3 Reasons to End ObamaCare Before it Begins!
As the legality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act - a.k.a. ObamaCare - goes before the highest court in the land, here are three reasons to chuck the whole program even before it gets underway.
1. It Represents the End of Limited Government. The Supreme Court will issue its verdict later this spring of course, but there's no question that if the government can force you to do something simply because you exist and draw breath, then the American experiment in limited government is over and done with. Whether it's the mandating of eating broccoli or buying insurance, a government that can make you do whatever it wants just ain't in the American grain.
2. Its Price Tag is Already Ballooning. The latest government estimate of cost tells us what we already knew. Health-care reform is going to cost us a lot more than the arm and the leg it's supposed to save us. The Congressional Budget Office is now saying that the first full decade of Obamacare is going to cost about $1.8 trillion , or double the original estimate used to sell the program.
3. Obamacare Won't Make Us Healthier. Health insurance isn't the same thing as health. Most of us might end up paying more for health care under the new law, but there's precious little evidence that coverage itself leads to lower medical costs. A 1993 study by the RAND Corporation found that "for the average person, there were no substantial benefits from free care ." Not smoking, eating moderately, and not boozing it up provide greater health benefits than any low-deductible, low-co-pay insurance plan.
Produced by Meredith Bragg; written by Nick Gillespie, who also narrates.
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But all of those reasons would mean abandoning the good intentions of the progressives.
? Universal Koch Industries pollution is good.
? Universal birth defects from pollution are good.
? Universal asthma attacks are good.
? Universal health care for the victims, well, that isn't so good.
Funny how that works on a website funded by Koch Industries.
Privatized profits, socialized costs. All your dollars and health are belong to us.
Debra, I had Botox, and no one noticed! Yes, woman should do whatever makes them feel great. I haven't hit menopause, and I'll try not to go too crazy when I do.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
That's OK, you're already nuts, you stupid fucking retard. God damn, you're pathetic. Do your children know how pathetic their mother is?
so funny to watch
you have no arguments
no reason
not even a half-witted attempt at rationalization
just pure rage
you mad, bro?
Cats won't allow themselves to be put in the family Christmas card? Who knew cats were atheist but you could put the scarlet large "A" in bold print to appease their nature.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
You're so fucking stupid, it's amazing. I love it.
*strawmen are good
When we're all gamboling about the forest, those that get will will be a real wet blanket. Tomahawks in the back of the head will be the primitivist solution.
I'm always confused by stuff like that. Would they do that to a person before or AFTER they set fire to huge tracts of forest land in order to flush out animals? Ah, living in harmony with nature, at least the few parts not out to get you.
"The end of limited government"...... the author is looking at American history through rose-colored glasses. America started out as a country where slaves were legally bought, sold, and couldn't run away.
Ever see any of those shiftless nigras want to move off the capitalist plantation back to Africa?
Q.E.D.
Huh?
Now that you mention it...
Yes, it's called Liberia, and I'm sure it's just a slice of paradise today. Oh wait....
And we corrected slavery, TELMOFF, just as we will correct the affront to liberty that is Obamacare.
I don't know why... a very clever democratic process upheld slavery. So, what's the big deal with it?
Libertarians didn't end slavery; they studied slavery and hid in their think tanks durring the Civil War.
Far be it from them to tell their society that their democratically chosen and justified laws are bad, m'kay?
It WILL be "the end"... that doesn't mean limited government can't COME BACK at some point, just that the government will not have any real limitations to it's power.
Nice double-post there. Does that mean there are in fact 6 reasons, but you forgot 3?
Slightly OT: Kentucky is fucking sick!
Sick as in "cool," "ill," or "disgusting?"
"Sick" as in "Holy fuck, this is about the best college basketball team I've seen in a long, long time" sick.
yea boi Obama gettin me helth care soon! guna be sik win i can git at those drs ad nurses and git me my medcine!
When did orrin start posting on the weekend threads?
Orrin just contracts every phoneme. This guy sounds like some Limey in baggy five-sizes-too-large soccer shorts and a double-digit IQ thrusting away at his keyboard while his pals beat up a five-year-old black kid.
"...if the government can force you to do something simply because you exist and draw breath..."
Yep, that's a reference to gambol lockdown.
Officer, am I free to gambol about plain and forest to forage a free lunch as humans have done for millions of years?
Ever wonder if "limited government" is an oxymoron?
Yes briefly, and it's obviously not, though "living in harmony with nature" certainly is.
And yet your desired lifestyle will require force to keep in place. You just haven't thought through the logical end of it.
OT: Guys, what's the best large state in the US? If you had to move to Texas, Arizona, Florida, or California, which would you pick?
If you had to move to Texas, Arizona, Florida, or California, which would you pick?
Suicide.
Try Montana or the Idaho panhandle.
I was thinking more along the lines of powerful states that could easily be independent nation-states. Apart from those four, which could work as such, and which would you choose to live in?
For example, I love a great deal of shit about New Hampshire, but it's only slightly larger than Israel and has a population of less than 2,000,000. It's not exactly formidable. I excluded Illinois because Illinois is the realm of Mephistopheles.
lol
that's the answer, FREE STATIST.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
ya'll are so fucking stupid, it's amazing. I love it.
To start off with, I should tell you I cared nothing for beauty.
And you still don't...except for the botox treatments!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Go to Alaska and establish residency so you can partake of future GOP Gov Bristol Palin's public oil largesse. I hear its $8,000 per year per Alaskan secessionist. Plus they don't have any of them pesky "coloreds" there. You will enjoy it.
Plus they don't have any of them pesky "coloreds" there.
You are both racist and wrong. I've lived there. One on three Alaskans are non-white.
And I'm not typing well today. One of three Alaskans is non-white.
Bullshit.
I am non-WASP. Sarah Palin calls me un-American due to my Irish-Catholic heritage.
I hate that bitch but I would fuck her anyway.
I am non-WASP thought.
FTFY
Plus they don't have any of them pesky "coloreds" there.
One of three Alaskans is non-white.
Bullshit.
66.7% White, and that number includes hispanic whites.
I am non-WASP. Sarah Palin calls me un-American due to my Irish-Catholic heritage.
What that has to do with pesky "coloreds," I don't know, but as of 2000
Catholics have 102 congregations totaling over 54,000 members, making them the single largest denomination in Alaska.
No coloreds? What are you talking about that place is crawling with seal clubbers!
shrike is getting uglier by the day.
I am not!
If Montana, the Dakotas, Wyoming and the panhandle of Idaho (the rest of the state will want to go with Utah and the Nation of the LDS) joined to form their own nation, they'd be self-sufficient in a matter of months. Lots of oil reserves, a good dose of liberty, low taxes and plenty of guns.
Add in that they would be pretty well able to be a net exporter of food and they're all set.
Of course, California would be as well, but it would take an open revolution for the idiot nannystaters to release their death grip on the central valley and central coast, which is where the vast majority of oil, water and agriculture come from.
California can't be saved. Only after some epic disaster has killed off all of those who have zero survival skills will there be any hope for this state.
Isn't there a huge push to split the state? IIRC, it would be divided pretty much coast/inland+OC, SD counties.
Yes. But there was an even more huger push to squash the huge push to split the state.
Liberals don't maintain their conquistador skills for nothing.
Not to mention they know enough to have kids to hand it all down to.
of those choices, TX hands down. FL is run by the Police State version of the GOP. Lots of moralists and escapees from the Northeast who want to convert the place into what they left.
Don't let the no state income tax fool you; that money is made up for in other ways. Good deals on real estate, though.
Montana.
California #2
I am biased though.
This is a WI post.
You can tell because of the frequent use of both bold and italics in the body itself, as well as the fact that it's usually copy-pasting quotes, responding to itself in chain trying to pretend to be multiple people and making no fucking sense whatsoever.
"In short, we must face the fact that the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children."
~Murray Rothbard
"...The demand for babies and children is usually far greater than the supply, and hence we see daily tragedies of adults denied the joys of adopting children by prying and tyrannical adoption agencies. In fact, we find a large unsatisfied demand by adults and couples for children, along with a large number of surplus and unwanted babies neglected or maltreated by their parents. Allowing a free market in children would eliminate this imbalance, and would allow for an allocation of babies and children away from parents who dislike or do not care for their children, and toward foster parents who deeply desire such children. Everyone involved: the natural parents, the children, and the foster parents purchasing the children, would be better off in this sort of society."
For the full context: http://mises.org/daily/2568
And ^^this^^ is still the case even after all the Chinese babies that get dropped down wells.
And I've had friends who had to shell out over $30K a pop to adopt unwanted children from China. Sorry, but the market for children is run by the state, and it's horribly distorted. Try again.
Are you stupid or just can't read. At what point does he say we currently have a free market in children?
He says that a "free society will have a flourishing free market in children."
We currently have a state-managed market in children: one that's distorted in favor of the state, and at the cost of unwanted children.
It's incorrect to hold a "free market in children" in disdain while a state-run market hurts children.
Is this where I rekindle my idea of having the states comprising Louisiana Purchase withdraw from the union?
There's a lot of factors. I live in Arizona, but depending on the factors, it wouldn't necessarily be the one I picked.
I moved away from a large US state, NM, to live in the Czech Republic. And fuck you, my ex-homestate is bigger and cooler than fucking Arizona.
a government that can make you do whatever it wants just ain't in the American grain.
What a clever Wickard v Filburn reference, Nick!
"Agriculture creates government." ~Richard Manning, Against the Grain, p. 73
Hate American government? Blame the Native Americans. The people on the East Coast were farmers when the white settlers came, which allowed them to both give the settlers food, AND teach them how to feed themselves.
Also, you don't need agriculture to have government. Technically, any group of humans ruling over themselves or others in ANY WAY is a form of government. Nomads without any farms whatsoever can still have a Chief that governs them.
Lastly, how do you do that neat bold and italics stuff?
I turned the NCAA tourney off for good - the worst ever.
The underdogs are long gone with nothing left but basketball factories. I have no money on the shit so it sucks ass.
I thought little Ohio could pull it off but they lost in OT.
college hoops' downward spiral is self-inflicted. The one-and-done rule for players is a marginal improvement over the flock of guys who thought they could make the jump from high school to the NBA. Most of them were not LeBron or Kobe.
The underdogs are long gone with nothing left but basketball factories.
You do realize that the "big dogs" have to regularly dominate in order for underdog success to actually mean anything, right?
If every year is a big year for Cinderellas, then Cinderellas stop actually being Cinderellas after a while.
Logical.
I remember watching some great upsets a long time back - when Houston and Georgetown lost finals close together to Jimmy V and Villanova.
Even my shitty alma mater, UGA, made it to the Final Four back then. And we suck in roundball. Really suck.
You left out "Christ-fag".
Even my shitty alma mater, UGA,
It's all starting to make sense. He went to a college dedicated solely to educating the mildly to severely mentally retarded.
Fucking Georgia. Hahahaha.
I've never made an issue out of it.
I grew up in Athens, went to UGA, and was a rebellious punk turned B-man asshole in the Big ATL.
Someone who bleeds tOSU red shouldn't speak too loud about unethical sports factories.
What??
Most of us might end up paying more for health care under the new law.... Not smoking, eating moderately, and not boozing it up provide greater health benefits than any low-deductible, low-co-pay insurance plan.
Nick, did you take off the Jacket or something? You are being pretty obtuse. The new law makes us healthier by leaving us no money for the cancer sticks, heaping plates of food, and demon rum!
lol
the fibertarian hordes are sure funny to watch
She laughed at me when she saw I was there for Botox and was stunned when I told her my age. Hell, I bought the treatment at an auction (and competed against a man bidding for himself! I think I won because I told him I was going to spread a rumor, starting with his wife, that he had a boyfriend. He graciously let me win!)
So you're total scum in your real life too, and you freely admit it.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
This shit is a fucking goldmine.
Your anti-fiber stance appears to have left you full of shit and irritable. Chronic constipation is no laughing matter, Mary. I would see your healthcare provider before it escalates.
Are you really not going to the store?
Probably not. Why don't you go?
Because I work.
Your pro-fib stance appears to have left you full of shit and irritable. Chronic constipation is no laughing matter, Banjos. I would see your healthcare provider before it escalates.
No, you're a towel, Mary. You're a towel.
I'm not "mary." But you all are mean fucks who can't defend your fantasy ideology worth a shit.
Then why come here? Wouldn't you be better off talking to people receptive to your ideas and the eloquent way you present them? Seriously, if I were in your shous, I'd just walk away laughing from a website that overwhelmingly despises my ideas and mocks me.
Asks if sloopy has lawyer.
Then decides it is not Mary, and thus has less than no standing for a suit, not that it had any in the first place.
Easy on the botox, Mary. See what it makes you do?
Easy on the botox, Mary. See what it makes you do?
Yes, it's called the Pelosi Syndrome. It means that one's intellect is reduced in direct inverse proportion to the amount of botox one has had injected into their head.
I'll check the premises now..
1. This depends on metaphysics and libertarian puritanism. Metaphysics are bullshit.
2. Lies, damned lies and accounting. You could easily make the PPACA more or less costly by finagling with benchmarks, definitions and timeframes.
3. Yeah, the US system is kinda fucked up and people would save more money by caring more about their health rather than *trying to destroy the FDA or the EPA and rolling back OSHA legislation because your Galtian overlords demand it*.
Man, reason.com makes libertarianism look worse than it is. Impressive.
Good. Use your aggressive feelings, boy. Let the hate flow through you
Pick up your statist weapon. I am unarmed. Strike me down with it. Give in to your anger.
When you use reason, Libertarianism IS worse than it really is.
Poor Mary has never been the same since her identical twin brother flew that plane into the IRS building in Austin.
Not sure about the tree, but those two apples sure landed side by side.
obama rulz n ur faggy nom rominey got no chanse haha ur blog is so faggy gay n obama gunna destroy u lame rethugs
did you wander out of huffpo? dailykos?
fuk u faggerator i am just defindin obama from all ur gay attacs that try 2 get me 2 loose my health care u fag 1%er probs dont care that i cant get health but u think thats coll well obama gonna giv me health care a u 2 so u should like him
Admit you love George W. Bush and his freedom agenda.
yeh i bet u would lik bushie u faggondo no way i like bush i like obama cuz he is a bettir prez than bush ever was and is gettin me health care for free and iznt startin stupid warz like ur belived bushie wuz u dum fukker
Public school?
he talks all faggy and his shit is all retarded and stuff
Get him a bottle of Brawndo and he'll be as good as new. It has electrolytes.
Go away! Batin'!
Right, kick ass. Well, don't want to sound like a dick or nothin', but, ah... it says on your chart that you're fucked up. Ah, you talk like a fag, and your shit's all retarded. What I'd do, is just like... like... you know, like, you know what I mean, like...
he talks all faggy and his shit is all retarded and stuff
Los Angeles Unified School District. I'll bet my copy of "The Fountainhead" on it!
Who is Mary Stack?
I don't know. They think they do though. They'd better be right unless they have a penchant for making the acquaintance of process servers. Whatever, this bizarre puerile obsession here with Rather is getting weirder and weirder.
So Mary Stack is rather? And rather is the gambol person?
This site gets worse ever day.
They'd better be right unless they have a penchant for making the acquaintance of process servers.
How so? I just replied to someone posting as Mary Stack about the publicly available information on her home, courtesy of the state of Texas.
Besides, you must have missed her a few weeks ago posting personal information about John and calling him a pedophile.
Or it's her, attempting to intimidate you. She has had hundreds of screen names and has spoofed just about everyone on the board at some point.
rectal/WI (4/5ths of the time)/anonopussy/three thousand other screen names of passive-aggresive projection due to Botox injections and menopause.
There is way too much evidence for any other explanation.
Animals!
Holy Jeebus, once again weekend Hit & Run comments descend into useless lunacy. Could we talk the server squirrels into implementing a comment rating system, so we could sort by quality, and not even see all the trolling and insanity?
+ infinity
A 1993 Rand study. Scraping the bottom of the barrel there guys. And the price tag comment is simply a lie that has been blown out of the water numerous times since it appeared in a Republican press release.
There aren't really a ton of good studies out there on the subject. Everyone just sort of assumes that if health care is "free", then the health of the population improves automatically. Part of the problem, also, is designing a study that isn't loaded with confounding elements.
One thing that ISN'T a lie is that government spending on health care has gone from $55 billion in 1980 to over $800 billion today.
That's a 9% increase annually, and if you think that number's going to drop just because Obama says it needs to, I've got a demographic bomb in the form of aging Baby Boomers to hand to you.
Scraping the bottom of the barrel there guys.
Said like a man who has no idea what he's talking about. The Rand Corp. studies are the pinnacle of studies on health insurance. The size and scope of these studies have not been duplicated, mostly due to cost, and they are widely considered the best there is. Sorry, but subsidized health care does not lead to better health outcomes; it only leads to spending more money.
What's your predictions, everyone? Will the Supreme Court knock down the mandate? Will they sustain it? Will they knock down the whole law?
Will the Supreme Court knock down the mandate?
Probably not.
Why wouldn't they? I'm leaning toward them doing it.
One of the justices (probably Kennedy, but who knows) is gonna decide he wants to "make history" and be all heroic and shit, and vote with the statist four.
He'll get his 15 minutes of fame, and then we get stuck with the ACA clusterfuck for all eternity.
The statist four never switch. They vote as a superglue block of stupid. So we need to herd cats with the other five, and it ain't happenin.
Reason #2 has been debunked.
Basically some GOP congressman shouted out that "the cost is ballooning" because it makes a great sound bite.
If you actually READ the report you find that Gross costs have gone up but Net costs have gone down. Net is what matters.
Actually if you look at Massachussets or Medicare as a predictor, the cost will balloon regardless of partisan ass-hattery.
Only barking moonbat lefties believe that you can hand out an unlimited supply of free shit.
This story had to have been linked to extreme leftist site, there are too many of these assclowns to be a coincidence.
Welcome lefty moonbats! Please remember that we are libertarians and not conservatives, so please save all of your neocon, social conservative, and Limbaugh strawmen for New Republic. Any strawmen involving us being 1 percenters and anarchists are acceptable. Please note that mentions of Somalia are part of an ongoing drinking game.
Now wait a minute, here!
TNR has been taken over by a Lefty Moonbat Obama sucking twinkle-toed communist cocksucker. It's not like they are for invading every ME nation and installing a Jewish Governor General anymore.
Those were the G-d damned days!
Now the dumb bastards come over HERE thinking H&R is a conservative site and start yakking it up about Cheney and Unitary Government and the Stolen Erection and all that garbage.
The problem with lefties, as with Bushtards, is that they don't realize that someday, rather soon, the Chicoms are going to turn off the money spigot. Then their boy Jesus Obama is going to be standing around with his dick in his hands.
Gross costs have gone up but net costs have gone down. Great. More accounting buffoonery. It's another round of doublethink. More government for less money!
I expect they will exercise "deference" toward the legislative branch; you know, "It's a Law, so it must be Constitutional. And besides, they mean well."
The entire role of the judicial branch and its relationship to the other two has been so incongruously fucked up for so long, it's a fucking miracle anything ever gets struck down by the justices.
If we're placing ourselves into a universe where reindeer shit rubies and up is down, why not go for the full prize? Full law. I hope the entire law is struck down. But that's probably not going to happen.
It is, after all, for the children.
Yeah, we should have nipped Social Security, Medicare and civil rights in the bud. If the government can tell you who you can serve in your restaurant, it will soon be telling you what color the tablecloths should be. We know this from bitter esperience with the tablecloth taste police. We know where affordable healthcare will lead. Soon doctors will be in chains and doing the bidding of minority welfare queens. Ah, the horor of it!
Eat shit and die in a fire, you pinko fuck. Much to the cataclysmic horror of anybody who gives a damn about freedom and justice, most of the world is of the same breed of thought as you, so pack your shit and get the fuck out. Cuba'd be a good match for you.
Suck my cock, you brain-dead right-wing fuck.
"Suck my cock."
I wouldn't be able to even if I wanted to, since you've already got that covered. Who needs partners when autofellatio is all the rage in Dumbfuckistan?
You suck only Nazi cocks, you Nazi cock sucker.
Did you just out yourself?
I think you did.
Ouch. There's a Downfall Parody in there. Somewhere...
You Libtards really should come out of the bunkers sometimes.
There's a real world happening out here, with people and grocery stores too.
No more hunting wabbit, and someone to talk with too.
That old nasty attitude will melt away in no time, after you get to talking to people instead of squirrels.
Actually civil rights were nipped in the bud by the Supreme Court in Slaughterhouse, not to mention Plessy. Of course those were popular decisions in their day and fit with the progressive agenda.
I'm kind of in chains now, Max, since I have to see you in my emergency department for any complaint you might think up, regardless of your ability to pay me, while still being open to being sued by you for any reason, real or imagined. Just because I'm relatively highly compensated (though not by the CEO standard) doesn't mean it's not unjust.
Yeah, we should have nipped Social Security, Medicare and civil rights in the bud.
Civil rights - properly understood - I'm down with. The rest you can send straight to Hell.
If you would have gotten a job instead of playing war-crack in yo momma's basement, you too could retire on S.S. and live comfortable in your old age.
Come back here when you know how to Moby, you witless fucktard.
I hope you go to Free Republic and get butt-raped by Jim Robinson his bad self.
That was just amateur night at Moby Theater.
I hope the entire law is struck down. But that's probably not going to happen.
I *want* to believe, but my expectations have been trampled into the mud by the maternalist totalitarianism enshrined in the War on Drugs.
God save the republic.
Arbeit Macht Frei
Arbeit Macht Frei
Yeah, we should have nipped Social Security, Medicare and civil rights in the bud.
Max, this is the smartest thing you have ever written on here. It's a shame you were being sarcastic.
You can actually perceive sarcasm with your head up your ass, can you?
I sure can. It's called multitasking, dumbass.
yeh u faggo repuglies don want me 2 hav free helth care but imma gon get it cuz obama is givin it to me y dont u all go 2 fukkin repug land and live in shitty olaces w/o health care and then u can die cuz u cant afford it fukking gaybo de clowns
Yeah, all those fantastic, exuberant islands of ultimate prosperity and happiness are definitely better than freedom, like Limetree Island, or France, or Venezuela. Grandfather Lenin would be proud of Maxie and his buttbuddy cohort on the left.
Someone tell Max what happened to the Soviet Union and all the hyper Welfare States of Eastern Europe.
We are MUCH more in debt than they were, and they suffered a Legitimacy Crisis and Economic Collapse.
Oh, wait. You're not Max. You're the Lefty from the L.A. Unified School District.
California: Your (Borrowed) Tax Dollars at Work!
Ah, this is the very first thing I see when I come to reason.com 🙂
What a maroon! as Bugs Bunny would say.
Really? Government can force you to do things! Right here in the USA? When did all this start to happen?
You might try actually reading for a while and learning something prior to commenting. I understand you were attempting to be sarcastic, but there's a big difference between the rule of law and a banana republic where those in power just do what seems expedient because they've decided it's a good idea.
We can argue about the limits of the power of the federal government to compel you to do certain things: pay taxes, serve in the military, and so forth. Those things are at least mentioned in the constitution, which is supposed to lay out the rules by which government works. It's hard to make an argument, though, that a document that was expressly and indisputably written to create a limited and restrained government that respects private property actually allows it to compel you to spend your money to enrich a private industry.
You (inadvertently I'm sure) make an excellent point by asking when government being able to compel you to do things happened. If you read the original contract between the government and the people (the constitution) which laid out the limits of government, along with the explanation of it written by those who wrote it (the Federalist Papers) you'd see that many of the "powers" the government now exercises were never granted to it. It just assumed them, because people were asleep at the switch.
Those in power always want more power, because they're convinced they are doing good. Hitler, Stalin, and Mao were convinced they were doing the right thing. You candidate isn't any different. There are no angels in politics. The power that you think is no big deal, because it's being used for a relatively innocuous purpose now, can be used to oppress you later.
You simply re-inforced his assertion.
This has been going on for a long time.
There TONS of things I think the Libs should be fighting against.
Health care for the people isn't one of them.
Or should be THE last one to repeal, AFTER you repeal the driver license laws.
This seems rather appropriate.
you are such a fag
Hopefully Obama wins, appoints additional moderate supreme court justices, and I hope Democrats keep the house and senate.
Had we had super-majority, we could have also had a public plan which would have been a better option than the mandate.
Did I miss something, Alice. When did Team Blue get control of the House?
Yes, and the land would flow with milk and honey. The laws of economics would not apply. We could have unlimited health care for everyone with the highest quality. Also, manna from heaven.
Seriously, the public plan is already bankrupt. See Medicare. Generalized an already broken and bankrupt system is the very definition of a bad idea.
"Generalizing". Whoops.
It is non-sense that we can't give modest health care (that includes cancer treatment) to Americans not covered. We can at least cover what insurance weasel out of paying.
Take a annual healthcare premium of $12,000 (that's $1,000/per month for individual coverage). The $5billion we give to Israel, we can fund 416k people with healthcare premiums. And for the $132Billion a year we spent on Iraq/Afghan and all that crap, we can give 11million people coverage.
Libertarians are a bunch of stingy meanies. All I like about them is the legalizing pot thing.
So to cover the claimed 50 million uninsured, it would cost $600 billion/year.
About the same as the entire US military budget...
...or just deregulate the industry and end medical licensing and they can all afford it themselves, dumbfuck.
That would defintely get us off the bullet train to insolvency, and quick.
Of course, we'd then board the rocket-chair to the same destination, but we'd all be equal in our misery!
KPres;"...end medical licensing"....
You'll surely be able to afford your local handy man's specialty;"broken leg" splint.
And Democrats show us, once again, that true selflessness is being willing to stop spending other people's money on one thing, so you can spend it an another, more giving thing. Other. People's. Money.
That's it, Alice? Seriously? You disagree with us on shitcanning the surveillance state, or not getting into shit wars like Iraq, or... oh, fuck, what's the point.
Alice Bowie|3.25.12 @ 7:39PM|#
"Hopefully Obama wins, appoints additional moderate supreme court justices"
"Moderate" = hand over your wallet; we don't care about no stinking constitution.
Did I get your number, Alice?
Check this out. The solicitor general's defense of Obamacare. And nary a cite of the part of the Constitution that would allow it to stand up.
Looks like their defense is gonna be, "all civilized nations do this, so we should as well."
http://www.mcnaughtonart.com/a.....mp/421.jpg
Uh, lemme be perfectly clear: Bob Mugabe's excellent leadership of Zimbabwe is a model for our great nation, and I have instructed my administration to emulate his presidency in every respect.
Latest CBO estimate of the total cost. If I understand it correctly, the CBO states that it will add $50B to the deficit -- can anybody confirm that I'm reading this chart correctly?
http://cbo.gov/sites/default/f....._total.png
No, this is how you read it without being a dishonest asswhipe...
http://media.reason.com/mc/psu.....=462&w=600
That graph shows that the reform will *cut* 50B from the deficit. See the negative sign next to the 50?
The federal government can't force you to buy health care. They will only force you to pay a tax if you earn income and don't buy health care. There is no enforcement measure in the bill other than additional taxes.
Hey, you got taxes on my penalty!
What? You got penalties on my taxes!
So what is it today, a penalty or a tax?
That sounds like a government version of a Reesee's Peanut Butter Cup. But instead of chocolate and peanut butter, it's made with shit and vomit.
I'm just telling it how it is dawg. Agree or disagree that the law shouldve been passed, but there is no mandate to force people to buy health care. I pay more taxes now than I would if I owned a home, so is there a government mandate to buy homes too? Ones a debit and the others a credit but in the overall scheme of things they are both just parts of the tax code and nothing else.
God Damn you are an idiot.
Now yer gittin all teknickle-like on these fellers.
Stop it, they're eyes will start bleeding.
Good post.You did a good work,and offer more effective imformation for us!Thank you.
I have instructed my administration to emulate his presidency in every respect.
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The points made aren't bad, but it is missing the whole point of Obamacare. People can't afford the current health care system, so it needs to be changed. Obamacare is Obama's way of changing it for the better. It is one step closer to nationalized health care. Anyone ever been to the UK? Their nationalized health care tromps our system any day of the week. Something needs to change, and Obamacare isn't a bad step. Yes, it will cost a lot in the short run, but pay off in the long run. And because of that, politically it only hurts Obama. I support Obamacare, because the current system is purely shit.
The same NHS that keeps killing people?
How about #4. Those that can't afford healthcare now still aren't going to be able to afford it when it is mandated. They'll still be out of luck with additional fines for being out of luck.
short term costs are only relevant if there is no gain to offset and overcome it... people who dislike obamacare specifically because of the mandate i get it
but if you have a condition which hinders you getting insurance how is this plan worth it
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I don't see that you are suggesting a better idea. Do you really want to continue with a system that makes medical costs the leading cause of bankruptcies, or one that allows insurance companies to deny coverage to those with "pre-existing" conditions, or to kick enrollees out if they get sick? We have a fragmented, broken system now that needs to have more oversight and controls. I have Medicare, which I consider a fine form of Obamacare. In fact, 85% of American citizens already have some form of Obamacare. It's the remaining 15% that we are trying to get within the system. For them, it will be cheaper for the federal government to subsidize their insurance premiums than to pay for their bills if they end up in the hospital.
Jesus Christ. It's amazing that you people can't do basic math.
1980: $55 billion spent by the feds on healthcare.
2011: $800 billion spent by the feds on healthcare.
You're daft if you think this is sustainable. The best thing you're hoping for is that you're dead and in your grave by the time it actually collapses.
Have you ever considered that nothing short of a total reset is going to fix the system? Healthcare, like college debt, has risen at rates greater than inflation for decades precisely BECAUSE they are so heavily subsidized by Uncle Sugar.
Nuke Medicare and Medicaid, and healthcare costs will go back to what they were in 1960 within a couple of years. Provide "free" healthcare for 320 million people, and watch the whole damn thing come down on your ears.
If you could control your rage for one minute you might just see the strawman you keep throwing up.
NO ONE is talking about "free" health care for the masses.
Obamcare IS;
1) stopping the insurance companies from dropping patients when they get sick (after paying into the policy for 20 years).
2)Making the insurance companies provide coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, that are either being refused coverage now, or pricing them out of the market.
3)It puts ALL of the uninsured into a "pool", thereby lowering the rates that would apply to an individual policy.
4) Finally; it charges a tax to those who can afford insurance but refuse to buy it.
When people without insurance show up in emergency rooms with 20 thousand to over 200 thousand dollar tabs, and cannot/do not pay these bills, who do you think make up those losses?
If you could control your rage for one minute you might just see the strawman you keep throwing up.
NO ONE is talking about "free" health care for the masses.
Oh, that's right--it's "affordable" healthcare. And the math still isn't on your side.
Obamacare is nothing more than the same cost-shifting scheme that's allowed healthcare costs to go up at a 9% rate every year for the last 30 years. The only difference now is that people will be REQUIRED to pay into it.
When people without insurance show up in emergency rooms with 20 thousand to over 200 thousand dollar tabs, and cannot/do not pay these bills, who do you think make up those losses?
What else did you think the consequence of getting others to cover the costs of your medical care would be?
Healthcare is expensive because the government is so involved. The tax code favors employer-provider cost-insulation that allows providers and the insured to drive up cost and utilization way beyond what a rational market would allow. States protect provider oligopolies by madating strict licensing laws and the use Certificate of Need laws to keep the numbers of providers and facilities below the level of demand for both. The FDA makes the cost of producing new and effective pharmaceuticals so expensive that few drugs make it to market and those that do must subsidize the huge costs of those that fail. Plantiffs' attorneys lobbied the vast majority of states to make illegal for providers and patients to agree on limited liability contracts that would lower the cost of healthcare that is driven by the medical malpractice lawsuits and the resulting defensive medicine.
I haven't mentioned Medicare, Medicaid, state mandates, insurance market regulations, etc. From top to bottom, the feds and the states are chest deep involved in healthcare and health insurance in every way imaginable. Yet you focus on a private entities that are the best actor in this whole flawed system. Insurance companies negotiate with providers to keep the cost of are lower than what these jackels would like. Hospitals regularly ask for double digit unit cost increases (yes even during a recession). Insurers play pr-chicken with them to keep the increases at 5 or 6%. Insurers also work hard to keep fraudulent policy-holders out of the "insurance" pool as many inviduals and small groups wait until they or a family member are sick or likely to incur costly expenses before getting insurance (or expanding coverage).
I do not agree with the core opinion of the article. I think Obamacare is the problem of the whole world.
We all are facing such problems, not only America has to end Obamacare.
Something should be changed, I think if we act like Japan everything will be cool. They are developing so great and nobody loses anything, only wins.
Fucking risk, how does it work?
Why are the critics always so damn dumb?
The health reform *will* make us healthier, because people who formerly didn't have insurance will now have access to affordable preventative checkups, as well as life saving treatments for serious illnesses.
The price tag has *not* doubled. The idiots who say this are comparing two different time spans. The projected cost actually went up only by about 9%, *and* the projected savings and revenue *also* went up. All totaled, the health reform is projected to cut the deficit by even more than before.
And a mandate to buy insurance has already been implemented by Mitt Romney in Massachusetts, and it's working out great. It certainly isn't the harbinger of doom that critics make it out to be.
"And a mandate to buy insurance has already been implemented by Mitt Romney in Massachusetts, and it's working out great."
Massachusetts struggles to rein in health care costs
"Massachusetts boasts that 98 percent of its residents have health insurance, but the state is stricken by the highest health care costs in the country."
Massachusetts had the highest health costs even before Romney's mandate was implemented. The mandate did not cause high costs.
Re: Anthony T,
It certainly did not reduce the cost or their deficits like you tout above, and RomneyCare is the closest working example of ObamaCare there is. What does that tell you?
I *never* touted that Romney's mandate would reduce health costs. And I accurately noted that *Obama's* health reform is projected to reduce the deficit.
When you can't accurately cite my post, that tells me you're an idiot.
Or that, like any intelligent person, would consider the price tag of something before claiming it is "working out great".
I *never* touted that Romney's mandate would reduce health costs.
No, you just disingenuously equated that mandate with Obamacare as an implication that it would do so.
And a mandate to buy insurance has already been implemented by Mitt Romney in Massachusetts, and it's working out great.
Apparently not, since it's not reducing costs, which is supposed to be the whole point of your argument.
Clearly you don't understand what my argument was, because reducing costs was absolutely not the point of my argument, nor did I ever imply that either Romneycare or Obamacare would reduce costs.
As usual, the critics are arguing against their own imaginations.
Anthony T said
nor did I ever imply that either Romneycare or Obamacare would reduce costs.
But earlier, Anthony T said
All totaled, the health reform is projected to cut the deficit by even more than before.
Maybe us critics are arguing against our own imagination. But, more likely, you're just a dumbass who doesn't even know what he's saying from one minute to the next.
You're confusing health care costs with federal budget deficits. Try to keep the two straight.
Oh, I see: Obamacare is a magic federal program that allows the government to spend less money in total (over some strangely defined time frame) while spending more money on health care. So, here I was, stupidly thinking that you were saying that we would spend less on health care, when what you really mean is, that we'll spend more on health care, while we spend less total overall. What the fuck was I thinking?
Please, enlighten us more, oh wise one.
You got one thing in that post right... you were stupidly thinking.
I never made any claim about how the health reform would affect health care costs. What I *did* say, straight from the CBO estimate, is that -- during an explicitly and clearly defined time span -- the health reform will reduce the federal deficit. It's not hard to understand.
I never made any claim about how the health reform would affect health care costs. What I *did* say, straight from the CBO estimate, is that -- during an explicitly and clearly defined time span -- the health reform will reduce the federal deficit. It's not hard to understand.
If you can't see how the rising cost of health care and the federal deficit are linked, then clearly the one stupidly thinking is yourself.
How the fuck do you think Obamacare is going to rein in costs that are rising at a 9% clip every year? Do you REALLY not see how that impacts federal spending?
Just this last decade, spending was at $2.6 trillion, and that was with Iraq and Afghanistan included. It's now at $3.6 trillion with no indication that it's going to drop.
Where exactly is the money going to come from to pay healthcare costs that increase at a 9% compound rate?
You're confusing health care costs with federal budget deficits. Try to keep the two straight.
$800 billion in FY 2011 isn't contributing to the deficit?
Try to keep your math straight, you moron.
The projected cost actually went up only by about 9%, *and* the projected savings and revenue *also* went up. All totaled, the health reform is projected to cut the deficit by even more than before.
I don't give a fuck about "projections," you goon. A 9% annual increase over the last 32 years ISN'T going away. Period.
If you don't care about projections, then you're trolling the wrong article.
If you don't care about projections, then you're trolling the wrong article.
The projections are meaningless. It's the actual spending that counts.
OK then, so hop in your time machine and let us know what the spending will be over the next 10 years.
No? Flux capacitor out of order? Well then I guess you'll just have to rely on the projections like the rest of us.
OK then, so hop in your time machine and let us know what the spending will be over the next 10 years.
Somebody clearly hasn't read Chuck Spinney's Plans/Reality Mismatch.
How about you look at the track record of CBO scores vs. reality and factor that into your thinking? For example, let's assume the doc fix will happen, which it probably will, which automatically puts the program at a deficit?
If you want to believe that CBO scores == reality, no one can stop you. But don't insist that more reasonable people prevent that government spending plans are incredibly reliable. We all know that these CBO scores are gamed so that politicians can claim planned fiscal responsibility while they spend us into oblivion.
Re: Anthony T,
People already have access to preventive medicine even without insurance.
Nobody said that it has doubled, Anthony. What is being argued is that the price tag will double.
*Affordable* preventative checkups. "Affordable" is the key word.
This article claimed that the health reform's cost has doubled from the original estimate, and that's blatantly false.
This article claimed that the health reform's cost has doubled from the original estimate, and that's blatantly false.
Well, we won't really know until they actually start spending the money, now will we? Based on the last 30 years, it's not looking to good for advocates of "affordable," cost-shifted health-care.
I'll be more explicit for the obtuse people.
The article claimed that the latest CBO estimate shows that the cost doubled, but the estimate shows no such thing.
Anthony T said
The article claimed that the latest CBO estimate shows that the cost doubled, but the estimate shows no such thing.
But earlier, Anthony T said
This article claimed that the health reform's cost has doubled from the original estimate
Actually, this article says
"double the original estimate used to sell the program ."
These are three distinct statements. Maybe I'm being too obtuse, but it seems you're doing a great job refuting the two statements that actually weren't in the article. Do you care to refute the one that's actually in the article?
For a political ideology that asserts it must take care of the dumb, weak masses, you certainly foist upon them a great awareness of CBO scoring and implementation schedules in order to describe this as an honest selling of the program, based on full understanding of the actual costs.
> Maybe I'm being too obtuse...
Yes, in fact, you're being too obtuse.
Old Mexican;
"People already have access to preventive medicine even without insurance."
I sure would like to know where in hell that place is; in Old Mexico?
The health reform *will* make us healthier, because people who formerly didn't have insurance will now have access to affordable preventative checkups, as well as life saving treatments for serious illnesses.
This is an assertion backed up by nothing. How do you estimate the quality of care the average American after doctor/procedure prices/payments have been negotiated, renegotiated, regulated, and re-regulated between insurance companies and the government for 50, 60 years? Where's that study, and how does it compare to an alternative?
I hope you're not one of those people who whine about the influence of the 1% while you simultaneously shepherd people into the sweet embrace of the insurance industry.
BACK UP BY NOTHING?
Get real man.
How does a healthy populace translate into a healthier society?
With less cost over-all?
Unless/until you're ONE of the 50 million without access to get a simple anti-biotic when you get the flu, or even get a prescription for patches to help someone stop smoking, you have your head in your ass and have little to contribute.
You cannot drive your car on the road without having insurance.
States make pools for no-fault insurance so that EVERYBODY who drives IS insured.
A single-payer system would solve all of the qualms between us, but then even that is too much for ideologues.
Unless/until you're ONE of the 50 million without access to get a simple anti-biotic when you get the flu, or even get a prescription for patches to help someone stop smoking, you have your head in your ass and have little to contribute
Why the fuck should someone else pay to get you to stop smoking, you selfish shit? It's called "cold turkey," and it doesn't cost a dime. And flu shots are cheap as hell.
A single-payer system would solve all of the qualms between us, but then even that is too much for ideologues.
LOL at this goonfiction. $800 billion on healthcare spent last year says you're full of shit.
The price tag has *not* doubled. The idiots who say this are comparing two different time spans.
I would describe this situation as, the people selling Obamacare were being very clever in their choice of time spans.
The people selling Obamacare didn't choose the time span. CBO 10-year projects are standard. And in any case, the new estimate shows that the net cost went *down*.
They definitely did, in fact, choose when Obamacare would go into effect: 2 years after the next presidential election, years after which your cited CBO projections start. That's the cause of the confusion for how much the first 10 years of the program will cost. That was not done unintentionally, for multiple reasons.
Any confusion between time spans and resulting differences in costs was caused by the authors of Obamacare, not the people trying to clean up the mess.
Now you're just inventing conspiracy theories. None of what you just claimed has any supporting evidence.
Enjoy living in a CBO-scored fantasy lands, where we estimate the cost of a program using time spans when said program is not actually in effect, and we give programs deficit reduction credit under assumptions that we know are totally invalid. If that's your idea of honesty and accuracy in assessing a program, then you're the stupid, obtuse one. Enjoy drinking the koolaid that allows you to avoid seeing reality, and keep believing we can continue spending more and more while we spend less and less.
For one thing, obamacare never passed congress, it was DEEMED passed, because dem0s did not have the votes. The exact same bill is supposed to pass both houses, that did not happen.
AND, as for the supremes taking it up today, BY LAW, kagan MUST recuse herself.
"I hear they have the votes, Larry!! Simply amazing," Kagan said to Tribe in one of the emails
According to 28 USC 455, a Supreme Court justice must recuse from "any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned." The law also says a justice must recuse anytime he has "expressed an opinion concerning the merits of the particular case in controversy" while he "served in governmental employment."
Obamacare violates hundreds of years of contract law as it Forces you into a contract. As contract law has long held that any time one is forced into a contract, it is immediately void, exactly how do those two things square?
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And what would you replace it with? Or would we go back to 45 million Americans not having any hope for health insurance protection? It's a far from perfect health care bill, but it's the first attempt at national health care that this country has ever had. How about changing it, instead of eliminating it.
What would you replace the Auricare bill with? Or would you go back to 300 million Americans not having any hope for food insurance protection? It's a far from perfect food care bill, but it's the first attempt at national food care that this country has ever had. How about changing it, instead of eliminating it?
Or would we go back to 45 million Americans not having any hope for health insurance protection?
There's a difference between not having health insurance, and not being able to obtain health insurance. Of the 45 million without, many are relatively young, healthy people who choose not to insure, betting that the costs of coverage outweigh their risk and their future need of healthcare. Obamacare claims credit for providing them with health insurance, when it really penalizes them for not buying it. In most cases, it hurts them, rather than helps them.
Only in liberal fantasy land it is assumed that everyone should have insurance, and any law that results in more people with insurance must be better than the alternative.
Of course not, and besides that is not the point. The point is to make people poorer, not healthier. Poor people have less to lose from government largess than land and property owners, plus it's easier to bamboozle poor people into voting for you than property owners.
It is critical to understand the intent of legislation. Universal Healthcare was first enacted by Kaiser Wilhelm in Germany 1880. In 1935 Edwin Witte included Universal Healthcare in the original version of the Bill that created the Social Security Administration,but the legislature considered to to radical to be attached to the more passable old age insurance. In 1953 the day before my MD at Madison UWis. Dean Middleton presented Prof. Witte to our class to inform us of the future of government controlled healthcare ( inclusive that medical insurance ). The short lecture by this Progressive Party stalwart ( campaign manager for Robert LaFollette, 1924 Presidential campaign) was ended with the terse mandate, quoted," Before yor ( our MD class ) finish your residencies, we will own you." Ownership of one human by another defines slavery. .
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I do not agree with the core opinion of the article. I think Obamacare is the problem of the whole world.
We all are facing such problems, not only America has to end Obamacare.
Something should be changed, I think if we act like Japan everything will be cool. They are developing so great and nobody loses anything, only wins.
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This comment is exactly why they shouldn't delete harsh comments from message boards under stories. After a very tough day, "Get back to kitchen, whore." complete with the comma gave me a much-need laugh. Maybe I'm rotten, but I believe it's all in good fun and appreciate Alden Stack for the comment regardless of his intentions.
Wow, Mary. Your house and land are worth $204,000. The bitch of it was losing $30k from 2008 to 2009.
Now is that a typical value of a 4BR/3BA 3316 SF house in the DFW area? I mean, I know it's an irregular shape, but the good exterior brick work and the above-average built-in appliances and fireplace should more than offset it.
...have you got an attorney yet?
No, really.
Comparing images from the reason wikia to google maps confirms this is my actual address.
Not to mention you giving your name and address by accident, having your info available on whitepages.com and linkedin and the description of your house by the tax assessor.
Sloopy isn't the moron that posted their name and address online.
Has rectal responded to the mountain of evidence yet?
If by "respond," you mean shitting all over a thread by using someone else's handle and e-mail address, then just look at the student loan debt thread that just popped up.
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