Scenario #1: Current Fast Food Practices
Smirk: Yes, umm, I’ll have a number one with a diet coke. No onions on the burger. Biggie up the the fries please.
McDonalds: Thank you, please drive around for your total.
Scenario #2: Obama’s Fast Food Plan
Smirk: Yes, Ummm, I’ll have a number one. But first, exactly what is a number one?
ObamaBurger: We don’t know yet, but you’re going to love it!
Smirk: Can you tell me at least if its a burger or chicken or something?
ObamaBurger: We’ll iron out all those details later. Just stop being afraid!
Smirk: Can I get a diet coke with that?
ObamaBurger: That we can probably do! Diet definitely. Might not be coke though. But we do definitely offer diet drinks! Although further research with has shown that “diet” drinks might possibly be bad for you, so we will have to get back to you on that.
Smirk: Do I have to get fries or do you have other sides?
ObamaBurger: Don’t know that either, but did you know that McDonald’s had a salmonella outbreak in Buttfuck, Florida in 1987?
Smirk: No! Holy shit!
ObamaBurger: Yes. Very tragic. We are in crisis mode.
This is not to say that I’m against healthcare reform or what Obama is trying to accomplish, but c’mon dude, at least give us some apples to work with so we can compare apples.
Asking people to blindly choose some “plan” that you have yet to provide contractual details on, just as my current insurance provides me with a contract of what is and what is not covered, is insulting.
Smirkdirk's Blog 
Scenerio #3:
Smirk: I was in the Burger King yesterday drinking the kool-aid, when I read on the side of my Whopper Combo bag how your food is really unhealthy for me…
Obama: You mean compared to what you were already eati-
Smirk: SHUT UP MAN I’M TALKING HERE. And it said how unlike at Burger King, were I can get the $10,000 Mega-Whopper, McDonald’s doesn’t have one, because McDonald’s only serves the cheap crap.
Obama: But most people can’t afford a $10,000 Mega–
Smirk: F’in NAZI I SAID SHUT UP! And it went on to say how NOBODY knows what’s inside your food. Like how the nutritional information to the Big Mac is literally impossible to find…
Obama: But we’ve had that printed on the back of the little papers you get with your trays for years now, and we also print them on the side of the ba…
Smirk: YOU EXPECT ME TO TURN OVER A PIECE OF PAPER AND READ YOUR F’IN INGREDIENTS MAN!!! YOU’RE JUST TRYING TO MURDER ME!
Obama: And of course we post them on the internet
Smirk: Like I have the time for that man! You’re going to force us all to eat at those pink-o commie restaurants, like the Wendy’s or the Arby’s…
Obama: You think Wendy’s and Arby’s are communist?
Smirk: ABSOLUTELY.
Obama: Have you ever eaten there?
Smirk: You’re saying I’m a communist?!? That article was written by someone who knows what he’s talking about, I think his name was Mr. King or something. He writes about how you are now marketing the Dollar Menu Option, which is yet another word for government take-over of our meal making freedoms..
Obama: But its really just there for the people who can’t afford a Combo. You don’t have to orde…
Smirk: Can you SAY I won’t order from there? What if everyone ONLY orders from the Dollar Menu. Then there wouldn’t be a Chicken Nuggets combo would there?
Obama: But that would be their choice and…
Smirk: How many people are going to order from the Dollar Menu?
Obama: Its hard to say, but for the person with only a Dollar that’s better than…
Smirk: SEE! SEE! You don’t know! You don’t f’in know! AND I’M SUPPOSED TO TRUST YOU?!?
Obama: Like you trust that fella who wrote that article that you heard in the Burger King?
Smirk: “FOUR LEGS GOOD! TWO LEGS BAAAAAAD!”
By: Chancho Cox on August 18, 2009
at 5:28 pm
Interesting, Chancho. In the future, I will only question Republican authority.
The point of this post was not about being “against” Obama, or that there aren’t things wrong with our current healthcare system, but his absolute lack of concrete information about his “plan”. Your current insurance, if you are lucky enough to have it, is a contract that tells you exactly what it will cover. There are literally thousands of different plans offered by several different companies. Each of these is different as far as co-pays, caps, all kinds of stuff. You can find out exactly what your plan will cover, and more importantly what it will not cover. For example. My current plan has a cap of 2 million dollars. Meaning, once they pay up to that amount, they stop paying for me and I can die of my cancer or whatever. Is Obama’s plan going to have caps or will all Americans have unlimited access to unlimited healthcare and technology regardless of price? I think this is a fair question. If I were to shop around for insurance in the private market every single plan out there by every single company would be able to answer this question. Unfortunately Obama can’t answer this question because he actually doesn’t have a plan in the most concrete sense of the term. Thus, how can you truly have the realistic debate he supposedly wants when he has no apples to compare to apples.
To summarize my post was not meant to debate healthcare, but rather about the debate about the debate and Obama’s lack of preparation. As far as your claim that he has all this information readily available:
1. Find yourself a concrete question, such as, how much will your plan pay towards a CAT scan.
2. Go to his site, http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/ and find the answer to your question. (hint: you will not find a solid answer.)
3. Call your insurer and ask the same exact question.
4. Give them a couple of minutes to find your answer and then listen to it.
I thought the post spoke for itself, and I’m not sure why in your parody of it you inserted nazi and fascist into my mouth. So, any criticism of Obama automatically means you’re a non-thinking, right-wing fucktard? That’s a rather left-wing fucktard attitude…
And you have also made me realize something else. I am now officially boycotting any reference to ‘drinking the Kool Aid’ from here on in. I don’t care who uses it or in what context. It is old and stale, and just way too easy. Any writer who uses it has obviously got to reinvigorate their creative juices and should thus be ignored.
Where’s John Edwards when we need him the most?
By: smirkdirk on August 19, 2009
at 7:47 am
First I think a civics lesson is in order:
http://vodpod.com/watch/14595-school-house-rock
Which points out a basic fallacy in your premise. Obama chose a different route, than say Hillary and Bill by not presenting what you call his “plan” to Congress and then letting them vote on it. He has chosen the route of letting the house and the senate decide what they think the “plan” should be. If he agrees with it, he signs off.
What he has been talking about are the basic principles that he feel are important to make any “plan” work. The main principles being: expanding coverage, improving quality, lowering costs, honoring patient choice and holding insurance companies accountable.”
Once the “plan” has come out of the joint House/Senate committee, it will be posted on the internet for all to see. Then I’d be open to hearing the critique that he can’t answer how this or that part of the proposed Bill would solve/not solve this or that problem.
See back in the ’90s, the Clintons tried to be the good McDonald’s managers that the Smirk of Scenerio #2 longs for. They provided a very detailed plan. But then the argument was that they should have let Congress come up with the plan, that they were wrong about how things were going to actually work out, that it would be too expensive, people wouldn’t get treatment, etc. etc.
Of course here we are over 15 years later and our healthcare system is the most expensive in the world yet we are at the bottom of the list in terms of overall care compared to other countries that have some form of Universal Health Care.
Because no matter WHAT Obama does on Health Insurance there are certain very wealthy, very dedicated groups that are going to fight till the bloody end to keep us from having a system that provides health care for everyone. The point of the Town Halls was to open up the debate as to how best to achieve the goal of health care for everyone. It wasn’t to sell a specific plan that Congress hasn’t come up with yet. So as offended as you are at me for lumping you in with the nuts that have turned the town halls into fiascos (and that, as you know, is where I got the Nazi/fascist references), I’m equally offended that you attribute to a pretty smart president the traits of George W. Bush.
But you say you were writing about the debate about the debate. I don’t know, if I’m going to critique something, is it going to be the person who encourages town halls and puts himself and his party on the line to have a real debate about policy, or is it going to be the yahoos who show up with their guns and their bullshit (I mean, there’s people who really believe TORT reform is the answer? Hah!) with the sole purpose of shouting down the people they disagree with. I was addressing them with your characters. If they were copywrited I would refer you to my lawyer. I thought they were stock characters.
And forgive me I lump “Smirk” in with the yahoos, but Obama has said again and again and again and again he’s not interested in eliminating private health insurance. No one in Congress has proposed eliminating private health insurance. If the plan that comes out does this, then ok. I see why Smirk is concerned. But otherwise, Smirk gets to keep his Health Insurance, which kind of makes all of the other questions “fictional Smirk” poses to “fictional Obama” irrelevant — since as you note, he already knows what’s in his Health Insurance plan.
Unless, like the yahoos Smirk thinks the real purpose is a communist takeover of the entire health care system. I’m sorry, I think that’s yahoo. But even if it were true, man, those country’s with Universal Health Care, look how backwards they are. I mean, paying less overall for their medical treatment and having a better life expectancy than us. Socialists!
Because the point of whatever specific plan that comes out of Congress is not to help or hurt you or me or Smirk or Obama that already have Health Insurance. Its to provide coverage to the millions of people whose only choice when they have a problem is to a) suffer and hope its not too bad or b) go to a hospital which costs way too much for everyone (including you and me in our HI premiums) and gives too little return. I mean can ANY plan be worse than what is there for the people with no coverage?
For that reason, I think its appropriate for 1994 Chancho to answer your bullet points:
1. Find yourself a concrete question, such as, how much will your plan pay towards a CAT scan.
Uh, I don’t have HI so if it pays any of it, and even makes sure I get the CAT scan that’s better than the nothing I can afford now right?
2. Go to his site, http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/ and find the answer to your question. (hint: you will not find a solid answer.)
What’s the internet?
3. Call your insurer and ask the same exact question.
What, are you drinking the kool-aid (this is 1994 and therefore outside the Statute of Limitations for your decree), I said I don’t have health insurance. You mean my auto insurance?
4. Give them a couple of minutes to find your answer and then listen to it.
Geico said I haven’t paid my premiums in 6 months so they aren’t willing to talk to me.
By: Chancho Cox on August 19, 2009
at 5:28 pm
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/17/the-funniest-signs-from-t_n_260838.html
By: Chancho Cox on August 19, 2009
at 5:56 pm
Health Care Reform: A Minority Report
By: Frank McCoy
Posted: August 4, 2009 at 7:14 AM
How will Obama’s health care plan affect poor and minority patients?
Medical professionals sound off on how Obama’s health care plan will impact poor and black Americans.
frank.mccoy
Medical professionals sound off on how Obama’s health care plan will impact poor and black Americans.
Medical professionals sound off on how Obama’s health care plan will impact poor and black Americans.
08/04/2009 07:14
Let’s cut to the chase regarding President Barack Obama’s health care plan, or, as it’s formally called, the Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009. At least three versions exist at the moment: the administration’s and those of the House and the Senate. In the days remaining until the congressional recess begins this week, they will squabble over what the final bill looks, and who will pay for it.
What is not uncertain is, however, that whatever becomes law will have a great impact on poor and minority patients, the hospitals that treat them and those hospitals’ doctors, nurses and staff. An estimated 16 percent of the black population is uninsured, as is 32 percent of Hispanics. So what are the best ways to address that problem and the many others that afflict a health care system everyone agrees is complex, expensive and economically discriminatory?
Most people who have health insurance get it through an employer. In a nutshell, Obama’s plan offers a less expensive government-run option, with nearly universal coverage of all Americans. This public plan would function alongside the private and other health care options that now exist. The advantage of a public plan is that it may force private insurers to compete for customers when it comes to treatment, service and price.
Linda Loubert, a research associate at the Institute for Urban Research, favors a single-payer, government-administered, health care system but believes that neither the president nor Congress wants to create such a public system, which would eliminate the need for private insurer coverage. Loubert, a Morgan State University economist, says that the best she could hope for was that whatever law emerges will “take the competition for money [in health care provision] out and make it a competition for good health.”
To Dr. Carolyn Barley Britton, former president of the National Medical Association, which represents more than 30,000 black physicians, the current state of American health care reminds her of New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005. “For years people were warned that levees had problems but not enough steps were taken [to correct them]. We have also been warned for more than 20 years that the health care system is in trouble and have not taken steps [to prevent disaster],” she said.
Some critics say the Obama plan costs too much. Britton points out, though, that bringing people who are currently uninsured into a new system would lower costs, since they now arrive in emergency rooms with serious illnesses that could have been prevented or slowed under universal coverage. Instead, she says, “they get health care at the high [cost] end of the spectrum.”
Darrell Gaskin, an associate professor of health economics at the University of Maryland, College Park, sees many advantages to Obama’s proposal, including that it would permit employees to take their health benefits from one job to another without loss of coverage—in effect, a insurance coverage rollover, much like the way people move their 401(k) or 403(b) retirement savings plans.
Plus, he says, a small business may see a decrease in insurance expenses as it becomes easier for employees to obtain health insurance from a pooled marketplace of private and federal insurers. These factors will encourage ambitious private insurers to compete by lowering costs for customers.
Those are sweet ideas to Vita Ozoude, president of the Nevada Black Chamber of Commerce. “If the Obama plan is a cheaper alternative, [business] owners will look at it because it boosts the bottom line,” said the Reno-based CPA, who has a private tax practice.
The tricky part may be getting the word out. Azizza Davis Goines, president of the Sacramento Black Chamber of Commerce, says a lot of business owners hear the clamor over health care costs and think it’s not for them. They have to be educated, she says: “It will be a wonderful thing to have options.”
For medical schools at historically black colleges—among them, Meharry Medical College, Howard University College of Medicine and the Morehouse School of Medicine—a plan that insures more people could only help. These are “safety net facilities” providing health care to the nation’s neediest and most ill, says Osei Mevs, an official at Meharry.
As institutions of last resort, these hospitals see many of the sickest patients, many of whom have no health insurance. If the health care reform becomes law, says Mevs, the financial condition of these black teaching hospitals may improve because the patients they are treating would suddenly be insured.
Dr. Charles Mouton, chairman of family medicine at Howard’s College of Medicine, agrees. He says a health care plan that helps increase hospital reimbursement is a major step forward. Otherwise, he said, frontline hospitals cannot afford the staff to provide the basic care that communities need.
The alternative to fixing the health care system, all agree, is crisis. Britton, of the NMA, says, “There is no question that if the health care system is not altered, it is going to break. And when that storm hits, there is no doubt that the levee is going to collapse.”
By: Chancho Cox on August 19, 2009
at 6:04 pm
Great copy and paste! Such effort! And from such unbiased, middle-of-the-road sources too!
But, of course, you’re right, Chancho. I recall being friends with some young college students who accidentally got pregnant and as far as I know had no insurance. The baby was born prematurely and used something like 1/4 to 1/2 of a million dollars in medical care over the course of months. Perhaps even more! The insurance industry didn’t give a crap, and neither did the government. Now, those two young kids owe all that money back to the hospitals because of the healthcare CRISIS. It’s a CRISIS, I tell you! You better hope such a thing never happens to you, Chancho, or you will probably be paying for the rest of your life!
Why, if Obama had been president back then who knows what the future for that child might have been, but as it stands, Superman was not there and who knows what has become of her and the horrible medical care she received.
Obama must dismantle it all immediately for the children.
Oh please, link to Michael Moore’s movie – especially the part where all the patients are dumped on the side of the road – because, like I said, I don’t know how that story ended with that premature baby, but I’m sure it ended up on the side of the road without Obama.
As far as your first post – that was really good! You need to start your own blog!
By: Smirk on August 19, 2009
at 7:41 pm
Oh also, those signs ruled. Here’s one that reminds me of why I need to take a Rosa Parks poster to all my townhall meetings!
http://failblog.org/2009/08/12/racism-fail/
By: smirkdirk on August 19, 2009
at 8:10 pm
Actually I heard of those kids. The girl ended up applying for Medicaid for pregnant mothers, which is a socialist program that took care of all the bills. So if every uninsured American would just get PREGNANT, the problems would be solved.
Of course her pseudo-husband ended up becoming a member of the Green arm of the communist youth movement, which just goes to show that its all about converting our country to Stalinist Russia.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 8:23 am
Here’s another post from that Propaganda machine the Associated Press:
FACT CHECK: Health overhaul myths taking root
By CALVIN WOODWARD, Associated Press Writer Calvin Woodward, Associated Press Writer – Wed Aug 19, 4:11 pm ET
WASHINGTON – The judgment is harsh in a new poll that finds Americans worried about the government taking over health insurance, cutting off treatment to the elderly and giving coverage to illegal immigrants. Harsh, but not based on facts.
President Barack Obama’s lack of a detailed plan for overhauling health care is letting critics fill in the blanks in the public’s mind. In reality, Washington is not working on “death panels” or nationalization of health care.
To be sure, presenting Congress and the country with the nuts and bolts of a revamped system of health insurance is no guarantee of success for a president — just ask Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Their famous flop was demonized, too. After all, the devil does lurk in details.
It can also lurk in generalities, it seems.
Obama is promoting his changes in something of a vacuum, laying out principles, goals and broad avenues, some of which he’s open to amending. As lawmakers sweat the nitty gritty, he’s doing a lot of listening, and he’s getting an earful.
A new NBC News poll suggests some of the myths and partial truths about the plans under consideration are taking hold.
Most respondents said the effort is likely to lead to a “government takeover of the health care system” and to public insurance for illegal immigrants. Half said it will probably result in taxpayers paying for abortions and nearly that many expected the government will end up with the power to decide when treatment should stop for old people.
A look at each of those points:
THE POLL: 45 percent said it’s likely the government will decide when to stop care for the elderly; 50 percent said it’s not likely.
THE FACTS: Nothing being debated in Washington would give the government such authority. Critics have twisted a provision in a House bill that would direct Medicare to pay for counseling sessions about end-of-life care, living wills, hospices and the like if a patient wants such consultations with a doctor. They have said, incorrectly, that the elderly would be required to have these sessions.
House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio said such counseling “may start us down a treacherous path toward government-encouraged euthanasia.”
The bill would prohibit coverage of counseling that presents suicide or assisted suicide as an option.
Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia, who has been a proponent of coverage for end-of-life counseling under Medicare, said such sessions are a voluntary benefit, strictly between doctor and patient, and it was “nuts” to think death panels are looming or euthanasia is part of the equation.
But as fellow conservatives stepped up criticism of the provision, he backed away from his defense of it.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 8:24 am
Part 2 of above article:
___
THE POLL: 55 percent expect the overhaul will give coverage to illegal immigrants; 34 percent don’t.
THE FACTS: The proposals being negotiated do not provide coverage for illegal immigrants.
___
THE POLL: 54 percent said the overhaul will lead to a government takeover of health care; 39 percent disagree.
THE FACTS: Obama is not proposing a single-payer system in which the government covers everyone, like in Canada or some European countries. He says that direction is not right for the U.S. The proposals being negotiated do not go there.
At issue is a proposed “exchange” or “marketplace” in which a new government plan would be one option for people who aren’t covered at work or whose job coverage is too expensive. The exchange would offer some private plans as well as the public one, all of them required to offer certain basic benefits.
That’s a long way from a government takeover. But when Obama tells people they can just continue with the plans they have now if they are happy with them, that can’t be taken at face value, either. Tax provisions could end up making it cheaper for some employers to pay a fee to end their health coverage, nudging some patients into a public plan with different doctors and benefits.
It’s unclear now whether Obama is committed to the public option. He described it recently as “just one sliver” of health reform, suggesting it was expendable if lawmakers could agree on another way to expand affordable coverage. Now the White House is emphasizing his strong support for it.
___
THE POLL: 50 percent expect taxpayer dollars will be used to pay for abortions; 37 percent don’t.
THE FACTS: The House version of legislation would allow coverage for abortion, but the bill says a beneficiary’s own money — not taxpayer funds — must be used to pay for the procedure. How that would be enforced has not been determined.
Obama has stated that the U.S. should continue its tradition of “not financing abortions as part of government-funded health care.” Current laws prohibiting public financing of abortion would stay on the books.
Yet abortion guidelines are not yet clear for the government-supervised insurance exchange. There is strong sentiment in Congress on both sides of the issue.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 8:26 am
Well seeing as I administrate our current plan for my company, and Mrs. Smirk actually works within the health insurance industry – (who by the way just went through a month-long bout of kidney stones which required three ER visits, multiple doctors appointments and 2 CAT scans – to the tune of $50,000 that her insurance company picked up, so evil – I mean, EVIL of them) I suppose you know way more about health insurance than either her or I do and I’m bound to lose any argument against your copied and pasted effort.
My concerns:
#1. Due to a government program, for-profit businesses will drop their private coverage in favor of the “free” coverage they’re paying for anyway, thus putting the private industry out of business.
#2. Obama’s constant attacks on insurance companies reek of hypocrisy when our government contracts with EVIL CIGNA and other EVIL health insurance companies to administer Medicare. (Didn’t know that did you? That’s the kind of info that you know when you actually talk to people who work in the industry.) In fact, the only health insurance CEO that Obama talks to is the one from AETNA who you may notice share’s more in common with Obama than just an interest in health insurance. I’ll leave you to figure out what that might be with a little Googling. But I think the first order of business is to get this evil health insurance companies out of your public programs that are so wonderful!
#3 So when Mrs. Smirk and the kids (Remember, the boy Smirkling has had a seizure disorder) have probably used between the three of them nearly 1/2 a million dollars in healthcare that their evil, Evil, EVIL insurance has paid for no-fuss/no-muss, you don’t think that she ought to be concerned when it may, through this legislation, put that company out of business? She’s just a selfish bitch to think about herself and her kids? In fact anybody who puts their own selves and families well-being in front of that of strangers is just a total asshole.
#4 I’m sure when I run into the trouble with the law that my bestest lawyer friend will totally recommend that I just go with the lawyer who’s provided for me. There is really no difference between a public defender and a private practice attorney at all. Private practice attorneys are greedy people who are just in it for the money.
#5 47 million Americans out of 300 million don’t have any kind of health insurance. The solution is not to throw out what works for 5/6ths of the population, but to find a way to include that 1/6.
#6 In the first paragraph of his website Obama sets his sites on insurance companies and drug companies. Because, of course, providers, hospitals, adminstrators and all the other people and institutions involved with healthcare are perfect, right? Wrong. The reason Obama particularly targets insurance companies is because, as I said previously, under his watch they will go out of business (putting millions of people out of work who, of course, could not be hired elsewhere because they are so EVIL.) so he will never have to face the consequences. As far as drug companies. They’re an easy target.
#7 All of my thoughts here are pretty much my own original thoughts from my own experiences, whilst yours are selectively quoted articles that confirm your point of view. That would be like Michael Moore walking up to our young couple at the hospital and asking them how much they owed for the care their child received. When they said, “zero”, just like the Canadian, the whole premise of his movie becomes questionable.
#8 I am done with this discussion. There is a middle ground here but as long as I don’t see things exactly your way you will portray me as some right-wing lunatic, which you, Chancho, of all people should know I’m not. I don’t approve of misinformation and the tactics being used by those assholes, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t good reasons to slow the fuck down.
By: smirkdirk on August 20, 2009
at 10:06 am
Nope I don’t know anything about health insurance. Because I don’t deal with thousands of people a year with injuries, about 65% of whom don’t have health insurance. And I never ever ever hear that they are denied by multiple providers because they don’t have health insurance. So that their only option really is to go to a CHIROPRACTOR. And I never hear over and over again that they CAN go to the hospitals but that the hospitals don’t give them the radiological tests that they give the other people I don’t know of who have HI and almost always get the same set of tests for the exact same injuries. And of those non-existant people, they absolutely never have those same hospital bills turned over to collections and their credit ruined.
And I never deal with clients who have Medicare and Medicaid because those people never get in car wrecks. So I am amazed at your own first hand experience which truly covers the full spectrum of HI scenerios.
So I agree to drop it.
Although I would note that if you don’t want comments that disagree with you, just drop the comments feature. Otherwise, just look at me as the Colmes to your Hannity. You can use me as a willing dupe to show-case your superior grasp of the issues.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 10:28 am
I have no problem with disagreement, and you can comment all you want, and I never denied that there are reforms to be made, but your argument that everything needs to be dismantled when, in your own experience with you student friends, you’ve seen the current system work miracles… it just doesn’t make sense. You refuse to work towards any consensus. The world in that you’ve created in this discussion is a dichotomy of right/wrong, black/white, good/evil – which is reflective of the problem with the actual debate going on out there beyond this post. I really do think your first ‘civics lessons’ post made a great point and was a touche’, but not a single thing I’ve said makes any sense to you because of your partisanship? That is, as you like to say, drinking the Kool Aid.
Doh!
By: smirkdirk on August 20, 2009
at 10:32 am
Hah! I got you to post again!
Eh, we agree to disagree. I don’t think a public option is going to end private health insurance, that in fact it will just make all HI more affordable and better (through good old conservative free market competition) and you seem to think it would or might or whatever.
And by the way, if anything I should completely be against any further government HI from a personal standpoint because Medicare and Medicaid are absolutely horrible for my line of work for reasons I won’t get into here. And also I have an excellent HI plan, better and more generous than most, so from that perspective I shouldn’t give a rat’s ass.
I just think what it ultimately boils down to is are we going to cover the uncovered or not. I don’t believe there is a way to do that with only Private HI because they’ve had decades to do it and haven’t. It will cost money as Medicare and Medicaid did. Somehow those systems have stuck around and people over all are happy with them (compared to the alternative which is alot of old people without it).
It MAY make it where certain high end treatments are unavailable for a relative few as the price of certain basic quality care being available for everyone. I think that’s a price worth paying if it really turns out to be a true price. The commies (i.e. France, Canada, England, Germany) have done it and their standard of living aint so bad, so why can’t we, the so-called Super Power of the world figure out how to make universal coverage work.
And finally, I write my own stuff and then look for articles to confirm my superior opinion, so it really is a coincidence that I am so much aligned with college professors and the AP.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 10:59 am
Well, then we can disagree however, I will say that I can see where your optimism comes from, though I can’t share it.
Re-reading the whole thread, I am struck by the amount of times we reference the same item as a means of evidence towards the opposite point.
For example, you use our non-fictional young couple with preemie as an example of how well the government system worked and we should all have such care and get rid of private insurance, whereas I use it as an example of how stuff is working as its supposed to so why fix it if it ain’t broke.
You use nightmare Medicare stories as an example of why we need government overhaul, the opposition (not me, I still haven’t made up my mind on this one.) sees them as exactly the reason the government needs to keep its involvement to a minimum.
As a personal aside, a few years ago we had a maintenance guy who had worked here for years. Whenever insurance time came up he always declined because he didn’t want to by the $150 per month. Time came when he got cancer, and all of the sudden he demanded coverage and demanded that it cover his cancer. I convinced our agent pulled some strings (whatever she did, I do believe that it involved some falsehoods to the insurance carrier) and the insurance company added him to the policy at his regular premium and paid untold amounts for chemo and so on over the next couple of months until he passed away. I used to actually drive him to the chemo sessions and pick him up as part of my daily errands for a while. When commentators on the left continually bash insurance companies, using the 1% of the time things go wrong, but avoid the 99% of the times they get stuff right, when they whine about pre-existing conditions, even though in my experience a lot of uninsured people choose NOT to have insurance and then when they get sick seem to think the insurance company should pay out thousands while they just pay their lousy premium of a couple of hundred dollars, its just stupid.
The very basis of the word insurance infers that you’re supposed to be paying into the system and then when something happens, you’re covered, not something happens, now that I need it I’ll trade you a couple of hundred in premiums and demand hundreds of thousands in coverage. Just out of curiousity, do you ever have clients who are uninsured at the time of their wreck and then attempt to buy insurance after the fact and make it cover their accident….?
According to this article:
http://www.factcheck.org/2009/06/the-real-uninsured/
26% of the uninsured actually qualify for some sort of government program but do not take advantage of it – which takes our uninsured population 47M down to 35M.
There are stupid people on both sides. Thankfully there are two superior intellects such as ourselves to sort through this for the simpletons.
So, to boil it down:
Smirk: Death Panels!
Chancho: Rosa Parks!
Here is a song about rule under us…
By: smirkdirk on August 20, 2009
at 12:31 pm
How dare you put words in Smirk’s mouth.
By: Chancho Cox on August 20, 2009
at 2:35 pm