not drastic changes.  So good luck!

Edited March 16, 2017 by yjacket

[Guest MormonGator]

6 minutes ago, yjacket said:

Lol . . .Gingrich a conservative.  Tell me another good one.  I don't think you know what a conservative really is:

 

I don't blame anyone for not knowing what a conservative is these days. The media hates us, so they'll skew anything about conservatism. Mainstream Hollywood hates us,  so they'll never give us credit. Academia hates us...notice a trend? Then you throw in Trump, who is not a conservative (even though he might agree with conservatives on some issues) and we're back to square one. 

Edited March 16, 2017 by MormonGator

[yjacket]

On 3/16/2017 at 11:35 AM, MormonGator said:

I don't blame anyone for not knowing what a conservative is these days. The media hates us, so they'll skew anything about conservatism. Mainstream Hollywood hates us,  so they'll never give us credit. Academia hates us...notice a trend? Then you throw in Trump, who is not a conservative (even though he might agree with conservatives on some issues) and we're back to square one. 

I generally agree add in schools and what they teach and no one really knows. What it really ends up being is the cult of Personality, i.e. I like blah and I think he is conservative so when he says blah2, that must be a conservative thing.

Trump is an independent . . .I'm not exactly sure he has an ideology, except get the job done.  That can be good, or it can be bad.  I only voted for him to shove it up the patutee of the Paul Ryan's of the world.  We'll see if that was a good decision or a bad one . .. .

Edited March 22, 2017 by yjacket

[anatess2]

27 minutes ago, yjacket said:

And yet you claimed Gingrich balanced the budget? Why claim it if you know it is political trickery? (one can actually balance the budget it is possible).

Lol . . .Gingrich a conservative.  Tell me another good one.  I don't think you know what a conservative really is:

1. Education — Gingrich backed federal education funding from his earliest days in office, though the Constitution gives absolutely no authority over education to any branch of the federal government. He helped garner support to create President Jimmy Carter’s Department of Education in 1979. Since then educational spending has soared while educational standards have plummeted. Things got worse when he was Speaker. In 1996, then-Republican Party Chairman Haley Barbour bragged that “education spending went up under the Republican Congress as much as it went up under the Democratic Congress.” That is a bit of an understatement since Gingrich’s Republican Congress increased education funding by $3.5 billion in 1996, the largest single increase in history.

2. Foreign Aid — Gingrich voted numerous times throughout his 20 years in Congress to increase and expand unconstitutional foreign aid and trade. He supported both subsidized trade with the Soviets and federally funded loans to foreign governments through the Export-Import Bank. Between 1994 and 1995, Gingrich voted for $44.8 billion in foreign aid. He also helped push through federally funded loan guarantees to China. 

3. NAFTA and GATT — In 1993, Gingrich proved himself invaluable to Clinton and the Democrats in Congress when he garnered enough Republican support to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the precursor for development of an eventual North American Union, following the same trajectory that has occurred in Europe with the emergence of the EU. (See the October 15, 2007 “North American Union” issue of The New American, especially “NAFTA: It’s Not Just About Trade” by Gary Benoit.) The next year he followed suit by supporting the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO). As Minority Whip, he could have postponed the lame-duck vote on GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) that subjected Americans to the WTO. Gingrich’s Benedict Arnold act helped to hand over the power to regulate foreign commerce, a power reserved in the Constitution to Congress alone, to an internationally controlled body, making America’s economic interests entirely at the mercy of the WTO.

Gingrich knew GATT sounded the death knell for American sovereignty. In testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee prior to the lame-duck session, he said, “We need to be honest about the fact that we are transferring from the United States at a practical level significant authority to a new organization.... This is not just another trade agreement. This is adopting something which twice, once in the 1940s and once in the 1950s, the U.S. Congress rejected.... It is a very big transfer of power.”

4. Contract With America — Another con-game Gingrich played was the much-acclaimed “Contract With America,” the Republican Party’s supposed answer to big government. It turned out to be a public relations smokescreen to cover various unconstitutional measures that Congress planned to pass under Gingrich’s leadership. The Contract included a “balanced budget amendment,” which amounted to a Republican excuse to continue spending while claiming to fight for fiscal conservatism. If the government only spent money on constitutional programs, the deficit would take care of itself.

And Gingrich isn't much of a conservative either.  He's an establishment guy too. The key with Gingrich though is that every now and then he throws out morsels of truth (such as his acknowledgement on national TV during the primaries of the Insiders/globalists who didn't want Trump to win.

If a conservative is someone who likes to talk small government but does the opposite then yes he is one; but the guy is a hypocrite, just like Ryan and Price.

or this:

https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/newt-gingrich-is-no-conservative

anatess, I know you believe in conservative principles, I just don't get why you let the so-called "conservative" Representatives skate on actually doing conservative things.

As far as your Ryan's "process", it passed the committee, now it goes to the full House.  If you think the full House will change the bill wholesale, you have no clue as to how committee's work and why they have them. The committee is where the nitty gritty work on the bill is done-it's where it gets modified. Yes it can get modified by the full house-but that is a much harder process and generally only results in very minor changes to the bill, not drastic changes.  So good luck!

Okay, if you think Gingrich is not a conservative, then we're not going to see eye-to-eye on anything conservative on the legislative process.  And the discussion is done.

You want the Bernie Sanders of conservative.  That's not going to work in the way the US federal government is designed.  That doesn't accomplish anything but gridlock and the reason Ted Cruz did not get elected President.  And that's the reason the Democrats are in the weeds right now.

I'm surprised you voted for Trump if that's your position on conservatism.

Edited March 16, 2017 by anatess2

[yjacket]

2 hours ago, anatess2 said:

I'm surprised you voted for Trump if that's your position on conservatism.

No, that's exactly the reason why I voted for Trump.  I'm surprised you voted for him (and like him) considering everything you've said about Ryan, Gingrich and the whole other host of establishment, insider Rs.

I voted for Trump to blow up the entire Republican establishment-not b/c I think he is conservative.  The exact reason we are in this mess is b/c of the Paul Ryan's of the world and it's the exact reason why people voted for Trump.

When Trump says "for too long politicians have been all talk and no action", the Paul Ryan's are exactly the one's he was referring to.

And contrary to most all talk politicians.  Trump is actually doing something.  His budget (while not what I'd like,it still increases the budget), does what the Paul Ryan's have been saying they would do for ages-it's making significant cuts to the federal government.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/16/winners-and-losers-in-trumps-budget-blueprint.html

Please tell me when Ryan came out with a budget that cut the State Department by 28%!  Ryan can take his budget that called for a measly 2% cut and shove it.  Now if we just completely eliminated some departments we'd really be rocking, but I'll still take an almost 30% cut.

Edited March 16, 2017 by yjacket

[Mike]

3 hours ago, anatess2 said:

You don't shop for a doctor when your guts are on the table.  You shop for a doctor the minute you establish residence.  This is why it is important to not have anything standing in-between the doctor-patient relationship.  Because, that's a relationship that is built on trust and is very personal.  It's not easy to find a doctor you trust.  So you don't go searching for one when your guts are hanging out of your belly.  That's what insurance policies are for.  For the extreme emergencies.  That's what fire departments are for.  For the extreme emergencies.  You don't shop for insurance policies when your stomach is spread on the table.  You shop before you get to that point.

This is really nothing different than anything else in life.  Food, water, gasoline, energy, transportation, housing, etc. etc. etc.

Market-based healthcare system is not some arbitrary definition one just pulls out of the air.  There's a specific definition for it.  Market-based - healthcare service is a commodity, you are a consumer, the healthcare provider is the producer.  It works in the same way as any other commodity - life-saving or otherwise.  Consumer behavior differs depending on need.  Provider behavior differs depending on need.  They all get to decide how to deal with life's situations and navigate through the market.  But in any case, the consumer has a myriad of choices among competing providers.

 

You say that insurance policies are for the extreme emergencies. Yes, that's true, but they are also for the anticipated expensive aspects of life such as those associated with pregnancy. And of course for decades pre-existing conditions (like pregnancy or congenital diseases) were not covered by insurance.

A key component of the equation is that from the perspective of the insurer the insurance exists to make money. We both know without saying that making money depends upon more people signing up for the insurance than will utilize it.  But all too many people won't sign up at all (for all the reasons we both already know.)  Because over time more and more insureds need the insurance benefits and the procedures grow ever more costly, the insurers must ultimately raise their prices. Ultimately a very large portion of the population can't afford the insurance (for a variety of reasons many of which are no one's "fault" except maybe greed, but nonetheless a reality) whether they want to or not.

This is a single illustration where the market-place just doesn't work for the good of sufficient numbers of a society. Any society that seems to obtain different results (like a clan) is merely too small as of yet. Even the Stakes of Zion face this reality. At some point where any given society's population reaches a certain density the society has to decide what to do, and invariably regardless of whether the society favors Phillipino Clanism, Theocracy, Capitalism, Communism, Libertarianism, Dictatorship or any other form of government it must decide *between* allowing ever-growing numbers of the population to suffer and preventing such suffering. And invariably a given society must choose whether to put its government (in other words themselves) to ameliorate the situation that a market-based system cannot acceptably deal with. The alternative is to ignore the problem by saying it doesn't exist or by denying the numbers of sufferers exist until some other tipping point occurs which is most often associated with violence. 

If the next four years prove to me that my perception is wrong I will freely admit it and send you a gift certificate for a free lunch. But what I expect is that the GOP and President Trump will satisfy themselves with little more than what you initially called "dung" on this thread by telling each other things along the lines of what President Trump tells everyone about the number of attendees at his inauguration, and in four years sufficient numbers of disaffected voters will turn again to the other Party to dismantle O'Trumpcare in favor of helping greater numbers of Americans. 

 

 

[anatess2]

4 hours ago, yjacket said:

No, that's exactly the reason why I voted for Trump.  I'm surprised you voted for him (and like him) considering everything you've said about Ryan, Gingrich and the whole other host of establishment, insider Rs.

I voted for Trump to blow up the entire Republican establishment-not b/c I think he is conservative.  The exact reason we are in this mess is b/c of the Paul Ryan's of the world and it's the exact reason why people voted for Trump.

When Trump says "for too long politicians have been all talk and no action", the Paul Ryan's are exactly the one's he was referring to.

And contrary to most all talk politicians.  Trump is actually doing something.  His budget (while not what I'd like,it still increases the budget), does what the Paul Ryan's have been saying they would do for ages-it's making significant cuts to the federal government.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/16/winners-and-losers-in-trumps-budget-blueprint.html

Please tell me when Ryan came out with a budget that cut the State Department by 28%!  Ryan can take his budget that called for a measly 2% cut and shove it.  Now if we just completely eliminated some departments we'd really be rocking, but I'll still take an almost 30% cut.

Discretionary spending is only 40% of the budget.  That's why even when Trump slashed every single liberal-wet-dream in the budget, he is still up to break-even with the increased military spending.  Entitlements is where the bread and butter is.  Ryan has been trying to cut entitlements for the whole time he was in the Budget Committee.  It barely passes Committee, gets diluted in the House floor and gets whacked in the Senate and never gets through Reconciliation.  But not for the lack of Ryan trying to get it voted on.  So, Trump slashing discretionary spending and Ryan slashing entitlements... that would be a good combination.

I agree with you about the establishment.  I don't put "All Republicans Except for the Freedom Caucus" in that bucket.  I pushed for Gingrich in 2008 and 2012.  Republicans chose McCain and Romney - both establishment.  McCain they call the Maverick not because he bucks establishment but because he bucks Republican establishment in favor of Democrat establishment.  He's one of my  most disliked Republicans and they wanted him for President.  So, you wonder where the conservatives have been all this time, eh?

 

Edited March 16, 2017 by anatess2

[Traveler]

 

The top 4 reasons for health care costs are (not necessarily in this order)

#1. Increasingly more people receiving health care that are contributing less to the costs requiring others to pay more.

#2. Out of control malpractice suits where unhealthy individuals are awarded increasing bigger awards from physicians that tried to help them but the unhealthy choices of the individuals are ignored in settlements.

#3. Increasing secondary costs – For example adding insurance means that more $$$ are used to fund the insurance companies and experts in health care industry specializing in dealing with insurance companies and collections.

#4.  Corporate greed – most doctors are required to work for Corporate entities (health plans) that take most of the $$$$ for themselves.

Any federal plan that does not take these items into account and reduce or illuminate them will only add more $$$$$ to health care costs.  I estimate that close to 90% of health care costs do not go towards health care of the individual that pays for their care – maybe even more than 95%

 

The Traveler

Edited March 16, 2017 by Traveler