>Making it at the state level is a steaming pile of crap as well.

Well if the people of a state want to do it then you really don't have a right to complain if you don't live there. Your opinion doesn't matter outside of NJ.

1) Read it again.

2) Go read one of your right wing sites to get the news you want.

3) No, it isn't a lot of money. Read up.

4) You do realize the "startling bad conditions" in the VA hospitals were due to the government handing over VA contracts to PRIVATE CONTRACTORS don't you? No? You should read up on the subject. You just made an argument against private companies.

5) In the long run, it will cost us less. Weird, right? You should read up on it.

Indeed. Communism is bad, so no health care reform.

hate to break it to you reaper but a system in which there multiple big name insurance companies to choose from isn't a monopoly on health care, in fact its the exact opposite of that. Free competition is the very system we use to fight monopolies in this country, and as far as socialized health care can anyone name a country which socialized health care that actually improved the quality of life for it citizens. Look at Canada they did it and all it did was establish a system where you'll die waiting on the sub par treatment that prob wouldn't save many lives even if they got it in time

Reading comprehension was never your strong suit. Allow me to help.

1) You missed the part about those ten big companies have a monolithic presence in regional markets, dominating states & regions so while there are several companies working within the same field they don't all work within the same market, you understand this conceptually, yes? There are many markets, given that health insurance is regulated at a state level, meaning that one company's model may not work in California but might be highly effective in New Jersey.

2) The study was compiled by a pro-reform group using data gathered by the American Medical Association. You know, one of the huge anti-reform groups. The pro-reform people are basically using their own data against them, but the fact that he put it out there that they're a pro-reform group is a lot better than all these 'citizens for' groups that are currently choking CNN with anti-reform ads & scare tactics.

3) I'm not entirely anti-tort reform, so I'm the wrong liberal to wave this ax, but seriously, that's not the real problem, here. Did you catch the part in the study where in six years premiums have risen 87% and in seven years profits 428%? Are you so blinded that you really think that its the endless litigation that's causing the poor insurance companies to not be able to break that stunning 500% rise in profits in under a decade? Tort reform is a serious issue that needs to be addressed. It isn't the serious issue that needs to be addressed, that issue would be the fact that so many people have no health insurance because costs to the consumer is skyrocketing, & that clearly isn't because these companies are hurting & need to pass the increasing costs of doing business along.

4) Way to muddy the waters. The public option, at least the three that I saw discussed in this piece don't refer to government managed health care providers. It referred to government wading into creating a publicly financed alternative to private health insurance. Maybe I misread the information given I'm exhausted, argumentative, & healthcare isn't my forte. But then again, give your posting history & mine, I'd wager I didn't.

5) How in god's name have we spent the last six years paying for two wars while slashing taxes, & rising discretionary spending? The bottom line is that this a problem that's lingered since the first days of Clinton's administration, if not longer, but that's the earliest high-profile initiative to address it I can think of. That's sixteen years & two Presidents ago, its not getting any better. Its time to address this now, the numbers are only getting worse as more Americans- including children- are uninsured while insurance companies' profits continue to rise, even outpacing the costs they pass on to consumers? Allow me to paraphrase Mario Coumo, who once said something to the effective of 'We cannot afford to do nothing while we wait to do everything.'

Erm, I almost hate to break it to you, but "If a doctor wants to be a dick and say, 'Ya know, I'm not going to fix your heart for any less than $25,000' to a person on welfare" neatly describes health care for people on welfare now, and doctors aren't exactly going out of business. The purchase of insurance is a completely rational response to a problem of catastrophic health costs: given the option of paying $500 per year for insurance to cover 100% health costs, even when the yearly average nowhere near totals $500, versus the .5% chance of having to pay $50,000 for on operation, most reasonable people are going to pay that $500 even if it never pans out. Why? Because most people can't afford a $50,000 bill.

Well, why not bargain down from $50,000, you might say? Well, first let's grant the assumption that the total amount of time, labor, and resources that went into providing that care (it's not like hospital operating rooms or the doctors that work them grow on trees, after all) isn't actually $50,000, just to be fair. There's still this thing called leverage: a person with a greater bargaining position can command a higher bargaining price. When you are on an operating table asking the doctor to put your spleen back in, it is the doctor that has leverage. This happens rather frequently in health care, and in fact it's one of the main reasons why applying market principles to health care is a bad idea: health care isn't about rational relations between freely contracting parties. When you get hit by a car, you go to the closest ER, not the one that bargains for the lowest price.

I'm not against a public option, but given are current debt I don't see it as viable. Spending that kind of money in this economy in hopes of saving money in the long-run won't work, especially considering how much he's spent ( around 2.6 trillion if I'm not mistaken), and plans to spend. If he actually cuts the deficit in half by 2012, then I'd be more receptive to a public option. He's simply spending too much $$$.

Dear.

God.

That's not what I said at all. I'm saying it is ridiculous for a leftist to call a libertarian a utopian when their candidate ran on the rock solid platform of "hope" and "change". Left wing ideology is an attempt to create a utopia.

Is it suddenly cool to be a libertarian with no profile pic who makes arguments based on no evidence?

I totally agree with Nicole_Powers. The rest of the world stopped having this debate a century ago. We the People decided that we as a people would use part of the taxes we pay so that those of us who become ill can be looked after. Here in New Zealand, doctor's visits are subsidised, medicine is subsidised and hospital care is free because we the people regard healthcare as a basic human right.

Obama's not a lefty. He's a centrist. Just a tip.

Sadly, there are those here in my fucked up part of the world who are able to label that "communism."

But, of course, the country I'm in is more interested in solving world issues than issues within its borders.


Even Cuba has socialized health care and we have people literally dying here in this "great country." And before some idiot suggests, "Duh...why don't you leave then?" Because, if I could go to one of those countries I probably would (er...maybe not Cuba)*. Remember: We're not the only one who views everyone else outside the borders as "fucking filthy immigrants."


* Although, I'd still like to see this country "catch on."