Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Single-payer healthcare vs. Obamacare - "A signal in all the noise"
Salon ^ | David Sirota

Posted on 11/01/2013 3:14:44 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife

"Medicare for all" isn't perfect, but it does what the ACA can't: Guarantee better healthcare and a simpler system

Whenever scandal arises in Washington, D.C., the fight between the two parties typically ends up being a competition to identify a concise message in the chaos — or, as scientists might say, a signal in all the noise. This week confirms that truism, as glitches plagued the new Obamacare website and as insurance companies canceled policies for many customers on the individual market.

Amid the subsequent noise of congressional debate and cable TV outrage, Republicans argued that the signal is about government — more specifically, they claim the controversies validate their age-old assertions that government can’t do anything right. Democrats countered that the signal in the noise is about universal healthcare — Obamacare is a big undertaking, they argue, and so there will be bumps in the road as the program works to provide better health services to all Americans.

This back and forth is creating an even more confusing cacophony — and further obscuring the signal that neither the two parties nor their health industry financiers want to discuss. That signal is about the need for single-payer healthcare, otherwise known as Medicare for all.

One way to detect this signal is to consider the White House guest list.

In trying to show that he was successfully managing the Obamacare rollout, the president last week staged a high-profile White House meeting with private health insurance executives — aka Obamacare’s middlemen. The spectacle of a president begging these middlemen for help was a reminder that Obamacare did not limit the power of the insurance companies as a single-payer system would. The new law instead cemented the industry’s profit-extracting role in the larger health system — and it still leaves millions without insurance.

The second way to see this single-payer signal is to behold the Obamacare-related congressional hearings. During the proceedings, you’ve been hearing a lot about the insurance enrollment website that the government is paying millions to insurer UnitedHealth Group to build. But you’re not hearing much about actual health care. That’s because the insurance industry wrote the Affordable Care Act, meaning the new statute’s top priority isn’t delivering health services. Obamacare is primarily about getting the insurance industry more customers and government contracts, whether or not that actually improves health services.

The third way to see this single-payer signal is to simply experience the confusion about Obamacare for yourself.

If you’ve managed to successfully navigate Healthcare.gov, you probably have been treated to a wave of perplexing information about different kinds of private insurance plans and premiums. In other words, you haven’t seen a simple, standardized and guaranteed form of healthcare coverage like the kind provided by the single-payer government-administered Medicare system. You’ve likely seen the same maddeningly labyrinthine private insurance system that works to ration — and often deny — access to healthcare.

It didn’t have to be this way. Back when Obamacare was being negotiated, Congress could have circumvented the private insurance industry by simply expanding Medicare to cover everybody. Medicare isn’t perfect, of course, but it remains one of the most popular institutions in America because its single-payer model guarantees access to decent, cost-effective health care rather than just meager health insurance. It also does a good job of preventing profit-taking middlemen from getting between patients and their physicians.

Obamacare doesn’t do all that. It certainly includes some important reforms, but it doesn’t do what a single-payer system does — it doesn’t guarantee better healthcare or a more simple health system.

Those Democrats who pretend it does are just as dishonest as the Republicans who ignore Medicare and pretend government cannot effectively manage healthcare. All of them are making noise to drown out the single-payer signal.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; Health/Medicine; Politics
KEYWORDS: endgame; medicare; singlepayer; socializedmedicine
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-24 next last
single payer [aka government healthcare]....does a good job of preventing profit-taking middlemen from getting between patients and their physicians.

Oh yes! The "evil" profit takers.

In the end, LIBERALS plan for government to be the new middle man, the top man - an all caring, all controling socialist healthcare "paradise."

1 posted on 11/01/2013 3:14:44 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

The US which has the finest health care in the world will soon have that of the UK...Zip zero nada.


2 posted on 11/01/2013 3:19:17 AM PDT by AlexW
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife
When a business ends up with money left over, they call it profit and they usually re-invest a good part of it because they want to make the business better in the future.

When the government ends up with money left over, they call it graft and they usually spend it on their cronies, because its good to be king.

Profits = bad
Crony Capitalism = fascism = good

3 posted on 11/01/2013 3:23:31 AM PDT by ClearCase_guy (21st century. I'm not a fan.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

Evil and stupidity is a lethal combination.


4 posted on 11/01/2013 3:31:45 AM PDT by John Valentine (Deep in the Heart of Texas)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

I say no. The democrat party should not be rewarded for the mess they created.


5 posted on 11/01/2013 3:32:41 AM PDT by dforest
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: AlexW

Not really, we have one slight difference over the UK...our fine lawyers standing by to sue.

If I am denied a hip replacement because they think I’m sixty pounds too heavy....my lawyer will take it to court in my humble state, and within four months...win. I will also collect damages...likely in the $250,000 range for the torment.

All you need is forty thousand of this lawsuits going on monthly throughout the US....to bring the entire system to a failure within two years.

Congress and the President? Well...they will admit the system is bankrupt and the only solution left? Go back to step one and just let insurance companies sell their policy without government involvement.

This cycle...ever as vicious and stupid as you might deem it....will run through a decade and clean itself up by 2023. ObamaCare and Medicare XXL (likely the name of single-payer) will just fade on and be a Jeopardy question.

Single-payer is no match for the lawyers of America. They will destroy it....with absolute precision. Sadly, our knights in armor....a bunch of law school graduates...out to make a buck off anyone. The American system....you have to appreciate it.


6 posted on 11/01/2013 3:34:11 AM PDT by pepsionice
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: pepsionice

Wow. That didn’t take long. It’s like they designed an airplane that wouldn’t fly ... due to the height of ineptitude, and yet now they want to scrap everything (600 million or more later) and control the airport.

Wouldn’t trust these people to water my plants over the weekend, much less my healthcare.

They think THEY can manage it better? How about we just let doctors and patients manage it between themselves, like they used to do, ok?


7 posted on 11/01/2013 3:40:13 AM PDT by LibsRJerks
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: pepsionice

“Congress and the President? Well...they will admit the system is bankrupt and the only solution left? Go back to step one and just let insurance companies sell their policy without government involvement.”

One problem I had with Batman, Sherlock Holms, Moriarty and other related super hero’s is that government would NEVER admit they couldn’t handle the case. Similarly, no government would EVER admit it couldn’t handle something. The problem, you see, is we don’t have enough money. If we raise taxes just a penny on every dollar in existence, every time you use it, then we’ll solve all the problems. (It’s for the children. Do it for the children. If we save just ONE life, it’s worth it. How can you argue?)


8 posted on 11/01/2013 3:48:04 AM PDT by Gen.Blather
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife
“single payer [aka government healthcare]....does a good job of preventing profit-taking middlemen from getting between patients and their physicians.”

Oh sure, because we all know that there are no ‘middlemen (or women) in a government bureaucracy... What a sad joke.

9 posted on 11/01/2013 4:08:34 AM PDT by pieceofthepuzzle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: pepsionice

The only ones left by 2023 are the ones Government Health care hasn’t killed.


10 posted on 11/01/2013 4:10:38 AM PDT by Venturer (Keep Obama and you aint seen nothing yet.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: AlexW; ClearCase_guy; John Valentine; dforest; pepsionice; Gen.Blather; pieceofthepuzzle; ...

Stewart Varney reported on Fox & Friends this morning:

In 6 years [2020] it is projected we will have a shortage of 90,000 doctor.

You do not (will not) know who your doctor will be or what hospital you can go to when you sign up.


11 posted on 11/01/2013 4:14:01 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: AlexW
I think the most productive way out of this is to be working right now on alternative free-market approaches and be ready with them when wide dissatisfaction by the public leads to wide support to replace ACA. Actually, I think it's time already to begin developing and pitching alternative plans.
12 posted on 11/01/2013 4:14:13 AM PDT by pieceofthepuzzle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Venturer

No...the lawyers will be around. There’s billions to be made from single-payer law suits. This gravy train will be the biggest haul in American history. Billions to be awarded in pain-and-suffering cases....all leading back to the government’s little program. It’s like candy on the street...just find one idiot doctor or government guy to deny your needs, and you got a quarter-million in damages. People will be suing over and over...hauling out cash and laughing over the political figures worried about the collapse of the revenue bucket.


13 posted on 11/01/2013 4:14:37 AM PDT by pepsionice
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

Hospitals lose money on Medicare patients. A move to a single payer system is a move to nationalize healthcare entirely.


14 posted on 11/01/2013 4:17:36 AM PDT by driftdiver (I could eat it raw, but why do that when I have a fire.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: pieceofthepuzzle

“I think the most productive way out of this is to be working right now on alternative free-market approaches”
_________________________________________
Ohhh, now now comrade. You do know that you use speech that is not permissible in our new USSA.
Fall in line with dear leader. He knows best for you and our glorious revolution.


15 posted on 11/01/2013 4:20:15 AM PDT by AlexW
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

“You do not (will not) know who your doctor will be or what hospital you can go to when you sign up.”

I read recently that in New York, only 25% of doctors where planning on taking Obamacare. Many of those were taking it because they had existing contracts that required them to. When those contracts run out the percentage will doubtless drop. Having a plastic card and paying lots of money for coverage does not guarantee anybody will accept that card.

In addition, I have recently learned that if you go outside the system and pay cash for treatment you can be denied all coverage inside the system. (I think this is for Medicaid and Medicare.) This is apparently common in the UK, where if you have cancer it may be untreatable by the time you get your second doctor visit which is generally over a year from your first.


16 posted on 11/01/2013 4:25:08 AM PDT by Gen.Blather
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife
“You do not (will not) know who your doctor will be or what hospital you can go to when you sign up.”

The doctor-patient relationship has been under attack for a long while now. The plan all along was to diminish the central role of the individual physician and make physicians into ‘employees’ of a larger health care system - in which they could be better controlled.

It started with a simple change in language - calling physicians and everyone else involved in patient care at an individual level ‘providers’. Once that was in place, you can replace physicians with other types of ‘providers’ and go forward as though they are all interchangeable. In the minds of liberal bureaucrats this is a great way to mitigate any physician shortages, and it also takes control of the system away from physicians.

Then, they came up with legislation that made payment rates for tests and procedures done at private facilities lower than payment rates for exactly the same tests and procedures done at hospitals. By doing this they made it harder for private practices to remain financially solvent, and thus pushed physicians into selling their practices to large hospital corporations. This is happening everywhere right now, and it puts physicians under expanding hospital bureaucracies. By centralizing medical care into hospital systems like this, they made it easier to exert centralized control - ultimately at the federal level.

They also passed legislation restricting physician-owned and operated facilities (e.g. physician-owned hospitals), thus essentially saying that you can't be your own boss as a doctor.

The list goes on and on, but this has been happening for many years now. I've often wondered how some of this can even be Constitutional.

17 posted on 11/01/2013 4:29:44 AM PDT by pieceofthepuzzle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: pieceofthepuzzle

Flagstaff,AZ news paper:

“......Starting in January, he will charge each patient a $600 per year fee that lets them enjoy his “concierge” service. The fee can be paid in smaller installments. He will still bill a patient’s insurance and collect co-pays as before.

Signups will be on a first-come, first-served basis until the reduced roster is full. He said his patients who do not want to use the concierge service can still stay with the practice and be seen by Amy Clark, D.O. in his office or his nurse practitioner at no extra fee, he said.”...........

http://azdailysun.com/business/local/business-the-concierge-will-see-you-now/article_5be08d38-3e08-11e3-b5db-0019bb2963f4.html


18 posted on 11/01/2013 4:36:56 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: Gen.Blather

Good information. Thank you for posting it.

D’Amato and Giuliani where separate guests on this morning’s Fox & Friends - both ripping this “healthcare” scheme apart.


19 posted on 11/01/2013 4:42:07 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: Cincinatus' Wife

All this crap is all about PIECES OF PAPER. Those are called “insurance policies”, but are useful only for starting fires in the woodstove or reserve toilet paper.

When sick, what you need is MEDICAL CARE!!! From actual MEDICALLY-QUALIFIED PEOPLE!!!!

What about that, dumbass??


20 posted on 11/01/2013 5:03:07 AM PDT by Flintlock ("The redcoats are coming" -- TO SEIZE OUR GUNS!!--Paul Revere)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-24 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson