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Healthcare Reform: Critical Mass
Posts
k..krieder-chan!!
steam
I was busy watching Hackers.
http://ilga.org/ilga/en/article/mflhzAz1eE
it owns. everybody who is into critical (specifically feminist/queer) theory should read this
There really are better ways to organize this than Congress has been doing. The Singapore system, for instance, which handles things with forced savings and a universal, public catastrophic insurance plan, and keeps costs very low and health outcomes extremely good. They've solved the root problem, which is insurance itself -- paying for all our medical care through third parties is the reason it costs so much and works so badly.
This is what Marty Feldstein has been telling us to do and it's not crazy, it's actually out there working.
Of course, the Republican politicians don't want a solution, even a "conservative" solution, they just want to play defense.
I've been criticizing progressives for not being economically sensible for a long time. But now? Fuck that. At least they have some concern for public welfare. From now on I'm going to be a political animal for the Democratic Party because the alternative is living in a country I fear to even imagine.
http://numberblog.wordpress.com/
at least they try, I guess
kpop appreciation station i also like to tweet some
sigh i'm probably going to end up moving like five years from now aren't i.
Besides, all the schools are here. (Only half kidding. It really does make sense to study and work in the US if you do science.)
I just don't want to see it all go to shit. We've got a sizable proportion of the populace that just doesn't think public social services are legitimate at all. I used to be one of them but I got over that in, like, a year, because I had friends who told me to get a conscience already. But apparently you can persist in that lunacy into adulthood...
I don't want to know what it'll look like when they run things.
http://numberblog.wordpress.com/
More money for me
And I'll sue you for whatever you didn't give me
http://atlanticus.tumblr.com/
is there a reason they made their logo look like a fist pounding into a vagina made out of the jamaican flag?
ooohhhhhhhhhhh
STEAM ID
I was $3,000 in the hole after fracturing my wrist with no insurance. Since I set up a payment plan in a timely fashion they decided they didn't even need to process my financial aid request. A couple months later, after I'd been paying $100 a month on top of other doctor visit bills I was paying in full, my dad went to the hospital billing department (he works in the ER) and talked to them. They processed the request and whoops I don't owe anything anymore.
http://atlanticus.tumblr.com/
My best friend is an epileptic. She can't just go a year without health care. Without medicine, she'd crack her head open on her bathroom floor. And because her background is in public policy, there's a good chance that her first job will be for some kind of nonprofit or think tank, and those jobs don't give health care benefits.
This is what happens even to well-educated, responsible, affluent people who happen to have a disease. How the hell can any of us say it's not our problem?
http://numberblog.wordpress.com/
I'm not the epileptic here
STEAM ID
“As opposed to standing outside Fenway Park? In the cold? Shaking hands?’’
I like how she confused Curt Schilling as a Yankee. She might as well have called Jesus a muslim and then asked if Tom Brady was still playing quarterback for the Ravens.
four days in the hospital > "that will be ten dollars, sir"
STEAM ID
the motto of the human race
<3 u superpoop
And placing all the blame on one specific, vaguely defined group is the best way to fix it.
Amazon wish list | Please check out my wife's blog and jewelry store.
its not a vaguely defined group :wink:
Obama's health-care reform bill is hated by the republicans (because it seems like socialism?) and the democrats aren't too keen on it because it's not as effective as Obama promised it would be.
The democrats just lost what should have been a really easy seat in the senate, because their senate candidate made some major gaffes.
This puts the health-care bill in jeopardy, since the GOP now has the ability to veto (?) it since the democrats don't have enough seats to push it through? This also makes Obama a lame duck president, since he has the administration power to propose votes but not the congressional power to vote them through.
Obama might try to sneak the health care bill in by getting the bill passed before Brown can be sworn in, but the republicans can counter by filibustering (stalling by talking about nothing), until Brown gets sworn in.
So for the next few years likely nothing will get done, as the GOP can simply kill any bill the president tries to pass.
Did I get any of this correct? I've been reading a few news stories, but I don't know a lot about American politics.
Well first you have to understand that we have two legistlatives houses, and each one has their own version of the health care plan. The Senate plan is much more conservative than the House of Representatives plan, so many of the left don't like the Senate plan anyway. These differences have to be resolved in a conference committee.
The main thing about the Senate is that while 51 votes is enough to pass a bill, it takes 60 votes to end debate and proceed to the vote. This process of not ending the debate is called filibustering, and it's the major reason the minority party has so much influence in the Senate.
1 - the Republicans don't like the health care bill because they've predicated their political stance on hatred for Obama (like the dems and Bush II), and some dems don't like it because there's no public option
2 - yes
3 - democrats no longer have enough seats to break a filibuster
4 - they cannot beat a filibuster with only 40 votes
5 - basically the congressional democrats are bitches and this is accurate
STEAM ID
The "third party" system isn't inherently flawed, it's the free market health care system that's flawed. I remember hearing about a country that has around 200 different health care companies, all of which are heavily regulated. You can change plans and keep your current premiums, costs are fixed, and the competition between companies keeps overhead low. The companies make the bulk of their profits by offering home, car and fire insurance, which incentivizes them to offer great health care service so you don't take all your money over to the other guy. By throwing out most of the free market stuff that doesn't work they end up with a health care system that does work.
You don't pay for your own medical procedures so:
1. there isn't a lot of clear price information allowing you to do even rudimentary comparison shopping
2. nobody has an incentive to minimize duplicate treatments or unnecessary tests
3. in addition for paying for the medical care itself, you have to pay for the insurers' administrative costs (and profits.)
4. You're not the consumer, so "customer service" stuff like efficient record keeping doesn't necessarily happen. Doctors and hospitals don't lose money instantly when their consumers are dissatisfied, the way other companies do.
http://numberblog.wordpress.com/
If we regulate the insurance companies... we're no better off than the reds.. and it will be a cold day in hell before I accept that the free market system we have here could ever possibly be flawed
(no seriously, insurance companies and banks require regulations.. they've proven that they can't regulate themselves)
BEcause the yare noobs
what