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On August 18 2016 11:19 LegalLord wrote: Meh, the failings of Obamacare so far seem mostly to be the standard fare of difficulties in adjustment that inevitably follow such a large scale change. Perhaps its biggest fault is that it didn't end up implementing the public option which would have probably made everything run much more smoothly overall.
At the time when Obamacare was still being debated, there were many people on the far right who argued that Obamacare was secretly a poison pill for the private insurance regime that would ultimately lead to the need for universal care. I didn't pay much mind to that argument at the time -- especially given that the medical insurance companies were participating in the legislation -- but it's looking rather prophetic now.
Folks who characterize Obamacare that way tend to conveniently ignore the stunningly poor state of the health insurance industry prior to its passage. Healthcare didn't need a poison pill because it was already sick.
My insurance was a shitton lot better before Obamacare. Yes, everyone has insurance now (or has access to it), but anyone who already had decent coverage got fucked. Hard.
"Obamacare" would be a far better piece of legislation if they had been successful in:
1) Forcing states to develop exchanges 2) Been able to coerce states into accepting the Medicaid expansion as they had previous Medicaid changes
The former was probably never going to happen. The latter only didn't happen because of a Supreme Court decision that went unpredicted by the vast majority of legal minds because it simply hadn't come up in previous Medicaid expansions.
Of course the public option would have made it even better.
On August 18 2016 11:19 LegalLord wrote: Meh, the failings of Obamacare so far seem mostly to be the standard fare of difficulties in adjustment that inevitably follow such a large scale change. Perhaps its biggest fault is that it didn't end up implementing the public option which would have probably made everything run much more smoothly overall.
At the time when Obamacare was still being debated, there were many people on the far right who argued that Obamacare was secretly a poison pill for the private insurance regime that would ultimately lead to the need for universal care. I didn't pay much mind to that argument at the time -- especially given that the medical insurance companies were participating in the legislation -- but it's looking rather prophetic now.
Folks who characterize Obamacare that way tend to conveniently ignore the stunningly poor state of the health insurance industry prior to its passage. Healthcare didn't need a poison pill because it was already sick.
My insurance was a shitton lot better before Obamacare. Yes, everyone has insurance now (or has access to it), but anyone who already had decent coverage got fucked. Hard.
Consumer side costs for those with access to insurance weren't where the pre-Obamacare healthcare market showed its age really, but yes, out of pocket costs did go up for a fair number of people.
On August 18 2016 11:19 LegalLord wrote: Meh, the failings of Obamacare so far seem mostly to be the standard fare of difficulties in adjustment that inevitably follow such a large scale change. Perhaps its biggest fault is that it didn't end up implementing the public option which would have probably made everything run much more smoothly overall.
At the time when Obamacare was still being debated, there were many people on the far right who argued that Obamacare was secretly a poison pill for the private insurance regime that would ultimately lead to the need for universal care. I didn't pay much mind to that argument at the time -- especially given that the medical insurance companies were participating in the legislation -- but it's looking rather prophetic now.
Folks who characterize Obamacare that way tend to conveniently ignore the stunningly poor state of the health insurance industry prior to its passage. Healthcare didn't need a poison pill because it was already sick.
My insurance was a shitton lot better before Obamacare. Yes, everyone has insurance now (or has access to it), but anyone who already had decent coverage got fucked. Hard.
Consumer side costs for those with access to insurance weren't where the pre-Obamacare healthcare market showed its age really, but yes, out of pocket costs did go up for a fair number of people.
Yes, out of pocket costs went up. So did premiums. The only thing that went down was the quality of the coverage. The current coverage that I have now is a joke compared to what I could get before. And this was all by design. My good coverage was taxed into oblivion to subsidize shitty coverage for everyone -- including those who don't even want to buy coverage in the first place.
Personally,I'll take you having to pay a little more over me have to declare bankruptcy or borrow a fuck ton of money for medical expenses. Just me though.
Single payer woulda been better and simpler than the strange amalgam of the aca. Pity people weren't up to just doing single payer. Have the republicans yet put forth any sort of actual viable proposal on the topic?
On August 18 2016 11:58 zlefin wrote: Single payer woulda been better and simpler than the strange amalgam of the aca. Pity people weren't up to just doing single payer. Have the republicans yet put forth any sort of actual viable proposal on the topic?
Pretty sure the vast majority of republicans are still riding the "repeal Obamacare" train as their primary policy towards healthcare.
I think they are still pushing the super vague voucher system that would just be government money into an industry that needed a lot of the regulations in the ACA. I am sure all the good stuff in the ACA, like not being able to be denied for pre-existing conditions, would be removed.
Back too the good old days when you could be denied for having diabetes or cancer.
To be fair, the Republican's version of healthcare reform isn't too ridiculous compared to their other economic plans. Oh, oops.
Aetna pulling off the exchanges is more a sign of a big insurer who failed to adapt to a new market rather than the ACA being inherently flawed. Also, I hear all these stories about people who had their policies get worse or that plans are expensive... but more people are insured and costs are increasingly more slowly? What is this madness? It's like anecdotes aren't an accurate representation of what's actually going on.
Paul Manafort, Donald Trump’s campaign chairman, personally recruited a top lobbyist to join a $2.2 million campaign aimed at influencing U.S. policy toward Ukraine, but refused to tell him who was behind the effort, the lobbyist, former Republican congressman Vin Weber, tells Yahoo News.
Weber, a senior partner at Mercury Group, said in an interview that “Paul did recruit me” in 2012 to lobby on behalf of the newly formed European Centre for a Modern Ukraine, a Brussels-based nonprofit that, Manafort told him, was backed by “businesspeople who did not want to give their names.”
Weber said he “repeatedly” asked Manafort to identify the principals behind the Brussels organization, but he declined to do so. In fact, the backers of the nonprofit had close ties to the hardline, pro-Russian government of then Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovych, and one of the group’s board members was the country’s foreign minister, says Adrian Karatnycky, a Ukraine expert at the Atlantic Council and the former president of Freedom House, a Washington-based human rights group.
“It would be very hard to look at this entity and say it was not directed by the then Ukrainian government,” said Karatnycky. “It’s pretty clear they were running interference on sensitive issues on behalf of Yanukovych.”
Manafort’s role in setting up the Washington lobbying campaign on behalf of the Brussels nonprofit was first reported Wednesday by The Associated Press. The AP reported that between 2012 and 2014, Manafort helped channel $1.07 million to the Republican-oriented Mercury Group and another $1.13 million to the Podesta Group, a Democratic firm headed by Tony Podesta, brother of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta. The fees were meant to promote the publicly announced purpose of the nonprofit: to lobby Congress and the Obama administration to support Yanukovych’s bid to gain entry into the European Union.
Weber’s account shows how Manafort’s work for the Kiev regime may have gone beyond his self-described role as a campaign adviser to Yanukovych to include active — and previously secret — efforts to influence U.S. policy in the region. Asked for comment for this story, Manafort Wednesday night said in an email: “I never worked for the center. I introduced them to D.C. firms who worked directly for the center.” He added that The Associated Press account was “wrong. I was not involved in any payment plans” from the center to the two Washington lobbying firms.
I always thought the ACA was the Republican plan for health care. Not sure why they turned around and tried to deny that it was their creation from the 90s.
I do have to agree that a large part of the motivation for the Democratic implementation of ACA was just getting some form of reform in to likely make it easier to get even more substantial reform later. The issue really is letting GOP states opt out of shit like medicaid expansion.
Completely off topic, but the easiest way to tell if someone is a total right wing shill is if they refuse to say "Democratic Party" or "Democratic". Especially if they do it multiple times in a very consistent, obviously coached manner. I've never seen any left winger call it the "Republic" party which makes nearly as much sense as refusing to use proper English to refer to the Dem. Party. It's not even like we live in a democracy, it's the most obvious, cynical ploy I can think of.
On August 18 2016 11:19 LegalLord wrote: Meh, the failings of Obamacare so far seem mostly to be the standard fare of difficulties in adjustment that inevitably follow such a large scale change. Perhaps its biggest fault is that it didn't end up implementing the public option which would have probably made everything run much more smoothly overall.
Would have been nice if "Democrats" hadn't killed it.
Here's the Green Party town hall, GMO's, and Vaccines came up if people are interested in listening to her positions. If people don't have to vote against Trump than there's no harm in giving a clear signal to the parties that the party is over with a Stein or Johnson vote.
On August 18 2016 12:26 ticklishmusic wrote: To be fair, the Republican's version of healthcare reform isn't too ridiculous compared to their other economic plans. Oh, oops.
Aetna pulling off the exchanges is more a sign of a big insurer who failed to adapt to a new market rather than the ACA being inherently flawed. Also, I hear all these stories about people who had their policies get worse or that plans are expensive... but more people are insured and costs are increasingly more slowly? What is this madness? It's like anecdotes aren't an accurate representation of what's actually going on.
Of course service will be initially poorer. We have a system in place used to only treating healthy people and are now told they can't just say no to people they dislike. That means their costs will go up because taking care of sick people is hard.
That's not a flaw in the ACA, that's the cost of doing business.
On August 18 2016 05:00 GreenHorizons wrote: @Ticklish, she's not hedging as much as being consistent. She doesn't think we should trust test results from people who have a financial interest in certain results, have to say the alternative sounds a lot crazier to me.
Then she should recognize that the debunked Wakefield paper, which is the root of the anti-vaxx hysteria, is guilty of precisely that.
But I'm sure she knows that, and she's just pandering to those people to get their votes.
And perhaps she could recognize the NSF as well as individual universities have their own funding. Pesticides and genetic modification does not rely on industry for funding. Some funding is provided to some studies, but it is incredibly easy to find a study done by a university that got the money from their sports programs.
wait universities are using football money to fund studies on GMOs? can you find me an exampme
Oregon State University profits from its football program and uses money generated to fund research. Oregon State studies GMOs extensively.
can you provide a link please? this oregonstate.edu seems to indicate a lot of private contracts and grants. i dont have find on my phone that im aware of to search for football or athletics but in a quick read i didnt spot it anywhere
Not really sure what to link. Being a professor at a university entitles you to a certain level of funding for research. PhD students get their paycheck and money for buying equipment and supplies from the university. The money made from various sources funds that. The football program is a notable income generator.
1) you said it would be "incredibly easy" to find a study funded by football and now you "don't know what to link"
2) that's not how funding works. professors actually give up a percentage of their grant money to the university as "rent" for facilities. if grants stopped being given out research would stop but football would go on
3) i think you don't know what you are talking about and are otherwise full of shit. this actually surprises me since i thought you knew how research worked since you work with semiconductors somehow
On August 18 2016 11:30 cLutZ wrote: Our drug/device costs are actually representative of what the free market cost should be, other countries have artificially low rates because of the government monopoly.
If the free market would have its way then people would die if they cost more to treat than they can pay and diseases that could be cured for cheap would be allowed to grow into huge, profitable problems to treat. Which is close to what we have.
A big part of reducing healthcare costs is treating problems early before they become bigger. That's how a lot of countries with far less resources and technology than the US implement pretty good healthcare systems.
On August 18 2016 12:59 Nevuk wrote: Completely off topic, but the easiest way to tell if someone is a total right wing shill is if they refuse to say "Democratic Party" or "Democratic". Especially if they do it multiple times in a very consistent, obviously coached manner. I've never seen any left winger call it the "Republic" party which makes nearly as much sense as refusing to use proper English to refer to the Dem. Party. It's not even like we live in a democracy, it's the most obvious, cynical ploy I can think of.
Can you give an example of this? I want to know what you're talking about because you just said "Dem. Party." People say "Democratic Party" and "Democrats" and "Republican Party" but not "Republics" because that's not a word that refers to people... what am I missing?
On August 18 2016 11:19 LegalLord wrote: Meh, the failings of Obamacare so far seem mostly to be the standard fare of difficulties in adjustment that inevitably follow such a large scale change. Perhaps its biggest fault is that it didn't end up implementing the public option which would have probably made everything run much more smoothly overall.
At the time when Obamacare was still being debated, there were many people on the far right who argued that Obamacare was secretly a poison pill for the private insurance regime that would ultimately lead to the need for universal care. I didn't pay much mind to that argument at the time -- especially given that the medical insurance companies were participating in the legislation -- but it's looking rather prophetic now.
Folks who characterize Obamacare that way tend to conveniently ignore the stunningly poor state of the health insurance industry prior to its passage. Healthcare didn't need a poison pill because it was already sick.
My insurance was a shitton lot better before Obamacare. Yes, everyone has insurance now (or has access to it), but anyone who already had decent coverage got fucked. Hard.
Consumer side costs for those with access to insurance weren't where the pre-Obamacare healthcare market showed its age really, but yes, out of pocket costs did go up for a fair number of people.
Yes, out of pocket costs went up. So did premiums. The only thing that went down was the quality of the coverage. The current coverage that I have now is a joke compared to what I could get before. And this was all by design. My good coverage was taxed into oblivion to subsidize shitty coverage for everyone -- including those who don't even want to buy coverage in the first place.
Oh the experts say your travails are one-offs and everything is either dandy or a sad consequence of not going full-socialized from the outset. Who are you going to believe, the experts or your lying eyes?
As a great man said, the more the planners fail, the more the planners plan. I've seen enough in this thread and elsewhere that if you aren't part of the privileged classes in the victimhood caste, your concerns are of no concern.
Two Killed, Another Injured at Martin County Home Where Man Found Eating Victim's Face
A 19-year-old Florida State University student was found biting a dead man's face in South Florida on Monday at the scene of a deadly stabbing, authorities said.
Martin County Sheriff William Snyder told reporters that he may have been on hallucinogenic drugs when he attacked Michelle Mishcon, 53, and John Stevens III, 59, at their Tequesta, Florida, home.
Police pronounced Stevens dead at the scene, and later found Mishcon's body inside the couple's garage. She is the daughter of the former mayor of North Miami Beach.
Martin County Sheriff’s Office officials said a female deputy arrived and found Harrouff on top of Stevens attempting to eat his face.
"When she got there she realized that the offender was actually biting the victim in the face and causing what turned out to be some substantial trauma to his face from bite marks," Sheriff William Snyder said.
Deputies were initially unsuccessful in getting him off of the victim with a stun gun and K-9 dog, officials said.
A neighbor who initially came to the home to try and help was also stabbed by the suspect and taken to a nearby hospital for surgery. The neighbor, 47-year-old Jeff Fisher, is expected to survive.
"I think he had a knife," Jeff Fisher told a 911 operator in a tape of the call released Tuesday. Breathing heavily and bleeding profusely, Fisher told the dispatcher the assailant had attacked a woman, who was lying motionless on the driveway, and then him when he tried to intervene. When asked if he knew the man, he replied, "I have no idea."
The sheriff said the attacker had joined his family for dinner at a restaurant a short distance away when he stormed off, apparently agitated about slow service. His parents were so worried by his behavior that they called police and some of his fraternity brothers in a futile attempt to find him before the attack. About 45 minutes later, he apparently targeted the couple at random, the sheriff said.
EPT
