Posted on 04/11/2009 6:33:21 PM PDT by anniegetyourgun
Republican senators are hyperventilating over the possibility that Democrats might try to pass health care reform with only a majority vote — depriving them of the chance to try to block legislation with filibusters that can only be overcome with the votes of at least three-fifths of all senators.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
It sounds to me as though it’s the Old Gray Mare that is the one doing the “hyperventilating”.
friday i got my physical.
the female doc was attended by a female nurse.
she had me undress, checked me for a hernia, and did a proctology.
i wonder—do women undress in front of male doc’s and nurses?
“The NYTimes says - ram it through, no matter the cost, no matter the product, no matter what anyone else thinks.”
Insurance, especially if you are self-employed or self-insured is close to unattainable for the average person with an average salary. Some of these people, faced with the alternative of no-insurance will support socialized medicine, even though they are politically not democrats.
If the GOP supports status quo with insurance, then they will lose politically.
If Obama resists the temptation to implement right away he will have a political winner of an issue to get re-elected.
The insurance/healthcare system is broken for too many working folks. Merely opposing socialized medicine is not enough this time. I’m afraid the GOP is not up to the task, and they will get plowed under politically by having no alternative to a situation that is financially killing small business and self-insured folks.
The Dems will have legions of self-insured folks with pre-existing conditions and will wheel them out. What is the GOP response? They have none.
So what is the GOP alternative to socialized medicine, if not status quo?
No doubt my two Senators (both stupid democrats) and one Congresscritter (an equally stupid democrat) see things the same way.
That's the problem with all the health care/medical insurance proposals ~ there's nothing in them for anyone!
The Swiss system.
Every person MUST have health insurance.
If you cant find your own, for whatever reason, you are placed in the “assigned risk” pool; similar to what we do for car insurance.
It’s a real problem. I have MS, and we have group insurance at this time, so no problem. But if we had to go to private insurance, I’d be satisfied to be able to purchase a policy with a large deductible, but that wouldn’t be possible. They’d put a rider on anything related to the MS. I guess I could do w/out the interferon, and take the bet that my MS wouldn’t worsen. But there’s no getting around having to have occasional MRIs, physical therapy, and regular (every 6 month) neuro visits. (I’m no doctor lover, and that’s the only time I really go to the doctor.)
But say I could afford the MRIs, neuro visits, etc. even if I was covered for non-MS things, I know insurance companies. If I came down with pneumonia, they’d try to blame it on the MS and not pay. If I had to see a urologist for a bladder infection, they’d blame it on the MS and not pay. That’s the major problem I see when someone has a chronic illness. If you have a rider on the policy, they try to get out of paying whatever they can by blaming it on the existing illness.
Of course, but I always have a female chaperone in the room.
It was the law where I was a student, and it's crazy not to do it.
“Every person MUST have health insurance.”
Which hasn’t worked too well in Mass. But this isn’t the GOP alternative. They have proposed neither this, nor any other system.
But look at the two alternatives politically:
#1: You have to buy your own insurance at a cost of $500/mo (or whatever) for a young person with no pre-existing conditions with an average salary for a young person, just starting out.
#2: “the rich” pay for your insurance. It’s a right, after all.
If you have to sell one of the two alternatives to the American people, which one would you have a better chance of selling.
Again, the GOP has no alternative. I’m not sure there is one to overcome scenario #2 - which is why I’m 100% sure that we are going to get socialized medicine, at least until it fails.
It is also a certainty that Obama and company will use option 2 to sell their plan.
The GOP is dead meat on this issue, unfortunately.
“It’s a real problem. I have MS”
I agree. The Insurance companies have finessed themselves out of a profitable business.
If you were self insured and faced with financial ruin and a painful debilitating condition - but the status quo, or taking a stab at socialized medicine - where at least you wouldn’t be left totally destitute for trying to seek care (even if it is poor care) which would you choose?
I know which one I’d go for if I were you. You have to have care for your condition - and status quo is not possible.
That’s the problem - conservatives will support it, not because they want to, but because many will HAVE to.
What makes you think that a single-payer system would get you the treatment you want? A national health care system would work pretty much like the Veterans hospitals. Some are awesome, some are awful. But THEY decied what treatmentsyou will get. Insurance companies are bureaucratic, but governmental institutions are an even larger bureacracy and even more bound by rules. Have you ever wondered why they shut down the mental hospitals?
“What makes you think that a single-payer system would get you the treatment you want?”
That’s the wrong question.
If you had a significant pre-existing condition, your choice is financial ruin and no coverage for your condition or the “promise” of care under socialized medicine.
Which would you pick? Check your brain at the door, and try not to think too far ahead like the average American.
It’s really an easy choice. The fact that you may not actually get care is a problem down the road.
Oh, by the way, notice we had no option from the GOP. They have no alternative, and therefore will be politically irrelevant.
Obama can be even more incompetent than he’s been already, and will win if he promises socialized medicine.
The GOP doesn’t get it. The status quo cannot be anymore.
Same here. I've had the evil rotten b@$t@rds lie to me more than once. I've been given incorrect call back numbers to check on an issue, been given approvals for payment that were later rescinded or modified, out right lied to, etc. With any other business, if you were treated that shabbily you'd be able to either sue them or do business elsewhere. Insurers viciously abuse the fact that they have control of our health care. I believe that they get away with it because they have the money to buy the politicians.
I've been screwed by auto insurers, too, although the company I insure with lately has been good, in fairness.
I’m not for a single payer system, I’m just saying there are no good solutions for people with chronic illness.
If you happen to win the “health lottery” and don’t have to contend with something chronic, then you can buy private insurance, no problem, and probably be happy with it.
But once you’re “labeled” with something chronic, you really have no choices available if you lose your group plan.
Any reform is going to deprive a lot of people of medical care. that’s simply because of the confusion, and because of the increased demand. Fact is that the Democrats have no real plan. They expect somehow piecemeal to arrive at something like the NHS in England. But the USA is too big and diverse for that to happen. Great Britain was for all intents and persons used to governmental controls because of the war. They were also used to scarcity. The status quo that you dislike so much produces very good medicare care for millions of people. I think that attempts to reform it are going to muck that up.
For the last 3 years, I've avoided the whole mess by having a female doc.
Even if the GOP had a good plan, they have no voice and no votes. We live in a 1-party world now.
When my Dad died in 1965, he was in a private room in a good hospital for $20 a day. A small insurance policy covered everything. That is $135 a day in today’s money. Medicare changed the whole economics of medical care. Millions of previously uninsured people were able to get the same kind of care. Medicine was flooded with money. The demand increased exponentially. But the expansion was gradual. Sort of like public education.
What is going to happen if the federal government tries to supercede within a few years a system that has been buillt up for forty years?
...funny how LIBS think the “nuclear” option is Just Fine and Dandy .... they sure screamed ‘bloody murder’ when the Republicans threatened to use it during Bush’s term. Liberal Hypocracy once again!
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