Healthcare in America

[Wrath of Dagon]

Seconded. We don't need LOF in any sane thread.

[lord of flies]

Seconded. We don't need LOF in any sane thread.

You misspelled "Wrath of Dagon."

[Tigranes]

Hug & make up, babies.

[Guest The Architect]

Right, so have we finally established that the only people opposed to universal healthcare in America are those like Gfted who are happy to see others suffer as long as they pay less taxes?

 

No, small business owners are rightfully worried that it is going to be a cost that they can't take in an already fragile economy.

 

And add to the list conspiracy wackos. "OMG THEY'RE RAISING TAXES THEY WANNA DESTROY THE MIDDLE CLASS!".

[213374U]

No PSL article is the sort of thing you get bored with in the middle

Can't argue with that, that's for sure...

 

 

Seconded. We don't need LOF in any sane thread.

You misspelled "Wrath of Dagon."

I lol'd

[Guard Dog]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause. The Commerce Clause empowers congress to regulate interstate commerce (note it does NOT empower it to interfere with intra-state commerce, in fact the 10th amendment specifically forbids it). Obamacare twists the power from one that regulates commerce to one that compels it under threat of jail and fines. In order to be a law abiding citizen in the US the Federal Government is commanding everyone to purchase a service from a third party. It makes no distinction for circumstance. For example the Amish have their own doctors, and practice their own fashion of healthcare in their communities. They are now compelled to do something their religion forbids them to do. People who are into holsitic medicine, natural cures, etc are likewise compelled to conform to something they do not wish to follow. It gets worse too. Congress is now ordering everyone to buy something want it or not. As you all now Obama and the Federal Government has seized and nationalized GM. This same abuse of the Constitution could be used to empower the government to force everyone in the US to buy a GM car. Or force everyone to shop in a certain store.

 

One other thing that bothers me is the federal government is compelling the states to spend state tax dollars on medicare extensions. They cannot do that. You need to remember the US is a union of 50 sovreign states. It is beyond the central governemts authority to tell a state how to spend its revenue. Let alone the fact that 46 of the 50 cannot afford to do what it's being ordered to do.

 

I do think the Constitutional challenges have a lot of merit and I truely hope the Supreme Court will strike down the entire law. Many states are providing health plans to their citizens now. This Federal takeover is just not necassary and is more than a little frightening.

[Killian Kalthorne]

The whole notion of decentralized power just doesn't pan out in the 21st century. An individual state just does not have the resources on its own. That is why we either need to break up the nation to force multiple centralized governments or a single centralized government. Other nations that have a strong centralized government are surpassing us. The 50 states model is failing.

[Wrath of Dagon]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Uprecedented? They've been doing it since FDR. Almost the entire Federal government is unconstitutional by now.

 

Edit: Here's an article about rationing under Obamacare: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-real-obamacare-fraud/ Well, it least it has some cost control. This is particularly disturbing though : '"Qualified plans" can contract only with a doctor who "implements such mechanisms to improve health-care quality as the [current or future] secretary [of Health and Human Services] may by regulation require"(Sec. 1311, p. 148-49).'

 

Keep your filthy government hands off of my insurance.

 

Edit2: Actually a lot of the stuff he claims as rationing is speculative, it's not in the healthcare bill.

 

There's a link to the implementation timeline in that article : http://docs.house.gov/energycommerce/TIMELINE.pdf

Edited March 26, 2010 by Wrath of Dagon

[Calax]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Uprecedented? They've been doing it since FDR. Almost the entire Federal government is unconstitutional by now.

And yet if we ran strictly by the constitution, we'd fall apart, go figure, we need to change things and expand things simply to exist as a single entity/nation.

[Guard Dog]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Uprecedented? They've been doing it since FDR. Almost the entire Federal government is unconstitutional by now.

And yet if we ran strictly by the constitution, we'd fall apart, go figure, we need to change things and expand things simply to exist as a single entity/nation.

Then there is no law, you have no rights, and the government can do whatever the hell it likes to you.

[Humodour]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Uprecedented? They've been doing it since FDR. Almost the entire Federal government is unconstitutional by now.

And yet if we ran strictly by the constitution, we'd fall apart, go figure, we need to change things and expand things simply to exist as a single entity/nation.

Then there is no law, you have no rights, and the government can do whatever the hell it likes to you.

 

In theory, perhaps. In practice, no.

[Guard Dog]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause.

Uprecedented? They've been doing it since FDR. Almost the entire Federal government is unconstitutional by now.

And yet if we ran strictly by the constitution, we'd fall apart, go figure, we need to change things and expand things simply to exist as a single entity/nation.

Then there is no law, you have no rights, and the government can do whatever the hell it likes to you.

 

In theory, perhaps. In practice, no.

Does not is not the same as can not. I am far more suspicious of government and the people in it than you are. But then again I've actually worked in it. You have not. I can tell you for a 95% certain fact that Obama, Pelosi, et al do not give a damn about who has or has not got health insurance. If their motives are not altruistic than why do you think they feel compelled to extend the reach of government power into places it has never been?

[Bos_hybrid]

So let me get this straight.

 

Taxes being used to help those less fortunate: Bad

Taxes being used for war: Good

 

I only say this because the war in Iraq will cost $900 billion this year alone. Where Health care will cost $940 billion over ten years. Yet there seems to be a lot less moaning about that.

[Asol]

So let me get this straight.

 

Taxes being used to help those less fortunate: Bad

Taxes being used for war: Good

 

I only say this because the war in Iraq will cost $900 billion this year alone. Where Health care will cost $940 billion over ten years. Yet there seems to be a lot less moaning about that.

 

So maybe I can't make my speedboat payments(or mortgage for that matter) without borrowing all over town and going into hoc. I should have no problems taking on a couple jetski's 'for the kids', while never planning or expecting to give up any of it for any circumstances. That logic is based on either planning to circle the drain or hope that some kind of crazy financial miracle and sunshine will just break over the horizon, both pretty ridiculous.

 

Also war compliance good or bad has everything to do with employment in the united states. There are some 118 or so million people in completely expendable service and middleman positions. Approx 19 million in some facet of manufacturing positions and approx 21 million government employees.... We have more people in government than manufacturing. Compared to 'real world' employment these people are over payed, under worked and don't face any direct competition. There is a lot of motivation to toe the line.

[Wrath of Dagon]

The war in Iraq will cost $900 billion this year?

 

The Supreme Court so far is not disregarding the entire constitution, just the parts that have become inconvenient and unpopular. Of course eventually the whole thing can be thrown out, depending on future elections. As it says in our courthouse "Where law ends, tyranny begins."

[Humodour]

Does not is not the same as can not. I am far more suspicious of government and the people in it than you are. But then again I've actually worked in it. You have not. I can tell you for a 95% certain fact that Obama, Pelosi, et al do not give a damn about who has or has not got health insurance. If their motives are not altruistic than why do you think they feel compelled to extend the reach of government power into places it has never been?

 

A) You'll excuse me if I ignore your personal anecdote. The writings of somebody like Enoch on what it is like to work in the public sector are eminently more interesting because his stance is reasoned and tempered without desire to push some sort of agenda.

B) Where is your proof of that grand claim? The basis for making such a claim would seem to stem from your personal lack of faith in government rather than be a reason for it.

[Humodour]

Here's a piece from what is probably Australia's biggest right-leaning newspaper (a Murdoch entity of course) on the matter (Tony Abbott is the current leader of the opposition). It's disappointingly brief in its analysis of the root causes of the political divide between the US and the West:

 

Stark reminder of US-Australia divide

 

TONY Abbott the communist. That's right, in the US. If you plonked the "Mad Monk", the "right wing nutter", in the Congress and he started talking about healthcare, he would probably be mistaken for a certain Democrat representing Vermont.

 

That's a state in the union so unlike the rest of the US that it continues to re-elect Bernie Sanders to Congress, the only member on Capitol Hill who is a self-declared socialist.

 

As a recently returned correspondent from Washington, to watch the healthcare debate unfold in the US concurrently with the one here is to witness a core difference in our two countries.

 

Why is it that Australia boasts bipartisan support for publicly funded healthcare and a large rump of the US so vehemently opposes it?

 

Yesterday, during a worthy debate with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the opposition leader lauded the public health system and boasted of a big increase in government spending on health during the Howard years. He'd be laughed out of the Republican Party with talk like that.

 

The Rudd-Abbott debate was was not driven by the ideology of government's role in healthcare, but it centred on process. Indeed, Abbott, so derided by the Left here, would, on the contrary in the US, have Sanders right behind him. He'd just love Abbott's plan to raise taxes on big business for a European-style paid maternity program. The pragmatism in Australia over the role of government is wildly different from the US. As Chris Berg, a research fellow with the Institute of Public Affairs, wrote in Fairfax papers at the weekend: "The truth is there's very little ideology in Australian politics. Australia's political culture has always been somewhat apprehensive about obviously high-minded philosophies of government.

 

"Australia's political institutions were formed in the mid-19th century, when utilitarianism was the height of ideological fashion. Utilitarianism is an intensely practical political philosophy that says the purpose of government should be simply to seek the greatest good for the greatest number. No more, no less."

 

One can trace the roots of the healthcare debate both in the US and here to our two nations' founding. The US's fight against the British overlords and its unlikely victory gave rise to American exceptionalism. To this day that also finds voice in fringe elements, such as the Tea Party.

 

It is at the heart, a cry from Americans for individual liberty and innate distrust of "The Feds".

 

That Obama struggled to get up healthcare no doubt has some explanation in the $US1 trillion ($1.09 trillion) cost when the US is struggling in a deep recession. But the Clinton administration also failed at healthcare reform, and the US economy in 1993 was in relatively good shape.

 

Rather, the belief that government should not be doing something the private sector can do lies at the heart of the opposition in the US.

 

Of course, in Australia, we had a far more benign handover from the British and were originally founded as a nation-building project in which the government funded everything.

 

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opini...o-1225844454916

Edited March 28, 2010 by Krezack

[Monte Carlo]

Caveat Emptor.

 

Obama was upfront about what he sought to achieve when he ran for office. He won.

 

I write as somebody who doesn't share Obama's politics and has yet to be particularly impressed by the man. But you can't say that he hasn't delivered what he promised, unusual for a 21st Century politician.

 

As somebody wrote recently, the rugged individualism and excitement of the American Dream is all very well, until you get diagnosed with cancer and have no health insurance. But there is a problem - in the UK the Left (who invented socialised healthcare) are destroying it with managerialism and social engineering. Which is their own manifest destiny - every function of the state must not only deliver a core service but also prosletize Frankfurt-school Marxism. As Alanis would no doubt erroneously warble, isn't it ironic?

 

So, rugged individualists of the US, a word from an English conservative with Libertarian leanings (the small 'c' is deliberate), socialised healthcare as safety net = good. Socialised healthcare as comprehensive vehicle for social engineering = bad. I fear you will get the latter from the Obama iteration of the Democratic party.

 

Republicans, if they want to get with the programme, should triangulate the issue by forging 'safety net' light-touch healthcare whilst fighting tooth and nail the leftist version.

 

Cheers

MC

[Killian Kalthorne]

The Republicans had their chance to fix health care when they controlled the House, Senate, and the White House. They failed.

[Monte Carlo]

^ Indeed. But I am talking about now, not then.

 

Madison flags, Sarah Palin and Tea Parties are no doubt very enervating for the tectonic right-wing plates of the Republican / Conservative movement. For which, I add, I have some sympathy.

 

They won't however get Joe Voter supporting the GOP anytime soon, the Republicans face up to the fact that a page has been (probably irreversibly) turned and go with it. or face extinction as a credible political entity.

 

This is the context in which I see the Republicans responding to the Bill. Naturally, recently deposed political parties always return to their core activist base after the storm. But at this point in the electoral cycle the GOP should be moving out of that and wondering how to build up support. They ain't, as far as I can see, doing that. If they really want to screw around with the moveon.org remnants camped out in the West Wing they should brazenly steal some of their clothes, park their own tanks on their lawn (etc).

 

Cheers

MC

[Wrath of Dagon]

Why is it that Australia boasts bipartisan support for publicly funded healthcare and a large rump of the US so vehemently opposes it?

Doesn't really prove much, both parties now support Social Security and Medicare, or at least pay lip service to it. It's the difference between what's expected and what's new. Plus everyone loves getting something for free, even if it really isn't. Now a conservative supporting government paid maternity leave is indeed something else.

[Enoch]

My biggest problem with Obamacare is that it is a raw and unprecedented abuse of the Commerce Clause. The Commerce Clause empowers congress to regulate interstate commerce (note it does NOT empower it to interfere with intra-state commerce, in fact the 10th amendment specifically forbids it). Obamacare twists the power from one that regulates commerce to one that compels it under threat of jail and fines. In order to be a law abiding citizen in the US the Federal Government is commanding everyone to purchase a service from a third party. It makes no distinction for circumstance. For example the Amish have their own doctors, and practice their own fashion of healthcare in their communities. They are now compelled to do something their religion forbids them to do. People who are into holsitic medicine, natural cures, etc are likewise compelled to conform to something they do not wish to follow. It gets worse too. Congress is now ordering everyone to buy something want it or not. As you all now Obama and the Federal Government has seized and nationalized GM. This same abuse of the Constitution could be used to empower the government to force everyone in the US to buy a GM car. Or force everyone to shop in a certain store.

 

One other thing that bothers me is the federal government is compelling the states to spend state tax dollars on medicare extensions. They cannot do that. You need to remember the US is a union of 50 sovreign states. It is beyond the central governemts authority to tell a state how to spend its revenue. Let alone the fact that 46 of the 50 cannot afford to do what it's being ordered to do.

 

I do think the Constitutional challenges have a lot of merit and I truely hope the Supreme Court will strike down the entire law. Many states are providing health plans to their citizens now. This Federal takeover is just not necassary and is more than a little frightening.

The 10th amendment doesn't say anything "specifically." It's the most generic statement in the whole document.

 

What I didn't know earlier that may make a difference: The consequences for not complying with the individual mandate is a tax penalty. Couched simply as a higher tax on people who don't have health insurance, I think that the whole endeavor is on more solid legal ground. (Not to say that the Commerce Clause argument is a slam-dunk; it's a pretty thin reed after Gonzalez v. Raich, but with the most conservative Supreme Court nearly in a century, it does have a chance.) While there is caselaw stating that Congress can't do through the taxing power what it couldn't otherwise do through its regulatory powers, there is ample precedent of Congress using the tax code for regulatory purposes by making certain economic decisions that people make more expensive than they would otherwise be. (As a sidenote, it is very likely that the current legal challenges are going to be dismissed for lack of standing-- most of the parts that are being challenged haven't taken effect yet, and it is dubious whether State AGs would be the proper parties to bring suit even when the claims become ripe.)

 

The bit about Medicaid expansion imposing costs on states is also a non-starter. (I assume you meant Medicaid, as Medicare is wholly federal.) Medicaid is a voluntary program that States participate in to gain matching funds from the Feds, and the Feds have always been the party that sets the qualifications. If state governments hate this legislation that much, they can cancel their Medicaid program (and face the consequences at the ballot box).

 

The religious objections are probably the ones with the most teeth. But litigation over that will almost certainly have to wait until the potentially-objectionable portions kick in and actually impact the free exercise rights of some individuals.

[Walsingham]

Thinking about this on the train home I have to agree with the spirit of Monte's objections, given one addendum. Having a baseline healthcare system makes cold hard economic sense to me. But I also feel that there needs to be a far more concrete delineation of where that provision ends. This is difficult because we all pay for it in the UK, and no-one wants to be told they won't get what they need. But ANY system has to have limits. I can't think of any examples of this being a problem, but I do suspect that it must be, on simple logical principle.