People oppose ObamaCare because they are schizophrenic
[Posted by Karl]
Opponents of government-run healthcare have been called stupid, and mobs of extremists, but the Wall Street Journal’s Jerry Seib adds that they are crazy:
I hate the health-care system — but don’t you dare mess with it.
That’s a pretty apt summary of the American mind-set about health care — and not just now, but for decades. Something about health care calls forth from the national psyche a deep, almost inexplicable schizophrenia, as the latest, delayed effort to “reform” health care is showing President Barack Obama and the rest of Washington.
Indeed, the quest to fix health care has bedeviled every president since Harry Truman. Arguably, only one — Lyndon Johnson, when he oversaw the birth of Medicare — succeeded in making a real dent. Mr. Obama and Congress have, of course, spent much of the summer agonizing over how to alter the system, but this week lawmakers will head home for an August recess without having passed anything in either the House or Senate, largely because of public anxieties.
This seems counterintuitive. People know the system is creaking, frustrating and way too expensive. They complain about it all the time. Yet they can’t quite let it go.
Seib then offers five factors with cutesy names that explain why he thinks most Americans do not seem keen on ObamaCare. Unfortunately, Seib’s piece is based on an almost total misunderstanding of what Americans think about the healthcare system and supposed reform.
Frank Newport recently compiled a summary of ten key elements of American public opinion on healthcare reform, based on a review of Gallup’s latest survey research as of the week of July 27-31. Of these ten elements, four seem most relevant to the discussion. First, contrary to Seib, most Americans do not believe that the US healthcare system is in a state of crisis. Second, contrary to Seib, most Americans are satisfied with their current medical care and access to healthcare — and thus are not convinced that healthcare reform will benefit them personally. Third, Americans do not believe that healthcare reform would lessen costs — neither for the system as a whole nor for individuals. Fourth, Americans have little confidence that Congress can effectively and efficiently reform the country’s massive healthcare system. At least Seib got that last one right, calling it “The Post Office Factor.”
In short, it turns out that we do not need armchair psychoanalysis from a Beltway columnist to figure out what Americans think about healthcare reform and related issues. Indeed, public opinion on these issues has remained essentially unchanged since the last time Democrats tried healthcare reform in 1993-94. If Jerry Seib is looking for crazy people, he might want to start with the people who deluded themselves into thinking the public was demanding a government takeover of the US healthcare system.
–Karl
Obama’s proposal does not represent a government takeover of the US healthcare system. Private insurers might be SOOL though.
Well that puts that canard to bed.
Next.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 11:46 amHm. So the government, with essentially infinite resources and a horrifically bad record of micromanagement, has set things up so that companies will be forced to go to government controlled healthcare.
And it isn’t a takeover.
It reminds me of Henry Ford’s famous line about his Model T: you can have any color you like, so long as it is black.
Very seriously, spart, though you are AstroTroll, you might discuss all this with Mike K. He is a physician with experience in this entire debate. What have you got, besides Media Matters talking points?
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 8/5/2009 @ 11:53 amActual health care providers – hospitals, doctors, nurses etc. no. Insurance providers on the other hand will be required to comply with government imposed minimum standards as opposed to ‘standards’ determined by the health insurance industry. What’s not to like?
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 11:58 amWhere, other than anecdotal evidence floating around their own echo chambers, do liberals get the idea that everyone hates the current health system? For my part, I am pretty impressed that I get decent coverage and benefits at a fairly competitive rate. Sure, if you don’t have health insurance you may be negatively inclined towards the system, in the same way that if you don’t have a job you probably believe that the economy is rotten no matter what the key indicators say.
The problem is that every Obamabot wants $2500 worth of health care per year, but they only want to pay about $1000 (if even that) for it. Doesn’t take a genius to know that all the accountants in the world can’t make that work.
JVW (46226b) — 8/5/2009 @ 11:59 amnobody gets too much health care no more
happyfeet 2012 (71f55e) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:13 pmit’s much harder to come by
I’m waiting in line
Where, other than anecdotal evidence floating around their own echo chambers, do liberals get the idea that everyone hates the current health system?
Not everyone obviously, just a clear majority of voters who are the only one’s who should count right?
365 v 173
69,456,897 v 59,934,814
52.9% v 45.7%
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:16 pmLyndon Johnson did not make a dent in improving medical care. On the contrary, he started its downhill slide with Medicare. I’m almost 69 and can vividly recall what life was like pre-Medicare. Old people were not dying due to lack of care and believe it or not, even if you didn’t have insurance you could afford to go to the doctor. I know because my mother (who was the sole support of my brother and me)could always afford to take us to the doctor when we needed it. Unfortunately, we’re too far down the path of no return, but the best thing that could happen to the medical industry would be for government to just get completely out.
jwarner (0a2a75) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:23 pmsprat,
Got any numbers more recent than 9 months old? On healthcare?
Karl (092fb2) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:23 pmMy nasty gram to Congress ….
I suggest you stop pushing for Kevorkian Care on the American Public.
We don’t have a Health Care Crisis. We have a LIFESTYLE CRISIS. Less fast food, more exercise is 99% of Preventative Care. Handouts do NOTHING to solve the problem you claim to want to address.
The false premise of helping uninsured people who for the most part are either (a) illegal, (b) don’t want to buy insurance, (c) youngsters, or (d) too lazy to file for Medicaid is a Trojan Horse to institute Gov.t sponsored Kevorkian Care. Obama has said it. Frank has said it. All of you think it.
At least today, if a Private Company screws up there are alternatives to protest. Who can protest Uncle Sam? Uncle Sam will “Soylent Green” us citizens under the guise of “doing what is best for society.” You are 62 with cancer, die already and be patriot!
To boot, taxes, taxes and more taxes. Social Security broke. Medicaid is broke. Medicare is broke. They already pay the lowest health care prices to MDs and Hospitals …. yet you want Kevorkian Care so we can go MORE BROKE while allegedly “saving” money?
Only an ignorant buffoon thinks this saves money or provides for healthier population. Our ignorant, lying President with all Hope and Nonsense.
Congressman (blank), if you want Kevorkian Care — YOU VOLUNTEER FIRST WITH YOUR FAMILY! Congress excludes itself from drinking its Kool-Aid however. How convenient.
Degenerates. All of you. My only wish for those who support this — I hope you suffer the consequences of it yourselves.
Passing this bill and the other energy nonsense turns me into a virulent critic of anyone who votes for it. You will lose your job and I will help. Wise up before it is too late. We are sick of it and this time we will not forget.
I am so damn angry at the President and Congress. Furious. BASTA!
Anyway …… I am blasting these Mutherfuckers. Fuck them if they don’t like. I didn’t like 8 years of GWB hysteria either.
Can’t take the heat, drop dead.
HeavenSent (01a566) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:24 pm“Actual health care providers – hospitals, doctors, nurses etc. no. Insurance providers on the other hand will be required to comply with government imposed minimum standards as opposed to ’standards’ determined by the health insurance industry.”
You trolling idiot.
We already have Gov.t imposed minimum standards via Medicare and Medicaid.
All Private Insurers do is COPY/PASTE.
You are clueless on this issue.
HeavenSent (01a566) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:27 pmspart does a really good job of defeating his own arguments and making the government takeover of healthcare (or whatever topic he’s on) very unappealing on every level.
I am starting to doubt that spart is really a liberal… this level of embarrassing and obviously ridiculous argumentation and rudeness is more likely to have been planned. No doubt spart realizes that a lot of people from many points of view read this blog, and Spart wants them to reject Obama’s awful policies.
I don’t mind, Spart. I want Obama’s attempt to destroy this country to fail.
Juan (bd4b30) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:34 pmName calling to the people who Oppose, Hmmm Chicago Thug Poltics
lou (2b9753) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:36 pmIts amusing how spart puts canards “to bed” by basically creating new canards. Obviously spart has not read any more of the healthcare legislation than have Democrat congressmen.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:38 pmGot any numbers more recent than 9 months old? On healthcare?
Mandate bitches, mandate!
We already have Gov.t imposed minimum standards via Medicare and Medicaid.
Time to expand then.
All Private Insurers do is put profits above actual care. Take the excess profits out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost and expand the franchise to cover just about everyone.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:45 pmGot any numbers more recent than 9 months old? On healthcare?
Mandate bitches, mandate!
We already have Gov.t imposed minimum standards via Medicare and Medicaid.
Time to expand then.
All Private Insurers do is put profits above actual care. Take the excess profits out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost and expand the franchise to cover just about everyone.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:45 pmI love it!
This demonstrates Juan’s point (though I think is a lack of thought on the part of this troll, actually). What would spart think of Republican mandated “government imposed minimum standards”? Ah, but that’s different!
And notice how the knee jerk reaction occurs before learning the nature of those mandates!
But it isn’t different. “Government” doesn’t mean “politicians with whom spart finds common cause.” Putting government in control of things means that the other party gets that control too, from time to time. At least until ACORN has its way. Governmental bureaucracy and power is independent of party affiliation.
It’s alternately irritating and amusing to watch these characters attack private enterprise while turning around and bowing down before government entities. I could understand being sympathetic to both, or distrusting both.
It’s all partisanship. Which is why so many of the President’s supporters, like this Ariannawannabe posting here so furiously are undergoing…ah…cognitive dissonance as The One begins to back away from campaign promises and even do many things that the hated GW Bush administration did.
Ego-driven partisanship. Why else would committed progressive liberals support an inexperienced Chicago poll who is feathering his own nest—and doing things over which those same progressive liberals lambasted the last administration?
Silly trolls.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:46 pmNotwithstanding Newport’s findings that most people are satisfied overall, who would disagree that everybody would like to change some aspect of health care/health insurance, that nobody is perfectly happy with the ways things are?
And I think it is just as safe to say that there is absolutely no consensus on what aspect(s) needs changing… or on how to do it… or on how to finance it.
And given that, I find it quite reasonable that people would prefer to leave it alone rather than change it in ways that they quite possibly (probably?) wouldn’t like.
It’s akin to viewing the two party system as screwed up… but with no consensus around which to build a third party… people quite logically stick with the two parties that we have.
steve sturm (369bc6) — 8/5/2009 @ 12:58 pmSteve,
1) Tort Reform
2) Ban Assignment — make Insurers more responsible to their patients and patients to their MDs treatment plans.
3) Have Gov.t Provide Catastrophic Insurance Coverage to All — use taxes to pay for it, limit it to genetic defects and horrific accident victims with chronic care needs.
4) Allow all Insurers access to all patients across country without State Insurance Board meddling.
I could see policy expenses for Business and Self Insured falling 50-60% within a year.
HeavenSent (01a566) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:05 pmAscribing mental illness to political opponents is an increasing habit of the Left. Another thing that they borrowed from Stalin.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:13 pmComment by spart — 8/5/2009 @ 12:16 pm
Let me give you some actual polling figures from Gallup. According to them, 58% of all Americans are satisfied with their health care plans. Presumably included in the sample are the 15% of Americans who do not have health care coverage, and let’s make a very conservative assumption that at least half of them would say they are dissatisfied with their coverage, we are looking at something like 2 out of 3 Americans with health care plans are satisfied with them. That is precisely why Obama is trying to claim that those of us who currently have health insurance will get to keep their current plan — they are reading the same polls!
Want to hear the same argument from your fellow lefties? Check out this piece in The Atlantic. Trying to play the “everyone hates their health care plan” is a losing proposition for the Dems.
JVW (46226b) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:17 pmActual health care providers – hospitals, doctors, nurses etc. no. Insurance providers on the other hand will be required to comply with government imposed minimum standards as opposed to ’standards’ determined by the health insurance industry. What’s not to like?
Comment by spart
I suppose you are referring to mandates like that in California that now requires virtually any workers comp case to have a trial of acupuncture if it is requested. I have a long list of similarly idiotic requirements that place insurance out of the reach of many low income people.
I have watched this occur over the past 40 years and eight of those years in the commission on legislation of CMA. Each little group, like the inhalation therapists who wanted to set up store front clinics to treat COPD, would come to the legislature and offer contributions if they would just pass this little tiny piece of legislation. Over the years it became a thousand ton weight on the system because insurance cannot write bare bones coverage of the type that kids could afford and that would protect them from catastrophic events. Of course, they have people like me to take care of them for free so the motivation isn’t too high.
Right now a lot of medical students want single payer, partly because they have no idea of what it would be like as presently written. Ditto for the lefties who have never started a business or signed someone else’s paycheck. To them, it is about tactics and politics. They are either young and don’t think they’ll ever get sick, or they are old and demand everything for free. Both groups will be disappointed if it passes.
Mike K (addb13) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:22 pmAlmost Certain Leftist BS Alert, claiming that an unspecified “freshman congressman” was “physically assaulted” at some unspecified place by a healthcare protestor:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/08…-dem-assaulted/
Note that the story, oddly, never names the purported “victim” of said assault. Note, too, that there’s absolutely no news story anywhere online, as of this writing, confirming either the so-called “assault,” nor any arrest for same. (… and surely, publicly assaulting a congresscritter, in broad daylight, would be all sorts of newsworthy…) 😉
Just a quick heads-up, as I expect this is meant to go viral.
kent (9497c3) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:29 pmkent You know it’s coming.
Who do you think is showing up raising hell at the health-care meetings? They are the same people that believed the Clinton Chronicles, spent the last eight years waving American flags while singing Let the Eagle Soar, the same people who then changed into NOBAMA t-shirts and traded racist emails with each other after going to Palin rallies, the same misfits who then carried poorly spelled signs to tea parties. This is the activist Republican base.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:36 pmspart’s understanding of the electorate’s frustration with the tax and spend Democrats’ abandonment of the false themes that they campaigned upon is based on the same irrational denial that we’ve seen spart apply to the rest of the times that his fantasy world conflicts with reality.
spart is rather typical of the partisan Democrat. Easier to invent stereotypes of racist, ignorant, rubes that to actually have to construct something called an argument that is designed to persuade.
Democracy is the first thing abandoned by the fanatic like spart.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:40 pmComment by spart — 8/5/2009 @ 1:36 pm
As opposed to the activist Democrat base who fly Che flags, smash windows at Starbucks, hang Sarah Palin in effigy, intimidate voters at the polls, and assualting senior citizens? Yep, the tolerant, reasonable Democrat activist base for you.
JVW (2b9c02) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:45 pmSPQR false themes?
What false themes? seems to me that Obama is attempting to implement exactly what he campaigned on.
fly Che flags, smash windows at Starbucks, hang Sarah Palin in effigy, intimidate voters at the polls, and assualting senior citizens?
All of which were the acts of individuals, none of which were sanctioned or organized by astroturf outfits in support of GOP policy, promoted by partisan cable news networks or funded by large donations from special interest lobbyists.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:57 pmspart, false themes like fiscal responsibility which Democrats campaigned upon before getting the keys to the parents’ Corvette like drunken teenagers.
The astroturf accusations are just more of your irrational conspiracy theories, spart. Ought to get that neurochemical thing checked out.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 1:59 pmSPRAT:
“All of which were the acts of individuals, none of which were…”
So sure of yourself, aren’t you.
KB (0d0623) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:02 pmThere are drunken sailors on the street corners shouting to Obama, “Hey, dude, don’t you think you’ve spent enough?”
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:04 pmAll of which were the acts of individuals, none of which were sanctioned or organized by astroturf outfits in support of GOP policy, promoted by partisan cable news networks or funded by large donations from special interest lobbyists.
OK, if you believe the Dems and Radical-Leftist groups don’t coordinate these activities, then you really aren’t worth the effort of debating. I know in your weird world every “spontaneous” anti-war gathering is organic, no matter how clearly the puppet strings lead back to George Soros, ANSWER, and other hard-left groups, and every pro-ObamaCare rally has nothing to do with the deep pockets of organized labor or trial lawyers. You are welcome to live in that fantasy world; just don’t expect any of us to buy into it.
JVW (2b9c02) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:05 pmYou keep trolling, pal. That’s why you are here, to stir things up with lies, exaggerations, and word games. No worries: you will find lots of people here who will want to fight with you, which is your goal.
The sad news is that your games—as opposed to honest dissent and debate—damages what Patterico works hard to build. Trolls like you build nothing, and your joy at irritating others is palpable—and quite juvenile.
Rave on, astrotroll.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:05 pmSpart gives idiots a bad name 🙁
Lord Nazh (899dce) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:10 pmAs more and more people hear the horror stories of the Indian Health Service, the VA, Medicare, Medicaid, … (VA example) they will begin to see themselves as potential victims of those government programs, where care is dictated by government bean counters rather than by government licensed medical practitioners.
If it was going to be so good, Congress would be lining up to get care from the IHS or VA. Not happening, won’t, and the public smells the dead rat.
htom (412a17) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:10 pmfalse themes like fiscal responsibility which Democrats campaigned upon before getting the keys to the parents’ Corvette like drunken teenagers.
5 year spending freeze, ’nuff said. Oh and thanks for the tanking economy you guys left behind, a nice gesture.
The astroturf accusations are just more of your irrational conspiracy theories
What are you denying? That outfits like ‘Freedom Works’ and ‘Conservatives for Patients Rights’ are conservative astroturf organizations or that such astroturf outfits are heavily involved in organizing the town hall mobs, just as they did the teabaggers. Or both? Just to be clear.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:17 pmThis is just alphie-esque performance art by shart.
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:19 pmPeople who believe that the government that cannot:
-balance the budget;
-exempts themselves from the laws they impose upon the public;
-has created Medicare and Medicaid which are bankrupting the nation;
-manages the VA and Indian Rseervation Healthcare systems, two of the worst systems in existenance;
-can’t be trusted to run their own bank; gave us Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and lied about their condition;
-and finally a government which is shredding the Constitution.
Such people are in need of a lobotomy or a straight jacket.
I miss the days when the Left was more sane and started the day by claiming 2,333,000 innocent Iraqi children were eaten by genetically mutated gerbils created by Karl Rove.
Little wonder than we hear such nonsense.
Thomas Jackson (8ffd46) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:19 pmPatterico – Is this the kind of good-faithed discussion you mentioned last week?
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:21 pmOnce again we see that spart’s only tools are invention, misrepresentation and defamation.
No attempt at persuasion because that’s so inconvenient. Just can’t have those voters not do as they’re informed by their betters, that’s spart’s theory.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:22 pmSpart: To paraphrase James Carvill:
“It’s the cost, stupid!”
It’s telling that neither you nor Seib above deal with the cost issue other than to make assertions that our current system is “too expensive.” The problem here for both of you is that the CBO has already outed the woefully underestimated cost figures of this heaping, bloated pile of monkey crap and has stated categorically that it will bloat the deficit in an “unsustainable” way.
No amount of hand wringing about “GOP activists” or “47 million” or twistingly dishonest readings of current or past polls can change this one, simple, shining fact: Less and less Americans believe that this administration and their cabal leaders in Congress are being either realistic or truthful when it comes to the cost of a “reform” that will, eventually, raise deficits to the point that the American economy goes into the tank… along with the majority of Americans.
It’s not health care reform, necessarily, spart, its this health care reform. Live with the truth, troll.
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:24 pmMore reality that does not match spart’s fantasy interior dialog:
And:
But spart has to repeat dishonest talking points about mobs, and astroturf and extremists because he can’t confront reality.
Never could, evidently.
SPQR (5811e9) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:27 pmShart again proves that it wants Þo talk about anything except for the actual topic. Dishonest f*cking lying douchenozzle, it is.
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:28 pmBJTexs
Highest cost/lowest return per capita of all the industrialized world.
We can do better, a lot better.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:29 pmspart: Linky?
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:31 pmSee how it just moves on to its next talking point / lie without even acknowledging the fact that is was just outed on its prior lies? It is like it just ignores everything that does not fit within the framework of its talking points.
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:34 pmOh and spart? Still no word from you on the CBO’s projections of cost and increased deficits compared to the unicorn numbers of Teh One.
It should also be noted that Seib’s unfortunate decision to call people mentally disturbed for opposing this health care reform package uncomfortably echos the forced institutionalizations of dissidents to “sanitariums” in the old USSR.
Scratch a lefty, find a fascist, I guess.
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:35 pmBJTexs
Linky (PDF)
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:38 pmBJ – Shart tells lies and it is a f*cking liar. That is all you need to say to it.
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:41 pmOh, Good Unicorn, spart. Yet another study based upon the “groundbreaking” WHO study of 2000 that attempts to compare the quality of US health care based almost solely on gerrymandered numbers for things like infant mortality?
There are other studies that were not impressed.
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:45 pmthe same misfits who then carried poorly spelled signs to tea parties. This is the activist Republican base.
Comment by spart
Whereas, the correctly spelled, professionally printed signs are carried by Obama activists.
I made the mistake, over at Washington Monthly (I know. I need to give up on them once Kevin Drum left), of trying to debate the significance of the tea party groups. I didn’t realize at the time that this is the theme of the week and the lefties have their marching orders.
I am quite interested in how the tea party movement will continue. I know from hard experience that it is difficult to keep citizen volunteers motivated very long. WE had such a movement in Mission Viejo for several years but they got discouraged when the new people we put into office to boot out the clique, turned out to be just as susceptible to the temptations of office. The current city council is spending Mission Viejo into insolvency. The health care issue seems to be catching fire and may last until 2010. I hope it lasts longer but we have 1994 to show us that nothing good lasts long in politics.
What is really sad is that we do need reform or Medicare will collapse in 11 years. All the left wants to do is add everybody to Medicare. No reform.
Mike K (addb13) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:49 pmStill nothing for spart on how much this health care reform is going to cost all of us and what the potentially devastating deficit numbers will result from its implementation.
Any insight there, troll?
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:52 pmBarcky will not sign anything that is not deficit neutral. He said so, so it must be true.
JD (24e83b) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:55 pmBJT, you surely aren’t expecting a genuine answer from some undergrad speaking Troot to Powder to a buch of eeevvviillll Republican types?
Seriously, this dude isn’t interested in discussion, debate, or honest disagreement. He is only interested in games and talking point lies. Mock and guffaw, friends. Mock and guffaw.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 8/5/2009 @ 2:58 pmApparently Lanny Davis now wants to photograph little old ladies and veterans protesting at Townhall meetings as evidence of the organized right-wing cabal against health care. And after they’re photographed, he wants them investigated.
rochf (ae9c58) — 8/5/2009 @ 3:07 pmBJTexs
The Hoover Institute, a classic. Thanks for the laugh
If there are CBO numbers you think make your case, post ’em.
spart (3095d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 3:11 pmYour mother wants you to clean up that cat box right now, or no dinner tonight.
Dmac (e6d1c2) — 8/5/2009 @ 3:20 pmWow, is spart really as dumb as he seems? He thinks that the gov’t will take over (oh, not take over – simply mandate everything and the insurers will be “SOOL”) and make things better and cheaper? Really? Based on what evidence?
And mandate? What mandate? Every poll shows a majority of americans opposed to every single one of Obama’s policy ideas. Spart – your guy won the election – we all know that. But that does not translate into the electorate agreeing with all of his policies.
You really don’t know anything about this subject other than your tired leftists cliches. “just take away the excess profits and everything will be rainbows and unicorns for all”. that’s idiotic.
First, define “excess profits”? How much is a “good profit” and what is above that? Is one cent profit o.k.? How about one dollar? Twenty dollars?
The cost has gone way up on health care, and you blame the insurance companies? Explain to me how it is in the interest of the companies whose job it is to pay for care on the insured’s behalf to make those costs more?
O.K. now that you understand that the insurance companies not only don’t raise the costs, but want to controll the costs – explain how taking them out of the picture will somehow reduce the costs. And then explain how the gov’t is going to reduce the costs w/o rationing care.
It is beyond idiocy to blame the costs of health care on the insurance industry. That is like blaming the high cost of flour on the baking industry. Yeah, for some reason the bakers WANT their own costs to increase exponentially. that will really help profits.
Why don’t you take some classes in basic logic before trying to form an opinion.
Monkeytoe (83f0c8) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:21 pmWatch for “spart” boasting of meeting von Braun, being in special forces and smelling Rush Limbaugh’s B.O.
Brother Bradley J. Fikes, C.O.R. (3c7120) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:38 pmGood point, Bradley, that act of pretending not to know widely reported events ( like pretending above not to know that the CBO scored the Obama proposals as adding to the deficit ).
SPQR (26be8b) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:41 pm“Take the excess profits out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost”
spurt – Please tell me more about the excess profits private insurers are earning in health care. Do you have any documentation? How do you define excess?
daleyrocks (718861) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:45 pmSpart is in moderation because of a comment in another thread so I suggest you don’t reply to his comment since he can’t respond.
DRJ (8d138b) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:50 pmSorry, DRJ, I missed that spart was in moderation. It is not my practice to continue to address people in such circumstances.
SPQR (26be8b) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:52 pmDRJ – I missed that as well. I’ll have to search and find what the lad did.
daleyrocks (718861) — 8/5/2009 @ 4:55 pmComments have become virtually unreadable. I guess Spart has earned his paycheck from Axelrod.
Peg C. (48175e) — 8/5/2009 @ 5:09 pmTake the excess profits out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost and expand the franchise to cover just about everyone.
You’re good at making things up.
The public does not support the health care plans in Congress. The polls are clear on that. Don’t bother with any more contortions to try to argue they do.
Gerald A (78e08a) — 8/5/2009 @ 6:18 pmTake the excess profits out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost and expand the franchise to cover just about everyone.
… should read
Take the excess Government Do-Nothing Bureaucrats out of the system and we can get the same or better care at the same or lower cost and expand profits with even lower prices.
You would think 200 years of Capitalism creating gobs of wealth never, ever enjoyed would disabuse them of the fantasy that somehow the profit motive is bad but bureaucratic government is benevolent and kind.
HeavenSent (01a566) — 8/5/2009 @ 6:27 pm“I suggest you stop pushing for Kevorkian Care on the American Public.”
lol
imdw (c990d8) — 8/5/2009 @ 6:47 pmOh you mean, like, here and here?
Anything else you want to say about the cost of this bloated crap sack, spart or are you still stuck in moderation?
BJTexs (a2cb5a) — 8/6/2009 @ 5:59 am[…] So a plurality thinks the health care plan is a bad idea! (And this is consistent (as Karl noted yesterday) with other recent polling data on key elements of the debate.) Yes indeed, let’s bury that […]
Patterico’s Pontifications » L.A. Times Uncritically Spouts Democrat Talking Points on ObamaCare (e4ab32) — 8/6/2009 @ 7:35 am#67
Attempting to speak rationally with Spart is hopeless. Those who advocate Kevorkiancare aren’t sane. As Pelosi demonstrates they are also prone to hallucinating.
Thomas Jackson (8ffd46) — 8/6/2009 @ 4:21 pmI would bet my last poor dollar,3/4 of these ranting know nothings don’t even have current health care. Perhaps Palin can lead them to her praying witch doctor.
Pam (6c78d5) — 8/12/2009 @ 3:42 amPam, do tell what you base your observation on. Surely your snark has some facts behind it?
steve miller (c5e78c) — 8/12/2009 @ 4:08 am