G5000's Plan For Economic Prosperity And Better Cable Reception

[westwall]

Note to self: Deficits. "Tax the rich more." Over-regulation

Correct, the poor don't buy lobster. They buy illegal drugs which are ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE MORE EXPENSIVE!

DURRRRRR

 

[g5000]

This all bullshit, there is no negotiating at all. Property Casualty and Life insurance is set up as a "buffet". You pick and choose what you and pay what they ask. You don't get a quote for $200 and then counter with "I'll give you $150.

Actually, that is exactly what you should do. In fact, I usually lowball the shit out of them. "$200? I'd like to pay $50. I realize that's crazy, but..."

And then you go from there. You'd be amazed how well this works.

I am famous in my family for my negotiating skills. I never pay full price for anything over $100. This is a skill I picked up in the Middle East. Only fools pay the asking price outside the US.

When my friends want to buy an expensive item, they ask me to come with them.

You have leverage. Every salesman knows that if you walk out the door, they will probably never see you again. If you hang up the phone, they know they will probably never hear back from you. So they are desperate to keep you in their store or on the line. They know you can walk and find another vendor.

Capitalism, baby!

This is what pisses me off about employer insurance. You are a fucking hostage and they know it.

I was once negotiating with a salesman and then his manager for a big screen TV. I eventually got it for half price.

My oldest daughter almost sabotaged me halfway through, though. I had brought her along to teach her my ways. Unfortunately, she said, "Dad, are you doing that thing right now?"

We still laugh to this day about that.

 

[g5000]

Correct, the poor don't buy lobster. They buy illegal drugs which are ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE MORE EXPENSIVE!

DURRRRRR

Poverty breeds crime and addiction.

Solve poverty, you will solve most crime and addiction.

It won't solve the special interests from stealing from you though. We have to do that by holding our politicians' feet to the fire.

A very big, very hot fire.

 

[JustAGuy1]

I am famous in my family for my negotiating skills. I never pay full price for anything over $100. This is a skill I picked up in the Middle East. Only fools pay the asking price outside the US.

When my friends want to buy an expensive item, they ask me to come with them.

You have leverage. Every salesman knows that if you walk out the door, they will probably never see you again. If you hang up the phone, they know they will probably never hear back from you. So they are desperate to keep you in their store or on the line. They know you can walk and find another vendor.

Capitalism, baby!

This is what pisses me off about employer insurance. You are a fucking hostage and they know it.

I was once negotiating with a salesman and then his manager for a big screen TV. I eventually got it for half price.

My oldest daughter almost sabotaged me halfway through, though. I had brought her along to teach her my ways. Unfortunately, she said, "Dad, are you doing that thing right now?"

We still laugh to this day about that.

Not with insurance son. There is only what want and what you don't want. It's what i do so don't bother with deception.

 

[g5000]

When the powerful state becomes the god. Medical procedures in all ways will be quite known. Sluts will have their tubes tied. Men who produce children without paying for them will be neutered. Just the beginning.

Okayyyyy...

My mentally handicapped son has recently become obsessed about forced sterilization. He heard about the horrors of eugenics in our past and he is scared shitless the government will come for him any day. He doesn't understand that shit is long gone and will never happen again.

But his inability to understand that is not going to happen to him is because he's mentally handicapped. I don't know what your excuse is.

 

[g5000]

Not with insurance son. There is only what want and what you don't want. It's what i do so don't bother with deception.

My father worked in insurance for three decades. He gave me a very thorough education.

I've negotiated my insurance rates all my life.

If you work in insurance, I know you have charts and actuarials and all that crap. But you also have some leeway.

If you don't have any leeway, you are working for the wrong company.

 

[g5000]

If you don't like the rates you are quoted from an insurance company, hang up. Call another one. Shop around.

Capitalism, baby!

"What if I bring you all my home, auto, and life insurance? What kind of deal can you offer me?"

That question should also include health insurance, but there is a bipartisan conspiracy to stop you from being able to do that.

The federal government is the biggest player in the health insurance market, and they get to write the rules for their private sector competitors.

Come on! It really doesn't get more commie than that.

Someone is obviously making bank at our expense. This needs to be terminated.

 

[JustAGuy1]

My father worked in insurance for three decades. He gave me a very thorough education.

I've negotiated my insurance rates all my life.

If you work in insurance, I know you have charts and actuarials and all that crap. But you also have some leeway.

If you don't have any leeway, you are working for the wrong company.

You're wrong. There is no negotiation with the street level companies. You cannot negotiate automobile rates with Geico or any of the others.

 

[kyzr]

I am opposed to all abortions. Even first trimester. But I could live with first trimester abortions. I would not go to war over it.
My focus is on birth control. That's where the solution is and where all Americans could meet.

I made a mental note in my second post to talk about "tax the rich more".
Wealth inequality is not created by taxing the rich too little. It is created by what I talked about with deductions, credits, and exemptions. If we leveled the playing field, we could actually lower tax rates for everyone, including the rich. Unnatural wealth concentration is also caused by government regulation. That's another mental note I made which I will get into later.
What are your thoughts about Milton Friedman's "negative income tax"?

Eliminate all welfare programs and replace them with Friedman's negative income tax.

From the very beginning, blue collar workers were at a disadvantage. As I said, most Americans were not expected to live long enough to actually collect Social Security. They died with their boots on. SS was meant for outliers who beat the odds.

Not really. You are held hostage to your employer. If you lose a job, you are uninsured. When you get a new job, you have to wait several months before you qualify for new employer's insurance plan. Employer health insurance is a total scam which was created by labor unions and it bends the cost of health care up. So, no. That is not easy.
Employer health insurance needs to go away, along with its boondoggle tax deduction.
There is no reason why you shouldn't be able to buy your health insurance the same way you buy your life, auto, and home insurance. That would free you from being held hostage by your employer.
Yes, Obamacare is here to stay, with UHC not far behind. Thanks to the GOP.
In my opinion, we need to get government out of all healthcare, excepting Medicare.

1. Birth control is a solution, but abortion is the topic that the USSC tossed to the states. You're at 12-weeks, 1st trimester, that's fine.

2. Agree that tax fairness needs to happen.

3. I'm against a "negative income tax". That is welfare by another name. Poor people would get "something for nothing".
IMHO for people to get ANY benefits they would have to do something to qualify. Clinton limited welfare to only two years.
a) prove that they applied for jobs
b) prove that they were not accepted by a letter from interviewer, and for what reasons they failed the interview(s)
c) Food stamps could be more generous for families with children IF parent(s) are working and can't earn a decent wage.

4. SS is fixable.

5. Whether you're between jobs or buy health insurance on the open market, ITS EXPENSIVE. If you take early SS at 62 you buy health insurance until you hit 65 and qualify for Medicare. Can you budget about $1,500 a month for healthcare paying out of pocket, $3,000 a month for a couple? Most people can't.
Get a job with benefits and healthcare is solved.

 

[g5000]

1. Birth control is a solution, but abortion is the topic that the USSC tossed to the states. You're at 12-weeks, 1st trimester, that's fine.

In every abortion topic since I have arrived at this forum, I have stated the repeal of Roe v. Wade would have zero impact on the rate of abortions. You will find this to be true going forward.

If ending abortion is the goal of the pro-life movement, the focus of the fight being the repeal of Roe v. Wade has been an astronomical misuse of energy.

Birth control education will do more to reduce abortions than all the wasted decades spent fighting pitched battles over Roe.

I have always said I felt Roe should be repealed strictly for moral reasons, but I have never deluded myself that it would make a difference.

Now that Roe has been repealed, what we have seen from the right is a sadistic spiking of the ball. I understand after decades of frustration that the temptation is great to do that, but it has backfired. The nation has inflicted a penalty for spiking the ball, to the detriment of the lives of the unborn.

Hey, I like to spike the ball myself sometimes. Everybody knows that. "Buh-bye Kari".

But when it comes down to shit that really matters, the sadism of the Right has been a horror. And it backlashed on them in the mid terms when every pro-abortion measure that was on the ballot passed. All of them. Even in the red states.

3. I'm against a "negative income tax". That is welfare by another name. Poor people would get "something for nothing".
IMHO for people to get ANY benefits they would have to do something to qualify. Clinton limited welfare to only two years.
a) prove that they applied for jobs
b) prove that they were not accepted by a letter from interviewer, and for what reasons they failed the interview(s)
c) Food stamps could be more generous for families with children IF parent(s) are working and can't earn a decent wage.

You know how I hate tax expenditures, right? I want them all banned, for many reasons.

But there is one tax expenditure I support, and that is the EITC. The reason I support it is because the EITC has been irrefutably proven to increase the productivity of the poor and lift them out of poverty.

San Francisco Fed

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) substantially subsidizes earnings for low- to moderate-income families with children in the United States. Research has established that the EITC has positive short-term effects on the employment of less-educated single mothers and reduces overall poverty. The...

www.frbsf.org

I believe the negative income tax would do the same. And how glorious that would be!

All other forms of welfare are a poverty trap.

4. SS is fixable.

Yes. We just need to increase the retirement age and peg it to 9 percent of the population.

5. Whether you're between jobs or buy health insurance on the open market, ITS EXPENSIVE. If you take early SS at 62 you buy health insurance until you hit 65 and qualify for Medicare. Can you budget about $1,500 a month for healthcare paying out of pocket, $3,000 a month for a couple? Most people can't.
Get a job with benefits and healthcare is solved.

This is kind of circular reasoning.

Health insurance is expensive because government interference has made it that way.

 

[westwall]

Poverty breeds crime and addiction.

Solve poverty, you will solve most crime and addiction.

It won't solve the special interests from stealing from you though. We have to do that by holding our politicians' feet to the fire.

A very big, very hot fire.

Poverty can't be solved. It can be mitigated, and those who wish to escape poverty deserve help.

However, there is a group of people who are ALWAYS going to be poor.

They simply choose to live that way.

 

[kyzr]

In every abortion topic since I have arrived at this forum, I have stated the repeal of Roe v. Wade would have zero impact on the rate of abortions. You will find this to be true going forward.
If ending abortion is the goal of the pro-life movement, the focus of the fight being the repeal of Roe v. Wade has been an astronomical misuse of energy.
Birth control education will do more to reduce abortions than all the wasted decades spent fighting pitched battles over Roe.
I have always said I felt Roe should be repealed strictly for moral reasons, but I have never deluded myself that it would make a difference.
Now that Roe has been repealed, what we have seen from the right is a sadistic spiking of the ball. I understand after decades of frustration that the temptation is great to do that, but it has backfired. The nation has inflicted a penalty for spiking the ball, to the detriment of the lives of the unborn.
Hey, I like to spike the ball myself sometimes. Everybody knows that. "Buh-bye Kari".
But when it comes down to shit that really matters, the sadism of the Right has been a horror. And it backlashed on them in the mid terms when every pro-abortion measure that was on the ballot passed. All of them. Even in the red states.

You know how I hate tax expenditures, right? I want them all banned, for many reasons.
But there is one tax expenditure I support, and that is the EITC. The reason I support it is because the EITC has been irrefutably proven to increase the productivity of the poor and lift them out of poverty.
I believe the negative income tax would do the same. And how glorious that would be!
All other forms of welfare are a poverty trap.

Yes. We just need to increase the retirement age and peg it to 9 percent of the population.
This is kind of circular reasoning.
Health insurance is expensive because government interference has made it that way.

1. If you want me to take the pro-life stance in this abortion debate I can do that. The babies' lives matter, etc.
But my personal stance is to let the democrats abort as many of their larvae as they choose to, abortions basically reduce the prison populations.
As for repealing Roe, it was wrongly decided to begin with. Abortion is a state responsibility to regulate, not a Federal one. Its not in the US Constitution, period.

What spiking of the ball? What sadism? I agree that the GOP learned a hard lesson in the mid-terms. That promising $10,000 in student loan relief, and scaring young people by lying that Republicans want to ban abortion nationwide gets young voters to the polls. Well played.

2. Agree that the EITC is a very good thing. I also support child care tax credits. A negative income tax could still be gamed by lazy folks. No thanks.
A 2-year limit on welfare is not a poverty trap, its a time limit on charity.

3. What part of "working past 66" doesn't work for most people don't you understand? SS needs a minor tweak. Medicare needs major surgery.

4. Health insurance is expensive because liability insurance is expensive, medical school is expensive, pharmaceuticals are expensive, hospital staffs and equipment are expensive, etc. Prove that the government can wave a wand and make health insurance cheap. You can't. The marketplace of healthcare insurance sets the price, not the government. What circular reasoning? Those numbers are right, go online and price health insurance for 60-year olds.

5. Did you say you want to end Medicaid?

 

[MarathonMike]

Apparently some people are tragically confused about where I am on the political spectrum. So I thought I would consolidate my larger political beliefs into one topic and let the dice fall where they may.

This OP will necessarily be long as I intend to point to it in the future when some fool assumes my political orientation.

You are free to tl;dr this OP and continue to bear false witness against me, but you will always know you are lying and so will everyone else.

I have never understood why some people throw away their integrity so cheaply just to score a momentary, fake political point.

Sometimes your integrity is all you have, folks. It matters. It really, really matters.

Okay, here we go.

1. Abortion. I'm pro-life. It's right there in my signature. I believe this issue has been hijacked by the extremists on both sides. Even though I try to remain calm and collected when talking about abortion, I find myself feeling pushed to the right wing extreme when debating the pro-choice extremists. I think a lot of moderate reasonable people on either side of the issue feel that same compulsion.

So here's the deal. Even though America is split about 50-50 when asked if they are pro-life or pro-choice, it turns out when you ask them specifically about second trimester abortions, a supermajority of Americans are opposed. This means a lot of people who call themselves pro-choice actually have personal beliefs which are in direct opposition to Roe v. Wade which allows abortions on demand all the way to the end of the second trimester.

Where Americans Stand On Abortion, In 5 Charts

UPDATE (June 24, 2022, 12:31 p.m.): On Friday, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which established the constitutional right to abortion in 1973, with fi…

fivethirtyeight.com

This extremist-dominated fight has been going on for half a century, with the needle barely moving.

And over the past decade or more, I said many, many times the repeal of Roe V. Wade would have ZERO impact on the number of abortions in America, though I believe for moral reasons that it should be repealed.

Astronomical amounts of energy have been wasted on a zero-sum game.

So what should we do?

According to the pro-choice Guttmacher Institute, about half of all abortions are the result of no birth control being used during the sex act which led to the unwanted pregnancy.

HALF!

Another fifth are due to the improper or inconsistent use of birth control.

So just imagine what the result would be if we devoted all that tremendous energy toward getting people to use birth control and use it correctly and consistently.

I believe we would see a dramatic drop in the number of abortions.

And this is a middle ground upon which sane moderate pro-lifers and pro-choicers could meet.

This is but one of many issues which there are forces in our country who are doing everything they can to keep us all at each other's throats, though. Someone wants us divided so we can be conquered.

The pro-life extremists are getting more and more sadistic and cruel in their fight against abortion, and it is turning people off. Every pro-abortion measure on the ballot this year succeeded, even in the red states.

I will not go into the profound dark spiritual forces which I believe are at work here.


2. Taxes. Hate 'em! I don't even like that YOU have to pay taxes.

But what I hate most is the ridiculous amount of exemptions, credits, and deductions which are proven to tilt the legislative playing field upward, concentrating wealth up the food chain. I am very much in favor of people who invent a better mouse trap accumulating vast amounts of wealth. They earned it. But I am deeply opposed to the unnatural concentration of wealth.

Every dollar returned to someone in the form of a deduction, exemption, or credit has to be offset. This is done by taking money from someone else's pocket in the form of higher tax rates. This is the greatest wealth redistribution socialist program in history. It is also the worst kind of government interference in the markets. Your home costs an average of 27 percent more because of the mortgage interest deduction, so you are not getting ahead as much as you think you are.

So who's making bank on the mortgage interest deduction? Well, if your houses costs more, you have to pay your realtor more and you have to borrow more from the bank.

Bingo-bango, wealth redistribution up the food chain and massive government interference in the housing market.

That's just one example crammed inside the $1.4 trillion of government deductions, exemptions, and credits each year.

That's $1.4 trillion each year which has to come from your pockets in the form of higher tax rates or by borrowing from China or other investors.

What we have, folks, is an insane system where two people earning identical incomes are paying radically different amounts in taxes!

You are punished with higher taxes for not borrowing money! You are punished with higher taxes for not breeding or breeding less than you neighbors! You are punished with higher taxes for not buying the right kind of refrigerator which some company bribed our elected officials to put in the tax code.

So it was no big leap for Obama to punish you with higher taxes for not buying the right kind of health insurance.

If we eliminated all this socialist wealth redistribution and government interference, we could radically lower tax rates across the board for EVERYONE.

By the way, this political position of mine is a core libertarian principle.

3. Taxes II. Income taxes are a punitive tax on production. I hate 'em! A flat income tax is STILL a punitive tax on production.

There is no magical quality in a flat income tax which prohibits the exact same $1.4 trillion of exemptions, deductions, and credits.

That's a big secret, but you deserve to know.

What this means is that it would be required to raise the flat income tax rate ever higher to offset the $1.4 trillion of deductions, credits, and exemptions.

Most economists agree that a consumption tax is superior and healthier for the economy. I agree, which is why I favor the FAIR Tax.

FairTax - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

A flat tax is regressive. It's great for the rich, but it really schlongs the middle class and poor.

The Fair Tax is a kind of sales tax. But since sales taxes are also regressive, the Fair Tax has a prebate built into it.

Everyone gets the exact same prebate amount. To the rich, it's not even lunch money, but to the working poor it can be the difference between starvation and survival.

The Fair Tax also does not have any magical quality which prevents exemptions. Therefore, for every exemption the Fair Tax will have to be raised to offset them.

What's great about the Fair Tax, though, is that everyone immediately notices a tax increase. If you ask everyone you know how much they paid in income taxes from year to year, they would be unable to tell you. They remember what their REFUND was, but they really didn't look at their total tax bill and compare it to previous years.

Just ask your friends and see if I'm right.

But you can't hide a tax hike in the FAIR tax. It is immediately noticed.

Therefore, if the special interests manage to get the leading edge a wedge of exemptions (say, for milk) passed through Congress, everyone will personally feel the result when the FAIR Tax is raised to offset those exemptions. It will therefore be extremely difficult to get exemptions passed.

There is a significant drawback to the FAIR Tax which I won't go into as I have not come up with a solid solution yet.


Or...instead of the FAIR Tax as our consumption tax, we could take a look at Value Added Taxes. Another time, maybe.

In any case, a consumption tax should SUPPLANT the income tax, not SUPPLEMENT it.

Oh, and get this. If you take away the ability of congresscritters to sneak deductions, credits, and exemptions into the tax code, you just took away the incentive for special interest to give them campaign cash in exhange for those tax gifts.

TA-DAAA! You just reformed campaign finance! For real this time.

In all the decades of court decisions, Congressional legislation, and every other effort to reform campaign finance, the money flowing into politics has SKYROCKETED.

That's because the more power we take from the states and centralize at the federal level, the easier you make it to capture that power.

Take away the power to cram $1.4 trillion of giveaways in the tax code, and presto, campaign cash dwindles to a trickle. And this will give challengers to incumbents a fighting chance.

Which is why our politicians will give up that power when we pry it from their cold, dead hands.

Think about this. I do. A lot.




4. Welfare. Here I wander off the libertarian reservation a little bit. But maybe not as much as you might think.

There are some heartless people on the Right who would end all welfare and let our poor sink or swim. The fact is, they would sink.

The poor are not lazy, despite what the echo chamber propagandists pushing their confirmation bias to the limit would have you believe.

Sure, there are people who cheat the system, but they are the exception which prove the rule.

How do I know this? Just walk through a ghetto and see if you smell the odor of boiling lobster or sizzling steaks wafting through the air. Even better, volunteer in the ghetto and get to know these people.

Anyone you see with any kind of "eminence front" going on probably acquired their goods through crime. Poverty breeds crime.

No, the real problem, in my opinion, is the ridiculous number of welfare programs. And for each welfare program, you have to jump through a ridiculous number of bureaucratic hoops to qualify. It's just plain stupid. Misguided compassion has led to a tremendous amount of waste, fraud, and abuse.

These compoundingly dissipative programs are not lifting people out of poverty. They are actually a poverty trap. The only people making out are the social workers drawing down a paycheck. Not that they are paid well. They are actually wonderful people working their asses off to help their fellow man.

But the administrators above them are making bank.

So what am I saying? Would I end all welfare programs?

Yes. Yes I would.

Before any heartless bastards applaud me, let me quickly add I would replace all those welfare programs with a single one.

Milton Friedman's "negative income tax".






So you see, I have not really wandered off the libertarian platform.

Someone, I forget who, has Thomas Sowell as their avatar. Check out the first video.



5. Entitlement Programs. Let's face it. We are stuck with Social Security and Medicare. I say "stuck" as if I oppose them. I don't.

However, we are living much longer than our ancestors did. Decades longer. It is insane and unsustainable that we start drawing from the national treasury at the same age they did.

We are living longer, we should be working longer. This is just plain common sense.

When Social Security was established in 1935, only 5.7 percent of the US population was over 65. The average American was not expected to live long enough to collect Social Security. SS was for the outliers. The actuarials were against you, especially if you were a blue collar worker.

Most Americans died with their boots on.

By 1965, 9 percent of Americans were over the age of 65. This is the year Medicare was introduced to our entitlement package.

Today, 16 percent of Americans are over 65. Over the past 87 years, we have had a larger and larger percentage of the population drawing from the national treasury for longer and longer periods, while being supported by a smaller and smaller percentage of the population.

As I said, this is insane and unsustainable.

The retirement age should be indexed to an actuarial.

It so happens that 9 percent of our population is over the age of 70. The same percentage which was over 65 when Medicare was introduced.

I propose we raise the eligibility age to 70, and index it to 9 percent of the population going forward.

If one day there was a zombie apocalypse and half the country was wiped out, we would then lower the retirement age accordingly.


6. Health care. I am doing my best to avoid mentioning someone by name who everyone knows I detest. But it is the health care issue above all others which really pisses me off about him.

Not that he was the only one who pulled a hoax on the American people. The entire Republican party did long before he came down the shit pipe.

Health care costs have been skyrocketing for at least half a century. The Democrat answer to this problem was, is, and always will be what was originally called "socialize medicine" and is now known as Universal Health Care. The stigma of "socialized" has been removed by the ad men.

Ted Kennedy was not the first advocate, but he was the biggest. Both figuratively and literally, the fat bastard.

What I am saying is that for basically forever, the Democrats have been telegraphing exactly what their goal is. They did not make it a secret. They shouted it from the mountain. But for most of that time, they were screaming into the void.

But over all that time, the Democrats have succeeded in incrementally achieving the goal. George W. Bush even chipped in by creating a whole new government health care program to pander votes, and it has added more to the debt than Obamacare. Most right wingers are completely ignorance of this. Hell, Bush didn't even bother to try to offset the cost! At least Obama made an attempt to do so with the ACA.

Speaking of the ACA, which was a Great Leap Forward for socialized medicine, the Republicans immediately promised to repeal and replace Obamacare if they were given the power. This was the greatest political hoax of the modern era.

While they were out of power, the GOP passed, what, over 60 repeals knowing Obama would veto every one of those bills. But boy it was great theater for the rubes, wasn't it? They just kept voting for those hucksters until finally that glorious day arrived when the Republicans were given the House, the Senate, and the White House.

Then, suddenly, the GOP repeal and replacement program went dark. If that was not solid proof it had all been a hoax, then nothing is.

And yet the rubes didn't catch on! Unbelievable! They STILL have not caught on!

A "skinny repeal" was passed in the House on Trump's watch, and he did that repeat-a-lie-three-times thing he does. On the White House lawn, Trump held a party and prematurely ejaculated, stating, "“Make no mistake, (one!) “this is a repeal and a replace of Obamacare, make no mistake (two!) about it. Make no mistake.”(three!)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/05/04/this-is-not-the-health-care-bill-that-donald-trump-promised/

But it wasn't even close to a full repeal, and it certainly was not a replacement.

Hoax.

And who did the rubes get mad at?

John McCain.

You can't make this shit up.

As a result of all this hucksterism by Trump and the Republicans, Obamacare is now immortal. A third rail like Social Security and Medicare. Thanks, Drumpf!

The Democrats have moved the ball MUCH closer to the goal. UHC is now inevitable.

That's because the Republicans have never had a plan to get health care costs under control. They are too intellectually bankrupt, and so they have silently assented to UHC. They sold us all down the river to UHC decades ago.

Decades ago.

So what is G5000's plan for better health care?

Go ahead and call me a commie Democrat Biden-loving groomer homo, but I believe we have to get the government the fuck out of health care entirely.

With the exception of Medicare I described above.

Ladies and gentlemen, the government is the biggest player in the healthcare market, and they get to write the rules for their private sector competitors! Does it get more fucking commie than that!?!?


You know how you can pick up your phone and dial ANY car insurance company in America and personally negotiate for the car insurance which best suits your needs?

You know how you can pick up your phone and dial ANY life insurance company in America and personally negotiate for the life insurance which best suits your needs?

Avoid whole life insurance. Those are a scam. Go with term life insurance. And tell your beneficiaries to punch any insurance person who tries to tell them to accept your life insurance in annuities right in their fat gob. That's another scam. Tell your survivors to take the lump sum. My dad was an underwriter for 30 years, this is him talking.

But I digress.

You know how you can pick up your phone and dial ANY home insurance company in America and personally negotiate for the home insurance which best suits your needs?


I'm not one for conspiracy theories as you all well know. But the fact you CANNOT pick up your phone and call ANY health insurance company in America and personally negotiate for the health insurance which best suits your needs IS a vast bipartisan conspiracy.

You are deliberately being held hostage to your employer insurance. How's that been working for you?

You know how I feel about exemptions, deductions, and credits. Well, the tax deduction corporations get for employer-sponsored health insurance is bending the cost of healthcare UP.

Obama worked very hard to keep that alive. It was a big boon he gave to labor unions.

So that's my solution to healthcare. Get government the fuck out, and let Americans be able to call any health insurance company in America and negotiate for the best insurance which fits their needs.

The best part is that if you bundle all your insurance together with one insurance company, you get big discounts.

No, actually the best part is that you would be able to take your health insurance with you wherever you go. You would no longer be hostage to your employer. You know when you get a new job and you have to wait several months before they let you into their health plan and you pray to god you don't need medical care in the meantime?

That bullshit is gone.

FREEDOM, BABY!



I have more. Lots more. But I hope the point has been driven home.

If I'm in the mood, I will add more items in the coming days.

Your typical posts do not read like this one at all. Maybe you also have a split personality syndrome?

 

[kyzr]

Your typical posts do not read like this one at all. Maybe you also have a split personality syndrome?

Funny but true!

No clue why he hates Kari Lake so much?!

My 2024 can't lose GOP team would be Nikki Haley for president, and Kari Lake as VP.

 

[CarlinAnnArbor]

Go ahead and call me a commie Democrat Biden-loving groomer homo, but I believe we have to get the government the fuck out of health care entirely.

With the exception of Medicare I described above

100% agree with this

 

[Lesh]

I disagree with the OP on virtually every point. But at least we can have a reasonably honest discussion because a certain set of facts are just that.

Facts.

How those facts are interpreted or how to mitigate the effect on society of those facts is where we differ.

That’s how politics SHOULD be discussed. That’s how sane honest people do that.

He is absolutely a conservative and I am absolutely a liberal. Neither of us is evil.

Unfortunately that is not the case with most self described “conservatives.

To them facts are whatever meets their needs at the moment and no rational discussion can be had under those circumstances

 

[g5000]

1. If you want me to take the pro-life stance in this abortion debate I can do that. The babies' lives matter, etc.
But my personal stance is to let the democrats abort as many of their larvae as they choose to, abortions basically reduce the prison populations.
As for repealing Roe, it was wrongly decided to begin with. Abortion is a state responsibility to regulate, not a Federal one. Its not in the US Constitution, period.

What spiking of the ball? What sadism? I agree that the GOP learned a hard lesson in the mid-terms. That promising $10,000 in student loan relief, and scaring young people by lying that Republicans want to ban abortion nationwide gets young voters to the polls. Well played.

Republicans DO want to ban abortions nationwide. They tipped their hand during the midterm campaign, and it was not just Lindsay Graham. Several Republican candidates across the country had a national ban pledge on their campaign web sites.

They quickly removed those pledges in the face of a public uproar, but the damage was done.

As for sadism, gleefully announcing they were opposed to any and all exceptions (rape, incest, etc.) did a lot of damage. The fact a 10 year old rape victim was forced to leave her state to get an abortion was incredibly sadistic and damaging to the cause.

Student loan forgiveness is not why the Red Tsunami Shining Elevator Bloodbath Shambolic Extravaganza failed to materialize. That's just a story the sore losers tell themselves.

Every pro-choice measure across the country passed, even in the red states. That was not "because student loans".

2. Agree that the EITC is a very good thing. I also support child care tax credits. A negative income tax could still be gamed by lazy folks. No thanks.

The propaganda there are tens of million of "lazy folks" collecting welfare is bogus. The Right's constant portrayal of the poor as "lazy" is as sadistic as it gets. Imagine how it sounds to someone working their ass off at two or three jobs hearing the Right call them lazy because they have to supplement their income with food stamps.

Imagine how turned off they must feel toward Republicans. Imagine how they feel when Fox News goes out of their way to find welfare cheats so they can paint everyone on welfare with the brush of laziness..

The fact that blacks are overrepresented in our low income population makes calling the poor "lazy" come across as old school racist, too.

Racists have called the Negro lazy for centuries. The Right really needs to cut that shit out.

Instead of growing up and cutting that shit out, the Right has instead learned how to "dog whistle" that same old bigoted bullshit to the people they are pandering to.


On the flip side, the "compassionate" Left has kept a large swath of the country in a poverty trap. This is not deliberate to "keep blacks on the Democratic plantation", as the Right would have us believe. It is simply misguided mercy.

Even more sadly, the black community has their own demagogues who aren't doing them any favors. If anyone is actually deliberately keeping our beleaguered poor trapped, it is their demagogues from inside their own fence.

The EITC lifts people out of poverty. I believe the negative income tax would accelerate that process and widely expand the thrust necessary to break the chains of bondage.

All that cash Trump and the Democrats rained down on America turned out to be a proof of concept, and the results were incredibly encouraging.

Unfortunately, all the political largesse was not means tested and we added umpteen trillion more dollars to the debt.

3. What part of "working past 66" doesn't work for most people don't you understand?

Working past 60 didn't work for most people of the 1930s, 40s, and 50s.

It's a simple fact we are living DECADES longer than our ancestors. It makes no sense whatsoever we are retiring at the same age they did.

Constantly having to rescue SS and Medicare from insolvency has more than proven this is unsustainable.

4. Health insurance is expensive because liability insurance is expensive, medical school is expensive, pharmaceuticals are expensive, hospital staffs and equipment are expensive, etc. Prove that the government can wave a wand and make health insurance cheap. You can't. The marketplace of healthcare insurance sets the price, not the government. What circular reasoning? Those numbers are right, go online and price health insurance for 60-year olds.

Health care is expensive because the government is involved in every aspect.

You know how anti-conspiracy theory I am on a visceral level, but there is an actual conspiracy to keep every bit of health care expensive.

You should be asking yourself why you can't pick up the phone and call whatever health insurance company in America you wish. You should be asking yourself why you are not allowed to go to whatever health care providers you wish.

You really need to ask yourself why you are being held hostage like that.

It's because there is a very real conspiracy going on. It is a conspiracy between insurance companies, health care providers, and both national political parties.

All of this keeps the cost of health care high.

Hell, even the cost of a college education is made too expensive because of the government.

5. Did you say you want to end Medicaid?

Yes. It is a welfare program. I would end all welfare programs, with the exception of the EITC, and replace all of them with a negative income tax.

In G5000's world, even the poor will be able to get the insurance which fits their needs from whatever insurance company they wish, and they would be able to go to any health care provider they wish.

 

[g5000]

Your typical posts do not read like this one at all. Maybe you also have a split personality syndrome?

I admit I expend way too much energy going after the psychos, liars, hypocrites, and retards infecting the Republican Party.

That's because the GOP is my party of origin and it feels like a mob of maniacs moved into my house and they are shitting all over the furniture.

There is so much shit, I can't keep up.

Our house is fucking filthy and it really, really pisses me off.

Someday, maybe soon, some left wing loon will go after someone connected to the right wing with a bat or a crowbar or some other blunt object.

And I will say, "I had no idea the victim was gay!"

 

[g5000]

kyzr

You mentioned Biden's student loan forgiveness plan. That was actually dead before the election.

Anyway, I said above the government has made college more expensive.

Let me give you an idea of how wide the libertarian streak in me is.

Do you know what would happen if Biden was able to forgive $10,000 of student loans?

College would instantly become $10,000 more expensive.

 

[kyzr]

Republicans DO want to ban abortions nationwide. They tipped their hand during the midterm campaign, and it was not just Lindsay Graham. Several Republican candidates across the country had a national ban pledge on their campaign web sites.
They quickly removed those pledges in the face of a public uproar, but the damage was done.
As for sadism, gleefully announcing they were opposed to any and all exceptions (rape, incest, etc.) did a lot of damage. The fact a 10 year old rape victim was forced to leave her state to get an abortion was incredibly sadistic and damaging to the cause.
Student loan forgiveness is not why the Red Tsunami Shining Elevator Bloodbath Shambolic Extravaganza failed to materialize. That's just a story the sore losers tell themselves. Every pro-choice measure across the country passed, even in the red states. That was not "because student loans".

The propaganda there are tens of million of "lazy folks" collecting welfare is bogus. The Right's constant portrayal of the poor as "lazy" is as sadistic as it gets. Imagine how it sounds to someone working their ass off at two or three jobs hearing the Right call them lazy because they have to supplement their income with food stamps.
Imagine how turned off they must feel toward Republicans. Imagine how they feel when Fox News goes out of their way to find welfare cheats so they can paint everyone on welfare with the brush of laziness..
The fact that blacks are over-represented in our low income population makes calling the poor "lazy" come across as old school racist, too. Racists have called the Negro lazy for centuries. The Right really needs to cut that shit out.
Instead of growing up and cutting that shit out, the Right has instead learned how to "dog whistle" that same old bigoted bullshit to the people they are pandering to.
On the flip side, the "compassionate" Left has kept a large swath of the country in a poverty trap. This is not deliberate to "keep blacks on the Democratic plantation", as the Right would have us believe. It is simply misguided mercy.
Even more sadly, the black community has their own demagogues who aren't doing them any favors. If anyone is actually deliberately keeping our beleaguered poor trapped, it is their demagogues from inside their own fence.
The EITC lifts people out of poverty. I believe the negative income tax would accelerate that process and widely expand the thrust necessary to break the chains of bondage.
All that cash Trump and the Democrats rained down on America turned out to be a proof of concept, and the results were incredibly encouraging.
Unfortunately, all the political largess was not means tested and we added umpteen trillion more dollars to the debt.

Working past 60 didn't work for most people of the 1930s, 40s, and 50s.
It's a simple fact we are living DECADES longer than our ancestors. It makes no sense whatsoever we are retiring at the same age they did. Constantly having to rescue SS and Medicare from insolvency has more than proven this is unsustainable.

Health care is expensive because the government is involved in every aspect. You know how anti-conspiracy theory I am on a visceral level, but there is an actual conspiracy to keep every bit of health care expensive.
You should be asking yourself why you can't pick up the phone and call whatever health insurance company in America you wish. You should be asking yourself why you are not allowed to go to whatever health care providers you wish.
You really need to ask yourself why you are being held hostage like that.
It's because there is a very real conspiracy going on. It is a conspiracy between insurance companies, health care providers, and both national political parties. All of this keeps the cost of health care high.
Hell, even the cost of a college education is made too expensive because of the government.

Yes. Medicaid is a welfare program. I would end all welfare programs, with the exception of the EITC, and replace all of them with a negative income tax. In G5000's world, even the poor will be able to get the insurance which fits their needs from whatever insurance company they wish, and they would be able to go to any health care provider they wish.

1. Grabbing a minority Republican position and blaring it as a "Republican Policy" is dishonest. True Lindsay Graham and a few other Evangelicals may be pushing for a nationwide abortion ban, but we all know that has ZERO probability of passing Congress. Same with exceptions, see poll below, your calling Republicans "sadistic" is a LIE. Same with stupid Rick Scott proposing to reauthorize Social Security every 5-years. Why do Republicans ALWAYS come up with moronic ideas? Is it to deliberately lose elections?

Vast majority of Republicans support abortion exceptions for rape, incest and mother's health

A new survey shows broad bipartisan support for abortion exemptions, including in states that have restricted the procedure.

www.nbcnews.com

2. WOW! You are really sensitive about welfare recipients. I called them lazy, I said nothing about race. Here are the latest stats. I'm happy to learn that welfare recipients dropped 48% since 2016. Also learned that Social Security reduced poverty more than any other program. Welfare is still too expensive, it should be a state responsibility so it doesn't add to the DEBT.

Important welfare statistics for 2021 - Lexington Law

Poverty remains a widespread problem affecting countless low-income families in the U.S. Here’s a breakdown of the latest welfare statistics for 2021.

www.lexingtonlaw.com

Many different ethnicities receive SNAP benefits: White Americans make up the largest share (37 percent), followed by Black Americans (26 percent), Hispanic Americans (16 percent), Asian Americans (3 percent) and Native Americans (2 percent).

3. Your Social Security plan is DOA. SS is easily fixable.

4. How does the government make healthcare more expensive. You type a lot, but don't prove anything. Take off the aluminum foil hat when you type next time. There is no conspiracy between the government and insurance companies.

5. So after whining about racial profiling for welfare recipients, you'd end it. OK. Your magically affordable health insurance plan sounds like Medicare for all where the government is the single payer. NFW.