There's a thread here which purports to show that the new health care laws are designed to dehumanize us. Of course that sounds scary and depressing, but it is no more certain to become the reality for you or me than these other provisions:

Did you know that the new laws require hospitals to provide survey information from all released patients which includes very specific information about how they were treated? The attention is focused on how much information was provided the patient, how long did treatment take, how comforting was the staff, how was the food, etc. These happen to be among my favorite topics when in a hospital.

The important thing is that Medicare funding will be based on the survey results. Hospitals are already scrambling to train staff to be more attentive, and just plain nice. Menus are being radically revised. This sounds like REHUMANIZATION to me!

Will it be much better on my next hospital visit? I don't know. But the chances are probably better that I won't be treated as a "unit" as I was before Obamacare. If I, as well as other patients are treated better, how could I not think this is real progress?

Good luck with that.

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Certain people have certain skills...I prefer a surgeon who knows how to skillfully do the surgery without a great bedside manner over one who is courteous and unskilled...nuff said!

...and you do not think that you can have both courteous and skilled doctors instead of one or the other?

No, I think we should get both! Great doctors are usually the people who have spent their lives with their nose in a book to learn what they are passionate about. The great ones often have very little social skills and bedside manner. Just saying that we could lose some incredible doctors over this.

It is my opinion that the health care legislation was the biggest mistake the president made, and not for the reasons most people beleive. His mistake was in spending the first months of his presidency, and much of his political capital focusing on healthcare, to the exclusion of other things which could have benefited the country more immediately. In the end he got the worst of all possible outcomes - a bartered piece of legislation which pleased no one, and is so complex and far reaching that virtually no one really knows what is accomplished by it. The far right can attack it with impunity, as it is so convoluted as to be almost impossible to defend. The far left doesn't like it because it failed to provide pure socialized healthcare. There are parts of the plan which will be beneficial to the public good, and there are parts which will cause problems, and will probably have to be amended, but virtually no one embraces the whole.

what has not kicked in yet that way too many folks forgot is the assumption made by Obama's plan...that $500,000,000,000 will be found in savings to offset the costs.

Do we need any more proof than the last budget fiasco when a super dooper committed was formed to find $1.2 trillion....words to get the subject off the screen....just like words to find $500,000,000,000 in savings for Obamacare...

Does anybody REALLY need much more proof it ain't gonna happen???

ANd those costs will be recovered how? Higher taxes and premiums....as forecasted and which will happen. The cheapest and best medical service you will EVER have going forward is what you have NOW. Enjoy it as it WILL NOT LAST!

btk

The taxes start now but the cost don't really kick in until 2014. When they do I imagine even myopic liberals will say "Holy S**t!!"

Originally Posted by RichieLion

The taxes start now but the cost don't really kick in until 2014. When they do I imagine even myopic liberals will say "Holy S**t!!"

If the 2012 election goes right, we will not have to worry about 2014 tax increases.

Here's an idea. Call your congressman and tell him you want to abolish medicare. That's what republicans have been trying to do for 40 plus years. Abolish it for everbody - current recipients and future recipients. Think of the money that will save. And abolish The Affordable Care Act, and throw in social security while you're at it. This will be a wonderful platform for the republicans to run on in 2012. The deficit will be wiped out in no time without raising taxes on the wealthy. Let me know how shopping for healthcare goes with your voucher when you're 80 years old and have a pre-existing condition.

The US government has already taken millions from American tax payers to fund Social Security and Medicare. The government who didn't handle that money properly so that it was more securely there as the name implies...SOCIAL SECURITY. This money is OWED to those taxpayers.
Now the same government wants to scam us again with Obamacare?! ...duh?

Katz, there's another way to look at it.

Social Security never was a 'lock box' or a savings account. It was always a 'pay as you go' system. However, many seniors have the stance that, since they paid into it for so long, they damn well deserve to get their share out of it. Quite frankly, I have no problem with that.

But when it's reversed and you're getting more than 'you' paid for, there doesn't seem to be the willingness to say "Well, we got more than our share so I should pony up". A good example right now is our infrastructure, especially our roads. The gas taxes have not "paid' for the roads in many years - meaning the difference is being made up from general revenues (which means, these days, funded by everyone including the Chinese).

I've read that the problems with Social Security could be solved entirely with something around an eventual 20% cut in benefits. As I understand it, this is done by looking at a simple formula of expected tax revenues versus benefit payout. When Social Security "goes broke", it's not like there's no money - just not enough to pay 100% of the promised benefits.

So, just like teachers in Ohio and Wisconsin, there's money - just not enough to keep the checks coming at large as they had been.

Are you willing to take a cut? If so, how much?

I have to say that it's easy for me to say I will because I'm still at least 17 years from retirement. I know I'd be more nervous if I were 17 months away. I also feel pained when my mom screams about a lack of COLA increases but doesn't say a word about the last COLA increase she got which was more than inflation and that she got no reduction in benefits when the CPI actually went down. That double-standard gets to me a bit.

Amazing to consider that in the late 30's or early 40's the concern in this country was the vast amount of money in the SS fund

Originally Posted by djplong

Katz, there's another way to look at it.

Social Security never was a 'lock box' or a savings account. It was always a 'pay as you go' system. However, many seniors have the stance that, since they paid into it for so long, they damn well deserve to get their share out of it. Quite frankly, I have no problem with that.

But when it's reversed and you're getting more than 'you' paid for, there doesn't seem to be the willingness to say "Well, we got more than our share so I should pony up". A good example right now is our infrastructure, especially our roads. The gas taxes have not "paid' for the roads in many years - meaning the difference is being made up from general revenues (which means, these days, funded by everyone including the Chinese).

I've read that the problems with Social Security could be solved entirely with something around an eventual 20% cut in benefits. As I understand it, this is done by looking at a simple formula of expected tax revenues versus benefit payout. When Social Security "goes broke", it's not like there's no money - just not enough to pay 100% of the promised benefits.

So, just like teachers in Ohio and Wisconsin, there's money - just not enough to keep the checks coming at large as they had been.

Are you willing to take a cut? If so, how much?

I have to say that it's easy for me to say I will because I'm still at least 17 years from retirement. I know I'd be more nervous if I were 17 months away. I also feel pained when my mom screams about a lack of COLA increases but doesn't say a word about the last COLA increase she got which was more than inflation and that she got no reduction in benefits when the CPI actually went down. That double-standard gets to me a bit.

Social Security tax is a specific deduction for a specific purpose. As such it's ostensibly a "tax fund". The fact that the federal government has decided to flow that money into the "general fund' doesn't change the definition and it should be thought of as a "dedicated fund".

But, given that everyone now agrees that the so called "Social Security Tax" is just thrown on the pile of general tax revenue of the Federal Budget with no real dedicated purpose, how is it these same people say that the Social Security fund is in danger?

if Social Security is just part of the federal budget, with no budget or trust fund of its own, then it’s just part of the federal budget. How can there be a Social Security crisis? All you can have is a general budget crisis. You might say that Social Security benefit payments might be one reason for that crisis, but it’s hard to make the case that it will be central.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/200...ty-trust-fund/

A Short Course in Brain Surgery - Canada:

Why people put so much faith in central government is beyond comprehension.

Governments don't solve problems they create problems. All I can do is shake my head on how gullible and ignorant some Americans can be with their freedom and how quickly they are willing to give it up.