Universal Healthcare is Wonderful and Will Ensure Better Health care for everyone

[MyOneAndOnly]

none of these teabaggers can get on the website, but i have no problem looking up plans. must be a liberal conspiracy.

[MyOneAndOnly]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

scott's not affected so this is not a problem

i like my insurance, so I'm keeping. like Obama said I could

[Future Boy]

at least now we know who he was talking to

[Future Boy]

Originally Posted by scottytheoneand

did you listen to the vid? she has no clue. she only knows the price for one plan. without subsidies.

why would i do that

Originally Posted by scottytheoneand

the basic info for the plans is available on the website. you can view all the plans for your state by tier (gold, silver, etc) online

describe basic, when I browsed I saw the tiers, names and costs, nothing else beyond that

[jczeroman]

Originally Posted by Order 66

big part of the ACA is it forces insurance companies to spend most of their profits on the actual insurance, rather than line their pockets with it. it may not "stick it" to the evil corporations like some would hope, but it's not a blind cash grab for them either

and its been clear for about half a decade single payer is out of the window and the law isn't going to fit alongside any ideological boundaries. the purpose is to lower costs and insure more. maybe it'll work, maybe it wont... alot of people were crying about medicare part D at first but it worked out okay

Did you write any of that and wonder: "am I being naive?" If you think for one second that the insurance companies, especially those who helped write the legislation and who have supplied the regulators and bureaucrats who are even now filling in the details, are not going to make bank on this legislation, then I'm not sure if I can say anything that will make sense to you.

It will force more people into the HMO model of insurance, definitely. But it will also, unquestionably, as I have proved in the other thread and not a single person has bothered to engage with, make costs higher than they other wise would be.

[jczeroman]

Originally Posted by scottytheoneand

for what it's worth, there were/are people in both parties who have opinions that don't fit your stereotypes. Democrats aren't all united on health care reform. Only the progressive wing of the party supports real single payer style reform. If they ALL were for universal coverage we would have had that, since they controlled both houses of congress when this passed. In fact, both parties have significant proponents in congress for health care industry lobbies.

On the right there was support for a Massachusetts style system. That's where it came from. But the conservatives who favor it have been silenced by the right wing of their party. Some of them even thrown out of office.

True, yes. I was particularly disappointed with Kucinich, who switches his vote at the last minute and I still don't know why.

[MyOneAndOnly]

srsly? it was covered at the time, and he made public statements about his reasoning. Like other progressives, he wanted universal coverage. He held out as long as he could, but compromised because the only law that was going to pass was better than the status quo. it was a choice between extending insurance to millions more people or not.

https://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/03/17-9

The following are the prepared remarks offered by US Rep. Kucinich today regarding his plans for the upcoming health care vote:

Each generation has had to take up the question of how to provide for the health of the people of our nation. And each generation has grappled with difficult questions of how to meet the needs of our people. I believe health care is a civil right. Each time as a nation we have reached to expand our basic rights, we have witnessed a slow and painful unfolding of a democratic pageant of striving, of resistance, of breakthroughs, of opposition, of unrelenting efforts and of eventual triumph.

I have spent my life struggling for the rights of working class people and for health care. I grew up understanding first hand what it meant for families who did not get access to needed care. I lived in 21 different places by the time I was 17, including in a couple of cars. I understand the connection between poverty and poor health care, the deeper meaning of what Native Americans have called "hole in the body, hole in the spirit". I struggled with Crohn's disease much of my adult life, to discover sixteen years ago a near-cure in alternative medicine and following a plant-based diet. I have learned with difficulty the benefits of taking charge personally of my own health care. On those few occasions when I have needed it, I have had access to the best allopathic practitioners. As a result I have received the blessings of vitality and high energy. Health and health care is personal for each one of us. As a former surgical technician I know that there are many people who dedicate their lives to helping others improve theirs. I also know their struggles with an insufficient health care system.

There are some who believe that health care is a privilege based on ability to pay. This is the model President Obama is dealing with, attempting to open up health care to another 30 million people, within the context of the for-profit insurance system. There are others who believe that health care is a basic right and ought to be provided through a not-for-profit plan. This is what I have tirelessly advocated.

I have carried the banner of national health care in two presidential campaigns, in party platform meetings, and as co-author of HR676, Medicare for All. I have worked to expand the health care debate beyond the current for-profit system, to ******* a public option and an amendment to free the states to pursue single payer. The first version of the health care bill, while badly flawed, contained provisions which I believed made the bill worth supporting in committee. The provisions were taken out of the bill after it passed committee.

I joined with the Progressive Caucus saying that I would not support the bill unless it had a strong public option and unless it protected the right of people to pursue single payer at a state level. It did not. I kept my pledge and voted against the bill. I have continued to oppose it while trying to get the provisions back into the bill. Some have speculated I may be in a position of casting the deciding vote. The President's visit to my district on Monday underscored the urgency of this moment.

I have taken this fight farther than many in Congress cared to carry it because I know what my constituents experience on a daily basis. Come to my district in Cleveland and you will understand.

The people of Ohio's 10th district have been hard hit by an economy where wealth has accelerated upwards through plant closings, massive unemployment, small business failings, lack of access to credit, foreclosures and the high cost of health care and limited access to care. I take my responsibilities to the people of my district personally. The focus of my district office is constituent service, which more often then not involves social work to help people survive economic perils. It also involves intervening with insurance companies.

In the past week it has become clear that the vote on the final health care bill will be very close. I take this vote with the utmost seriousness. I am quite aware of the historic fight that has lasted the better part of the last century to bring America in line with other modern democracies in providing single payer health care. I have seen the political pressure and the financial pressure being asserted to prevent a minimal recognition of this right, even within the context of a system dominated by private insurance companies.

I know I have to make a decision, not on the bill as I would like to see it, but the bill as it is. My criticisms of the legislation have been well reported. I do not retract them. I incorporate them in this statement. They still stand as legitimate and cautionary. I still have doubts about the bill. I do not think it is a first step toward anything I have supported in the past. This is not the bill I wanted to support, even as I continue efforts until the last minute to modify the bill.

However after careful discussions with the President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, Elizabeth my wife and close friends, I have decided to cast a vote in favor of the legislation. If my vote is to be counted, let it now count for passage of the bill, hopefully in the direction of comprehensive health care reform. We must ******* coverage for those excluded from this bill. We must free the states. We must have control over private insurance companies and the cost their very existence imposes on American families. We must strive to provide a significant place for alternative and complementary medicine, religious health science practice, and the personal responsibility aspects of health care which ******* diet, nutrition, and exercise.

The health care debate has been severely hampered by fear, myths, and by hyper-partisanship. The President clearly does not advocate socialism or a government takeover of health care. The fear that this legislation has engendered has deep roots, not in foreign ideology but in a lack of confidence, a timidity, mistrust and fear which post 911 America has been unable to shake.

This fear has so infected our politics, our economics and our international relations that as a nation we are losing sight of the expanded vision, the electrifying potential we caught a glimpse of with the election of Barack Obama. The transformational potential of his presidency, and of ourselves, can still be courageously summoned in ways that will reconnect America to our hopes for expanded opportunities for jobs, housing, education, peace, and yes, health care.

I want to thank those who have supported me personally and politically as I have struggled with this decision. I ask for your continued support in our ongoing efforts to bring about meaningful change. As this bill passes I will renew my efforts to help those state organizations which are aimed at stirring a single payer movement which eliminates the predatory role of private insurers who make money not providing health care. I have taken a detour through supporting this bill, but I know the destination I will continue to lead, for as long as it takes, whatever it takes to an America where health care will be firmly established as a civil right.
Dennis Kucinich

[Order 66]

d

[Eulogy]

Originally Posted by Future Boy

I asked them once what the path forward was, answer was basically hope/change.

It's demographics.

What's your plan?

[Eulogy]

And I don't like to say this too loudly in front of dumbs but I do think this is a tiny tiny step toward single payer.

Shit takes a long time. Look at your fellow countrymen. Jesus.

[Future Boy]

Thats not a path forward from this, thats single payer eventually happening because all the old idiots die off and we elect nothing but liberals or something. The question was how could this market based approach turn into a single payer system as the dems have wanted forever. No one really had an answer then, and you dont seem to have one now.

[Future Boy]

I mean really, if this thing works then it actually hurts and delays single payer, how is that not clear to you guys.

[Future Boy]

My plan is this continuing to explode and dying a quick death and single payer happening somewhere down the road when all the old idiots die off and we elect nothing but liberals or something.

I mean shit takes a long time, but you know, keep hope alive and stuff.

[MyOneAndOnly]

[MyOneAndOnly]

I don't think the ACA delays single payer. what's the argument? that if things got even worse and another 30 million people were uninsured then and only then would they be willing to support universal medicare coverage?

[MyOneAndOnly]

I don't think the US will ever have universal single payer health coverage. Obamacare might get improved upon in the future with things like coverage gaps closed, subsidies adjusted price controls, etc. But there are too many competing interest groups involved. Look at the absurdity of tax code or the way education is funded and regulated. THAT's how everything in the US gets done. I don't see how demographic changes will change that.

[Future Boy]

yeah but scotty you suck

[MyOneAndOnly]

yeah, but that's not germane to the healthcare crisis discussion.

[jczeroman]

If I had the ability to make a video about the healthcare law, it would be like this one:



(I do have some minor quibbles with this, but it's mostly dead on - especially regarding the idea that this just enshrines the terrible inequalities and corporate privileges of the existing system into law)

[Starla]

Originally Posted by Future Boy

My plan is this continuing to explode and dying a quick death and single payer happening somewhere down the road when all the old idiots die off and we elect nothing but liberals or something.

I mean shit takes a long time, but you know, keep hope alive and stuff.

There are young idiots ready to take over for the old ones.

[Eulogy]

when was the last time future boy offered anything substantive about anything

[duovamp]

His unwitty little comments have certainly broadened my perspective. And by that I mean I've had him blocked for a few years.

[Future Boy]

Originally Posted by Eulogy

when was the last time future boy offered anything substantive about anything

back when I thought it was possible to reach any of you.

But, my plan is your plan, so hey o/

[Future Boy]

by a few years he means 6 months. I know, Duo wrong about something, its shocking.

[Future Boy]

Originally Posted by Starla

There are young idiots ready to take over for the old ones.

But they'll be liberal idiots! Its perfect.

Originally Posted by Eulogy

when was the last time future boy offered anything substantive about anything

also to revisit this again, this is the person who never gives an inch and ultimately just calls the opposition idiots that dont know what they're talking about. My "substantive" discussions with you resulted in you calling me at different times crazy, stupid, uninformed and unrealistic, that was when you weren't just flat out misstating my position no matter how many times I corrected you. If you'd like to have serious discussions then dont act like a dick.

But dont worry, you'll get it one day Euls.

[Trotskilicious]

Originally Posted by Future Boy

No one really had an answer then, and you dont seem to have one now.

tiny steps man tiny, tiny, tiny steps that help to undermine the left and give ammunition to the right

[Trotskilicious]

Originally Posted by jczeroman

(I do have some minor quibbles with this, but it's mostly dead on - especially regarding the idea that this just enshrines the terrible inequalities and corporate privileges of the existing system into law)

I KNOW RIGHT

[Trotskilicious]

OBAMUNISM

[Future Boy]

Originally Posted by Trotskilicious

tiny steps man tiny, tiny, tiny steps that help to undermine the left and give ammunition to the right

please Trots, we're trying to have a discussion here

[Eulogy]

Originally Posted by Future Boy

also to revisit this again, this is the person who never gives an inch and ultimately just calls the opposition idiots that dont know what they're talking about. My "substantive" discussions with you resulted in you calling me at different times crazy, stupid, uninformed and unrealistic, that was when you weren't just flat out misstating my position no matter how many times I corrected you. If you'd like to have serious discussions then dont act like a dick.

But dont worry, you'll get it one day Euls.

so what do you think should be done

because you really do seem like a person that just bitches and bitches and bitches and offers nothing even approaching a workable solution. you really love to refer to me misstating your position but then you hide the ball and say you don't want to state it again. really annoying.