Maybe he didn't lie, but

[FrankDC]

I have no idea as to Stupak's motives (and am not inclined to speculate), but I do know that some excellent lawyers have scrutizined the bill and have concluded that it would, or at least could, circumvent the Hyde Amendment. When legislators offer amendments to clarify the survival of Hyde's prohibitions, they are resisted by the bill's supporters, who happen to be pro-abortion rights.

Well, just to restate my position, I would favor specific language in this bill to prevent federal funding of non-elective abortions. However I don't believe the lack of this language should derail the entire bill.

But upon further reading it appears the issue is moot anyway. The Hyde Amendment is a rider that must be renewed in yearly spending bills, and both Obama and Democratic leaders have said they are not going to renew it next time around. Unfortunate, but that's how our system works. Those of us who feel strongly enough about the issue should vote accordingly.

[a4audi08]

politicians lie. that's what they do. i supported obama, but was never under any delusion that he was going to "change" the way washington works. as far as abortions - my suspicion is that the provision will eventually sneak in with some sort of "compromise" that allows funds to cover the procedure if it is required for the health of the mother - a loose standard but i think one that the blue dogs that are actually against funding the procedure can live with.

if im not mistaken i think wouldashoulda is talking about the tax on "cadillac" plans. judging by how vehemently the unions are fighting this provision, i wouldnt be surprised if it isn't eventually stripped out of the bill.

finally, i do believe that as one poster above said that this is a slow march towards a single payer system. it will probably take a generation or so, but i think thats the eventual goal and i honestly dont see anything wrong with it. i have yet to hear of one coherent argument as to what exactly it is that private health insurance companies add to justify their outsized profits.

[ksinc]

politicians lie. that's what they do. i supported obama, but was never under any delusion that he was going to "change" the way washington works. as far as abortions - my suspicion is that the provision will eventually sneak in with some sort of "compromise" that allows funds to cover the procedure if it is required for the health of the mother - a loose standard but i think one that the blue dogs that are actually against funding the procedure can live with.

if im not mistaken i think wouldashoulda is talking about the tax on "cadillac" plans. judging by how vehemently the unions are fighting this provision, i wouldnt be surprised if it isn't eventually stripped out of the bill.

finally, i do believe that as one poster above said that this is a slow march towards a single payer system. it will probably take a generation or so, but i think thats the eventual goal and i honestly dont see anything wrong with it. i have yet to hear of one coherent argument as to what exactly it is that private health insurance companies add to justify their outsized profits.

Maybe you haven't heard a coherent argument to your question because of the coherence of the question?

[WouldaShoulda]

... what exactly it is that private health insurance companies add to justify their outsized profits.

They (most) return over 90% of premium dollars collected to claims paid.

The Government wants 35%.

Now, let's discuss "outsized profits!!"

[Mike Petrik]

They (most) return over 90% of premium dollars collected to claims paid.

The Government wants 35%.

Now, let's discuss "outsized profits!!"

Yes, and about 80% of the remaining 10% covers expenses, with the remaining 2% or so of premium dollars representing "outsized profits." I suppose it is that 2% that we will save. Add that to the additional savings generated by the efficiencies long associated with government monopolies, we soon won't have to work at all. Viva la revolucion!!!

[a4audi08]

Maybe you haven't heard a coherent argument to your question because of the coherence of the question?

i apologize. i guess my issue is having a profit motive in an industry whose main motivation should be keeping people healthy. the only way to squeeze enough dollars out of the system to justify your stock price to wall street is by doing things like denying coverage to someone who has paid their premiums religiously based on some typographical error in a form they filled out years ago.

[Mike Petrik]

I don't understand what is so bad about the profit motive. It feeds us, supplies us with legal representation when our life or liberty is at stake, and shelters us too. Greed and meanness will always be a problem, but eliminating the profit motive won't diminish that a bit. And ask the elderly if they have always been treated by Medicare. Claims are denied there too, and in some cases unfairly. There have been a handful of horror stories circulated about insurance companies unfairly denying claims, but in most cases upon investigation they turn out to be quite exaggerated.

[FrankDC]

I don't understand what is so bad about the profit motive. It feeds us, supplies us with legal representation when our life or liberty is at stake, and shelters us too. Greed and meanness will always be a problem, but eliminating the profit motive won't diminish that a bit. And ask the elderly if they have always been treated by Medicare. Claims are denied there too, and in some cases unfairly. There have been a handful of horror stories circulated about insurance companies unfairly denying claims, but in most cases upon investigation they turn out to be quite exaggerated.

Any profit-based health care system is fundamentally immoral. What's best for insured patients is rarely what's best for shareholders of the company who's insuring them. It's as simple as that.

For uninsured Americans, our health care system is already socialized. Anyone can walk into any county health clinic and be treated without charge for their serious medical problems.

[PetroLandman]

Based on your inability to grasp spelling, punctuation and logic, I would join those who suggest you read a book or two and learn the language.

As to the list of countries which became so amazingly enlightened before 'we' did, I wonder how long those countries were in existence prior to that enlightenment as opposed to 'us'. In most cases, centuries rather than decades, I would think although I am sufficiently disinterested in your 'point' to look it up.

[Quay]

...Anyway, the bottom line is that we're being strangled by a corrupt two-party political cartel...Neither party has been or is willing to do what's needed to fix our problems.

'Twas always thus:

Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule - and both commonly succeed, and are right.

~H.L. Mencken, 1956

But will it always be so? Yes, until there is something like 100% public campaign financing and the rot stops being funded.

"Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder." -- George Washington, letter 1779

"Our government...must be freed from the sinister influence or control of special interests (which) corrupt the men and methods of government for their own profit. We must drive the special interests out of politics... The citizens of the United States must effectively control the mighty commercial forces which they have themselves called into being. There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but it can be done." -- Theodore Roosevelt

"What stuns me most about contemporary politics is not even that the system has been so badly corrupted by money. It is that so few people get the connection between their lives and what the bozos do in Washington and our state capitols." -- Molly Ivins

[PetroLandman]

Any profit-based health care system is fundamentally immoral. What's best for insured patients is rarely what's best for shareholders of the company who's insuring them. It's as simple as that.

For uninsured Americans, our health care system is already socialized. Anyone can walk into any county health clinic and be treated without charge for their serious medical problems.

My sister-in-law and her husband, both about 40, have not held jobs since I have known them (ten years). They have two boys, 10 and 6, and live in a converted store front in a small Texas town. He has been in prison twice in the ten years I have known them, drunk driving. She was diagnosed in April with pancreatic cancer. She has no 'insurance' to use the simplified phrase of Ms Pelosi. Her care at Baylor Hospital in Dallas, East Texas Medical Center in Athens and her doctor in Corsicana has been absolutely great. She gets unlimited prescription drugs, so much so that her husband sells every other Hydrocodone prescription on the street! She has had numerous CT scans and a whole host of tests as well as weekly chemo treatments. Thus far it has cost her NOTHING.

These are two of the most irresponsible adults that I can imagine and yet they have been GIVEN treatment far better than I could get with the policy for which I pay over $800 per month.

What is 'broken' in our system that the amazingly stupid legislation being considered will fix? It works well for my sister-in-law and her husband as well as other flakes.

The government is in charge of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the Post Office all of which are losers. So will this be.

[agnash]

Any profit-based health care system is fundamentally immoral. What's best for insured patients is rarely what's best for shareholders of the company who's insuring them. It's as simple as that.

Doctors and nurses go to work every day to make a profit. They may love what they do, and absolutely believe in their mission, but if they didn't make money they would do something else. Drug researchers and the people working in the factories making the drugs live in the same world. Hospitals as an indutry made about 3% last year. Insurance companies, on average, made about 3.4%. Drug manufacturers made 8.9%.

What is best for health insurance companies is having lots of healthy people paying premiums to make up for the people who get sick. Unfortunately, a lot of healthy people have figured this out.

[nick.mccann]

"Insurers' profits not as big as claimed"


http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/biz-economy/314754

[FrankDC]

My sister-in-law and her husband, both about 40, have not held jobs since I have known them (ten years). They have two boys, 10 and 6, and live in a converted store front in a small Texas town. He has been in prison twice in the ten years I have known them, drunk driving. She was diagnosed in April with pancreatic cancer. She has no 'insurance' to use the simplified phrase of Ms Pelosi. Her care at Baylor Hospital in Dallas, East Texas Medical Center in Athens and her doctor in Corsicana has been absolutely great. She gets unlimited prescription drugs, so much so that her husband sells every other Hydrocodone prescription on the street! She has had numerous CT scans and a whole host of tests as well as weekly chemo treatments. Thus far it has cost her NOTHING.

These are two of the most irresponsible adults that I can imagine and yet they have been GIVEN treatment far better than I could get with the policy for which I pay over $800 per month.

What is 'broken' in our system that the amazingly stupid legislation being considered will fix? It works well for my sister-in-law and her husband as well as other flakes.

The government is in charge of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the Post Office all of which are losers. So will this be.

Social Security is one of the two most successful government programs in U.S. history. It's been accomplishing its intended goals for nearly 75 years, is currently keeping 40% of Americans over age 65 out of poverty, and currently has a $2.5 trillion (yes, with a T) surplus in its trust fund.

As for your family, you answered your own question. The reason why your sister-in-law receives better care is because her bills are paid by the government, and not by soulless pennypinchers at a private HMO who are responsible to their shareholders.

[nick.mccann]

Social Security is one of the two most successful government programs in U.S. history.

Please tell me you're joking? It's the biggest ponzi scheme in history. The first in do well, and the last ones do bad. The people who were in on it early will make a lot from it, while it's estimated the average 25 year old now will pay 300,000 more than he'll receive. I'm searching for the source of that quote, but I heard it a few weeks ago.

But the fact is SS will be a massive failure like all ponzi scheme, they look good for a while, great returns then out of nowhere reality hits and people realize it was a scam.

Consequently, whether there is $2.4 trillion in the Social Security trust fund or $240 trillion has no bearing on the federal government's ability to pay benefits that have been promised.

http://www.forbes.com/2009/05/14/tax...-medicare.html

[ksinc]

i apologize. i guess my issue is having a profit motive in an industry whose main motivation should be keeping people healthy. the only way to squeeze enough dollars out of the system to justify your stock price to wall street is by doing things like denying coverage to someone who has paid their premiums religiously based on some typographical error in a form they filled out years ago.

No need to apologize. I was just making an observation. I agree that they have to squeeze out profits which is consistent with their industry profit margins; which are pretty low - lower than most industries. I think that is part of the problem - it just is the opposite of "outsized profits."

If people could make "outsized profits" by offering affordable health insurance I think they would be incentized to do so.

I would disagree the motivation of insurance companies should be to keep people healthy; I think that's the motivation of doctors and the two are rightly separate. Insurance companies are just providing financing IMHO. I think people have some unreasonable expectations. For instance, I don't expect our Mortgage companies to insulate our houses to save on utility bills.

[ksinc]

Any profit-based health care system is fundamentally immoral. What's best for insured patients is rarely what's best for shareholders of the company who's insuring them. It's as simple as that.

I'm sorry, there is an absolute standard of morality all the sudden? I hate it when I fall asleep watching TV, wake up, and the world has turned on a dime ...

[PetroLandman]

How anyone could believe that SS is a successful program is beyond laughable. It is the single most shameful program ever devised by our government. It is a horrible 'investment' for all of us and if it were proposed by a private enterprise, that enterprise and its executives would be behind bars!

As for my sister-in-law's care, my point WAS that she got great treatment from the CURRENT program available to her making a 'new and improved' program a mistake! To believe that the legislation being rushed through has even one thing to do with health care is to believe in the Easter Bunny.

Post script: For those who in their ignorance defend Social Security, please just Google the names of two counties in Texas - Galveston County and Brazoria County - and take a look at what those counties have achieved for their employees. You will be ashamed to be a proponent of the debacle in Washington.

[FrankDC]

How anyone could believe that SS is a successful program is beyond laughable. It is the single most shameful program ever devised by our government. It is a horrible 'investment' for all of us and if it were proposed by a private enterprise, that enterprise and its executives would be behind bars!

One thing that's rarely mentioned by people who're trying to destroy SS is that retirement of the baby boom generation is a temporary burden. According to the CBO, a 4.9% increase in SS payroll taxes would ensure the solvency of SS indefinitely. The program has been solid for 75 years, and with a very modest shift in spending priorities (e.g. from defense spending to SS), it will be solid for at least another 75 years.

One last point, I hope no one is still advocating the "privatization" of SS. Had we listened to GWB, now that would have been catastrophic for the program.

As for my sister-in-law's care, my point WAS that she got great treatment from the CURRENT program available to her making a 'new and improved' program a mistake! To believe that the legislation being rushed through has even one thing to do with health care is to believe in the Easter Bunny.

That's incorrect, and illogical. What's being proposed is an extension of the exact same SS Medicare benefits to cover all uninsured Americans (and hopefully, an option for all Americans period). The bill might be new, but the benefits definitely are not. You said her health care was better than yours, and you're the one paying over $800/mo. for private insurance.

[nick.mccann]

Madoff's fund was "solid" for a while then out of now where it was trouble, like all ponzi schemes they come to an end after a lifetime of looking great. SS is not any different, it's a massive ponzi scheme.

You want more government and taxes, we can't pay for the government we already have, we have to print and borrow, that cannot last in the long run. Our tax rate is too high, you raise it more and capital will flee to Asia. In states where they raise taxes or have high taxes like New York, they're having a problem with the wealthy leaving. Our government will have to take a massive reduction in size once we can't print or borrow large amounts anymore. We're running our future on a giant credit card that is almost maxed out and will have to pay back. America cannot afford most the programs it has with unfunded liabilities at 100 Trillion dollars...about twice the global GDP.

US debt is 350% of GDP, unsustainable especially as we lose the reserve currency status and will face higher inflation and a weaker dollar all while we've lost most our jobs the produce real wealth.

[FrankDC]

Nick, we've tried the slash and burn approach to taxes twice in the last 30 years, and both times it was an unqualified disaster. When Ronald Reagan won election in 1980 the U.S. was the world's largest creditor. By the time he left office in 1988 we were the world's largest debtor, a title we still hold today.

The problem is not overtaxation, it's spending. When we have the Cato Institute saying we need to cut our defense budget in half, something is very, VERY wrong with our existing defense budget. Their budgets should have returned to peacetime levels after WWII, but the industrial complex Eisenhower specifically warned us about in 1961 (by then the warning was much too late) succeeded in keeping their budgets at wartime levels. Since 1946 it's been over $100 trillion flushed directly down the toilet, and we're still flushing at least a half-trillion dollars a year down that same commode.

Similar cases can be made for most other government behemoths, everything from the Depts. of Energy and Education to domestic terrorist organizations like the DEA and FDA.

I agree that this spending binge cannot continue forever, but I think (or at least pray) it'll be a massive reprioritization rather than a complete collapse.

[ksinc]

Nick, we've tried the slash and burn approach to taxes twice in the last 30 years, and both times it was an unqualified disaster. When Ronald Reagan won election in 1980 the U.S. was the world's largest creditor. By the time he left office in 1988 we were the world's largest debtor, a title we still hold today.

The problem is not overtaxation, it's spending. When we have the Cato Institute saying we need to cut our defense budget in half, something is very, VERY wrong with our existing defense budget. Their budgets should have returned to peacetime levels after WWII, but the industrial complex Eisenhower specifically warned us about in 1961 (by then the warning was much too late) succeeded in keeping their budgets at wartime levels. Since 1946 it's been over $100 trillion flushed directly down the toilet, and we're still flushing at least a half-trillion dollars a year down that same commode.

Similar cases can be made for most other government behemoths, everything from the Depts. of Energy and Education to domestic terrorist organizations like the DEA and FDA.

I agree that this spending binge cannot continue forever, but I think (or at least pray) it'll be a massive reprioritization rather than a complete collapse.

So, why not start with the largest spending program?

[FrankDC]

So, why not start with the largest spending program?

If you're referring to Social Security, it's an entitlement not a "spending program". People are simply taking out what they specifically paid into it.

Also, relative to other countries the U.S. doesn't spend an exhorbitant amount on social programs. Currently it's just over 4% of GDP, which is about 1% lower than it was in 1980. Defense spending, on the other hand, is nothing short of obscene. Our annual defense budget is half as big as the rest of the world's, and we're spending more than the next 14 highest countries COMBINED (which includes China).

[ksinc]

If you're referring to Social Security, it's an entitlement not a "spending program". People are simply taking out what they specifically paid into it.

Also, relative to other countries the U.S. doesn't spend an exhorbitant amount on social programs. Currently it's just over 4% of GDP, which is about 1% lower than it was in 1980. Defense spending, on the other hand, is nothing short of obscene. Our annual defense budget is half as big as the rest of the world's, and we're spending more than the next 14 highest countries COMBINED (which includes China).

"For FY 2009, Department of Defense spending amounts to 4.8% of GDP"

So, is over 4% of GDP an "obscene" or not "exhorbitant" amount?

Since this is clearly your source

The 2009 U.S. military budget is almost as much as the rest of the world's defense spending combined and is over nine times larger than the military budget of China (compared at the nominal US dollar / Renminbi rate, not the PPP rate). The United States and its close allies are responsible for about two-thirds of the world's military spending (of which, in turn, the U.S. is responsible for the majority).

In 2005, the United States spent 4.06% of its GDP on its military (considering only basic Department of Defense budget spending), more than France's 2.6% and less than Saudi Arabia's 10%.[15] This is historically low for the United States since it peaked in 1944 at 37.8% of GDP (it reached the lowest point of 3.0% in 1999-2001). Even during the peak of the Vietnam War the percentage reached a high of 9.4% in 1968.[16]

[FrankDC]

"For FY 2009, Department of Defense spending amounts to 4.8% of GDP"

So, is over 4% of GDP an "obscene" or not "exhorbitant" amount?

Since this is clearly your source

It's all about priorities. Over four percent of GDP to care for the American people, or over four percent to pay for military adventurism and presidential photo-ops on aircraft carriers? Your choice.