Serious Discussion Thread

As I am.
From an economics standpoint, the only way to rid the system of pre existing condition dilemmas is a public option paid for by the taxpayer....and it will be very costly.....no doubt about it.....but for the life of me, I can not find any other solution that makes sense......with the exception of the madate to buy insurance.....but I can not see that ever making it past the first case brought up to the SCOTUS.

again: addressed in a link and a post earlier:

Is Mandatory Health Insurance Constitutional? - Taking Liberties - CBS News
then there is this: Is Mandatory Health Insurance Constitutional? - - CBS News
Timothy Jost, a professor of Washington and Lee University School of Law who says he prefers a national public plan, has argued the constitutional principles -- ...


Unfortunately for legal prognosticators, the U.S. Supreme Court has provided no exact guidance. In Gonzales v. Raich (2005), a majority concluded that a federal law prohibiting a California woman from growing marijuana for her own medical use is "entitled to a strong presumption of validity" -- and authorized by the Commerce Clause -- even if state law permits the medicinal use of cannabis. On the other hand, in U.S. v. Lopez (1995), the court struck down a gun-related law on the grounds that it lacked "any concrete tie to interstate commerce."

Because Gonzales v. Raich is more recent, it's presumably a better glimpse into what the court thinks. (As Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a strongly-worded dissent siding with the medical marijuana patient named Angel Raich, "If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything -- and the federal government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.")...

Then again, a must-purchase-or-be-fined insurance law remains a recognizably different creature than the medical marijuana case, which dealt with punishing undesirable behavior criminally rather than requiring all Americans to purchase a service from a private company. (Automobile insurance isn't an exact parallel because only Americans who choose to drive must buy it, and the requirement comes from the states, not the Feds.) And it's true that the composition of the court has changed in the years since Gonzales v. Raich.

Still, not even conservative and libertarian scholars who would like to see mandatory health insurance shot down by the courts are betting it will be, although Georgetown's Randy Barnett holds out some hope. Call it the difference between political preference and reality, or the difference between what is and what might be.
 
It's not a good point. It's close to a red herring.

The economic abyss argument is usually put aside for defense related projects, yet in debates about life/health it appears to rear it's ugly head.

:eusa_whistle:

The question is, when is enough "Enough" when it comes to throwing money after an illness? When it is your health, most people will say "NEVER!" When its a random person somewhere else, people become more likely to find a threshold where they'll say "Deal with it" and want to stop treatment.

I agree, it is puzzling that for matters like DoD projects cost is literally never an issue, as it is argued that those projects protect and save lives, even if never used. However, when it comes to the medical treatments that will also save lives....
 
The real debate is how to achieve not punishing those with pre-existing conditions.
I don't think you can't. Look at any other insurance industries and the risk of payout directly affects the premium. Someone who gets in lots of car accidents will have to pay more for car insurance. Someone who's in bad health or very old will have to pay more for life insurance. The higher the probability one will draw more from the system than they pay in, the higher the premium.

Take the profit element out and put everyone in the same system and you're still going to have to pay for those who draw more out than they put in.

Exactly my point.
So enough with the crap that it will result in lower healthcare costs....it will not.
Tiome for some honesty by congress....but that is like asking for this whore thing to be nothing but a bad dream.
 
Just because you deserve something doesn't make it a right.

I deserve toilet seats made of gold, mansions scattered across the globe, and enough money to purchase happiness for myself and all my family for eternity.

What I've earned is considerable less.
What I have a right to is the opportunity to work my butt off to obtain those things.
 
nope. you are stuck. and that appears to be obvious to all except you.

all questions may be legitimate, but that doesn't make them all germane to the issue at hand.

you assume you have a new hypothesis. I assume others have went down that road and for whatever 'legit' reason, they have abandoned it.

you have mentioned a few times that you are conservative. I have no reason why you would, except that you are stuck with preconceived ideas on how people view and tackle subjects like health care. Saying you see the need for reform is like saying you see the sky is blue.

We are not representatives of parties or politicians, so I assumed you were speaking as a person, and not a label.

I mentioned I am a conservative as I wanted it to be understood that whereas I believe in smaller government, I do not see it possible as it pertains to healthcare.

But I am done with you Dante. You offered me great links and I thank you for them....but you are otherwise useless as it pertains to your own thinking...as is evident by your holier than thou attitude despite your being 100% wrong with your observation.

You, sir, do way too much assuming for someone who is obvisuly a poor judge of character.

I wish you luck in life....cause you are sure going to need it. You will be taken by every con man out there....and I have no doubt you already have been.

Cya.[/QUOTE]as a matter of fact, I do not get taken by con men, but I've been pals with quite a few. I have more street sense that most people have common sense, not that I think most people have much common sense.

you are stuck framing this as a conservative, and not as a citizen.

you shall be released...

[youtube]a0WMBYQL14U[/youtube]

...hopefully soon.
 
Top Notch Care[/I] is NOT available all over America. That is a myth.
Top notch according to whom? I'm talking about in comparison with the rest of the world. I've never been outside of the country before but i'd have to believe that some of the worst doctors in America are still better than most doctors in 3rd world countries. I may be wrong on that, but i doubt it.


and health insurance is not research and development of medicine. It is a vehicle for cost coverage and profit.
You cannot address the cost of health insurance without addressing the cost of health care. When you buy health insurance, you're basically buying a pass to access health care. A health insurance company is just a middle man between you and the product you're consuming.

That's why argument over who's going to insure people and how is comical to me as it relates to reducing costs. Until doctors can perform surgeries for less, administer drugs for less and perform evaluations for less, you will not see a meaningful reduction in health insurance costs.
 
...
...
The insurance rates we got were ridiculous. I mean purely outrageous. COBRA was a joke and unaffordable on halftime pay. We sucked it up and bought insurance, but it was a major financial drain and the coverage was half of what we'd had as employees. As soon as we could switch to an employer based system we did. Our premiums and deductibles went down and our coverage and access to care increased.

In theory, with everyone on the market the plans and coverage should approach reasonable levels. In theory. I am very skeptical. I will probably not give up my employer based coverage until absolutely forced after my experience trying to "go it alone."
COBRA is a halfhearted attempt to address a huge flaw in the system we have. Sucks. Been there.

Public option and a mandate equal s sane approach, but political and financial interests will throw everything they have at it. Power and $$$$$$$ are at stake. Lots of both.

That's why this failed in 1992 and why its on life support here. Truly innovating healthcare will put a lot of administrative types out of business and make a lot of wealthy folks much less wealthy.
true, that and Bill and Hillary made a few strategic errors which he and she and their supporters have owned up to.

This is why I was such a supporter of Hillary in 2008. I thought she knew all the players and had experience and battle scars to get to the next step.

Unfortunately, Obama's moves have proven many of my suspicions to look like foresight. :doubt:
 
... You can't drive down the costs of health insurance without driving down the costs of providing health care. IMO, there's a few ways to do that though maybe still not enough for some people.
Why? Wouldn't that all depend on HOW one drives down costs?
If driving down costs involved non profit insurance, how would that effect costs/delivery?

Your premises dictate your conclusion, and so I think your assumptions are based on cutting costs in areas where this has already been done with the result you claim.

We have not tried other ways. Your assumptions are based on too narrow an argument about what cost cutting would entail.

or am I wrong?
 
Tried this in another thread and I was ignored...so I will try it here.

I am for HRC.

I am for eliminating pre-existing condition clauses.

I am not for a government mandate to purchase insurance the day you are born and have insurance til the die you die.

Likely, if such mandate is passed, it will not make it past the first appeal.

Not using talking points, exactly how will insurance costs go down...or even stay constant....if we elimintate pre-exisitng conditions.

NO TALKING POINTS...I really would like an answer.

I don't like the current healthcare bill, but I'm curious about something. One of the biggest problems is the number of people who don't have insurance - the number of personal bankrupcies caused by medical emergencies and the number of emergency room and hospital bills that the government ends up paying anyway.

How do we address that without mandating coverage?
 
The real debate is how to achieve not punishing those with pre-existing conditions.
I don't think you can't. Look at any other insurance industries and the risk of payout directly affects the premium. Someone who gets in lots of car accidents will have to pay more for car insurance. Someone who's in bad health or very old will have to pay more for life insurance. The higher the probability one will draw more from the system than they pay in, the higher the premium.

Take the profit element out and put everyone in the same system and you're still going to have to pay for those who draw more out than they put in.

true, but right now we are dropping the ball on preventative medicine in this country. In scattered populations (in US) where preventative care has grown, there is I think, a initial jump in costs with a steady decline as the care continues.
 
It's not a good point. It's close to a red herring.

The economic abyss argument is usually put aside for defense related projects, yet in debates about life/health it appears to rear it's ugly head.

:eusa_whistle:

The question is, when is enough "Enough" when it comes to throwing money after an illness? When it is your health, most people will say "NEVER!" When its a random person somewhere else, people become more likely to find a threshold where they'll say "Deal with it" and want to stop treatment.

I agree, it is puzzling that for matters like DoD projects cost is literally never an issue, as it is argued that those projects protect and save lives, even if never used. However, when it comes to the medical treatments that will also save lives....
If and when people become more ill, many become more comfortable with letting go. That has been what I've experienced and witnessed in life.
 
The real debate is how to achieve not punishing those with pre-existing conditions.
I don't think you can't. Look at any other insurance industries and the risk of payout directly affects the premium. Someone who gets in lots of car accidents will have to pay more for car insurance. Someone who's in bad health or very old will have to pay more for life insurance. The higher the probability one will draw more from the system than they pay in, the higher the premium.

Take the profit element out and put everyone in the same system and you're still going to have to pay for those who draw more out than they put in.

Exactly my point.
So enough with the crap that it will result in lower healthcare costs....it will not.
Tiome for some honesty by congress....but that is like asking for this whore thing to be nothing but a bad dream.

what does the CBO say?

Congressional Budget Office - Health

what do others say, and why is your analysis better informed than theirs?

:eusa_whistle:
 
Lots of people say they want a serious discussion. Somebody want to start? It is pretty simple to avoid the trolls. Staying on message is pretty simple. It may take time between posts, but if you go to your User cp, you should be able to subscribe to this thread and keep it easily accessible.

Go for it.


or not.

:cool:
Fuck off.
 
Top Notch Care is NOT available all over America. That is a myth.

Some Guy said:
Top notch according to whom? I'm talking about in comparison with the rest of the world. I've never been outside of the country before but i'd have to believe that some of the worst doctors in America are still better than most doctors in 3rd world countries. I may be wrong on that, but i doubt it.


and health insurance is not research and development of medicine. It is a vehicle for cost coverage and profit.
Some Guy said:
You cannot address the cost of health insurance without addressing the cost of health care. When you buy health insurance, you're basically buying a pass to access health care. A health insurance company is just a middle man between you and the product you're consuming.

That's why argument over who's going to insure people and how is comical to me as it relates to reducing costs. Until doctors can perform surgeries for less, administer drugs for less and perform evaluations for less, you will not see a meaningful reduction in health insurance costs.
It specious at best to bring third world medicine into the discussion. :eusa_whistle:

Some of the worst doctors in America are still practicing thanks to lax standards of enforcement. I will not live in certain areas of the country because as I grow older and my needs grow more complicated, I do not wish bad medicine for myself. I have friends in Fla., who are shocked at the overall standard of care in that state.

In other countries the rates of death by illness and lifestyle are available. We are not really ahead of other industrialized nations when it comes to health care delivery.

We do have great technology and research, much funded by---gulp---the government, but delivering that to patients is another issue all together.
 
I don't like the current healthcare bill, but I'm curious about something. One of the biggest problems is the number of people who don't have insurance - the number of personal bankrupcies caused by medical emergencies and the number of emergency room and hospital bills that the government ends up paying anyway.

How do we address that without mandating coverage?

Poorly.

It's criminal what we allow.


look at Switzerland...a Capitalist Democracy:
FRONTLINE: sick around the world: interviews: pascal couchepin | PBS

One of the things really striking for Americans is that under LAMal, you now say the insurance companies can't make a profit on basic coverage. What's the thinking there?


The idea is very simple: If it is a social insurance, and everybody is obliged to be a member of a health insurance system, you can't ask them to pay so that the shareholders get a better revenue. It is a little the same, if I can compare with SBB, our railway system. We are very attached to the railway system; Switzerland is a country of railway. ... I think that the people wouldn't [have] agreed to privatize the railways [as] it is done now in Great Britain. To think that they can [make] a profit on the railway system, it [would] be against equality in this matter.

Naturally, you can question that, ... but till now we were able to afford a good railway system, to improve it and to have a high quality in transportation. ... We want also high quality for everybody in the health system, and after that you can earn more money than your neighbor. ... School, health care, railway system, aging, to have a good place for nursing homes for old people, retired people, we think that we must have equality of that -- not quite complete equality, it is impossible, but to have a great sense of solidarity among the people.

Now, see, that's striking for an American, because we would certainly say everyone is entitled to an education, everyone is entitled to legal protection if you get in trouble with the law, but we don't say that everyone is entitled to health care.

Why? Because it is a profound need for people to be sure that, if they are struck by a stroke of destiny, they can have a good health system.

... So if you ask the people of Switzerland, is everyone entitled to decent health care, the Swiss would say?

Everybody has a right to health care.

You would say, yes, they have a right, and you provide it.

Yes, and high quality. Naturally, you can have a better quality. To be in a room with only one bed, you have to pay something supplementary. But even that, I see in my own canton, which is not a rich canton -- and hospitals belong to the cities or to the canton now; they belong to the canton -- they intend to improve the system so that the people can be alone in a room when they are in hospital, rich or poor.

... When you said to the insurance companies, "No more profit on the basic health plan," what did they say?

They accept it; they have no choice. And [all these] companies are [heirs] of former social companies. For instance, the Groupe Mutuel ... was built on this idea: no profit; everything must be given to the people who are members of it. So there is a tradition of social attitude in these systems.

I am not systematically against the idea of having profits in the health insurance system, but if we introduce it, it is more with the idea to balance the power in the health insurance system, because now there is a lack of balance of power.
 
For all that Dante the Miserable professes to loathe trolls, this is a troll thread in that his response to posts by those he doesnt' agree with (or perhaps just doesn't like) is to neg rep them.

What a boner. Lol.
 
I don't like the current healthcare bill, but I'm curious about something. One of the biggest problems is the number of people who don't have insurance - the number of personal bankrupcies caused by medical emergencies and the number of emergency room and hospital bills that the government ends up paying anyway.

How do we address that without mandating coverage?

Poorly.

It's criminal what we allow.


look at Switzerland...a Capitalist Democracy:
FRONTLINE: sick around the world: interviews: pascal couchepin | PBS

One of the things really striking for Americans is that under LAMal, you now say the insurance companies can't make a profit on basic coverage. What's the thinking there?


The idea is very simple: If it is a social insurance, and everybody is obliged to be a member of a health insurance system, you can't ask them to pay so that the shareholders get a better revenue. It is a little the same, if I can compare with SBB, our railway system. We are very attached to the railway system; Switzerland is a country of railway. ... I think that the people wouldn't [have] agreed to privatize the railways [as] it is done now in Great Britain. To think that they can [make] a profit on the railway system, it [would] be against equality in this matter.

Naturally, you can question that, ... but till now we were able to afford a good railway system, to improve it and to have a high quality in transportation. ... We want also high quality for everybody in the health system, and after that you can earn more money than your neighbor. ... School, health care, railway system, aging, to have a good place for nursing homes for old people, retired people, we think that we must have equality of that -- not quite complete equality, it is impossible, but to have a great sense of solidarity among the people.

Now, see, that's striking for an American, because we would certainly say everyone is entitled to an education, everyone is entitled to legal protection if you get in trouble with the law, but we don't say that everyone is entitled to health care.

Why? Because it is a profound need for people to be sure that, if they are struck by a stroke of destiny, they can have a good health system.

... So if you ask the people of Switzerland, is everyone entitled to decent health care, the Swiss would say?

Everybody has a right to health care.

You would say, yes, they have a right, and you provide it.

Yes, and high quality. Naturally, you can have a better quality. To be in a room with only one bed, you have to pay something supplementary. But even that, I see in my own canton, which is not a rich canton -- and hospitals belong to the cities or to the canton now; they belong to the canton -- they intend to improve the system so that the people can be alone in a room when they are in hospital, rich or poor.

... When you said to the insurance companies, "No more profit on the basic health plan," what did they say?

They accept it; they have no choice. And [all these] companies are [heirs] of former social companies. For instance, the Groupe Mutuel ... was built on this idea: no profit; everything must be given to the people who are members of it. So there is a tradition of social attitude in these systems.

I am not systematically against the idea of having profits in the health insurance system, but if we introduce it, it is more with the idea to balance the power in the health insurance system, because now there is a lack of balance of power.

:cool:
 

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