I know, Canada is not the US, but up here we think people’s health is too important to leave it to the market and to the greed of CEO’s. The system is not perfect, but it kept my aunt alive after her heart attact even if she was poor.
A doctor you don’t like is better than no doctor at all. If you are wealthy enough to ask that question, then you don’t know jack about the preoccupations of the uninsured people the democrats want to help
Apparently, you don’t know who these people are either. A little over 10 million of these uninsured people are illegal immigrants. Another 18 million are those who live in households with income above $50,000 annually, this means they could afford health care but choose not to.
This is a vote getting scam by the Democrats to play on your sympathies and a ploy to nationalize an industry that is 16% of our GDP.
Bob, Your comment is misleading and specious. A: You’re making a lot of assumptions about how it might be set up, and B:Almost 50 MILLION Americans don’t have access even to bottom-of-the-barrel incompetent docs, which ends up overburdening the ER’s and costs the hospitals and us taxpayers boatloads of money more than having a decent system in the first place. America used to take pride in ‘taking care of our own’, the current non-system is just stupid, short-sighted bullshit. It’s MUCH cheaper to do the minor maintenance than let things get to the ER/crisis stage. If a national health plan oversaw the poor and working class, the damned insurance companies could still duke it out cherry-picking the wealthy and rich the way they’re trying to do now. And BTW, I earned my nursing degree in 1988 and spent almost a decade working in Los Angeles alone.
I’m not making any misleading comments farwestgirl. A little over 28 million of these 47 million uninsured people aren’t legally able to or simply don’t want/need health insurance. The numbers don’t lie.
‘Lies, bleeep lies and statistics.’. I dispute your numbers and I’d love to know where you’re getting them. And numbers in general and their interpretation can be fudged, finessed and flat out faked. I didn’t do great in calculus, but statistics was a breeze. I’d love to have health insurance, as would many of the people I know and have known for the past 20 years. I wouldn’t be applying for disability if I could get my bleeeped knees fixed and get back out in the units. Simple surgeries, but without a way to get them done, I’m out of the game.
People making $50K/yr are losing houses and jobs right. left and center, and not ALL of them are irresponsible speculators. Health insurance for a family of four can easily run $12K/year, that’s 25% of the GROSS income that you’re pointing at, IF they’re all reasonable healthy. And again, if the single payer system only covered the middle and low income people the insurance companies could still compete for the high rollers that are the ones they really want anyway, leaving our GNP at worst unchanged, but in reality would inject extra billions for the first 5 or 6 years, as people caught up on all the things that should have been done that they haven’t been able to afford. The scam is the republicans don’t give a bleeep about anyone but themselves and are lying for any number of reasons. Arecent study showed that 63% of American physicians now support some form of socialized medicine in this country.
Who, beside the government, would insure, let’s say, a 61-yo man with a heart disease and a 56 yo woman with diabetes and arthritis (ie, my parents)? If we had to pay for their care, it would simply be easier to let them die and bury them!
ConservativeBob, I’ve never seen such a lack of compassion. You are both a racist and an elitist. Actually, I almost admire it because you really must be trying very hard to act like such a jerk.
By the way, it’s not that hard to get to a specialist here, I’ll explain.
First, every province has its own healthcare system. In New-Brunswick (about 800 000 habitants), you get to choose your family doctor, in a clinic, you call for an appointment and, most of the time, get it in the same week.
The province is divided in ten health autorities, each one covering about 75 000 peoples. Each health authority has a regional general hospital and several minor hospitals in smaller towns that take care of small stuff like stitches, broken bones, minor surgeries, medical imaging (x-rays CT Scans, MRIs and ultrasounds)…some have maternity wards (for natural births. For a c-section, you are transfered by (free) ambulance to the regional hospital.)
Unless you’re really trying, you can’t be more than a one-hour drive from the nearest regional hospital. They take care of more complicated surgeries like hysteractomies, organ transplants, c-section deliveries, mild heart attacks (those that don’t need surgery). There are specialized hospital in bigger cities; a major psychiatric hospital in Campbellton, Cardiology centers in Saint-John and Moncton-civic and an oncology center in Moncton-Dumont (I did volunteer work there! :D).
You have to ask your family doctor to get an appointment with a specialist, most of them have their offices in or near the regional hospital. If there is more than one available, you can choose; a pregnant woman can choose her obgyn, and my dad, who doesn’t speak a word of english (this province is 60% english, 40% french) got a french-speaking cardiologist.
And here’s the kicker; for over the top, big time, move-your-butt emergencies, like for instance when my aunt had her heart attack, you can be transfered by helicopter (and that’s free, too!). By road it would have taken three or four hours to take her to the cardiology center in Saint-John. It took 15 minutes with the chopper and my aunt is still alive.
The bureaucracy, that McCain is so afraid of, is very discrete. You never even know how your open-heart surgery, x-ray, cast or delivery cost. First, they take care of you and after that, a medical secretary or nurse fills the paperwork
Well, that’s how it works in tiny NB but Maine, or Connecticut, or Nevada, or Florida or…(insert US state here) is not New-Brunswick and what works here might not go so well there.
Here’s the Acadie-Bathurst health authority, for example (one of the poorest regions in Canada, and still…)
http://www.santeacadie-bathursthealth.ca/
Ok fine, you think numbers can be fudged and on that I’ll agree with you so instead of throwing links to my numbers at you I’ll try to show why UHC is a bad idea instead. Here’s a helpful link showing the basics showing both pros and cons of UHC (pay attention to 12 on the NO side):
You have to put underscores between the worlds “universal” “health” and “care” for this link to work. For whatever reason putting an underscore italicizes words on this forum.
“The scam is the republicans don’t give a bleeep about anyone but themselves and are lying for any number of reasons.”
To insinuate that the Republicans don’t care about people is absolutely ridiculous and a downright lie. That sounds like blind hatred and honestly, we are ALL better than that.
“Arecent study showed that 63% of American physicians now support some form of socialized medicine in this country.”
Well of course they do! That means they’ll get paid by the government to provide substandard medical care. Much like the teacher’s unions do with teaching now. Also, don’t give me numbers without a source if you call me on that same thing. I thought numbers could be fudged anyhow? No more statistics lets try to argue the idea of UHC instead.
Bob, Okay(snort), I guess we’re going to find out if there are size limits on posts, here(grin).
1) Define ‘efficient’. And then go to ‘acceptable’. One of the big reasons there is so much inefficiency is because we allow lobbyists to write so much of the text of laws these days, putting in innumerable, convoluted gimme’s to special interests. This should be dealt with by restricting vested interests’ input and looking at conflicts of interest more clearly.
2) No kidding, there’s no free lunch, it all comes from somewhere. But, we’re paying defaulted debt on emergency healthcare now out of taxes, it’s much more efficient to maintain decent healthcare than it is to to crisis intervention, that was the tip of the sword that the HMO’s used to get leverage to get into the market. Investment in maintenance does pay dividends in overall health and save money.
3) As a blanket statement, BS. Competition and bidding can have positive effects, but profit alone is an incentive to cut corners and form cartels which collude to price fix. One of Karl Marx’s biggest mistakes was to try and define everything in terms of ‘mode of production’, pure capitalists do the same thing in terms of profit and their God, the free market. Both approaches discount the human element and devalue any aspect of life and living that can’t be quantified with a dollar sign,( or whatever your currency is).
4) If it was truely universal insurance, possibly, but balance that lack of flexibility with the frank lack of care that now exists.
5) There’s no reason to believe that there wouldn’ t be reasonable restrictions/choices built into the system to deal with hypochondriacs, etc, ( we call them PITA patients, too). And drug costs would go down significantly for the same reason folks cross over to Canada to buy their meds, volume buying lowers per unit cost.
6) It is not illegal to refuse followup care, or care for non life threatening chronic conditions which increases periodic exacerbations of those conditions. It condemns many, many people to chronic ill health for things that are not particularly expensive to manage properly. It condemns a significant number of American citizens to a miserable quality of life through no fault of their own. We’re not talking about substance abusers who refuse to get treatment, we’re talking about families who can’t afford to take their kids to the dentisns of the richest country in the world, they ought to be entitled to some personal benefit from the taxes they pay and compensation for all the things that corporations shear off of us sheep and try to play keep away with.
I notice a lot of the assertions are theoretical, ‘it could’, ‘it might’, and all of those are manageable with some attention and good sense, ( admittedly in short supply in most places). This looks like an insurance company sponsered site that’s trying to scare people into holding still for the next shearing.
There apparently is a size limit, it only got as far as 6 ( sigh)
7) As opposed to the utter lack of patient care for significant portions of the country now?
8) Again, they don’t now?
9) As opposed to the long, painful lack of any, much less adequate care we are now experiencing. Those workers might, (gasp) lose their health insurance? I’m sure that at least some of the people in the insurance industry are bright enough to be retrained into other jobs. Some of them might even open their own businesses and contribute to the GNP.
10) The ones who go into it for those reasons are often the ones we’d rather weed out anyway, trust me.
11) You don’t think the government knows the trial lawyers are out there? I’m pretty sure there’d be restrictions in place to prevent that problem. In fact malpractice insurance (upwards of $250K/ year for many physicians) would probably drop precipitously, offereing a net savings and an offset that could be applied elsewhere.
12) The insurance companies are already adjusting premiums with these factors, what’s the diff?
13) True. And as citizens of the richest country in the world, how dare they presume to feel any sort of entitlement to a decent return on their taxes or some compensation for all that the corporations shear off of us as fast as they can and try desperately to play keep away with.
Yeah, listen to the conservatives! It’s OK to spend a million dollars a day dropping bombs on people with dark skin, but God forbid we spend a million dollars a year providing even the most basic, bare bones health care for poor immigrants fleeing an economy that the US helped destroy by decades of interference in Latin America.
By the way, illegal immigrants do not exploit these services like the conservatives and fanatics like Lou Dobbs say. And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.
“Yeah, listen to the conservatives! It’s OK to spend a million dollars a day dropping bombs on people with dark skin”
As I do recall, Clinton also dropped bombs on “people with dark skin” too in fact, he also dropped bombs on people with white skin! Stop pretending that Democrats never started a war or even that war is unneccesary when the facts prove otherwise.
“And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.”
If they need OUR healthcare then perhaps they should become citizens. Why don’t you look up how the Mexicans cross the border every day and go to hospitals for emergencies before you say they don’t abuse our system.
Also, It was nice that you tried to paint me as some fanatical Christian. You do know that not EVERY conservative or Republican is a Christian right? Too suggest that all right wingers are Christians is complete bigotry and you look like a fool for saying it.
Where did I paint YOU as a Christian? I didn’t. As a conservative, however, your party says America was founded to be a Christian nation and wants to spread Christianity, many want to spread it militantly. So I guess religion is relevant.
By the way, how was what I said (about Jesus wanting to help the poor regardless of country of origin) defined as “fanatical Christian”? That’s Jesus’ basic teaching! And it’s simple logic and humane behavior, too. There is nothing fanatical about it.
What makes you think I’m a democrat? Bill Clinton was a conservative who called himself a democrat. He was NOT progressive or liberal. But we’re not talking about Clinton are we? We’re talking about the conservative desire to bomb the world into submission in order to privatize it, take it’s resources, prop up our dollar, etc, at the expense of the poor of all countries (including Latin America).
Oh yeah, I forgot, whenever conservatives are on the losing end of an argument they have to bring up Bill Clinton (which is why they bring him up constantly).
FYI- the democratic party (with the exception of a very few) is not progressive or liberal.
Again- people getting emergency medical care is “abuse” to you? Seriously man, I can’t understand why conservatives want to turn away people who NEED healthcare based on what country they were born in. That is cruel.
And the “abuse” you cite PALES in comparison to your party’s corruption, fraud, waste, and crime. Why aren’t you concerned with that? Why do you support it? I think I know the answer.
To even define people getting needed healthcare as “abuse” is pretty telling that there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative.
And you fail to absorb the obvious point (not surprising since you’re a conservative)- that point was that we spend FAR more on CREATING military problems that we then need to spend billions to “solve” when we could be spending much less money on giving everyone (even those dark skinned people most conservatives are so afraid of) healthcare.
Actually, I hope you don’t continue your debate over email, ConservativeBob and FarWestGirl. I’m enjoying it, especially the outsider vs. insider aspect of it. I think you can tell who’s read about it and who’s lived it.
Well after I was talking about not giving Health care to illegal immigrants you said:
“And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.”
Why would you throw Jesus into a conversation with a conservative and mockingly add that he wouldn’t like something a conservative thinks? It’s pretty clear you got caught so stop denying it and move on. (not in that moveon.org way either.)
“What makes you think I’m a democrat? Bill Clinton was a conservative who called himself a democrat.”
I didn’t say you were a Democrat. You said that Republicans want to bomb dark people and I pointed a Democrat that did the same exact thing. Clinton, by the way was center-left, not a conservative.
“Oh yeah, I forgot, whenever conservatives are on the losing end of an argument they have to bring up Bill Clinton”
I’m not too sure what argument I’m “losing” since we’ve only went back and forth once. I didn’t “throw” Clinton into anything. He just happened to be the Democrat that bombed the same people the Republicans. If you are going to claim victory after one post you have no idea what a debate is. It’s a bit immature as well.
Again- people getting emergency medical care is “abuse” to you? Seriously man, I can’t understand why conservatives want to turn away people who NEED healthcare based on what country they were born in. That is cruel.
“And the “abuse” you cite PALES in comparison to your party’s corruption, fraud, waste, and crime. Why aren’t you concerned with that? Why do you support it? I think I know the answer.”
Crossing the border illegally to receive health care on the tab of another nation IS abuse. Can I come over to your house and eat your food then go back home without asking you? Afterall I was hungry and to deny food to a hungry person is wrong as well right?
Also, there is not a Conservative party so I’m not sure where you get all this “corruption” rubbish from. You made great pains to mention that not all Democrats are liberal, did you forget that not all Republicans are conservative? Think before you post please, your contradicting yourself.
“To even define people getting needed healthcare as “abuse” is pretty telling that there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative.”
We don’t pay our taxes to provide healthcare for people that aren’t citizens. It isn’t “cruel”. You think that would be fair to let people that aren’t citizens of our country to use OUR tax money? Please explain how it would be.
“And you fail to absorb the obvious point (not surprising since you’re a conservative”
If you’re going to start insulting me instead of debate then I’m not even going to bother with you. I have made a call for more civility on this forum and I extend that to you as well. There is not reason to insult me just because you disagree. I’m not doing that to anyone.
“yes, bob, how crazy of me to imply that a nation that bans a certain kind of people froma certain place is anywhere near racist”
Please cite the laws and Politicians that advocate banning a certain group of people from certain places that want to become citizens of the United States of America. They don’t want people to come into this country ILLEGALLY that is completely different and in fact the right of our country. You are race baiting and making clear LIES. I question whether you are actually serious or just trolling to get some kicks.
-Handrew
I would be more than happy to email you the discussion should it happen via email. I’m waiting on her reply and if she doesn’t want to debate it via email I’ll post it here instead.
“Up here, illegal immigrants don’t have free healthcare if they don’t have citizenship. I think FarWestGirl defends free healthcare for US citizens”
You don’t have illegal immigrants crossing into your country everyday like America does. If Canada had a border with Mexico you could bet your prescription drugs that they sure would be!
I explained why I mentioned Jesus. Fathom it. It’s relevant. Move on.
Again, Clinton was very conservative. He was NOT left of center at all. A quick look at his governing while in office can tell you that much. YOU brought up Clinton as an example of the left, or something opposite conservatives when I said CONSERVATIVE policy leads us to drop bombs on people. Clinton is NOT an example of the left. Clinton was Conservative!
Conservative policy is VERY destructive. When you support republican candidates, you support this conservative policy. You can’t name many conservatives who have opposed the Bush/Cheney/neo-con regime. And you cannot tell me that the right-wing media didn’t support it either. So, if we’re going by sheer numbers, the right supports conservative policy.
I was responding to your response to me. You clearly could not respond to my points. Therefor you fell back on “blame Clinton” (or let’s include Clinton) as if that is somehow relevant in any way to what we’re discussing (which it isn’t). You were trying to say the “left” is equally guilty. We’ve not had any “left” elected officials in office in some time. So- You still cannot back up your points. Your arguments are not logical. You fell back on the “balme Clinton” argument, which is totally illogical.
If crossing the border to obtain medical care after we’ve helped ruin their economy is abuse then what was us ruining their economy? That wasn’t abuse? Now denying them help while they deal with the aftermath is acceptable to you? Do you have ANY education in Latin American affairs? Do you have any idea how much the US has interfered and helped to destabilize all Latin American countries? Stop supporting that policy and then you won’t have to deal with the Latinos conservatives object to so much coming here for needed health care. Is it that difficult to comprehend? Again, to deny people healthcare, whose economy you helped ruin (“you” as in your country and the policy conservatives support by voting conservative), is barbaric and cruel.
I never said there was a conservative party. Conservatives generally support republicans, however.
I already explained why its cruel to deny people healthcare. And why it’s asinine to think we aren’t responsible for the plight of many Latin Americans. But if you don’t get why it’s cruel to deny people healthcare, then that explains why you’re conservative.
C Bob, since the moderators haven’t asked us to leave I’m inclined to leave it in the open forum for the same reason that binocular vision is the most common body plan on the planet- perspective requires a minimum of two points of view, and in general, more POV’s= greater understanding of the issue.
I was actually talking about healthcare for US citizens and I don’t want to get too far afield,(faint hope),but I could make the case that offering emergency care to illegals is both foreign/humanitarian aid and a good investment since many if not most of those illegals pick our food, build stuff and pick up after us. Foriegn aid is an investment that pays massive dividends, if we hadn’t cut off much of the aid to poor muslim countries, the madrassas would never have gotten a foothold and the Taliban, etc would have been drowned out in relative prosperity. Yes, bribery is hard to swallow, but used properly, it’s darned effective.
A number of people have been making assumptions and jumping to conclusions, I’m with C Bob on the civility issue and staying on stated points, not assuming that ‘all cats are toms because all toms are cats’.
Somalia was a mess, but I was actually in favor of strategic bombing in Bosnia. If I had been asked, I would have proposed two bombing runs, ( alright, I’m biased, my grandfather flew B-24’s in WWII), the first carpet bombing a military site of the massing Serbs, and the second with leaflets saying, ‘We can talk or we can fight, talking’s easier.’ If someone had taken THAT pre-emptive action while Europe was wringing its hands and denying anything was happening, (just like WWII), the ‘ethnic cleansing’ wouldn’t have been able to get any momentum.
Ok farwestgirl I’ll answer here. I won’t go point for point because that would be long and tedious. I’ll just list why I oppose universal health care and you can decide if my argument has any validity. Of course, I will want to here your rebuttal as well and perhaps I can different learn view. A huge misconception with a couple people on this board is that they think they are always right and that everyone else thinks that they are right as well. I’m not politican, I don’t have all the answers, I’m always willing to be proved wrong so that I can learn and become a better person for that. “May the best idea win” I say.
Government cannot overcome the laws of economics. Supply and demand is what sets prices, quantity of goods (in this case doctors, nurses, etc.) and quality best not government. When you promise something for free, you run out of supply since people will use the free service whether they really need it or not. (going to the emergency room for a non-emergency.) UHC would also put your healthcare in the hands of a bureaucrat instead of the hospital. Europe and Canada already have long waits for elective surgery because of this and only a minimal lower cost as a whole than the U.S. We also have hundreds of millions more people than the other Western countries do and our tax rate would have to be higher than the Europeans to cover all of the people in our country and their tax rate is already almost 50% in some countries. Therefore a government takeover that offers unlimited healthcare for over 300 million people couldn’t possibly work without overtaxing the already abused American taxpayer. It is a noble idea don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to help people…but it’s just not fesible.
We need to improve health care, not make it an endless bureaucracy. If the government would only allow healthcare to be run like the free market runs things (ie: competition) then we would all be better off. When companies have to compete against each other they lower their prices and improve their quality in order to get more customers, this would be the same for healthcare.
Here’s an example of what happens when only one company owns the entire industry:
For almost a century AT&T was the only phone company in the entire United States until it was broken up in 1984. The only inovation that came out from the beginning of telephones to then was touch-tone dialing and that fancy french handled doodad that fancy people used…maybe even a different color phone if you were lucky. After the government busted up their monopoly you had call waiting, and caller id, and portable phones, and answering machines and different long distance plans and all the wonderful things you can do today with a phone in order to get you to go with one phone company over the other. Competition breeds inovation while monopoly stiffles it.
Just because the government is not a company doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have a monopoly. This will soon mean long wait for basic surgeries, doctors becoming government employes, and bureaucrats more worried about how they will make their governmentally funded budget instead of keeping people healthy.
If the government is in charge of your healthcare that means that they can make laws in order to stop you from doing what they considered bad for your health. Do you smoke? Not anymore if the government wills that it’s too dangerous to smoke. Do you eat fast food? Well that’s unhealthy and your food choice means more hospital bills that the government has to pay for so you better not do it anymore. You are also unable to choose your doctor and will have to go to the hospital appointed to your in your district. You don’t like the doctor there? Then move, otherwise you’re stuck with him. Plus, since the government will be paying all doctors (and government pay is NEVER higher than private industry) you’ll see thousands of talented people looking elsewhere for jobs that pay more money. Perhaps they’ll become lawyers to sue the government for all the low-quality healthcare they provide from the lack of talented doctor.
Here’s another article you should read that I think is also a pretty good argument against UHC. Feel free to provide links to me expressing the opposite opinion as well.
jeez, bob, are you THAT scared of talking about race?
You seem like a smart guy, you must know that there are quite a load of americans who would rather the world be white, christian and straight.
There’s no denying that it is your country, but you might wanna change that part where you aknowledge a human being’s unalienable right to pursue happiness if you don’t wan’t “Illegal Aliens” coming on to your land.
Besides, “Illegal Aliens”? What is this, East Berlin?
“jeez, bob, are you THAT scared of talking about race?”
I’m not afraid to talk about anything but it’s clear that you are just posting hateful nonsense to get a rise out of me and I’m not falling for it. You have consistently trolled this forum with nothing but race-baiting jibberish and outright lies. You have a hatred for white people and Americans…it’s quite obvious.
maxxed2 over 15 years ago
Or we could just go on with the guys that are making a huge profit on sickness and then deny health care when something REALLY goes wrong with us.
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 15 years ago
I know, Canada is not the US, but up here we think people’s health is too important to leave it to the market and to the greed of CEO’s. The system is not perfect, but it kept my aunt alive after her heart attact even if she was poor.
charliekane over 15 years ago
To paraphrase BHO:
In the GOP’s ownershop society, you’re on your own.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
The “uninsured” character won’t be saying that when he doesn’t like the doctor the government appoints him and isn’t able to change it.
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 15 years ago
A doctor you don’t like is better than no doctor at all. If you are wealthy enough to ask that question, then you don’t know jack about the preoccupations of the uninsured people the democrats want to help
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
Apparently, you don’t know who these people are either. A little over 10 million of these uninsured people are illegal immigrants. Another 18 million are those who live in households with income above $50,000 annually, this means they could afford health care but choose not to.
This is a vote getting scam by the Democrats to play on your sympathies and a ploy to nationalize an industry that is 16% of our GDP.
FarWestGirl over 15 years ago
Bob, Your comment is misleading and specious. A: You’re making a lot of assumptions about how it might be set up, and B:Almost 50 MILLION Americans don’t have access even to bottom-of-the-barrel incompetent docs, which ends up overburdening the ER’s and costs the hospitals and us taxpayers boatloads of money more than having a decent system in the first place. America used to take pride in ‘taking care of our own’, the current non-system is just stupid, short-sighted bullshit. It’s MUCH cheaper to do the minor maintenance than let things get to the ER/crisis stage. If a national health plan oversaw the poor and working class, the damned insurance companies could still duke it out cherry-picking the wealthy and rich the way they’re trying to do now. And BTW, I earned my nursing degree in 1988 and spent almost a decade working in Los Angeles alone.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
I’m not making any misleading comments farwestgirl. A little over 28 million of these 47 million uninsured people aren’t legally able to or simply don’t want/need health insurance. The numbers don’t lie.
FarWestGirl over 15 years ago
‘Lies, bleeep lies and statistics.’. I dispute your numbers and I’d love to know where you’re getting them. And numbers in general and their interpretation can be fudged, finessed and flat out faked. I didn’t do great in calculus, but statistics was a breeze. I’d love to have health insurance, as would many of the people I know and have known for the past 20 years. I wouldn’t be applying for disability if I could get my bleeeped knees fixed and get back out in the units. Simple surgeries, but without a way to get them done, I’m out of the game. People making $50K/yr are losing houses and jobs right. left and center, and not ALL of them are irresponsible speculators. Health insurance for a family of four can easily run $12K/year, that’s 25% of the GROSS income that you’re pointing at, IF they’re all reasonable healthy. And again, if the single payer system only covered the middle and low income people the insurance companies could still compete for the high rollers that are the ones they really want anyway, leaving our GNP at worst unchanged, but in reality would inject extra billions for the first 5 or 6 years, as people caught up on all the things that should have been done that they haven’t been able to afford. The scam is the republicans don’t give a bleeep about anyone but themselves and are lying for any number of reasons. Arecent study showed that 63% of American physicians now support some form of socialized medicine in this country.
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 15 years ago
Who, beside the government, would insure, let’s say, a 61-yo man with a heart disease and a 56 yo woman with diabetes and arthritis (ie, my parents)? If we had to pay for their care, it would simply be easier to let them die and bury them!
ConservativeBob, I’ve never seen such a lack of compassion. You are both a racist and an elitist. Actually, I almost admire it because you really must be trying very hard to act like such a jerk.
By the way, it’s not that hard to get to a specialist here, I’ll explain.
First, every province has its own healthcare system. In New-Brunswick (about 800 000 habitants), you get to choose your family doctor, in a clinic, you call for an appointment and, most of the time, get it in the same week.
The province is divided in ten health autorities, each one covering about 75 000 peoples. Each health authority has a regional general hospital and several minor hospitals in smaller towns that take care of small stuff like stitches, broken bones, minor surgeries, medical imaging (x-rays CT Scans, MRIs and ultrasounds)…some have maternity wards (for natural births. For a c-section, you are transfered by (free) ambulance to the regional hospital.)
Unless you’re really trying, you can’t be more than a one-hour drive from the nearest regional hospital. They take care of more complicated surgeries like hysteractomies, organ transplants, c-section deliveries, mild heart attacks (those that don’t need surgery). There are specialized hospital in bigger cities; a major psychiatric hospital in Campbellton, Cardiology centers in Saint-John and Moncton-civic and an oncology center in Moncton-Dumont (I did volunteer work there! :D). You have to ask your family doctor to get an appointment with a specialist, most of them have their offices in or near the regional hospital. If there is more than one available, you can choose; a pregnant woman can choose her obgyn, and my dad, who doesn’t speak a word of english (this province is 60% english, 40% french) got a french-speaking cardiologist. And here’s the kicker; for over the top, big time, move-your-butt emergencies, like for instance when my aunt had her heart attack, you can be transfered by helicopter (and that’s free, too!). By road it would have taken three or four hours to take her to the cardiology center in Saint-John. It took 15 minutes with the chopper and my aunt is still alive. The bureaucracy, that McCain is so afraid of, is very discrete. You never even know how your open-heart surgery, x-ray, cast or delivery cost. First, they take care of you and after that, a medical secretary or nurse fills the paperwork
Well, that’s how it works in tiny NB but Maine, or Connecticut, or Nevada, or Florida or…(insert US state here) is not New-Brunswick and what works here might not go so well there.
Here’s the Acadie-Bathurst health authority, for example (one of the poorest regions in Canada, and still…) http://www.santeacadie-bathursthealth.ca/
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
Ok fine, you think numbers can be fudged and on that I’ll agree with you so instead of throwing links to my numbers at you I’ll try to show why UHC is a bad idea instead. Here’s a helpful link showing the basics showing both pros and cons of UHC (pay attention to 12 on the NO side):
http://www.balancedpolitics.org/universalhealthcare.htm
You have to put underscores between the worlds “universal” “health” and “care” for this link to work. For whatever reason putting an underscore italicizes words on this forum.
“The scam is the republicans don’t give a bleeep about anyone but themselves and are lying for any number of reasons.”
To insinuate that the Republicans don’t care about people is absolutely ridiculous and a downright lie. That sounds like blind hatred and honestly, we are ALL better than that.
“Arecent study showed that 63% of American physicians now support some form of socialized medicine in this country.”
Well of course they do! That means they’ll get paid by the government to provide substandard medical care. Much like the teacher’s unions do with teaching now. Also, don’t give me numbers without a source if you call me on that same thing. I thought numbers could be fudged anyhow? No more statistics lets try to argue the idea of UHC instead.
MexicanCommunist over 15 years ago
Yes, listen to bob! Democrats want to give insurance to MEXICANS!!!! run!!
FarWestGirl over 15 years ago
Bob, Okay(snort), I guess we’re going to find out if there are size limits on posts, here(grin). 1) Define ‘efficient’. And then go to ‘acceptable’. One of the big reasons there is so much inefficiency is because we allow lobbyists to write so much of the text of laws these days, putting in innumerable, convoluted gimme’s to special interests. This should be dealt with by restricting vested interests’ input and looking at conflicts of interest more clearly. 2) No kidding, there’s no free lunch, it all comes from somewhere. But, we’re paying defaulted debt on emergency healthcare now out of taxes, it’s much more efficient to maintain decent healthcare than it is to to crisis intervention, that was the tip of the sword that the HMO’s used to get leverage to get into the market. Investment in maintenance does pay dividends in overall health and save money. 3) As a blanket statement, BS. Competition and bidding can have positive effects, but profit alone is an incentive to cut corners and form cartels which collude to price fix. One of Karl Marx’s biggest mistakes was to try and define everything in terms of ‘mode of production’, pure capitalists do the same thing in terms of profit and their God, the free market. Both approaches discount the human element and devalue any aspect of life and living that can’t be quantified with a dollar sign,( or whatever your currency is). 4) If it was truely universal insurance, possibly, but balance that lack of flexibility with the frank lack of care that now exists. 5) There’s no reason to believe that there wouldn’ t be reasonable restrictions/choices built into the system to deal with hypochondriacs, etc, ( we call them PITA patients, too). And drug costs would go down significantly for the same reason folks cross over to Canada to buy their meds, volume buying lowers per unit cost. 6) It is not illegal to refuse followup care, or care for non life threatening chronic conditions which increases periodic exacerbations of those conditions. It condemns many, many people to chronic ill health for things that are not particularly expensive to manage properly. It condemns a significant number of American citizens to a miserable quality of life through no fault of their own. We’re not talking about substance abusers who refuse to get treatment, we’re talking about families who can’t afford to take their kids to the dentisns of the richest country in the world, they ought to be entitled to some personal benefit from the taxes they pay and compensation for all the things that corporations shear off of us sheep and try to play keep away with.
I notice a lot of the assertions are theoretical, ‘it could’, ‘it might’, and all of those are manageable with some attention and good sense, ( admittedly in short supply in most places). This looks like an insurance company sponsered site that’s trying to scare people into holding still for the next shearing.
FarWestGirl over 15 years ago
There apparently is a size limit, it only got as far as 6 ( sigh)
7) As opposed to the utter lack of patient care for significant portions of the country now? 8) Again, they don’t now? 9) As opposed to the long, painful lack of any, much less adequate care we are now experiencing. Those workers might, (gasp) lose their health insurance? I’m sure that at least some of the people in the insurance industry are bright enough to be retrained into other jobs. Some of them might even open their own businesses and contribute to the GNP. 10) The ones who go into it for those reasons are often the ones we’d rather weed out anyway, trust me. 11) You don’t think the government knows the trial lawyers are out there? I’m pretty sure there’d be restrictions in place to prevent that problem. In fact malpractice insurance (upwards of $250K/ year for many physicians) would probably drop precipitously, offereing a net savings and an offset that could be applied elsewhere. 12) The insurance companies are already adjusting premiums with these factors, what’s the diff? 13) True. And as citizens of the richest country in the world, how dare they presume to feel any sort of entitlement to a decent return on their taxes or some compensation for all that the corporations shear off of us as fast as they can and try desperately to play keep away with.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“Yes, listen to bob! Democrats want to give insurance to MEXICANS!!!! run!!”
Yes, ILLEGAL Mexicans. Big difference. Stop crying racism every chance you get.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
Farwestgirl this is going to eat up the gocomics site entirely. Perhaps we can continue this debate through email?
CorosiveFrog Premium Member over 15 years ago
Up here, illegal immigrants don’t have free healthcare if they don’t have citizenship. I think FarWestGirl defends free healthcare for US citizens
spacecrawler over 15 years ago
Yeah, listen to the conservatives! It’s OK to spend a million dollars a day dropping bombs on people with dark skin, but God forbid we spend a million dollars a year providing even the most basic, bare bones health care for poor immigrants fleeing an economy that the US helped destroy by decades of interference in Latin America.
By the way, illegal immigrants do not exploit these services like the conservatives and fanatics like Lou Dobbs say. And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“Yeah, listen to the conservatives! It’s OK to spend a million dollars a day dropping bombs on people with dark skin”
As I do recall, Clinton also dropped bombs on “people with dark skin” too in fact, he also dropped bombs on people with white skin! Stop pretending that Democrats never started a war or even that war is unneccesary when the facts prove otherwise.
“And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.”
If they need OUR healthcare then perhaps they should become citizens. Why don’t you look up how the Mexicans cross the border every day and go to hospitals for emergencies before you say they don’t abuse our system.
Also, It was nice that you tried to paint me as some fanatical Christian. You do know that not EVERY conservative or Republican is a Christian right? Too suggest that all right wingers are Christians is complete bigotry and you look like a fool for saying it.
Alexus_The_Great over 15 years ago
Bob, Not all christians are fanatics, and not all christians are conservatives.
If you are going to live your life up to the Gospels, you need to be a little revolutionary…
spacecrawler over 15 years ago
Conservative Bob,
Where did I paint YOU as a Christian? I didn’t. As a conservative, however, your party says America was founded to be a Christian nation and wants to spread Christianity, many want to spread it militantly. So I guess religion is relevant.
By the way, how was what I said (about Jesus wanting to help the poor regardless of country of origin) defined as “fanatical Christian”? That’s Jesus’ basic teaching! And it’s simple logic and humane behavior, too. There is nothing fanatical about it.
What makes you think I’m a democrat? Bill Clinton was a conservative who called himself a democrat. He was NOT progressive or liberal. But we’re not talking about Clinton are we? We’re talking about the conservative desire to bomb the world into submission in order to privatize it, take it’s resources, prop up our dollar, etc, at the expense of the poor of all countries (including Latin America).
Oh yeah, I forgot, whenever conservatives are on the losing end of an argument they have to bring up Bill Clinton (which is why they bring him up constantly).
FYI- the democratic party (with the exception of a very few) is not progressive or liberal.
Again- people getting emergency medical care is “abuse” to you? Seriously man, I can’t understand why conservatives want to turn away people who NEED healthcare based on what country they were born in. That is cruel.
And the “abuse” you cite PALES in comparison to your party’s corruption, fraud, waste, and crime. Why aren’t you concerned with that? Why do you support it? I think I know the answer.
To even define people getting needed healthcare as “abuse” is pretty telling that there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative.
And you fail to absorb the obvious point (not surprising since you’re a conservative)- that point was that we spend FAR more on CREATING military problems that we then need to spend billions to “solve” when we could be spending much less money on giving everyone (even those dark skinned people most conservatives are so afraid of) healthcare.
Handrew over 15 years ago
Actually, I hope you don’t continue your debate over email, ConservativeBob and FarWestGirl. I’m enjoying it, especially the outsider vs. insider aspect of it. I think you can tell who’s read about it and who’s lived it.
MexicanCommunist over 15 years ago
yes, bob, how crazy of me to imply that a nation that bans a certain kind of people froma certain place is anywhere near racist
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“Where did I paint YOU as a Christian?”
Well after I was talking about not giving Health care to illegal immigrants you said:
“And if they did need health care, you’re saying you’d deny that? Jesus wouldn’t like that.”
Why would you throw Jesus into a conversation with a conservative and mockingly add that he wouldn’t like something a conservative thinks? It’s pretty clear you got caught so stop denying it and move on. (not in that moveon.org way either.)
“What makes you think I’m a democrat? Bill Clinton was a conservative who called himself a democrat.”
I didn’t say you were a Democrat. You said that Republicans want to bomb dark people and I pointed a Democrat that did the same exact thing. Clinton, by the way was center-left, not a conservative.
“Oh yeah, I forgot, whenever conservatives are on the losing end of an argument they have to bring up Bill Clinton”
I’m not too sure what argument I’m “losing” since we’ve only went back and forth once. I didn’t “throw” Clinton into anything. He just happened to be the Democrat that bombed the same people the Republicans. If you are going to claim victory after one post you have no idea what a debate is. It’s a bit immature as well.
Again- people getting emergency medical care is “abuse” to you? Seriously man, I can’t understand why conservatives want to turn away people who NEED healthcare based on what country they were born in. That is cruel.
“And the “abuse” you cite PALES in comparison to your party’s corruption, fraud, waste, and crime. Why aren’t you concerned with that? Why do you support it? I think I know the answer.”
Crossing the border illegally to receive health care on the tab of another nation IS abuse. Can I come over to your house and eat your food then go back home without asking you? Afterall I was hungry and to deny food to a hungry person is wrong as well right?
Also, there is not a Conservative party so I’m not sure where you get all this “corruption” rubbish from. You made great pains to mention that not all Democrats are liberal, did you forget that not all Republicans are conservative? Think before you post please, your contradicting yourself.
“To even define people getting needed healthcare as “abuse” is pretty telling that there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative.”
We don’t pay our taxes to provide healthcare for people that aren’t citizens. It isn’t “cruel”. You think that would be fair to let people that aren’t citizens of our country to use OUR tax money? Please explain how it would be.
“And you fail to absorb the obvious point (not surprising since you’re a conservative”
If you’re going to start insulting me instead of debate then I’m not even going to bother with you. I have made a call for more civility on this forum and I extend that to you as well. There is not reason to insult me just because you disagree. I’m not doing that to anyone.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“yes, bob, how crazy of me to imply that a nation that bans a certain kind of people froma certain place is anywhere near racist”
Please cite the laws and Politicians that advocate banning a certain group of people from certain places that want to become citizens of the United States of America. They don’t want people to come into this country ILLEGALLY that is completely different and in fact the right of our country. You are race baiting and making clear LIES. I question whether you are actually serious or just trolling to get some kicks.
-Handrew
I would be more than happy to email you the discussion should it happen via email. I’m waiting on her reply and if she doesn’t want to debate it via email I’ll post it here instead.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“Up here, illegal immigrants don’t have free healthcare if they don’t have citizenship. I think FarWestGirl defends free healthcare for US citizens”
You don’t have illegal immigrants crossing into your country everyday like America does. If Canada had a border with Mexico you could bet your prescription drugs that they sure would be!
spacecrawler over 15 years ago
Bob,
I explained why I mentioned Jesus. Fathom it. It’s relevant. Move on.
Again, Clinton was very conservative. He was NOT left of center at all. A quick look at his governing while in office can tell you that much. YOU brought up Clinton as an example of the left, or something opposite conservatives when I said CONSERVATIVE policy leads us to drop bombs on people. Clinton is NOT an example of the left. Clinton was Conservative!
Conservative policy is VERY destructive. When you support republican candidates, you support this conservative policy. You can’t name many conservatives who have opposed the Bush/Cheney/neo-con regime. And you cannot tell me that the right-wing media didn’t support it either. So, if we’re going by sheer numbers, the right supports conservative policy.
I was responding to your response to me. You clearly could not respond to my points. Therefor you fell back on “blame Clinton” (or let’s include Clinton) as if that is somehow relevant in any way to what we’re discussing (which it isn’t). You were trying to say the “left” is equally guilty. We’ve not had any “left” elected officials in office in some time. So- You still cannot back up your points. Your arguments are not logical. You fell back on the “balme Clinton” argument, which is totally illogical.
If crossing the border to obtain medical care after we’ve helped ruin their economy is abuse then what was us ruining their economy? That wasn’t abuse? Now denying them help while they deal with the aftermath is acceptable to you? Do you have ANY education in Latin American affairs? Do you have any idea how much the US has interfered and helped to destabilize all Latin American countries? Stop supporting that policy and then you won’t have to deal with the Latinos conservatives object to so much coming here for needed health care. Is it that difficult to comprehend? Again, to deny people healthcare, whose economy you helped ruin (“you” as in your country and the policy conservatives support by voting conservative), is barbaric and cruel.
I never said there was a conservative party. Conservatives generally support republicans, however.
I already explained why its cruel to deny people healthcare. And why it’s asinine to think we aren’t responsible for the plight of many Latin Americans. But if you don’t get why it’s cruel to deny people healthcare, then that explains why you’re conservative.
Bob, I’m not insulting you. I’m stating fact.
FarWestGirl over 15 years ago
C Bob, since the moderators haven’t asked us to leave I’m inclined to leave it in the open forum for the same reason that binocular vision is the most common body plan on the planet- perspective requires a minimum of two points of view, and in general, more POV’s= greater understanding of the issue.
I was actually talking about healthcare for US citizens and I don’t want to get too far afield,(faint hope),but I could make the case that offering emergency care to illegals is both foreign/humanitarian aid and a good investment since many if not most of those illegals pick our food, build stuff and pick up after us. Foriegn aid is an investment that pays massive dividends, if we hadn’t cut off much of the aid to poor muslim countries, the madrassas would never have gotten a foothold and the Taliban, etc would have been drowned out in relative prosperity. Yes, bribery is hard to swallow, but used properly, it’s darned effective.
A number of people have been making assumptions and jumping to conclusions, I’m with C Bob on the civility issue and staying on stated points, not assuming that ‘all cats are toms because all toms are cats’.
Somalia was a mess, but I was actually in favor of strategic bombing in Bosnia. If I had been asked, I would have proposed two bombing runs, ( alright, I’m biased, my grandfather flew B-24’s in WWII), the first carpet bombing a military site of the massing Serbs, and the second with leaflets saying, ‘We can talk or we can fight, talking’s easier.’ If someone had taken THAT pre-emptive action while Europe was wringing its hands and denying anything was happening, (just like WWII), the ‘ethnic cleansing’ wouldn’t have been able to get any momentum.
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
Ok farwestgirl I’ll answer here. I won’t go point for point because that would be long and tedious. I’ll just list why I oppose universal health care and you can decide if my argument has any validity. Of course, I will want to here your rebuttal as well and perhaps I can different learn view. A huge misconception with a couple people on this board is that they think they are always right and that everyone else thinks that they are right as well. I’m not politican, I don’t have all the answers, I’m always willing to be proved wrong so that I can learn and become a better person for that. “May the best idea win” I say.
Government cannot overcome the laws of economics. Supply and demand is what sets prices, quantity of goods (in this case doctors, nurses, etc.) and quality best not government. When you promise something for free, you run out of supply since people will use the free service whether they really need it or not. (going to the emergency room for a non-emergency.) UHC would also put your healthcare in the hands of a bureaucrat instead of the hospital. Europe and Canada already have long waits for elective surgery because of this and only a minimal lower cost as a whole than the U.S. We also have hundreds of millions more people than the other Western countries do and our tax rate would have to be higher than the Europeans to cover all of the people in our country and their tax rate is already almost 50% in some countries. Therefore a government takeover that offers unlimited healthcare for over 300 million people couldn’t possibly work without overtaxing the already abused American taxpayer. It is a noble idea don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to help people…but it’s just not fesible.
We need to improve health care, not make it an endless bureaucracy. If the government would only allow healthcare to be run like the free market runs things (ie: competition) then we would all be better off. When companies have to compete against each other they lower their prices and improve their quality in order to get more customers, this would be the same for healthcare.
Here’s an example of what happens when only one company owns the entire industry: For almost a century AT&T was the only phone company in the entire United States until it was broken up in 1984. The only inovation that came out from the beginning of telephones to then was touch-tone dialing and that fancy french handled doodad that fancy people used…maybe even a different color phone if you were lucky. After the government busted up their monopoly you had call waiting, and caller id, and portable phones, and answering machines and different long distance plans and all the wonderful things you can do today with a phone in order to get you to go with one phone company over the other. Competition breeds inovation while monopoly stiffles it.
Just because the government is not a company doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have a monopoly. This will soon mean long wait for basic surgeries, doctors becoming government employes, and bureaucrats more worried about how they will make their governmentally funded budget instead of keeping people healthy.
If the government is in charge of your healthcare that means that they can make laws in order to stop you from doing what they considered bad for your health. Do you smoke? Not anymore if the government wills that it’s too dangerous to smoke. Do you eat fast food? Well that’s unhealthy and your food choice means more hospital bills that the government has to pay for so you better not do it anymore. You are also unable to choose your doctor and will have to go to the hospital appointed to your in your district. You don’t like the doctor there? Then move, otherwise you’re stuck with him. Plus, since the government will be paying all doctors (and government pay is NEVER higher than private industry) you’ll see thousands of talented people looking elsewhere for jobs that pay more money. Perhaps they’ll become lawyers to sue the government for all the low-quality healthcare they provide from the lack of talented doctor.
Here’s another article you should read that I think is also a pretty good argument against UHC. Feel free to provide links to me expressing the opposite opinion as well.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1229567/posts
…Until your next post.
MexicanCommunist over 15 years ago
jeez, bob, are you THAT scared of talking about race? You seem like a smart guy, you must know that there are quite a load of americans who would rather the world be white, christian and straight. There’s no denying that it is your country, but you might wanna change that part where you aknowledge a human being’s unalienable right to pursue happiness if you don’t wan’t “Illegal Aliens” coming on to your land.
Besides, “Illegal Aliens”? What is this, East Berlin?
ConservativeBob over 15 years ago
“jeez, bob, are you THAT scared of talking about race?”
I’m not afraid to talk about anything but it’s clear that you are just posting hateful nonsense to get a rise out of me and I’m not falling for it. You have consistently trolled this forum with nothing but race-baiting jibberish and outright lies. You have a hatred for white people and Americans…it’s quite obvious.