[Bryan]

Originally Posted by JerryLove

I propose a system that covers everyone, requires less regulation, and saves money. Interestingly, there are those who oppose this.

but some people say that this can't be done. that the government doesn't know how to do things that require less regulation or save money. that if we did implement a universal coverage system then it would be highly regulated and cost too much money. my father who owns a small construction company will at times do work for the federal government, when he does, his adds 30% to the price a private company would pay because the federal government regulates more.

i'm not saying it can't be done, it's just that the federal government has a history of increased regulation and increased costs.

[JerryLove]

Originally Posted by Bryan

but some people say that this can't be done. that the government doesn't know how to do things that require less regulation or save money.

And if they actually believe that they must be anarchists.

that if we did implement a universal coverage system then it would be highly regulated and cost too much money.

I'd say that they are ignorant of the current healthcare landscape then.

my father who owns a small construction company will at times do work for the federal government, when he does, his adds 30% to the price a private company would pay because the federal government regulates more.

And the opthomologist at the end of my street charges 7x as much for people paying cash as he does for people on medicade.

But if you really want to compare aples-to-apples, look at government-run medicare to private run medicare and see who wastes more money.

i'm not saying it can't be done, it's just that the federal government has a history of increased regulation and increased costs.

There's a history of failures and successes... but I don't list every failed private company as why we shouldn't have private healthcare.

[natedawg5280]

Originally Posted by JerryLove

Even I was surprised to see that we have the worst infant mortality rate in the G7

But is that really reflective of the fact that we have private healthcare?

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

I'm curious why people who aren't targets of terrorism are paying for the war? I don't think Al-Queida was planning on attacking rural Alabama.

That's a very very silly point that is by no means a rebuttal or anything.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

Yes, I showed that they were red herrings.

Because you are sure that there will be no decline in quality or any increase in the amount of time one will have to wait for appropriate care? No rationing of care increasing wait time?

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

I hope you equally oppose marriage laws, laws restricting adoption, etc... honestly, I'm not sure how you justify police (assuming you do).

I'm not familiar with adoption laws, but I don't see why I should oppose marriage laws and not be able to live with police. Nothing I said had much to do with those things.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

And dozens of other programs as well... and yet many who need healthcare don't have it.

Because they can't, or they don't apply? Why not just fix those systems if they are messed up and leave everything else the way it is?

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

I propose a system that covers everyone, requires less regulation, and saves money. Interestingly, there are those who oppose this.

Due to the fact that quality, research, technology, and speed of care would decline, our government can't afford it, and there would be rationing of care.

Are you socialist? We are a capitalist nation, and there's a reason for that.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

Anything could happen. If you are asserting that it would, please prove your claim before you expect a disproof.

But we've never tried it so we do have the right to speculate, and it looks like all I've said would happen. How is your saying it won't any more valid then my saying it will?

[grand_master_d]

How do, let's say Clinton's and/or Obama's plans, offer an incentive to research and development?

[Aquaman]

Hillary said in a press release:

Double the budget for basic and applied research at major federal agencies, and encourage more high-risk, high-reward projects. Hillary will double, over 10 years, the research budgets at the National Institute of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Energy’s Office of Science, the Defense Department, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). It is critical that government support basic research that ultimately produces the new tools, new products, and new jobs that benefit our nation. It is especially important to reverse the Bush administration’s poor record of funding the NIH. Unpredictable and declining resources have meant halted construction at new labs, fewer grants, and disincentives for young researcher

http://www.hillaryclinton.com/news/r.../view/?id=3656

Obama says:

Advance the Biomedical Research Field: As a result of biomedical research the prevention, early detection and treatment of diseases such as cancer and heart disease is better today than any other time in history. Barack Obama has consistently supported funding for the national institutes of health and the national science foundation. Obama strongly supports investments in biomedical research, as well as medical education and training in health-related fields, because it provides the foundation for new therapies and diagnostics. Obama has been a champion of research in cancer, mental health, health disparities, global health, women and children's health, and veterans' health. As president, Obama will strengthen funding for biomedical research, and better improve the efficiency of that research by improving coordination both within government and across government/private/non-profit partnerships. An Obama administration will ensure that we translate scientific progress into improved approaches to disease prevention, early detection and therapy that is available for all Americans.

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/

[JerryLove]

Originally Posted by natedawg5280

But is that really reflective of the fact that we have private healthcare?

So you are dubious that infant mortality is tied in to the quality / availability of medical care? What do you think might be the cause then?

That's a very very silly point that is by no means a rebuttal or anything.

It would be cool if just saying so made it true... non-the-less: you support government programs which are paid for by all but have little or no benifit to some while at the same time decrying other programs on the basis of having the same property.

Because you are sure that there will be no decline in quality or any increase in the amount of time one will have to wait for appropriate care? No rationing of care increasing wait time?

More accurately: Because they are based on a premise which is not true.

I'm not familiar with adoption laws, but I don't see why I should oppose marriage laws and not be able to live with police. Nothing I said had much to do with those things.

Marriage laws are about the government employing Christian morals.

Of course, you could be picking and choosing which morals the government should emply, but then the burden of support is moved to how you pick and choose.

Why is gay marriage something the government should act on but not caring for the sick?

Because they can't, or they don't apply? Why not just fix those systems if they are messed up and leave everything else the way it is?

Because this is better.

I'm curious if you are glad East Germany abandoned communism or if you think that they should have just fixed it.

Due to the fact that quality, research, technology, and speed of care would decline, our government can't afford it, and there would be rationing of care.

Three assertions that you've been entirely unable to support... likely because there's no basis for them.

Are you socialist? We are a capitalist nation, and there's a reason for that.

That's why we can just fire a union on strike? Why private property cannot be taken for the public good, and why there are no taxes?

Of course your first sentance is just an ad hominym in the form of a question (and no, I'm not a socialst, and this is not a discussion of socialism), and your second, in addition to being untrue (like pretty much all economies, we are a mixed system), and in addition to being unsupported (likely because untrue) is irrellevent. You are not discussing the matter at hand.

But we've never tried it so we do have the right to speculate, and it looks like all I've said would happen. How is your saying it won't any more valid then my saying it will?

I suspect that you've never tried shooting yourself in the head... you don't know what it would do.

Of course there are pages of me actually supporting my position on this, and of you basically not talking about it.

For a fun excercise, try to find one instance where you moved past an assertion "it won't work" and into actual support.

[natedawg5280]

Originally Posted by JerryLove

Why is gay marriage something the government should act on but not caring for the sick?

I guess it's not so much that the government shouldn't employ christian principles, it's more that it doesn't need to at the expense of efficiency or anything else. Plus gay marriage laws are just laws, they don't cost the country money or anything else weird.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

I'm curious if you are glad East Germany abandoned communism or if you think that they should have just fixed it.

How is medicare like Communism? And why shouldn't medicare just be fixed? Then we would still have efficient, unrationed healthcare with full research and technology, but people who really cannot afford healthcare could get it. And I know I can't prove that technology, research, and quality would decrease with UHC, but you cannot prove that it would not happen, and I am inclined to think it would.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

Three assertions that you've been entirely unable to support... likely because there's no basis for them.

"Simply saying that people have health insurance is meaningless. Many countries provide universal insurance but deny critical procedures to patients who need them. Britain's Department of Health reported in 2006 that at any given time, nearly 900,000 Britons are waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals, and shortages force the cancellation of more than 50,000 operations each year. In Sweden, the wait for heart surgery can be as long as 25 weeks, and the average wait for hip replacement surgery is more than a year. Many of these individuals suffer chronic pain, and judging by the numbers, some will probably die awaiting treatment. In a 2005 ruling of the Canadian Supreme Court, Chief Justice Beverly McLachlin wrote that "access to a waiting list is not access to healthcare.""
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/...nion-rightrail
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2006/...-universal-is/
"Another myth has to do with the quality
of care that patients receive. British ministers
of health have told British citizens for
years that their health system is the envy of
the world. Canadian ministers of health say
much the same thing. In fact, Canadian and
British doctors see 50 percent more patients
than American doctors do, and, as a consequence,
they have less time to spend with
each patient. In Britain, the typical general
practitioner barely has time to take your
temperature and write a prescription. And
even if they discover something wrong with
you, they may not have the technology to
solve your problem."
http://www.cato.org/pubs/catosletter...letterv3n1.pdf

that whole PDF file has some nice information.
http://www.theobjectivestandard.com/...are.asp#_edn41
that article also has like a trillion sources which unfortunately can't be linked to.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

That's why we can just fire a union on strike? Why private property cannot be taken for the public good, and why there are no taxes?

You're right that we are not totally capitalist I guess, but that doesn't mean we can't oppose negative socialization that could occur.

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

Of course your first sentance is just an ad hominym

I wasn't trying to attack you at all, I just really wanted to know.

[JerryLove]

I guess it's not so much that the government shouldn't employ christian principles, it's more that it doesn't need to at the expense of efficiency or anything else. Plus gay marriage laws are just laws, they don't cost the country money or anything else weird.

This feels a lot like moving goal-posts.

How is medicare like Communism? And why shouldn't medicare just be fixed? Then we would still have efficient, unrationed healthcare with full research and technology, but people who really cannot afford healthcare could get it.

I'm just trying to understand if you are expousing a universal asiom (it's better to fix an existing system than replace it), or if you are specifically saying that you feel a revised version of the dozens of existing programs would be superior to an overhaul of the whole thing.

I think an overhaul is in order because one set of uniform rules is easier to do correctly, easier to regulate, easier to manage, less prone to manipulation, and less prone to missing someone than dozens of seperate, often overlapping programs.

Why do you think the opposite?

And I know I can't prove that technology, research, and quality would decrease with UHC, but you cannot prove that it would not happen, and I am inclined to think it would.

But you have the positive claim. I'm having trouble even imagining why it might. Could you give a specific example of how government-offered healthcare might effect a specific instance where efficient private healthcare would not?

I mean, I suppose I could make a case that moving from paying $6,000 to $3,000 per-person would lower profit margins for drug companies and the like, and some of those profits might be not lining the CEO's pocket... but if that's a reason to aim for higher health-costs then we should be rejoicing when health-costs go up every year... we should also be able to show a correlation statistically; but the opposite is true.

Simply saying that people have health insurance is meaningless. Many countries provide universal insurance but deny critical procedures to patients who need them.

Private healthcare in the US does this all the time. I've already cited examples.

Heck, I was denied for a tetnus shot.

Britain's Department of Health reported in 2006 that at any given time, nearly 900,000 Britons are waiting for admission to National Health Service hospitals, and shortages force the cancellation of more than 50,000 operations each year.

And what are the numbers in the US?

The statistic is useless without context.

What percentage of people in the US de from lack of medical care? What about Canada? What about the UK? This would be a useful statistic.

AFTER saying that I went and looked it up (I really didn't know).

U.S. Ranks Last in Preventing Deaths from Treatable Conditions

You're right that we are not totally capitalist I guess, but that doesn't mean we can't oppose negative socialization that could occur.

It does mean "because it's not capitalist" is not a vlid support for such opposition.

[natedawg5280]

Originally Posted by JerryLove

I'm just trying to understand if you are expousing a universal asiom (it's better to fix an existing system than replace it), or if you are specifically saying that you feel a revised version of the dozens of existing programs would be superior to an overhaul of the whole thing.

I think an overhaul is in order because one set of uniform rules is easier to do correctly, easier to regulate, easier to manage, less prone to manipulation, and less prone to missing someone than dozens of seperate, often overlapping programs.

Why do you think the opposite?

Because I think it's important to keep what we have going. I think an overhaul would result in some bad stuff, wheras if we just fix medicare, we'll still have all the research and technology we've got progressing.

Originally Posted by Jerry

But you have the positive claim. I'm having trouble even imagining why it might. Could you give a specific example of how government-offered healthcare might effect a specific instance where efficient private healthcare would not?

In my last post I gave a bunch of sources that gave examples of stuff.

Originally Posted by Jerry

And what are the numbers in the US?

The statistic is useless without context.

What percentage of people in the US de from lack of medical care? What about Canada? What about the UK? This would be a useful statistic.

AFTER saying that I went and looked it up (I really didn't know).

U.S. Ranks Last in Preventing Deaths from Treatable Conditions

I've also seen statistics how patients with lung cancer etc. have a 2-1 survival rate here compared to European countries. That's not that same as people waiting to get attention because of UHC. In our system people don't wait as much, some people just aren't covered. That's why medicare should be fixed (since it apparently doesn't work, I'm not sure why it doesn't).

Originally Posted by Jerrylove

It does mean "because it's not capitalist" is not a vlid support for such opposition.

Ah, yeah. You're right.

[JerryLove]

Because I think it's important to keep what we have going. I think an overhaul would result in some bad stuff, wheras if we just fix medicare, we'll still have all the research and technology we've got progressing.

I don't see any relationship between the two issues. How does replacing medicare / medicard / STAR / etc with universal coverage affect research?

In my last post I gave a bunch of sources that gave examples of stuff.

You gave examples that Britain has too few medical resources to handle needs (though you've not really said how that stacks up to the US). I don't see any way to extrapolate those anticdotes into a claim that universal healthcare will cause a shortage of resources in the US. You seem to be comparing apples and oranges.

I've also seen statistics how patients with lung cancer etc. have a 2-1 survival rate here compared to European countries. That's not that same as people waiting to get attention because of UHC. In our system people don't wait as much, some people just aren't covered. That's why medicare should be fixed (since it apparently doesn't work, I'm not sure why it doesn't).

I looked that up (since you didn't cite): This site suggest that the variance is caused by how the data is gathered.

Of course your study is also 20 years old, and I don't know which European countries are involved, and (as I've already pointed out) the bigger picture ("died from preventable causes") is worse in the US than the rest of the G7 (since I really am not expousing the medical system in Yugoslavia in 1985)

I'm a little mixed on the comparison. Obviously I opened the door to making such comparisons myself, but I worry that we are moving into cases controlled more by available resources than by access... and more than a bit out of date.

[natedawg5280]

Originally Posted by JerryLove

I don't see any relationship between the two issues. How does replacing medicare / medicard / STAR / etc with universal coverage affect research?

UHC means the government gets involved and the business gets lazier and less motivated. Private = competitive and focused on developing; gov't not so much.
I looked that up (since you didn't cite):

Originally Posted by Jerry

Obviously I opened the door to making such comparisons myself, but I worry that we are moving into cases controlled more by available resources than by access... and more than a bit out of date.

OK.

What it comes down to is that I am afraid that if the government took over the HC business bad things would happen. You argue that those are invalid, but not so much by countering them but for asking me to prove that the bad things would happen. I can't really do that because we don't have UHC and if I make comparisons to Britain you say that their available resources are different so some stats I used don't work. So I can't really argue much, only state what I believe would result.

I don't see why medicare shouldn't just be tuned up a bit and HC left privatized. The big stat you posted was our ranking last in deaths by treatable condition, and that is pretty largely related to the # of uninsured. If those people are uninsured due too lack of money, let them get medicare. There's no really reason for UHC if medicare works properly.

[JerryLove]

Originally Posted by natedawg5280

UHC means the government gets involved and the business gets lazier and less motivated. Private = competitive and focused on developing; gov't not so much.

Why would government health insurance make pharmicutial companies, or research hospitals lazier? I don't see the correltation.

What it comes down to is that I am afraid that if the government took over the HC business bad things would happen. You argue that those are invalid, but not so much by countering them but for asking me to prove that the bad things would happen. I can't really do that because we don't have UHC and if I make comparisons to Britain you say that their available resources are different so some stats I used don't work. So I can't really argue much, only state what I believe would result.

I've asked you *why*. If you want to compare Britain, that's fine, I just want to make sure we are making a fair comparison with Britain... there are many more differences than UHC in the British medical system.

I don't see why medicare shouldn't just be tuned up a bit and HC left privatized.

46million Americans with no insurance.

The big stat you posted was our ranking last in deaths by treatable condition, and that is pretty largely related to the # of uninsured. If those people are uninsured due too lack of money, let them get medicare. There's no really reason for UHC if medicare works properly.

You are thinking of medicade. Medicare is for old people.

I would not qualify for medicade (I make way too much money). If I were working for a small company, or self-employed, I would not be able to afford healthcare because I have had cancer.