Mass. Pols OK Mandatory Health Insurance

AP ^ | 4/4/6 | STEVE LeBLANC

[SmithL]

BOSTON -- Lawmakers overwhelmingly approved a bill Tuesday that would make Massachusetts the first state to require that all of its citizens have some form of health insurance.

The plan — hailed as a national model and approved just 24 hours after the final details were released — would dramatically expand access to health care over the next three years.

If all goes as the supporters hope . . .

[ClaireSolt]

I don't think you copied a quote from me. As far as I am concerned, the individual is who decides. The rest is just government distorting an industry that has been around longer and has more experience than our country.

[ClaireSolt]

Stop falling for that lower income, sad sack story about the poor. The poor are covered every which way by duplicate programs.

If the Supreme court would rule that lawmakers should leave insurance companies completely alone and let them compete, we would get the best results.

[Jack Hammer]

Here's a start:

http://www.gunowners.org/statealerts/sma0102.htm

http://www.ontheissues.org/Mitt_Romney.htm#Gun_Control

http://www.ontheissues.org/Governor/Mitt_Romney_Gun_Control.htm

http://www.operationrino.com/web/news.637&postdate+2005-09-30

That should give you the beginnings of a general picture. If that isn't enough, you can always do a web search with your favorite search engine. Cheers. :-)

[GovernmentShrinker]

Federal laws which involve confiscating money or labor from some people, to give it to other people, are unconstitutional. Medical professionals are certainly free to provide care without payment when they see fit. However, medical professionals are neither free to, nor ethically obligated to appropriate money, goods, and services from other people, in order to provide care. The simplistic principles of the Hippocratic Oath date from a time when there was little doctors could really do, and when medical care did not involve massively expensive equipment, or the services of a high-tech hospital which is largely staffed by non-doctors and to a large extent non-medical personnel.

This dangerous notion that every human being is entitled to all the medical care they can possibly benefit from has got to be stopped. Money is not irrelevant. The staggering cost of the federally imposed obligations of the Medicare/Medicaid system have begun to have a huge negative impact on many things completely unrelated to medicine (in one New York county, for example, the closing of all public libraries), and this problem will only get worse until we finally face the fact that it is an unsustainable concept. Sorry, but a smoker does not have the right to eliminate his neighbors' access to public libraries, in order that he may get treatment for his self-inflicted emphysema, and physicians have no obligation or even right to try to perpetuate such injustices.

[Bogeygolfer]

Part of the problem is this is a thread on health insurance and auto is a different beast.

'ALl of your argument changes when the context of forced purchase is added into it.'

Agreed. I can see a compromise so long as you keep the level of competition high and have sufficient companies doing business in the state.

'I ask this about the term middleman? When I contract with them to assume liability for covered items. How exactly are they a middle man? I sure see them as the man.'

Not even. From a macro perspective they are providing a service to insure risk. The risks are too large for one individual to self insure or cover themselves so the pool together. In the old days a town or community would insure each other. A farm burns down and the community rebuilds it. Same concept now. The clients of an insurance company have pooled their risk and they each pay into a fund to cover each others losses. For this service the company charges enough to cover it's expenses plus it's profit in addition to the amount in claims reserves. No mirrors at all. You put in what you get out less expenses and profit and the occasional illegal operation or fraud. That's why they are a classic middle man merely providing a service to efficiently share the risk amongst a large population. They provide you a service. It's just that no one likes the tax man. We don't generally object to paying taxes as much as we do about how much and how they are wasted. In this sense you can complain about their efficiencies or if you think they have excessive profits. If you complain about the profits, buy their stock.

Answer me this one question, Can you get an insurance company to pay a claim they dispute without contracting the services of a lawyer? ( especially when dealing with Auto claims)......therein lies the game they play.....

Again we probably have a significant difference in health and auto insurance but I get health claims paid daily. I would suggest the claims department are set up to be cautious and/or difficult and that gives the impression of duplicity. Most of the claims I see are simply unintentional errors. As incidents of fraud increase in a sector so to the difficulties in claims processing as they need to increase their diligence so as not to give away the store. An example is disability insurance which much like workers comp is so beset by fraudulent claims you begin to doubt everybody.

[chapin2500]

Thank-you very, very much. Josh

[steve86]

It's impossible to debate with extremists so I won't.

[Arkinsaw]

If they can order you to buy health insurance, they can order you to buy a hamburger, or a red car, or any services, or whatever they want.

[GovernmentShrinker]

I think it's pretty extreme to declare that there should be no limits to how much medical care people are entitled to get at other people's expense. And the more this destructive policy cuts away at other aspects of individual and community life, the more people will come to understand that it is irrational and unsustainable. The only question is how much damage will be done before that becomes clear to a critical mass of the voting population.

Several years ago, an Amish community faced a difficult decision over whether to pursue very expensive medical treatment for an infant who had been born with a serious genetic disorder. There was no cure, but the effects could be somewhat mitigated (though not to a degree which would have permitted the child to ever be a productive member of the community) at huge and ongoing expense, for as long as the child lived. That community didn't stick its head in the sand; they faced reality head-on. They got together and discussed the situation, figured out how large the sacrifices would be for every other member of the community if they were paying for this treatment, and in the end decided it just wasn't worth it, and that they would just make the baby as comfortable as possible while nature took its course. A very sensible decision, but I'm sure you'd call them "extremists".

We are fast approaching a level of medical technology where even a normally healthy person, with no self-inflicted conditions, can easily enjoy longer and higher quality of life, through the expenditure of millions of dollars on things like replacement organs; genetically engineered drugs, enzymes, and hormones; various types of microsurgery; and gene therapies (think telomere re-lengthening). But this is clearly not something that can be given to everyone who would benefit from it, because the total wealth produced by people is nowhere near the amount that the clearly beneficial therapies would cost. Either we draw the line on the free handouts at the most basic level of care, requiring payment for anything beyond that, or we completely socialize the system and prevent ANYONE from getting the benefit of the more expensive therapies, even of many of the things which are already available (as is happening in Canada and the UK right now). Hide your head in the sand if it makes you feel better, but unless you're very near the end of your lifetime, the sand is going to get blown away.

[MaDeuce]

"He is vehemently anti-2nd Amendment (even thought he won't say so).
I would like to read something that supports your statement please. see my tagline"

For one thing, when the phony Assualt Weapons Ban expired he was more than happy to sign a Mass only Assualt Weapons Ban that was even more stringent than the old Federal one was.
I have heard him several times on the Howie Carr show and when callers call the show and talk to Mitt about gun control, he bobs and weaves and dances like a lying sack of you know what. Then give the "I'm all for sensible gun-control" BS.
Also look here http://www.operationrino.com/web/newsperm.606

And here: (page down about 4 times for his support on Gun Control) http://blog.electromneyin2008.com/index.php?p=129&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1

[steve86]

I think it's pretty extreme to declare that there should be no limits to how much medical care people are entitled to get at other people's expense.

Who made that declaration???

[Shqipo]

>>>If all goes as the supporters hope . . .<<<
--Original price tag of the Big Dig was 4 Billion. Final cost w/ leaks--16 Billion.

[Victoria Delsoul]

Wow, how long until the rest of the country start looking like Canada?

[Alberta's Child]

Good question.

As long as Alberta doesn't change . . .

:-)

[Victoria Delsoul]

Right. :-)

[Alberta's Child]

Looks like somethin' outta heaven, eh?

[Victoria Delsoul]

Beautiful! Let me guess... Lake Louise?

[Alberta's Child]

have no idea (LOL), but it's too far from the mountains to be Lake Louise. I just found it somewhere on the 'net.

From the looks of it, this picture could have been taken somewhere in the foothills of southern Alberta west of the villages of Black Diamond and Turner Valley. The dusting of snow on the mountain peaks and bright yellow colors on the trees in the foreground indicate that it was probably taken sometime in September.

Man, I can almost smell the cool, dry mountain air from here!

[Alberta's Child]

Autumn in the Rockies . . .

[Victoria Delsoul]

It looks beautiful anyway.