Who wants Universal Health care--ran by our government?

[oreo]

It's clear with the Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae disasters (government run programs & government sponsored programs)--that we got a good look at how effective the Federal government has been in the mortgage loan business. (We're all paying for this huge bail-out--along with the most recent financial disaster AIG--we "us" had to loan billions too, & we've all got our fingers crossed that they will be able to pay us back).

Now can anyone imagine what happens when the Federal government takes over health care--as Barack Obama is proposing.

GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE SOLUTION--IT'S THE PROBLEM! "Ronald Reagan".


Your thoughts?

 

[DiamondDave]

Who wants it?

Simple

Those who find their own responsibilities too hard... those that want someone else to blame, pat them on the back, hand them something, and say it's all better.... envious people who think they are owed something just because someone else has it, whether they earned it or not

 

[xsited1]

We've got some neighbors with an Obama sign in their front yard that want government healthcare. They live in a section-8 house and sit on their front porch all the time. Trouble is, they are ALWAYS on their front proch which means they don't work. I guess they're watching the people go to work to pay for their lifestyle.

 

[SwingVoter]

Your thoughts?

George Bush expanded gov't health care more than any pres since LBJ with the medicare drug program, now costing $60 billion a year and rising. Mac's response has been to go on about earmarks, even though all the earmarks in the budget don't add up to the expansion of medicare that's taken place under W.

So we already have socialized medicine with medicare, medicaid, and SCHIP now accounting for $600 billion (more than the entire DoD budget with Iraq and Afghan included), and the Republicans doing nothing to stop the growth, other than talk about bridges in Alaska that would barely be rounding errors if they were built.

I'm against socialized medicine, and therefore I'm against the GOP. If you're dumb enough to buy the small gov't rhetoric they preach, but never practice, then I feel sorry for you.

 

[SwingVoter]

Who wants it?

Simple

Those who find their own responsibilities too hard...

Exactly. And most of those people are senior citizens who belong to the Republican party, who scream like socialists if anyone dares to tell them that they need to pay for their own prescriptions, or that they must stop withdrawing more money from socialist security than they ever put in.

 

[Navy1960]

Across the country, some military quarters for wounded outpatients are in bad shape, according to interviews, Government Accountability Office reports and transcripts of congressional testimony. The mold, mice and rot of Walter Reed's Building 18 compose a familiar scenario for many soldiers back from Iraq or Afghanistan who were shipped to their home posts for treatment. Nearly 4,000 outpatients are currently in the military's Medical Holding or Medical Holdover companies, which oversee the wounded. Soldiers and veterans report bureaucratic disarray similar to Walter Reed's: indifferent, untrained staff; lost paperwork; medical appointments that drop from the computers; and long waits for consultations. Washington Post.

Okay, you want an example of how well the government runs Universal Healthcare. Imagine this on a nationwide scale and you get some idea of Universal Health Care. Not to mention the fact, that Universal Healthcare is not some right you have because you simply suck in oxygen and take up space. All those Military men and women , and here's the key word " WORK" their collective asses off for that benefit. So now we are to give the same benefit to those that simply say, " I want it" thats the new standard?

 

[SwingVoter]

Okay, you want an example of how well the government runs Universal Healthcare.

I agree it's a disaster, so why not end the medicare drug program?

 

[editec]

It's clear with the Freddie Mac & Fannie Mae disasters (government run programs & government sponsored programs)--that we got a good look at how effective the Federal government has been in the mortgage loan business.

You have been misinformed that those programs were government run or owned, Oreo

History

Fannie Mae was founded as a government agency in 1938 as part of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal to provide liquidity to the mortgage market. For the next 30 years, Fannie Mae held a virtual monopoly on the secondary mortgage market in the United States.
In 1968, to remove the activity of Fannie Mae from the annual balance sheet of the federal budget, it was converted into a private corporation.[5] Fannie Mae ceased to be the guarantor of government-issued mortgages, and that responsibility was transferred to the new Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae).
Fannie Mae was put under a conservatorship of the U.S. Federal government on Sunday, 2008-09-07: Federal takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

History Freddie Mac

From 1938 to 1968, the secondary mortgage market in the United States was monopolized by the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae), which was a government agency during that period. In 1968, to help balance the federal budget, part of Fannie Mae was converted to a private corporation. To provide competition in the secondary mortgage market, and to end Fannie Mae's monopoly, Congress chartered Freddie Mac as a private corporation.

The Emergency Home Finance Act of 1970 created Freddie Mac. The goal was to create a secondary market for conventional mortgages, as indicated in the Fannie Mae charter. [3]
The Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act ("FIRREA") of 1989 revised and standardized the regulatory mechanisms for both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Prior to that, Freddie Mac was owned by the Federal Home Loan Bank System and its member thrifts and governed by the Federal Home Loan Bank Board which was later reorganized into the Office of Thrift Supervision. FIRREA severed Freddie Mac's ties to the Federal Home Loan Bank System, created an 18-member board of directors to run Freddie Mac, and subjected it to HUD oversight.
Freddie Mac was put under a conservatorship of the U.S. Federal government on Sunday, 2008-09-07: Federal takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

that we got a good look at how effective the Federal government has been in the mortgage loan business. (We're all paying for this huge bail-out--along with the most recent financial disaster AIG--we "us" had to loan billions too, & we've all got our fingers crossed that they will be able to pay us back).

The government did not bail out itself. It took over a privately owned corporation.

As they did I note with AIG this morning. A mere $85 Billion for 80% of their stock.

Now can anyone imagine what happens when the Federal government takes over health care--as Barack Obama is proposing.

Yes, I can imagine that.

I personally think it is a plan that will not work in the medium run..

Not because the government would run it, but because it won't have anything to do with health care, except the paying for it.

It is be a very expensive program that drives up the cost of health care very quickly.

GOVERNMENT IS NOT THE SOLUTION--IT'S THE PROBLEM! "Ronald Reagan".

Not this time, but that is true sometimes.

Your thoughts?

I think you were misinformed.

 

[Navy1960]

I agree it's a disaster, so why not end the medicare drug program?

Whats your issue with Medicare? You think the people that collect Social Security are a bunch of "Freeloaders"? There is a reason they call it the Social Security Trust Fund. The comparision being made between that and Universal Healthcare is completely different and I will tell you why. A. Social Security is a benefit paid at retirement after one has paid into the system for many many years. B. It is also paid to those that are disabled, however, even people that qualify for that have got to have paid into the system in order to qualify for benefits. It is a "Trust Fund" set up both for medical and retirement. Universal Health care is just that, a medical insurance program provided to EVERYONE, regardless, of age, or ability to pay. So give you an even better example, Under Social Security, my neighbors benefits are not the same as mine because both he and I paid into the the system different amounts. However, under Universal Healthcare, I would pay not only for my own, but for that person sitting on the stoop that won't get off their ass and go out and do for themselves.

 

[rayboyusmc]

Medicare may not be perfect, but it saves the lives of a lot of senior citizens who worked all their life to get to that age. It also has lower overhead costs than your private managed care companies.

Fuck this crap about calling it socialized medicine to scare people off.

Doctors would not work for the government. They would be paid through a single payer system where the average person would pay in less now than they are paying for current coverage.

I also know people who have lost their jobs and their coverage. They weren't lazy welfare queens like some of you like to point out.

50% of the frigging bankruptcies are caused by catastrophic illinesses and that is even to people with coverage.

We have the 37th lowest health care quality in frigging world. OUr infant mortality is worse than some third world countries.

You need to stop drinking the AMA and Right Wing Wacko Kool-Aid and do something about the 51 million "lazy" Americans who have no coverage.

Let's also privatize Social Security like McMumblefuck wants. Wow, it would really be a great time now to have all that money tied up in private investments like Lehman, AIG, Merrill Lynch etc.

I hate to burst your frigging bubble, but privatization is not always the best or the least costly. Something about a culture of greed sometimes gets involved.

 

[SwingVoter]

Whats your issue with Medicare? You think the people that collect Social Security are a bunch of "Freeloaders"?

They're both massive welfare programs, because people take out a lot more than they've paid in. The avg socialist security beneficiary is now withdrawing more than 5 times what he/she paid in, and that # is rising. That's socialism if it ever existed. Ironic that I have to argue with conservatives on this.

The trust fund is an accounting gimmick, as the GOP has rightly said for years, but still has done nothing to stop the massive increase in gov't debt caused by socialist security beneficiaries treating the U.S. gov't like their personal bank account.


Also, Medicare + SS are $1 TRILLION, or nearly half the non-interest outlays of the gov't. You can't at once say you like small gov't, and then not support cuts in government's largest programs.

 

[SwingVoter]

Let's also privatize Social Security like McMumblefuck wants.

Why not stand up to the AARP lobby and simply lift the retirement age?

Avg beneficiary got 2 yrs of benefits when FDR created the program, now avg is pushing 20 yrs. Retirement age should be adjusted to life expectancy.

 

[dilloduck]

Why not stand up to the AARP lobby and simply lift the retirement age?

Avg beneficiary got 2 yrs of benefits when FDR created the program, now avg is pushing 20 yrs. Retirement age should be adjusted to life expectancy.

Amen----lie to those old fuckers and make em work longer than they were told they were going to have to.

 

[SwingVoter]

Amen----lie to those old fuckers and make em work longer than they were told they were going to have to.

no, AARP doesn't want retirement age lifted for future beneficiaries still working, and the GOP doesn't have the balls to stand up to them

but love how the conservatives defend these massive, socialist programs

 

[Chris]

We already have universal healthcare, just a really bad version of it.

Every other Western democracy has a single payer system and they pay HALF per capita what we pay for healthcare. Why? Because a single payer system has inherent cost savings. Americans are being screwed by the lawyers and Big Pharma and the insurance companies.

 

[dilloduck]

no, AARP doesn't want retirement age lifted for future beneficiaries still working, and the GOP doesn't have the balls to stand up to them

but love how the conservatives defend these massive, socialist programs

Of course they don't--why would they ?

(swing voter ---)

 

[clazona]

George Bush expanded gov't health care more than any pres since LBJ with the medicare drug program, now costing $60 billion a year and rising. Mac's response has been to go on about earmarks, even though all the earmarks in the budget don't add up to the expansion of medicare that's taken place under W.

So we already have socialized medicine with medicare, medicaid, and SCHIP now accounting for $600 billion (more than the entire DoD budget with Iraq and Afghan included), and the Republicans doing nothing to stop the growth, other than talk about bridges in Alaska that would barely be rounding errors if they were built.

I'm against socialized medicine, and therefore I'm against the GOP. If you're dumb enough to buy the small gov't rhetoric they preach, but never practice, then I feel sorry for you.

Make sure to add the fraud cases involving medicare. I heard that number to be pretty high percentage wise. Talk about wasteful spending.

 

[clazona]

MIAMI, Florida - On an FBI undercover tape, the fraud was plain to see: A patient came to a South Florida AIDS clinic, signed some papers, walked into an office and was handed $150 in cash. She politely thanked the workers and left, her visit to the doctor finished without ever receiving any treatment.

According to records seized by investigators, the office staff (who was assured of the patient's cooperation) used her name to fraudulently bill Medicare for a list of expensive treatment and medications.

Law enforcement officials said it's just one of the many widespread, organized and lucrative schemes to bilk Medicare out of an estimated $60 billion dollars a year — a staggering cost borne by American taxpayers.

Blatant Medicare fraud costs targets...

In response to rayboyusmc, billions of dollars are accounted to medicare fraud in this nation. Socialized medicine = Socialized scam to taxpayers. If we want universal health care, we should fix SS, medicare, immigration, and this housing crisis started by our government first.

Medicare may not be perfect, but it saves the lives of a lot of senior citizens who worked all their life to get to that age. It also has lower overhead costs than your private managed care companies.

Fuck this crap about calling it socialized medicine to scare people off.

Doctors would not work for the government. They would be paid through a single payer system where the average person would pay in less now than they are paying for current coverage.

I also know people who have lost their jobs and their coverage. They weren't lazy welfare queens like some of you like to point out.

50% of the frigging bankruptcies are caused by catastrophic illinesses and that is even to people with coverage.

We have the 37th lowest health care quality in frigging world. OUr infant mortality is worse than some third world countries.

You need to stop drinking the AMA and Right Wing Wacko Kool-Aid and do something about the 51 million "lazy" Americans who have no coverage.

Let's also privatize Social Security like McMumblefuck wants. Wow, it would really be a great time now to have all that money tied up in private investments like Lehman, AIG, Merrill Lynch etc.

I hate to burst your frigging bubble, but privatization is not always the best or the least costly. Something about a culture of greed sometimes gets involved.

 

[Diuretic]

No partisanship here, just an observation or two.

When this subject comes up it's usually met by a storm of criticism based on ideological and not practical grounds. If you oppose the idea of changing the current US health care system you really need to pause for a moment and see if there are other ideas that might work in the US context and try to do it without resorting to a slogan such as the government can't do anything right and only the private sector can do that. At the moment it seems the private sector is putting the US and world economy in big trouble so why not put aside that mantra for a few moments.

Try not to use the term "socialist" and try not to look at poor people as being undeserving of decent health care.

Then have a look at the ideas being put forward.

 

[SwingVoter]

Of course they don't--why would they ?

so if you support the AARP, why not just let other leftist groups like the AFL-CIO just have their way ?why bother fighting big gov't when you can have empty rhetoric from politicians who'll never cut any program?