For some reason for the better part of the day yesterday, Monday, August 10, I didn’t feel much like blogging or really dealing with anything political. My mind was about as far from politics and the blogosphere as it could get.
I wonder if it is because sometime in the late morning, early afternoon — I’m no longer sure excatly what time — I simply had enough with those on the left, our commenters, pundits, Democratic legislators and even members of the Obama Administration who rather than engage the criticisms of their political, ideological and philosophical adversaries seek to ignore their criticisms and denigrate the critics.
We’ve seen these so many time before. Why, simply put, do they refuse to accept the legitimacy of our concerns? Why do they need to badmouth their adversaries?
But, I’ve said this before.
I knew my hiatus from politics was only temporary. And when, as I cleared my head and prepared for bed, words came to my head, words from the man I sometimes dub the first neo-conservative, a figure beloved on the left for the better part of his life, yet reviled by them at its end. As Albert Camus increasingly spoke out against the rising tide of Communism, applying to that totalitarian ideology the same standards he applied to Nazism, he lost friends among (and suffered opprobrium and ostracism from) the French left.
It was his words that came to mind, words I used in my first blog post (now long since disappeared into the ether), but which I used to celebrate my six-month blogiversary. Shortly, after World War II, Camus wrote:
Something in us has been destroyed by the spectacle of the years just past. And this something is the eternal confidence of man, which has always made him believe that one could draw human reactions from another man by speaking to him in the language of humanity. We have seen lying, debasing, killing, deportations, torture, and each time it was not possible to persuade those who were doing it not to do it, because they were so sure of themselves and because one cannot persuade an abstraction, that is to say, the representative of an ideology.
The long conversation of mankind has just ended. And, of course, a man whom one cannot persuade is a man who frightens us….
We live in terror because persuasion is no longer possible, because man has been delivered entirely to history and because he can no longer turn to that part of himself, as true as the historical part, which he discovers in front of the beauty of the world and of human faces…
Emphasis added.
All too many Democrats, including the Speaker of the House and her fellow San Franciscan, my junior Senator, refuse even to be persuaded that those protesting their policies have legitimate concerns. And that is truly frightening in a society like ours.
So, while perhaps temporily discouraged, I will not be silenced, just as tens of millions of my fellow Americans who have serious concerns about the President’s policies, will continue to speak out, including many who voted for him, hoping that he would change his predecessor’s spendthrift domestic policies.
“More? More? Never before has a boy wanted more!”
Shut up, eat you porridge and let your stomach and your mind be content with being fed by those who know more about what is good for you than you ever will.
The Obama crowd sees us as charges of the state. The Pharaoh stands at the top with scribes and the czars and satraps and toadies doing his bidding. But there is a huge populace to feed, employ, house, teach, and control. Much has to be done to them “for their own good.”
Meanwhile, there is this annoying crowd of malcontents who keep chanting “Let my people go!”
I think Camus could not quite bring himself to look the face of evil in the eye. He lived among fellows who willingly whored themselves for privilege under occupation.
The Obots are willing to ride state socialism to where ever it takes them. They are not looking forward, they are in thrall with the possibility of the unknown. And they are equally willing to blame any hitches or failures on the Jews or the infirm or the Republicans or global warming or Rush Limbaugh or fatty foods or Wal-Mart or glass ceilings or movie theater popcorn.
The revolution of turning from the chance of capitalism to the certainty of state socialism relies on a population that is satisfied with the vision of moving one step forward. Once a person is housed, fed and generally cared for, he is content to go along with the program, because if he has the rug pulled out from under him, he has to start from scratch.
In the Obama world, you can aim for the politboro and live well. Or you can take a leadership role in a union and have access to power and the perks of handling the cash. Or you can tuck yourself into a niche and live out your life at your chosen station. Or you can go to the mall everyday and smoke dope. Everything is possible as long as you follow the patterns of state acceptance.
When Obama was inaugurated, an odd event occurred in D.C. The sidewalk vendors have worked for and earned specific locations in the city. They are there rain or shine as a part of their license. The Obama crowd let in hundreds of vendors from outside and they doled out their places along the parade route. The daily vendors were told to get in line for the left over spaces. That is how state socialism works. The rules are the rules are the rules unless they aren’t.
Obama won. That’s the thing. We really need to internalize that before moving forward. He doesn’t need us. He doesn’t care what we think. He can nominate whoever he wants for the Supreme Court. He can stay in Afghanistan as long as he wants. He can take Air Force 1 out on date night. Obama won. We didn’t.
To the victor goes the spoils.
Shouting won’t help. Kicking won’t help. At the end of the day, Obama is going to sit in the Oval Office, put up his feet, and do whatever the hell he wants to do. We gave him the power to do that.
Nobody was forced to buy into the media’s slobbering love affair. No one’s cable is hooked up only to MSNBC. We decided to let the left-wing media do our thinking for us. We lost. They won.
If we want something different, we have to run a better campaign next time.
“rather than engage the criticisms of their political, ideological and philosophical adversaries seek to ignore their criticisms and denigrate the critics.”
Hmmm. So how exactly do you think the Democrats should respond to people whose “concerns” are pure lunatic rantings? Who must face ranting. spittle-flecked nutjobs who accuse them of plotting to exterminate the elderly, of have government “take over” healthcare, or set up FEMA concentration camps, or whatever lunacy is on the agenda today?
IF it were you Republicans facing such bizzarro attacks, you would respond the same way – as we all did with the 9/11 truthers, for example. But the truthers were always some weird fringe group. Certainly no Democrat, nor the Democratic party, ever tried to leverage the truthers as a way to defeat Republicans and win back power. But as we see with the comments of Palin, Gingrich and your favorite media entertainers, supporting, promoting and amplifying the crazy seems to be an intergral part of the GOP strategy to stop Obama. For no other reason than that he is a Democrat.
Y’all seem determined to do, with outlandish and dishonest rhetoric, what you could not do at the ballot box last year.
“We’ve seen these so many time before. Why, simply put, do they refuse to accept the legitimacy of our concerns?”
Because the “concerns” that we hear most prominently, every day, are simply not legitimate concerns. They are lunatic, totally inaccurate misinformation that the propaganda-meisters on the radio and elsewhere have succeeded in persuading a lot of people are legitimate.
Fear mongering of the very worst type.
“one could draw human reactions from another man by speaking to him in the language of humanity. ”
It means nothing to simply quote such noble sentiments. The point must be to live them.
Look to your own writing here, and the dreck that passes for your comment section. Y’all, and so much of the right, are easily the worst abusers in this regard. Where is the language of humanity with which you address those you disagree with? Never to be seen. Y’all seem totally committed to the childish name calling game – the effort to see how many insults you can pack into a sentence, whenever a dissenter is sighted.
“We live in terror because persuasion is no longer possible,”
So here is a radical idea. Why not make this site into a vehicle for persuasion, instead of just another carbon copy of the usual rightwing rant sites.
GPW, you seem to say that current leading Democrats can’t be persuaded by speaking out, just like French Communists or the Nazi instigators of WW2. Therefore, you will speak out all the more.
I agree 100%. I’m just noticing that it’s pretty defiant, for you.
But Tano, it has been. You’ve demonstrated in thread after thread, Tano, that you are exactly one of the unpersuadables that GPW is now talking about: facts, logic and evidence don’t reach you and aren’t anything you need to back up your crazy claims.
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzt. Wrong answer, Tano. Republicans *did* face bizarro attacks from the Left, Tano, for 8 years. And President Bush never once responded by telling his critics to shut up, as your Dear Leader did recently. President Bush questioned his critics’ judgment – Never their patriotism. If you don’t believe me, contradict me with citations from President Bush.
Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it. So far, Tano, the Democrats have only faced legitimate questions from legitimately concerned citizens – and have responded by marshalling their union thugs to physically bash them.
Fixed it for ya, Tano.
And Ash, you continue your love affair with Authority. I mean, let’s translate the above to another historical moment in which a patriotic socialist who liked union thugs was elected more or less peacefully and democratically. Put yourself in Germany, 1933.
I hope it’s clear that a helluva lot more shouting and kicking could have helped the world a great deal… then and now.
Ash, America doesn’t elect a dictator every 4 years. Or a tribal King from Biblical times. Or anyway it isn’t supposed to, yet. America is supposed to run on a system of checks and balances – including the check-and-balance that *all three* branches of the Federal government govern only with the consent of the governed and are beholden at all times to their objections, which are protected and privileged.
A small victory: It looks like Congress is backing down on their luxury jet purchase. It’s a good thing people stood up and raised hell about this, instead of sitting quietly with their hands folded, as some would have us do.
Tano can’t accept that our arguments have merit. To do so would force him to think on his own.
“So far, Tano, the Democrats have only faced legitimate questions from legitimately concerned citizens”
and
“Tano can’t accept that our arguments have merit”
Ha
Like the “death panels” charges?
Or this oneFrom an actual protestor on Fox Mr Mike Sola: “What you are doing is sentencing our families to death. We lose the right to life. The old people are discarded. Those who cannot fend for themselves are discarded,” he said. “We are American citizens who want one thing: to be heard before you put us down.”
Or the guy who accuses Health Care Reform as a way of dening life to his disabled child
Come on why deny it?
The repubs going to these events have looked and acted like a mob of fear mongering loonies.
Its the right’s OWN actions and statements that make their concerns appear illegitimate.
Why is it you refuse to look at your own bad behavior as the reason your concerns are being widely ridiculed? Take responsibility for your own actions. Stop blaming Pelosi and “Obama’s Thugs”
Go to the town hall meetings and actually try and forward the debate without screaming, and shutting down the meetings.
Maybe that would make you a legitimate party again instead of a punch line.
ASh, I will not go quietly into the night, I will raise my voice, and if it is in anger it is because my passion is coming through.
of course the left wants us to be polite and quiet, that way people don’t hear us.
Sorry, too much at stake here for me to play by the lefts’ rules.
#9
no one is asking you to go away.
Raise your voice in anger all you want.
But do so with respect, be informed and do not make wild charges that totally untrue.
Because when you do, your anger and concerns look like a joke.
Tano,
This is an inaccurate statement:
“Certainly no Democrat, nor the Democratic party, ever tried to leverage the truthers as a way to defeat Republicans and win back power.”
In 2004 Michael Moore sat in Jimmy Carter’s sky box of the DNC convention.
In the 2004 campaign John Kerry said the following on Larry King Live:
King: Have you seen Fahrenheit 911?
Sen. Kerry: No I haven’t, I haven’t
King : Do you plan to?
Sen. Kerry: I’ve seen it. I’ve watched it for the past 4 years…
A prime example of a Democratic presidential candidate, and party allowing truther nonsense to be legitimized.
So how exactly do you think the Democrats should respond to people whose “concerns” are pure lunatic rantings?
Which, as the lying bigot Tano makes clear, is everyone who disagrees with them.
Because the “concerns” that we hear most prominently, every day, are simply not legitimate concerns.
That’s because, bigot, you deny and lie and spin constantly.
You babbled about preventative care always cutting costs; I proved it didn’t, and you namecalled and insulted me.
You babbled about emergency room visits; I proved that people on government care use the emergency room four times as often as those on private insurance and twice as much as those with no insurance, and you namecalled and insulted me.
You claimed that no bill for single-payer was being considered; I proved it was, and you namecalled and insulted me.
And now we’re going to show what the Obama Party and its “single-payer” plan does when it comes to care:
One patient in Oregon got a letter that made this all too clear, when in the same letter rejecting her request for life-extending chemotherapy, Oregon offered her “physician-aid-in-dying”.
There’s your “death panels”. If that’s not good enough for you, you can look at the DIRECT QUOTE from your Barack Obama’s chief “health care” advisor:
Emanuel, however, believes that “communitarianism” should guide decisions on who gets care. He says medical care should be reserved for the non-disabled, not given to those “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens . . . An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia” (Hastings Center Report, Nov.-Dec. ’96).
Translation: Don’t give much care to a grandmother with Parkinson’s or a child with cerebral palsy.
He explicitly defends discrimination against older patients: “Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not invidious discrimination; every person lives through different life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now was previously 25 years” (Lancet, Jan. 31).
So why do you support withholding care from disabled children, liar Tano? Is it a backup in case you can’t browbeat the person into aborting them first, since your “plan” explicitly encourages and pushes abortion?
The repubs going to these events have looked and acted like a mob of fear mongering loonies.
I love how Barack Obama calls senior citizens a bunch of “fear mongering loonies”.
Then again, what should we expect; Michelle and Barack Obama screamed and tried to accuse an Inspector General who caught one of their friends committing massive fraud of being senile.
Barack Obama hates and loathes senior citizens because they vote and they tend to vote against him. It should be no surprise that his plan is to demonize them, slash Medicare, and deny them the care for which they have had to contribute from every single dollar they’ve earned for forty-five years so that he can pay his thugs like gillie and Tano.
And it gets even better; the Obama Party and Barack Obama’s mouthpiece are now saying that people who disagree with them are like the KKK.
Of course, to the puppets gillie and Tano, namecalling your opponents as “un-American” and “like the KKK” is totally rational and intelligent argument. That’s how completely brainwashed the Obama Party and its members have become.
For distortions and projections and reasons why repubs are walking jokes
Please read comments 14 13 12
like this for example:
“Barack Obama hates and loathes senior citizens because they vote and they tend to vote against him”
wtf?!?!?
How can you guys expect to be taken seriously with outlandish statemens such as this????
So, an exact quotation from a key Obama adviser on health care is now a “distortion.”
And gillie wonders why no one takes him seriously.
What an excellent observation from Camus! Yet still apropos to today. I love these lines:
“because they were so sure of themselves and because one cannot persuade an abstraction, that is to say, the representative of an ideology”
Presidential elections seem to be a distillation of ideology, so perhaps this is a problem we cannot escape.
V&K
Yes Distortion to say that the Obama plan will have death panels. Its not in there
No matter what one of his many advisors have said in 1996 or what the state of Oregon did.
Its just not true.
And another one
Pelosi did not call dissenting un-American she called shouting down reps and shutting down town halls un-American.
Want more?
Note how gillie tries to operate:
He keeps parroting points while ignoring that the President himself said that rather than a pacemaker prolonging life for 6 years a pill to make death less painful might be an option.
Note also how he can’t reply to this post where administration advisors are cited as rationing people to death is a viable option.
Likewise Tano ignores when his statements are reposted for shredding here or questions he refuses to answer are reposted here.
But hey, maybe they both believe if they tell their lies enough and never change their tune, it will magically come true.
“Eschewing process of Intellectual Engagement”? You have a pair of examples here.
For distortions and projections and reasons why repubs are walking jokes
Please read comments 14 13 12
Yup; they’re chock full of links, facts, and direct quotations, all of which are easily referenced and readable.
How can you guys expect to be taken seriously with outlandish statemens such as this????
Because they are backed up with facts and references indicating that Barack Obama wants to deny care to the elderly and to cut Medicare.
Back in the old days, gillie, you and your Obama Party used to scream that cutting Medicare meant you hated senior citizens. Why did the rules change suddenly? Do you want to state that cutting Medicare and cutting Medicaid doesn’t mean that you hate old people and the poor?
I sure hope ghillie and the lying SOB are getting paid to be pathetic.
As citizens of a democracy, we have to bow to the will of the majority. We can’t simply overthrow the government every time we lose an election. At some level, we have accept the fact that sometimes, we are not in the majority and not whine about it.
We gave Obama this power–we Americans. We gave it to him for four years. We gave it to this Congress for two years. Elections have consequences.
We’re not a banana republic who changes governments by organizing militias every time we’re unhappy. We vote–and when we lose, we live to vote again.
Instead of all this whining and ranting in townhall meetings, why not start picking a good candidate for the next round of elections?
Even the New York Times admits, Obama’s promise that you can keep your private health insurance is a big fat lie.
Everything the Dear Teleprompter says on this topic is a big fat lie.
#19
that is not what he said at all
The whole thing he says its up to the family and doctors
Way to cut off a quote.
Geez.
Terrible.
terrible
TERRIBLE.
and proof of yet agian ANOTHER distortion of the right
gillie,
Care to provide proof? He says ‘we’ I didn’t know he considered himself a doctor or a member of her family.
#26
the rest:
“and those kinds of decisions between drs and patients and making sure that our incentives are not preventing good those decisions and that drs and hospitals all are aligned for patient care that’s something we can achieve we are not going to solve every single one of this end of life decisions ultimately this is going to be between physicians and patients”
Can you show me the death panel? Unless you say the death panel is “physicians and patients”
or do you have more distortions and snipits to show? Come on livewire, don’t stoop to NDT’s level, I think you are above that.
Can you show me the death panel? Unless you say the death panel is “physicians and patients”
LOL….silly puppet gillie. Perhaps you should read what your Barack Obama says above.
Emanuel, however, believes that “communitarianism” should guide decisions on who gets care. He says medical care should be reserved for the non-disabled, not given to those “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens . . . An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia” (Hastings Center Report, Nov.-Dec. ‘96).
Translation: Don’t give much care to a grandmother with Parkinson’s or a child with cerebral palsy.
He explicitly defends discrimination against older patients: “Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not invidious discrimination; every person lives through different life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now was previously 25 years” (Lancet, Jan. 31).
As we saw in the example I provided above, that’s what Barack Obama means; he will allow patients and physicians to make a choice between dying now by assisted suicide and dying later. Barack Obama doesn’t believe in chemotherapy and believes that disabled children shouldn’t receive care following their birth — or, given how the plan will fund abortions for disabled children but not health care for them, that they should be born in the first place.
That is the “death panel”, gillie — the panel that follows Barack Obama’s beliefs that medical care should not be given to the disabled and should be denied to those who Barack Obama thinks are not “participating citizens”, and who rations medical care accordingly.
In our current system, people have the choice to go elsewhere. In the Obama Party’s single-payer system, they will have no choice.
Why do you intend to deny care to disabled children, gillie?
He’s jsut trying to eliminate anyone more capable then him, NDT.
Note how his attempt at a reply *again* dodges the article I linked and you quoted.
If it’s a panel who decisions govern who lives or dies, it is a “death panel”.
As any non-dumbass would know.
distortion #1
you say “what Obama says”
then you quote something what one of his advisors talked about it 1996
Distortion #2
The article you “cite” has been widely discredited and the quote was sniped out of context.
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/feature/2009/08/10/ezekiel_emanuel/
In fact he said later in front of the senate “Just because we are spending a lot of money on patients who die does not mean that we can save a lot of money on end of life care.””
I don’t blame you for this, you are simply following your talking points
But now will you correct the record now that its shown you were misinformed?
I also hopes this ends the talk of “death panels” and denying care to disabled kids when that is just obviously not factual
gillie – the canards of throwing grandma out into the cold, starving little kids, forcing women to hunt for coat hangers in back alleys, separate drinking fountains, torturing kittens and puppies – you name it – have long been staples of Democrat politicians.
As far as Emanuel’s published statements regarding the denial of care to people “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens . . .”, it strike me as similar to the phrase “life unworthy of life”. Look it up.
I can’t fault gillie and Tano for being unable to state clearly why we should give up our basic liberties when it comes to medical care to government; no one in Congress nor the President has been able to make that case (which is why they result to smears).
There is no doubt in my mind that we need to get medical costs under control and that means that there are going to be people who will do without. The woman in Oregon who was offered assisted suicide in lieu of expensive treatment is an illustration of what’s wrong with both sides:
The government sent her an unsigned letter to tell her that the bureaucracy had decided that she needs to die and that they’re willing to pay for the drugs if she’d just hurry things along. Even condemned murderers get more consideration.
On the other hand (if I remember correctly), she was suffering from a recurrence of lung cancer that had metastasized. Her initial treatment which resulted in remission was paid for. Her physician prescribed erlotinib which costs several thousand dollars a month and would add only two or three months. An argument can be made that scarce resources have to be allocated where they can do the most good. That’s why an alcoholic with cirrhosis is unlikely to get a liver transplant. So “rationing” already exists.
Other than the liberty thing, the problem with Obamacare is that we’re handing over a system that, despite the warts, works pretty well to a government that has managed to steer the economy into a ditch and has failed utterly to accurately estimate the cost of any entitlement.
I mentioned to Tano the other day the government’s $55 trillion in unfunded liabilities so far (Social Security and Medicare being the lion’s share) and received no comment.
Poor gillie; you just repeated your talking points and didn’t read the article.
In the original paper that laid the groundwork for the article McCaughey quoted, Emanuel and his co-authors were simply proposing a different system — a controversial one, to be sure, and not one the medical community at large espouses, but still not nearly as radical as it’s been made out to be. Instead of prioritizing the number of lives saved, the researchers said that “life-years” should take precedence.
“Most people have the intuition to say, ‘Give it to my 19-year-old. I got to 65; I’ve lived a good life,'” Emanuel explained to the Washington Post in 2006. “We are not interested in purely the number of lives (saved), but also life-years.”
In short, Barack Obama says that 65-year-olds should be denied care because they’re too old and cannot contribute any more to society.
What makes this really pathetic, silly gillie, is that 65-year-olds have paid into Medicare for their entire working life. Now your Barack Obama wants to deny them that medical care that they were promised and have already paid for because he needs to purchase votes from lazy 19-year-olds who will never pay it back.
Also, aside from the fact that he’s breaking promises and stealing from the elderly, isn’t it amazing that Barack Obama wants to shift health care from the people who by and large voted against him to the people who by and large voted for him?
Why does Barack Obama hate senior citizens, gillie? After all, Barack Obama and his Obama Party used to shriek that cuts to Medicare meant that you hated old people. Why can’t you now follow your own rules? Are you trying to hasten the death of non-Obama voters?
SoCalRobert,
The 55 trillion “unfunded liabilites” is a ridiculous scare tactic used by those who wish to undermine support for these programs. It is calculated over an infinite time horizon. So what is 55 trillion divided by infinity?
Just so I can get a better handle on this….
Social Security is perfectly solvent for the next 32 years. After that is perfectly solvent provided benefits are cut 25% – solvent as far into the future as one can project. OF course, I dont support cutting benefits 25% in 32 years, so I do accept that some minor tweak is necessary to keep benefits at comparable levels to today. There is no crisis in SS – only a minor tweak needed, similar to what happened in the 80s.
The main problem with Medicare is a something that is a characteristic of the medical system as a whole, not a problem specific to Medicare – i.e. the rate of medical inflation. You should join with those who are working today to bend that cost curve downward, rather than supporting those who would do nothing (as they did nothing, except make the problem worse, when they had all the power in DC).
“the problem with Obamacare is that we’re handing over a system that, despite the warts, works pretty well”
Actually it doesnt.
” to a government that has managed to steer the economy into a ditch”
Oh c’mon. Now the economic crisis is the fault of the government? My goodness, is there nothing the private sector can do that would earn your condemnation? Is there some rule -private sector good, no matter what. Government evil, no matter what?
In fact, the government health plan – Medicare – is run enormously more efficiently than private insurance – an overhead of something like 2-3 %, rather than 15-20%. (yeah, not having to hire all those people to sit around and figure out how not to pay legitimate claims saves a lot of money).
None of which is really the point anyway, since Obamacare is simply not going to turn over the health system to the government. Even if there is a private option (and there may well not be), it would be voluntary, and probably soak up a few percent of the market.
AH – that latter point brought to you by the rightwings favorite authority on these matters, the Congressional Budget Office – who estimate that about 10-11 million people would sign up for a public option over the next 10 years.
I realize this is less than 10% of the number that the “Lewin Group” estimates – the group quoted everyday by rightwingers, the group that is a wholly owned subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group, but y’know, they just might have a bit of a conflict of interest….
Sorry, Tano, but I think you’re wrong.
The timelines I read about are in the 50-75 year range, not infinity.
Taking Social Security – what assets are backing up its obligations? As far as I know, whatever surplus is in the “lockbox” are Treasury securities that will have to be redeemed sooner or later.
The current surplus is “invested” in treasuries (not sacks of gold bullion), the proceeds then spent by Congress. When SSA outgo exceeds income (in 2016 according to a story in the WaPo) then SSA will show up at Treasury wanting to redeem these bonds. We’ll have to raise taxes or borrow to pay SS benefits at that point (or drastically cut benefits). Most of the Federal budget is on autopilot (entitlements and interest on the debt) so spending cuts at that point will be too little, too late.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-05-28-federal-budget_N.htm
http://www.heritage.org/research/budget/em1004.cfm
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200401/littlefield
I’m all for bending the cost curve – starting with tort reform, insurance portability, MSAs, denial of non-emergency care to illegals, increasing peoples’ responsibilities for their own basic care.
Any system where third parties pay the bills have costs that increase far faster than inflation (e.g. education). When the consumer doesn’t pay the bill, he’s not inclined to ask the price.
You should join with those who are working today to bend that cost curve downward, rather than supporting those who would do nothing (as they did nothing, except make the problem worse, when they had all the power in DC).
Problem is, puppet boy Tano, doing nothing is better than what you and your Obama Party are proposing.
Conrad: Dr. Elmendorf, I am going to really put you on the spot because we are in the middle of this health care debate, but it is critically important that we get this right. Everyone has said, virtually everyone, that bending the cost curve over time is critically important and one of the key goals of this entire effort. From what you have seen from the products of the committees that have reported, do you see a successful effort being mounted to bend the long-term cost curve?
Elmendorf: No, Mr. Chairman. In the legislation that has been reported we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount. And on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs.
In short, Obamacare makes the cost problem worse — which means doing nothing is BETTER than Obamacare.
Don’t you and your President ever stop lying, Tano? We’ve already proven Obama lied when he said “preventative care” would result in savings. We’ve already proven your Obama lied when he claimed that putting people on government health insurance lowers their use of emergency care. No wonder Obama needs to send out his SEIU goons to beat up people and drown out others; the facts don’t work in the Obama’s favor.
[GP ED NOTE: This comment has been edited as it violated our community terms of conduct.]
In fact, the government health plan – Medicare – is run enormously more efficiently than private insurance – an overhead of something like 2-3 %, rather than 15-20%. (yeah, not having to hire all those people to sit around and figure out how not to pay legitimate claims saves a lot of money).
LOL….and again, Obama’s little parrot tells a lie.
You see, little parrot Tano, Medicare currently has an annual expenditure rate of about $453 billion — $60 billion of which is estimated to be fraud.
Now you see, in the REAL world, where you and your thug have never visited, if you have $60 billion in fraud, that money is counted as a loss, and is therefore an expense that adds to overhead — just as if you owned a grocery store and had to throw out old produce. Using $60 billion divided by $453 billion, we come up with an overhead cost to Medicare from fraud ALONE of over 13%.
Let’s see, what else? Medicare doesn’t have a collections and billing department; the IRS does that. Medicare doesn’t have to pay its own light bills or facilities costs; other parts of government do that. In the real world, again, you have to pay your bills and can’t just write them off to other people. Let’s give that an honest 10% additional overhead cost.
And finally, as a government entity, Medicare doesn’t pay taxes. Again, Tano, if you and Barack Obama ever paid taxes, you would know that they count as a business expense — in other words, overhead. Being KIND, let’s tack on another 15%.
So let’s see; your 2-3%, plus your 13% in fraud, plus your 10% in hidden bills, plus your 15% in taxes, means that Medicare has a REAL overhead of approximately 40% — nearly twice that of private health insurance companies.
That would explain why Medicare is a) already insolvent and b) desperate to cut payments while private health insurance companies are profitable.
But you wouldn’t know that, Tano, because you’ve never worked a day in your life or paid taxes, just like Barack Obama.
[GP ED NOTE: This comment has been edited due to violating our community terms of conduct.]
SOCal,
“We’ll have to raise taxes or borrow to pay SS benefits at that point (or drastically cut benefits).”
Actually, cutting benefits doesn’t work at that point. The money is owed to the Social Security Trust Fund by the Treasury, with the same legal effect as when the Treasury owes you money because you own a T bond. So all the money that the Treasury has borrowed from SS will have to be paid back. That is why SS is fully solvent till 2040. It will have its money, or the Treasury will be in default, which simply cannot happen without the entire global finance system imploding.
Now if you want to make an argument that this will be a hardshop for society – to raise enough money for the Treasury so that it can pay its obligations to the SS Trust Fund, fine – that is a separate argument. It speaks to the possibility of a “crisis” of some sort – but it is not a crisis for Social Security. Nor is it the fault of Social Security, as a program, that it had excess revenue and the entity it leant the money to might have to struggle to pay it back.
But that is theoretical talk. What are the actual numbers?
I dont have all of them available right now, but I am looking at an explanation that calculates SS “unfunded liabilities’ over an infinite time horizen at 13.4T. I dont know if that is part of the 55T you quoted. But over 75 years, that same liability is only 4.6T – something that could easily be met with a relatively minor tweak, as i explained above.
Or, just to put things in perspective, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has calculated that the cost to the Treasury of making permanent the Bush tax cuts is three times higher than the total unfunded liabilities of SS over the next 75 years.
So no, this is not a grave crisis.
“When the consumer doesn’t pay the bill, he’s not inclined to ask the price.”
So are you in favor of delinking health insurance from employment – given that most people who get insurance through work are not conscious of its true costs? What are you thoughts about the Wyden-Bennet bill.
(pretty good summary HERE )
Or, just to put things in perspective, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Oh yes, the Obama Party leftist think tank that is fully funded by leftist Obama Party sources like George Soros.
No wonder you didn’t link to them, puppet Tano; that would have exposed your lies right there.
And what was your insinuation about the Lewin Group?
Oh, that’s right, something undercut by your very own Obama Party’s blabbering.
The Lewin Group, the gold standard of independent, health-care analysis
Tripped up by your own talking points again, puppet? Why are you recommending a bill and a practice whose support is based on the analysis of a group you are now trashing as nothing but insurance shills?
Now what’s funny here, puppet, is that you’re whining and throwing insults without a single link to back them up — and meanwhile, I am demonstrating with linkable facts and references how you’re just flat-out lying.
Death panels already exist. In countries where there is socialized medicine there is a need to allocate scarce resources. Bureaucrats make certain decisions and these include allowing the death drug RU486 to be used. (Women have died from taking RU486).
One way of rationing resources is to say no to people who need expensive medication including injections for arthritis relief.
Take a good look at the system in the U.K. where the elderly are abused and seem to be the ones that end up dying from such things as MSRA when they need to go to hospital for routine operations.
Then take a good look at the state of Australian hospitals where there is a scarcity of that resource called “budget”.
Lets not forget that the Senate rejected three ammendments to guarentee no rationing of care. So the Senate bill specifically counters what the President is promising.
They also rejected two ammendments to keep from cutting Medicare reimbursements or raising taxes to deal with the costs. Again, these are two things that private insurance companies can’t do that Congress has chosen to leave open. So much for the ‘even playing field’.
At least the Congress must enroll ammendment passed, but who thinks it will last conference?
I was unaware that street lights and parks were a health care issue.
Oh, and look, Planned Parenthood gets their cut. Margaret Sanger, Eric Holder and Ruth Bader Ginsberg must be happy to see the undesirables get their population curves.
So much for keeping your plan if you like it
I guess this means healthcare is dead. After all, President Obama said he’d not sign anything that isn’t deficit neutral
And looks like they now have the backdoor to single payer. “It’s not the Federal Government, it’s those evil states”
HT Heritage.org via National Review