It's far from over. They passed something the American people largely don't want and they will pay for it next year with their jobs. Even if the Senate passes a form of it, it doesn't take effect until 2013. After BO is sent packing in 2012 they will start to undo the damage and fix health care properly among all the other things he and the radicles in congress have screwed up.

How long could you maintain your lifestyle with declining revenues and an over drawn check book?

Great question! One the liberals here or anywhere else can't and won't answer. Why? Because all it has to do is sound good and make them feel good. Nothing else matters, especially the actual outcomes.

It's kind of like outcome based education. It's ok if 2+2=5 as long as the child feels good about it. It's not fair if they can't figure out it's actually 4.

This is a sad day for America. Even though all the polls show that a vast majority don't want this monstrosity they passed it anyway. We can only hope that it can be stopped in the Senate. I'm not holding my breath.

It seems to me we are stuck between two options and I'll use a little of the inflammatory rhetoric from both sides.

Choice #1: Leave things the way they are and let corporations run our lives and cut us off as soon as we're not profitable for them.

Choice #2: Turn our lives over to the government. At least nobody has told us we can't vote when we're no longer profitable.

I'm dismayed, but not surprised that the bill that came out of Washington wasn't as much health care reform (which would require attacking every issue I've raised in the past and a few more - and do it simultaneously) as some incomprehensible committe-designed ******* child.

Yes, most people are happy with their insurance. or so they say. Ask anyone who's been cut off when they needed benefits. When they've paid into 'the system' for so long only for it to leave them high and dry.

I've had two bad run-ins with insurance companies - fortunately nothing I couldn't solve.

First was a doctor for an HMO who wrote down in my file that I'd had polio when I'd never had any such thing. I told him why I had adhesions in my ankle and he just didn't listen. (Which surprised another doctor reading my file later on)

Second was the insurance company telling me that my vasectomy would be covered. So I went and had it, then they rejected paying for it, saying it was elective. When I protested, they asked for the name rank and serial number of the representative who told me it would be covered. Of course I didn't have that so I paid for it myself (around $650).

When the insurance companies know that the vast majority of subscribers are 'happy' because they still make a profit for the company and therefore still think they'll be covered in the event of catastrophic illness, they can keep cutting off the 2% and call it "isolated incidents".

$300B in profits. *PROFITS* (Not the cost of the care - the PROFITS) Somehow it's ok to give that money to a CEO and the Board of Directors, but it's not ok to give that to the doctors and nurses that would be providing the additional care under a public option?

Like I said, I'm no fan of a public option. But I find it less offensive than the "sick people are a growth industry and profit center" mentality that has overtaken the insurance companies over the last 20 years. ...just don't get TOO sick.

The point is simple:

What works Socialism or Capitalism?

Neither are perfect.

Capitalism has always worked better than socialism.

Capitalism cannot function with Governments trying to overly control it.

History shows that Socialism never works under any situation.

1. There are more than two choices.

2. Insurance companies work within about a 3% profit margin.

3. When the government option drives private insurers out of business, then where where you go?

4. Name one program where the government improved efficiency and reduced costs?

Obama said if we pass the stimulus, unemployment wouldn't go above 8%, now it's at 10.2% and climbing. 95% of Americans won't see their taxes go up one dime? It's all a big fat lie. Medicare is bankrupt, SS is bankrupt and now they want health care right next to out of control debt.

Where does all this confidence in government come from?

I'm still waiting for someone on the left to give an answer to a simple question.

How long could you maintain your lifestyle with declining revenues and an over drawn check book?

You guys are right. It's not about health care or they would be listening to the people. They just come up with pretty words while they aim the knife straight for your back. If it was what they want us to believe, there would be no "bridges, roads, etc." or all the double-talk. The transparency is just as hidden as the pork stuff.....only more so.

Originally Posted by dklassen

It amazes me how easily some will turn their lives over to the federal government. Mind boggling really.

It's not about health care IF you have your own, or company supplied, or government supplied (Medicare & VA) health care already. It's totally about health care if you can't get it now, even if you want to pay for it!


I couldn't care less if Congress is forced to have the same "public option" as the bill has- that's an immature red herring. Talking about illegal immigrants and abortion provisions and "privacy" are also red herrings.

Illegal aliens are not covered by this bill. End of story- except for those who want to perpetuate a lie. Federal funding for abortions- still banned as it was in the Hyde Amendment. What the conservatives wanted was to outlaw all legal abortion- that's a whole different argument.

Finally, and most importantly, your "private" insurance company already has every bit of information you could ever give them about your health, and they have some low level bureaucrat making life-or-death decisions about you based on some book of "covered" & "non-covered" illnesses. It's disingenuous to claim that some "shadow" government will somehow take away your God-given freedom if health care is made more affordable. If it hasn't happened yet with Social Security, FICA, federal taxes, the Census and other programs, then why assume all of a sudden things will change.

On the other hand, if you believe that the loss of privacy and freedom is already a fact (which, personally, I do "in part"), then this isn't going to make it any worse than it already is!

dklassen - on a few of your points:

2 - The problem with insurance companies is that they treat sick people like a product. That's fine when you're talking about cars or refrigerators. But these are *people*. You can NOT treat health insurance as if it were "any other industry". That's the one thing that left a bad taste in my mouth when working at Beth Israel Hospital. I loved the fact that we were trying to offer better care and do it more efficiently (because the insurance companies had us by the short and curlies) but there was also a push to "fill the beds" - more inpatient admissions. That part didn't make me feel too good. It's ok for GM to drop an unprofitable product line. Is it ok for Aetna, et al., to do the same with people?

3. Won't happen the way you think. Insurers, as they have been doing for nearly 25 years, will simply drop the unprofitable segments. I feel no pity for them. They're the ones who decided, rightly or wrongly, that the shareholders were more important than the subscribers.

Regarding your Obama quote. I'm searching all over the web and all I'm finding are people who SAY Obama said this, but I can't find it. Even people claiming that a brietbart.com sourced quote says it can't point to it. I've found dozens of references on the first several Google pages - but no actual quote. I've found references to the unemployment rate being 7.6% when he said it. But, again, no actual quote.

The closest I've been able to find is a story on MSNBC.COM from January 9 that says the President-Elect said that if the stimulus didn't go far enough, we could expect "double digit unemployment" and worse. Now from everything I'm reding, unemployment, which is a lagging, as opposed to leading, economic indicator is levelling off. Granted it's just over 10%, but I also have been reading about how states aren't exactly spending the stimulus money quickly - been very slow to get to hiring.

Where does this confidence in government come from? I think you're proceeding from a false assumption. It's not a confidence in government. Obama wasn't elected because all those people agreed with him in lock-step. It's largely because of the people who believed the new John McCain's policy of "more of the same" would be even worse. My older daughter (who just graduated college) said they were terming these people "Obamicans" as the exact opposite of what happened when we coined the term "Reagan Democrats".

And if you believe revenues will continue to decline, you haven't been paying attention to the GDP lately.

Of course, I have no faith in our government to hold the line on spending when revenues grow from the inevitable recovery (strong or weak). They'll take it as a sign to spend even more.

Check out video on computation of GDP

http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashc...-fuzzy-numbers

Bob

the composition of the GDP? Or how many care? (as long as they feel good!).

How about a guess how many will have the simple ability to sit and listen to the whole video for almost 16 minutes?

And far too many are all to willing to espouse the party line (either party) instead of understanding for themselves.....and then holding their representatives, including the POTUS ......ACCOUNTABLE.

It has not happened in the last 40 years and since history sets the pace....it is unlikely to happen....or said differently the malaise of the fickle Americans will continue.

btk

Just TRY to explain the difference between GDP and the "old standard" GNP to a layman!

And for accountability, I'd like to see a Constitutional Ammendments allowing the Line Item Veto. Even the GOP gave it to Clinton back in the early 90s but the USSC shot it down (I still disagree with their reasoning - the override capability kept the division of powers but that wasn't my decision to make).

Wouldn't totally solve the problem but it would certainly cut down on the "hostage ammendments" that Congress likes to attach to important bills.