Stop Drinking The Cool-aid America

[BarryTheEnginee]

People get so caught up in the noise the media and candidates are feeding us that we get distracted from our Nation’s true challenges. Cynically I believe this is by design. It amazes me how effective these distraction techniques are and how so many Americans can be so easily programmed. As the Farther of two children frankly I find this a little disheartening. However, I’m an optimist by nature and believe we will overcome. In this vain I started a blog that addresses real potential solution to some of our Nation’s most crucial problems. I started on healthcare and I’m working on energy right now. The bottom-line is when you methodically analyze the problems, causes and solutions it really does not require a brain surgeon to define real solutions. America we need to stop drinking the cool-aid we are being feed and start thinking for ourselves. Most of us have good ethics and common sense we just need to exercise it.
It you would like to read my take on some real solutions to our problems visit my blog at : www barrytheengineer blogspot com (replace spaces with periods ".")

Barry The Engineer

 

[Caligirl]

The real issues are sustainability, and education, these are global issues with long-lasting ramifications.

Have you blogged about these?

 

[BarryTheEnginee]

Not yet but agree both are crucial. They are on my list.

Thanks for the input,

Barry The Engineer

 

[BarryTheEnginee]

Why don’t we have “debates” on the top 10 issues facing America. Each debate would be one one and only one issue (so we hold 10 of them on different days). During a debate each candidate gets 20 minutes of uninterrupted time to describe in detail how they are going to address the critical issue being debated. Following the first 40 minutes (20 minutes each candidate), another 30 minutes would be to debate each other on this single issue. Moderators would participate to ensure equal time not to ask their own questions.

America we need to stop drinking the cool-aid we are being fed and start thinking for ourselves. Most of us have good ethics and common sense we just need to exercise it.
It you would like to read my take on some real solutions to our problems visit my blog at : www barrytheengineer blogspot com (put in periods)

Barry The Engineer

 

[cjcord]

Is cool-aid the same as Kool-Aid?

 

[LOki]

Barry,

I read your blog on healthcare, and would like to express how nice it was to read a nicely thought out analysis and solution to the "healthcare crisis" the U.S. is facing.

If I can offer but one critique, it this: every "solution" has at it's heart the presumption that access to healthcare insurance, rather than heathcare is neccessary.

There was a time that the very best healthcare could be obtained for the princely sum of a chicken. The doctor even made a house-call. I do realize that healthcare is more valuable now, and chickens were more valuable then, but then most folks also are capable of producing greater value than the agrarains of the past. The point is that most folks could muster the means for the very best healthcare available, because providers had to cost their service based upon what the market could bear.

Then came health insurance. Which at first was on catastrophic coverage, but now seems pretty much a system for creating a problem it's there to solve. Through the use of an intermediary, healthcare providers have been insulated from the market realities of keeping prices down--a practice encouraged by insurance providers to validate the "need" for their services--until every visit to the doctor's office is covered by insurance--then the market plays again, but now heathcare providers are accustomed to their fees, and the costs and profits associated with insurance must also be covered by premiums, rather than straight up bills. Healthcare is certainly going to "cost" more if the fees must cover not only the actual cost of every healthcare service provided, but also bureaucracy (and salaries of bureaucrats) involved in insuring the folks receiving healthcare.

I once heard someone characterize healthcare insurance as being like insuring lunch. You know everyone is going to make a claim--why would you add an intermediary that doesn't know what you want for lunch, nor how to make lunch but will add to the price of lunch; leaving everyone paying more for a poorly executed lunch that they really don't want?

 

[Missourian]

Is cool-aid the same as Kool-Aid?

Generic.

 

[Modbert]

There is no Kool-Aid left, John McCain drank it all.

(Note: Click on the picture to see it more clearly)

 

[BarryTheEnginee]

LOKi,

You bring up some excellent points. Several others have responded with leanings towards eliminating the middle man (i.e. the insurance companies). My sense is that, for better or worse, healthcare today is extremely complex and specialized, as opposed to the old trade-a-chicken days when a single physician did it all. Given this fact it seems to me you actually need some mechanism to herd-the-cats and insurance companies for all their faults are used to performing this function. Having aggregation entities also lets consumers compare quality factors holistically as opposed to physician-by- physician /specialty-by- specialty/treatment-by-treatment. Of course sometimes you want to drill-down and compare at this level but for young healthily families knowing which specialties they many need in the future is impossible.
Moreover, HMOs (probably one of the most cost-effective forms of insurance) today often pressure doctors to keep cost down because they are in essence offering the insurance-service at a fixed cost. My thoughts are that if insurance companies had to truly offer the same product (the standardized government-specified plan) and we measured consumer satisfaction with that product, then they would be forced to compete on price and quality alone. This in turn would put pressure on healthcare providers that are “in the network” to keep costs reasonable. Of course increasing the supply of doctors would also help to create more competition. All of these things are related. Although I share your frustration with insurance companies and lean towards the catastrophic-coverage-only approach with things like car and home insurance, I don’t like the alternatives. To me the alternatives would be either
1) People pay doctors directly and don’t have financial protection that “insurance” provides; or
2) People try to get “insurance-like” plan doctor-by-doctor specialty -by-specialty; or
3) Government becomes the “insurance provider”.
I would argue options 1 and 2 are not practical in today’s society and option-3 would make today’s inefficient burdensome health insurance companies look like lean-mean-fighting machines. But if this response does not address your suggestion please reply with some more details on how you would like to see it play out so I can better understand.

Thanks again for your response and concern about our Country’s Challenges.

--Barry The Engineer