Obamacare flies

[rockouthippie]

The Supreme Court upheld Obamacare and now I'm trying to figure out how I'm gonna pay the fine I'm gonna be paying from now on. Pre-existing health issues put me in the category of health insurance being a "more than I make" affair.

It looks to me like I get to pay a $1000 yearly fine and still not have health insurance.

ROH dies even further in debt. Yay!

Before you lefties start cheering, you better read the son-bitch that the lawyers, medical industry and drug industry wrote.

No tort reform. No cost containment. We just wrote a bunch of greedy assholes a blank check.

[thinktink]

I wonder what it means for homeless people.

[watadoo]

There are substantial subsides for the poor and old written into the bill. If you get hit by a bus you'll be mighty glad to have the health insurance and me too. It really is a positive thing. Our country finally gets to join the ranks of the civilized western nations.

[rockouthippie]

There are substantial subsides for the poor and old written into the bill.

Well... sort of. Those subsides are completely unfunded. Not just a little unfunded. 2 Trillion dollars unfunded. This health care bill, even with a Democrat super-majority, didn't include a way to pay for it. This would not have passed if Congress had to fund it. I don't see how you fund it now.

Our country finally gets to join the ranks of the civilized western nations.

Are you nuts? This isn't anything like health care in "civilized western nations".

You must now buy inferior, overpriced products or get fined. That isn't Canada, Great Britain or civilized.

With 26 million people that will still be uninsured, it's not even universal:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/47873215/Mill...acare_Survives

This isn't anything like the single payer health care plan liberals could sing Kum-by-ya about. The more left you are, the more you should hate Obama's deal.

http://video.pbs.org/video/1468710007/

So far, all we have is a new tax.

[ujay]

No tort reform. No cost containment. We just wrote a bunch of greedy assholes a blank check.

Grow up RoH, that's how the world works. What do you want ... a fair deal or something
Doesn't matter what political system you have in place there will always be a bunch of parasites creaming it off the top.

Our country finally gets to join the ranks of the civilized western nations.

Who says we'd have ya

UJ

[Aminifu]

The ACA has a number of problems, least of which is funding. Especially with the current state of the GOP law making machine, which doesn't want to fund anything not related to the war machine or would offend Grover.

This is a step in the right direction for the richest nation on the planet. Health care should not be tied solely to the profit motive, imo. Universal health care in the USA should have been sorted out a long time ago. You shouldn't have to face bankruptcy if you get really sick.

What we had sucked! Do you really want insurance companies to deny you coverage because they think you will actually use it and reduce their profits? Do you want them to drop your coverage or let it run out when you need it? Your body is not a car!

[rockouthippie]

What wasn't in this bill is more important than what is. What wasn't in it? Reform of any kind. The "affordable" care act didn't do anything for "affordable".

Obama said he was gonna take on these industries and ended up enshrining them.

What do we have so far? A new tax. Supposedly, we're supposed to get subsidies to help pay the bill if we are too poor. Nobody's funded that. I think it's unlikely it will get funded.

So what did we end up with? A new tax. A tax on the poor. And a way to send 20% of our GDP to the insurance companies. And 26 million who still won't have medical insurance.

Even this moderate guy, me, thinks this stinks. You liberals should be getting out the pitchforks and torches. The whole idea was for us to get some economy in our health care system, but this went completely the other way.

This the the work of the best Congress money could buy.

Ladies and Gentlemen. Obama is not left. He's probably the most establishment President in history. I might even go along with the Presidents left wing rhetoric, but I knew he was full of shit. There I said it, I might even be left leaning on this issue, but I can spot a bullshit artist, and we elected one.

I think I'm in love with Karen Ignagni. That bitch can strike a deal and still look compassionate and cute. I gotta give it to the lady. Looks cute, made of brass.

I call this magnificent bitch. It's almost admirable. She single handedly saved the insurance industry. If that was a good thing. Grabbed a US president by the balls and said cough.

[Aminifu]

Hi rockouthippie,

Nothing this big can be fixed in one step. What we had also stinks. You may be right for the short term, I hope you're wrong in the end.

One thing for sure, if Congress doesn't start trying to work together everything is going down the drain. Left, right, middle will not matter. Keep your ammo dry.

[DrO]

...or just move to an island, declare it as your own principality and do whatever the hell you want

-daz

[rockouthippie]

I don't see a way from here to there. I was thinking. Gee.. something must be better than nothing, but it isn't. This is so cockeyed, I think it puts us in worse shape than we were before.

Do you really think Congress will appropriate the 2 Trillion dollars this is gonna cost? The Democrat super majority couldn't. The bill would have died if they had to fund it. And that's with the Democrats in control. If you can't get the Democrats to fund this, what makes you think a Republican Congress will?

I'll bet we end up back at square one in pretty short order. If Romney gets elected, he'll kill it. If Obama stays in, it dies of lack of money. This bill is missing the most important part. How you pay for it.

You can't give 20% of the GDP to the insurance companies and still have an economy. Most of the single payer nations are doing 10 ish. Americans already spend more on health care than anyone. That's the problem. A problem we've now made institutional.

Medical care in the US needs cheaper. Nothing about this makes anything cheaper. It codifies not cheap. We spend too much on medical care, and to cure that, now we're forcing people to spend too much money on medical care.

Who won here? The industries we all agree need a diet. Look at those 5 people that got arrested in the Senate Finance Committee. People that represent the little guy couldn't even get a seat at the table.

It was a sit down to give medical, pharma and the insurance companies everything they wanted. Obama wanted some kind of deal, any kind of deal to make it look like he accomplished something.

Medicine in the US is too expensive. So expensive the system isn't even maintainable. Nothing in this law changes that. ACA attacked everything except the problem. It's the best bill our too expensive industries could write.

[mike-db]

Originally Posted by watadoo

There are substantial subsides for the poor and old written into the bill. If you get hit by a bus you'll be mighty glad to have the health insurance and me too. It really is a positive thing. Our country finally gets to join the ranks of the civilized western nations.

Watadoo, trust me you arent there yet. This really hasn't changed a thing for americans.

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

You can't give 20% of the GDP to the insurance companies and still have an economy. Most of the single payer nations are doing 10 ish. Americans already spend more on health care than anyone. That's the problem. A problem we've now made institutional.

Medical care in the US needs cheaper. Nothing about this makes anything cheaper. It codifies not cheap. We spend too much on medical care, and to cure that, now we're forcing people to spend too much money on medical care.

I don't know where you got that % from, but forcing insurance companies to spend 80% of their premium income on actual medical care and rebating their customers every year when they don't should help. Forcing much larger pools of customers should also help spread out and lower costs. Insurance companies now have to compete on cost and services. They can no longer 'cherry pick' their customers, drop or deny them for invalid/foolish reasons, or cap their coverage. Of course someone has to keep a eye on price fixing and other anti-competitive practices, like the AMA restricting the number of doctors. Tort reform is also needed. Sounds good in theory, anyway.

[watadoo]

Originally Posted by mike-db

Watadoo, trust me you arent there yet. This really hasn't changed a thing for americans.

Yes, I know, but it's a first step. Some progress is better than nothing, better than sitting back and bitching about how broken things are. This is far, far from perfect or even really good but that are many elements of the plan that ARE very good. Funding will be a problem, but problems can be addressed and fixed.

I remain an optimist.

[Warrior of the Light]

If you're the lucky one, you're paying for someone else's care.
If you're the unlucky one, and that could happen to anyone, someone else is paying for you.

I believe your value as a person has nothing to do with your financial income.

I'm all for letting people fix the problems you cause yourself, but nobody asks for health problems and you can never prevent it.

I know there are serious issues, but don't let the details stop you from getting this done.

[rockouthippie]

I've been watching my parent's generation die lately. It's shocking what that last year of life usually costs. If you're on medicare, it's like you won the lottery. You'll get any procedure the docs can figure out. It'll cost at least $100,000. Whether it's worth living that last year is questionable. You will get a shared room and shitty food for $6000-$8000 a month. That's if they don't figure out some surgery to keep you alive and miserable.

The main drain? Medical bills and custodial care. My mom's last year in a nursing home eating food that was fit for a jail, getting 1/7th of a minimum wage flunkie ..one doc visit.. one nurse visit a week ... $94,000.

My friends mom. $200,000. She had terminal brain cancer, so of course she needed a $200,000 craniotomy, so she could get 2 weeks lucid and die miserable over 4 months instead of on the spot.

Me. Chronic back pain. Went to doc. 10 second conversation. 10 seconds to write a prescription for a dozen muscle relaxers... like usual .... $150 for $3 worth of muscle relaxers.

That's the problem.

Yeah good. Let's just keep this health care system just the way it and get the taxpayer to pick up the tab on 40 million more people with a backache. Let's make sure lawyers can sue for a million over a hangnail. Let's guarantee insurance companies will be profitable, so the lawyers will have someone to sue. Let's guarantee drug companies will be profitable.

Somewhere under all that I'm supposed to find public interest as a motive?

[Warrior of the Light]

Those are exactly the details I'm talking about and I agree they should be dealt with, hard and improbable as it sounds.

You mentioned old people but what if a 11 year old boy gets a brain cancer and his parents only have a minimal income, why does he deserve any less care than a rich person's kid?

[rockouthippie]

I don't know how this law affects that incidence. I do know it chops the medicare budget some. If you are on medicare, your odds might be better now than in 2015.

What about 71 year old Dick Cheney. Does he get a million dollar heart?

I agree they should be dealt with

First! Otherwise it's just pouring perfume on a pig. You start with tort reform and go from there.

[watadoo]

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/201...e-strip.html#1

[rockouthippie]

We agree. I find very little contrast between Romneycare and Obamacare. I'm not a big fan of either of these guys. They both seem like a couple stuffed suits. Out of touch college professor or out of touch business shark. Both multi-millionaires. Both with a big interest in maintaining the status quo. I'm not finding anyone I know represented, even though with partisanship, they've convinced themselves they are.

At least Romney doesn't try to pretend he's not a stuffed suit. The first black President. Some days he and Michelle acted like they grew up in Harlem and not in upper middle class, ivy league educated.... Little Barry was playing B-ball in Hawaii, not slugging it out with gang members.

Dreams of the Father I met once. I was smoking weed and playing hoop in Hawaii trying to figure out how to get a chip on my shoulder. God Damn America!

Obama has written and talked about using alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine during his teenage years to "push questions of who I was out of my mind." What he was is a spoiled middle class kid feeling sorry for himself. Join the club. You could write something like that when you were 15, but you'd grow up.

OMG! I'm black! Gimme a toke!

If I had a son, he'd have Alfred E. Newman ears and be nowhere near Florida.

He'd be down at Sidwell School for the Washington elite with Sasha and Melika:

http://www.sidwell.edu/

With a tuition of $40K a year. For grade school. Lunch included. Sushi on Pearl Harbor day:

http://wusa9.com/news/article/178399...arl-Harbor-Day

[rockouthippie]

Biden at least came clean after Obama mentioned his "blue collar roots" and admits lying about having an uncle that was a coal miner.

"My dad never worked in a Food Fair," "My dad never wore a blue collar, although Barack makes me sound like I just climbed out of a mine in Scranton Pennsylvania carrying a lunch bucket. No one in my family worked in a factory."

"The truth of the matter is, I got myself in trouble." "Hell, I might be President now if it weren't for the fact that I said I had an uncle who was a coal miner. Turned out I didn't have anybody in the coal mines. I tried that crap, you know. It didn't work!"

Biden is the son of a middle class car salesman and never worked a day in his life. His dad had enough money to send him to Catholic school and he went to college at Syracuse. He married well, meeting his wife while taking spring break in the Bahamas. His wife and one year old daughter were killed in a car accident in 1972. He ended up a single father, and by all accounts was serious about it. He became a Senator at 30, shortly before his wife died.

The truth about Biden isn't awful. By all accounts, he's a decent guy. Started out his law career as a public defender.

...but you sure as hell can't paint him as a liberal victim..... He's a suit, and when he got caught, he even admitted it.

[Aminifu]

I believe all national politicians are 'out of touch' with most Americans. They go by what the money, polls, and trusted friends tell them. In other words, they go by their life experiences just like the rest of us do. Thing is, most of our experiences are quite different.

Experience is the best teacher, but it should not be an absolute requirement to appreciate the condition of people with a higher or lower social-economic outlook and circumstance. White middle class is in no way equivalent to black middle class; high, middle, and low. I know from direct personal experience.

All of Harlem is not ghetto, just like all of Scranton is not coal mine. Take some virtual tours, if you can't travel for real. Learn something of the history of the places, not just how they are now. You may be shocked at the conditions of the neighborhoods on 3 sides (4th side is a mile or so from the lake) and a few blocks (less than a mile) from Obama's house in Chicago.

I drank alcohol as a teenager to have fun, I knew who I was. I was introduced to marijuana and cocaine in college and used them for a while as a young adult, also to have fun. Think a little deeper about Obama and other multiracial kids. Around his mother and his mother's parents and friends of that family he is treated (and taught to react) one way. Around others who react to him based on what he looks like (not how he sounds or carries himself), he is treated (and taught to react) a totally opposite way. I'm so glad I didn't have those kinds of identity issues along with the 'normal generic' ones growing up.

Networking and knowledge go hand in hand. Who you know will get you an opportunity. Bulls**t will keep you there for a while, but it takes real knowledge to take full advantage of the opportunity. So every parent, worthy of the name, seeks the best education they can provide for their kids. Not just elite in terms of the parents of the kids going to the school (good to start networking early), but also in the quality of the education. Nothing against good public schools, but they can't apply the resources per student a good private school can. And no matter the school, its up to the student to learn something.

So everyone should and does have an opinion on Obama, Romney, Biden, etc. I just hope they form it based on the facts for each person, what that person has done and what each has consistently stood for. Not on what they want them to be or some other unrealistic expectation. Don't be content with just the facts you want to hear, but also search out those facts you don't want to hear. Too often we go by a gut reaction from limited info and/or what we hear somebody we trust say and then we are 'surprised' by the result. My teachers always told me to do my own homework.

[rockouthippie]

White middle class is in no way equivalent to black middle class; high, middle, and low. I know from direct personal experience.

Bullshit. Your experience in the US is largely based on green. Obama led a charmed life, but alas he's black so it doesn't count?

Obama is obviously a victim of Hawaiian Jim Crow laws and the local Honolulu KKK chapter. They come along and if you're black, they put flowers around your neck and make you wear a flower shirt! I'm sure the cross burnings at Harvard were insufferable.

OMG!

I'm 50, like the President, so I recognize a 1976 teenage, west coast, middle class, goofy fucker when I see one because I was one. Our hair was flammable. I know from direct personal experience.

Really, by the time Barack and I came around, there really wasn't a hell of a lot left to protest. We weren't going to Vietnam. We couldn't even get drafted. All that Jim Crow stuff in the South was gone.

If you had a problem in 1976 or you have one now, it's not color, it's poverty. It's effects are color blind. If you are poor, you have the same story as any other poor person in this country. Color quit mattering 50 years ago.

If you had the bucks and the grades, you could grow up in Hawaii, go to Harvard, meet a beautiful woman, have 2 beautiful daughters, be an ivy league law professor, become President of the United States and still have time to evolve on the subject of gay marriage.

But he's black... so fuck..

[Aminifu]

I'm black (funny, I'm still not completely comfortable with that term. I was a teenager when it came into wide spread use), you're white (and seem to know everything), ... so fuck

I'm 61, born in Baltimore, MD. Dad from N. Carolina, he bought a row house via the GI bill, drove a taxi until he died (heart attack while in a hospital, it happens). Mom from S. Carolina, worked for AT&T, died because her employer provided health insurance refused to cover a brain operation she needed for an aneurysm. She had paid premiums for over 25 years and nothing in her documentation listed this exception. She ran out of time before the family could secure alternate financing (that happens too, it was years ago but I'm still angry about it).

Experienced Jim Crow laws in the south, got slapped around when 6 for trying to use a water cooler instead of a spigot. Just 1 of several things I had to live with down there to stay alive. Lived through some issues in Baltimore too (in the fifties), like buying food but not allowed to sit down and eat it where it was bought.

Then the sixties. Kennedy gave everyone I knew hope, then he and his brother were killed. I listened to the "I Have a Dream" speech in person. Experienced the riots in Baltimore when ML King was killed. Had great grades but poor SAT scores, 'given' a full 4 year scholarship to MIT in '69 anyway. Lucked into that whole 'talented 10th' thing. Watched the moon landing while on campus, went to Woodstock with some new found friends. Life was great for me. During that 4 years I got to travel all over the country and a little outside of it. Met all kinds of people, had good experiences and bad. From your pov and mine, I was 'charmed'.

Started college with a student deferment. Next year the lottery was started and I lucked out, again. Plenty guys I grew up with went to Nam, some even volunteered. Most did not come back. 2 who did tried to suicide, 1 succeeded.

In the seventies everyone took a much needed brake from the turmoil (not just race related) of the previous 2 decades, but there was Watergate and a few other things. Then the Arabs got hip to the fact that they had been undercharging for their oil and started overcharging. They also came to realize that at bottom, American foreign policy was no difference than Russian foreign policy. It seemed to be: With you only as long as you're useful, then screw you. US standing in the world started slipping. You have meaningful experience from here on, maybe a little sooner. I lived the fifties and sixties, and was forced to 'grow up' quickly.

Color quit mattering 50 years ago, for you maybe. Money (too little or too much), class, and race are still major problems in America from my pov. Back when I was growing up, race and class issues were more out in the open. TBH, I prefer it that way. You would better known who the 'decent' people are and who to be extra careful with. Poor, undereducated, and so called 'low class' whites felt they were better than any black person, some still do. Politics aside, well meaning whites tried to help but many had no clue, some still don't. I fault no one but myself for my current economic situation, but with my education and work experiences I can't help feeling I would be in a better situation if I was white (but I'm glad I'm not).

Obama had it better than many in his situation, but a charmed life, I think not. Lucky as hell and he took full advantage of what networking brought his way. But what do I know, you're white and know better_______________NOT.

Anyway it's not about Obama or race. The battle for universal health care must be fought on more than 1 front. Tort reform, sure, but the whole justice system could use some reform. Only computer technology has advanced further than medical science in the last 30 years, but doctors are not 'gods'. They still 'practice' medicine and sometimes no better than in 1912 (e.g. your back pain treatment). There are plenty of real mal-practice cases. There are plenty of bad drugs released on us. When I listen to the commercials, the potential side effects sound worst than the ailment the drug is supposed to cure. The medical insurance and drug companies need to be allowed to use a different business model, where profit is not the be all and end all. Why do these companies profits need to increase way beyond 'need' from year to year, for the businesses to be considered successful?

[rockouthippie]

I'm 61, born in Baltimore, MD. Dad from N. Carolina, he bought a row house via the GI bill, drove a taxi until he died (heart attack while in a hospital, it happens). Mom from S. Carolina, worked for AT&T, died because her employer provided health insurance refused to cover a brain operation she needed for an aneurysm. She had paid premiums for over 25 years and nothing in her documentation listed this exception. She ran out of time before the family could secure alternate financing (that happens too, it was years ago but I'm still angry about it).

You could be white and tell an identical story. Mine isn't much different other than our 11 year age difference. You say racial inequality. I say life. At least you got some college money out of it, I didn't get shit and I had good grades.

You lived in the South during and before the civil rights wars. But that isn't Obama smoking a blunt in Hawaii ten years later.

In the seventies everyone took a much needed break

And why didn't we stay there? Vietnam ended. Johnson sent the FBI to bust up the clan.

But Obama and I? We're too young to know shit about that. Obama and I never saw a whites only drinking fountain. I sat in the back of the bus. ???

There are plenty of real mal-practice cases

The reason there is no tort reform has nothing to do with that. Malpractice attorneys are to Democrats what Big Oil is to Republicans.

The public good has zero weight in this discussion, just like it did in the ACA. We said health care reform and the government said payday for lobbyists. We say tort reform, the government says payday for lawyers.

You might say.... Gee.. I made a pretty good life for myself. Reverend Al and Oprah will be along, with hand extended for money, to tell you "Whitey's out to get you! You should be out singing God Damn America with Reverend Wright and Ferrikam!".

Oh brother. It even works when you end up President and never had a real job in your life. Perhaps feeling hypocritical, the President even had to paint Biden as white trash that "stepped out of a coal mine with a lunch box".

You and I have more in common than you and Obama. The call it stolen honor when you pretend you're a veteran. What do they call it when you're black and cry foul when you're upper middle class, college bound and living in Hawaii? The only cracker Obama ever ran into had cheese on it. Oprah never met one she didn't eat.

1975 is not 1965, and Alabama is not Hawaii.

Obama even talks about the "Hawaii's Spiritual Tolerance". Finding too much tolerance, I guess he had to leave and read some Bill Ayers to find some outrage.

What's really weird about Obama is that he goes into his impersonation of Martin Luther King while being completely establishment. Compared to Obama, George Bush is a hippie.

Change! What do you lobbyists think? I can evolve my thinking. I can think of no one better to handle health care than my good friend Max Baucus?

..but I born in a log cabin in Indonesia... killing clan members with my bookbag..or was that when I was smoking a log in Indonesia and talking about eating FiFi...

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

You could be white and tell an identical story. Mine isn't much different other than our 11 year age difference. You say racial inequality. I say life.

I said nothing about racial inequality. The problem I see is institutional racism. One on one, most people can get along. It's only went we group up, cliche up, gang up and rely on stereotypes that trouble starts. People say its not me personally and that's generally true. Things are way better than they were on the surface, but racism is still ingrained in too many of the institutions that control or guide our ways of life for Whites, Blacks and every other race in this country. America is not a melting pot, its more like a salad bowl. Some stuff works well in a salad and some doesn't. People attitudes are slow to change, maybe in another 200 years we will really learn to 'all get along'.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

At least you got some college money out of it, I didn't get shit and I had good grades.

As for my scholarship. Right place, right time. If it wasn't for King's murder and the riots, I don't think I would have gotten it. Administrators at MIT said that played a big part in the decision to 'relax' admission standards that year. My class included the single largest group of Blacks admitted at one time, before or since. Mistakes in judgements were made, some of us should not have been admitted. There was some serious trouble and lessons were learned.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

And why didn't we stay there? Vietnam ended. Johnson sent the FBI to bust up the clan.

The smart ones just when underground or changed their tactics. There are still plenty of dangerous radical groups of every race.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

You might say.... Gee.. I made a pretty good life for myself. Reverend Al and Oprah will be along, with hand extended for money, to tell you "Whitey's out to get you! You should be out singing God Damn America with Reverend Wright and Ferrikam!".

My parents taught me to search out truth and think for myself. I've never been much of a follower on blind faith. The thing is with all those people you listed, there are nuggets of truth mixed in with their rhetoric. But, I don't like Oprah either. I've been to Rev Wright's church and listened to his 'sermons'. Taken in context, a lot of what he says makes perfect sense. For a people considered sub-human for hundreds of years and with what we have accomplished anyway for America and the world, I understand his angry.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

You and I have more in common than you and Obama.

I can understand and even agree with many of your points. The ACA is another big change for America, time will tell if it is for good or ill.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

Change! What do you lobbyists think? I can evolve my thinking. I can think of no one better to handle health care than my good friend Max Baucus?

Good politicians have always and will always mix truth with lies to further their agendas. The point is to win by any means necessary. The end justifies the means. When the end is for the so called 'greater good', some people benefit. The group that benefits just needs to be larger and more inclusive, imo. When the end is for selfish greed, nobody else benefits. With all his faults, I don't think Obama is selfish or greedy.

[rockouthippie]

The problem I see is institutional racism.

The problem I see is that institutional racism hasn't existed for 50 years, not since Lyndon Johnson signed the civil rights act. Nixon is the one that put in affirmative action in the 70's. That still exists. So you get a bonus for being black. Does that count?

If it wasn't for King's murder and the riots, I don't think I would have gotten it.

If it weren't for Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon... I'm pretty sure Dr. King wouldn't have approved of affirmative action. I know Malcolm X wouldn't have.

For a people considered sub-human for hundreds of years

Everybody has ancestors who people treated as sub human. Join the human race. I'm part Polish. What the Russians didn't kill, the Nazi's finished off. Meanwhile, here in America, people worked themselves to death in Chicago factories. Likely standing next to him at work was a black guy.

Your African American story is more of an American story than it is black.

I've been to Rev Wright's church and listened to his 'sermons'. Taken in context, a lot of what he says makes perfect sense.

The same could be said of Hitler. Wright is an angry man who is out of time and out of touch.

You think all the civil rights hoopla got black their rights. I think it worked against the issue. The real reason is that most people in the country liked black people. What's not to like? Slavery ended 500 years ago in Poland. It ended 100 years earlier in UK than it did here. All without Dr. King.

My hero and a lesson. Rosa Parks. Sat down to have her lunch like anyone else would. What was really cool, and shows how peoples mindset was changing. No one did anything about it.

If African Americans had to go to war for their rights, they would have lost. Winning was because most people wanted you to win.

My dad was about 20 years older than you. He'd call a black man "Sir". Even the farm hick from nowhere knew he was looking at a fellow human being. You had contemporary cops who wouldn't arrest Rosa Parks. You had nobody yelling that they should. People let Martin Luther King talk and they didn't have to.

The Clan? Glad to see them scurrying for a rat hole.

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

The problem I see is that institutional racism hasn't existed for 50 years, not since Lyndon Johnson signed the civil rights act. Nixon is the one that put in affirmative action in the 70's. That still exists. So you get a bonus for being black. Does that count?

Like I said before, some people have no clue. Do you really think simply passing a law changes anything that people in general don't want changed? Affirmative action is a flawed attempt to allow a race of people in the US to overcome centuries of discrimination, reparations would be better, imo. Quotas are being fought in courts every day. Set asides are being stolen by fake companies every day. Some cases are being won and fakes exposed, after years of court battles and tremendous cost. Too bad some of those who started these cases (like Black farmers vs USDA) have died waiting for their justice. There are plenty of places big and small were nothing much has changed, except on the surface. But, there are also places were change in attitude is taking root, which gives me hope.

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

Everybody has ancestors who people treated as sub human. Join the human race. I'm part Polish. What the Russians didn't kill, the Nazi's finished off. Meanwhile, here in America, people worked themselves to death in Chicago factories. Likely standing next to him at work was a black guy.

Your African American story is more of an American story than it is black.

You're damned right, it is an American story. No where else in the world was slavery practiced like it was in what became the good ol' USA. I'm not talking about a few years of man's inhumanity to man. As to the form it (slavery of blacks) took here, genocide may have been better. But talk to the American Indians about that.

As if factory work conditions can even compare, even though they stem from the same tree of inhumanity.

Every race of people used slavery at some point, some still do. But I repeat, nowhere was it like what happened here. I'm talking about from the time of the first landings until the American Civil War (and some years after that). Educate yourself, but then again what would be the point. That happened a long time ago and has nothing to do with now, right? Of course!

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

My hero and a lesson. Rosa Parks. Sat down to have her lunch like anyone else would. What was really cool, and shows how peoples mindset was changing. No one did anything about it.

I don't understand your Rosa Parks reference to lunch. She was simply too tired one day to give up a seat on a bus to a white man. She was arrested and taken to jail, and you're right about 1 thing___no one did anything about it (that day). She, like many who become historical figures, had no idea what was going to happen because of her actions that day.

People are herd creatures and most prefer to follow or trample those in front. The few who are leaders step up and lead when allowed. History/time tells us whether they were good or bad leaders based on the winners and losers. One thing is clear, they all are needed (Hitler, King, and anyone else you care to mention) to set a direction and if anything changes, then they are judged to be right on time. If nothing much changed, then they were deemed too early or too late.

Things are seldom all one way. Hitler did some great things for Germany at the time in the beginning. He also had some insane ideas that brought everything to ashes in the end. American institutions have shown themselves capable of great evil. American people have shown themselves capable of great good. I wonder which will win out in the end.

[rockouthippie]

OK, So I'll agree black people have some special misery I don't understand.

What will make you happy? What can I possibly do for ya? You vote. You can't be discriminated against, legally anyway. You get free money for college that I don't get, even if I have better grades. You'll get a job that would be mine even if I'm more qualified. I'm fine with that.

No where else in the world was slavery practiced like it was in what became the good ol' USA.

But not you or anyone you ever knew was a slave. Your great, great, great, great grandfather might have been a slave. Who knows who my great grandfathers are or where life buried them? Like just about every other American you see today, they were running away from something circa 1900... usually starvation..

We didn't get cholera, scarlet fever, polio, TB, or rickets. We didn't starve. We aren't dead at 50. If we died, it would have been our wives that did it.

God damn what?

You went to college. I went to college. Obama went to college.

That's about it. Pretty boring. Life sucks and then you die. We're Americans. Wanna beer?

[Aminifu]

All I'm saying is current conditions have historical reasons. Some ingrained stuff has been allowed to fester for far too long. Penalizing the more qualified person is one of the things I don't like about affirmative action. Its a poor solution to a tough problem and its not leveling the 'playing field' fast enough.

You suggest health care reform start with tort reform. I'm saying start were you can and bring other stuff in when you can. The ACA has finally made a significant start, imo. You think it will make things worse, I don't agree. Time will tell. I'm biased, my mom might have lived longer if some of the things in the ACA had been in place then.

Obama is one person. He can suggest stuff, but Congress passes the laws and the judicial system rules on infractions. He's like a football quarterback, too much credit when the team wins and too much blame when the team loses.

Congress now does not do its job. They are too content to let others write the laws and they just rubber stamp them. Like the crazy statement Nancy P made, "Pass the law to find out what's in it". What was she really trying to say or did she mean that literally?

For the pass 30 years, everyone seems more interested in exploiting 'loopholes' than in following the so called 'rules'. Maybe its always been that way and it took me passing 30 to start to really notice.

Two years in that full scholarship was changed to half grant and half loan. They claimed financial problems, but that's another story. Life is tough, but it is what you (as an individual) make it in America. That beer sounds good, but I think I'll have a scotch. Have a good day.

[rockouthippie]

Some ingrained stuff has been allowed to fester for far too long.

It was allowed to fester too long. Now it's history.

Two years in that full scholarship was changed to half grant and half loan

More than I got.

Obama's "cure", the ACA, perpetuates most of the reasons we need health care legislation in the first place. It doesn't insure everyone will have health care. About 30 million people won't. What it does insure is that we stay at the status quo.

It not only doesn't solve the problem, it makes sure we can't bargain with pharma, medical, or the insurance companies. It prevents tort reform. It prevents bargaining with medical and pharma over medicare cost containment. And, above all, it isn't paid for. It's way underfunded, so we just add that to the deficit.

It completely ignores the main problem. Medical care in the US costs too much. A lot too much. Most western countries don't spend what we spend ..today.. and cover everybody.

So Obama got all the "smart people" in a room and they said "Pay us. We're smart". Take a stab at the ACA... it largely reads like "How can we pay you? let us count the ways".

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

It was
It completely ignores the main problem. Medical care in the US costs too much. A lot too much. Most western countries don't spend what we spend ..today.. and cover everybody.

So Obama got all the "smart people" in a room and they said "Pay us. We're smart".

I don't think it completely ignores the cost issue. Medical care in the US costs does too much, even though we do have the best technology and that costs more.

To get anything started, everyone at the table wanted a piece of the pie.

I not a socialist and don't know a lot about economics, but could health care related stuff be non-profit or not-for-profit?

[rockouthippie]

I don't think it completely ignores the cost issue.

It doesn't ignore it. It makes it law. Government has given up the right to do medicare cost negotiations outside of what's in this bill, which doesn't negotiate any meaningful cost reductions at all. It entrenches tort malfeasance keeping lawyers (we have more than any country in the world) sue happy.

It's a sweetheart deal for the American medico-pharma insurance cartel. Those folks are why we have a problem in the first place.

The last priority, if you could call it that, is that anybody gets medical insurance.

even though we do have the best technology and that costs more.

Uh.. our medical outcomes aren't generally better than anybody else. It costs more. Lately $150 for me to talk to a doc for a minute and get $4 worth of generic Flexeril. I guess I should take up smack. It would be cheaper.

The keepers of the pain meds.

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

Uh.. our medical outcomes aren't generally better than anybody else.

No they aren't, many say they are worst. I was referring to the technology (other than drugs) not the outcomes. Outcomes have more to do with the competence of those using the technology, imo. With all our specialists, there are fewer with general overall understanding. Fewer get to develop long term relationships with their patients. For me, it seems most doctors are too old to keep up or too young to have enough experience. The drug companies also keep pushing doctors to try new stuff. Treating us all like guinea pigs.

It seems those wanting to, and allowed to, attend medical school has not kept pace with the need. The increasing longevity of us baby boomers will make the shortage of GPs worse. Also not enough LPNs.

Back pain is a bitch. I find drinking plenty of water and moderate stretching exercises help me when mine acts up. Medicine is useless for me, unless its the real potent stuff. Wife says the water flushes out toxins and the stretching eases muscle tension. All I know is it seems to help.

[rockouthippie]

I just get some muscle spasms sometimes. If I take some Flexeril, it stops the spasm and I'm good to go again in 48 hours... until next time... could be months... If I don't take anything, I'm pretty much hurting... could be weeks before it sorts itself out.

I can get a gram of heroine cheaper than I can get a dozen muscle relaxers.

Technology? What do you call technology that doesn't extend or improve the quality of life? Advanced or stupid?

They can send a man to the moon, but $4 worth of muscle relaxers and a 1 minute conversation with a doc will be $150. Thank you for grabbing the sink. Insurance rules prohibit us from giving you a kiss.

[Aminifu]

Originally Posted by rockouthippie

They can send a man to the moon, but $4 worth of muscle relaxers and a 1 minute conversation with a doc will be $150. Thank you for grabbing the sink. Insurance rules prohibit us from giving you a kiss.

That's like the old joke.

Man says, "Doctor, it hurts when I do this."
Doctor says, "Then don't do that. That will be $150.00."

Anyway, good ol' doc does have to repay school loans and buy malpractice insurance.
And at some point, he or she will have to go to a doctor and be overcharged too.

[rockouthippie]

The reason he has to pay exorbitant student loans and too high malpractice insurance is because we are dealing with government sanctioned cartels. The only way to fix this is to break the cartels.

The ACA is like somebody tossing a punch at you, and you lean into it.

Maybe there should be no insurance. Then the medical industry would have to provide care that we could afford out of pocket. Insurance on it's massive creep upward in expense covers stuff that isn't affordable. If it isn't affordable, maybe we shouldn't be doing it.

They'll promise you the moon and the stars if you have enough money and insurance. Whether that really translates to your health care being really tended is obvious from the outcome data we have. It doesn't. And as we get increasingly worse outcomes, our insurance premium goes up.

When I see lobbyists, executives and lawyers leaping out of skyscrapers, that'd be a sign we're getting it right. If they are happy, you shouldn't be. They are really happy. You shouldn't be.

The problem is that we'll pay nearly anything not to die or be in pain and a lot of the time we don't make anywhere close to a reasonable bargain.

$150 for $4 worth of meds. I paid.

If you paid $300 a minute for anyone to do anything else for you. What would you say? If you were old, and you had to actually pay the bill, would 1/7th of a minimum wage flunky, a shared room and jail food be worth $8000 a month?

Is 2 days in the hospital with them doing nothing except watch you off and on for a couple days worth $10,000?

Do you do a $140,000 craniotomy on a lady (my friends mom) when you know she isn't gonna last more than a few months? Poor woman. They should have just let her die in peace. It would have been a lot more merciful than what happened.

But hell, with Medicare picking up the tab.... Why not? Does Dick Cheney get a million dollar heart, when the odds are he'll be dead in 5 years? Medicare covers this.

Like I said. Hit 65 and you won the lottery. That is they will give you a million dollar heart transplant, but not enough Social Security to eat.

[Aminifu]

Careful now. Sure the cost of a lot of stuff has no relationship to anything practical or sensible. But its only money. We can't eat it and we sure as hell can't take it with us when we die. Nobody left me any. I have not been successful enough to be able to leave anything significant to anyone else, so I'm no longer trying to. Sure if I can spend less on some stuff, I'll have more to spend on something else. In the long run, I'm going to spend it on something. Now I'm just trying to stay ahead of what expenses I can anticipate, no major savings plan. If something catastrophic happens my ass is out anyway, so I don't worry about it.

At some point along the way, I heard it said, "Capitalism is not a perfect economic system, but it is the best one we have.". The so called free market is supposed to regulate prices. Well we know that is not true. But however prices are set, we as people have allowed it to happen by the intrinsic value we place on things. I mean for example, why are jewel diamonds worth so much? After all they're only rocks and they are not extremely rare. How is the 'right' price set for any material thing or service?

Then on the other hand, how much is life worth? Ten years of it? Ten seconds of it? Some would say its priceless, any amount of it. I would agree with them. At the same time, I feel the quality of my life is more important than its quantity. But, I would never try to, or want to, make that decision for anyone else. Hell, I can't even make it for myself, since suicide is legally and morally against the rules. It's ironic (maybe crazy) how life and death is dealt with, a person sentenced to death will have the execution delayed if he/she becomes seriously ill. Why is that? Anyway, I would not want us, as a country, to start judging who gets what care based on how much it costs or how long the recipient is expected to live with or without it.

I know you will say the ACA will start to do just that. Only if we let it, like we have let the access to big money determine who gets what now. Qualifying for Medicare guarantees nothing other than you get to go on a waiting list. Now, only big bucks (your own and/or from an insurance company) gets you the care you need (if it exists), when you need it.

"They'll promise you the moon and the stars if you have enough money and insurance. Whether that really translates to your health care being really tended is obvious from the outcome data we have. It doesn't. And as we get increasingly worse outcomes, our insurance premium goes up."

First, the insurance companies only provide the money, they have little to do with the outcomes. As the direct medical costs go up (with all other things kept the same), the insurance cost has to go up or the number of paying customers has to go up. In the past, the other things were not kept the same or even to a reasonable proportion. It is hard for a company to just survive in a capitalist economy. To be successful enough to be among the market leaders is even harder. A lot of regulations and controls are against the free market principles. To expect self driven ethical restraint was never realistic, so what has happened was inevitable.

But going forward, the ACA requires insurance companies spend 80% of their annual premium revenue on actual health care or rebate their customers. Other than limiting the added cost for non-medical expenses, this will force at least 2 reactions. One reaction is top insurance executives will accept lower salaries and companies will reduce their advertising and other non-medical expenses. I don't expect this reaction to occur. Another reaction, closer to what I expect, is companies will hold the line on, or reduce, premiums (since they will be forced to compete) and seek to greatly expand their customer base. The ACA mandate that everyone who can (some with limited help) must buy health insurance will provide the customers.

There are other things in the ACA that will try to improve outcomes and bend the rising curve of direct medical costs due to drugs, human medical providers, and medical equipment providers. One of the things that could reduce costs and improve outcomes is the national interoperable electronic patient medical records/databases.

[rockouthippie]

The problem is that we don't have a free market, we have a government instituted cartel. It's why you can have a million dollar heart transplant and go home and eat cat food. There is no money in feeding you, but a heart transplant at taxpayer expense.... we got you covered.

I remember my dad passing on. The medical industry got 2 million. I was lucky if I had a box of mac n' cheese for dinner. I was 15. Dad died real close to intestate. So much for going to a decent college.

My mom had a stroke about 10 years after my dad passed on. Again.. millions for the medical industry... but not a hell of a lot of help for paying for daily living. Last year medicare expenses... about a quarter million. I got $330 in a death benefit. Mom got about $7000 to live on a year. It's only money

How much did I spend on mom? Quarter million? Half million? But I just can't go up to the government and issue a bill. I don't have a cartel.

So everybody got their money, except the 15 year old kid watching his dad die of cancer. He got a fucking box of mac n' cheese if he was lucky. His shoes were either too big or too small. Gone was the idea that he'd go to a good college. I wanted to go to Stanford and had the grades, just not a pot to piss in.

Why can people get a heart transplant and not lunch? They're no profit in giving you lunch.

Now with mom passed on last year, I am 50 and officially broke. Thank God I'm only broke. I should be debt free this year, but I am pretty much back on the Mac 'n Cheese. Kid done. Mom done. Now to keep me from living under a bridge.

I don't think I've ever been worth nothing before. The richest I've ever been.

http://www.whale.to/b/ruesch.html

You might find this article interesting. It has a slant, but it's largely accurate.

"The medical monopoly or medical trust, euphemistically called the American Medical Association, is not merely the meanest monopoly ever organized, but the most arrogant, dangerous and despotic organisation which ever managed a free people in this or any other age."

That about sums it up. And Obama let them write their own health care law. A legalized mafia including the ability to engage in price fixing and racketeering. That's what you'd call their activities if the weren't sanctioned.

You might argue that this is a reason that medical care could be socialized. The problem is, it isn't capitalist. It's teachers pet. It doesn't have to play by the rules. It makes the rules. As this medical bill makes really evident.

We chickens said... the Fox is gonna eat us... Obama says... we'll put the Fox in charge... and tax you if you don't want to be eaten...

The Fox, like any other cartel, wants to keep quality down, prices up, and create artificial scarcity. It's much like DeBeers, the diamond cartel. If it wasn't for diamonds being artificially made scarce, you could put them in gumball machines. Other cheaper gemstones are actually a lot more rare than diamonds.

If you ever knew anybody that studied to be a doctor or a nurse. They aren't trying to educate doctors and nurses. They are trying to wash you out and keep tuitions out of reach. Ideally, they'll wash you out and keep the money. Better if your student loan has a government guarantee.

Medical schools. Paid to purposely not train medical professionals. My sister got her nursing degree at 40. She's told me the same thing. They don't want to educate you, they want to wash you out. Hell, she never gets a vacation. The nursing shortage insures that she'll always be in a grinder.

Doctors. The smartest of the smart end up in medical school, and we wash out more than half.

[Aminifu]

It's like I said at the start of all this, no one should have to be bankrupted by serious medical expenses. In these cases, I think no one should have to pay more than 30 to 50% of their net worth for the first instance and nothing for any subsequent instances of catastrophic care.

I don't think Americans will accept socialized medicine, at least not for a long, long time. But they can be made to see that a single payer system where everyone pitches in to help those who need it, can work. Along with firm controls on medical related profits. The ACA could be the way to get us there. None can say what the catalyst for real change will be.

I will read the article later tonight or tomorrow.

Keep your chin up. Things will change, they have too. Not in time for me or you, I expect. But, too many people have been quiet too long, taking it on the chin. Believing its their duty to grin and bear it; like good, strong, independent Americans.

It maybe selfish of me, but I have 2 daughters and hope to soon have grand kids. It's them I'm concerned for. Thinking of the consequences for them is the main thing that has kept me from 'losing it' and going on a 'very targeted' rampage a long time ago.

[rockouthippie]

But they can be made to see that a single payer system where everyone pitches in to help those who need it, can work.

This isn't single payer or anything like single payer. It's like the Spock alter-ego of single payer complete with agonizer.

Mr. Kyle. You didn't buy your medical insurance. Your agonizer please!

Really Mr. Spock.. I tried, I really tried....