Border walls have never worked. Even Ronald Reagan, for all his other faults, understood that. “Mr Gorbachev, TEAR DOWN THIS WALL.” But TrumpubliCONs who once worshipped Reagan have traded him for another golden calf to worship. They have replaced “Morning in America” with a dark, hateful vision of corruption and greed based on fear, not hope.
In contrast, Medicare for all (single payer) has worked in every country it has ever been tried in. Better health outcomes, zero medical bankruptcies, for a fraction of the cost by CUTTING OUT THE CORPORATE PROFITEERING MIDDLEMEN who contribute NOTHING to actual health care but suck out dollars that could go to actually helping people. NOT ONE COUNTRY THAT HAS GONE TO UNIVERSAL PUBLIC HEALTH CARE has ever repealed it. It’s almost like it works or something.
Even Medicare for the old is a resounding success, and that is for the oldest, sickest segment of the population! Imagine if we expanded it to include the young and the healthy!
Medicare for all, regulating medicare drug prices as VA does, adding lots of young people into the program, instead of just we “oldies” who require all the care, would change the actuary and save, again, hugely.
If you spend the money on a big useless wall, you have something to show for it. If you spend the money on the general health of the US population, there’s not much to show for it.
Once again Republican Troll Steve Kelley gets is wrong by 360 degrees. Isn’t Kelley one of the Republican LIARS who said the ACA would never work? I guess the real question is whether Kelly is working for the Republicans or the Russians?
The ones that make HUGE money off of healthcare will have their profits erode because universal healthcare tends to control costs by eliminating profit and focusing on actually providing care. Preventive medicine does a great job at keeping costs down in the long run. Insurance companies prefer to refuse to cover preventive medicine hoping that the complications that arise from non-treatment won’t happen until the person is covered by Medicare.
An immediate cost savings can happen by controlling pharmaceutical costs. The U.S. pays for a lot of the R & D, and then the companies make obscene profits that have no relation to their actual costs, so the U.S. taxpayer pays TWICE. Look at the cost changes when the meds go generic, so companies try to continue their monopoly on meds by combining two when the copyright is running out. Other tricks are to change the dosage and the method of medication, e.g. time-release formulation.
Where are all our premiums and $5000 deductibles going now? Into the healthcare system and the for-profit insurance industry with multi-million dollar compensation packages for the upper management!
Where would our taxes for health-care-for-all go? Into the healthcare system with government management. I’ll vote for the health-care-for-all.
Meanwhile the disgusting Republican president is holding himself hostage in the WH to extort 5 billion from the American tax payer. Trump thinks like a criminal.
Think of all the money being wasted on the govt shut down.
I’m willing to listen but the rebuttal seems much more rational.
" … The United States spends twice as much on healthcare as 10 other high-income nations, driven by the high price of everything from prescription drugs to doctors’ salaries, a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds. …"
Very shortsighted comic, Mr. Kelly. Tell us how the current system is ensuring care for all U.S. citizens. It contains costs because insurers deny coverage to people needing it.
Universal Healthcare would be a boon and a hit to large corporations. Boon in that a new tax to help pay for it would still be cheaper than they pay for premiums now. Hit in that it would allow talented people to change jobs, and even move about the country for those jobs if necessary more easily since they would not have to worry about whether coverage was even available at the new job or location.
But….But… Steve. I believe EVERY thing that Trump Says. and He told me the MEXICANS were going to pay for it. Why are you suggesting that we need MONEY for the wall? Why are you lying to me?
We are now spending more money on health care than any nation on earth, and the World Health Organization rates the quality 37th.
In the America I grew up in, spending more than anyone else for the 37th best result would not have been considered acceptable.
The problem is that you assume that with socialized medicine, cancer medicine will still cost $100,000 a year. It won’t. The for-profit system gouges people unbelievably. And it’s immoral. “Give me your life savings or die” is immoral.
Border walls, where they have been used along the US/Mexico border, have worked quite well in drastically reducing illegal entry. It’s part of a cost-effective solution in some areas but not so much for other areas. In more developed and densely populated areas a wall makes sense. In no-mans land, it’s no longer a cost-effective strategy. Patrols, drones, electronic monitoring, etc. can do the job for far less in certain sections of the border. I’m all for border security but I’m also all for doing it in the most efficient way possible. Fact is, we need more wall/fence installed but we do not need as much as some of the pro-wall people believe. Fund the border patrol and ICE adequately, put structures where they’re needed and be done with it.
The last time the Republicans closed the government, they said we could not afford 3.4 billion for Medicare.
The Republican president has shut down the govt and is holding it hostage demanding 5 billion for his very unpopular wall and the GOP is fine with this.
Right wingers have to be the most disgusting people on earth.
Talk about pouring all of our money down a rat hole…
In FY 2017, the Congressional Budget Office reported spending of $590 billion for defense, about 15% of the federal budget. For the FY 2019 President Donald Trump proposed an increase to the military to $681.1 billion.
Yes, Medicare for All would be expensive. But our current, private system of healthcare finance is even more expensive. The U.S. spends a larger portion of its economy on healthcare than any other nation. Also, if every other first world country in the world, with an economy similar to the American economy, uses Medicare for All, or a single provider system, and isn’t taking any action to remove it, then isn’t this good proof that Medicare for All does work? How can the U.K., and Scandinavia, and France, and Russia, and Canada, and Japan, all afford their national healthcare programs, but we can’t? Can someone answer this question?
It’s a bottomless hole only if Big Pharma and Big Med continue to be allowed to gouge consumers with their insane profit margins to the detriment of the consumer.
I recently read that the DoD has been audited for the first time ever, and it was found that since 1998 the military has spent 21 trillion dollars that they can’t account for, but you want us to believe that giving health care to people who can’t afford it is a waste of money. You sir, are severely lacking in basic human decency. Tell me. Do you think that paying for the orange grifter’s New Years party, that they sold tickets to at $1,000 a pop because it was intended as a profit generating venture was a valid use of our tax dollars?
Uh, a useless border wall is not even remotely equivalent to universal Medicare that would insure healthcare for all citizens. It is far from dumping money down a hole. Unlike that stupid wall.
I do Remember the Nice looking woman on the TV sent there by the Koch brothers to tell me that the ACA won’t work That was the argument. some Blonde woman that repeated 3 or 4 times “It Won’t work” No reasoning, no charts and graphs no caveats just “It won’t Work”
Well It does work It Does Work It does work
… and it works so well the Republicans are lying to us by saying that Thier plan will protect Americans with pre-existing conditions even though THEY HAVE NO PLAN. THEY HAVE NO PLAN. THEY HAVE NO PLAN. That is what is great about having a fantasy plan you can make up what ever you want about it and you can invent the cost as well.
Just Like when Trump said " No one will lose coverage. There will be insurance for everybody. Healthcare will be a “lot less expensive” for everyone.But the Trumpsters have forgotten about that promise
A functioning national healthcare system would significantly expand the economy because it would produce jobs that would last for generations. Healthcare should be seen as a service, not a product.
Daeder over 5 years ago
That’s true. And Medicare for all would save a lot of money.
I’m sure you have a point though, and I’m sure it’s a lie.
DD Wiz Premium Member over 5 years ago
Border walls have never worked. Even Ronald Reagan, for all his other faults, understood that. “Mr Gorbachev, TEAR DOWN THIS WALL.” But TrumpubliCONs who once worshipped Reagan have traded him for another golden calf to worship. They have replaced “Morning in America” with a dark, hateful vision of corruption and greed based on fear, not hope.
In contrast, Medicare for all (single payer) has worked in every country it has ever been tried in. Better health outcomes, zero medical bankruptcies, for a fraction of the cost by CUTTING OUT THE CORPORATE PROFITEERING MIDDLEMEN who contribute NOTHING to actual health care but suck out dollars that could go to actually helping people. NOT ONE COUNTRY THAT HAS GONE TO UNIVERSAL PUBLIC HEALTH CARE has ever repealed it. It’s almost like it works or something.
Even Medicare for the old is a resounding success, and that is for the oldest, sickest segment of the population! Imagine if we expanded it to include the young and the healthy!
Dtroutma over 5 years ago
Medicare for all, regulating medicare drug prices as VA does, adding lots of young people into the program, instead of just we “oldies” who require all the care, would change the actuary and save, again, hugely.
Brian G Premium Member over 5 years ago
one more step in the campaign of disinformation.
Say What Now‽ Premium Member over 5 years ago
If you spend the money on a big useless wall, you have something to show for it. If you spend the money on the general health of the US population, there’s not much to show for it.
thosgpetri Premium Member over 5 years ago
right on bother!!
walfishj over 5 years ago
Once again Republican Troll Steve Kelley gets is wrong by 360 degrees. Isn’t Kelley one of the Republican LIARS who said the ACA would never work? I guess the real question is whether Kelly is working for the Republicans or the Russians?
docrucker Premium Member over 5 years ago
Name one effective border wall. Every other first world nation has public health care.End of argument.
Kilrwat Premium Member over 5 years ago
Imagine all those working people who won’t have to stress about paying for health care. Catastrophe!
Librarylady over 5 years ago
Comparing a wall that doesn’t keep people out to healthcare for all citizens is ludicrous.
https://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2015/sep/01/dan-gecker/dan-gecker-says-us-only-wealth-nation-without-univ/
Nantucket Premium Member over 5 years ago
The ones that make HUGE money off of healthcare will have their profits erode because universal healthcare tends to control costs by eliminating profit and focusing on actually providing care. Preventive medicine does a great job at keeping costs down in the long run. Insurance companies prefer to refuse to cover preventive medicine hoping that the complications that arise from non-treatment won’t happen until the person is covered by Medicare.
An immediate cost savings can happen by controlling pharmaceutical costs. The U.S. pays for a lot of the R & D, and then the companies make obscene profits that have no relation to their actual costs, so the U.S. taxpayer pays TWICE. Look at the cost changes when the meds go generic, so companies try to continue their monopoly on meds by combining two when the copyright is running out. Other tricks are to change the dosage and the method of medication, e.g. time-release formulation.
well-i-never over 5 years ago
Where are all our premiums and $5000 deductibles going now? Into the healthcare system and the for-profit insurance industry with multi-million dollar compensation packages for the upper management!
Where would our taxes for health-care-for-all go? Into the healthcare system with government management. I’ll vote for the health-care-for-all.
trimguy over 5 years ago
God forbid someone I don’t like gets healthcare, like those illegal aliens or some Democrat
Radish the wordsmith over 5 years ago
Nice propaganda.
Ontman over 5 years ago
Yet another Kelley-toon. Only the artwork has been changed.
Radish the wordsmith over 5 years ago
Meanwhile the disgusting Republican president is holding himself hostage in the WH to extort 5 billion from the American tax payer. Trump thinks like a criminal.
Think of all the money being wasted on the govt shut down.
superposition over 5 years ago
And the proof of this assertion is?
I’m willing to listen but the rebuttal seems much more rational.
" … The United States spends twice as much on healthcare as 10 other high-income nations, driven by the high price of everything from prescription drugs to doctors’ salaries, a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds. …"
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/mar/13/us-healthcare-costs-causes-drug-prices-salaries
AndrewSihler over 5 years ago
Is obtuseness in an editorial cartoonist a bug or a feature?
mourdac Premium Member over 5 years ago
Very shortsighted comic, Mr. Kelly. Tell us how the current system is ensuring care for all U.S. citizens. It contains costs because insurers deny coverage to people needing it.
joshbra Premium Member over 5 years ago
Universal Healthcare would be a boon and a hit to large corporations. Boon in that a new tax to help pay for it would still be cheaper than they pay for premiums now. Hit in that it would allow talented people to change jobs, and even move about the country for those jobs if necessary more easily since they would not have to worry about whether coverage was even available at the new job or location.
JHayes over 5 years ago
But….But… Steve. I believe EVERY thing that Trump Says. and He told me the MEXICANS were going to pay for it. Why are you suggesting that we need MONEY for the wall? Why are you lying to me?
Ignatz Premium Member over 5 years ago
We are now spending more money on health care than any nation on earth, and the World Health Organization rates the quality 37th.
In the America I grew up in, spending more than anyone else for the 37th best result would not have been considered acceptable.
The problem is that you assume that with socialized medicine, cancer medicine will still cost $100,000 a year. It won’t. The for-profit system gouges people unbelievably. And it’s immoral. “Give me your life savings or die” is immoral.
guyjen2004 Premium Member over 5 years ago
Border walls, where they have been used along the US/Mexico border, have worked quite well in drastically reducing illegal entry. It’s part of a cost-effective solution in some areas but not so much for other areas. In more developed and densely populated areas a wall makes sense. In no-mans land, it’s no longer a cost-effective strategy. Patrols, drones, electronic monitoring, etc. can do the job for far less in certain sections of the border. I’m all for border security but I’m also all for doing it in the most efficient way possible. Fact is, we need more wall/fence installed but we do not need as much as some of the pro-wall people believe. Fund the border patrol and ICE adequately, put structures where they’re needed and be done with it.
Radish the wordsmith over 5 years ago
The last time the Republicans closed the government, they said we could not afford 3.4 billion for Medicare.
The Republican president has shut down the govt and is holding it hostage demanding 5 billion for his very unpopular wall and the GOP is fine with this.
Right wingers have to be the most disgusting people on earth.
Radish the wordsmith over 5 years ago
Talk about pouring all of our money down a rat hole…
In FY 2017, the Congressional Budget Office reported spending of $590 billion for defense, about 15% of the federal budget. For the FY 2019 President Donald Trump proposed an increase to the military to $681.1 billion.
mr_sherman Premium Member over 5 years ago
Republicans have no compassion.
VadimUzdensky1 over 5 years ago
Yes, Medicare for All would be expensive. But our current, private system of healthcare finance is even more expensive. The U.S. spends a larger portion of its economy on healthcare than any other nation. Also, if every other first world country in the world, with an economy similar to the American economy, uses Medicare for All, or a single provider system, and isn’t taking any action to remove it, then isn’t this good proof that Medicare for All does work? How can the U.K., and Scandinavia, and France, and Russia, and Canada, and Japan, all afford their national healthcare programs, but we can’t? Can someone answer this question?
braindead Premium Member over 5 years ago
SKelley once again shows off the Trump Disciple analysis skills — this time it’s his special medical and financial expertise.
.
And once again: If you want fewer illegals, prosecute those who employ them.
And force the training and hiring of Americans by curtailing H-b1 visas.
Zev over 5 years ago
It’s a bottomless hole only if Big Pharma and Big Med continue to be allowed to gouge consumers with their insane profit margins to the detriment of the consumer.
DrDon1 over 5 years ago
@mourdac — perhaps, besides being short-sighted, Kelley speaks with forked-tongue!
rowena28 Premium Member over 5 years ago
Holy false equivalency, Batman!
walkingmancomics over 5 years ago
Oh, Steve, I hope you never get sick… but sooner or later…
hwolfe22 over 5 years ago
I recently read that the DoD has been audited for the first time ever, and it was found that since 1998 the military has spent 21 trillion dollars that they can’t account for, but you want us to believe that giving health care to people who can’t afford it is a waste of money. You sir, are severely lacking in basic human decency. Tell me. Do you think that paying for the orange grifter’s New Years party, that they sold tickets to at $1,000 a pop because it was intended as a profit generating venture was a valid use of our tax dollars?
Aliquid over 5 years ago
Almost every other developed country manages to handle the cost of medical care for all… sure it isn’t cheap but it can be done.
If the wall was “expensive but it would work”, then this would be a different conversation. But it is overly expensive and won’t work.
Ninjapup over 5 years ago
Uh, a useless border wall is not even remotely equivalent to universal Medicare that would insure healthcare for all citizens. It is far from dumping money down a hole. Unlike that stupid wall.
Dave Ferro over 5 years ago
Great cartoon, Steve!
JHayes over 5 years ago
I do Remember the Nice looking woman on the TV sent there by the Koch brothers to tell me that the ACA won’t work That was the argument. some Blonde woman that repeated 3 or 4 times “It Won’t work” No reasoning, no charts and graphs no caveats just “It won’t Work”
Well It does work It Does Work It does work
… and it works so well the Republicans are lying to us by saying that Thier plan will protect Americans with pre-existing conditions even though THEY HAVE NO PLAN. THEY HAVE NO PLAN. THEY HAVE NO PLAN. That is what is great about having a fantasy plan you can make up what ever you want about it and you can invent the cost as well.
Just Like when Trump said " No one will lose coverage. There will be insurance for everybody. Healthcare will be a “lot less expensive” for everyone.But the Trumpsters have forgotten about that promise
All the dinosaurs feared the T-Rex over 5 years ago
Can someone PLEASE bring back Rob Rogers, this guy is a troll…
ED CANTWELL over 5 years ago
A functioning national healthcare system would significantly expand the economy because it would produce jobs that would last for generations. Healthcare should be seen as a service, not a product.
Pogostiks Premium Member over 5 years ago
DD WIZ: forget it… Kelley is obviously in lala land…or has his own private health care and doesn’t give a damn about anyone else…