Government shutdown looms over ObamaCare

[shira]

What I want to hear from the right is - just once - a rational, workable alternative to Obamacare that solves the death-spiral trajectory of the pre-Obamacare, status-quo, private-insurer-based system, with its ever greater number of un- and under-insureds.

Instead, all we hear is "kill obamacare," as if that's a solution to anything.

It's the height of irresponsibility to merely oppose, oppose, oppose without actually offering substantive alternatives.

 

[Vic Vega]

...

 

[buckshot24]

What I want to hear from the right is - just once - a rational, workable alternative to Obamacare that solves the death-spiral trajectory of the pre-Obamacare, status-quo, private-insurer-based system, with its ever greater number of un- and under-insureds.

I don't need an alternative to dog shit on my carpet. I just want it cleaned it up.

Instead, all we hear is "kill obamacare," as if that's a solution to anything.

Yes, this is the biggest problem in health care now, thanks to the health fascists out there. The first thing you do when you find a tumor is decide how to get rid of it, not what you can replace it with.

It's the height of irresponsibility to merely oppose, oppose, oppose without actually offering substantive alternatives.

I'm opposed to dog shit on my carpet, I'm opposed to tumors in my body, I'm opposed to health fascism. Some things deserve to be opposed.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

What I want to hear from the right is - just once - a rational, workable alternative to Obamacare that solves the death-spiral trajectory of the pre-Obamacare, status-quo, private-insurer-based system, with its ever greater number of un- and under-insureds.

Instead, all we hear is "kill obamacare," as if that's a solution to anything.

It's the height of irresponsibility to merely oppose, oppose, oppose without actually offering substantive alternatives.

"I want to hear from the right"...
Well that's part of the problem. You and others are looking for, no insisting on, political and ideological solutions to a concern that should avoid both. The truth is most who support Obamacare here will fight against any such alternative.

 

[Jhhnn]

"I want to hear from the right"...
Well that's part of the problem. You and others are looking for, no insisting on, political and ideological solutions to a concern that should avoid both. The truth is most who support Obamacare here will fight against any such alternative.

Yeh, that's why Repubs wanted to make healthcare reform into "Obama's Waterloo".

They haven't just put it in term of politics, but rather in terms of warfare.

So, uhh, what do we get if they win, other than the same ailing system that needed serious reform before the ACA? Perhaps another trickledown flimflam that'll route an even greater share to the tippytop? Health insurance providers too big to fail over which there's no control at the state level? More Americans who can't afford basic care?

Seems like the whole routine of "teach the controversy" about evolution, like granting legitimacy to bullshit as if it were reasonable in the first place.

 

[glenn1]

Yeh, that's why Repubs wanted to make healthcare reform into "Obama's Waterloo".

They haven't just put it in term of politics, but rather in terms of warfare.

So, uhh, what do we get if they win, other than the same ailing system that needed serious reform before the ACA? Perhaps another trickledown flimflam that'll route an even greater share to the tippytop? Health insurance providers too big to fail over which there's no control at the state level? More Americans who can't afford basic care?

Seems like the whole routine of "teach the controversy" about evolution, like granting legitimacy to bullshit as if it were reasonable in the first place.

The ailing system that needed reform before ACA is still better than the system post-ACA. The biggest problem with ACA is that the problems it attempts to solve are geared to help small impacted populations and are either immaterial or directly harmful to the majority of the larger population.

 

[palehorse]

Obamacare and the Wake county school system here in NC:

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/06/01/2932880/some-nc-employers-cut-worker-hours.html#storylink=cpy

Just an example of the awesomeness that is Obamacare.

Fern

I think it's telling that obamacare supporters have thus far ignored this post completely.

I also think that the Wake County Schools situation perfectly demonstrates all that is wrong with the ACA, and that there will be a countless number of similar situations in every single market/industry.

The reality of those fiscal decisions, and their repercussions, is a truly frightening prospect...

 

[piasabird]

I say let O'bammacare be fully implemented. Like half the states or more do not want to do anything with it. States like Illinois and California could be both pushed into default by Obammacare. There will be howling and whaling and mashing of teeth!

 

[berzerker60]

Repetition #438452433: Literally no one thinks Obamacare is great as-is and doesn't need some real changes and fixes, like virtually every other piece of major legislation ever passed that needs amendments as it comes into effect to fix oversights and flaws. The problem is that Republicans are so 100000% anti-Obamacare-no-matter-what-no-compromise that they won't allow those amendments to pass, thinking this will accelerate Obamacare's complete repeal. Would those changes make Obamacare great? I don't know. They would certainly make it better. Bitching about how Obamacare has flaws when you're completely unwilling to even passively allow solutions to pass is absurd.

Now, based on the rest of this thread, someone will say "Cancer is bad, there's no making it better," which is a dumb over-stretched-analogy rather than an argument. No one can honestly say pre-ACA health care in America was anything but horribly flawed, no matter how much you hate the ACA. No one can honestly say there are no parts of ACA that make like better for virtually everyone, like making health insurance companies spend at least 80% of collected premiums on health care instead of denying every claim and playing Big Finance games with the premiums. You want the individual mandate and other major parts of the ACA repealed? That's a fair position to take. But complete repeal is an absurd position, unless you're simultaneously actually proposing concrete aspects to immediately re-instate in addition to a better overall plan.

 

[ivwshane]

When did righties become bitches? All they do is whine. You name it and they will find something to whine about. When something they were whining about is addressed they whine about how long it took to get it addressed.

Ask them to provide a solution to a problem and they will whine about that.

Well guess what, you had your chance to add your input into the healthcare reform debate and you chose to whine about it instead of contributing.
So go to your room like the little kids you are and don't come out until you are done whining.

No one likes a whiner.


I await your whiny responses

 

[TerryMathews]

When did righties become bitches? All they do is whine. You name it and they will find something to whine about. When something they were whining about is addressed they whine about how long it took to get it addressed.

Ask them to provide a solution to a problem and they will whine about that.

Well guess what, you had your chance to add your input into the healthcare reform debate and you chose to whine about it instead of contributing.
So go to your room like the little kids you are and don't come out until you are done whining.

No one likes a whiner.


I await your whiny responses

Its hard to refute such a well thought out debate point. My hat is off to you, master debater. :sly:

 

[ivwshane]

Its hard to refute such a well thought out debate point. My hat is off to you, master debater. :sly:

Actually it's pretty fucking easy. It starts by ignoring what I wrote and instead provide solutions to improve the US healthcare system.

Instead you chose to sarcastically whine about my post.

You guys are so predictable.

 

[glenn1]

Actually it's pretty fucking easy. It starts by ignoring what I wrote and instead provide solutions to improve the US healthcare system.

Instead you chose to sarcastically whine about my post.

You guys are so predictable.

For what end? It's not like progressives would ever accept the offered solutions anyway. The two sides are simply too far away in what they even see as being the problem to ever agree on any solution worth discussing. You're not going to agree with a plan that centers on Health Savings Account/catastrophic insurance plans, and I'll never agree on Single Payer. This will end with the abject and total capitulation of one side or the other. And probably even then you will have partisan warfare for generations to come, as with abortion.

 

[berzerker60]

For what end? It's not like progressives would ever accept the offered solutions anyway. The two sides are simply too far away in what they even see as being the problem to ever agree on any solution worth discussing. You're not going to agree with a plan that centers on Health Savings Account/catastrophic insurance plans, and I'll never agree on Single Payer. This will end with the abject and total capitulation of one side or the other. And probably even then you will have partisan warfare for generations to come, as with abortion.

Too far away in what? One side already did capitulate entirely, the Democrats accepted the 1990s Republican proposal wholesale. Instead of that being a 'compromise,' it's only led to this consensus 'solution' being cast as horrible evil commu-fascistic-socialism.

 

[TerryMathews]

Actually it's pretty fucking easy. It starts by ignoring what I wrote and instead provide solutions to improve the US healthcare system.

Instead you chose to sarcastically whine about my post.

You guys are so predictable.

You must be using some liberal definition of whine.

To get back to your original point, I would support a law that actually made health care more affordable by limiting costs. This law just crammed more customers into the same broken system and drove my costs up. I can't want to see what 2014 brings.

 

[Jhhnn]

The ailing system that needed reform before ACA is still better than the system post-ACA. The biggest problem with ACA is that the problems it attempts to solve are geared to help small impacted populations and are either immaterial or directly harmful to the majority of the larger population.

Stating projection as fact, huh? Followed by a nice string of hazy innuendo & accusation.

"Small impacted populations" you don't give a damn about? How small are they, in your mind, and why is it just fine that they get screwed? Because in this corporate utopia, somebody's gonna get screwed, and at least you've got yours, so you're not getting screwed?

Not yet, anyway. Predators just start on the weakest.

 

[ivwshane]

You must be using some liberal definition of whine.

To get back to your original point, I would support a law that actually made health care more affordable by limiting costs. This law just crammed more customers into the same broken system and drove my costs up. I can't want to see what 2014 brings.

Thanks for the attempt, would you like to elaborate on your feel good talking point? Because I'm with you on what you want as I feel most people are, the issue of course is how do we achieve that?

 

[TerryMathews]

Thanks for the attempt, would you like to elaborate on your feel good talking point? Because I'm with you on what you want as I feel most people are, the issue of course is how do we achieve that?

I would start with some level of tort reform. A doctor shouldn't be liable for a mountain of costs if he or she acts in a reasonable manner and yet death is still the outcome.

Medical malpractice lawsuits are clearly hyperprofitable; there is a whole industry built up around soliciting for it.

We get fixated on oil profits and bank profits. Maybe we need to take a closer look at other profitable industries, especially parasitic ones.

 

[fskimospy]

In the end this doesn't matter much anyway, the democrats will never give in on this demand as it would do nothing other than open them up to endless blackmail going forward. The only question is how irresponsible the Republicans will act before capitulating. Their leadership knows this is a loser anyway.

You really have to wonder when they will stop having a temper tantrum and start trying to constructively contribute.

 

[ivwshane]

I would start with some level of tort reform. A doctor shouldn't be liable for a mountain of costs if he or she acts in a reasonable manner and yet death is still the outcome.

Medical malpractice lawsuits are clearly hyperprofitable; there is a whole industry built up around soliciting for it.

We get fixated on oil profits and bank profits. Maybe we need to take a closer look at other profitable industries, especially parasitic ones.

Tort reform is good but it wouldn't affect prices in any meaningful way. The last I heard was that lawsuits only accounted for less than 3% of healthcare costs.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Yeh, that's why Repubs wanted to make healthcare reform into "Obama's Waterloo".

They haven't just put it in term of politics, but rather in terms of warfare.

So, uhh, what do we get if they win, other than the same ailing system that needed serious reform before the ACA? Perhaps another trickledown flimflam that'll route an even greater share to the tippytop? Health insurance providers too big to fail over which there's no control at the state level? More Americans who can't afford basic care?

Seems like the whole routine of "teach the controversy" about evolution, like granting legitimacy to bullshit as if it were reasonable in the first place.

I think you must have missed the part about needing apolitical solutions. I don't care what the Republicans do to Obamacare. Ideally it would be done away with and people who know (and that's not legislators) guided this. Dems would endorse that as much as the Reps do Obamacare. Thanks but not interested.

 

[dawp]

Tort reform is good but it wouldn't affect prices in any meaningful way. The last I heard was that lawsuits only accounted for less than 3% of healthcare costs.

texas implemented tort reform and it did nothing to reduce the cost of healthcare.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Tort reform is good but it wouldn't affect prices in any meaningful way. The last I heard was that lawsuits only accounted for less than 3% of healthcare costs.

That's suits. Since the more tests are done the better the chances in a suit if things go wrong there is defensive medicine. That's not cheap.

 

[Jhhnn]

I think you must have missed the part about needing apolitical solutions. I don't care what the Republicans do to Obamacare. Ideally it would be done away with and people who know (and that's not legislators) guided this. Dems would endorse that as much as the Reps do Obamacare. Thanks but not interested.

I'm terribly sorry, but Repubs have turned this into trench warfare. Of course it would be different if the players had different attitudes. We'd all have ponies.

They don't.

Reality, sir. You shouldn't find it too obtrusive.

 

[TerryMathews]

That's suits. Since the more tests are done the better the chances in a suit if things go wrong there is defensive medicine. That's not cheap.

Right. Not to mention the decrease in malpractice insurance premiums and hospitals needing to hold a war chest to fight off claims.

It wouldn't cover the whole tab. It's a good start though.