BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 08:41 PM

Well, yes...but they're not shrinking the government. Far from it. They are extending and enlarging its draconian powers and activities, but they are doing so to a great extent through privatized entities. The government is becoming a submissive arm of a privately owned oligarchy of rich corporates. This actually results in higher government spending and a larger and more authoritarian government...but a reduction in public services.

Eisenhower warned that this could happen in his closing address to the nation. Kennedy, I think, attempted to prevent some of it from happening, and he paid with his life.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: heric
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 08:49 PM

I have lots of questions CarolC. Please don't take them as a challenge. The Democratic leadership should have answered them. If you know some of the answers and I've missed them, please let me know.

Is there a public option, or is there isn't?
If there is a public option, is it negotiable and unessential or is it isn't?
If there is a public option, who will be allowed to opt in to it?
How many people is that estimated to be?
If there is a public option, will anyone, and if so who, will be forced into it by the government?
How many people is that estimated to be?
If there is a public option, will anyone, and if so who, will be forced into it by their employer?
How many people is that estimated to be?
What is the benefits package in the public option?
What is the estimated cost projection for the public option?
How will the estimated cost projection for the public option be funded?
How will the benefits of the public option be coordinated with Medicaid and other state and federal funding?
Why can't the public option be administered by existing administrative agencies?
If there is overlap in membership of the public option and existing public assistance (nearly half of all health care spending in the US, reportedly), why does the bulk of funding not come from that, rather than from "eliminating waste" in Medicare?
No funding for illegal immigrants, even children? How can that be possible? (See coordination of benefits with Medicaid and other public programs, above.)

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 09:26 PM

Ok. I'll see what I can find out.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: heric
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 09:42 PM

To put it quite frankly, I see this as the stuff of a simple business plan that any American small business owner could put together in a couple of days. How many tens or thousands of millions went into an incomprehensible and incoherent agenda by people working at Obama's behest. We have been betrayed by incompetence. They didn't bend over backwards - They bent forward, and tied their shoes together. The only way I see out of this, speaking as a self-appointed rep of the Middle, is for them to put together a simple plan and ram it through. They will have to abandon the 8% solution, since they didn't even understand it if they could say the public option was not essential. Sebelius should be fired for incompetence for saying that (and telling Obama to say it.)

I hope that they do do that - a re-write with a simplified public option and then ram it through. Targeting about 20 million people or less and then working forward over the years.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 10:27 PM

Wouldn't a healthcare plan that covers all of us be like everybody being on Medicaid?
That sounds like a really good idea to me.

It seems like it ought to be easy enough to broaden medicaid to accept our layer of uninsured folks..maybe with an offer to the private ins companies to participate (which would keep them in the game..since there would still be money flying around and with the understanding that the goal is a National Plan, they'd either want to adapt or end up pushed out)
I'm starting to wonder if some of the hollering about National Health being a horrible idea is somehow rooted in the notions that have created a herd of shouting-haters who abhor anybody who 'rides the system'? I've known plenty of people who are downright hateful and closedminded about the whole idea of "lazy welfare bums..driving their fancy cars and having all those things Good, Working Folk can't afford"
I wonder if the resistance is sort of a gut response (because I don't see how it can be a brain response) to that?

If I was in a position to choose private vs medicaid (without having to choose between wealth/impoverishment) I wouldn't need any time at all to think it over.
Maybe it's not the same in all areas, but I've never gotten lesser care than with private ins..and I have no reason to worry that I might need something that the ins would deny.

After a few years without, I renewed yesterday.
I had been putting it off because the surgery I need wasn't available a few years ago and I couldn't stand the idea of dealing with the dehumanizing heifers at the office. I figured now that I've got a sudden and mysterious shoulder ailment making my life miserable, it was time to be tough and endure.
There were no mean heifers (wondering if the difference in treatment comes from a difference in govt?) and no question of whether my shoulder is an excluded, pre-existing condition.

AND..none of that has much to do with anything. It's just a big relief that the option is available to me and I truly don't understand why anyone would want to keep others from having the same security--unless they're afraid that if everyone can afford the same care, they might have one less way to look down their noses at the rest of us?

Long, pointless post..sorry.
It would be a good time for me to thank American taxpayers. The program you help fund will surely have me back playing my guitar before too long..and I truly appreciate it.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 10:59 PM

I watching tonight's Rachael Maddow show, and nodded at the part about Republicans 'asserting' that "If Ted was only here, we could have done something about Health Care".....then purely by accident, I was looking thru a drawer and found my small stack of old Realist magazines from the 60s. One cartoon jumped out at me, and I looked for any reference to the author on the WWW. LO! The entire series has been scanned & put online.


Please look at the cartoon at the upper left in this page from Issue #50 in mid-1964. It is still happening, but to a different Kennedy.


http://www.ep.tc/realist/50/11.html

Please look at the cartoon at the upper left in this page from Issue #50 in mid-1964. It is still happening, but to a different Kennedy.


http://www.ep.tc/realist/50/11.html



(Yes...you CAN look thru all the old Realist magazines and relive the 60s...if you can stand it...)

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Bill D
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:01 PM

(I sent an email to Rachael...I thought it might interest her)

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:30 PM

Not medicaid. That program should be scrapped and everyone on it should be put on medicare. But if everyone who is now uninsured had access to medicare, I think the vast majority of those people (myself included) would jump at the opportunity.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:38 PM

are medicaid/medicare different by state?

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: heric
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:40 PM

It's been my vague notion that Medicaid comes through on big ticket items, but isn't very good at providing routine and wellness care. Even if that's wrong - it would certainly need to be modified drastically in benefits and operations to do the "public option" as most of us interpret the term. Yes Medicare-for-All-Who-Need-It could be more efficient. It needn't have the full range of benefits that seniors get. It just needs to provide basic care to those who aren't getting it and protect the working and middle classes from bankruptcy and it would soon be a very popular program.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: heric
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:41 PM

Melissa I think that Medicaid varies greatly by state.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Peace
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:44 PM

Does anyone think that given the choice--Private Insurance or Universal Health Care--that people would willingly choose to keep their private insurance? OK, even if ya have LOTSA money, do you really want to give an insurance company thousands a year when you could give $1000/year?

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:50 PM

It must, heric.

After trying to finagle adequate care for my granny and seeing the level of specialists and treatments open to me, medicare doesn't look so hot from where I'm standing.

Whichever is best/most adequate, it just seems like it shouldn't be all that hard to broaden it to slowly start covering everyone..starting with the uninsured.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:54 PM

Yes, Peace..at the beginning of the process, I do think there would be some blustery ego-snorts who would stick with their "By God, I PAY my OWN way..I don't NEED the government meddling with MY life/health!" attitude.

I don't think it would last very long..

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 27 Aug 09 - 11:55 PM

Most doctors won't take medicaid patients because medicaid pays them so poorly. And medicaid doesn't cover a lot of things that people need. And it has a very big stigma attached to it for those who receive their medical care under it. Medicare is a much better program.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 12:03 AM

that's not my experience, Carol..but I have no reason to doubt you.
I guess I DO have a reason to be glad I live here and not there, though.

Some doctors in my state don't accept medicaid, but the majority seems to. With medicaid, they do get lower rates, but they're sure of getting paid and the rules aren't mysterious or changeable.

I'm sorry you don't have coverage. I wish you did.
If your medicare/medicaid comparisons are designed to teach me a lesson about how bad off I am, you're barking up the wrong tree. I am grateful for what I have and I'm practically giddy with relief at being able to go to a dr and get my current woes tended.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 12:57 AM

I was on medicaid for about ten years while I was receiving SSI. My opinions about the program are based on my experiences with it. I would definitely prefer medicaid to not having anything at all, but my experience was that medicaid is not adequate care.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:05 AM

I have asked the questions posted above here in this site that tracks Congress. They are subject to review by a moderator before they appear, so I haven't seen them up on the site yet. I don't know how long it will take them to appear or to be answered. Meanwhile, I will continue looking around. This page is specifically in reference to the House bill. I'll see what I can find out about the Senate bill...

http://www.govtrack.us/users/questions.xpd?topic=bill:h111-3200

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Melissa
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:31 AM

my experience (so far) is that the part about signing up and jumping hoops was always shitawful (until this time) but I think I've gotten good, timely care with the program.

Maybe I'm a lucky fluke, but I've never been denied reasonable, fair treatment for anything I've taken to a doctor and other than a few places that don't accept medicaid, I've never been restricted on who I could see.

I sure hope something goes through soon so that you (and everybody else that needs it) can start getting coverage. I'm poor and there are a lot of things I do-without, but I can't imagine how ugly life would seem without the security of knowing there's medical care on the back burner in case I need it.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Janie
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:34 AM

Medicaid does vary considerably by state, particularly with regard to reimbursement amounts.

Medicare is good if one is retired and also has a good Medicare supplement policy, or if one is eligible for both Medicaid and Medicare. It is not very good if it is the only insurer one has for coverage of outpatient medical or mental health services. The Medicare Part D prescription coverage is good for low income people. It is not at all adequate for lower middle through middle income retirees and disabled folks with high prescription costs, and who lose their coverage along about July or August of every year because of the bizarre provisions related to income.   

I haven't read through all of the nearly 1000 posts to this thread. Rather than risk redundancy, I will not share examples from my work as a social worker with low income individuals and families, some with Medicaid, some with Medicare, some with both, some with none, and some with insurance but who can not afford the co-pays. Nor will I share the story of my moderately middle class elderly parents' situation regarding the cost of medical care, or of my own deliberate decision to not seek treatment of my own medical issues because, even though I have catastrophic coverage through the private, non-profit agency for whom I work, since I can not afford the $5000/$10,000 deductible, in spite of having no debt whatsoever.

I listen to comments on NPR and read things in the news about proposals that would not allow insurance companies to deny coverage because of pre-existing conditions. But if one can not afford the coverage, it really doesn't matter that an insurance company can't deny coverage. If one can not afford the deductibles and/or co-pays, it really doesn't matter, except when it comes to catastrophic medical events.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:58 AM

Just as an example, one of the health problems I experience is a ruptured disk in my neck that presses on my spinal cord, which gives me a whole complex of problems beyond just the pain. Medicaid paid for the scan that found the problem, but it wouldn't pay for ongoing physical therapy or chiropractic sessions that could have helped to alleviate the problem. And there were other such deficiencies that I experienced with that program.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Janie
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 02:15 AM

Good example, Carol.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Janie
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 02:36 AM

Another example of disjointed care and coverage: I'm thinking of client with major medical problems and major mental health problems. When this person was homeless and single, client qualified for 'charity care' at no cost, or very, very minimal cost (co-pays so low that neither medical or mental health providers paid attention to if the co-pays were made or not.) Said client got married to a person who worked at a major medical center whose employees are State employees. Spouse grosses less than $35,000 per year, and has custody of 3 younger siblings which spouse must provide for. To add client to spouse's State insurance would cost $450 per month. At that salary, they can not afford to add client to insurance and still pay for basic needs, and could not afford co-pays if they could afford the the insurance premium. Because of client's spouse's income, client no longer qualifies for 'charity care.'   Because client and spouse take financial obligations seriously, client has withdrawn from medical treatment for the broken back, seizure disorder, hypertension, and chronic pain from broken back, and has reduced needed care for PTSD because of the increase in co-pay in sliding scale fee once client married.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 11:32 AM

"Yes...I know this. What is the relevance? Are we supposed to intuit that 'strict immigration restrictions' are required for good health?"

             Older citizens in Japan have every reason to believe that their children and grandchildren will by happy to support them in their old age. In America, older citizens have every reason to suspect that someone else's children and grandchildren will not want to support them in their old age.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 11:35 AM

It's not someone else's children and grandchildren you have to worry about, Rig. It's your government and corporations in bed together that you have to worry about.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 12:20 PM

Okay, let me put it this way. American Seniors have every reason to suspect that government and corporations will be able to convince young minority immigrants that it is not in their interest to support and pay for the healthcare of a bunch of old white people.

                In Japan, they would have to convince you native born citizens that it's not in their interest to support their grand parents and great grand parents. The government and corporations would have a much harder task.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:15 PM

So young immigrants will work on the assumption that they will never grow old themselves.Or need healthcare for thenmselves or their children in the menatime. And will have the magical power of outvoting people who aren't immigrants.

Slightly strained logic. But then, that's what you tend to get from people with that particular obsession...

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:39 PM

If I had a dollar for every time I've heard a young Hispanic say, "I ain't gunna pay money out to support a bunch of old white people," I'd be a multi-millionaire.
             Some old white people believe them.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Don Firth
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:41 PM

This is a nation of immigrants.

Who has the moral right to say, "That's enough! Raise the drawbridge!"

This matter has nothing to do with civilizing our health care system.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 01:44 PM

Without immigrants working in providing services our NHS would be in serious trouble. And I suspect the same would be true of health services in the USA.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 02:15 PM

All of that stuff could possibly make some sort of sense in some possible alternate reality, but only if there were no old Hispanic people currently in the US who depend on medicare and social security. But since there's millions of old Hispanic people in the US who depend on those programs right now, it makes absolutely no sense whatever.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Bill D
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 02:23 PM

"Who has the moral right to say, "That's enough! Raise the drawbridge!"


When does 'moral' become superceded by 'practical'? With no limitations, there will come a time, metaphorically, when the drawbridge cannot BE raised because of the crowd standing on it, looking for room. We need to be fair & sensible, but we do need rules.

Same with health care, I'm sorry to say. If a cure for acne was discovered but it came from an endangered turtle and cost $10,000, 20,000,000 teenagers would demand treatment. There **WILL* be limitations and restriction in some aspects...access simply cannot be infinite.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 02:50 PM

"But since there's millions of old Hispanic people in the US who depend on those programs right now, it makes absolutely no sense whatever."

                   There ars some older Hispanics, no many. A major portion of the Hispanic population arrived since the disasterous Amnesty Bill of 1986, and there are tens-of-millions of those.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 03:18 PM

Yeah, Rig. It's almost as terrifying as all those filthy Irish coming over in the mid-1800s, isn't it?

(satirical remark)

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 04:19 PM

Really, it has nothing to do with the Irish. There are people with questions as to the motivations of so many older people who openly oppose public health care.
       I heard young Hispanics make the comment about not wanting to support a bunch of old white people over and over when I lived in California. If folks don't want to take that mind-set into consideration, it's their business.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 04:33 PM

You won't find very many older people who oppose public health care in Canada or Europe, Rig, but there is much immigration from the Third World to Canada and Europe. Immigration is a separate issue to health care.

The reason many older Americans oppose it is that they are ignorant of what it's like, fooled by corporate scare propaganda, and clinging to what they are already familiar with in fear of change. It's not uncommon for older people to fear change, and for younger people to support it. It's been happening that way ever since ancient Rome and Egypt, if not long before.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 04:49 PM

There are millions of old Hispanic people living in this country whose families have been living on the landmass that is currently called the United States of America for more than four hundred years.

I think someone is forgetting that the US took quite a lot of land from Spain upon which were living quite a few people who were of Hispanic ancestry. They've probably even been living in on the land that is now this country longer than the family of the person who is saying they don't exist.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 05:19 PM

Unless such person is a descendant of Kennewick Man, in which case the Hispanics are the squaters.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 05:20 PM

Now there's one hell of a good point!

You look at all the land the USA grabbed from Mexico in the 1800s, including some of the best land Mexico had back then...boy, it's really something. Why did they grab it? Well, they had the military strength to, right? Ask the Indians about stuff like that.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: The Barden of England
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 05:28 PM

Riginslinger - I presume the Native Americans said much the same about the immigrants. Were they right too?

John Barden

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 05:32 PM

Of course, it's really a matter of numbers now, but what we call Native Americans today were once immigrants themselves. The descendants of Kennewick Man find that hard to forget.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 05:54 PM

Well, certainly Hispanics weren't the first people here. But they're hardly newcomers, and they're not more recent than the other Europeans who showed up after Columbus.

By the way, that Kennewick man thing was thoroughly debunked, but that's a subject for another thread.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Bobert
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 06:15 PM

Well, Eugene Robinson had an intreresting take on health care reform in this morning's op-ed... He said that when it comes down to it, liberal and conservative and everyone in between is somewhat resistant to change... Yeah, no gun pointed at their heads and it's business as usual, i.e. the status quo...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: CarolC
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 06:22 PM

Here's a good talk with Howard Dean about health care reform. Definitely worth listening to, and lots of questions and answers after the talk...

http://fora.tv/2009/07/23/Howard_Deans_Prescription_for_Real_Healthcare_Reform#fullprogram

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 06:25 PM

Any "descendants of Kennewick Man" would presumably be Native Americans. Accepting for a moment that there might be credible evidence about his origins, he might have had some European ancestors, but it's hard to see how he could have had any European descendants.

This is silly drift anyway.
........................

But then it's a thread about some rather silly politicking by people who, whatever their public posturing might proclaim, pretty clearly have very little love for millions of their fellow Americans, and absolutely no confidence in the ability of their country to do something that all other developed countries have managed to do.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Riginslinger
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 06:50 PM

There are several pre-clovis finds. Kennewick Man was one of them, and there is nothing to debunk about it.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Don Firth
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 06:56 PM

". . . rather silly politicking by people who, whatever their public posturing might proclaim, pretty clearly have very little love for millions of their fellow Americans, and absolutely no confidence in the ability of their country to do something that all other developed countries have managed to do."

Kevin, may I quote you to some of my fellow Americans? That's the situation in a nutshell. Well said!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 07:02 PM

Well said indeed.

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 07:06 PM

Even so, none of their descendants would be likely to have lived in Europe.

It might be interesting if it were true that some of the ancestors of today's Native Americans might have come from Europe. But it wouldn't have any other significance, or given later immigrants from this side of the Atlantic any special birthright in the American continent.

Silly drift. Start a thread about it if you want to discuss it. It doesn't belong in here.

......................

What's the line of the oppositionists on proposals to stop insurance companies imposing "pre-existing conditions" exclusions, and so forth? Is that seen as "socialist" as well?

Subject: RE: BS: Nationalized Healthcare, good? bad?
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Aug 09 - 07:10 PM

npr had a show tonight with the actual recordings of debates for national health care going back to 1912 to Teddy Roosevelt and up to the 50s 60s and 70s