Later Is Already Here
First they came for our post offices…. and I said nothing.
Then they came for our roadways…and again, I said nothing.
Now they’re coming for our health insurance companies…and I say “Tear them a new one, Barack!”
In a society as large and unwieldy as the one we’ve become, some institutions just naturally lend themselves to standardization and oversight. Back in those yearned-for (and largely non-existent,) days of a “free market economy,” private companies and municipalities regulated and ran their own mail delivery, roads, schools, currency and coinage. Rail lines into the frontier were independently owned and taxed, leading to foundational fortunes for their robber baron owners—and poverty for the local businesses displaced via eminent domain seizures. The food supply was unstable and distribution lines were unreliable and expensive—great for the entrepreneurial and politically well connected, not so great for inter-city, let alone inter-state commerce. Few would argue that nationalizing these entities was a mistake. (I could, but for the sake of argument here, I won’t.)
After Great Depression 1.0, a series of reforms was instituted to ensure a standardization of banking practices, and allow federal oversight of commerce deemed in the national interest—the underwriting of mortgage loans, for example, or speculation in commodities that affected our national security.
Alas, beginning with the “deregulation” of the 1980’s, federal authority over standards and practices were systematically eviscerated by corporate interests with political backing. Savings and Loans were gutted and looted for private gain, and “market forces” I.E. Wall Street and their handmaidens at the Federal Reserve and UST, were allowed to rampage through the derivatives landscape, trampling the SEC and Joe6Pack underhoof as they ran wild.
As we’ve now seen, our once-anticipated retirements have financed the billion dollar bonuses of these cartels. They have enabled the very mergers and acquisitions that looted our pensions, and financed their wars of “containment” — or more accurately, wars of lucrative no-bid contracts and international hedging. Can you say “systematic transfer of national wealth? ”
Remember how hard GWB et al pushed to privatize Social Security and allow “ordinary Americans” to invest their social security accounts in the stock market? Although I ‘m sure their intentions were pure, following as they were, so closely on the heels of the tech bubble burst, one can only imagine the subsequent carnage had they been successful in their attempts.
In this regard we may have been the inadvertent beneficiaries of a literal deux ex machina in the form of the 9-11 attacks, which immediately diverted the discourse—and the cartels’ grubby intentions—and gave Cheney, Inc. an excuse to pillage the national coffers of Iraq instead.
An unregulated and unaccountable finance industry has already taken over our economy and bankrupted our country for the benefit of a miniscule aristocracy. The real estate credit bubble has burst. And now that Medicare is facing insolvency, and the ranks of the uninsured are swelling unsustainably, reform of the health care reimbursement system is a make-or-break moment for the insurance industry. Either they become the trustees of one of the biggest financial coffers on the planet, or they are rendered as irrelevant to the conversation as the recording industry is to music distribution.
This so-called reform bill decides their fate.
As a person caught in the cracks of America’s health care reimbursement industry, I’m in an unique position to comment. Most of my family are physicians, and for much of my 20’s I worked for a private inter-insurance exchange, marketing medical malpractice insurance to doctors and dealing with the subsequent political fallout from established insurers as they attempted, first to discredit, then to hone in on, the doctor-owned company I represented. It wasn’t pretty, but it was, as the owners put it, “a license to print money.” I know how the industry works. More importantly, I know how its insiders operate.
Nonetheless, for thirty-plus years now, I have paid, out-of-pocket, for a private health insurance policy. Let me just say that my experience with them has been less than helpful. (Google: “Mauled By a Bear, Then Mauled By Blue Cross” for the gory details.)
After successfully battling my way back to functionality over the last year-and-a half—a half-dozen surgeries and a fortune’s worth of out-of-pocket expenses later—I find myself both bankrupt and bereft, disfigured and unemployable, without teeth, essentially blinded, and with no way to come up with the onerous co-pays and deductibles I am responsible for paying in order to prompt my insurer to kick in for their share of the repairs. It’s almost like being an FB….
As many of you know, I live in a remote area without public transportation. Imagine the fun of trying to recover from devastating injuries (I was discharged from hospital after 36 hours in the ICU,) without a visiting nurse to help out, or any way to pay someone to get you to a doctor for follow up—and forget PTSD counseling. Imagine the horror of discovering that the $1,200+ per month of non-generic pharmaceuticals you need to save your eyesight and battle your necrotizing facial bones are not covered by your insurer—or available through any private or public subsidies. Imagine your insurer denying “medical necessity,” time after time and forcing you to figure out how to pay for time-sensitive treatment out-of-pocket—then trying battle their legal department for reimbursement. Or holding up payments until your doctor dismisses you for “obtaining medical services under false pretenses,” or claiming that services they pre-approved were in reality not approved – after the procedure has been performed and billed. Ad infinitum. That’s private insurance.
Now imagine trying to stay strong enough to recover under such unremitting psychological torture. Those who watched their 401(k) disappear as the market tanked, knowing there wasn’t a damned thing they could do about it because the market was rigged, know precisely what it feels like.
Yet insurers expect their insured to pay their premiums every month, whether or not we deem them “reasonable and customary.” And with no accountability to their customers, there’s nothing we can do about it either. The federal government, for all its many faults, couldn’t get away with this. They are, after all, accountable to the voters, and there are reliable mechanisms for appeal.
Is this broken “insurance” system what you want for your cancer treatment a few years down the line? How about for when you’re dealing with the aftermath of your first stroke? Keep in mind that Medicare as we now know it, will be, is being rationed. Whom do you want in charge of the rationing?
Quite honestly, I do not believe that medical care is a ‘”right.” I’ve always eaten a disgustingly healthy diet, kept myself extremely fit, and never smoked a cig in my life. I resent like hell having to subsidize people who are too lazy to take even minimal responsibility for their own good health, and those who refuse out of “political conscience” or just plain cheapness, to do their part in maintaining America’s national medical system by buying a health insurance policy and paying their fair share. And don’t even get me started on people who “hire” illegal labor under the table and then expect the rest of us to pick up the costs of educating those workers’ children and caring for their health needs.
Thirty-two million of us Baby Boomers are about to retire. Medicare is about to go under. The labor base that we’ve been expecting to support us through our old age is unemployed for the foreseeable future—and most likely until we all die off and give them the jobs back. The stock market is about to implode for real (no TARP bailouts this time,) and pensions are going to evaporate into the ether—whether they’re inflated into vapor, or simply “modified” away as the tax base dwindles and quasi-public entities like GM, declare bankruptcy. And in the midst of all this, twenty-three layers of middlemen stand –palms outstretched—between our wallets and our doctors.
Now, I personally happen to think that being able to send a letter three thousand miles across the country in three days—for 42 cents—is a pretty good deal. I am heartened that local school districts in Kansas do not get to teach their students that Jesus walked with the dinosaurs as part of the accepted curriculum. It gives me actual hope that Congressmen Daryl Issa (R. CA.) and Phil Angelides (D. CA.) have stopped foaming at each other long enough to form a tag team to smack Wall Street over the head with a Congressional folding chair. That Representatives Alan Grayson (D. FL.) and Ron Paul (R. AZ.) have outflanked Barney Frank to take on the Fed. That Representatives Dana Rohrabacher (R. CA) and Dennis Kucinich (S. OH.) have united from really opposite sides of the aisle to rail against funding anymore death and destruction in Afghanistan.
And now we have Scott Brown in Kennedyland while Bill Clinton urges Massachusetts’s voters to “take back the Tea Party.” Maybe with a little luck we’ll see Sarah Palin joining forces with Bernie Sanders to oust Ben Bernanke. (Hey, a girl can dream…. )
What I’m seeing here is our federal government finally beginning to lay off the partisan bickering and starting to demand some accountability in our national institutions. If We the Citizenry egg them on a bit more, maybe they’ll get the idea and put the thumbscrews to the bandits who are holding our medical system hostage as well.
Seriously folks. The system is broken. We’re going to have to raise taxes to pay for the repairs. Rationing is already a fact of life and is about to get a lot more stringent—forcing us to confront some hard ethical choices. And we’re going to have to do this NOW, because later is already here.
So what it comes down to is this: who do you, personally, want to administer your health care in the last third of your life? A profit-oriented, unaccountable cartel like the ones that have run our country’s economy into the ground, sold US out to every foreign interest with two shiny pennies to rub together, and siphoned off our savings and our grandkids’ future? Or the good old reliable, plodding-but-fair, hold-the-bell-and-whistles US Postal Service?
Why look! It’s snowing down there on the creek road, and here comes Gus in his beat up old 4WD—with my my snail mail….
by ahansen
I’m sorry for your situation, which is a product of the health care system people are “for” if they do nothing. But I disagree with this.
“Yet insurers expect their insured to pay their premiums every month, whether or not we deem them “reasonable and customary.” And with no accountability to their customers, there’s nothing we can do about it either. The federal government, for all its many faults, couldn’t get away with this.”
Guess what’s going to happen, after Generation Greed leaves a bankrupt country, when younger generations reach old age and hope to receive Medicare. After a lifetime of paying, as you did for private insurance. I guess Reagan taught us deficits don’t matter, if you are one of the people taking out off the top first.
This is beyond party and ideology. It’s Generation Greed.
“I guess Reagan taught us deficits don’t matter, if you are one of the people taking out off the top first.”
You might have spotted a drawback with letting retired movie actors with a ‘Greed is Good’ mentality run the show…
Obama has spent more money in one year than GW did in 8. I hope that Mass 41 votes NO on extending the debt limit. Need all depts to cut at least 10%. There you go Big O.
Maybe we could start instead with eliminating Homeland “Security” and cutting the War Department in half or merely returning it to a Department of “Defense” with a commensurate much smaller budget.
+1
The US health care system is a remarkable (yes, I mean it) creation that has been years in the making, but it is far from perfected. I get frustrated by folks who see things through a very narrow prism of how to make it serve only their own needs and not how to make it work well by understanding its limitations and capabilities.
My perspective (to paraphrase a certain men’s vanity product) is that I’m not only a cog in the healthcare machine…I’m also a client. A better analogy is not to a machine, but to a tree that has to be cared for properly to thrive and bear fruit. That tree is currently sick and damaged from a variety of stresses.
a) The tree needs a sufficient diet but restricted diet of out of pocket payments, insurance reimbursements, government subsidies, and a limited amount of charitable contributions. During lean times, it feeds on another, cannibalistic source: cost containment. This can be derived from profit driven “innovation” (as opposed to quality driven), improved efficiency (i.e. equipment or wage cutting) and/or increased access (i.e. market share).
b) The tree bears fruit of a quality that is not only difficult to measure but is of a highly subjective nature. While we look at things like infant mortality, post surgical wound infection rates, quality of life surveys, etc….ultimately the best trees are the ones that get the most visitors, as customers vote with their feet.
c) The tree has a host of predators: frauds, corporate profiteers, outdated equipment or techniques, moribund bureaucracies and incompetent practitioners, misuse by certain patients who consume the fruit unsustainably (hypochondriacs, prima donnas, and entitlement queens who need the blessing of the system to keep drawing payments from the government), or even overuse by patients with more rational and legitimate needs.
d) The tree needs predator control mechanisms: regulation, new equipment, transparency, torts, and research into efficacy of all of those interventions. However well intentioned those things may be, all can be overdone to the point of becoming toxic or even predatory to the tree.
The problem with health care reform legislation is that it is like asking a bunch of PhD scientists to care for a tree, all with good intentions but different types of expertise that don’t jibe and ultimately hurt the tree more because they don’t know how to work together.
Alas, the human body is not a machine, engineered to specific tolerances, and uniformly repairable via a factory schematic. I find it telling that every government attempt to rein in reimbursement proceedures seems to include “experts” from all sectors of society except the people who actually have a clue as to what’s wrong with the system and how to fix it—practicing physicians.
Don’t you just love it that the Dems healthcare bill takes $500 billion from Medicare and gives it to illegal aliens for their use. Go Harry Reid hohohohahaha and Pelosi.
Obviously no one should have to go through what you have gone through. But that doesn’t necessarily make your policy prescriptions ideal.
For instance, exactly who was responsible for all the wrongs that you rightly decry: wars, financial disasters, corruption and the like? It is the very Federal Government that you suggest would never act as badly as the health insurance companies. And in at least some cases (e.g., TARP and its relatives), the populace was almost unanimously opposed to what they did, but they did it anyway.
Of course, it is also important to understand WHY the health insurance companies are in the position they are in, which is primarily because of our weird “system” in which most people’s health insurance is paid through (or by) their employer. And in turn the reason for that is wage-price controls enacted during WWII by the Federal Government.
I’ll take real private enterprise any day, in preference to the currently proposed choices: a cartel such as the current insurance industry, or the Federal Government.
The employer-based insurance system is going the way of the dodo, and it’s not in society’s best interests to have a sick citizenry. My opinion is that it’s about to implode like the banking industry has. Losing your house is one thing. Watching your family die of plague is quite another altogether.
The federal government (supposedly,) brings standardization and oversight to our institutions; its actual agencies and programs are run by those who have training in these specific fields. The military is run by the military. Education is run by educators. Agricultural policy is run by agronomists. One presumes medicine would be run under the purview of those with training in the medical field. The aim here is to cut out the redundant middlemen and make a standard of medical care (as yet to be determined,) available to all and available at the same cost basis for all.
Why can’t we have public and private options?
Those who want to pay more for the private options are free to do so, while those who are okay with a little less service are free to choose a public option? You can also have a hybrid where private insurance is available to people who want “Cadillac care.”
Why not?
‘Remember how hard GWB et al pushed to privatize Social Security and allow “ordinary Americans” to invest their social security accounts in the stock market? Although I ‘m sure their intentions were pure, following as they were, so closely on the heels of the tech bubble burst, one can only imagine the subsequent carnage had they been successful in their attempts.’
Can you even begin to imagine how much higher the stock market peak would have reached before Main Street’s retirement savings were destroyed in the Great Financially-Engineered Wall Street Meltdown of 2008 if GWB’s plan to hardwire Social Security to Wall Street had materialized? I shudder to contemplate it…
Yep
Wall Street leaders saw this coming a mile a way. They pushed to get Social Security into the system before the collapse to keep the party going a bit longer. They changed bankruptcy law. They put Bernanke in place, while the MSM gushed about how he was a scholar of the great depression. When the great depression loomed who would argue with such a scholar as the gov and tax payers were looted. GS started shorting and selling their own MBS. They put their guy Hank in place at the treasury, a great deal for Hank as he got to sell all of his GS at the peak with no tax paid and plow all the money into treasuries right before the collapse.
Nicely stated. See my post at the end of today’s bits bucket, which gives a general description of the kind of ‘innovative financial engineering’ that Wall Street has recently developed and implemented…
Wall Street leaders saw this coming a mile a way. They pushed to get Social Security into the system before the collapse to keep the party going a bit longer. They changed bankruptcy law …
I’d like to believe that. It sounds good, and I like a good corporate conspiracy theory as much as anyone.
I think you’re right in the sense that the financial industry has tried to juke the system at every turn. But all their machinations have been reactive, not forward-thinking. Or perhaps they’ve been reactive and/or purely profit-focused. The majority of Wall Street leaders didn’t see this coming, or they would’ve defended their own firms and profits more vigorously. Bear Stearns, Lehman, AIG, Citi — financial entities like that don’t walk so close to the precipice if they have an inkling of how catastrophic the drop will be. (Do they?)
I think they all thought they could get out before the crash.
Like most of us do on a personal level. Thinking, “I’ll be able to sell and get my equity out.” But we don’t think that everyone else will be thinking the same thing at the same time.
Blaming Arizona…
Business
M&I reports 5th straight quarterly loss
By Paul Gores of the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Jan. 20, 2010 8:52 a.m.
Marshall & Ilsley Corp. (MI) reported its fifth consecutive quarterly loss Wednesday, but noted signs that loan delinquencies are slowing down.
…The company reported that its exposure to construction and development loans in Arizona, where it has taken the worst losses, has declined as the bank has written down and sold off problem loans.
“It was Ben Jones, he MADE me wear the HBB T-Shirt…honest M. Furlong!” exclaimed mikey as he clutched his loose change, frog, a short string and blue plastic M & I piggybank after being escorted out by security.
An unidentified SWAT member stated that will be charged with Flashing a FDIC Bankster with Reality which is a Federal Offense.
http://tinyurl.com/yfm6kty
ET-Chicago!
Excellent post, the year is young but…
Additionally, we talk on and on about WS, but somehow forget about a little known town ( Calabassas, CA ) that was the Epi-Center from which all meltdowns originate.
Sure, the “wirehouses” had their hand in the subslime but I hardly think their “design” was to decimate their share price, appear before Senate comm. meetings and we’re still not certain they ‘won’t’ do time? Great “plan”!
ET, you’ve really nailed it. Still, ahansen’s post is impossible to dismiss. Personally I would have added the airlines and AUTO ins. co’s… but!?
Personally I would have added the airlines and AUTO ins. co’s… but!?
Ah yes, the airlines and the auto industry. I waffle between feeling sorry for them (the rank-and-file, at least) and getting angry at their Keystone Kops management and union antics.
This is from wikipedia
In 2006, Fuld was named #1 CEO in the Brokers & Asset Managers category, by Institutional Investor magazine.[21] In 2007 he received a $22 million bonus.[22]
Fuld at one time served on the board of directors of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, a position he ceased to hold shortly before the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers. He is a member of the International Business Council of the World Economic Forum and the Business Council. He also serves on the Board of Trustees of Middlebury College and New York-Presbyterian Hospital. As well he was on the board of directors of the Robin Hood Foundation, but was removed from the Board following the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy.[23]
In December 2008, Fuld was given the “Lex Overpaid CEO” and “thief” award of the Financial Times for having received $34m in 2007 and $40.5m in 2006, the last two years before his bank’s failure
It’s the heads I win tails you loose game. Fuld made money hand over fist. So he lost a little on his options, he probably thought that he would get bailed out too, but GS needed one to go down so that they could scare the pants off of Congress and get 700 billion in TARP and other gifts. Fuld new what was coming so he took while the taking was good. You also have no idea if this guy massively shorted to hedge the stock that he held. He could have shorted the financial industry in general and would not have had to report it.
Exactly, measton.
The meltdown in 2008 was pretty bad, but it’s generally over now for my 401k and personal investment accounts.
The real problem with privatized 401 over SS is that the gov’t couldn’t raid a privatized 401k as easily, meaning taxes would go up or contributions would go down.
Another ‘real problem’ with privatized 401(K) plans whose contributions are hard-wired into Wall Street is that markets behave differently in flood conditions than under normal financial flows. Like a river valley experiencing a 500-year flood, the flow of liquidity would tend to first lift the ‘water level’ of market indexes to record heights, followed by subsequent years of drought.
The real problem with privatized 401 over SS is that the gov’t couldn’t raid a privatized 401k as easily,
You might want to read up on Argentina.
The Gov might have a little more trouble raiding a private 401k vs SS, however Wall Street would fee it to death.
George Miller, DCa, has already had hearings on confiscating IRAs, 401ks, and other pension plans. It’s here sports fans.
Sure, 2008 is over, but 2010 is just beginning. I don’t think we’ve seen the last of the market turmoil.
I’m thinking 2011/2012 will see the worst of it.
The stock market bubble would have been the mother of all bubbles ever seen had speculation with social security funds been allowed.
yeah.. Government knows how to invest and grow that money better than us peons. They’ve already done it to the tune of something like a negative $6 trillion already.
Anyway, it took a lot of hard work but the SS can was kicked further down the road.. to 2016. We got 6 whole years before SS expenses begin to exceed revenues..
Yep. Good thing it all got spent by Big Brother, replaced with inter-governmental (we’ll pay if we ever get the money) treasuries in a fabled “lock box,” or we’d surely have lost half of our money instead of all of it.
Wait just a darn minute…
“The stock market is about to implode for real (no TARP bailouts this time)…”
That may be the case, but I confess I have a hard time seeing it. For instance, what is propping up the stock market today, and what would make whatever is propping it up presently suddenly stop doing so tomorrow?
Is this the kind of scenario that concerns you?
Market Snapshot
Jan. 20, 2010, 10:16 a.m. EST
U.S. stocks tumble on China concerns, starts drop
By Kristina Peterson, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stocks tumbled Wednesday as a report stoked fears that China may curb bank lending and housing starts fell by more than expected last month.
…
PB -
The Fed has caused this surge in equity prices (indirectly and directly) - Taking toxic assets of the books of banks enhanced their value temporarily (they are still insolvent with the true value of the junk i.e. Alt-A and seconds left on the books) and the banks were quite generous with their profits and bonused their employees. In addition buying Treasuries shunted money from bonds into stocks due to the depressed interest rates. The 2.3 trillion dollar balance sheet plus all the backstops/guarantees did wonders, something I thought was unimaginable back in March of 2009.
This house of cards won’t last - right now, international financial crisises: Greece, Ireland, Iceland, Dubail result in a flight to quality. Is that “quality” the greenback printed in increasing numbers by a fiscally troubled superpower or is that “quality” the barbaric relic which stored value for thousands of years?
“Taking toxic assets of the books of banks enhanced their value temporarily (they are still insolvent with the true value of the junk i.e. Alt-A and seconds left on the books) and the banks were quite generous with their profits and bonused their employees.”
Two questions:
1) Is this true?
2) If yes, why doesn’t this qualify as accounting fraud?
Perhaps the Congressional audit committee could sort that out…
How much of the toxic debt is on gov books now.
I suspect that when the threshold is reached we are in for another leg down. Just not sure what or when that will be.
“2) If yes, why doesn’t this qualify as accounting fraud?’
Because it’s per direction of the Federal Reserve in hopes that asset prices will rebound before losses have to be taken.
You asked what could trigger a stock market retreat. It will be the recognized loss in total equity due to the inevitable failure to reinflate RE values, leading to another credit crisis.
Nothing appears to be propping it up today. It’s down nearly 200 points.
200 points down even with a Republican elected in Mass.? I don’t get it.
More than anything else, the markets dislike “uncertainty”.
The election puts everything that’s been going on for the past year in healthcare, cap and trade and other shenanigans in doubt.
Even if no one like the plans, contingencies were being made in the event they became manifest.
now……….who knows what direction we will take.
Back 2 steps?
Welcome back Ahansen!
How did Mrs. Wilson’s Christmas fund do?
Thank you, Skye, it’s been one humdinger of a month and I’m glad, grateful even, to be back.
Thanks to you, and to all who responded to the Mrs. Miller piece. I received a lovely phone message from her on Christmas day alluding to my possible part in the sudden flurry of donations she had received, but she is too discrete to accuse me of being behind it, and I didn’t wish to shatter the Santa Claus illusion by taking any credit for the generosity and good hearts of others.
I’m sure if you asked her directly, she’d be glad to fill you in. I honestly have no idea.
Welcome back Ahansen…
Thanks, scd.
“I am heartened that local school districts in Kansas do not get to teach their students that Jesus walked with the dinosaurs as part of the accepted curriculum.”
LOL. I agree — I think you could get doctors on board by providing them stability/certainty in a crazy marketplace.
I’d rathert be seen by a doctor who knows what he’s going to make, rather than a fresh-out-of-med-school noob who needs my out-of-pocket $3k to feed their student loan gators (as has been the case with the last two dentists I ditched).
Hey Mug,
I’d estimate that about 2/3 of the docs I know support some sort of nationalized health service, if only to be rid of all the non-standardized billing paperwork they’re subjected to in the current system.
This wouldn’t preclude fee-for-service elective practices, but at least would provide for a common coinage, as it were. And get rid of the layers and layers of middlemen feeding off the actual practice of medicine so maybe we could afford to train more RN’s and Physician’s Assistants.
My mom worked for one of those layers in medical billing. She said that some bills went through up to 8 middle layer companies between MD/hospital and insurance? Each extracting a fee.
Our daughter is a young doctor (with $145k med ed loans). She supports just what you are calling for.
I just spent 1.5 hours of my day on the phone with the insurance company straightening out some billing for a recent accident. I can only imagine what the lost productivity is each day for people having to deal with insurance claims. Just fixing that alone would save untold billions.
Hey, slow down on that bike!
Very true, and something people don’t talk much about.
My nephew is a specialist physician. He received all of his medical training courtesy of the US Army. After he fufilled his committment to the Army (eight years) he went into private practice. He lasted 2 years in private practice and returned to military practice as a contract physician to one of the military hospitals. The paperwork, insurance billings, low medicare reimbursements and uncollected accounts drove him crazy.
He is happy as a clam practicing medicine while the bureaucrats shuffle the papers.
Spoke, the doctor I rent my house from did this exact same thing. He is an anesthesiologist for the Army and I wouldn’t have my current rental if worked outside if the service. When they were in town a few year ago I tried to get some stories out of him, but he wouldn’t talk about it at all.
Another problem with the MSM………the news about the Kansas “Intelligent Design” issue made the National news. but the fact that all the jackholes that voted for it were thrown out in the next School Board elections, didn’t..
I think I can speak for every state/municipality, in that nobody pays much attention to local school board elections, until stuff like this happens. Then it usually gets corrected during the next election.
Everybody assumes that “Intelligent Design” is still the standard out here, when, in fact, the issue has been addressed. Mainly because the “rest of the story” didn’t get nearly as much coverage as the initial headlines.
the news about the Kansas “Intelligent Design” issue made the National news. but the fact that all the jackholes that voted for it were thrown out in the next School Board elections, didn’t.
That happened in Dover, Pennsylvania, not Kansas.
The Dover case relates to interpretations of ID (not legit); whereas the Kansas issue gave rise to Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (which, despite being a science educator, I am not a fan of (making fun of people doesn’t help them learn)).
I am amazed that anyone teaching “science” can promote Darwinism, which has very little basis in science, and much in the way of theories and beliefs. It is more religion than science, but ID is usually not even investigated by so-called scientists, even to look at the arguments.
It is usually simply dismissed as “religious” lunacy.
I have read AHansen’s contempt for Christian views over the years, so i expect that to be her viewpoint, however, i expect she has never read a single book on ID. I expect you haven’t either. Most school teachers i have discussed this subject with have NO knowledge of ID and simply parrot the fraudulent evidence that has been proposed over the years. They also tend to become very emotional about it. Hardly “cool-headed” unbiased researchers of the truth.
I found similar reactions when discussing the FRAUD of the “settled science” of global warming.
Now that that issue is being exposed as selective data point reading, perhaps the rabid emotionalism of the advocates for the “inconvenient truth” will see that scientist rely more on faith for their viewpoints than many devoutly religious people.
I am amazed that anyone teaching “science” can promote Darwinism, which has very little basis in science,
For me, I’ve never understood the conflict between God and science. Maybe because it’s presented as so contentious for something that is probably so simple.
As an imperfect Christian and a product of a natural science education, I have never had a problem with my core belief that God created evolution.
Slow down, dude. I saw *in person* and *spoke with* Dr. Kenneth Miller at a conference in Pinellas a few years back.
Can you tell me who he is without google?
I know he is not a supporter of ID or “creationism”>?
I am more familiar with Michael Behe, Phillip johnson and Michael Denton. Behe disagrees with Miller and his lab experiments to try and Create evolution in the lab.
He uses e-coli and works at it to make new strains, but his experiments are tainted. He thinks his experiments prove evolution. Interestingly enough, the processes he “creates” in the lab would NEVER happen in nature.
I find from my own experience that people in academia tend to seek out people who side with Darwin and look for ways to discredit ID.
I haven’t done much reading lately, and i am sure that the arguments are being added to with more Genome work, but i think ID will eventually displace Darwin.
Evolution is mathematically impossible from a statistical point of view. The complexities of the CELL should prove that Mutations could never have sufficient time to develop life.
And, of course, there is always the issue of causation. The whole primordial soup story is interesting, but there are no mechanisms in nature to create DNA from a soup.
There are also major issues with the age of the earth, and gee whiz, if the earth was a frozen ice ball 800,000 years ago, how did all these new life forms pop up, or did they just all thaw out and start reproducing again.
The so-called Cambrian explosion seems to defy gradual changes over long periods of time, but that has been explained away, also, with a modified theory.
The whole story just says “given enough time” this can happen. Where’s the science? Where are the intermediate species in the fossil record? They don’t exist. And most disturbing, the most recent discoveries in China show even MORE unknown species. Where did they come from?
Behe’s thing was “irreducible complexity”. IN one example he tried to use a simple mechanical device, a mousetrap, with only 4 components to show that if ANY of the components was missing, the device cannot work. Cells have similar traits. You need all the parts to make them work. They are exremely complex. Given all the time in the universe, there is simply no way they “evolved”.
Even Darwin had trouble with the “EYE”, knowing nothing of molecular biology. If you didn’t have one to begin with, how could such a complex organ “evolve”, with all the pieces necessary to make it “work”. Without all the pieces it is useless, and therefore, under the theory, would disappear since it did not provide for survival of the fittest. It simply would not develop.
I will stop here. Ben usually deletes my more expansive posts since i tend to push the levers of controversy.
Interestingly, i have a book by James Gills, M.D., an opthomogist here in Tarpon Springs ( he did a lens replacement for me).
He writes extensively on the complexity of the cell has some compelling arguments against Darwinism.
Well, if you have a hard time believing that the eye could just ‘appear’, how could something as complex as a God just appear and make it happen? The eye is a tinker-toy in comparison.
‘Splain that one.
Philosophy is philosophy, Diogenes. Science is science. Ten years ago, when “ID” was being taken semi-seriously by bio-ethicists, I spent the better part of a year debating creationists in public forums. This blog is not one of them.
As for Christianity, from what I’ve seen of your attitudes concerning your fellow man, you are in no position to discuss my alleged “disdain” for the teachings of Jesus Christ.
“I know he is not a supporter of ID”
Dr. Miller was the expert witness in Kitzmiller V. Dover.
If you actually have questions about evoloution and are willing to learn why ID and creationism has no basis, read talkorgins dot org. THay have extensive databases of information that tries to go against science and evoloution, and explain why they are wrong with data and references. They specificly talk about your irreducable complexity and eye.
I suspect you wont, and will just keep parroting the same arguemnets that were debunked 100 years ago, like the rest of creationists, because you dont care about reality.
I can relate, ahansen. I’m self-employed, and I’ve written about my health insurance “choices” here before. Time to let other self-employed HBB-ers weigh in on this topic.
My wife and I have good health insurance as employees.
But the trend is to hire the next generation as “independent contractors” without health insurance — and without even the enjoyment of running their own show.
Why doesn’t anybody care about their own kids? And why don’t the young and self-employed stand up for themselves before they reach the age when health care needs arrive and it’s too late?
I buy my own health insurance through ehealthinsurance.com. $5k deductible ppo. $139 per month. I love my health insurance. I love being responsible to pay for it. And yes it does go over state lines.
Government stay out of health care.
Watch the Frontline program, “Sick across America”. Private health insurance if fine until you have a significant problem then the insurers pour over your medical history looking for ways to deny coverage. One of the insurance companies “featured” had a bonus plan for thier coverage denial group, paying nice sums of money for finding holes in the suscribers health history to allow denial of coverage. Its criminal. It should be be like life insurance, once past a two year look back period, private insurance should not be cancellable for anything other than non payment of premium.
Dispite being a lean, fit, marathon runner, and having been continually covered by an employers plan for more that 30 years, I am uninsurable in the private insurance market at any price due to the discovery of a genetic heart condition. Too bad the doc didn’t just keep his mouth shut.
So, I am locked in to my job for the next four years until I can transition to medicare. If it weren’t for maintaining my health coverage, I could retire and give my seat to the next generation. I have no intention of having the heart problem “fixed” and have a very strongly written non intervention living will. The problem is, if I were to collapse, they would have me in the hospital and a quarter million bill wracked up before anyone could stop them. That is money I would prefer my wife and children have as opposed to prolonging my life for a couple of more years.
I’ve been ranting about the inequity of responsible people forced to pay for all the addicts medical treatment for years!
About 15 or so years or so ago I realized the implications of the MIB & the impact upon med insurance billing/coverage.
In fact, I really became a gadfly by proclaiming that if I ever had an admit for a major medical event, I’m going to say “no speake de english” & give my name as “Jose Gonzalez”! (and enjoy watching the pissy attitudes from intake because I look 1000% caucasian as hell …. blonde / blue eyed devil that I am)
Hey, fuggit! Let ‘em track me down for follow-up billing with THAT common hispanic name. Why the hell should the average taxpayer forever subsidize the 3rd world?
Lastly, notice just who exactly is sending help to Haiti.
As usual.
Medicenes Sans Frontieres was there three full days before the US medical contingent arrived. French, don’t you know….
Why do I get the impression you’ve never had a major medical incident, BiLA?
Nothing wrong about being a self-employed contractor. You don’t get benefits but that only means you have to make up for it by $ per hour, as I do. You have multiple job offers? Well you figure the bottom line in a spreadsheet and go to the best.
This is now a society built for footloose people who only rent. Month to month is preferable too.
No whining!
Sounds like your masters have trained you well. Everybody to the hamster wheels! (And how will people raise families?)
I’m happy to be a hamster running on the interior of the wheel. Why? Because I can live much more than five years without a…
J-O-B.
Can you?
Oh yes, and I keep grinning about people who think the purpose of being human is to produce babies.
We are far more developed than the reptilian stage, methinks. The purpose is to make the best of your own environment for your own happiness.
That’s your opinion, Bill.
Being the good libertarian that you are, surely you understand we are all individuals with different needs and desires? Do you really think your way is the only right way?
Mind you, I’m not trying to pick on you. It’s just fun to mix things up so we can debate these things.
I think there is a great deal of instances out there of “getting married and having children because we are expected to do it.”
I work with a lot of first generation Asian Americans. They are so into getting hitched and mating, just like nth-generation Americans were into during the 1950s and early 1960s.
The senior white boomer engineers are mostly single and childless where I work. The first generation asians are always amazed at us, like we are freaks, because we are single or divorced or childless. One first generation Asian guy keeps asking me if I found a girlfriend yet. That one’s wife has number 5 in the oven.
It’s the culture of baby making for them.
For us, it’s much different. There are no large farms needing more hands to work. Death rate of infants is much lower too. Jobs are less secure. The good life is harder to get. Our parents were one income families. We see that we cannot have it all.
Your genepool, and all the things you could teach it, dies with you, BiLA.
I find that saddening.
More and more articles about male biological clock. Birth defects, mental illnesses are more common in people conceived when the fathers are older than 40. Much worse when older than 50. I fall into that camp.
Cannot detect the mental illnesses in the womb. Enough anti-choicer’s out there to object to aborting physical defects.
I don’t want to risk it. The risks outweigh the advantages. Even even if the kid is perfectly healthy, which can ba possible with older fathers, there is no guarantee he or she will grow up to be someone you are proud of. Ask Charlie Manson.
I am self employed also…You all would “up-chuck” if I told you what my monthly Ins. was…
I’m becoming a “self-employed contractor”, whether I want to be or not.
Me-thinks that health insurance premiums that are 40% of my take-home pay are a little out of line. But that’s just me.
Basically, if you are 45-50 and not generating a six figure plus income, you are “economically unviable” in the US economy. If you don’t believe it, just check out the stories every week of companies wanting to “buy out” their older employees. It won’t surprise me if the government starts a “Cash For Geriatrics” bounty on the old folks one of these days.
“Me-thinks that health insurance premiums that are 40% of my take-home pay are a little out of line. But that’s just me.”
I’m thinking it’s not just you. The greed is despicable.
Just for kicks I got a quote from Anthem for my family of 5. A crappy policy with a $2000 deductible: $1400/month.
Basically, if you are 45-50 and not generating a six figure plus income, you are “economically unviable” in the US economy.
Bingo. Anyone without a nice income can forget about seeing a doctor in this country. Small wonder ER’s are choked with patients who can’t pay.
It’s testimony to how badly we’re being gouged that many of us would consider this a really good deal….
I have a homeowner’s policy that costs around $425 a year. With a deductible of $1,000. And, like my health “insurance” policy, this is individual, not group, insurance.
Quite honestly, I do not believe that medical care is a ‘”right.” I’ve always eaten a disgustingly healthy diet, kept myself extremely fit, and never smoked a cig in my life. I resent like hell having to subsidize people who are too lazy to take even minimal responsibility for their own good health, and those who refuse out of “political conscience” or just plain cheapness, to do their part in maintaining America’s national medical system by buying a health insurance policy and paying their fair share. And don’t even get me started on people who “hire” illegal labor under the table and then expect the rest of us to pick up the costs of educating those workers’ children and caring for their health needs.
Ahansen,
I hardly EVER agree with you or your point of view on some issues. But that last paragraph summed up my feelings on this subject.
On a personal note,
Me and you agree on some principals. I hate what happened to you. And you are correct in that there has to be something that prevents what the insurance company is doing to you. I would point out tort reform, but that’s just me….
I honestly hope you get better….
Me and you agree on some principals. I hate what happened to you. And you are correct in that there has to be something that prevents what the insurance company is doing to you. I would point out tort reform, but that’s just me….
Stp how is tort reform going to keep the insurance companies from screwing ahensen???????????? Unless you mean allowing ahensen to take the insurance companies to court and extract a pound of flesh for failing to pay what they promised. I suspect you are talking about preventing legal action against MD’s.
As a dabbler in healthcare and insurance law, I can assure you that it’s entirely possible to take your insurance company to the cleaners if they actually breach a promise to you.
My experience writing coverage opinions is that insurance companies generally hedge their bets, conceding coverage even when there are decent arguments against it, to avoid the expense of litigation.
My take is that they throw up road blocks and only pay for those that catch it and make a stink repeatedly. They delay and hope the patient dies or becomes too ill to fight. They change their plans on a regular basis. How many have a written plan that dictates exactly what they will pay for. They talk in generalities.
I hear plenty of horror stories, but I (who am congenitally unlucky in most other respects) have never personally encountered any. My insurance company has always paid right up — even, a couple of times, when technically they didn’t have to.
That may be true, but insurance companies also may exclude types of coverage overtly, but it is buried in the fine print of pages upon pages of legalistic boilerplate.
My own health insurance policy is about 14 pages. I read it carefully, but I’m no lawyer, and even though I bought the most expensive plan I could get, I noticed there were still exclusions and restrictions that I was in no position to negotiate (not that I had a reason since I’m mostly pretty healthy at the moment).
I really wonder sometimes if I shouldn’t get a law degree, if for no other reason that every transaction involves contracts that are increasingly complex, decreasingly transparent and simple, and designed to get the more powerful party with the better lawyer off the hook on a technicality.
It’s a hierarchy of weasels out there, NSO. Can you imagine if medicine were practiced on this plane of obfuscation and unaccountability?
Well, some practitioners do operate at that level…but it’s definitely looked down upon and only noticeable in markets where they have little competition or a corrupt administrative structure looking to pad their own pockets. Like attracts like, after all.
I remember watching a cartoon as a child with daffy duck selling an insurance policy that only paid out of you were hurt by a herd of 100 pink elephants, this was the small print of course. Amazingly porky pig was injured by just such a herd.
You wanna handle my case? I’ve documentation out the wazoo and a publicity-friendly narrative….
Ah, Step.
I sincerely doubt that the world could handle me any “better” than I already am. Saw myself on one of those ‘Maneater” shows last night (always a start to be randomly surfing the channels and see oneself staring out of the tube,) and was surprised at how well I’ve recovered in spite (literally,) of my insurance company. I actually owe them a huge favor in making me so angry that I’ve survived just so I can vex their bottom line.
Saw myself on one of those ‘Maneater” shows last night (always a start to be randomly surfing the channels and see oneself staring out of the tube,)
Isnt that some type of copyright something or another? That you didnt know you would be on there? Shouldnt they be paying you for your story?
LOL.
I did a couple of minimally-compensated generic interviews at one point to get the media off my back, and they’ve since been cannibalized and cobbled together by the conglomerates that copyrighted the original footage. I’ve seen myself staring out of tabloids in the grocery stores, referenced in people’s self-help books, quoted by lecturers, even derided as an urban legend. It’s a public story, I’m just the unpaid messenger.
It’s a public story, I’m just the unpaid messenger.
Too bad you didn’t do the Jasper Schuringa thing. After he foiled that terror attack on Northwest Flight 253, he did one CNN interview for free.
Jasper got many other interview requests, but he said, “Pay me!” AFAIK, that pretty well ended things as far as the interview requests were concerned.
Ahansen,
I saw that show on Animal Planet! I rarely watch TV, but just happened to be channel surfing and there you were.
It was my first DVR recording (I’m old school) so I could show my husband the footage of “one of our posters.”
Hope your surgery(ies) went well, and that you are healing well. Good to have you back again.
lmao….. tort reform huh?
An insurance industry trade group study conducted in 2008 stated that “tort reform” accounts for 7% of total medical costs.
“Tort reform” is a convenient media belched buzzword that is used as a cheap counterfeit by clueless people who don’t know any better.
Tort issues are just one of a myriad of problems in the health care arena. The real problem starts with the notion that health insurance should be paid by the employer, essentially teaching everyone that health care costs nothing, leading to massive overutilization for those that are employed and have coverage and a system that is generally unavailable to those that do not.
I mentioned the Frontline program “Sick across America” earlier. One of the segments detailed the plight of a young woman, self employed who was diagnosed with Lupus. She was quickly dropped from her individual policy, picked up the dropped by Tenncare and spent several year unable to get treatment of any kind for a what is a treatable illness. In the end, her conditioned to the point that she entered the system on an emergency basis, spent the better part of six months in the hospital, wracked up $900,000 of medical bills, and died. For the lack of perhaps $10,000/year of treatment costs, society was left with a $900K bill.
It is a crazy system.
Uhhhhh……you know “tort reform” is about protecting the “insurers” not the patients, right?
My wife is an MD, and I can verify, that you are 100% incorrect on this one. Tort reform currently does not exist(bear with me), and so is not about anything. What tort reform *should be* about is recognizing that doctors are human and make mistakes. When mistakes happen it doesn’t mean that it is payday for the patient the mistake happened to.
Reform is needed (doesn’t exist until it happens). Doctors are paying outrageous sums for malpractice insurance. The insurers who provide malpractice are not *necessarily* the same insurers who are insuring you as the patient. Also, reform should be about ferreting out bad doctors to help alleviate the huge amount of damages awarded due to malpractice. I can vouch firsthand that residency programs talk tough to residents about being careful, but when mistakes are actually made by residents(future doctors), the mistakes are secreted away, and the residents are *definitely not* forced to do remedial training to correct the problem. I’ve seen this first hand with a very few of my wifes co-workers.
I could go on and on about the reforms needed in healthcare, but I firmly believe that National healthcare is not the solution. Ahansen talks about how great the post office is delivering her daily mail. Let me ask this: when was the last time you got junk mail from UPS? And when was the last time you paid tax to “support” UPS? These are minor things, and the USPS is one of the *better* run gov’t institutions IMHO.
Don’t get me wrong, I think it is very reasonable for certain social services to be provided by the gov’t. However, I also think that the more local a gov’t program is, the more successful it will be. People always go to the police and/or fire as examples of why we should have national health care. They throw up the straw man of “oh we should just privatize police too then!” Police and fire are local institutions. If you want to get socialized healthcare, why don’t you start a county program to provide insurance to your citizens? If people don’t like it, they can move out of the county. This is more reasonable than telling them to move out of the USA when we have nationalized health care.
Further, when people are complaining about “socialization” you have to remember that socialism is the “people” (read gov’t) owning the means of production. Like it or not, general health care is a *product* in a sense that police and fire services are not. Note, I am excluding emergency health care. Emergency health care is a *service* in the same way that police and fire response are. If you want to provide emergency health services as a gov’t function, I am all for that. Oh wait, we already do that; at the county level; because it makes sense.
I believe the real complaint about healthcare in the country is because people want something they don’t want to pay for. They want someone else to pay it for them. I had a conversation with a person who was for nationalized health care the other day. Their statement was that their insurance was fine, but they were worried about the other uninsured people in the nation, and therefore wanted the national plan. I was touched by this person’s empathy for those in need. I then asked how much additional tax they were willing to pay for those in need. The person made 80k, and said she was comfortable paying an additional $4000 if it would eliminate the healthcare shortage. Again I was touched by her generous nature. However when I asked her how much she currently donated to health care relief efforts, her answer was nothing. After some discussion, we agreed that in our current free-country, she was already free to donate to the medical care of others, and was choosing not to. She didn’t know why she was asking for someone to force her to do what she thought was right anyway (and also force everyone else along with her), but agreed that she really could already help if she really wanted to.
However when I asked her how much she currently donated to health care relief efforts, her answer was nothing.
Because $4K doesn’t go far if you’re the only one who donates (while everyone else buys ego-toys with their $4K). However, if you’re just one of a hundred million who is “forced” to donate $4K via taxes, you’re much more willing to do so. “I’ll do it if everyone else does…”
Rubbish. $4k goes exactly the same distance… $4k worth. Also, if you are the only one, maybe it’s not something everyone else wants??? It seems that you are saying we *all* want healthcare help. If so, fine: everyone donate the $4k (or 5%) and you will have that pot of gold you want for healthcare.
Even if only the 50% of population who are democats and say they want this donate, there would be 75 million people * avg salary of $30k * 5% ($1500) that would be about $100 billion per year. I’d be happy to let the gov’t run that “donation system”. I’d prefer it happen at the state level instead of Federal level, but whatever, as long as it is donation based.
Now, I’ll be snarky and say that I personally know more republicans that donate money than democrats, but that is a data point set of only about 100 people, and is very subjective. Either way, piss off telling me that no one else is doing it so that person shouldn’t either. If it’s right, it’s right, and to heck with everyone else.
I hope the lame healthcare bill the Dems. were nursing through the Senate gets stopped in its tracks.
I am al for healthcare reform. More to the point, I’m all for full blown rationed care and socilaized medicine. We will never get it until it “hurts” enough. Though many are hurting, apparently it is still not bad enough.
No Viagra, no breast reconstructive surgery, no hip replacements for 75 year olds. Real evidence-based methods, and Rationale spending.
I still think about the Canadian who wrote a while back about the “horror” story in his Emergency room - inaccessible coctors and interminable waits. That’s what I have now, plus a $6,000 bill on top of it.
5 Mile Ambulance ride- $1,000. Appendectomy- $50,000
Let insurance (medical expenses) double again- maybe then people will be ready for nationalized medicine. Or by then we can do our own home surgeries and buy antibiodics and painkillers at Costco.
Tort reform- interstate competition: That’ll save five cents.
My wife is French. I have seen how it can work up close. Got my tetnus shot booster for 8 dollars. My wife got an X-ray, A twenty minute chat with the Doctor, and sent home with a copy of the Xray. They have 13 fewer Aircraft carriers.
My wife is French. I have seen how it can work up close. Got my tetnus shot booster for 8 dollars. My wife got an X-ray, A twenty minute chat with the Doctor, and sent home with a copy of the Xray. They have 13 fewer Aircraft carriers.
Aircraft carriers nothing, they spend 50% per capita that we spend here in the US, and still have a good system.
My wife is French. I have seen how it can work up close.
My son was born in France when I was stationed in Belgium. I saw it up close as well. The socialized system there charged us almost three times what they would have charged a french citizen. I have the bill to prove it. They kept pushing the “midwife” type of care to my wife. They kept asking her to sit and rock on a huge ball. It felt like yoga to me. We visited several hospitals. Crowded. Elevators were the worst. They dont use fragrance in their deodorant, so everywhere smelled like B.O. I guess everyone else knows they can fleece the U.S. govt insurance too. To us, the difference was night and day between the U.S. system (where my daughter was born) and Europe..Give me the U.S. system any day…
They have 13 fewer Aircraft carriers.
Lets not get into military strength. It’s just at the moment nothing is threating Europe. I really gets my goat that progressives act like there will never be a threat to them or their way of life…until they have lost it..
Does it not occur to you that people who cannot afford to pay for their or their own family’s health care are forced to pay for that of you and your family? It’s much the same as the responsible renters here who would like to be able to purchase a house, but cannot afford to do so because we have to bail out all the FB’s.
No wonder you like “the U.S. system any day.”
Wouldn’t it be great if ALL Americans had the same opportunity?
Thank you, ahansen.
The socialized system there charged us almost three times what they would have charged a french citizen. I have the bill to prove it.
Of course, because you never paid into their system. Health-care is never free although it can seem like that when one is in the military which practices America’s finest example of socialized medicine.
I’d put up with crowded elevators for halved premiums but I’m still thinkin’ bout the BO thing…
Again France pays 50% per capita that the US pays and gets better results. See 2005 CBO report.
Stp gets his care via the gov but believes that private insurance is good and not just extracting wealth from the system.
Three times the price that they charged a French citizen….hah that is almost the rate difference for sending your kids out of state for a U degree in the USA.
“They still have a good system”
Really? 90 year olds in France don’t get implantable defibrillators when their heart function declines a bit. French government doesn’t pay $10,000 a month for cancer treatments that extend lives by a few weeks. French Doctors don’t spend thousands of dollars on ultrasounds, CT scans, MRIs and blood tests for every headache dreading the fear they would end up on a stand with some medmal attorney asking them why they didn’t care about the life of their patient.
JDinCT - I agree with you from the point of government provided “safety net.” Of course, everyone has the right to treatments on top of the basic government program as long as they pay for it, or have insurance that pays for it.
JDinCT - I agree with you from the point of government provided “safety net.” Of course, everyone has the right to treatments on top of the basic government program as long as they pay for it, or have insurance that pays for it.
Wrong they do pay for treatment that works. They bargain w big pharma. They don’t pay for a lot of marginal tx but you can buy it on your own. This is the system we need here. Public plan that sets cost benefit paramaters for treatments and then people can buy a suplement if they want the bells and whistles.
Agree 100%.
They have 13 fewer Aircraft carriers ??
Ding, Ding, Ding….We have a winner….And there my friends is your answer…
And their one aircraft carrier spends about half its time in the shop.
The problem is, as was pointed out above, the U.S. actually spends *more* government money on healthcare than the French do (we can evidently afford it AND the carriers), without getting universal coverage. Medical care in the U.S. is simply more expensive than it is in France. One of the reasons is simply that we are accustomed to consuming more of it.
>One of the reasons is simply that we are accustomed to
>consuming more of it.
How does one over consume health care? I mean, there’s already protocols by doctors to deal with hypochondriacs.
You go to the doctor because you are not able to make an informed choice about your health. That’s why they’re the MD.
No Viagra, no breast reconstructive surgery, no hip replacements for 75 year olds. Real evidence-based methods, and Rationale spending.
One of the easiest ways to approach this would be to have a nationalized “high risk pool” to cover when your expenses are over, say, $10,000 for any calendar year (or single event, like getting Cancer or mauled by a bear). Poor people get their premiums paid for them, those who can afford it pay the premium, with the risk spread out over the entire population.
This high-deductible risk pool would be relatively cheap to administer, and would encourage competition for basic medical services and medical tests. I can get an eye exam and glasses for $29 at Wal*Mart because there’s competition.
For some reason, there’s very little support for this sort of thing. People want FREE health care, not health insurance.
Poor people get their premiums paid for them, those who can afford it pay the premium, with the risk spread out over the entire population.
But it isnt spread out. It’s only spread out among those who are paying. Why cant you understand this?
People want FREE health care, not health insurance.
Of course they do. You are giving them a fish, to quote an old proverb. Teach them to fish and make them pay for it. Only the aged and infirm need for health care to be taken care of for them, in my opinion…
Well, here’s the thing–if everyone pays, not just sick people, it truly spreads risk.
“But it isnt spread out. It’s only spread out among those who are paying. Why cant you understand this?”
I’m sorry but how the hell does the Pentagon employ someone as utterly stupid as you??? Can you direct me to one single post where you haven’t said something so completely uninformed and dumb? Just ONE?
Have you ever heard of risk pool? Do you know what an actuary is? Do you flippin know ANYTHING?
employ someone as utterly stupid as you???
You sir, are not as intelligent as you think you are. Please, dont respond to my posts or speak to me again.
Good luck on that one, Step. The only guns you have behind you here are your wits and your body of knowledge. You might want to brush up on both before you post. And take your licks like a man.
Pax
I’ve proposed this for years as an alternative to the disastrous “system” we have today. It has the great benefit of solving the problem that the population is worried about: getting financially destroyed due to one expensive sickness or accident.
However, it would not require or justify the creation of a gigantic new bureaucracy, so there’s no chance of its being adopted.
There are two ways to get a better health care bill than the one now in the Senate:
1. Scrap it and pass single-payer socialism. The problem is that you’ll need 60 willing Dem Senators to do it. How many people are you willing to see die before we get 60 willing Senators? And please don’t tell me that Obama can “exert his leadership” or “twist arms” or similar fluff talk. They tried that, but talk don’t cook rice. It didn’t work.
2. Pass the non-budget items now, then pass the money items under reconciliation. That appears to be the plan now.
Nobody considers their local, regulated electric company “Socialized Electricity”.
I’m with JD…..the only problem is, nobody sees the “hurt”/dislocations our present so-called “system” is causing the economy:
-A “Cadillac” priced system, with “Yugo” levels of service/quality.
-Businesses building/expanding/hiring overseas, because US labor “costs too much”.
-Nobody can change jobs, due to “pre-existing conditions”, thus restricting mobility and rates of pay.
-Some businesses off-loading health care onto other businesses. (everyone has seen how many businesses are able to hire employees, because one spouse is already covered).
We’ve seen the choices we are being offered. The Democrats plan sucks. The Republicans like the status quo, which leaves 40% of the population in the lurch. Which is fine, I guess, until you become part of the 40% the the Republicans are willing to throw under the bus, or until NASCAR mom/dad figure out that the Republicans are not their friends..
Electricity is a natural monopoly (unless you want three separate power lines running down your street). Insurance coverage isn’t. It requires no space-intensive infrastructure whatsoever, and there are no “network effects” that tend to cluster usage around a single product provider once its product becomes dominant (i.e. Windows).
However, the health insurance enjoys constant and guaranteed demand. Example: with a car, if you don’t like the price, you can go somewhere else. If you don’t like anybody’s price, you can wait a few months and outwait the dealers, effectively forcing a price drop. You control your own demand.
You cannot reject health insurance so easily. The demand is always there. Thus, the health insurance enjoys a competitive advantage as strong as a natural monopoly.
Medical care is not a marketplace.
1. Their is a huge asymmetry of information between providers and the sick.
2. There is no way to compare prices and quality.
3. You need the service when you are sick and need it very quickly. You need it when you are least able to shop and make rational decisions.
Leaving this industry to the free market is guaranteed to result in extravagant pricing and poor quality.
Very true, Jon.
Insurance coverage isn’t
Correct it’s an oligopoly in many places with a 2-3 carriers controlling most of the market.
So open the market to interstate competition.
Thomas,
What would you call a hospital?
X-GS,
Well said. What wears me down is, for those of us that ‘have’ ( to the degree that they can ) taken care of themselves.., when do ‘we’ get to kick back?
Hell, you think I ‘like’ jogging ( at 51 y.o? ) Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad that I can and staying healthy is the best revenge against this monster, but don’t think I wouldn’t mind not worrying about my weight ‘all’ the damned time!?
“The Republicans like the status quo, which leaves 40% of the population in the lurch. Which is fine, I guess, until you become part of the 40% the the Republicans are willing to throw under the bus, or until NASCAR mom/dad figure out that the Republicans are not their friends..”
40 million uninsured out of 300 million is just 13%. Then, if you deduct the number of uninsured that could buy it but chose not to we’re down to about 7% “left in the lurch.”
20 million Americans at $5k per year for premiums is $100 billion. Take the middleman out by paying the health service provider directly and it’s much less than that. I don’t think the aggregate cost of this health care bill will be less than just providing service to the indigent and uninsurable directly. In fact, I think it will cost more because I think the main thrust of this legislation is to increase access to a finite resource/service, which must result in higher costs. You can’t increase service use, increase service quality and cut cost, and we can’t make a choice which way to go.
Heh. In the last three years, one of my Colombian in-laws had surgery for a herniated disk in his back. It cost him the equivalent of $200 out-of-pocket. Another in-law is French; he had his shoulder reconstructed after an accident and it cost him nothing. Neither of them had any complaint with their treatment and neither of them felt remorse about the fact that their countries’ healthcare systems deprived investors of the right to fully exploit global wealth opportunities.
My wife is a dual citizen. She has insurance through her job. If any major non-emergency health situation happens to her, though, we’re on a plane for Bogotá.
“Appendectomy- $50,000″
My emergency appendectomy was right around $50k. The surgeon, anesthesiologist, and such were less than $10k. My room, in a beautiful new wing of the hospital, was $7500 per day. I would have preferred to recover in a tent instead of being forced to pay such outrageous prices.
It was a few hours after I awoke from the surgery, when a woman from the billing dept came to ask me how I’d pay. I told her I had no idea how much the bill was. When the $7500 bed spewed forth from her lips, I about fell out of it. I told her, and the nurse, that I needed to leave IMMEDIATELY. They forced me to stay for three days since the surgery was not done laparoscopically and there were complications. I was never able to relax in that bed, as the dollar signs in my brain rolled like a slot machine unable to stop…
Grizzly you are my reference for the $50,000 appendectomy!
hope you feel better!
I’m one of those fit health nuts that knows I’m just one sharp pain in the side from medical bankruptcy (or stiffing the doctor hospital)
They have 13 fewer Aircraft carriers.
Having a 3rd rate military is a great cost savings….until the Nazis over run and occupy your country.
PS - We spend about 20% of out nation budget on defense (which is authorized in the constitution) and over 50% on entitlements (like welfare, SS, Medicare, Medicaid, etc) which is not mention once in the constitution…
We spend more on the military than every other country in the world put together. We spend almost ten times more than China, which is in the #2 position, and have hundreds of military bases around the globe. Yet Americans remain badly frightened.
“Having a 3rd rate military is a great cost savings….until the Nazis over run and occupy your country.”
Exactly. But I’m sure the French would save us if that ever happened. I love how people rave about HC systems like those in France, but fail to mention that many of those countries have individual tax rates of 50%+ … their HC is far from ‘free’
Here in California, we’re pretty close to 40% and get far less for our money.
Give me the 50% tax rate, and the “socialized” healthcare, retirement/pension, etc. that go with it.
I’m more worried about zombies than Nazis.
About the only way the American Electrical Engineers get regular work these days is through Defense Department work. Same goes for a whole lot of other technical fields. It’s practically the only thing that keeps whole sectors of expertise from evaporating.
Hansen, I agree that reform is needed, and as a beneficiary of SS and Medicare, I’m not against single-payer. But what Reid and Pelosi have put together is no better than what we have now, and the costs are higher (10 years of taxes to pay for six years of benefits in order to make the Reid/Pelosi abomination “revenue-neutral”). Look at the Massachusetts experiment. Maybe that’s why they elected Brown instead of Coakley.
My suggestion: A bill that does nothing more than incrementally drop the age for Medicare eligibility over, say, the next 20 years after which everyone is covered. That way the necessary tax increases can ratchet up in small increments.
Oh, and make SS benefits fully means-tested over that same period of time. A bumper sticker I saw on a McMansion-size motor home years ago still galls me. It said, “Your Social Security Taxes At Work.”
P.S. IMO your political rants greatly diminish the impact of your posts. They virtually guarantee that you end up preaching just to the choir.
Look at the Massachusetts experiment. Maybe that’s why they elected Brown instead of Coakley.
I think that has a lot to do with what just happening in MA. That state has the highest health care costs in the U.S.
And Brown voted for the Mass. health care system.
Look at the Massachusetts experiment. Maybe that’s why they elected Brown instead of Coakley.
Confirming the above:
Poll: Mass. Voters Protested Against Weak Wall Street, Health Care Policies
Some excellent suggestions here, Bill. THIS is the sort of non-partisan, practical thinking so woefully lacking in our Congress– and precisely what I hoped to encourage with this post. I’d love to see you expand them into a longer piece for the blog to mull over?
The irony of your final admonition does not elude me.
Cheers.
Bill,
I don’t mind the ones that say “We’re spending our kid’s inheritance” ( oh what a knee slapper huh? )
But now it’s become “We’re spending YOUR kid’s inheritance”!
It’s never been so much the politics I mind, just when posters try to connect the Housing Bubble to every long existing problem known to Man. That’s why they’re typically followed up w/ credit bubble/abolish the Fed statements.
If not persuasion, then passion.
Unfortunately expanding medicare is no solution. You think we have healthcare inflation now. 12% increases in healthcare costs will look like the good old days if we try that. (I think medicare was the driver for healthcare inflation that took off in the ’60’s).
No. We need to cut Cigna, Aetna, United Healthcare (talk about an oxy moron)right out out of the picture. They’ll have to finance those big downtown buildings on property/casualty or life insurance.
The current healthcare proposal’s shortcomings are too numerous to detail here.
Means test social security? Haluhluyuh!
Forget to mention that the aforementioned radiology visit cost $53.
Also, we don’t have French insurance. We just paid full price out of pocket.
If i’m not bleeding to death and can miss work. I would hop a plane (From CT- $700 round trip) to France for treatment.
We just cancelled our “regular” health insurance, and am looking forward to “negotiating” my next medical bill with the doctor/hospital.
And people are worrying about foreign terrorists……sheeesh!
“We’re going to have to raise taxes to pay for the repairs. Rationing is already a fact of life and is about to get a lot more stringent—forcing us to confront some hard ethical choices. And we’re going to have to do this NOW, because later is already here.”
Does anyone here really think that THEY will have rationed healthcare? No, the rationing will be for US, not THEM - not the wealthy, not the elite, not the “special.”
How about higher taxes? Nope - that’s another cost WE will have to eat, along with run away inflation, declining living standards, etc. And, hey, housing is still overpriced! But wow, those crooks at the top got rich, didn’t they?
I haven’t seen a thing come out of DC for years, no matter which party is in power, that has been of any real long term benefit for we the people vs. they the bankers/corporate elite. We can hope that this time will be different, but after years of disappointment, forgive me if I am jaded.
I always love your posts, PTM.
Wanna know the secret to tort reform?
Nationalize your healthcare system. (State paid doctors either can’t be sued or only to a very limited extent.)
Car accident victim? Sure you can sue for lost time at work , maybe pain and suffering, but you can’t sue for 50 years of future medical expenses.
That would cut out about 90% of payouts.
Tweaking this system is only guaranteed to line the pockest of the best lobbyist— i know i know that is true with any legislation.
Its seems to me that the prospect of a mal-practice suit is the only thing keeping some of the Medical Workers from incompetence . Maybe the amount you get for a death should be topped out so the insurance can be lowered . But lets say a doctor by mal-practice kills someone that would of made 10 million in their lifetime verses a party that would of made one million .Is killing a older person by mal-practice worth less money than killing a young person ? Is one death worth more money than another ? It gets really complicated .
Perhaps, but in the end the patient foots the bill through $100+ 5 minute office visits and $1400 ambulance rides.
We can’t this system. Something has to give.
“$1,400 ambulance rides”
And no, I realize you’re -not- kidding. My wife had a brief bout of Menier’s Disease ( uncontrollable dizziness ) and we lived 3 blocks from the hospital.
That’ll be $1,400 please.
You’re right, I’m not kidding. I had an ambulance ride last summer (false heart attack, was actually gall stones).
$1400. The insurance paid $900 and I paid the rest.
“is one death worth more money than another?”
obviously not in a metaphysical sense, but
everyday thousands of courtrooms put a price on one life versus another.
Run over a med-student versus a migrant worker?, yeah, one life (in the eyes of the law) is worth more than another.
State paid doctors either can’t be sued or only to a very limited effect.
Well, technically, because of the doctrine of sovereign immunity, state-paid anything can’t be sued without the state granting that right by law. Which most states have done, with variations on the federal Tort Claims Act.
Considering that one of the main contributors to one of the two major political parties is the plaintiff’s bar, do you realistically think that bunch would tolerate excepting government-paid doctors from the state Tort Claims Acts? Would they really let the government get away with destroying their meal ticket?
Well I obviously don’t think any reform is going to happen because of the big lobbies (Pharma, insurance, device, doctors).
you’re right though, the tort lawyers will have to be dealt with too.
Maybe when an untreated typhoid patient (or carrier of one of those nasty super bugs ) coughs on Stepn2 (or his family) or a few more of the other “I’ll take the USA system anyday” crowd, there will be a change of heart.
We got medicare because we saw pictures of the elderly suffering in complete destitution, and we got desegregation and civil rights after seeing black people get beaten systematically.
Healthcare reform will come, it’ll just be a little uglier the longer we wait. Come to think of it, that reminds me of the housing bubble too.
ahansen . Sorry for what has happened to you . It’s bad enough getting mauled by a bear ,but to put up with the bad faith of the current medical
system is a additional mauling .I have told my story and I talked to many
at the hospital that had similar stories . I talked to a nurse that had her father in law back at the hospital for the third time because they tried to
ration before . This nurse told me that about 15 years ago she noticed the insurance companies taking over and being in more control over the course of medical treatments . One wonders if this rationing didn’t create more serious and costly conditions because of it . I use to tell the insurance shill at the hospital that their attempts at rationing with me just ended up costing them more money and they were penny wise /pound foolish .I combated the bad faith of the Insurance Company which resulted in them getting scared into rendering right treatment ,but than I got done in by germs by all their dicking around the first two weeks . For instance ,they told me my spouse had cancer of the lungs .I told them they were full of shit . Later it was confirmed by a procedure that she in fact did not have cancer of the lungs .
I agree with you that the system is broken (in terms of no assurance that you will get what you thought your insurance contract was giving you ).Most people don’t know enough about medicine to dispute what
treatment is offered either . I especially think about people who have never been hassled yet that think their private insurance is great . I was told by one nurse that the last doctor I had was respected by the nurses .I asked why . The nurse in essence told me that this Doctor didn’t care what the Insurance Companies said and would fight for the Patients .
Isn’t that a sad testimony .
Just like Wall Street tells the Politicians what to do , its clear to me that
the Insurance Companies influence the Doctors and the bottom line is where is their paycheck coming from . Maybe the problems can be solved by coming down on the Insurance Monopolies and making rules
that keep them in line and limit their profits ,I don’t know . All I know is that if you have a system whereby a business makes more money by not rendering proper time is of the essence care ,than it’s not medical care anymore .If it’s the Insurance Companies intent to save money than don’t give a insurance policy and charge for it and than play games with ‘the real care .Cancelling peoples insurance policies just because they make a claim is another bad faith policy that gained ground in recent years .
The fact that Insurance is tied to a employer is another problem . With the way it is going how many employers are just going to drop springing for insurance coverage in the future and how many just can’t afford it to begin with ,especially small business . And finally what about the fact that there isn’t fair competition with the Insurance Companies thanks to favorable laws condoned by the Politicians .
The health system is -F——up and it’s no different than how Wall Street took over after deregulation and made the people their pawns in their money games . I don’t know what the health care answers are ,but with health care it gets corrupted if it’s simply a money game ,just as the
financial systems got corrupted . We need affordable sincere health care .and we need the truth if our Society does or doesn’t want to pay for
Granny to have a hip replacement at 85 .
How much does it cost to not do the hip replacement? Does Granny have any other health problems? What is her family history of longevity? 85 is an arbitrary number.
My grandmother lived to be 103. There is a woman in a neighboring town who just turned 108. Would you necessarily deny them a hip replacement at 85?
That said, I think there are treatment vs cost considerations that should be made. If I am 85 and get incurable cancer, just shoot me up with morphine and send me on my way. Hip replacements are much less expensive than most cancer treatments and provide good benefit to the recipient and society.
I only use the hip replacement as a example . People are talkiing like
there is only so much health care that is affordable for a Society ,(at least at the current costs and future projected costs ). So,the
debate is over the costs and where the rationing will fall . Will 40 or maybe 100 million in the near future be denied health care because
they simply can’t afford the private insurers costs . Will older people be denied future medical care based on the costs not being worth it to our Society . How this is going to be hashed out is a mystery to
me ,but at the rate our Society is going I’m betting that people will get screwed in favor of increased profits for some self interest
group .
Ah crap the HBB is masquerading as the DailyKos again.
Right. That’s why it’s lauding Ron Paul, Dana Rohrabacher, Scott Brown and Sarah Palin. Do you ever actually read before your knees start jerking?
If you actually read the Daily Kos you’d know that wasn’t true.
My observation(for what little it is worth) is that the HBB commentators average a little right of center, with a undertow strain of Libertarianism (Ron Paul anti-Fedism).
What would HBB be if I left?
Look, we can argue about whether it is reasonable to have a system of government that redistributes well being down.
But do we have to have a system of back door housing and health insurance subsidies, and direct health care payments, that exclude large numbers of people and pass the check to the next generation while redistributing well being up?
Great post ahansen.
I support your position on the health-care issue but from a different and yet complimentary point of view.
Because I do believe (as does every other democratic, industrialized government in the world except ours) that basic health care is a RIGHT.
Basic health-care is an AMERICAN RIGHT supported by ideals expressed in the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence. The fact that 60-73% of Americans support a public-option is evidence that most American’s lean this way as well.
The U.S. constitution reads We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
How do these basic goals of our Constitution apply to the health care debate?
1. In order to form a more perfect union:
Does 60 million uninsured in the world’s richest country strengthen our union? No. It undoubtedly weakens our union from a national health and a competitive advantage standpoint. Spending twice as much for inferior results hurts America.
2. Establish Justice:
Is it “Just” that a hard working ditch-digger’s job doesn’t offer health-insurance while the banker’s job does just because the banker’s daddy had enough money to sent him to Yale? Are the practices of our private, blood sucking insurance companies just? Where is this justice where those over 65 get coverage but the rest don’t?
3. Insure domestic tranquility:
History teaches well the lessons of inequity’s affect on “domestic tranquility”. We had better start throwing a few bones to our forgotten or they will be remembered.
4. Provide for the common defense
Against only armies and terrorists or against pestilence and disease as well?
5. Promote the general welfare:
“PROMOTE THE GENERAL WELFARE”? My gosh, it’s so self-evident how this relates to the right of health-care.
6. Secure the blessings of liberty
How are our blessings of “liberty” secured by a bastardized system that ties our HEALTH to our jobs? Where is the “liberty” in that? Are we at liberty to move or start a new business if we have pre-existing conditions? We are not! We are slaves to our existing jobs in many cases just as we can be slaves to debt. But at least debt can be discharged which is not the case for illness in the uncovered.
Now some will say, “but the constitution said nothing about health-care or health insurance”. Of course it didn’t, there WAS NO health insurance and back then it wouldn’t have mattered because health care was not a huge factor in public health as it is today. Bleeding anyone? The rich and poor were on a more even playing field when it came to health care. It is different now when a good health plan can mean life or death.
Besides the Constitution is a “living” document. How is the right to health care in this context much different than women’s suffrage or the abolition of slavery neither mentioned in the constitution. We evolve and apply the Constitutions PRINCIPALS to new times and issues that make a difference in that time.
Basic health care is an “American Right” that is inseparable from our rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness for how can we have a good life, liberty and the ability to pursue our happiness without guaranteed access to basic health-care when we need it?
Thank you, Rio!
A compelling arguement, Rio, the beauty of which is that I agree on practical grounds rather than moral or constittionally intrinsic ones. If we can just get our lawmakers to seek this same commonality, maybe we’ll be on the path to true solutions to healing our nation’s ills– rather than just slapping on band-aids and passing out lollipops.
as does every other democratic, industrialized government in the world except ours)
First, we are NOT democratic. And we are NOT one government or at least we should not be. We are one govt on the world stage and NOT at the local level. We are a collection of equal but SEPARATE states. This in my opinion, is where the debate SHOULD be.
“PROMOTE THE GENERAL WELFARE”? My gosh, it’s so self-evident how this relates to the right of health-care.
In your interpretation, it relates to socialism, not to the true definition of promoting the general welfare. In the founding father’s context, they meant giving the populace the opportunity to survive and prosper, not giving everything cradle to grave.
Is it “Just” that a hard working ditch-digger’s job doesn’t offer health-insurance while the banker’s job does just because the banker’s daddy had enough money to sent him to Yale?
Probably not, but it does give the ditch digger an incentive to better themselves and go to Yale themselves, no? Plus, what is the social justice in taking my money and giving to someone else? Where is the justice to ME?
Good job stpn. The real problem is that the govt has forced hospitals to provide care for everyone (including illegals) without regard to whether they can pay. Those with health coverage subsidize those without.
When the government becomes the single-payer, premiums can be deducted from everyone. That would include an appropriate reduction from welfare checks, just like they deduct Medicare premiums from my SS checks.
We’ll still need to ration care, big time. Over 70? All you get is the “two Ps” - preventive and palliative care. Newborn with an unfixable problem or facing a lifetime disability? Too bad.
Stpn2me,
There are holes in your argument. I will address a few.
we are NOT democratic
We are democratic, (small d) we are a democratic republic but what’s your point or your point to that entire section? It bears no relation to my points, unless you think the city of Houston should be debating Houston universal health-care.
Promote the general welfare: You said: In your interpretation, it relates to socialism,
Oh my goodness you said “socialism” LOL, Are you trying to scare me or discredit me by using that word? It doesn’t work on me but it’s a funny tactic coming from someone in the military.
My interpretation is that promoting the general welfare is one of many goals of the constitution that supports the position that basic health-care is an America right. It does and it is self-evident.
Even you said (promoting the general welfare) “meant giving the populace the opportunity to survive and prosper”
Fine. Now what kind of strained logic could separate the right to health-care from “the opportunity to survive and prosper”?
It seems to me that a right to health-care would be essential for an American to “survive and prosper” for how can someone very sick “survive and prosper” without health-care?
not giving everything cradle to grave Like as is given to career military personal and their children who continue in the same profession?
(it) does give the ditch digger an incentive to better themselves and go to Yale themselves,
The huge point that supply sider’s (want to) side-step is that we need the ditch diggers too! 80% of US workers are non-supervisory workers and we will always need labor and unskilled workers. How can people not see this? Do unskilled laborers not deserve honor and basic health-care in the richest country on earth?? I say they do and I say our Constitution’s goals say they do too.
what is the social justice in taking my money and giving to someone else?
It’s the same social justice involved as when it takes my money and gives it to YOU, the Third ID and the 6th Fleet.
Where is the justice to ME?
I hope I just explained that.
Good points, Rio. It’s rather ironic having to argue the benefits of socialized medicine with someone who enjoys it himself yet extols the virtues of the free market…for everybody else!
The counter to that is that: Stepn earns his socialized medicine by putting his life on the line. Those lazy bums who show at the emergency room? What did they do other than “be” a human being? It’s the usual conflict. You only deserve health if you “work hard.”
My response would be: Unwrap the flag from around the military and tell me how many actually put their life on the line? Plenty are tapping on computers in San Diego. If danger earns you socialized health care, then some military personnel have earned health care, but so have many in other dangerous professions: loggers, fishermen, farmers, roofers, etc.
Secondarily, if armed service ‘earns’ you socialized health care, then socialized health care must be a benefit to be desired, not the horror the right assures us it would be. Well guess what, it costs less to administer health care in this more desirable fashion, so let’s just extend it to everybody so we can all enjoy it *and* save money. Just like everywhere else in the world.
Really? In the context of providing HC services, and who ‘deserves’ such services, you’re comparing military members to fishermen? You really don’t see a difference b/w someone volunteering to serve in the military and someone volunteering to fish or cut trees down? Wonderful
I would like to add, no one has forced Stpn into the armed services. He was not drafted. He volunteered.
I would like to add, no one has forced Stpn into the armed services.
But that’s not the argument. Once in, you still cant say no to what the country asks you to do. It’s a giving of yourself to the nation. Imagine not being able to say no when your boss tells you to go somewhere (that is the biggie, at least a fisherman can refuse to go on a boat), far away from home, for months at a time, in harsh conditions, without creature comforts. Then imagine doing it while someone is trying to kill you and you are trying to protect others of that nation. I dont know of that many people who are volunteering to give time to their nation. If you want to compare me to someone who is fishing, so be it. At least respect that I am doing something that the average american either doesnt want or is scared to do, and that it deserves a little more respect than a fisherman or logger (which by the way are good professions)…
You really don’t see a difference b/w someone volunteering to serve in the military and someone volunteering to fish or cut trees down?
—————-
The fishermen (and farmers) who provide us with food, and the loggers who provide the lumber used to build our homes/shelters are somehow less “worthy” of medical care than military personnel? Why do you believe this to be the case? Do you think that someone with an opposing viewpoint might be just as “right” as you?
Rio,
Thanks for another sequence of exceptional posts. I agree 100%.
Rio -great posts .
The thing I find interesting is that regardless of the efforts put forth to reform health care we have a system that costs more than just about any other without better outcomes.
I would like to think that the US could take a page out of just about any western European countries play book and roll with it. But at the end of the day, this reform isn’t about you or me. It is about the citizens that matter… The citizens in the most protected of classes…corporations.
I am just glad we are beginning to see dividends in our cuts to education over the years. And I am glad that the system has so managed to polarize people as to make reforms which actually benefit people or society in general virtually impossible to implement.
No, no, no!
This is America, the greatest 3rd world country in the world. We don’t need no stinking lessons from anyone else.
Colorado,
You will fit in perfectly at our next Tea Party!
Anybody who is for the perpetuation of the current health care system in this country has never endured a catastrophic illness like you have, ahansen. Only the truly wealthy are insulated. For the rest, the system is a complete joke, and a total failure in such a scenario. Cancer, a heart attack, or a stroke- all possibilities for anyone later in life- can and will wipe out all retirement funds of the average person, likely resulting in BK.
The insurance companies are around to make as much money as they can by denying critical services and the payments for such. They do it everyday. People like to throw around the term “death panels” as it pertains to a public health care program, but that’s exactly the gig of these evil insurance companies. They’d love nothing more than the patient to die with the fewest services rendered. I’ll take my chances with the government rather than some sleazy insurance company rep, blinded by greed, lurking in the shadows of the hospital, making sure the patient is denied the care they so desperately need.
Grizzlybear …You are accurate in what you say ,but people will not realize the gig until it happens to them .
In fact ,the PR campaign of claiming that a public health option would bring on “death panels” was a great offense from the Industry that is already practicing rationing and cancelling and haggling for profit .
Now why would the President of the United States talk about making the
Insurance Companies honest by reform if everything was kosher ? Sure if you go in with a broken leg they are going to fix it ,but depending on the insurance company if the situation is more complicated it’s questionable what happens . It is hard to believe
until it happens to you and you see it happening to others .
I would like to see at least basic care by a public option and if people want more extensive coverage they can have private policies for that that cost more money .
Remember how hard GWB et al pushed to privatize Social Security and allow “ordinary Americans” to invest their social security accounts in the stock market? Although I ‘m sure their intentions were pure, following as they were, so closely on the heels of the tech bubble burst, one can only imagine the subsequent carnage had they been successful in their attempts.
I would take IN A HEARTBEAT all the money I have put into Social Security and all the money my employers have put into Social Security over the years (nearly 15% of my total gross income) with interest and leave it FOREVER.
Can you imagine ALL that money IN YOUR NAME? That you could invest how you wanted. That the governemtn COULD NOT TOUCH? That you could leave to your kids or favorite charity? Instead - it is used to buy votes and will be bankrupt by the time I need it (or means tested away).
You’ve got to be kidding. I’ve heard people say this kind of thing for many years now. These are the same sort of people who poured money into the dot-com stocks 11 or 12 years or got into real estate investing 5 or 6 years ago.
If you read about what people do with their 401(k) accounts, you will see similar problems. They don’t save enough. They take either too much risk or not enough. They move their money around from one fund to another too frequently.
The vast majority of all Americans benefit from the Social Security system. The only people who would benefit from its abolition would be the wealthy and extremely lucky.
The vast majority of all Americans benefit from the Social Security system. The only people who would benefit from its abolition would be the wealthy and extremely lucky.
So far. It is scheduled to go bankrupt within 7 years. All the money you put into it is SPENT and GONE. It is a giant ponzi scheme and like all ponzi schemes the first ones in make out. The last ones lose EVERYTHING.
I’m not sure where you heard about Social Security going bankrupt. You may have been reading about Medicare, which is in much worse shape than Social Security.
A year or so ago I happened to download a Congressional Budget Office report that projects Social Security’s finances far into the future. The CBO is widely respected in Washington for being non-partisan. The following summarizes part of the report’s findings.
In 2049—CBO’s projected date for the trust funds’ exhaustion—
revenues will equal only 84 percent of scheduled outlays.
Thus, payable benefits will be 16 percent lower than
scheduled benefits. Beginning in about 2070, the gap
between scheduled and payable benefits will begin to
grow, and by 2082, CBO projects, payable benefits will
be 19 percent less than scheduled benefits.
So, they are projecting problems 39 years from now, not 7. What they are projecting is not complete bankruptcy, but the ability to pay only 84 percent of what they’re currently promising.
For example, I believe that the last yearly letter that I got from the Social Security Administration told me that I would get about $24,000 per year (in 2009 dollars) if I retired at age 67. The section that I quoted above implies that that would have to be reduced to about $20,000 in the year 2049, if I happen to live that long.
There is no Social Security Trust Fund. Or rather, there is one in name, but not in reality; the “assets” in that “Trust Fund” consist of US government obligations. Those are obligations of the same government that is in charge of the “Trust Fund”.
In private industry, a company that spent its workers’ pension contributions and put its own debt in place of those contributions would be guilty of embezzlement. The same is true, economically and morally if not legally, of the government’s “Trust Funds”.
That may be true, but there is no need to worry that the government will not fulfill its obligations. When it comes time for the government to fulfill those obligations, it’s possible that 1/3 of all voters may be over the age of 65.
For: varelse - stepn2me
I am happy to discuss the best way to proceed. My town is budgeting a 13% increase in insurance costs this year, 12% next year. At this rate won’t they double in 6 years. What’s your vision for the future of American healthcare? (”give me the US system any day” there’s a hall of fame quote!)
How many hospitals are closing due to non-payment by patients? That’s a number to watch alongside the bank failures.
To update my wife’s healthcare situation, she just booked her trip to France for 10 days in may to get her colonoscopy done. 500 euros: doctor, anesthesiologists, all the blood tests et cetera. She had it done a couple of years ago at the same place- a dedicated center for that sort of procedure, no mention of B.O. She priced it here it looked like at least $4,500 without counting all the add-ons. Again she doesn’t even have French insurance, so she’s paying “the price.”
Explain again why we need 14 super aircraft carriers?
I am happy to discuss the best way to proceed.
I highly doubt our ideas are the same..In my opinion, the states need to have this ball. THEY should be taking care of the people, not the taxpayers. That is why if you dont like one state, you can move to another. I know you wont like this, most liberals and progressives dont. They feel we have to have it on a national scale because of how many people there are to insure. That liberals, always looking for that pot of money. Someone in the Dakota’s should be paying for health insurance for someone in San Fran. Like it or not, they shouldnt have to. It’s not the way this country is supposed to be. I am not heartless. But we as a nation cannot go down this road. You want socialism, go to europe or latin america. And I really dont care how good it works there, we dont need it here. It’s not how we were intended to be. Democracies lead to dictators every time, as the people are alwasy looking to the govt and who leads it to take care of them..
You want socialism, go to europe or latin america. And I really dont care how good it works there, we dont need it here.
Given that your salary and pension are funded by taxpayers your statement is risible at best.
Given that your salary and pension are funded by taxpayers your statement is risible at best.
I am serving the nation and it’s taxpayers at it’s whim. Unable to say no to any mission or duty station. How are welfare receipents or illegal alians serving the nation again? I have yet to see one holding an M4 here in afghan next to me…
Doesn’t it seem obvious that whichever state goes first will attract all the extremely sick and throw the system out of whack.
How can individual states get any leverage with megainsurance medical companies?
I am not looking for a pot of money- i am looking to ration care and spending.
North and South Dakota together have half the population of Connecticut, “they” won’t be paying for anything. Now, a more progressive tax structure is yet another topic for discussion - remember hedge fund operators pay %15.
Do you realize what is spent on medicine in this country? Do you realize what we get?
Are people that suffer catastrophic illness (and the ensuing destitution that entails) just something to be taken for granted- like people that die in car accidents or get hit by lightning?
How far do you take that state’s rights thing anyway? Remember the country WAS designed to accomadate slavery. You do realize that, right?
Oh well of course slavery was barbaric and we had to get rid of it.
Maybe one day I’ll be telling me grandkids about the guy i met on line who defended that notion that it was unamerican for people to have access to basic medical care.
If the past eighteen months are any indication, the people looking for that alleged pot of money and wanting to be taken care of, rather than being the lazy welfare queens so important to conservative thought, tend to be associated with large banking interests and insurance companies. The fact is that corporate interests are more powerful than most state governments. Who do you think is stronger, Exxon-Mobil or North Dakota? Goldman Sachs or Mississippi? For what it’s worth, corporate interests may even be more powerful than the federal government.
Stpn2me:
You’re starting to say things that make no sense. The states need to have this ball, not the taxpayers? Where do you think that states get their funds? There actually more reliant on their current taxapyers than the federal govenrment, because they can’t print money and most can’t run serious budget deficits.
And you don’t care how well socialism works, you don’t want it here? Why don’t you care how well something works? You prefer a health care system that works badly because someone told you that “socialism” is bad?
I had an argument with a neighbor at another neighbor’s party a few months ago. She heard that I voted for Obama and criticized my vote, using the word “socialism”. I aksed her if she knew what the word meant. She came back to me about half an hour later with an inadequate response that clearly indicated that she had been throwing this word around for a long time without a clear idea of what it even means.
I made a bad mistake there. I should have “They’re more actually more reliant”.
Mightymike,
How can it not make sense? The fed govt shouldnt be taxing me anyway. The states should. Yea, states get money from the fed govt. But they shouldnt. Corrupt politicians changed that. The Fed govt should get a tax from the states to fund itself. As far as I am concerned, that’s it.. That keeps the fed govt from being in the peoples business.
Dude, step away from whatever kool-aid you been drinking.
We are not organized under the Confederate Papers, we are under the Constitution, and direct taxation of the people by the federal government really isnt an arguable point.
Not by sane people at least.
What’s your vision for the future of American healthcare?
The only the wealthy and gov’t workers will receive it.
The rest of us will be going to Mexico for our treatment.
Costco selling medicne without a prescription.
Barbers doing surgery.
It’ll be 1850 again (hopefully without the slavery, unless those “states ra’ts activists get their way)
To update my wife’s healthcare situation, she just booked her trip to France for 10 days in may to get her colonoscopy done. 500 euros: doctor, anesthesiologists, all the blood tests et cetera. She had it done a couple of years ago at the same place- a dedicated center for that sort of procedure, no mention of B.O. She priced it here it looked like at least $4,500 without counting all the add-ons. Again she doesn’t even have French insurance, so she’s paying “the price.”
To me this indicates that we are getting closer an dcloser to the tipping point where it will be available only to the elites.
I’m seeing anecdotal evidence of this. I can now get same day appointments with my doctor. Just 5 years ago he was booked solid for weeks.
It won’t be long until we are offered insurance that ships you to Mexico for surgery that can wait.
It won’t be long until we are offered insurance that ships you to Mexico for surgery that can wait.
If that happens, of course, Big Pharma and FUBARHealth will have to do a 180 on their previous, dogged insistence that our neighbors to the north and south peddle suspect drugs and suspect health care.
There is a company in Calabasas (So Ca-L A County), “Planet Hospital” that does medical tourism.
http://www.planethospital.com/
The comment about aircraft carriers goes to the heart of the matter…
I’m avoiding the eastern winter by sojourning in San Diego, on Coronado Island where the big navy base is. Day in, day out, jet jockies hot rod around the sky in multi million dollar jet fighters making a horrible racket which people around here (who are all in various ways beholden to the military) like to call “the sound of freedom”.
There are I think 3 Nimitz Class carriers and all their accessory ships based here, all “keeping in practice” to fight an enemy who decamped 20 years ago.
What people describe as the sound of freedom is actually the sound of the US economy going up in flames while the money that could be used for infrastructure, health care, and many other worthwhile projects is dissipated on expensive toys…..
It’s so sad it’s actually funny in a way that all this is needed only to “fight terrorists”. In the meantime countries like France ,who’ve already seen what empire reduces to, can have a national defense predicated on a few dozen nukes which can destroy any country in the world and make the price of aggression against her far higher than any possible gain..
And you know I believe nobody is really in charge and that we as a country don’t actually have a plan…things have just sort of evolved so that the system runs on inertia and we do certain things just because that’s the way we always have…
countries like France ,who’ve already seen what empire reduces to, can have a national defense predicated on a few dozen nukes which can destroy any country in the world and make the price of aggression against her far higher than any possible gain..
Again,
You are speaking from a protected position. Let someone seriously threaten that position, and the military becomes VERY important to you. We are a target, and probably not why you think we are. We are the best, we are the hope for the world. Our military is the ONLY resource that could get to haiti and set up a fully functioning airport in the time it was done. WHY? Because WE are the United States. The best in the world. Without us, who else is there for the world to look to? France? HA!. There are those who dont give a crap about your good will. And they are looking at the resources that the U.S. have. And they would exploit them if they could. The only thing standing in between you and them, is people like me….
A couple of nukes wont matter if the enemy is at your shores. What are you going to do, nuke your own country? There MUST be a deterant. We have the largest navy in the world, more ships than all other nations in the world COMBINED. We have to spend so much because we have so much to protect. Namely, you and those like you, naive to world threats…
A couple of nukes wont matter if the enemy is at your shores. What are you going to do, nuke your own country? There MUST be a deterant. We have the largest navy in the world, more ships than all other nations in the world COMBINED. We have to spend so much because we have so much to protect. Namely, you and those like you, naive to world threats…
But, I’m just not the scarin’ type. I wouldn’t be scared if our military’s budget was cut in half.
I don’t think he was saying that the military needs to be abolished, just that we have a military that it set up to fight a boogeyman that no longer exists.
Eventually it will be irrelevant, for once we are bankrupt we won’t be able to afford our Buck Rodgers military anyway. And the truth is we CANNOT afford what we have today.
A couple of nukes wont matter if the enemy is at your shores. What are you going to do, nuke your own country?
No, you nuke their invading fleets. If they know we are serious they won’t invade, and even if they do who says we won’t have home based ground forces to begin with?
Pax Americana is unsustainable.
“Enemy At our Shores”???
How many crusaders do we need to keep back the hoardes?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM2001_Crusader
($25 million a pop, seriously stn2—how many do we need to keep safe?)
Those ships aren’t protecting me. They’re protecting corporate interests. Invasion of Hawaii? Panama? Go down the list, all to protect banana planters or other economic interests.
Careful with that original intent and states rights stuff, Stpn2, starts sounding like your advocating the restoration of the right to own slaves.
By the way, how many ‘crusaders” do we need to keep us safe.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM2001_Crusader
(It’s a 40 ton self-propelled rapid firing Howitzer- only $25 million a pop. The program was cancelled by the commies in the defense department thta are determined to see us overrun when the enemy is on our shores.)
We are the best, we are the hope for the world.
Come on. Get real. This is not 1962 or even 9-12.
I love America as much or more than anyone but right now we aren’t the “beacon of light” or “the shining city upon a hill” like we used to be. We are still respected but not as before.
The world has taken note of our crony capitalism, lousy health-care delivery, our corruption, our disregard for the middle class and the poor, our corporate takeover of our government and our military’s “extracurricular activities”.
I don’t say this stuff to the non-Americans who I interact with and I defend America to the last, but it’s the truth. I’m in a situation where I hear from people from many countries. Rio is one of the biggest tourist destinations in the world.
There is hope and we DO have a history of greatness. We CAN become great again but it will take a lot more than just jingoistic “we’re number 1″ cheerleader chants.
If we stop stealing natural resources from around the world and stop intimidating them to take dollars no one is attacking us anywhere. A few countries that ride on our coat tails may get attacked but then they should pay us for defending them>
+1
I personally happen to think that being able to send a letter three thousand miles across the country in three days—for 42 cents—is a pretty good deal.
The free market is not about one individual’s personal opinion of what is a good deal. It is about countless thousands of people, each making rational economic decisions and arriving at the best result for all. These decisions are impossible in a context of a forcibly imposed government monopoly.
You rest my case, Lehigh.
Okay, you all seem to have the same points of view about the whole thing. But!
Why is it even necessary to have health insurance?
Is it not the same thing as “car insurance”?
Just a way to spread the cost of repair of something?
If you don’t have car insurance, do you expect the government to pay to have your car fixed?
Haysoos, It is all a kind of ponzi scheme you are advocating!
We all put a little money in the pot, and when something bad happens we take a lot out of the pot and forget that lot of money came from the people who buy into the ponzi scheme.
And the people running the medical ponzi scheme advocate more and more investors to buy the insurance as you will need it in the future. And to get more investors they raise the benefits to be paid to the investors. Look, see, we spend all of this money to keep people alive, and we need more people investing so that we can keep saving lives. All the while taking a 20% piece of the action.
The government can not run it more cheaply! Look at medicare!
ahansen, I sympathize!
But, suppose that you lived there 100 years ago, would it have been any better for you?
What would have been the effect on you if there was absolutely no insurance available to cover the damage? You would be dead or disabled, disfigured, and bankrupt, wouldn’t you!
My personal belief is that we should eliminate health insurance completely, pay the doctors what they charge in cash, or credit, and eliminate the middle man as much as possible.
What in the world did the USA do before anyone even conceived of “health insurance”?
Think that “health insurance” is one of those things that someone thought up as a way to create a business and make money?
Did any of you older folks ever think you would see people paying $1,000 per month to insure their health?
How did we fall into this trap? How do we get out of it?
Should we get out of it?
Why is there little discussion about the NEED to have health insurance rather than the assumption that we need it, and it is a human right to have health care in toto.
I just wonder about these things.
JackO
well jack-o
on a practical level
Because your broken down car doesn’t give my kid typhoid. Your broken down car doesn’t spread a supervirus- wait until their really is a deadly flu pandemic hits- the TV stations implore people to see their doctor- but only the ultra-wealthy have one.
Mechanics aren’t forced to make emergency repairs and don’t go bankrupt trying to fix all the broken down cars that show up, leaving you high and dry when yours needs to be repaired.
Yeah, but why aren’t they. Isn’t a car a necessity in many places, and the lack of a car will hurt some people more than a sore throught, or most calamitous illnesses.
Without the car , they can not get to the doctor, and most doctors don’t do house calls.
Hell, the solution is simple, Let people buy health insurance if they need it, and let people who don’t buy health insurance take the consequences of not having health insurance.
For some reason or another people think that health insurance is necessary. I grew up with out health insurance as I am 87 years old. Why , now , is it necessary that a people have to pay to insure their health, and not insure their lives.
I have solutions to most of the problems, but solutions involve loss of income to some, lack of care to others, and lack of control to others.
As to france costing less for their health payments, how does it compare to their income?
Why, oh why, should a private individual devote $5,000 a year to the possiblity that they might have to have a serious hospital or medical emergency?
They won’t put $5,000 a year into a reserve for their house payments where a catastrophic event , such as Haiti, could wipe them out , phsyically and financially.
Look at the people who don’t have earthquake insurance as it costs them $1,000 a year!
JackO
The problem is that when people have resources, they say “I’ve got mine Jack-o,” but when they’ve got needs, suddenly we’re all in it together.
Jack O says
The government can not run it more cheaply! Look at medicare!
Again look at the medicare advantage program and then get back to me.
What do you think of the election last night? I think this will really help out the country big time because health insurance is not as important as ending the wars, unemployment and tons of other stuff…
because health insurance is not as important as ending the wars, unemployment and tons of other stuff…
I know!
Unless maybe if your daughter is gravely ill and you have no health insurance….
In a sad commentary about human beings and the 21st century very few care about your plight and what can you do to further me in life has replaced compassion and common sense in this world.
Health care is a basic need and all should be afforded the best care possible. Money,greed and power over the masses is all that counts now.
My wife took a fall at Wal-Mart and nobody really cared if she was alright just how much we were going to sue for.The adjuster was dumbfounded when i told him that all we cared about was that she was not seriously injured, you know we can’t give you a dime if you admit she is alright and you don’t go to a hospital for MRI’s I said we were just hoping that people would ask if she was not hurt and show compassion he said ,” we train them not to get involved”.
I guess that says it all about this world of ours everyday somebody is either in misery or scared to go to a doctor because they can’t risk going broke because of no insurance or to little coverage.
‘Health care is a basic need and all should be afforded the best care possible. ”
Why should all be afforded the best care possible?
Food is a more basic need, should all be afforded the best food possible?
Housing is a basic need. should all be afforded the best housing possible?
Who has to pay for these basic needs, if the individual does not want to, cannot, will not, or otherwise does not have those things?
I do believe that there are some forms of government that so provide these needs, but do you want to pay the price?
JackO
I’m not talking about best of anything. To the contrary - de minimis- is all I’m asking for- that’s called humanity.
I would never be so bold as to suggest equality. hate to be tarred as a commie, oops! too late!
that is what you are getting! De minimus, not worth of consideration.
So why are you complaining about it?
Oh, you probably mean the minimum amount of humane treatment!
OKay, but be prepared to be disappointed as that is subject to determination, and that is what the complaints are about now1
JackO
Not coming soon to a theater near you…
Asia Times Online
Jan 21, 2010
Page 1 of 3
Crisis probe lacks Pecora edge
By Julian Delasantellis
During the darkest days of the Great Depression of the 1930s, businessmen knew that they had to go the extra mile to separate customers from their money. For the movie-theater owner, this frequently involved presenting substantially more entertainment and information than just the feature film attraction.
One of these might be what came to be known as the “cliffhanger”, basically, a 10-20 minute segment of an adventure/science fiction film, one that began with a resolution of the protagonist’s crisis from the previous week, and ended with him getting into another one (as in, hanging off a cliff) that would hold the audience’s attention and interest until the following week.
But in 1934, competitive programming arose to challenge the presence in the theaters of buccaneering pirates or dashing heroes with rocket backpacks. These were filmed excerpts of a subcommittee of the United States Senate’s committee on banking and currency charged with investigating the financial skullduggery that led to the Great Crash of 1929 and subsequent world Great Depression. Leading the questioning of many of the captains of Wall Street banking and finance was the committee’s chief counsel, former New York assistant district attorney, Ferdinand J Pecora, giving the effort the name it has carried through time, the Pecora Commission.
There was wild public interest in the hearings; back then, people actually seemed to be looking for solutions to their dire economic circumstances rather than just scapegoats. Both of the two relatively new technological communications mediums, radio and sound cinema, covered the hearings extensively; radio through live broadcasts of the hearings; cinema through newsreels shown in place of the cliffhangers. Many historians credit the public outrage generated by Pecora as critical in the passage of the market regulation and stabilization regulations such as the Glass-Steagall Act that protected the financial markets for the next 50 years.
Now, in response to many demands for an investigation into America’s current economic travails, a new Pecora-type investigative effort has been formed, the Financial Crisis Investigative Committee, chaired by former California state treasurer, Philip Angelides. Also, much like the 1930s, the hearings of the commission, which began last week, were readily available through a new communications medium, the Internet. In a telling point as to the chances of this committee spurring real reform, not even the three cable business networks, CNBC, Fox Business or Bloomberg, carried the full hearings to their conclusion.
As for the general public, well, for them, the hearings never even approached the attention status of the shadow of an ephemeral blip on a radar screen. If there had been a “Rocketeer” type offering of a man setting his pants on fire with his rocket pack, its ratings would have bested the commission’s by huge numbers - as proof of that, look at all the coverage and attendant ratings garnered by coverage of the man whose pants were on fire, Tiger Woods.
…
The worst form of sex addiction: That which the victim can easily afford…
GOLF
Tiger Woods’ story veers to sex addiction
Reports the golfer is at rehab center brings attention to affliction as experts acknowledge the public’s skepticism. Fellow golfers worry about ‘circus’ atmosphere when Woods eventually returns.
…
Krugman’s idealism seems far removed from the reality of a bank-owned-and-operated government.
Opinion
Paul Krugman: Testimony shows bankers’ failure to grasp economic crisis
1/20/2010 9:24:09 AM
The official Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission — the group that aims to hold a modern version of the Pecora hearings of the 1930s, whose investigations set the stage for New Deal bank regulation — began taking testimony on Wednesday. In its first panel, the commission grilled four major financial-industry honchos. What did we learn?
Well, if you were hoping for a Perry Mason moment — a scene in which the witness blurts out: “Yes! I admit it! I did it! And I’m glad!” — the hearing was disappointing. What you got, instead, was witnesses blurting out: “Yes! I admit it! I’m clueless!”
OK, not in so many words. But the bankers’ testimony showed a stunning failure, even now, to grasp the nature and extent of the current crisis. And that’s important: It tells us that as Congress and the administration try to reform the financial system, they should ignore advice coming from the supposed wise men of Wall Street, who have no wisdom to offer.
Consider what has happened so far: The U.S. economy is still grappling with the consequences of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression; trillions of dollars of potential income have been lost; the lives of millions have been damaged, in some cases irreparably, by mass unemployment; millions more have seen their savings wiped out; hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, will lose essential health care because of the combination of job losses and draconian cutbacks by cash-strapped state governments.
And this disaster was entirely self-inflicted. This isn’t like the stagflation of the 1970s, which had a lot to do with soaring oil prices, which were, in turn, the result of political instability in the Middle East. This time we’re in trouble entirely thanks to the dysfunctional nature of our own financial system. Everyone understands this — everyone, it seems, except the financiers themselves.
…
It is truly stupendous to take stock of just how clueless some of the top players in the U.S. financial system were about the housing bubble! Nobody could have seen it coming, indeed…
‘…
As an aside, it was also startling to hear Dimon admit that his bank never even considered the possibility of a large decline in home prices, despite widespread warnings that we were in the midst of a monstrous housing bubble.
Still, Dimon’s cluelessness paled beside that of Goldman Sachs’ Lloyd Blankfein, who compared the financial crisis to a hurricane that nobody could have predicted. Phil Angelides, the commission’s chairman, was not amused: The financial crisis, he declared, wasn’t an act of God; it resulted from “acts of men and women.”
…’
AGain Goldmans actions speak lowder than it’s lieing CEO’s words.
Goldman was selling and shorting MBS from 2007 forward.
WASHINGTON – The chairman and CEO of investment titan Goldman Sachs acknowledged Wednesday that his company engaged in “improper” behavior when it made financial bets against $40 billion of securities backed by risky U.S. home loans it was selling to investors as safe products.
Chairman Phil Angelides, a former California state treasurer, warned Blankfein that he would be “brutally honest” in his questioning. Then he went straight to the question of why Goldman felt it necessary to take out protection against securities it was selling by purchasing insurance-like credit-default swaps. Angelides likened it to selling a car while knowing its brakes were bad.
Blankfein acknowledged “that the behavior is improper
Megabank, Inc CEO job = lying for a living…
“I’m not talking about best of anything. To the contrary - de minimis- is all I’m asking for- that’s called humanity.”
“de minimus” means insignificant and not worthy of consideration, and that is what you get now, in many respects.
When you inject “humanity” into the text, you leave it open to the heavens, don’t you?
You probably mean “humane” treatment, but , I interject my thought and shouldn’t do that!
JackO
Of course this thread was about health care, originally, until it wasn’t.
Somebody posting under a name like “step2me” commented that I spoke from a “protected position”
and then went on with some “talking points” of such a tautological nature as to nicely elucidate what I said about the reflexive nature of what we, as a nation, do.
Not to worry, Gas. This blog offers discourse of both a reasoned and of a less shall we way, nuanced nature. Interpret as you will, draw conclusions as you may, and pretend you’re watching a Charlie Kaufman film. With an adult beverage of choice in hand, It often comes together in the most unexpected manner. Don’t try to make sense of it just yet. It’s charms will reveal themselves over time….
What I can’t understand is how the Medical /Insurance industry thinks that the average wage earner can afford to pay 25 to 30% of their income toward a good health policy ,otherwise risk financial BK . Not only does this take away money for other needs , but the people who can’t afford it or people who have been cancelled live stressful lives which creates more sickness.
The medical industry just didn’t take that much of the pie in my youth and
a good % of my working life . Same with housing ,housing only took about 25% or less of the monthly nut. Why did certain industries pull far ahead of other industries in terms of % of the monthly nut cost? And I notice you get less service these days and wait longer .
I don’t really call keeping people alive 3 months longer by some cancer
treatment a success for the medical community .Some of the treatments that keep people alive for years ,now that progress ,especially if it doesn’t cost 10 thousand a month to stay alive .
To much money is going somewhere where it shouldn’t be going . What other industry gets to set the prices and raise prices without regards to
the over all economy like the health care industry does .Salaries are going down ,yet health care costs continue to go up .
“What I can’t understand is how the Medical /Insurance industry thinks that the average wage earner can afford to pay 25 to 30% of their income toward a good health policy ,otherwise risk financial BK.”
Well, if you have a health care industry at 20% of GDP, plus the cost of the insurance industry, you’re getting up toward 25% of GDP, aren’t you? On the other hand, the government pays for a lot of it. On the other hand, let’s say it’s just 12% of income on average. That’s for a person with average income and health. For someone worse off…
It’s a combination of expecting too much, and not being willing to pay for it.
We spend about 14% of GDP on Health Care.
When you take out Government Spending, the burden on the average citizen is much higher.
Why should I spend more money on my health care, than my housing? (and I live in a pretty shwanky area/house)
I am capable of looking at other systems in the world, and it looks like we’re paying 2x as much for worse outcomes.
I’m offended that anyone suggests that we have a working system, or that we need more disincentive to seek care.
step2me is a government employee who hates the government. America in a nutshell.
I can top it. I have a brother in law who is in his own small company. He is against a government takeover of health care, Obama care, and the public option.
He is also a diabetic who has been fired from a job because of his effect on the small firm’s insurance premium. And his current company has health insurance only through a plan sponsored by the State of New York.
Oh, those self-loathing secret socialists and the wicked webs they weave …
Ah the power of FOX NEWS.
Getting people to vote against their own economic interests.
Hey ahansen, start any controversial discussions lately? LMFAO. Why does everyone go bonkers when you post?
You’re a prosaic full moon for the blogosphere.
Hey ahansen, start any controversial discussions lately? LMFAO. Why does everyone go bonkers when you post?
The lady clearly has a gift!
Someone has to keep you raving lunatics off the streets until basket weaving time….
Hey ahansen, start any controversial discussions lately? LMFAO.
Yes, ahansen, thanks for the food for thought and all the best in your recovery.
It seems to me that our current health insurance system works great for people who don’t need it. A friend of mine, relatively young and healthy, was crowing about his high-deductible HSA account, about how it was so inexpensive, and the money in it could just grow. I thought, “Great, but let’s hope you never need to use your insurance because you’ll find out the hard way how good it really is.”
Best of luck ahansen, with your recovery.
I too am uninsurable at anything resembling a reasonable price. So at age 57, I go to the medical clinic 4 x a year to see the doctor or physician’s assistant, and get 2 scrips for which I pay Walmart $8 a month.
I’m in the process of putting together a pretty strict medical directive. I’m thinking of having “DNR” (do not resuscitate) tattooed on my chest just to make sure the medical establishment gets the message when my time comes.
By the time I am eligible for Medicare, I think that all my Boomer generation will get is a “shot for the pain.” Only as we begin to lose consciousness will the nurse bother to tell us that the shot we’d just been given was a morphine overdose.
An unregulated and unaccountable finance industry has already taken over our economy and bankrupted our country for the benefit of a miniscule aristocracy.
The real estate credit bubble has burst.
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… and now the idiocracy can no longer bankrupt the economy trampling lemming-like over each other in their fever to trade real estate.
A thought occurred to me . In the case of Haiti ,or other natural disasters ,
we immediately come in and donate for medical relief . Why is that in the case of a disaster we all of a sudden see the need for health care and saving people ,yet on a every day basis peoples life or death situations regarding health care are
not treated with the same concern. Are we saying to these earthquake victims that because they can’t afford medical treatment forget it ?
On a day to day basis if 40 million people can’t afford the current cost of
health care from the private sector is it OK in that situation to turn them away to the point that death might result .
Good question.
So China has real estate fueled growth. What could possibly go wrong with that???
China Home Boom Fuels Growth, Fears
China’s economy expanded 8.7% in 2009, exceeding expectations, but concerns persist over how real estate has helped fuel growth.
…
Lordy, help me.
I just turned on the TV, and there is an infomercial for Armando Montelongo’s “Flip and Grow Rich” Live Events!
This is the obnoxious puke on the flipping shows (HGTV?) who used to flip in Texas (IIRC). He’d throw tantrums and act like a real creep in his Hummer (or Escalade or??). He’s like a used car salesman on crack. The most obnoxious character on housing porn TV with the exception of that freakish bimbo on “Property Shop” in Canada.
Looked up the site, and here it is:
http://www.flipandgrowrich1.com/?gclid=CKOAz-6mtZ8CFSkZawodezPv0A
This is proof positive the bubble is NOT over.
I really like Reuven’s idea… I’d give .10 a paycheck or whatever to a fund for situations like Allena’s. My only question is, how then do you determine who doesn’t qualify?
A few years back a guy in Central Florida smoked crack, disrobed, and waded into a swamp to wrestle a gator. I mean, would this guy be covered? Is that really an “accident.” He actually did this twice.
I am that man. Just kidding, here’s the link:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/11/30/national/main2217850.shtml
The only answer that makes sense is “everyone”. Including illegals, druggies, homeless, etc.
Otherwise it becomes a program for “them”, and will be constantly attacked.
It needs to be OUR health that OUR government takes care of.