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On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance?
That is such a load of crap. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome.
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On March 02 2012 13:40 1Eris1 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:35 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:34 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:30 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! Does the concept of "free markets" ring a bell? If an employer (or in this case, a private Catholic school) does not want to offer free birth control to its employees (students), why should the federal government be able to force them to do so? More importantly, where in the Constitution does the federal government have that power? It's really as simple as that. What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide it? If people want to buy that healthcare plan, then that's their problem. Look, here's where I fundamentally differ from liberals: I believe that people should be responsible for themselves and making good decisions for themselves. Freedom has negative and positive consequences. I do not believe that it is the role of the federal government to police our lives and make decisions for us under the presumption that we're too stupid to do so. And the problem with that idea is you fundamentally assume that everyone has the ability to be responsible for themselves. Some people are just born into positions that are literally unworkable, and they require help, simple as that. So how large is this percentage of Americans that cannot help themselves? More to the point, is it large enough to warrant the federal government imposing paternalistic regulations on all Americans? I don't think anybody knows the exact number, but it's pretty obvious that it's growing, and I guess that it would depend on if you consider a restriction on 4x people worse than the continued suffering of x people.
I agree with you that it's growing. It grows as an unintended consequence of every liberal welfare policy (and that's really what this birth control funding issue is) that purports to help the people that it is inevitably going to screw over. Rather than merely providing a safety net for people who are down on their luck, we're creating a permanent class of people who are dependent on the state for their very existence.
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On March 02 2012 13:46 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:40 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:35 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:34 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:30 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! Does the concept of "free markets" ring a bell? If an employer (or in this case, a private Catholic school) does not want to offer free birth control to its employees (students), why should the federal government be able to force them to do so? More importantly, where in the Constitution does the federal government have that power? It's really as simple as that. What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide it? If people want to buy that healthcare plan, then that's their problem. Look, here's where I fundamentally differ from liberals: I believe that people should be responsible for themselves and making good decisions for themselves. Freedom has negative and positive consequences. I do not believe that it is the role of the federal government to police our lives and make decisions for us under the presumption that we're too stupid to do so. And the problem with that idea is you fundamentally assume that everyone has the ability to be responsible for themselves. Some people are just born into positions that are literally unworkable, and they require help, simple as that. So how large is this percentage of Americans that cannot help themselves? More to the point, is it large enough to warrant the federal government imposing paternalistic regulations on all Americans? I don't think anybody knows the exact number, but it's pretty obvious that it's growing, and I guess that it would depend on if you consider a restriction on 4x people worse than the continued suffering of x people. I agree with you that it's growing. It grows as an unintended consequence of every liberal welfare policy (and that's really what this birth control funding issue is) that purports to help the people that it is inevitably going to screw over. Rather than merely providing a safety net for people who are down on their luck, we're creating a permanent class of people who are dependent on the state for their very existence.
That is absolutely ridiculous and you have zero basis for that claim. If that were the case, then you'd see people having worse living conditions in other developed nations (almost all of which have far more federal programs than we do), and yet that isn't the case. Our employment rate is one of the highest, our income gap is one of the widest, our healthcare service is one of the worst, our education system is one of the worst, and our standard of living is one of the worst.
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On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:
What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide coverage for it? Or any other basic disease for that matter. (I'm not actually sure how much cancer is covered in worker insurance, but you get the point.)
Just fyi -
Chronic disease treatment (cancer, diabetes, COPD, autoimmune diseases, Alzheimer's, etc) accounts for about 3/4 of our health care expenditures. Illnesses like bacterial infection or the flu are a very small amount of our health care expenditures.
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doubleupgradeobbies!
Australia1333 Posts
On March 02 2012 13:35 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:34 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:30 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! Does the concept of "free markets" ring a bell? If an employer (or in this case, a private Catholic school) does not want to offer free birth control to its employees (students), why should the federal government be able to force them to do so? More importantly, where in the Constitution does the federal government have that power? It's really as simple as that. What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide it? If people want to buy that healthcare plan, then that's their problem. Look, here's where I fundamentally differ from liberals: I believe that people should be responsible for themselves and making good decisions for themselves. Freedom has negative and positive consequences. I do not believe that it is the role of the federal government to police our lives and make decisions for us under the presumption that we're too stupid to do so. And the problem with that idea is you fundamentally assume that everyone has the ability to be responsible for themselves. Some people are just born into positions that are literally unworkable, and they require help, simple as that. So how large is this percentage of Americans that cannot help themselves? More to the point, is it large enough to warrant the federal government imposing paternalistic regulations on all Americans?
So you are saying in short, that those (probably very small number) who cannot help themselves basically shouldn't get access to help. Because the free market sure ain't going to help them, they offer the market little in return, and since there's no profit in it noone will cater to them.
The federal government stepping in with regulation is the only way that's going to work in an already largely privatized economy. The alternative is to just let them die, I'm not saying that's an invalid perspective, because from a purely economical standpoint (if they are indeed a small part of the population and relatively unproductive) it makes sense, but most people are not willing to take that stance.
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On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion.
I fail to see how Medicare and Social Security provides equality of opportunity.
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On March 02 2012 13:46 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:40 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:35 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:34 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:30 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! Does the concept of "free markets" ring a bell? If an employer (or in this case, a private Catholic school) does not want to offer free birth control to its employees (students), why should the federal government be able to force them to do so? More importantly, where in the Constitution does the federal government have that power? It's really as simple as that. What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide it? If people want to buy that healthcare plan, then that's their problem. Look, here's where I fundamentally differ from liberals: I believe that people should be responsible for themselves and making good decisions for themselves. Freedom has negative and positive consequences. I do not believe that it is the role of the federal government to police our lives and make decisions for us under the presumption that we're too stupid to do so. And the problem with that idea is you fundamentally assume that everyone has the ability to be responsible for themselves. Some people are just born into positions that are literally unworkable, and they require help, simple as that. So how large is this percentage of Americans that cannot help themselves? More to the point, is it large enough to warrant the federal government imposing paternalistic regulations on all Americans? I don't think anybody knows the exact number, but it's pretty obvious that it's growing, and I guess that it would depend on if you consider a restriction on 4x people worse than the continued suffering of x people. I agree with you that it's growing. It grows as an unintended consequence of every liberal welfare policy (and that's really what this birth control funding issue is) that purports to help the people that it is inevitably going to screw over. Rather than merely providing a safety net for people who are down on their luck, we're creating a permanent class of people who are dependent on the state for their very existence.
I'm sorry, what? You were making a decent arguement until this post
Birth control funding=liberal welfare policy...
using the phrase "down on their luck" to describe people that can barely get food and shelter to survive...
I'm a moderate, but god damn Conservatives like you have been pissing me off lately. Do you even have any evidence for your conclusions?
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On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion.
So the federal government telling people what insurance they can buy, thereby limiting their options in the marketplace, promotes "equality of opportunity?" Really?
I have no idea what you're talking about, I know that you have no idea what I am talking about, and I am not even really sure that you know what you're talking about. This isn't the first time that this has happened, either. I'm going to do us both a favor and just ignore your posts from here on out.
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On March 02 2012 13:34 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. See my comment above. Do you really need the federal government to wipe your ass for you? I sure hope not.
I was speaking more from the perspective that there are plenty of insurance companies in the US that refuse to cover medical care despite being paid to do so.
Do you really need insurance companies to wipe your ass for you? If I'm terminally ill, and have been paying for health insurance for decades, YES. THAT'S THE FUCKING POINT OF INSURANCE.
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On March 02 2012 13:51 1Eris1 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:46 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:40 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:35 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:34 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:30 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:25 1Eris1 wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:
[quote]
Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! Does the concept of "free markets" ring a bell? If an employer (or in this case, a private Catholic school) does not want to offer free birth control to its employees (students), why should the federal government be able to force them to do so? More importantly, where in the Constitution does the federal government have that power? It's really as simple as that. What if an employer (say they're some sort of deep baptist) says they believe the answer to cancer to be prayer, not kimo, and thus refuse to provide it? If people want to buy that healthcare plan, then that's their problem. Look, here's where I fundamentally differ from liberals: I believe that people should be responsible for themselves and making good decisions for themselves. Freedom has negative and positive consequences. I do not believe that it is the role of the federal government to police our lives and make decisions for us under the presumption that we're too stupid to do so. And the problem with that idea is you fundamentally assume that everyone has the ability to be responsible for themselves. Some people are just born into positions that are literally unworkable, and they require help, simple as that. So how large is this percentage of Americans that cannot help themselves? More to the point, is it large enough to warrant the federal government imposing paternalistic regulations on all Americans? I don't think anybody knows the exact number, but it's pretty obvious that it's growing, and I guess that it would depend on if you consider a restriction on 4x people worse than the continued suffering of x people. I agree with you that it's growing. It grows as an unintended consequence of every liberal welfare policy (and that's really what this birth control funding issue is) that purports to help the people that it is inevitably going to screw over. Rather than merely providing a safety net for people who are down on their luck, we're creating a permanent class of people who are dependent on the state for their very existence. I'm sorry, what? You were making a decent arguement until this post Birth control funding=liberal welfare policy... using the phrase "down on their luck" to describe people that can barely get food and shelter to survive... I'm a moderate, but god damn Conservatives like you have been pissing me off lately. Do you even have any evidence for your conclusions?
Well think about: why isn't this birth control funding argument fundamentally a "welfare" argument from the liberal perspective? Just go read the testimony from that Georgetown law student. She testified that she and her fellow female law students were having so much sex that they could not afford purchasing the necessary birth control on their budgets. She even quantified the expense: $3,000 over 3 years of law school. What she asked for is that insurance companies (ie someone else) be compelled to pay for and provide birth control as part of their plans. The only thing that distinguishes this from welfare is that the government is forcing private companies to provide a goods to people rather than the government providing the goods itself.
As for evidence, less than half of the country pays any federal income taxes. The federal government and its welfare programs are bring propped up by a minority of productive Americans. This doesn't even account for the large and growing population of Americans who take more from the federal government in terms of benefits than they put in. In short, we have a growing population of Americans who have no stake in this country other than voting in additional benefits for themselves. Anyone else see the problem here?
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On March 02 2012 14:01 Defacer wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:34 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. See my comment above. Do you really need the federal government to wipe your ass for you? I sure hope not. I was speaking more from the perspective that there are plenty of insurance companies in the US that refuse to cover medical care despite being paid to do so.
Well, this is a bit of myth. Insurance companies that fail to provide benefits that they are contractually obliged to pay get the shit sued out of them.
Do you really need insurance companies to wipe your ass for you? If I'm terminally ill, and have been paying for health insurance for decades, YES. THAT'S THE FUCKING POINT OF INSURANCE.
Excellent point.
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On March 02 2012 13:54 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:
[quote]
Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion. So the federal government telling people what insurance they can buy, thereby limiting their options in the marketplace, promotes "equality of opportunity?" Really? I have no idea what you're talking about, I know that you have no idea what I am talking about, and I am not even really sure that you know what you're talking about. This isn't the first time that this has happened, either. I'm going to do us both a favor and just ignore your posts from here on out.
You're just dodging my points whenever I bring up an argument that deals with yours. I was never talking about individual mandates to the employee to buy insurance. It's always been about requiring employers/insurance companies to cover healthcare needs and not allowing them to refuse to cover certain medical treatments.
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Two things:
(1) I could be very wrong, and I have no source for this aside from some discussion that I've seen elsewhere, but I was under the impression insurance companies are still perfectly welcome to restrict what they cover, just not for religious reasons. This doesn't strike me as a particularly heinous government intervention, especially when I hear as an anecdote that some do not cover birth control because they don't consider pregnancy a medical condition.
(2) Can we stop saying that the Georgetown student pays so much in birth control because she has so much sex? That's a fundamental misunderstanding of how birth control works and what it's used for. It doesn't scale with the amount of sex you're having. It's binary: are you on the pill or are you not? That's the horrifying part of Limbaugh's comment.
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On March 02 2012 14:07 Stratos_speAr wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:54 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
[quote]
You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion. So the federal government telling people what insurance they can buy, thereby limiting their options in the marketplace, promotes "equality of opportunity?" Really? I have no idea what you're talking about, I know that you have no idea what I am talking about, and I am not even really sure that you know what you're talking about. This isn't the first time that this has happened, either. I'm going to do us both a favor and just ignore your posts from here on out. You're just jumping around and saying random crap that has no relevance to the actual point whenever I bring up an argument that deals with yours. I was never talking about individual mandates to the employee to buy insurance. It's always been about requiring employers/insurance companies to cover healthcare needs and not allowing them to refuse to cover certain medical treatments.
Don't bother, xDaunt is pretty hopeless, and when he doesn't understand something, he inevitably accuses you of not understanding which is ironic. He's done it to me more than once and I've seen him do it to other people. People who disagree with his broken opinion are not "wrong", according to him they actually "don't understand", which is pretty ridiculous seeing how resistant he is to new information which he outright rejects because of his preconceived opinions.
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On March 02 2012 13:50 gchan wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:On March 02 2012 12:18 xDaunt wrote:
[quote]
Rush's commentary on this is genius. How can people not appreciate how colossally stupid that Georgetown law student's testimony was? You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion. I fail to see how Medicare and Social Security provides equality of opportunity.
I don't know about Social Security, but if a poorish family (single mom or something) has one medical problem (broken limb, or any random accident), they'll get set massively behind for something that shouldn't be a big deal in today's society.
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On March 02 2012 14:33 ikl2 wrote:
Two things:
(1) I could be very wrong, and I have no source for this aside from some discussion that I've seen elsewhere, but I was under the impression insurance companies are still perfectly welcome to restrict what they cover, just not for religious reasons. This doesn't strike me as a particularly heinous government intervention, especially when I hear as an anecdote that some do not cover birth control because they don't consider pregnancy a medical condition.
I think under the current directive, employers can restrict what they are willing to pay to insure for religious reasons, but if they do so then the insurer is required to individually offer coverage for those services to the employees.
Looking beyond the topic of birth control, insurers can and do restrict what they cover. Many experimental and/or nontraditional therapies are not covered by insurance, for example. PPACA isn't going to (or certainly shouldn't) require insurers to cover treatments that do not have scientific backing.
(2) Can we stop saying that the Georgetown student pays so much in birth control because she has so much sex? That's a fundamental misunderstanding of how birth control works and what it's used for. It doesn't scale with the amount of sex you're having. It's binary: are you on the pill or are you not? That's the horrifying part of Limbaugh's comment.
Excellent point.
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On March 02 2012 14:33 ikl2 wrote:
Two things:
(1) I could be very wrong, and I have no source for this aside from some discussion that I've seen elsewhere, but I was under the impression insurance companies are still perfectly welcome to restrict what they cover, just not for religious reasons. This doesn't strike me as a particularly heinous government intervention, especially when I hear as an anecdote that some do not cover birth control because they don't consider pregnancy a medical condition.
Obamacare changed this in that it gave the federal government the power to mandate what healthcare that private insurers/providers provide.
(2) Can we stop saying that the Georgetown student pays so much in birth control because she has so much sex? That's a fundamental misunderstanding of how birth control works and what it's used for. It doesn't scale with the amount of sex you're having. It's binary: are you on the pill or are you not? That's the horrifying part of Limbaugh's comment.
Awwwww, you're no fun. Still, why not use condoms or get a diaphragm (diaphragms kick ass as far as I am concerned)? Why do we have to pay every woman to have access to the pill?
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On March 02 2012 14:36 Whole wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 13:50 gchan wrote:On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:On March 02 2012 12:30 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
[quote]
You have got to be kidding me, you honestly believe that Employers should be able to dictate if women can/should receive contraception through their insurance?! i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion. I fail to see how Medicare and Social Security provides equality of opportunity. I don't know about Social Security, but if a poorish family (single mom or something) has one medical problem (broken limb, or any random accident), they'll get set massively behind for something that shouldn't be a big deal in today's society.
Medicare is health insurance for people 65 years and older.
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On March 02 2012 14:35 Djzapz wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 14:07 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:54 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:44 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:41 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 13:38 Stratos_speAr wrote:On March 02 2012 13:33 Defacer wrote:On March 02 2012 13:09 xDaunt wrote:On March 02 2012 12:47 Mohdoo wrote:On March 02 2012 12:45 sc2superfan101 wrote:
[quote]
i certainly don't believe that the government has the right to force insurance companies to offer it. What do you think insurance companies should be forced to offer? Nothing. Kind of defeats the concept of insurance. Sometimes I wonder if Americans are just fighting for the freedom to let someone else rip them off. That's basically what it is. People like xDaunt refuse to acknowledge how the world really works and think that the free market will fix everything just like it does in their magical hypothetical land. Unfortunately, that isn't how the world actually operates. No, you have it wrong. I don't expect the free market to fix anything. That's not the point. The point is that people should be free to succeed and free to fail. If someone wants to buy shitty insurance, that's their problem, regardless of whether they have good reasons, bad reasons, or no reason at all for buying it. That's what freedom is. Seriously, when did we become such a nation of pussies? What happened to self-reliance? That is such a load of bullshit. No one is skirting self-reliance. The problem is that so many essential things aren't available to large amounts of the population if they are left to the free market. That's why the federal government mandates it, so everyone has equality of opportunity. This has absolutely nothing to do with equality of outcome, and your argument is a strawman and it's pathetic that you're bringing in that BS to this discussion. So the federal government telling people what insurance they can buy, thereby limiting their options in the marketplace, promotes "equality of opportunity?" Really? I have no idea what you're talking about, I know that you have no idea what I am talking about, and I am not even really sure that you know what you're talking about. This isn't the first time that this has happened, either. I'm going to do us both a favor and just ignore your posts from here on out. You're just jumping around and saying random crap that has no relevance to the actual point whenever I bring up an argument that deals with yours. I was never talking about individual mandates to the employee to buy insurance. It's always been about requiring employers/insurance companies to cover healthcare needs and not allowing them to refuse to cover certain medical treatments. Don't bother, xDaunt is pretty hopeless, and when he doesn't understand something, he inevitably accuses you of not understanding which is ironic. He's done it to me more than once and I've seen him do it to other people. People who disagree with his broken opinion are not "wrong", according to him they actually "don't understand", which is pretty ridiculous seeing how resistant he is to new information which he outright rejects because of his preconceived opinions.
The problem with posters like him is that I'll be talking about A, and he'll reply to my post and start talking about B, which inevitably is an irrelevant tangent. For example, in this latest episode, I spent several posts talking about self-reliance and how we should not need a paternalistic government in the context of government mandates relating to what services insurers provide, and this guy barges in and starts ranting about the glory of welfare programs and social safety net, which are irrelevant to what I was talking about.
As I have said countless times before, I'm not here to change anyone's mind. I'm here because good argument amuses me. Nothing more. If people respond to what I say with good arguments, I'm more than happy to respond in kind. Conversely, I'm not interested in arguing with people who consistently refuse to stay on point.
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On March 02 2012 14:44 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On March 02 2012 14:33 ikl2 wrote:
Two things:
(1) I could be very wrong, and I have no source for this aside from some discussion that I've seen elsewhere, but I was under the impression insurance companies are still perfectly welcome to restrict what they cover, just not for religious reasons. This doesn't strike me as a particularly heinous government intervention, especially when I hear as an anecdote that some do not cover birth control because they don't consider pregnancy a medical condition. Obamacare changed this in that it gave the federal government the power to mandate what healthcare that private insurers/providers provide. Show nested quote +
(2) Can we stop saying that the Georgetown student pays so much in birth control because she has so much sex? That's a fundamental misunderstanding of how birth control works and what it's used for. It doesn't scale with the amount of sex you're having. It's binary: are you on the pill or are you not? That's the horrifying part of Limbaugh's comment.
Awwwww, you're no fun. Still, why not use condoms or get a diaphragm (diaphragms kick ass as far as I am concerned)? Why do we have to pay every woman to have access to the pill?
One major reason for women to have access to the pill is because the burdens of child birth are largely forced upon the women; men can easily shirk the responsibility of child birth. If the cost of birth control (both economically and the responsibility of childbirth) is unfairly distributed between the sexes, a power imbalance occurs, which reduces the overall freedom of women. Universal access to birthcontrol therefor increases the overall freedom of women to a level closer to men, and it allows women to take responsibility for themselves without being slaves to producers/sellers of birth control.
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EPT
