The bidness guys ‘n gals are truly excited about potentially reducing health care costs that affect their bottom line. Well, not really.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said it will spend $100 million in an effort to stem the “rapidly growing influence of government over private-sector activity,” in a major new move by the powerful business group to counter the Obama administration’s regulatory agenda.
Because regulation would lead to horrible things like rationing, high overhead costs and bureaucracy, none of which exist in the current system. Most private insurance plans are simple, comprehensive and cover pre-existing conditions and specialist visits with little or no hassle.
Obama could come up with a proposal that costs them each one cent per year, drops manna from the skies and gives them eternal youth and three hour and fifty nine minute erections, and they would still hate him because manna represents “socialism.”
Tribes must stick together, no matter the little kiddies with teeth rotting out and old folks losing their houses after illnesses. Neo-liberalism may be dead as a doornail, but until the very serious people who destroyed the economy actually understand what has happened, which will be never, moving forward will be a slow slog.
You wouldn’t want to wind up with a crazy-quilt, nonsensical insurance system that places arbitrary hurdles in front of people, that would be terrible.
Obama nationalized health care will go the way of Hillary care. at a more rapid pace however.
An institution that can’t run Medicare effeciantly could never run this one
devoreberg, u are a moron. you dont see whats happening to your own country. you dont think socialism is a big deal? obama fired waggoner because hw wouldnt hand over gm to the uaw, so he brought in fritz, who laughably said on cnbc that the union was part of the solution, not part of the problem. now the dems are threatening healhcare providers to not say anything negative about nationalized healthcare. yeah, you really live in a free country now. shalom
A government-run system is inevitable because of costs. I believe a single-payer system will be fairly good for first-aid and primary care, but I don’t it will be much when it comes to serious medical problems.
MOT @ 2,
Bad management and a crappy union are responsible for ruining GM. Plus they really haven’t built many cars and trucks that Americans wanted to buy. Quality was so shitty for so long that Americans (and the rest of the world) don’t think much of GM’s products.
by the way, i dont watch the dan rather like lying networks, did they show the miles of protestors along obamas motorcade in wisconsin against nationalized healhcare? the rothschilds are 50 years too soon in taking over this country. there are still public school graduates alive before the brainwashing began, and too many guns to defend ourselves.
The simple fact that the % of GDP that we spend on health care is almost 16% — over TWICE what every other modern nation spends — and with worse care (50 million with no medical care), I find it difficult to believe that you are serious in your opposition to reform.
Think about this: If ‘private’ business is as efficient as you say, it will have no trouble outperforming the government insurance.
Don’t you have enough faith in your ideology to put it to the test?
Anyone seen ‘Breaking Bad‘? He’s got private insurance.
@2
The folks at moodys.com don’t seem to mind what Obama’s doing. Of course, that could mean that they’re part of the communist plot too…
re 4: How did unions affect the designs that the American companies came up with?
What happened to the American Auto Industry is that the emissions regulations from the 70’s had a loophole: Pick up trucks (presumed to be for farmers) were exempt.
Hence, Detroit could merrily and cheaply produce as many gas guzzling behemoths as they could sell.
Another 30 year dead-end from the American auto producers. Did unions force them to do this? I don’t think so. The culmination of this trend was the super-stoopid HUMMER. Nothing says I’m a stupid ass like a big HUMMER. It marks you clearly as an idiot and is easier to spot than a Bush/Cheney bumper sticker.
@3
I think a system that covers basic preventive stuff and catastrophic care and lets private co-insurance fill in the middle would work pretty well.
@5
How long until we see you on the news because you’ve shot a doctor, cop, soldier or security guard?
5 “there are still public school graduates alive before the brainwashing began”
You, sir, are evidently not one of them.
@11
how long before we see you shoot a military recruiter?
@13
Never. You’re the one carrying on about conspiracies and having guns.
I don’t own a gun.
9 A Suburban (or one of its variants i. e. Tahoe, Yukon, Denali, Escalade, etc) has to take the number two slot for stupidity unless it’s on the way to Camp Parsons loaded to the gunnels with Boy Scouts.
Then again, you have to hand an honorable mention for lunacy to Toyota, the company that almost invented the small pickup, for trotting out the gigantic Tundra to knuckle-dragging consumers who like to fantasize about hauling a skid of pig iron over a teeter-totter while they’re actually toting a couple of sacks of groceries. Many of the industry soothsayers are saying Toyota is going to be the next automaker to get into big trouble after GM and Chrysler, because they’ve grown so reliant on pandering to the bigger-faster-plusher market.
@13
Btw, my family has a record of military service that starts at the Revolution and ends with ‘Nam. My dad’s a Korean War vet, all my uncles were either in Korea or ‘Nam.
I have a hell of a lot of respect for people in the armed forces.
#13.
The difference is…your rhetoric sounds a lot like the paranoid rantings of the men that shot Dr. Tiller and Stephen T. Johns. Nothing you’re hearing here sounds anything like a recently-converted Muslim like the one who shot the soldiers in Arkansas. Wacko liberals typically don’t kill people. Wacko right-wingers typically do.
@15
I’ve got a soft spot for Suburbans. But yeah, if all you need to haul is a couple bags of groceries a couple a miles a bicycle works great for that. Save the ‘Burban for summer road trips with you and 6 or 7 of your friends.
Let us not forget that the obama sat in a church for 20 years listening to reverend wright say the exact same crap as the holocaust museum shooter.
Them Jews ain’t going to let him talk to me
…
the AIPAC vote that’s controlling him, that will not let him send representation to the Darfur Review Conference
That’s what obama’s reverend had to say the same day some wacko was shooting up the museum.
@15
Toyota’s retooling and refocusing on small cars.
http://www.treehugger.com/file.....t-cars.php
19. Wright’s rhetoric is nothing like you see on white supremacist sites. I defy you to find a quote in which Wright suggests actually doing harm to another person. Or anyone who listened to him that went out and did so as a result.
Liberal extremists may or may not be better people than their right-wing counterparts, but they are definitely less violent…at least in terms of actually hurting actual people. In eight years of Bush there was plenty of paranoid crazy-talk on the left, but nobody did anything like we’ve seen in the first five months of Obama’s administration.
Regarding the SUV’s, way back in ’76 I bought a huge 4×4 Silverado with a 350 engine, dual exhausts, and a 4 barrel carb (extra large radiator, too!}.
I loved that truck. But I liked the little 4 wheel ‘Power Ram’ that I got in the early 80’s even better. That thing could go where no 4×4 behemoth would dare It was made by Mitsubishi when they were trying to make a name, so it was solid. Got 225,000 mi. off of it and still sold it for $800.
I have a Durango now, so in all honesty, I’m not that far behind the HUMMER driver.
10 That wouldn’t solve the problem. Preventive care and encouraging healthy lifestyles is all well and good, but it doesn’t do much good telling a guy who already has stomach cancer that he should have eaten more brocolli 20 years ago.
@23
There’s no system or plan out there where someone wont get screwed.
The idea behind what I’m talking about is that the universal coverage would pickup the tab for things like cancer treatments (under catastrophic care). Co-insurance would cover things like having private room at a hospital instead of a shared one. Universal coverage would cover an eye exam. Co-insurance would help pay for contacts and Lazic surgery.
re 19: We all appreciate the fact that you are the champion of the underdog, but even in the Jewish community, there is a difference of opinion as to the long term efficacy of the Likkud party’s aims and goals.
Opposing the conservative, militaristic Jewish lobby isn’t anti-Jewish. It’s anti-conservative — which I suspect you already know. But your whole style is manipulation and shading of the truth. Much like a snake-oil salesman.
@21
beernotwar
one point you’re missing is the mainstream media potrays the holocaust shooter as a violent killer, as well they should, but they make excuses for bill ayers, who was just lucky nobody was killed.
We really don’t have “health care” in America so much as we have an ad hoc system constructed to capitalize on illness and injury.
@17
hey beernotwar,
did u think it was funny when david letterman made a joke about violence against sarah palins daughter? or because she’s a christian and a republican then thats ok?
@1 “An institution that can’t run Medicare effeciantly could never run this one”
WTF are you prattling about? Medicare is 50 times as efficient as the private health insurance industry. Medicare: 1/2 of 1% goes to administration and overhead, the rest to actual health care. Private sector: The insurance industry, whose only functions are collecting premiums and denying claims, skims 25% of our health care dollars off the top.
As usual, GS is totally and completely full of shit.
@2 Obama is saving the capitalists’ asses. He is saving capitalism from collapse. Why he bothers is a mystery.
@30
roger, its a mystery to you because thats not what he’s doing at all. he’s socializing, and if it sometimes appears he’s saving capatalism it’s because, one, they can’t do it all at once, and two, they want to confuse and misdirect you. and your not stupid. imagine how they’re fooling the “dancing with the stars” crowd.
I love how the mentally challenged anti-science anti-reality ‘publicans hate all things gov’ment because everything the gov’ment does is evil, corrupt and wasteful. But wait 10 seconds and they’ll tell you they’re the biggest supporters of the military and our troops. The military by the way is a nearly a third of our gov’ment. I’ve worked for them directly and indirectly, and for another non-military Federal gov’ment agency. It’s all the same, same rules, policies and leaders. Yes the military has guns and the social security office doesn’t, but it’s all your tax dollars and Federal employees. Why one is magically good and you can’t even DARE speak against it and everything else is magically bad is kinda funny.