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Obamacare scare stories?

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  • Obamacare scare stories?

    There have been:

    * Julie Boonstra
    * Dianne Barrette
    * Deborah Cavallaro
    * Edie Sundby
    * "Bette"

    There's even:

    * John Bohner and
    * Tom Coburn

    OK, let me state from the outset that there are real people having real problems with the law. Why, then are the politicians using so many fake stories? Why are the Koch brothers pumping untold amounts of money into an ad buy using a lie?

    If you have to lie to win the argument, you don't deserve to win the argument.

  • #2
    Originally posted by Outis View Post
    If you have to lie to win the argument, you don't deserve to win the argument.
    Just in case there is any doubt, the above applies to both parties and to all Independents and third-party candidates.

    Comment


    • #3
      Originally posted by Outis View Post

      OK, let me state from the outset that there are real people having real problems with the law.
      No, no, no. don't be fooled by the propaganda. Everything is perfect. All accounts of folks having trouble are nothing but flat out lies as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid unequivocally stated:
      "There's plenty of horror stories being told. All of them are untrue. But in those tales turned out to be just that. Tales. Stories made up from whole cloth. Lies distorted by Republicans to grab headlines or make political advertisements."

      And
      "Despite all that good news, there’s plenty of horror stories being told. All are untrue, but they’re being told all over America."

      I'm always still in trouble again

      "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
      "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
      "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
        No, no, no. don't be fooled by the propaganda. Everything is perfect. All accounts of folks having trouble are nothing but flat out lies as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid unequivocally stated:
        "There's plenty of horror stories being told. All of them are untrue. But in those tales turned out to be just that. Tales. Stories made up from whole cloth. Lies distorted by Republicans to grab headlines or make political advertisements."

        And
        "Despite all that good news, there’s plenty of horror stories being told. All are untrue, but they’re being told all over America."
        Sarcasm requires a certain amount of panache. Your panache pancaked.

        And yeah, Reed is about as high on my list as McConnell. Frankly, if the election sweeps out all incumbents, I'm not going to be horribly upset. I'll just be singing "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss."

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by Outis View Post
          There have been:

          * Julie Boonstra
          * Dianne Barrette
          * Deborah Cavallaro
          * Edie Sundby
          * "Bette"

          There's even:

          * John Bohner and
          * Tom Coburn

          OK, let me state from the outset that there are real people having real problems with the law. Why, then are the politicians using so many fake stories? Why are the Koch brothers pumping untold amounts of money into an ad buy using a lie?

          If you have to lie to win the argument, you don't deserve to win the argument.
          While not totally on-topic, your second link does address it. It's remarkable to me how often the phrase "junk plan" is repeated, as though the people who bought those plans are unmitigated idiots. It ignores the fact that many of those people were happy with their previous plans. It strikes me as downright arrogant.
          I DENOUNCE DONALD J. TRUMP AND ALL HIS IMMORAL ACTS.

          Comment


          • #6
            Sigh. I suppose there are many ways to try to spread the cost of medical care around so as to increase the quality and availability of care to everyone who needs it. There are guaranteed to be plenty of structural frictions in the process - especially if we're trying to transition from a "expensive care for the few, good luck to the many" system whereby public (i.e. taxpayer) subsidy is hidden (and as a result, inefficient and therefore unnecessarily large), toward a "insure everyone, make participation mandatory" model, where the public cost is more immediately obvious (and therefore objectionable).

            The underlying fact is that medical care is expensive because medicines cost a lot to develop, medical professionals cost a lot to educate, medical equipment costs a lot to design and manufacture, and so on. There is no escaping the fact that boosting both the application and the quality of medical care across the population will cost more. A LOT more.

            Are there any economies that can be achieved with serious modification of the model? Well, we have a whole raft of studies indicating that US medical care is the world's most expensive but US health in general is way down the list. This suggests room for improvement, but how? One way to answer that is to follow the money. For every dollar spent on medical care, how much goes into the actual care, and how much goes elsewhere (high profits for drug companies, high profits for insurance companies, million-dollar salaries for hospital administrators, etc.)? Is there some way that more of each medical dollar can go into actual medicine, without reducing the quality of the medicine? If so, how can this be achieved politically when (as rogue06 makes clear), politicians in the pockets of Big Medicine are willing to say whatever keeps those campaigns funded.

            This isn't to say that no economies can be achieved, only that to do so, tradeoffs must be made. If you get injured in England, you walk into the neighborhood clinic and they patch you up for free, on the spot. No questions asked, you need not even be a citizen. The tradeoff is, if you have a serious medical problem, you might not survive the interminable waiting list for specialized care. In the US, if you have that same serious condition you can be treated immediately - if you can pay Big Money. If you can't, well, there isn't even a waiting list. Sorry.

            Obamacare is, in this context, really a camel designed by a committee -- an effort to incorporate as many Republican recommendations as possible, as many Democratic recommendations as possible, without offending Big Pharma and Big Insurance and other big contributors. Unsurprisingly, the result is an ugly conglomeration of compromises, fees, penalties, confusion, subsidies, delays, exceptions, and more confusion. It's far from clear whether medical coverage will improve. It IS clear that insuring a lot more people does nothing to increase the number of beds, nurses, doctors, dialysis machines, etc. etc. etc. And providing enough of all of these for adequate medical coverage for all means a BIG chunk of GDP, much larger than ever. And if we as a nation don't wish to pay that price, we will more likely face an exodus of professionals rather than a reduction in coverage of the poor. We will be worse off than before we started.

            What will be required is a shift in national priorities. The $2 billion a WEEK that Bush's (and then Obama's) useless purposeless wars were costing (in money alone) would have paid for a LOT of medical care (rather than increasing the need for it). It's instructive that the nations with the best medical systems are single-payer, and have no military. Nobody can afford everything.

            Comment


            • #7
              I just can't resist:

              Originally posted by Outis View Post
              If you have to lie to win the argument, you don't deserve to win the argument.
              You mean kinda like how Obamacare was passed in the first place? (I know I don't need to repeat this, but, again, I can't help myself) "If you like your health insurance, you can keep your health insurance."
              I DENOUNCE DONALD J. TRUMP AND ALL HIS IMMORAL ACTS.

              Comment


              • #8
                And then there's this: a fundraising letter from Rep. Robert Pittenger.

                You see, I am already on the front lines, taking seriously my oath of office: to defend the U.S. Constitution — and you and your fellow Americans — against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And for that I am being attacked from all sides, including from my fellow Republicans. My friend, make no mistake, Barack Obama is Enemy Number One!


                Cited from: http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2014/...rd-nominee-39/

                Come on, congress-critters. Are you even trying?

                Comment

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