But it doesn’t matter what the Supreme Court, or any other court, rules. If Congress doesn’t fund it, Obamacare won’t function. But then the Republicans can say, “See, it doesn’t work”, and win elections.
^ I’d say 66% is running a lot better than the 0% on DADT and DOMA and PropH8 so far… maybe the Conservative-led Supreme Court will help your averages out.
About “death panels”. Some day the politicians in this country will finally realize that we cannot print enough money to pay for Cadillac medical needs of 310 million Americans.
There is absolutely no upper limit on what we could spend. None. I have never had a patient say “don’t give my mother the best care possible, it is too expensive”.
Picture a system where all 310 million of us could eat anywhere and anything we wanted for free. You say that is absurd but that is the medical system many advocate.
We are seeing the breakdown of the cradle to grave systems around the world. It will only get worse.
The question will be what should we ration and how much.
We must must ration care. those are called “death panels”
Libert., health-care in Canada, England, France, and the rest of Western Europe is in better shape than health-care in America, where we already have death panels, when insurance companies deny care, when the elderly cannot afford their medicine because of Bush-Dick’s doughnut hole.
You treat only wealthy people and very few of them. You are not in a position to judge how people treat medical care.
BrianCrook… if only people from other countries, especially Canada, didn’t come here to get healthcare then maybe you’d have a leg to stand on.
Unfortunately, for your argument at least, what France has is not what was advocated by the left, nor what England has, nor anything else in Europe (though there are certain similarities). Both do, however, require a more socialistic system of government in order to operate their healthcare systems. Thus, you must convert our system of gov’t in order to make those systems viable… it just so happens those other governmental systems are collapsing so maybe it’s not such a good idea.
I live in Florida and work in the healthcare industry. The number of Canadian’s, especially the elderly, that come here and see physicians is quite numerous. The fact that in their month or two here they can be seen on a short appointment, tested and treated long before they head home is something that they can’t get in the course of 12+ months in Canada. And they are more than willing to pay for it verses not being able to get such care in Canada.
But yea, our faster, more technologically vibrant, more accessible healthcare system is soooo much worse simply because some people might have to pay for some services (especially to get it taken care of in an emergency) - OH THE HORROR.
Of course in Canada you get arrested if you try and pay for a heath service, even if you are denied access to care and/or told to wait even in an emergency. But yea, they are FANTASTIC! Maybe if you are 15-35 and healthy and don’t need an MRI and are willing to wait a year or so on your cancer screening (after it’s essentially a death sentence).
But hey, got to make those tax dollars stretch cause people shouldn’t have to be able to be responsible for themselves when the government always knows best.
Crook I request you look at these numbers before you draw your erroneous conclusions. They usually surprise and bewilder “government option” advocates.
The health care as practiced in the US is the best in the world.
Lib1 - “Picture a system where all 310 million of us could eat anywhere and anything we wanted for free. You say that is absurd but that is the medical system many advocate.”
We don’t advocate benefits for everyone ‘for free”, nor do we expect everyone to be able to have filet mignon and champaign. We simply want everyone to be able to order something to sustain them so we taxpayers don’t have to keep paying to feed them at the high priced soup kitchen (i.e the ER).
When an insurance company’s bureaucrats decide whether or not the potentially life-saving cancer treatment or organ transplant you need is “covered” under your plan, I’d say that qualifies them as a “life or death” panel.
And in terms of the idiotic statement of only the wealthy get services… have you ever been to an emergency room or hospital, EVER? The number of homeless, and yes even illegal immigrant, getting free healthcare because they can’t pay for it but come into the emergency room is not small. And most have payment assistance/plans for those on low incomes not covered under Medicaid or other insurance.
In my 15 years with no insurance I was never turned away for any heath care need, ever. I just had to pay for it or suffer the credit hit… the homeless don’t exactly worry about that, nor the illegals, so they don’t pay - we the tax payers and the hospitals do.
No the “government option” system is totally free. Everyone would be eligible, Including undocumented aliens.
The lawyers would guarantee every one of these 310 million got every conceivable MRI, PET,CAT, Biologic drug, transplant, infertility, sex change etc. Cost is trillions and trillions.
And as soon as someone said no, you would be leading the charge that there is unfairness and discrimination.
Either you really don’t understand what you are asking fior or you would bankrupt this country.
Correction, DJGuardian; RICH canadians (I bet you believe we don’t have rich up here because of “class warfare”, but we do) go to get care in the US because the waiting list in the US, rid of all the poor, are much shorter than in Canada when we don’t give a heart patient 30 000$ debt and the poor can afford treatment.
Righties act like medical care is like a sports car; something you don’t need but just want. Excet for plastic surgery, I’ve never seen anyone up here, where healthcare is free, say “Hey, cardiac bypasses are free! So I’m gonna get to the hospital, have my chest cut open, have my veins and arteries tickled with, get sewn back together, be in pain for weeks, be in remission for months and my life shortened. Why not? It’s free!”
there is more than a financial cost to those procedures, people do it to save their lives, not because they enjoy it.
^And by the way, Libertarian, infertility treatments and sex changes (and plastic surgery) aren’t covered up here, and nobody thinks they should.
All we are asking for is primary health care and preventative care.
The insurance companies can make money on housing people in private rooms and botox if they want. No one here cares much about those things. All the civilized countries give primary and preventative care because they figure that a healthy populus is a productive populus. Why are we the only ones who can’t figure this out?
“No the “government option” system is totally free. Everyone would be eligible, Including undocumented aliens.”
You and I both know the “government option” (i.e., single-payer plan) is not totally free. That’s a long leap to hyperbole. The term “single-payer” should give you a hint that people are still paying for it. It would just let the government negotiate medical and Rx rates with a stroger hand than individuals currently have, and it would help reduce the 30% admin over-charges that are currently tacked on by the insurance companies. Nor does it prohibit doctors, hospitals or insurance companies from continuing to operating their businesses and making a profit. It would simply rein in some of their egregious over-charges. (Think $12 for an aspirin tablet.)
10-20% of all our health costs relate to the practice of defensive medicine which other countries don’t have to face. Yes, we are indeed more expensive but take the lawyers out of the equation and our costs drop precipitously. The trial lawyers gave Obama millions and he totally ignored their costs when he wrote Obamacare.
Canuck - Igloos are Alaskan (USA), not Canadian. Also, the Iditarod, is Alaskan (USA) not Canadian. So, you are saying that Canada isn’t known for ANYTHING? Oh yes, good hockey players who mostly come to America for the HEALTH CARE!
Lawyers are very articulate and have successfully sold you on their deliberate misconceptions. Take all the malpractice premiums paid by doctors and all the money paid out in successful law suits and that only adds up to 2-3% of total health costs. That is what you quote. See it is not so bad.
But what that totally ignores is defensive medicine. The literally billions of dollars in unnecessary tests that we in America perform so we won’t get sued. That is where the 10-20% of health costs come from.
Wait, the lawyers have an answer for that. That is not defensive medicine but simply the practice of good medicine. We should get an MRI, PET, CAT etc on all patients so as to prevent all disease. If that costs trillions so what. But if you don’t do that then we will sue.
Guardian, a great many elderly Canadians winter in Florida. They do not travel to Florida in order to seek health-care, but, certainly, they may visit doctors during the winter.
Libert., your first link cited all of Europe ten years ago, when many of those countries were just getting out of Soviet domination. I have no doubt that the typical health-care in the U.S. is better than that of Kosovo.
Your second link, the same, and it admits that some European countries (Sweden, Belgium, & Switzerland—each of which has universal single-payer—do better than does the U.S.
When compared with Canada, the numbers are within the margin of error, and all Canadians receive such care, not simply the wealthy, and receive such care at a cost that is half of what we pay in the U.S.
Your third link shows differences between the U.K. & some other western European countries—all of which have more progressive and economical health-care systems than the mess of the U.S.
Your fourth link repeats the information from your second.
In sum, this research proves nothing about the efficacy of a universal single-payer system as practiced by all of the world’s other industrialized nations. I suggest that you read T.R. Reid’s Healing Of America. He doesn’t write blogs. He does actual work, and he does not write utterly incorrect statements as you did above. You assume that universal single-payer health care is free, unlimited health-care, where you have the right to an M.R.I. when you just have a cold. IT IS NOT. PLEASE STOP LYING.
As for the lawyers, that issue was studied extensively. It cuts health-care costs two percent, not twenty percent. In addition, blaming the lawyers is a red herring. If we instituted tort reform, then you would support a Canadian-style health-care system?
Fennec, Libert. argues for the sake of arguing. When one avenue fails for him, he tries to wrench the argument down another, and he seldom has any substantial support for his opinions (which, of course, makes them prejudices).
An interesting character: I’m guessing that he’s probably a perfectly fine doctor & researcher, but there’s a total disjuncture between his medical mental abilities and his political mental abilities. Mutatis mutandis, he reminds me slightly of Bobby Fischer, a man with an incredible mental gift in one field who presumed that he could, thus, see well in others. This made him a chess genius and a fascist bigot.
Although Libert. is not a fascist, he is certainly a bigot and would love to take us back to the 19th century.
TCL is right. IVF is covered in Quebec now (since a few months), and many people think it shouldn’t.
You see, a major contributor to the Quebec liberal party is media guru Pierre Karl Péladeau, who tried IVF to get children. His wife, TV host (on his own TV station, of course) Julie Snyder, militated for free IVF. It is not covered in other provinces, though.
In NB, though, the closest thing to plastic surgery that is covered is gastric bypass surgery…in certain conditions. It is not covered in Quebec (among other provinces)
Surprised me to see that republican-wannabe Alberta paid for “sinful” sex change operations…I guess they wanted something to be outraged about. It’s not covered in any other province! (Is there a surgeon doing that in Calgary or Winnipeg anyway? Those are rare. There I one in Montreal that I know of.)
Michael Peterson Premium Member over 13 years ago
Headlines should have read, “Two out of three federal judges find provision constitutional.”
annamargaret1866 over 13 years ago
Clark Kent, and the governor of Arizona.
But it doesn’t matter what the Supreme Court, or any other court, rules. If Congress doesn’t fund it, Obamacare won’t function. But then the Republicans can say, “See, it doesn’t work”, and win elections.
Jaedabee Premium Member over 13 years ago
^ I’d say 66% is running a lot better than the 0% on DADT and DOMA and PropH8 so far… maybe the Conservative-led Supreme Court will help your averages out.
Libertarian1 over 13 years ago
About “death panels”. Some day the politicians in this country will finally realize that we cannot print enough money to pay for Cadillac medical needs of 310 million Americans.
There is absolutely no upper limit on what we could spend. None. I have never had a patient say “don’t give my mother the best care possible, it is too expensive”.
Picture a system where all 310 million of us could eat anywhere and anything we wanted for free. You say that is absurd but that is the medical system many advocate.
We are seeing the breakdown of the cradle to grave systems around the world. It will only get worse.
The question will be what should we ration and how much.
We must must ration care. those are called “death panels”
Motivemagus over 13 years ago
It’s ROMNEYCARE, dammit.
BrianCrook over 13 years ago
Libert., health-care in Canada, England, France, and the rest of Western Europe is in better shape than health-care in America, where we already have death panels, when insurance companies deny care, when the elderly cannot afford their medicine because of Bush-Dick’s doughnut hole.
You treat only wealthy people and very few of them. You are not in a position to judge how people treat medical care.
DjGuardian over 13 years ago
BrianCrook… if only people from other countries, especially Canada, didn’t come here to get healthcare then maybe you’d have a leg to stand on.
Unfortunately, for your argument at least, what France has is not what was advocated by the left, nor what England has, nor anything else in Europe (though there are certain similarities). Both do, however, require a more socialistic system of government in order to operate their healthcare systems. Thus, you must convert our system of gov’t in order to make those systems viable… it just so happens those other governmental systems are collapsing so maybe it’s not such a good idea.
I live in Florida and work in the healthcare industry. The number of Canadian’s, especially the elderly, that come here and see physicians is quite numerous. The fact that in their month or two here they can be seen on a short appointment, tested and treated long before they head home is something that they can’t get in the course of 12+ months in Canada. And they are more than willing to pay for it verses not being able to get such care in Canada.
But yea, our faster, more technologically vibrant, more accessible healthcare system is soooo much worse simply because some people might have to pay for some services (especially to get it taken care of in an emergency) - OH THE HORROR.
Of course in Canada you get arrested if you try and pay for a heath service, even if you are denied access to care and/or told to wait even in an emergency. But yea, they are FANTASTIC! Maybe if you are 15-35 and healthy and don’t need an MRI and are willing to wait a year or so on your cancer screening (after it’s essentially a death sentence).
But hey, got to make those tax dollars stretch cause people shouldn’t have to be able to be responsible for themselves when the government always knows best.
Libertarian1 over 13 years ago
Crook I request you look at these numbers before you draw your erroneous conclusions. They usually surprise and bewilder “government option” advocates.
The health care as practiced in the US is the best in the world.
http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/08/5-yr-cancer-survival-rates-us-dominates.html
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba596
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1551098/Cancer-survival-rates-worst-in-western-Europe.html
http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2009/07/21/most-cancer-survival-rates-in-usa-better-than-europe-and-canada/
Bluejayz over 13 years ago
Lib1 - “Picture a system where all 310 million of us could eat anywhere and anything we wanted for free. You say that is absurd but that is the medical system many advocate.”
We don’t advocate benefits for everyone ‘for free”, nor do we expect everyone to be able to have filet mignon and champaign. We simply want everyone to be able to order something to sustain them so we taxpayers don’t have to keep paying to feed them at the high priced soup kitchen (i.e the ER).
Bluejayz over 13 years ago
When an insurance company’s bureaucrats decide whether or not the potentially life-saving cancer treatment or organ transplant you need is “covered” under your plan, I’d say that qualifies them as a “life or death” panel.
DjGuardian over 13 years ago
And in terms of the idiotic statement of only the wealthy get services… have you ever been to an emergency room or hospital, EVER? The number of homeless, and yes even illegal immigrant, getting free healthcare because they can’t pay for it but come into the emergency room is not small. And most have payment assistance/plans for those on low incomes not covered under Medicaid or other insurance.
In my 15 years with no insurance I was never turned away for any heath care need, ever. I just had to pay for it or suffer the credit hit… the homeless don’t exactly worry about that, nor the illegals, so they don’t pay - we the tax payers and the hospitals do.
Libertarian1 over 13 years ago
bluejay
No the “government option” system is totally free. Everyone would be eligible, Including undocumented aliens.
The lawyers would guarantee every one of these 310 million got every conceivable MRI, PET,CAT, Biologic drug, transplant, infertility, sex change etc. Cost is trillions and trillions.
And as soon as someone said no, you would be leading the charge that there is unfairness and discrimination.
Either you really don’t understand what you are asking fior or you would bankrupt this country.
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 13 years ago
Correction, DJGuardian; RICH canadians (I bet you believe we don’t have rich up here because of “class warfare”, but we do) go to get care in the US because the waiting list in the US, rid of all the poor, are much shorter than in Canada when we don’t give a heart patient 30 000$ debt and the poor can afford treatment.
Righties act like medical care is like a sports car; something you don’t need but just want. Excet for plastic surgery, I’ve never seen anyone up here, where healthcare is free, say “Hey, cardiac bypasses are free! So I’m gonna get to the hospital, have my chest cut open, have my veins and arteries tickled with, get sewn back together, be in pain for weeks, be in remission for months and my life shortened. Why not? It’s free!”
there is more than a financial cost to those procedures, people do it to save their lives, not because they enjoy it.
^And by the way, Libertarian, infertility treatments and sex changes (and plastic surgery) aren’t covered up here, and nobody thinks they should.
WarBush over 13 years ago
All we are asking for is primary health care and preventative care.
The insurance companies can make money on housing people in private rooms and botox if they want. No one here cares much about those things. All the civilized countries give primary and preventative care because they figure that a healthy populus is a productive populus. Why are we the only ones who can’t figure this out?
pirate227 over 13 years ago
^ Greed.
Bluejayz over 13 years ago
Libertarian1 said:
“No the “government option” system is totally free. Everyone would be eligible, Including undocumented aliens.”
You and I both know the “government option” (i.e., single-payer plan) is not totally free. That’s a long leap to hyperbole. The term “single-payer” should give you a hint that people are still paying for it. It would just let the government negotiate medical and Rx rates with a stroger hand than individuals currently have, and it would help reduce the 30% admin over-charges that are currently tacked on by the insurance companies. Nor does it prohibit doctors, hospitals or insurance companies from continuing to operating their businesses and making a profit. It would simply rein in some of their egregious over-charges. (Think $12 for an aspirin tablet.)
Libertarian1 over 13 years ago
fennec
10-20% of all our health costs relate to the practice of defensive medicine which other countries don’t have to face. Yes, we are indeed more expensive but take the lawyers out of the equation and our costs drop precipitously. The trial lawyers gave Obama millions and he totally ignored their costs when he wrote Obamacare.
rockngolfer over 13 years ago
On the Supreme Court it is 5 to 4 but that may take years.
Loco80 over 13 years ago
Canuck - Igloos are Alaskan (USA), not Canadian. Also, the Iditarod, is Alaskan (USA) not Canadian. So, you are saying that Canada isn’t known for ANYTHING? Oh yes, good hockey players who mostly come to America for the HEALTH CARE!
Libertarian1 over 13 years ago
fennec
Lawyers are very articulate and have successfully sold you on their deliberate misconceptions. Take all the malpractice premiums paid by doctors and all the money paid out in successful law suits and that only adds up to 2-3% of total health costs. That is what you quote. See it is not so bad.
But what that totally ignores is defensive medicine. The literally billions of dollars in unnecessary tests that we in America perform so we won’t get sued. That is where the 10-20% of health costs come from.
Wait, the lawyers have an answer for that. That is not defensive medicine but simply the practice of good medicine. We should get an MRI, PET, CAT etc on all patients so as to prevent all disease. If that costs trillions so what. But if you don’t do that then we will sue.
Please don’t be naive.
BrianCrook over 13 years ago
Guardian, a great many elderly Canadians winter in Florida. They do not travel to Florida in order to seek health-care, but, certainly, they may visit doctors during the winter.
Libert., your first link cited all of Europe ten years ago, when many of those countries were just getting out of Soviet domination. I have no doubt that the typical health-care in the U.S. is better than that of Kosovo.
Your second link, the same, and it admits that some European countries (Sweden, Belgium, & Switzerland—each of which has universal single-payer—do better than does the U.S.
When compared with Canada, the numbers are within the margin of error, and all Canadians receive such care, not simply the wealthy, and receive such care at a cost that is half of what we pay in the U.S.
Your third link shows differences between the U.K. & some other western European countries—all of which have more progressive and economical health-care systems than the mess of the U.S.
Your fourth link repeats the information from your second.
In sum, this research proves nothing about the efficacy of a universal single-payer system as practiced by all of the world’s other industrialized nations. I suggest that you read T.R. Reid’s Healing Of America. He doesn’t write blogs. He does actual work, and he does not write utterly incorrect statements as you did above. You assume that universal single-payer health care is free, unlimited health-care, where you have the right to an M.R.I. when you just have a cold. IT IS NOT. PLEASE STOP LYING.
As for the lawyers, that issue was studied extensively. It cuts health-care costs two percent, not twenty percent. In addition, blaming the lawyers is a red herring. If we instituted tort reform, then you would support a Canadian-style health-care system?
BrianCrook over 13 years ago
Fennec, Libert. argues for the sake of arguing. When one avenue fails for him, he tries to wrench the argument down another, and he seldom has any substantial support for his opinions (which, of course, makes them prejudices).
An interesting character: I’m guessing that he’s probably a perfectly fine doctor & researcher, but there’s a total disjuncture between his medical mental abilities and his political mental abilities. Mutatis mutandis, he reminds me slightly of Bobby Fischer, a man with an incredible mental gift in one field who presumed that he could, thus, see well in others. This made him a chess genius and a fascist bigot.
Although Libert. is not a fascist, he is certainly a bigot and would love to take us back to the 19th century.
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 13 years ago
TCL is right. IVF is covered in Quebec now (since a few months), and many people think it shouldn’t.
You see, a major contributor to the Quebec liberal party is media guru Pierre Karl Péladeau, who tried IVF to get children. His wife, TV host (on his own TV station, of course) Julie Snyder, militated for free IVF. It is not covered in other provinces, though.
In NB, though, the closest thing to plastic surgery that is covered is gastric bypass surgery…in certain conditions. It is not covered in Quebec (among other provinces)
Surprised me to see that republican-wannabe Alberta paid for “sinful” sex change operations…I guess they wanted something to be outraged about. It’s not covered in any other province! (Is there a surgeon doing that in Calgary or Winnipeg anyway? Those are rare. There I one in Montreal that I know of.)