Yadkin View - Conservative News for Yadkin County, NC - when the Elkin Tribune lets you down, you will find the real conservative news at YadkinView.com!

	The Conservative News

HOME		NEWS		IMPORTANT LINKS		YOUR VIEW		SIGN IN		REGISTER

HOME >> Your View

Universal health care

« Return to Topics

OOgie	Posted 8:36, 11/27/2008
Ok, here is a preview of what we will get. http://www.thestar.com/News/article/175394

commonsense	Posted 1:42, 11/29/2008
OOgie, still can't think of anything original to say so just keep posting links for republican propoganda.

OOgie	Posted 9:38, 11/29/2008
common, tell us how great the universal health care system will be. Give the details.

Opine

Posted 10:15, 11/29/2008

Oogie - Good question. Most of these people including CS, spew insults toward traditional America and degrade the conservative view all the while unable to factually articulate their own wiew. Just like with the middle school post. I have been reading and will continue to read waiting for some facts to the questions you, I and others have asked about Obama's plans and why he is so worshipped. So far, silence. It is expected knowing what he truly stands for. Oogie, don't hold your breath for CS...you would set a record because you will get no answers.

care not	Posted 11:49, 11/29/2008
Does anyone on this board know that the U.S. is one of the few countries left that actually charge a student to go to medical school. Cut out that and a few other things and medical cost will become more reasonable.

OOgie	Posted 14:20, 11/29/2008
Anything the government "supplies/gives" to any person or organization comes with strings attached. Those doctors who get free medical schooling have far more government control on their professional lives - for the entire span of their life.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 18:37, 11/29/2008
care not - The country doesn't charge people to go to med school. The school (usually private) charges them. Even with the charge, people from other countries come here to pay for the education. There is a reason for that.

commonsense	Posted 21:33, 11/29/2008
OOgie, I'm so sorry I forgot you beleive only rich republicans children deserve healthcare that only they can afford.

OOgie

Posted 20:43, 11/30/2008

As President-elect Obama's apparent choice for health and human services secretary and as White House health care czar, it is a fair guess that Tom Daschle's view on health care legislation may be decisive.
So it is worth reading his book "Critical: What We Can Do About the Health-Care Crisis," in which the gracious former Senate leader lays out without equivocation both the policy he recommends and the tactics for how to pass it.
He proposes setting up a board to establish standards for health care delivery in the United States that would be modeled on how the Federal Reserve Board and Securities and Exchange Commission oversee banks and corporations. Technically, it only would oversee the public health systems (Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans Health Administration, etc.), which provide about 32 percent of health care nationwide.
On Page 179, he writes, "The Federal Health Board wouldn't be a regulatory agency, but its recommendations would have teeth because all federal health programs would have to abide by them." But here is the kicker: Although his board technically would have no say on the 68 percent of health care that is provided through the private sector, at the bottom of Page 179, Daschle modestly adds: "Congress could opt to go further with the Board's recommendations. It could, for example, link the tax exclusion for health insurance to insurance that complies with the Board's recommendation."
Those last 19 words would spell the end of independent private-sector health care in America. Obviously, no health insurance would be sold if it were denied the tax deduction. Thus, every policy, every standard decided by this board would be the law of the land for every drug company, every hospital, every doctor and every health insurance company.
Indeed, 20 pages later, in the section in which he identifies "losers" under his plan, Daschle is admirably candid. Among the explicit "losers," he includes: "Doctors and patients might resent any encroachment on their ability to choose certain treatments, even if they are expensive or ineffectual compared to alternatives. Some insurers might object to new rules that restrict their coverage decisions. And the health-care industry would have to reconsider its business plan ) (emphasis added)." That is to say, they can stay in business and deliver their services, but only as the government bureaucrats say they may. They no longer would be genuinely independent.
One of the things that Daschle says will have to change is the "technology arms race" he claims hospitals are engaging in "to attract aging baby boomers with the latest diagnostic imaging machines." Imagine that, offering customers the latest technology, which, as Daschle admits on Page 125, "help(s) doctors estimate the spread of cancer or the extent of cardiac disease without surgery."
Of course, for Daschle, the problem with such high-tech diagnostics is that it leads to treatment. On pages 123-124, he cites a study approvingly for the proposition that there are too many angiograms being performed. By too many, he specifically cites a study of 828 angioplasties in which only a third were likely to benefit the patients. Another half might or might not, and 14 percent were not likely. Now I might conclude that if 85 percent of the patients receiving the treatment might benefit (the one-third who definitely would and the 50 percent who might) and if I were one of them, I might want the procedure. But for Daschle, that would be a waste of money, and "the imaging test that shows narrowing of the arteries was to blame (for the excessive treatment)."
What followed is my favorite line in the book: "When the test revealed a narrowing of the artery, however slight, cardiologists couldn't resist doing something about it." Imagine a doctor trying to cure his patient.
Cardiologists may have thought they were carrying out their responsibilities. But under the Daschle(/Obama?) plan, political hacks appointed to the Health board will decide whether your cardiologist is allowed to image your arteries and, if they find blockage, try to treat it successfully.
But that is not all he doesn't like about private-sector health care. On Page 174, he points out the dangers of letting drug companies advertise their products to the public: The public may want the drugs even if some Washington bureaucrat likes another drug instead.
He believes that Americans are not entitled to just any care that might do some good. Yep, Page 122: "Many patients with insurance want any care that might do some good, and plenty of doctors will oblige them."
Recognizing that some of these ideas may not be vastly popular, he recommends two basic legislative strategies. First, seek to pass the legislation early in the first year of the president's first term, when he is most popular and is least likely to be resisted. That is a valid analysis.
The other strategy, which is very smart, is to leave the nasty details out of the bill. He says that was one of Clinton's mistakes in 1993. Clinton put too many details in the bill, thus alerting those who disagreed to mount an opposition (pages 108-109). Daschle recommends passing a vague bill and then "a Federal Health Board should be charged with establishing the system's framework and filling in most of the details. This independent board would be insulated from political pressure."
By "political pressure," he means the democratic process of electing fellow citizens to Congress who then pass legislation about which the public is informed before final passage � and about which they may wish to petition their government for redress of grievances. Apparently, we can end petty bickering and partisanship by not letting anyone know what the new laws will contain.

commonsense	Posted 23:55, 11/30/2008
OOgie, the good thing is you are probably the only person who beleives any of this stuff you post.

Grams	Posted 0:3, 12/01/2008
oogie, you have now been put in Stokes' category. Same statement was made by commone about that person.

commonsense	Posted 0:15, 12/01/2008
Grams, you posted on another thread, someone should learn to spell. Take your own advice. Common is not spelled with an "e" on the end. Butcher, grams just gave me a great idea. OOgie and stokes are the same person. haha.

hmm..	Posted 6:31, 12/01/2008
common, go back up a few posts. I before E except after C, you useless idiot....

Opine	Posted 16:51, 12/01/2008
OOgie - Great post stating fact rather than liberal propoganda. I still am amazed that someone with the name commonsense could have so very little. I honestly wonder if this person knows she / he is this uninformed and blinded or if it is all an act. I honestly don't know. I am amazed.

commonsense	Posted 18:0, 12/01/2008
Opine or OOgie( which ever screename you are using this half hour), As I have already said if you will look at the election results your side lost real, real, real BAD. Get over it most of America thinks as I do so your resitance to a better America is really insignificant.

weezie	Posted 18:34, 12/01/2008
Opine/OOgie Why are so dead set against health care for everyone? Is is because you or the /both as the sane one are so extremely rightwinged and prejudiced against the not so fortunate among your fellow Americans?

commonsense	Posted 18:41, 12/01/2008
weezie, Great job summing up what kind of person Opine/OOgie really is.

weezie

Posted 18:55, 12/01/2008

He/she/they are probably the sort of person/s that when the church doors swing open on Sunday they are the first to enter and stand tall and proud and the rest of the week business as usual. We've all seen that kind of christian, and I use that word loosley. I'm not a christian and don't claim to be one, but I am very observant to people and the things that I see going on around me. Hell, everybody can't be fooled.

libertarian	Posted 19:4, 12/01/2008
Religious Right and Liberal Left: EQUALLY dangerous for this country

OOgie	Posted 19:43, 12/01/2008
All the liberals here keep spouting about health care for children. Give us the name of one real child in Yadkin County that does not receive health care. Name the name, post it here. After that, tell us why you have not already remedied that situation.

weezie	Posted 20:32, 12/01/2008
Goes straight to the heart doesn't OOgie! I asked you the question why you are against it, do you have an answer or not, bullshit not accepted!

Opine

Posted 20:48, 12/01/2008

Healthcare is not a right! The two of you are crazy and simply indoctrinated. No, free healthcare should not be allowed. There are no children who go unattened when their health needs are at stake. Have you ever heard of Medicaid???

By the way, I have no idea who Oogie is. I do have an idea who nocommonsnse is...I think I saw her at the gay pride parade down in Raleigh as I was telling all of the little children around there that this is the type of person you want to avoid...a large ugly chick who can bench press more than their daddy.

weezie	Posted 20:52, 12/01/2008
Opine I have said that health care was a right. The question stills goes unanswered!

weezie	Posted 20:55, 12/01/2008
Opine - misprint, I meant to say That I NEVER said health care was a right.

Opine	Posted 20:58, 12/01/2008
Weezie - No problem.

Stokes	Posted 22:39, 12/01/2008
The messiah DID NOT win real real real big when you consider all the votes that were cast. There are millions that voted against him so those of us in Yadkin county are certainly NOT ALONE.

weezie	Posted 23:16, 12/01/2008
By a nose hair or a mile, a win is a win.

Stokes	Posted 23:41, 12/01/2008
I do not dispute the win statement, weezie, what I was saying is the conservative republicans in Yadkin are certainly not alone. There are millions more all over the country.

weezie	Posted 23:42, 12/01/2008
I agree stokes.

walks the talk

Posted 3:46, 12/02/2008

88% of the people that voted for the obamessiah did not know what his health plan was/is, could not name his vice-elect,..in fact, did not know anything except the word, 'change'. Who could be impressed with so many ignorant people?
Ignorance is bliss and these people were orgasmic over 'The One'. "Ohhhh, he just inspires me." pant,pant. "Ohhh, I don't eva' has to worry 'bout my mogage or gas again!"..pant, pant. No problem here with who 'won', but all the videos with the obamessiah voters being interviewed was sad and..hilarious.
Opine & OOgie, keep up the good work. You just have to remember that the 'welcome page' to yadkinview states that "contributors will come from all walks of life". In fact, trolls will try their best to take over. They will never start their own site which is amazing since, to them, all here are 'stupid, redneck, backwards', etc. Let'em keep talking..maybe someday they will say something intelligent. Or not.

walks the talk

Posted 3:46, 12/02/2008

OOgie	Posted 7:16, 12/02/2008
Who is the Yadkin child that does not receive health care?

Opine

Posted 8:7, 12/02/2008

Nocommonsense - If you really believe the factual arguments I have made continuosly on this website are as ayou say "nothing to back it up". I must say regrettably that you are as many on this site have referred to you as. You are sincerely dishonest.

Why don't you go to Al Sharpton's website, hit the phonics tab, and get some high quality liberal education so you can learn to read and not make stupid factless comments.

I have a question for you that I guarantee everyone you cannot answer because all you know is liberal propoganda and even that you know little of....What are five policies/stances that makes the punk Obama so appealing to someone like you? You cannot answer gay marraige because I already know that one.

talkischeap

Posted 10:28, 12/02/2008

Well, I've been to a country with socialized medicine. Two things to be noted, one from experience and another from conversations with residences of that country.

One, that socialized medicine is paid for with a 14% sales tax. And the residents I talked with said that it took "forever" to see a doctor about a specific medican condition. I don't know about you but I don't like it when it takes 2 weeks to see an oncologist. Go to Canada and it could take 2 months! That time period could be the difference between life and death.

answer	Posted 11:16, 12/02/2008
talk finally something we agree on..

commonsense	Posted 12:0, 12/02/2008
libertarion, Don't worry I don't think they will send the bill to you or anyone else personally to pay.

libertarian

Posted 11:46, 12/02/2008

if universal health care came to be:

do we all have to pay when someone needs care because of their bad habits?

for example: if Jim, smoking 3 packs of cigs a day (i know there are many Jims out there) needs medical care for any smoking related illness, who gets to pay for that??

who should pay for the medical care of the person who refuses to eat nothing but junk food and develops some kind of disease?

commonsense	Posted 15:29, 12/02/2008
opine/oogie, How many times do I have to answer this before you will stop asking. The American people quiver with joy because he is NOT a REPUBLICAN. Please accept and get over it and move on.

Opine

Posted 13:17, 12/02/2008

Nocommonsense - How does it feel to be so uninformed? Please tell me. I dare you to point out one instance I have portrayed hatred toward anyone less fortunate. It will be impossible because I know I have never done this. You live in a world of make believe. Give me an example...one example...I am waiting ....C'mon, try hard and think, think, thinnnnnnk.

You are dishonest, completely. Back up your garbage with fact...still waiting...still waiting....

Oh well, forget it.

Opine	Posted 13:20, 12/02/2008
Oh yeah, nocommonsense...I am still waiting for five things that make you quiver with joy when it comes to Obama. It really is a simple question. Once again, you cannot use gay marriage. That has been established with your commentary.

Opine

Posted 16:40, 12/02/2008

Nocommonsense - Ok. So you quiver because Bush will soon be out of office. Great. You still cannot name five things the Chicago thug stands for. You are comical.

By the way, you ARE LYING when you state that I said "people should work for next to no pay and just anything you can think of that hurts poor people".

Listen, you may get away with lying and distorting the truth around your group of intellectually challenged friends but it doesn't work with me. Prove your outlandish mistruths you continually speak with fact. That is impossible for dishonet folks as yourself.

commonsense	Posted 17:35, 12/02/2008
OOgie/Opine, you can keep denying saying these things even though they are right there in your posts. The only thing you can ever do is attack anybody personally that proves you wrong.

justwondering	Posted 15:42, 12/02/2008
I do not know what health care plan they have in Ireland,but my niece took a semester of college there this past summer. She had a problem with her eyes,went to the ER,was never ask for little more than her name.was treated,and then the ER doctor drove her back to her apt.,cause she was having trouble seeing. She had planned on taking a taxi. Whatever they got I want.

OOgie

Posted 16:33, 12/02/2008

common is the worst sort of liar. I never posted anything like that.
"Opine/oogie, you keep saying people have no right to healthcare, should work for next to no pay and just anything you can think of that hurts poor people. This ain't exactly showing love for your fellow man."
common, do you help your neighbor to have car as nice as yours? What about a house? Did the union bosses make sure that they personally got no more pay than the workers they exploited (but they call it representing)? Show the love?

Opine

Posted 16:40, 12/02/2008

OOgie

Posted 19:21, 12/02/2008

These brilliant liberals have overlooked all the significant drawbacks of the government-run health care system. When we do it, there will be a huge new Federal agency. Washington offices, offices in every State and in many larger cities in each State. To comply with all the regulations, each medical practice will hire people to keep up with the latest government regulations on the system. And your tax dollars will pay for all this plus pay for the cost of whatever real medical care you might get out of the system. You will PAY. And less of the money will go to actual medical care. The bureaucracy will eat up a lot of it. And the bureaucracy does not increase the supply of medicines, vaccines, in the slightest. But it will add to the costs. We will have less health care at higher cost. And you will pay the higher taxes.

Opine

Posted 22:4, 12/02/2008

Oogie - You must understand...facts are meaningless to liberals. It is all about the "intentions" and the "feelings". The unintended consequences of liberals can never be mentioned. We know, FACTUALLY, no liberal big government program has ever worked. They fail everytime. There has never been a program that has worked because it is a simple case that the private sector can do anything and everything better than the government. This is no secret. There is no debate. There is no doubt you'll pay more for a government run healthcare program and the system will be less efficient. True compassion is when you get all obstacles out of the way of people and give people a chance to be the best they can be. The worst and most difficult obstacle to remove is always the government.

It's a shame so many people are so beholden to the government and cannot stand on their on two feet. To many, the government is mom, dad and banker. I pray for this country.

weezie	Posted 23:3, 12/02/2008
Opine will you beholden to the gov't when you start to receive your ss?

weezie	Posted 23:33, 12/02/2008
To all Marines, Vietnam vets and Master Masons, good night. Will post tomorrow!

Stokes	Posted 0:27, 12/03/2008
weezie, why should anyone be beholding to the government for their social security and medicare? It is their money that was deducted from their paycheck. Not only that but IF that money has been invested properly as opposed to being spent for some government program, social security would have a surplus, not be without money.

Nature7	Posted 3:52, 12/03/2008
Opine, Too many people do not understand that what the 'government' gives, it must first 'take away'. "Everytime that we try to lift a problem from our own shoulders, and shift that problem to the hands of the government, to the same extent we are sacrificing the liberties of our people." JFK BTW, if amnesty is given to all the illegals, we are really in for it..health care, social security,etc.

OOgie

Posted 7:50, 12/03/2008

Health care is a right? At first glance, that would seem correct. Food is, for most, a more urgent and recurring need than is health care. Housing is another more urgent and recurring need than is health care. Lots of people need official health care only occasionally. But for very bit of food, someone had to WORK to provide it! For every sort of housing, someone had to WORK to build it. So health care is provided, directly or indirectly, by someone who WORKS. All health care results from WORK. For those who can and will work, they can provide better health care at lower cost for themselves than will the government.

Opine

Posted 8:7, 12/03/2008

Weezie - Stokes is correct. It was my money in the first place. Of course it should be mine when I retire. Will it still be there after this insane government is through with their idocy? Probably not. That is the perfect exmaple of why letting Americans CHOOSE to secure their money privately rather than the rot gut government run social security would be fair and ideal.

Nature - Great point. Illegals have invaded our country and will soon reap the benefits unintended for them. I say unintended but I know that is exactly the intention of liberals...make more people dependant upon the government.

OOgie	Posted 9:2, 12/03/2008
The liberals will grant benefits to illegals to indirectly buy political support from the illegals. It worked that way in this most recent election. And the labor unions contributed 53 MILLION dollars to the Democrats in the most recent election. The unions expect to get a great deal in return. And probably will.

TalkisCheap	Posted 10:36, 12/03/2008
How would you prevent those in charge of their own money from squandering it? If they squander it they go right to the government trough.

Stokes

Posted 11:14, 12/03/2008

That is very simple. You still cannot draw from your private social security account until retirement age UNLESS you died, then your family would get the money and the payout would be monthly so it couldn't be squandered. The advantage of private accounts is the income and growth on the invested money over the long haul which does not happen with the government being the "supposedly gatekeeper". Social security withholdings plus the employer match are now just thrown into the pot and an IOU put in the so-called "social security trust fund". The money is spent for social security checks and anything else the government wants to use it for. No income and no growth on the principal.

Opine	Posted 11:15, 12/03/2008
Talk - Good point and valid especially seeing how irresponsible people have been in buying cars and houses they cannot afford as well as running up credit card debt. I would simply suggest making it a voluntary system where an individual could use , say, 50% for private investment or savings. I know I would love that as well as many others. There are plenty that would waste it I am sure.

talkischeap	Posted 15:55, 12/03/2008
I'm with you on that, stokes. And I like the idea of distribution to your heirs. I think I read a couple years ago that the historic rate of return on SS payments was 1.1%! Pitiful.

hmm..

Posted 16:16, 12/03/2008

COLA increases for SS payments since 1975

July 1975 -- 8.0%
July 1976 -- 6.4%
July 1977 -- 5.9%
July 1978 -- 6.5%
July 1979 -- 9.9%
July 1980 -- 14.3%
July 1981 -- 11.2%
July 1982 -- 7.4%
January 1984 -- 3.5%
January 1985 -- 3.5%
January 1986 -- 3.1%
January 1987 -- 1.3%
January 1988 -- 4.2%
January 1989 -- 4.0%
January 1990 -- 4.7%
January 1991 -- 5.4%
January 1992 -- 3.7%
January 1993 -- 3.0%
January 1994 -- 2.6%
January 1995 -- 2.8%
January 1996 -- 2.6%
January 1997 -- 2.9%
January 1998 -- 2.1%
January 1999 -- 1.3%
January 2000 -- 2.5%
January 2001 -- 3.5%
January 2002 -- 2.6%
January 2003 -- 1.4%
January 2004 -- 2.1%
January 2005 -- 2.7%
January 2006 -- 4.1%
January 2007 -- 3.3%
January 2008 -- 2.3%
January 2009 -- 5.8%

I know this is not what Stokes is talking about, but what about you, cheaptalk?....

OOgie	Posted 19:12, 12/03/2008
Tonight at 8PM, less than an hour from now, a new 2-hour program premieres on Channel 8 FOX. Rich people will be dispensing personal largess. Better then the government doing it. Liberals should enjoy that, but they probably won't.

OOgie	Posted 19:13, 12/03/2008
"than", instead of then.

TalkisCheap	Posted 21:14, 12/03/2008
No, not cost of living. I believe it meant that if you took all that was paid in on your behalf and averaged how much the government paid out to retirees the retirees collect an amount that amounted to what there collects would amount to if it was imvested at 1.1%. But, honestly, I'm not sure about that. What a crappy sentence that was.

DickTracy	Posted 22:3, 12/03/2008
OOgie, fun program, and only slightly condescending. I have one question: Was 2008 a super-leapyear? Did we have 2/29 AND 4/31 in 2008?

OOgie	Posted 8:54, 12/04/2008
April 2008- 30 days.

OOgie

Posted 7:42, 01/12/2009

An Emergency Review: By Thomas Sowell This is an emergency book review.
Before you do anything else, make a note to read "The Top Ten Myths of American Health Care" by Sally C. Pipes. It might literally save your life, by checking the political stampede toward a government-controlled medical profession � usually presented politically as "universal health care."
It is one of the painful signs of our times that millions of people are so easily swayed by rhetoric that they show virtually no interest at all in finding out the hard facts. Any number of other countries already have government-controlled medical professions. Yet few Americans show any interest in what actually happens to medical care in those countries.
Instead, we are being lured into a one-way process � much like entering a Venus fly trap � by the oldest of all confidence rackets, the promise of something for nothing.
Fortunately, Sally C. Pipes is one of the few who has explored the reality of government-controlled medical treatment in Canada and other countries. Among the things she discovered is that new life-saving medications that go immediately into the market in the United States take a much longer time to become available to Canadian patients � if they ever get approved by the bureaucrats.
No doubt that lowers the cost of medications � if you count costs solely in money terms, rather than in terms of how many people literally pay with their lives when the bureaucrats are reluctant to buy new pharmaceutical drugs, while they can continue to approve obsolete and cheaper drugs for the same illnesses.
Cancer survival rates are higher in the United States than in Europe. A recent report by the Fraser Institute in Vancouver estimates that annually tens of thousands of Canadians seek medical treatment outside of Canada, even though treatment is free inside Canada and they have to pay themselves for treatment elsewhere.
Other studies show that waiting times for surgery are months longer in Canada, Britain and Australia � all countries with government-controlled medical care � than in the United States.
Among the many issues explained in plain English in "The Top Ten Myths of American Health Care" are why pharmaceutical drugs cost so much, why it is misleading to talk about uninsured Americans as if they do not get medical care, and how politicians make existing insurance more expensive by blithely mandating coverage that people would not voluntarily pay for with their own money, if it was left up to them.
In various states, these mandated coverages include alcoholism, acupuncture, breast reduction and treatment for baldness, among other things. You may just want insurance to cover you in case you get hit with some big-time medical problem, but many state laws will not allow an insurance company to sell you that "major medical" coverage, without all the add-ons that politicians and special interests have come up with.
The net result is more expensive insurance, which in turn can mean more people being uninsured.
As with so many government programs, "the poor" are used as a political justification for imposing government-controlled medical care on everyone. But "The Top Ten Myths of American Medical Care" shows what a fraud that is. First of all, the average uninsured American has above-average income � and people living in poverty are already eligible for Medicaid.
There are of course some serious problems with Medicaid, as there is with government medical treatment at Veterans Administration hospitals and with Medicare. But such things only highlight the dangers of having the government take over the rest of the medical sector, given its dangerous failures where it is already involved in medical matters.
The lure of something for nothing may be seductive when you are in good health. But it can become a bitter irony when you are waiting for months for surgery to relieve your pain or when your life hangs in the balance while some bureaucrat decides whether you can get the best medication or something older and cheaper.
"The Top Ten Myths About American Medical Care" can literally be a life-saver. What it reveals is unlikely to be told by the mainstream media or by other enthusiasts for the magic phrase "universal health care."

FED UP	Posted 6:15, 01/14/2009
Does anyone ever wonder; 1. Why do the people (Limbaugh, Hannity, Fixed News, republican politicians who only represent the rich,and R/W talking heads on TV) who are so against health care for everyone ALREADY HAVE IT? 2. How do they convince the people who don't have it that they don't deserve it?

weezie	Posted 9:42, 01/14/2009
I don't really think the people mentioned in the last post actually believe what they are saying. They are much like ANN COULTER, they are looking for higher ratings which increase their income.

Grams

Posted 10:38, 01/14/2009

I have stated on this site my approximate income and it is modest at best and my health ins premium just went up in January to $521.00 per month - blue advantage but I sure as hell do not want the government messing with my health care making me wait 6 mos for a selective operation etc etc etc and somebody has to pay for this universal health care. IT IS NOT FREE PLUS THE NEXT THING THAT WILL HAPPEN THE DOCTOR SHORTAGE THAT WE NOW HAVE WILL GET MUCH WORSE.

OOgie

Posted 11:28, 01/14/2009

FedUp continues to ignore the volume of evidence already presented here about the problems with government-run health care. So we post again.
Affordable health care: By Walter Williams
One of the campaign themes this election cycle is "affordable" health care. Shouldn't we ask ourselves whether we want the politicians who brought us the "affordable" housing, that created the current financial debacle, to now deliver us affordable health care? Shouldn't we also ask how things turned out in countries where there is socialized medicine?
The Vancouver, British Columbia-based Fraser Institute's annual publication, "Waiting Your Turn," reports that Canada's median waiting times from a patient's referral by a general practitioner to treatment by a specialist, depending on the procedure, averages from five to 40 weeks. The wait for diagnostics, such as MRI or CT, ranges between four and 28 weeks.
According to Michael Tanner's "The Grass Is Not Always Greener," in Cato Institute's Policy Analysis (March 18, 2008), the Mayo Clinic treats more than 7,000 foreign patients a year, the Cleveland Clinic 5,000, Johns Hopkins Hospital treats 6,000, and one out of three Canadian physicians send a patient to the U.S. for treatment each year. If socialized medicine is so great, why do Canadian physicians send patients to the U.S. and the Canadian government spends over $1 billion each year on health care in our country?
Britain's socialized system is no better. Currently, 750,000 Brits are awaiting hospital admission. Britain's National Health Services hopes to achieve an 18-week maximum wait from general practitioner to treatment, including all diagnostic tests, by the end of 2008. The delay in health care services is not only inconvenient, it's deadly. Both in Britain and Canada, many patients with diseases that are curable at the time of diagnosis become incurable by the time of treatment or patients become too weak for the surgical procedure. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown plans to introduce a "constitution" setting out the rights and responsibilities of its health care system. According to a report in the Telegraph (02/01/2008), "What this (Gordon Brown's plan) seems to amount to in practice are the Government's rights to refuse treatment, and the patient's responsibilities to live up to what the state decides are model standards." That means people who have unhealthy habits such as smoking, heart sufferers who are obese or those who fall ill because of failure to take regular exercise might be refused medical care, even though they pay taxes to support government health care.
Government health care can become ghoulish as reported in a Human Events (1/17/08) article "Gordon Brown Wants Your Organs" written by Susan Easton. As in the U.S., many Brits die while on the waiting list for organ donations. The prime minister has a solution called a "Presumed Consent Scheme." Mrs. Easton says, "If you don't specifically carry a card saying 'leave my corpse alone' � known as the 'opt out option', or unless one's family is on hand to object, one's remains are considered fair game for an organ harvest festival." Supporters of the scheme argue that what is done with people's organs after their death should not be up to the next of kin. Such a vision differs little from one that holds that after one's death he becomes the property of the state.
Of course, if socialized medicine becomes a reality here, Americans can do as many Brits do. Mrs. Easton says, "more than 70,000 Britons � known as 'health tourists' � have gone as far as India, Malaysia and South Africa for major operations. This figure is expected to rise to almost 200,000 by the end of the decade."
We have health care problems in the U.S. but it's not because ours is a free market system of health care delivery. Well over 50 percent of all health care expenditures are made by government. Where government spends, government regulates. It's truly amazing that Americans who are dissatisfied with the current level of socialized medicine in the U.S. are asking for more of what created the problem in the first place. Anyone thinking that an American version of socialized health care will differ from that found in Canada, Britain, Sweden, France and elsewhere are whistling Dixie.

commonsense

Posted 11:55, 01/14/2009

OOgie, We get it, you think rich people like you are the only ones that should be allowed access to hospitals and doctors. You are one of those people that think because you got lucky and were born rich that somehow makes you superior to the rest of us and we don't deserve health care like you. You try and make everybody think it is a bad thing by posting these "selective" accounts when the truth is the vast majority of people in these countries are very happy with their system of health care for all and not just the rich like in the US. I know you are going to come back with no hospital refuses care to anybody, but try showing up without insurance and see how great that treatment is. I know people in the health care business and they have seen first hand the pitiful care given to these people without insurance and they are all for the government stepping in and fixing this problem.

OOgie	Posted 13:7, 01/14/2009
So our resident liberals on this forum are in favor of poorer health care for all in the hope that some might get free health care? Medicaid already serves the poorest-for free! This new bureaucracy will give them poorer health care than at present. Brilliant!

commonsense	Posted 13:40, 01/14/2009
OOgie, try and spin it and distort the facts all you want. Like I have said before a good conservative never let a silly little thing like facts get in their way. You have already proven that you hate every one who is not like you, no need to continue.

Stokes	Posted 14:45, 01/14/2009
Health care is not about insurance. Try taking an elderly person to the hospital that has medicare and a good supplement. They are treated like a piece of $#!+. Many doctors currently WILL NOT TREAT PEOPLE THAT HAVE MEDICARE. So don't talk to me about how wonderful government insurance is. All doctors hate medicare. Just in case you don't know, that is the GOVERNMENT INSURANCE!!!!

Stokes	Posted 14:45, 01/14/2009
Grams, you are so right!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FED UP	Posted 15:33, 01/14/2009
Oogie, Grams, Stokes........Rush would be soooo proud.

commonsense

Posted 15:48, 01/14/2009

Stokes, If you think health care is not about insurance you should get out more. The reason doctors don't like medicare is because when they agree to accept medicare they also agree to the caps that medicare says they can charge. If the doctor refuses to accept medicare then it is because of his greed and not because the insurance is bad. I would think greed is something conservatives understand and would get behind. Stokes if you don't start supporting greed a little more they might boot you out of the republican club.

OOgie	Posted 15:49, 01/14/2009
Ok, you brilliant liberals, do a little research. Look at the insurance company executives making $125 million per year. And the ambulance chasing lawyers (can you say John Edwards?) such as Joseph Jamail. Now find a physician that approaches those numbers. Right, we need insurance for all the children. It is such a bargain.

commonsense	Posted 15:59, 01/14/2009
OOgie, That is what needs to be fixed. Take the greed out of it. Make doctors practice medicine for the right reason, not to see how rich they can get. I know looking at something other than how much profit is in it must be a foriegn concept to you. I mean it isn't like conservatives don't take pleasure in sitting on their pile of money and watching the poor folks suffer.

OOgie	Posted 17:8, 01/14/2009
Notice please that the-empty headed liberals here do not post any facts or statistics, no links to factual information. They just reflexively discount any information that does not fit their preconceived baseless ideas.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 17:28, 01/14/2009

"Make doctors practice medicine for the right reason, not to see how rich they can get."

What in the world? Are suggesting earnings caps or what? That is what you really want. People working on you who couldn't get paid top dollar somewhere else. Yesterday I was eating at a place in Winston with the wife. I saw one of those boxes where you fill out a card and drop it in a box to win something (like those gym membership boxes). You entered to win free lasik eye surgery! I told her that was a sure sign that I would never use that doctor. He has to give surgeries away to advertise. He must not be top notch. That is the kind of doctors that will be left if you "Make doctors practice medicine for the right reason".

OOgie	Posted 17:35, 01/14/2009
"Make doctors practice medicine for the right reason, not to see how rich they can get." So we should impose the same on lawyers, accountants, garbage collectors, auto mechanics?

commonsense

Posted 17:45, 01/14/2009

OOgie and fiesta, I am sorry, I forgot how much a conservative loves money and hate to see anyone attack greed. You guys think "the right reason" to become a doctor is money only. I say the right reason is because you have compassion in your heart for your fellow man and want to devote yourself to helping them and possibly make a difference. I know words like compassion and helping someone in need are foriegn to conservatives, so if you don't understand what I'm talking about please excuse me.

OOgie

Posted 20:47, 01/14/2009

Let's see now if we have this straight. Go to school after high school for another 8 to 12 years. Live on starvation income, if any income, for that time. Accumulate huge student loans which must be repaid when real earnings start. So the investment of time and money deserve no reward. Any farmers in the audience who think this would be good policy? And who would lend money to students with no future earnings potential?

fiesta pantalones	Posted 21:34, 01/14/2009
commonsense - That has got to be one of the dumbest things I have ever heard. Who do you think you are to decide what "the right reason" is for anyone else? I thought Libs like to say that it is Conservatives who impose their will on others. From each by their means, right commonsense?

commonsense	Posted 21:40, 01/14/2009
fiesta, What a hate consumed unhappy person you are.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 21:53, 01/14/2009
no - I am so happy I have to sit on my hands to keep from waving. What is your problem?

fiesta pantalones	Posted 21:54, 01/14/2009
no - I am so happy I have to sit on my hands to keep from waving. What is your problem?

commonsense	Posted 22:1, 01/14/2009
fiesta, I don't have any problem. It is people like you and OOgie that get on here and toss nothing but hatred for the less fortunate around. So no you are not a very happy person. No one can be that consumed by hatred and have any happy thoughts at all.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 22:20, 01/14/2009
commonsense - Sorry, I didn't know that you were less fortunate.

BAFEM	Posted 22:21, 01/14/2009
"Make doctors practice medicine for the right reason" That's like trying to convince someone to VOTE for the right reason.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 22:33, 01/14/2009

commonsense - Oh yeah, while you are on your high horse looking down, I am out of a job right now. I have lost 3 jobs in the last 8 years. If I had your outlook, I would be crying about the evils of Bush. Instead I turned two of those unemployments into better positions. I am in the process of turning the last job loss into a better opportunity. I just lost it last Monday so I am still working on it.

Right now I am so happy I have to sit on my hands to keep from waving. Why are you so miserable?

commonsense	Posted 22:40, 01/14/2009
fiesta, I never claimed poverty, just that unlike you and OOgie I don't have this deep hatred for those that are living in poverty. And please don't insult us by denying this. You have made it clear you feel they should just suffer if they get sick.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 22:48, 01/14/2009
You are making a complete fool of yourself.

Stokes	Posted 22:54, 01/14/2009
Commonsens: READ THIS VERY CAREFULLY AND VERY SLOWLY - THE POINT WAS ALL DOCTORS HATE MEDICARE WHICH IS GOVERNMENT INSURANCE. YOU WANT UNIVERSAL GOVERNMENT INSURNACE SO ALL DOCTORS WILL WANT TO CHOOSE ANOTHER PROFESSION IF THEY HAVE TO WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT. JUST A GREAT IDEA ON YOUR PART!!!!!

Nature 7

Posted 4:46, 01/15/2009

oogie..I think 'common' skipped over the fact you posted about the poor having medicaid.
Amazing how many people want big government to be the solution when big government IS the problem. I don't know if it is stupidity or denial or laziness... I do know that the difference between ignorance and denial is that ignorance responds to information. 'common' and 'weezie' are SO angry that all they can do is say the same ole things over and over, and at the end they have said nothing at all. So, anyone that wishes to discuss anything with these two may as well forget it..they know NOTHING beyond shooting the messenger.

Nature 7

Posted 4:46, 01/15/2009

Nature 7	Posted 5:24, 01/15/2009
(^^^sorry to hit it twice)

michelekibbler	Posted 8:28, 01/15/2009
Nature, that explains why they like Obama, they have something in common. They talk and talk, but really don't say anything. There is a website, I will have to find it again and post the link, and they had a bunch of recent mug shots. The one thing all of them had in common was they were all wearing some sort of Obama attire. It was too funny.

weezie	Posted 11:3, 01/15/2009
fiesta pantalones, why did you have 3 jobs in the last eight years? Could it be the employee is at fault or maybe just lazy? Where do you get your insurance from now?

weezie	Posted 11:8, 01/15/2009
OOgie, as I see it the liberals are working to support the wealthy like yourself and fiesta. That way you can spent your time looking for things that other have said and then you post them!

commonsense	Posted 11:8, 01/15/2009
OOgie. Nature 7, michelekibbler (aka the three stooges), I got a great idea. You guys should form your own little gang. You could then go around in the night and bash the poor, and minorities. Since you guys seem to hate them so much I bet you would really like that.

OOgie	Posted 12:14, 01/15/2009
There is no evidence that we hate the poor. We do want them to have all the possible opportunities to improve their financial situation. Conservatives see that responsibility as being with the individual. Liberals see it as function of government. But it is very clear that "commonsense" hates the successful.

FED UP	Posted 12:40, 01/15/2009
OOgie....which side would you have been on when the G I Bill was passed in 1944? Or the Social Security Act or Medicare? Republicans fought all these programs tooth and nail, and still do. The evil liberals are to thank for enacting them. The republican philosophy is "If the rich don't need them, we don't want them." Would you have been against them like you are against unviversal health care?

commonsense	Posted 17:36, 01/15/2009
Yes he would because him and his rich buddies on here don't need it.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 17:59, 01/15/2009

Weezie - 1 time I would take the blame. The other 2 were part of large lay offs. I will pay for my insurance as long as I can. That is the right thing to do.

I will make things better for me and my family because that is the right thing to do too. I will not sit back and look to the government for a living or blame Bush. That is the unproductive, liberal way to handle adversity. That isn't my way.

Thanks for your concern. It warms my heart.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 18:4, 01/15/2009

Fed Up - As MLK day rolls around and as we look at the first minority to hold the office of President, keep one thing in mind. Remember who got the civil rights bills through so that we can see this history taking place.

Democrats fought all those programs tooth and nail, and still do. The evil Republicans are to thank for enacting them.

Weezie - Please tell Wachovia how rich I am too. I am sure it will come as news to them too.

FED UP	Posted 18:19, 01/15/2009
fiesta.........I'll admit the repubs did get behind the civil rights bills. Back in the day when the south was democratic. Lyndon Johnson said, when he signed it into law,"Well, there goes the South." And he was right. Southern democrats fought it. And were wrong. How about you? Do you admit the repubs fought with all their might the G. I. Bill, Social Security and Medicare. And were wrong?

Grams

Posted 19:20, 01/15/2009

This post by Stokes says it all when it comes to GOVERNMENT INSURANCE!!!!!!!

Stokes Posted 22:54, 01/14/2009
Commonsens: READ THIS VERY CAREFULLY AND VERY SLOWLY - THE POINT WAS ALL DOCTORS HATE MEDICARE WHICH IS GOVERNMENT INSURANCE. YOU WANT UNIVERSAL GOVERNMENT INSURNACE SO ALL DOCTORS WILL WANT TO CHOOSE ANOTHER PROFESSION IF THEY HAVE TO WORK FOR THE GOVERNMENT. JUST A GREAT IDEA ON YOUR PART!!!!!

The topic of this thread is health insurance not the people posting.

michelekibbler

Posted 19:46, 01/15/2009

That just shows your ignorance common. Just because I don't agree with you on Obama you try to say I don't care about the poor. Well for your info, I go to WS and give the children free classes once a week, and yes they are black. I give poor kids free classes at my studio as well, and at daycares. I will help anyone that works hard, but I do not have any respect for people that pop babies out left & right to up their welfare check. My parents belong to a poor black church in WS, and those people work hard but are having a tough time making ends meet, yet they do all they can for the community around them. I admire people like that, and will do all I can to help them. You are so full of hatred, you don't know what you are talking about half of the time. Calm down, get rid of the hatred, it will eat you up and make you a bitter person, if it hasn't already.

commonsense	Posted 23:54, 01/15/2009
Michelekibbler, I'm sorry I thought you were conservative the way you were posting. I see now that you do care about people and it isn't all about money like with the conservatives. Well sorry for the insult in assuming you were conservative.

Nature 7

Posted 1:22, 01/16/2009

common, michelekibbler is so right. You just group everyone into a package and spew hate. You have ASSUMED so much about me, and others, instead of looking at yourself. You have no idea of my deeds from this website. You show me where I have EVER said that I hate the poor. Actually, you and 2cent spew out hate all over this site, and constantly attack anyone that beleives differently.
How do you know that michele is not a conservative? You think she is not because she helps her fellow man? That is such a narrow, blinded way of thinking...

Grams

Posted 8:45, 01/16/2009

Michele and Nature, I am with you.

If you speak a conservative sentence on A WEBSITE FOR CONSERVATIVE DISCUSSION, you are the enemy. I am a conservative and proud of it. I am also a republican and will not change. My party has strayed from its original founding principles but I have not changed and the liberal democrat principals will certainly not ever be mine. As I said on another thread, I help the animals, children, and the elderly that are in need. I am with you Michele about the baby poppers.

Again I say, the incoming new VP and Prez are very rich and are very poor examples of helping the less fortunate. Look at the tax return charitable amounts. The two of them together gave less than Sarah Palin and her income was not 1/3 of theirs. In a good year, I give more than the 2 of them and when I was a young person, no contest!!

OOgie	Posted 9:19, 01/16/2009
It is better that nocommonsenseatall try to get rid of all the internal hostility at this forum rather than take it out on the people he/she contacts personally.

michelekibbler

Posted 10:22, 01/16/2009

Common, I am conservative, but I do care about living things. I am a member of PETA, although I don't agree with the way they approach issues, they only do that do get media attention and money to help the animals. I am with Grams, I love the elderly and children too. I am not rich, in fact, we are struggling a little right now, but we have our health and everything we need. I saw a man on WXII not too long ago that was homeless because he lost his job and his wife died, he was only 44 but looked like he was much older. We could all do better to help those in need, but it isn't the government's job, because quite frankly, they aren't capable of handling it. Repubs, get a bad wrap because most of the ones in office are rich, but so are the dems. They won't spend their own money, they want ours. It seems in today's time, elections are bought, not won, and that needs to change. Univeral Health Care would be a huge mistake. We would lose all of our good doctors, and our health care would go down the tubes. The silly lawsuits and Insurance co. are the reason for the outrageous cost for health care.

walks the talk

Posted 23:53, 01/16/2009

The House passed a renewal of the State Children's Health Insurance Program
(SCHIP) by a vote of 289-139. The measure provides $32 billion to renew and
expand the program. (Really, when did a federal program ever get smaller?)
Democrats loosened a rule imposed by Republicans in 2006 that required all
applicants for Medicaid to prove their citizenship. President Bush twice
vetoed
the bill, but its chances of passage in the Senate are high and Barack
Obama is
expected to sign it.

Sure, this nation has so much money just for the taking, so let ALL the illegals be insured, too. If those of you that feel the (legal) poor need help here in the US, you should really be upset about this, right?

OOgie

Posted 19:49, 02/15/2009

Prescription for medical malpractice By Wesley Pruden : Nasty surprises are always nasty. We can expect to see a lot of them as the details of Barack Obama's Big Bopper Bailout unfold over the next several months. Joe Biden reckons the chances of the bailout working, despite the hype and hysteria, to be no better than 30 percent "even if we do everything right, if we do it with absolute certainty."
We've already had a few nasty surprises, enlivening the front pages from the moment President Obama took the oath. Sen. Judd Gregg's deciding that he doesn't have the stomach to be the secretary of Commerce is only the latest of the misfires. But the nastiest surprises are not likely to be the failure of the bailout legislation to work, but the way some of it will work only too well. The surprises won't be the Bridges to Nowhere, but the bridges to places no one wants to go.
Nastiest of all will be the health care catastrophe hidden in the thousands of pages of this legislation, the work of Tom Daschle, who was almost secretary of Health and Human Services before he was sent back to K Street to work on his tax returns.
The health rules set out in the bailout legislation will, as the bill boasts, affect "every individual in the United States." There will be no escaping the consequences of turning life-and-death health care decisions over to officious bureaucrats. (Members of Congress will get their usual special privileges.) If you think dealing with insurances companies is as awful as it can get, you'll be surprised.
A vast bureaucracy called the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, soon to be vaster, will carefully monitor what your doctor prescribes for you, not to protect and restore your health, but to make sure your doctor does what the government deems "appropriate" and "cost-effective."
These provisions are identical to the prescriptions set out by Mr. Daschle last year in his book about what to do about "the health care crisis." Doctors, he wrote, have to forgo their own judgment and "learn to operate less like solo practitioners." Deference will not be required to, say, distinguished professors from the Harvard Medical School, but to narrow-minded little men armed not with learning but with a lot of attitude, trained not in the medical arts and sciences but in government paperwork.
"Hospitals and doctors that are not 'meaningful users' of the new system will face penalties," Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor New York who is an analyst of health care issues at Hudson Institute, writes for Bloomberg News. " 'Meaningful' user isn't defined in the bill. That will be left to the HHS secretary, who will be empowered to impose 'more stringent measures of meaningful use over time.' "
How doctors will be penalized for putting the health of their parents above all else is not specifically set out in the bailout bill. But Mr. Daschle offers a hint or two in his book, language borrowed by the authors of the bailout bill's health care passages. The goal is to slow up the development of new medications and treatments that are driving up costs. He praises Europeans - whose health care is rarely praised for its quality or efficiency - as being more willing to accept "hopeless diagnoses."
Americans expect miracles; Europeans are resigned to mediocrity. (Does anybody go to London or Paris for advanced surgery?) The government bureaucrats would work from a formula dividing the cost of the treatment by the number of years a codger could expect to live. The elderly are expected to understand they're supposed to get sick when they get old, and hear something like: "Here, take this aspirin and if you don't feel better tomorrow don't call me, call the undertaker."
He cites as an example of what to expect from the decree of a British health board, which told elderly patients with macular degeneration that they must wait until they go blind in one eye before they could get expensive drugs to prevent losing sight in the other. Only after years of angry protests was the grotesque regulation rescinded.
But where are the angry protests here from Congress, or from the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), which worked to elect Barack Obama. Where is the coverage from our robust mainstream media? Where is the follow-up to Miss McCaughey's revealing account in Bloomberg?
President Obama and his partisan allies in Congress are determined to get this bailout legislation to his desk for a signature before all its gory details are discovered. He calls it "inexcusable and irresponsible" to delay. Why the rush? He remembers what happened to Hillary Rodham Clinton's health care plan, and he's determined that this one gets no scrutiny, or, as Mr. Daschle warns, is "stalled by Senate protocol."
The nasty surprise is saved for later.

OOgie

Posted 18:26, 02/23/2009

Guilt Complex (and the Stimulus Package)
By Tom Purcell I feel guilty about it, if you want to know the truth.
Maybe I better explain.
One of the provisions slipped into the pork-packed "stimulus" package authorizes billions for digitizing medical records. It also establishes a National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.
According to Betsy McCaughey, the former lieutenant governor of New York, that's not a good idea. She explains, at Bloomberg.com, that the national coordinator will monitor everyone's medical treatment to make sure doctors are "doing what the federal government deems appropriate and cost effective."
In other words, the government will be able to begin "guiding" doctors' decisions � it will be able to dissuade costly treatments, say, for older folks who the government figures may croak soon anyhow.
That's why I feel guilty.
I write for a living, you see. Writing is hard. Because I am unable to concentrate at home, I go to a coffee shop or diner every morning. One of my favorite spots is Panera Bread.
But most mornings, I encounter a problem: retirees.
There are dozens of them at Panera Bread. They are in their 60s, 70s and 80s � one woman is 93. They are healthy and cheerful. They talk loudly and laugh boisterously.
Who can blame them for being so upbeat? They are a reflection of an incredibly successful civilization that, our current recession aside, produced unimaginable wealth � and unimaginable advances in health care.
Some of the retirees have new hips and knees, no doubt. Their tickers, successfully bypassed and rerouted, are beating as good as new. They've likely outlived a number of maladies that might have been their end if not for the amazing drugs and medical innovations that America has produced.
But I am unable to write when the retirees are socializing at Panera Bread. One fellow has a powerful, booming voice and loves to use it. One lady has a cackle that sounds like fingernails scraping a chalkboard. Another fellow breaks out whistling for no reason at all � a loud, screeching whistle that makes concentrating impossible.
It is a touch ironic that as they enjoy their coffee and camaraderie on one side of the room, I sit on the other side working in order to fund some of their good fortune � to fund Medicare and Social Security.
It isn't their fault that Social Security is a giant Ponzi scheme � that they are drawing out way more than they paid in and that I'm surely paying in way more than I'll ever draw out.
It also struck me as ironic that the more they talk and cackle and whistle, the less work I am able to get done. The less I produce, the less I am able to bill. The less I am able to bill, the less taxes I am able to pay to fund the Medicare and Social Security that contributes to their cheerfulness.
But nothing is more ironic than this: Some of my retiree friends likely voted for the politicians � the Democrats � who have promised to give them the most stuff.
Surely, the retirees had no idea that Democrats would slip a provision by them through which the government would begin monitoring � and eventually denying � costly medical treatments to older folks just like them.
After all, says liberal Democrat Tom Daschle, who authored the idea, America's elderly need to become more like Europeans � more willing to accept their fates and "forgo experimental treatments."
In other words, it's just a matter of time before some nameless, faceless bureaucrat � not an elderly patient's doctor � decides which treatment is "cost-effective" based on the patient's age.
It pains me to bring up the most ironic point of all, but there is no escaping it: This could be the only time in my life that the decisions made by a heartless government bureaucrat might unwittingly benefit me.
It has occurred to me that as there are fewer retirees talking, cackling and whistling at Panera Bread � as the government denies them treatment � I'll finally be able to get some work done.
Such are the callous, thoughtless, perverse musings that only the government can encourage.
At least I feel guilty about it.

OOgie	Posted 12:29, 03/02/2009
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/03/michelle_obamas_patientdumping_1.html

Grams	Posted 19:21, 03/03/2009
My Canadian friend told me this week that all of Canada is terrified that we will end up with nationalization of our healthcare system because everyone that can afford to comes here for their surgeries and will no longer be able to get any better medical care here than they have in Canada.

OOgie	Posted 12:20, 03/05/2009
Sweden's government health care By Walter Williams Government health care advocates used to sing the praises of Britain's National Health Service (NHS). That's until its poor delivery of health care services became known. A recent study by David Green and Laura Casper, "Delay, Denial and Dilution," written for the London-based Institute of Economic Aff

commonsense	Posted 10:16, 04/28/2009
OOgie, You are being very misleading with the post on British healthcare. The waiting is not due to the system but because of a lack of doctors. You wouldn't have that here because we have more doctors than any other country. You have to also consider that anything the British can do we can do twice as well.

commonsense	Posted 12:1, 04/28/2009
Grams, Why do you say that is the reason they don't have as many doctors? Where did you get that information from? No other country has the number of attornies we have either, I guess you feel this is due to thier legal system.

commonsense	Posted 12:55, 04/28/2009
Ms Conservative, I'm glad somebody gets it. The reason the so called doctors keep telling Americans that we don't want this, is plain old greed. The money means more to them than practicing medicine. Is this really the kind of person you want for a doctor? Money before peoples health. I know we don't agree much, but I think you are exactly right on this one.

Ms Conservative

Posted 23:23, 04/28/2009

If we do what Britain or Canada has done, we will be in the same shape they are. Do I want this kind of person to be my doctor, you bet your sweet @$$ I do if he/she is the best in the business and the best in the business are going to be where the money is if that is the US, or France, or Japan, or Germany and I want it to be the US. I am not wealthy and I don't have a 6 figure income. My health insurance is very very expensive and I have to make sacrifices to have it but when my family or I needs a doctor or a hospital, I can get one. With national health insurance that won't be the case. Perfect example - the government's medicare - many doctors will not take a new patient that has medicare and some discharge any patient that reaches medicare eligibility. That is what government insurance does to the citizens. Be careful what you wish for. As for me, you can have my government coverage and I will take my private coverage with all the sacrifices to keep it.

commonsense

Posted 10:36, 04/30/2009

Ms conservative, That is the typical conservative attitude, you have health coverage so to hell with everybody else. The doctors you say that are dropping patients because of medicare are an example of the greed first I was speaking of. You blame medicare for something the so called doctor did. I have one question for you. If you are not wealthy and making six figures, why do you vote republican? That is cutting your own throat to vote republican and are not wealthy. I just don't get it.

walks the talk	Posted 2:14, 05/01/2009
common says... "I just don't get it." Exactly.

commonsense

Posted 12:21, 05/01/2009

Grams, the reason yadkin votes republican more than anybody else is because you don't think before you vote, I'll bet you think gay marriage and abortion are reasons to vote for or against someone. When the rest of the country with the exception of little yadkin county toss the republicans out, you don't consider yadkin to be behind. The part about republicans only serving the rich is not a myth, that's as true as anything has ever been, why don't you look at how the republican's vote in congress and you will see who they only look after the rich. They get people like you on board by hollering about abortion, and you buy into it. Then they do nothing about abortion other than to bring it up at the next election. They use this tactic because weak minded people will think of nothing else and then the republicans can run their real agenda which is everthing for the rich and not even crumbs for the middle class and poor.

Grams

Posted 13:21, 05/01/2009

show me where I used the abortion issue or gay marriage in my above post. there you go again, distorting a post. You have a serious mental problem or you cannot read.

I see you coveniently ignored Ms C's comments about her irresponsible sibling and his habits. By saying some of Ms C's family is ok tells me you are just like her sorry ass brother which means you condone taking from one who is responsible and conservative and giving to another that is irresponsible and sorry. I am certainly not surprised that anyone on the receiving end would support this concept.

Well guess what, get your freebies from someone other than me. I will give to my friends and neighbors when they need help, but just like Ms C, if you are irresponsible with your money that you earn, forget it!! AND I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU THINK OF ME. HAVE AT IT. What my friends, family, business associates, and neighbors think of me are what's important.

Stokes	Posted 22:9, 05/01/2009
fedup, why are you posting under the user name commonsense? Either way, you are clueless.

hmm..	Posted 23:47, 05/01/2009
common, sometimes I get tired and lazy and just prefer to state things in ways that touch you in a special place, so here I go: common, you are a f---ing dipshit!....

hmm..	Posted 0:24, 05/02/2009
Touched you again....

Ms Conservative

Posted 9:30, 05/02/2009

common posted to Grams:
As far as you wanting me to respond about ms. cons brother, would you want an outsider in a problem within your family. I don't want it and will not try and do it to her family.
common posted to me:
Ms. Conservative, I'm glad to hear that at least some of your family turned out okay. Now if they can get the rest of you to leave the dark side and come on over to democrat, your family should be okay.

There you go common, making contradictory statements about the exact same thing, my family. I don't know what the medical term is but you definitely have a problem of reading, understanding, and remembering. To just assume another person votes republican based on "YOUR" beliefs??? What kind of person does that? Oh I know - a liberal. Then you want to pretend that you have some kind of honor and wouldn't want to get in the middle of my family? Give me a friggin break.

Grams, I hear ya!!!! I'm with ya!!! Keep in mind, I do not have one tenth of the material things my brother has because I have saved my money yet he will say to me well, if I had your money...... and when he can't make a damm payment I don't need to tell you whom he asks but I have quit. I don't give a crap if he loses all those "THINGS". He thinks the most expensive clothes, cars, and houses creates this image that he is doing great and that puts him above his lowly relatives. Course all the democrats in my family feel that way, he is just the worst. The real deal is his lowly relatives don't give a $#!+ about things, we care about family, friends, neighbors, love, honesty, and compassion.

OOgie	Posted 17:57, 05/04/2009
Play the video, as many times as necessary. Listen carefully to what she says. She wants to kill private health care insurance and private health care. http://redclaycitizen.typepad.com/redclay/2009/05/does-the-left-believe-in-private-healthcare.html

walks the talk

Posted 2:21, 06/20/2009

ABC News is lending itself to the Obama administration for the night of
Wednesday, June 24, for a live broadcast of ABC World News Tonight from the Blue
Room of the White House. This will be followed by an hour-long primetime special
entitled "Prescription for America," which will advocate the Obama health care
plan. The Republican National Committee noted that with the absence of opposing
views, the programming amounts to little more than a campaign commercial -- one
that should rightly be paid for by the Democratic National Committee.

ABC predictably took offense and claimed that it will have complete editorial
control over the content of the program. Or at least as much control as the
White House wants them to have. As columnist Cal Thomas observes, "By the way,
guess who's the new director of communications for the White House Office of
Health Reform. It's former ABC News correspondent Linda Douglass, who left
journalism last year to join the Obama campaign." How convenient.

The network claims it will have "thoughtful" and "diverse" perspectives on the
plan, but one noteworthy absence is "20/20" anchor John Stossel, who will not be
participating. A pity, too, for if anyone at ABC has the requisite "thoughtful"
and "diverse" perspective, it's Stossel. (See his 2007 health care report for
more.)

Obama's reason for taking to the airwaves is that his proposal is facing stiffer
opposition than anticipated. First, his estimate of $634 billion over 10 years
is wildly optimistic. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the plan
will cost $1.6 trillion over 10 years and "result in a net increase in the
federal budget deficits of about $1 trillion," despite Obama's reassurance that
his reform (read: takeover) "will not add to our deficit over the next 10
years." Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) promised to cut $600
billion from the proposal and to pay for it with tax increases, spending cuts
and other offsets. House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-NY)
said the plan includes $600 billion in tax hikes and $400 billion in cuts to
Medicare and Medicaid.
patriotpost

Looney America-hating muslim dictator dummy thug scum obamessiah.

OOgie	Posted 16:57, 06/20/2009
Don't fail to read the post above. But watch this video also. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRdLpem-AAs

Walks the Talk

Posted 3:6, 06/25/2009

"The president claims that we must pass a government-run health insurance
program -- possibly the most wide-ranging and intricate government undertaking
in decades -- yesterday or a 'ticking time bomb' will explode. If all this
terrifying talk sounds familiar, it might be because the president applies the
same fear-infused vocabulary to nearly all his hard-to-defend policy positions.
You'll remember the stimulus plan had to be passed without a second's delay or
we would see 8.7 percent unemployment. We're almost at 10."
patriotpost

FED UP	Posted 8:22, 06/25/2009
OOgie, I'll be darned if your last post doesn't sound exactly like the last administration. Thanks for the perfect definition of republican political strategy.

FED UP	Posted 13:36, 06/25/2009
For once, I have to agree with Yakkin' county republicans, Fox News, and Rush Limbaugh....YA'LL DON'T DESERVE HEALTH CARE!!!

FED UP	Posted 14:58, 06/25/2009
Down..I'm just saying ya'll don't want it, all the repub powers that be say they don't want you to have it. All you have to do is, when and if it's passed, is refuse it. No problem. But, have you ever noticed, the people who say you can't have it already have it?

FED UP	Posted 16:39, 06/25/2009
You agree with Rush? I'm shocked, SHOCKED, I tell you. Gee, I wonder if Rush has health insurance?

walks the talk	Posted 3:14, 06/26/2009
snoopy..Bet you are not surprised by that. obamessiah said that private schools don't work..and yet, his kids are in private schools. He is such a liar and hypocrite.

FED UP

Posted 6:57, 06/26/2009

duke...I don't have to ask Rush anything. I already know the answer......of he course he has health insurance. Hel l, he makes 50 million a year telling people who make 20 thousand THEY can't have it!!!
Like all republican leaders and talk show hosts,he's a shill for big business, including insurance and pharma companies.
The status quo in the health industry is good for those businesses. The same for convincing their followers that global warming is a hoax. Consumption of hydrocarbons is good for oil companies.
Rush, Hannity and the rest of 'em get paid big bucks to propagandize their interests.
duke, you don't think these guys really believe the BS they spew over the airways, do you? Of course they don't. But, they don't have to. They know YOU will.

FED UP	Posted 7:53, 06/26/2009
I watch 'em all, Nature, ABC, CBS,CNN, MSNBC, Headline, even Fox, websites, including Free Republic, Red State, and other right wingers. I even listen to Rush and Hannity on the radio. You know what they say about keeping your enemies closer than your friends.

Stokes

Posted 12:40, 06/26/2009

Amen, SBD. You are so right. Medicare right now is a damn joke and that is government run and operated. Health insurance by the government for those under 65 will be no better or maybe worse. It will "dumb down if you will" all the private health care we now have. My wife and my health insurance is very expensive but we do without things and glad to do so to have good health care. Obama can put his health care program up the part he sits on as far as I am concerned.

FU, you are such a joke. You know that your posts are just to inflame everyone. They mean absolutely nothing. Now since you hate all republicans, find me, come after me, I'll be waiting.

OOgie	Posted 21:59, 06/26/2009
No health insurance? The numbers of such people are much lower than the Feds claim. And some of the reasons are surprising. http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/elder061809.php3

michelekibbler	Posted 18:22, 06/27/2009
Grams, you are absolutely correct. I know when I was young, and only responsible for myself, I opted not to get health insurance. That was my choice at the time because I wanted to spend my money elsewhere. Now that I am older and have kids, we have health insurance. We shouldn't have to pay for people that choose not to have health insurance.

Stokes	Posted 23:1, 06/28/2009
but who is going to pay for it?

FED UP	Posted 18:57, 07/02/2009
How many of you sheep have health insurance, and are happy with it? Be honest.

LeRoy B.

Posted 22:10, 07/02/2009

No govt. can operate a hospital. Look at the VA. Govt. owned and operated. No new equipment, Just old DR's hanging around till they can retire.
They now charge me $50.00 to see a specialist. Tricare for life for us retirees is going to change if obama gets his way we will have to pay over $2,000 bucks a year , Just because we didn't get our limbs blown off in the war. (NO pun intended) So I hope you have a smile on your face if you voted for that BUBBA!!!!!!

FED UP

Posted 6:56, 07/03/2009

Snoopy...I see there is no point in answering your questions.
When you asked me if I do "something else with my sheep", I repied, TWICE. Both were deleted by the moderator.
I said nothing vulgar, called no one names and told no lies. I merely posted a link to a Georgia republican, Neal Horsley, who is now running for governor. Mr. Horsley (who couldnt have been named better) admitted on a radio talk show that his first girl friend was a MULE.
So, people like yourself, walks, LeRoy, Stokes, Grams and others can call the president of the United States a monkey, his wife a gorilla, a muslim, post links that twist facts into lies,and accuse anyone who doesn't agree with your narrowmindedness of anything you want.
But, when I call you on your self righteous bull****, I get deleted by your protector.
But, I understand, thats the way it is. Life in Yakkin' county...must be miserable.

LeRoy B.	Posted 9:54, 07/03/2009
Fed Up: The sad part of having a girl friend Like the one you spoke about,(MULE,COW) is when you have to get off that stump and go up front and Kiss that face.hahah!!!

michelekibbler	Posted 11:23, 07/03/2009
If the health care system in our country is so bad, why do people from other countries come here for treatment?

OOgie	Posted 12:15, 07/06/2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xbqxyrprBsQ

scuttlebutt	Posted 9:18, 07/17/2009
Call Senator Kay Hagan and tell her you don't want Obama care, and to vote NO on health care. Her number in Washington is 1-202-224-3121. Ignore her rude receptionist.

OOgie

Posted 20:5, 07/21/2009

None of the people who are trying to rush government-run medical care through Congress before we have time to think about it are pointing to Medicare, Medicaid or veterans' hospitals as shining examples of how wonderful we can expect government medical care to be when it becomes "universal."
As for those uninsured Americans we keep hearing about, there is remarkably little interest in why they don't have insurance. It cannot be poverty, for the poor can automatically get Medicaid.

hmm..

Posted 9:13, 07/22/2009

TOP TEN INDICATORS THAT YOUR EMPLOYER HAS CHANGED TO OBAMA'S HEALTH CARE PLAN:

10) Your annual breast exam is done at Hooters.

9) Directions to your doctor's office include "Take a left when you enter the trailer park."

8) The tongue depressors taste faintly of Fungicides.

7) The only proctologist in the plan is "Gus" from Roto-Rooter.

6) The only item listed under Preventative Care Coverage is "an apple a day."

5) Your primary care physician is wearing the pants you gave to Goodwill last month.

4) "The patient is responsible for 200% of out-of-network charges," is not a typographical error.

3) The only expense covered 100% is "embalming."

2) Your Prozac comes in different colors with little M's on them.

AND THE NUMBER ONE SIGN YOU'VE JOINED OBAMA'S HEALTH CARE PLAN:

1) You ask for Viagra, and they give you a Popsicle stick and duct tape....

FED UP	Posted 18:28, 07/22/2009
Here's a question for all you people who still have enough of a brain left to think (just a little) for yourselves. Q. Who is paying the bill for fighting health care reform? Anyone have a clue?

FED UP	Posted 19:42, 07/22/2009
Do you, hmm..?

FED UP	Posted 8:21, 07/23/2009
So, LeRoy, does that mean you don't know who is paying for the fight against health care?

hambone	Posted 9:28, 07/23/2009
The american tax payer is paying for the reform. I knew you didn't have a clue, since you were making such a big deal of the question.

crap	Posted 10:50, 07/23/2009
I am glad we are paying to fight it because it is going to cost alot more forever to keep it up.There is no way that it wont efect the defecit that was a lie....

crap	Posted 11:2, 07/23/2009
"We" is us the tax payers.We pay for everything.If the health care is so great tell all politicians to get it and drop there fantastic insurance policy that "we" are paying for.

crap	Posted 16:4, 07/23/2009
WHO?

nasty	Posted 20:24, 07/23/2009
The answer hambone gave is still correct. It doesn't matter which side of the isle you are on, you are still paid by the taxpayers. If any federal employee even farts, it costs the taxpayers.

wizard	Posted 8:50, 07/24/2009
I bet you are going to blame Bush, as uaual

fiesta pantalones

Posted 10:23, 07/24/2009

Rushed Up - For goodness sake. We all know what you are trying to get at and what you think is such a strong point. You are wrong about it being a strong point. If the healthcare industry professionals (medical providers) are fighting it, then it should be a good sign that it is bad for the industry. Obviously those people know how to run their businesses better than you, Obama, and the others trying to take it over. Maybe they just want to keep the best healthcare system in the world the best healthcare system in the world.

My Mom is an administrator at a hospital. She even mentioned it when Hillary took the first wacko attempt at taking over one of the largest segments of our economy. She pointed out that she works with government healthcare plans (medicare, medicaid, etc.) and the notion of the government taking over the whole system scared the Hell out of her. They couldn't even run the small scale plans they already had in place.

Keep trying Rushed Up. You wingers (right and left) never hit the mark quite right.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 11:47, 07/24/2009
Sorry Rushed Up, but I am a true libertarian. Keep trying. You wingers never stop.

hambone	Posted 12:52, 07/24/2009
fu just because no one agrees with you doesn't make us thick headed, it just makes you look like you do not know what you are talking about.

Country Bumpkin	Posted 21:1, 07/24/2009
F-UP Just look at the VA Hospitals, see how bad they are operated! Just think any time the Govt. gets their hands on it and Rules passed just look how screwed up it will be . Just like you ...ALL SCREWED UP !!

Walks the Talk

Posted 2:13, 07/26/2009

michelek, so true.
The actress Natasha Richardson died after falling skiing in Canada. It took eight hours to drive her to a hospital. If Canada had our healthcare she might be alive today. In the United States, we have medical evacuation helicopters that would have gotten her to the hospital in 30 minutes.

In England anyone over 59 cannot receive heart repairs or stents or bypass because it is not covered as being too expensive and not needed.

Obama wants to have a healthcare system just like Canada 's and England 's.

Most of you know by now that the Senate version (at least) of the "stimulus" Bill includes provisions for extensive rationing of health care for senior citizens. The author of this part of the bill, former senator and tax evader, Tom Daschle was credited today by Bloomberg with the following statement:
Daschle says "health-care reform will not be pain free. Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them."
If this does not sufficiently raise your ire, just remember that our esteemed Senators and Congressmen have their own healthcare plan that is first dollar or very low co-pay which they are guaranteed the remainder of their lives and are not subject to this new law if it passes.

OOgie	Posted 10:35, 07/26/2009
Some of the younger generation who do not have INSURANCE through their employers choose not to buy for themselves. The premiums are not deductible. Yes, they could afford the $105 per month for Blue/Cross individual coverage. I chose not to have health insurance for several years. My employer offered a good insurance plan, but the entire premium was payroll deduction, no employer contribution.

michelekibbler	Posted 11:19, 07/26/2009
My dad was in his late 50s when he had cancer, and in his mid 60s when he had heart trouble. He is doing great now, cancer free, and very healthy. He would be dead under Universal Healthcare. Over the age 59 is when our bodies will start having trouble. Does Obama and his regime want to rid our country of older citizens so they won't have to pay SS benefits? It sure does appear that way!!!!

Nature 7	Posted 16:54, 07/26/2009
fu, you never want to talk about the facts, do you? You always just attack the poster. Do you like what your master/lover/the one/the new messiah wants to do regarding health care? And why? Also, you can post all the positive wonderful things that your prez is doing, you know. 'shoot the messenger' is all you are about, Bill. I will admit..you make me lol.

Grams	Posted 17:9, 07/26/2009
FU, my post is self explanatory. I do not need you, or Rush, or Sean or anyone else to tell me what I need. My intellectual level allows me to do that all by myself. You can save your condescending BS for your buddies that is causing what will be catastrophic(sp) for this country. If you are lucky you might live long enough to be one of these seniors that gets euthanized!!!

FED UP

Posted 18:7, 07/26/2009

Grams, I'm already 67...I think that makes me a senior.....and I'm not worried about being euthanized. I'll leave that to the paranoid, like the majority of Yadkin county.

Stokes, the only thing it has to do with it is republicans fought and are fighting both social security and health care reform...along with medicare, medicaid, the GI Bill and every other "socialist" program that just MIGHT help someone other than the rich.

BTW, before I'm accused of wanting a hand out of free health care, I don't need it. I still work because I want to and my employer pays my health insurance completely, I also have medicare and have the VA to fall back on.
Believe it or not, I'm thinking more of you and people like you who may be less fortunate. Apparently no one in your families have ever had a catastrophic illness that cost them everything they had worked and saved for all their lives. I have a friend who was diagnosed with colon and liver cancer last Sept. Same age as me. His treatment cost $8400 every 2 weeks, plus the meds he has had to buy. Insurance picked up 80% of the treatment or $6720. He was left with paying $1680 each treatment. Add his meds and his total has been about $4000 a month. How long could you folks last at $4000 a month before you went bankrupt? Oh, I forgot, Bush's republican congress all but ended that option, although 62% of all bankruptcies since 2007 have been due to medical catastrophic illness. So, if you find yourselves or a family member in that unfortunate situation, and Obama's health care reform fails because the insurance and pharma industry killed it, along with your help, maybe you'll think about your own contribution to it's failure really hard.

FED UP

Posted 18:31, 07/26/2009

michele...do you REALLY think seniors (like me) are going to be euthanized?
I thought believing Obama is not a U.S. citizen was pretty much off the wall, but that takes the cake.
And speaking of Ted Kennedy taking a pill, your own Dick Cheney, if not on public insurance,and a private citizen, would have been dead long ago.
Cheney doesn't think you deserve health care, but Kennedy does. Who's on YOUR side, michele?

FED UP	Posted 20:28, 07/26/2009
I'm sorry I bothered you, michele....excuse my ignorance.... You've got it all right, michele...I don't know what I was thinking. Oh, BTW, if I get euthanized, check on my social security fo me, will ya? Thanks.

FED UP	Posted 21:8, 07/26/2009
Obama's plan is to just let them die, huh? God.

michelekibbler

Posted 21:50, 07/26/2009

Fed, I don't think you read my post. I said seniors won't be euthanized, but they won't be cared for either. Sure, they will be given pain pills and offered counseling, but they won't get treatment. So yes, I guess Obama's plan is to just let them die, but at leat they will have pain pills and counseling. As far as SS is concerned, most older citizens have children over the age of 18, therefore, they won't receive any benefits. Our older citizens and the elderly deserve better.

michelekibbler	Posted 22:18, 07/26/2009
Thank you Stokes. I was being sarcastic when I said euthanized earlier, however it would be a lot more humane than Obama's plan of pain pills and counseling.

OOgie	Posted 19:46, 07/28/2009
http://docs.house.gov/gopleader/House-Democrats-Health-Plan.pdf

walks the talk	Posted 4:14, 07/29/2009
^^^the above does not apply to obamessiah^^^ or his wife or kids or motherinlaw. obama sucks.

Walks the Talk	Posted 1:58, 07/30/2009
THE DEMO-GOGUES Summer reading: "What good is reading the [health care] bill if it's a thousand pages and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?" --Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) off with his head^^^^

walks the talk

Posted 2:7, 07/30/2009

What's in the bill: "We also want to start rewarding doctors for quality, not
just the quantity of care that they provide. Instead of rewarding them for how
many procedures they perform or how many tests they order, we'll bundle payments
so providers aren't paid for every treatment they offer when they chronic -- to
a patient with a chronic condition like diabetes, but instead are paid for how
are they managing that disease overall." --Barack Obama in a townhall meeting
**Exactly how is BO or any of his elite minions authorized or qualified to
decide the quality of a doctor's care?

Again, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain: "My interest is not in
getting between you and your doctor." --Barack Obama during the same bogus Town
hall meeting as the prior statement

liar,liar..thug,thug

OOgie	Posted 21:44, 07/30/2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7w4f04zrF2s

Walks the Talk

Posted 1:25, 08/01/2009

Democrats have proposed one way to raise money for the bill -- tax payroll. The
Wall Street Journal writes that the tax could reach 10 percent. So much for "no
tax increases for those making less than $250,000 a year.

Democrats have also proposed yet another creative way to raise money for the
bill -- tax soda (known simply as Coke down here in the South). The CBO
estimates that a three-cent tax on soda, including Gatorade and other sugary or
energy drinks, would generate $24 billion in the next four years, all while
fighting obesity. We have been through this before. If Congress taxes something
expecting people to stop using that something for their health, the revenue
source dries up. Brilliant.

All in all, if the public option is so good, why don't Democrats in Congress
want it to be *their* health plan? Amendments requiring them to be covered by
the plan have been defeated in both the House and Senate. One reason for the
defeat might be the example of Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA), who, if his case went
before a review board, could be denied his current level of cancer treatment.
One might say he'd be left to sink or swim.

pp

OOgie

Posted 19:46, 08/01/2009

Dennis Prager: 10 Questions for Supporters of �ObamaCare�
1. President Barack Obama repeatedly tells us that one reason national health care is needed is that we can no longer afford to pay for Medicare and Medicaid. But if Medicare and Medicaid are fiscally insolvent and gradually bankrupting our society, why is a government takeover of medical care for the rest of society a good idea? What large-scale government program has not eventually spiraled out of control, let alone stayed within its projected budget? Why should anyone believe that nationalizing health care would create the first major government program to "pay for itself," let alone get smaller rather than larger over time? Why not simply see how the Democrats can reform Medicare and Medicaid before nationalizing much of the rest of health care?
2. President Obama reiterated this past week that "no insurance company will be allowed to deny you coverage because of a pre-existing medical condition." This is an oft-repeated goal of the president's and the Democrats' health care plan. But if any individual can buy health insurance at any time, why would anyone buy health insurance while healthy? Why would I not simply wait until I got sick or injured to buy the insurance? If auto insurance were purchasable once one got into an accident, why would anyone purchase auto insurance before an accident? Will the Democrats next demand that life insurance companies sell life insurance to the terminally ill? The whole point of insurance is that the healthy buy it and thereby provide the funds to pay for the sick. Demanding that insurance companies provide insurance to everyone at any time spells the end of the concept of insurance. And if the answer is that the government will now make it illegal not to buy insurance, how will that be enforced? How will the government check on 300 million people?
3. Why do supporters of nationalized medicine so often substitute the word "care" for the word "insurance?" it is patently untrue that millions of Americans do not receive health care. Millions of Americans do not have health insurance but virtually every American (and non-American on American soil) receives health care.
4. No one denies that in order to come close to staying within its budget health care will be rationed. But what is the moral justification of having the state decide what medical care to ration?
5. According to Dr. David Gratzer, health care specialist at the Manhattan Institute, "While 20 years ago pharmaceuticals were largely developed in Europe, European price controls made drug development an American enterprise. Fifteen of the 20 top-selling drugs worldwide this year were birthed in the United States." Given how many lives -- in America and throughout the world - American pharmaceutical companies save, and given how expensive it is to develop any new drug, will the price controls on drugs envisaged in the Democrats' bill improve or impair Americans' health?
6. Do you really believe that private insurance could survive a "public option"? Or is this really a cover for the ideal of single-payer medical care? How could a private insurance company survive a "public option" given that private companies have to show a profit and government agencies do not have to - and given that a private enterprise must raise its own money to be solvent and a government option has access to others' money -- i.e., taxes?
7. Why will hospitals, doctors, and pharmaceutical companies do nearly as superb a job as they now do if their reimbursement from the government will be severely cut? Haven't the laws of human behavior and common sense been repealed here in arguing that while doctors, hospitals and drug companies will make significantly less money they will continue to provide the same level of uniquely excellent care?
8. Given how many needless procedures are ordered to avoid medical lawsuits and how much money doctors spend on medical malpractice insurance, shouldn't any meaningful "reform" of health care provide some remedy for frivolous malpractice lawsuits?
9. Given how weak the U.S. economy is, given how weak the U.S. dollar is, and given how much in debt the U.S. is in, why would anyone seek to have the U.S. spend another trillion dollars? Even if all the other questions here had legitimate answers, wouldn't the state of the U.S. economy alone argue against national health care at this time?
10. Contrary to the assertion of President Obama -- "we spend much more on health care than any other nation but aren't any healthier for it" -- we are healthier. We wait far less time for procedures and surgeries. Our life expectancy with virtually any major disease is longer. And if you do not count deaths from violent crime and automobile accidents, we also have the longest life expectancy. Do you think a government takeover of American medicine will enable this medical excellence to continue?

Walks the Talk

Posted 3:6, 08/04/2009

"You note that the socialized medicine bill is over 1,000 pages. The Declaration
of Independence is two pages, and the Constitution, including the Bill of
Rights, is about a dozen pages. Proves that if you can't dazzle them with
brilliance you baffle them with bovine manure." --Cheyenne, Wyoming

"Is health care a right? I propose that one person's rights may not create a
burden for another person. We have the right to free speech, but we may not
force someone else to listen. We have the right to worship as we choose, but we
may not compel another person to attend church with us. We have the right to
keep and bear arms, but if our neighbor chooses not to, we may not require that
he carry a firearm. A right to health care cannot exist because it requires that
someone else provide it. Another person may not infringe on my Liberty by
requiring that I provide for his needs. That was called Slavery, and has long
been abolished in America." --Framingham, Massachusetts

Amen!!
pp

walks the talk	Posted 2:55, 08/05/2009
EagleEye: Yeah, I saw that on tv the other night. How about that 'lottery' box?! "Congratulations! Your name has been drawn at random to finally see a Doctor"!

Rivers Edge	Posted 7:30, 08/05/2009
Yes, Socialism at its best, Government monthly "allowances" given to everyone, productive or not.

walks the talk

Posted 3:24, 08/06/2009

The Big Lie: "First of all, nobody is talking about some government takeover of
health care. I'm tired of hearing that. I have been as clear as I can be. Under
the reform I've proposed, if you like your doctor you keep your doctor. If you
like your health care plan, you keep your health care plan. These folks need to
stop scaring everybody, you know?" --Barack Obama *And we're tired of you and
your lies.*

What he said then: "My commitment is to make sure that we have universal
healthcare for all Americans by the end of my first term as president. ... I
would hope that we could set up a system that allows those who can go through
their employer to access a federal system or a state pool of some sort. But I
don't think we're going to be able to eliminate employer coverage immediately.
There's going to be potentially some transition process." --Barack Obama in 2007

walks the talk

Posted 3:24, 08/06/2009

FED UP

Posted 5:4, 08/06/2009

HEY! WALKS! I know you are empty headed enough to believe the Patriot Post is a REAL news source, but, that doesn't make it so.
Reminds me of something Stokes once said, after a heated exchange.
"If Yadkin county is so stupid, why did we vote for more republicans than any county in the state"?
He made that remark, believing it showed how really smart Yadkin was.
Just like you, saying something that came from the Patriot Post was gospel.
Walks, if there was any point to it, I would debate or argue with you over the health care reform issue or any other issue you would like.
But, I realize you and the rest of the clown posse have WAY too much of an authoritarian mindset to reason with.

Stokes	Posted 9:37, 08/06/2009
FU, you can't even quote anyone right. GEEZZZZ!!!!!!!! Not only that you think you know the reason I say something - give me a friggin' break. You just keep on thinking this healthcare is not real. I do not care but if it is passed, it will be too late to stop these idiots in Washington AND IT WILL AFFECT YOU JUST LIKE ALL THE REST OF US!

walks the talk

Posted 4:20, 08/07/2009

^^^^too funny!^^^
fu(mouth full of poop): Why aren't you posting over on the thread 'obama list'? Can't think of anything your long-legged-mac-daddy has done for you? Ah, it is no surprise you would support a thug and liar. You keep trying to shoot the messengers to avoid talking about your lying thug. Even when the s*** and lies roll off that lying thug's own tongue, you are STILL in denial. Pathetic you.

hambone	Posted 8:53, 08/07/2009
walks the talk, I hope you were not referring to me in your last post. It sure sounded that way. I did not vote for Obama, and I am against everything he stands for, especially this healthcare reform. You saying I am an Obama supporter is a real insult.

walks the talk

Posted 12:35, 08/07/2009

CALLING ALL INFORMANTS

Linda Douglass, the communications director for the White House's Health Reform
Office:.
"There is a
lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from
control of personal finances to end of life care," says Linda.
"These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through
casual conversation. Since we can't keep track of all of them here at the White
House, we're asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the
web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to
flag@whitehouse.gov."
GOT THAT? Team Obama wants you to be a snitch; they want
you to report even casual conversation with those who oppose ObamaCare directly
to the White House itself.

SBD	Posted 15:16, 08/07/2009
Diesel, Hitler is a credit to the obamamaniacts

OOgie	Posted 16:52, 08/07/2009
Well said. The only people who need everything done/supplied for them by others are infants and the infirm. All others who want/expect such treatment are leeches and parasites.

FED UP

Posted 15:21, 08/08/2009

Nature..by "fishy" does she mean the lies about the government is going to "kill grandma" and Obama has a "death panel"? Lies so big only the people of Yakkin' county and other bastions of ignorance are dumb enough to believe? Sounds good to me, pass 'em on.
BTW, Nature...didn't you and your clown posse defend Bush's Patriot Act? You know the one...the government tapping anyone's phone? Reading our mail? Keeping tabs on what books we checked out of the library? Turning in your neighbor if he looked like a "terrorist" to you? I know you did, you're a good little republican, after all. So, don't complain now about losing freedoms.
The people you would follow into hell are the real "thugs", Nature. The republicans. Do you REALLY believe the insurance industry is your friend, Nature?
Follow that authority, Nature. Never think for yourself.

FED UP	Posted 15:57, 08/08/2009
Hello, SBD. There's another good little republican.

FED UP

Posted 19:18, 08/08/2009

hambone.."illegal president"? Oh, I forgot, you're one of the nutbags who think Obama was born in Kenya, right?
How would you know what the "liberal news media" is saying? Apparently, you watch Fox 24/7. Hey, I'm tellin' ya, Fox News has been proven to cause brain rot. If you don't believe me, look around at your neighbors. They think Obama is going to kill grandma and will have a "death panel", too. Ask Sarah Palin, she'll tell ya.

hambone

Posted 9:53, 08/09/2009

fu, the attack that I mentioned was on CNN. I have told you before, I do not watch Fox News. Unlike you, I have a mind of my own.
But you are so self important and I do thank you for proving my point. "YOU ARE A STUPID ASSHOLE. The only thing obama has done since he has been in office was make sure his real birth certificate was not made public. He did that his first day in office. I think I will go to Silo Run and wait until someone drops off a drooling idiot. That way I can find a face to go with all the stupidy you force on everyone.

Rivers Edge	Posted 10:29, 08/09/2009
Typical Liberal responce to health care reform. http://cofcc.org/?p=6115

walks the talk	Posted 4:50, 08/10/2009
Rivers Edge, ^^^watched the video. All the Doctor did was ask a question..and that lousy liberal SOB went berserk. "What were to be our servants are now our masters"

OOgie

Posted 11:26, 08/10/2009

"You would think that AARP would be up in arms. Nope. As Barack Obama proudly pointed out last night, AARP supports his plan.
What Obama didn�t say is that AARP receives millions in federal funds, and hopes to get even more by becoming a vendor under his plan. In January 2007, NLPC published Special Report documenting taxpayer support for AARP. The study found that federal funding accounted for $83 million, or about 10 percent, of AARP�s then-annual revenue of $878 million."
What's not mentioned is that AARP would benefit financially from the Obamacare Medicare cutback by increased sales of their popular medicare supplement United Health Care policies."

FED UP	Posted 15:36, 08/10/2009
Uh, you mean like INSURANCE COMPANIES, TalkisCheap?

SBD	Posted 16:34, 08/10/2009
Talk, did you see the video of the aarp meeting and some of their members? They have a palace for their corp headquarters in D.C. and if you have ever seen it and the video you would understand their mindset. If someone brings up the fact that the AMA supports the porch monkey's healthcare plan remind them that the AMA only represents 15% of the nations Doctors.

OOgie	Posted 17:27, 08/10/2009
I too, often bash the insurance companies. But we do, to a great extent, currently have the option to quit doing business with a particular insurance company and then select another -or none. Those choices will disappear under the House version of the Obama plan. Our freedom is being crushed with every new law.

hambone

Posted 21:16, 08/10/2009

Over five thousand years ago, Moses said to the children of Israel " pick up your shovel, mount your asses and camels,
and I will lead you to the promised land".

Nearly 75 years ago, Roosevelt said, " Lay down your shovels, sit on your asses, and light up a camel, this is the promised land".

Now Obama has stolen your shovel , taxed your asses, raised the price of camels, and mortgaged the promised land.

God help us.

SBD	Posted 10:36, 08/11/2009
Talk I was not referring to his race I was referring to HIM.

cowchip	Posted 14:4, 08/11/2009
I guess the truth hurts some of you thin skined liberals. You really need to get a set, because Obama is in over his head, and things are only going to get worse unless Obama gives up and resigns, which would be best for everyone.

FED UP	Posted 18:17, 08/11/2009
SBD, do your good black friends know you call the president of the United States a porch monkey and Obama monkey?

nasty

Posted 20:44, 08/11/2009

fu and cheapo, You are right, that is a derogatory statement, but in this case it is appropriate. If you two do not like what we say, that is tough. You going to have to live with it. Give em hell SBD, you da man!!!
I wonder if either of you wacthed your MONKEY on tv today. He had 1500 hand picked dumbocrats to kiss his butt on national tv. He is such a prick. If the meeting was open to the public instead of by invitation only, it then would have been real, instead of theater.
Everyone is still waiting for your list of what the MONKEY has accomplished since he swung into office.

walks the talk	Posted 1:20, 08/12/2009
I'll say it. Your prez is a monkey. List all the 'good for the nation' things he has done, and I might change the 'monkey' part. monkey thug liar.

talkischeap	Posted 13:33, 08/12/2009
Oh, I'm sure you got a ton of "Black Professional friends" SBD.

Eagle Eye	Posted 22:38, 08/12/2009
Well, in my opinion that should answer any questions on availability of a doctor under socialized healthcare.

walks the talk

Posted 1:34, 08/13/2009

"Democrats, bloodied over their attempt to force health care 'reform' on
Americans, are looking more unreasonable and hysterical by the day. This isn't
healthy for the republic. Their increasing anxiety and fear of failure are
typified in the words of the leader of their party, who wants Republicans to
keep their mouths shut while he 'fixes' health care.
'I don't want the folks who
created the mess to do a lot of talking,' the president said Thursday at a
political rally in Virginia. 'I want them to get out of the way so we can clean
up the mess.' So much for the promises of bipartisan lawmaking. So much for open
discussion. So much for understanding who really caused the 'mess' in the first
place.
Like Al Gore claiming the debate about global warming is over, the White
House simply wants to shut down dialogue over who controls more than one-seventh
of the economy. ... Truth is, there's nothing more American than revolting
against heavy-handed authority, be it a long train of abuses from a king or the
lawmaking of elected officials with strong authoritarian urges.
This is a nation
founded on independence, and there is a large portion of it that wants to retain
that priceless heritage. This seems to confuse some lawmakers. ... Voters' deep
anger is justifiable. They have every right to disrupt and shout down public
figures who, as the protesters can be heard chanting, work for them. At dispute
is not a mere difference of opinion that can and should be discussed in a civil
manner, but a fundamental question of who is in charge of peoples' lives. We are
not advocating violence, though coercive government is at its core violent as
the state is required to resort to force to ensure that its directives aren't
violated. But we do support our fellow citizens' right to express their rage at
an injustice, particularly if it makes lawmakers uncomfortable. Shouldn't
Americans bristle when their independence is threatened, when a federal
official, in this case White House deputy chief of staff Jim Messina, says party
leaders 'will punch back twice as hard' when voters merely show their
displeasure?
The freedom the protesters are defending can sometimes be messy and
imperfect. A lack of freedom, however, is eternally oppressive. It is an
unrelenting prison that poisons the human spirit, even when cloaked in allegedly
humane programs such as government-run health care." --Investors' Business Daily

hambone	Posted 8:39, 08/13/2009
It is really a shame the secrect service has to put their life at risk for that piece of shit wanna be dictator. From the way obama is talking down to them, I would say within a year the real citizens of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA will be in arms ready to take back this country from the racist negro obama.

talkischeap	Posted 10:12, 08/13/2009
I'm a conservative, SBD, but I can get my points across without callin' people names. Liberal? Socialist? Those are all fine by me for the POTUS, but you don't have to degrade the man himself. After all, he wouldn't be a "porch monkey" if he had your mentality would he? No, I don't imagine that would be the proper way to discribe him...lol.

talkischeap

Posted 12:28, 08/13/2009

Stokes, I chose to remain above the name calling. Name calling does no good. Protests and working to influence people/groups/voters to go in a different direction because my conservative path is best is the way to go. If callin' the POTUS a "porch monkey" would influence policy somebody with more clought than you or I would have alread tried it.

These derogatory statements who cause the casual obsever to liken you guys to the same ignorant, shallow thinking, uneducated crowd many of you would swear put Obama in office.

And I'm interested on your expounding on that "bought the presidency" remark. Seems pretty far fetched considering the virtual landslide back in November.

liberalbender

Posted 13:9, 08/13/2009

I happen to be a "real" citizen of the USA & Yadkin Co...am also (according to alot of ya'll) a moron, idiot, thin skinned FU(these are the nicer comments)-cause I am proud to be a liberal. Do u have any idea how thick skinned u have to be to be a liberal? I managed to go to school, raise a family & retire from a large multi-national corp.-so I really can't be a moron or an idiot. But,like most,i have fu'd on occasion and will admit it-unlike those that think they are morally superior while having affairs, deserting their families,abusing drugs, deserting their states, etc. The "Party of Family Values" isn't doing real well in that regard, is it? And while i did not vote for nor agree with most of Bush 2's policies, i never called him or his supporters vile names, doubted their patriotism, or advocated violence towards them. Why does the liberal view make you afraid? Why do you attack the ideas that secured our freedom from England? Why do you use violence,rantings and lies to try and force your views on others? I have not only read the bill, i understand the bill-it needs to be tweeked-but it should be ok. It is truely amazing how the words in it can be so twisted that folks here believe the lies told by Fox, Insurance companies & ultra-conservative officials. And it was ok for Bush 2 to TAP our phones-SECRETLY-but its wrong for Obama to ASK the public to tell them of lies concerning health care reform? I resent public officials-who receive PUBLIC money-MY TAX DOLLARS-adding to these lies of "death to granny", "murder", etc when all they want is to keep the dollars flowing to insurance companies and then to their campaigns. And to dispel some myths-the reason there is a wait in Canada for medical care-their docs hi-tail it to the USA where they can make mega bucks-I've been there & have friends there. And health care is already rationed here-try being in bad health and needing minor surgery. Have current medical problems? You can't afford to switch insurance companies or get additional life or health ins-IF any company will even offer you a policy. High cost of medical care-blame those without insurance and lawsuits and the high cost of education. I am blessed-we have insurance from my former employer. Am i worried that the health plan will hurt me? no. It may take some from me but it will give to those that need it. And it is MY responsibility to my God, my country, my state, my county, my town, my family and myself to help others. What is YOUR responsibility?

SBD	Posted 14:37, 08/13/2009
talk you must be blizz and lib's brother.

OOgie	Posted 17:15, 08/13/2009
People are being HIRED to support the proposed Health Care Plan. Read it here. http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/npo/1309501745.html

Vote4me

Posted 0:56, 08/15/2009

He already supports the murder of the unborn and in some cases the born babies{infaside}. Why not go for the next group the senoirs? If I was a betting person I would bet there are some laws or provisions in the health care reform that covers tax payer funded abortions on demand. This would force any doctor to have to perfom an abortion at any hospital. I don"t know but I bet it is hidden in there somewhere.

SBD	Posted 11:50, 08/15/2009
talks where on this thread did I call anyone a name.

hambone	Posted 15:50, 08/15/2009
You are right fu. Every time obama opens his mouth, lies come spewing out. I am glad you finally figured that out.

Walks the Talk

Posted 4:5, 08/16/2009

LIAR,liar.liar Part 1

"I have not said that I was a 'single-payer' supporter." --President Barack
Obama at a town hall meeting this week.

"I happen to be a proponent of a single-payer universal health care program."
--Obama in 2003

-------------

OBAMA LIED!!! Part II

"We have the AARP on board because they know this is a good deal for our
seniors. ... AARP would not be endorsing a bill if it was undermining Medicare,
okay?" --Barack Obama

Scratch that. AARP Chief Operating Officer Tom Nelson issued a statement saying,
"While the President was correct that AARP will not endorse a health care reform
bill that would reduce Medicare benefits, indications that we have endorsed any
of the major health care reform bills currently under consideration in Congress
are inaccurate."

liar.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 22:31, 08/16/2009

I read today that he is backing done a little bit. He is saying that he will be open to co-ops instead of straight government run healthcare. Co-op insurance would be similar to our Yad-Tel. They would compete with private insurers but not be ran by the government.

To me that is a big "Atta boy" to Obama. He had his idea and is seeing that people do not want it. He is listening to the people that electing him and being flexible and changing his course a little. That is a really good thing.

Now if our idiots that we call commissioners could only do the same thing. Tommy and Chad, the President can listen to the people, so can you two piss ants.

But that is another rant.

Walks the Talk	Posted 5:8, 08/17/2009
nasty, Guess you and I will be reported to that white house snich site..lol

OOgie	Posted 7:16, 08/17/2009
No matter the plan, Obama intends for the government to really be in charge.

Busted Flush

Posted 7:58, 08/17/2009

All you guys who are sooo happy now that the insurance companies and their mouthpieces, the republican party, are having their way, here's something to think about.
If you have what you THINK is insurance,and you get a catastropic illness, remember, they have people on their payroll whose only purpose in life is to go over your medical history with a fine tooth comb, looking for a reason to deny your claim. So, if you contract cancer, for instance, and they say "Look, you failed to disclose on your application you had your tonsils removed at the age of 10, so your CLAIM IS DENIED, you have no one to blame except yourselves and the people like Palin and Foxx who told you the government was going to set up "death panels" and was going to "kill granny".
But, looking on the bright side, maybe Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity will loan you some of the money they made lying to you to keep you from losing everything you've worked for all your lives, including your home.
But, I wouldn't count on it.

Walks the Talk

Posted 3:22, 08/18/2009

Grams, amen.

"Dirty secret No. 1 in Obamacare is about the government's coming into homes and
usurping parental rights over child care and development. It's outlined in
sections 440 and 1904 of the House bill (Page 838), under the heading 'home
visitation programs for families with young children and families expecting
children.' The programs (provided via grants to states) would educate parents on
child behavior and parenting skills. The bill says that the government agents,
'well-trained and competent staff,' would 'provide parents with knowledge of
age-appropriate child development in cognitive, language, social, emotional, and
motor domains ... modeling, consulting, and coaching on parenting practices,'
and 'skills to interact with their child to enhance age-appropriate
development.' Are you kidding me?! With whose parental principles and values?
... Do we really believe they would contextualize and personalize every form of
parenting in their education, or would they merely universally indoctrinate with
their own? ... One government rebuttal is that this program would be
'voluntary.' Is that right? Does that imply that this agency would just sit back
passively until some parent needing parenting skills said, 'I don't think I'll
call my parents, priest or friends or read a plethora of books, but I'll go down
to the local government offices'? To the contrary, the bill points to specific
targeted groups and problems, on Page 840: The state 'shall identify and
prioritize serving communities that are in high need of such services,
especially communities with a high proportion of low-income families.' ... Is
all this what you want or expect in a universal health care bill being rushed
through Congress?" -pp

walks the talk

Posted 4:4, 08/18/2009

"Instead of reassuring frightened constituents, Democratic
congressmen (and women) denounce the voters who sent them to Washington as
Nazis, Brown Shirts and the 'un-American.' Harry Reid, the leader of the Senate
Democrats, calls the critics 'evil-mongers.'

****Congress is dead to anything
outside the bubble it has created for itself. ... The rage at the town halls is
particularly irksome because congressmen are not accustomed to anyone talking
back to them."****

Washington Times editor emeritus Wesley Pruden

SBD	Posted 12:5, 08/18/2009
fu who gives a $hit what you think ! You live in a mobile mental ward ! I called them nothing I said that is what they are. I believe it was my friends that made the nig statement. Now why don't you do the world a favor and put some odor eaters in your shoes and disappear.

talkischeap	Posted 14:52, 08/18/2009
SBD, I imagine your friends call you the same thing they call the other folks when you aren't around.

thebutcher76	Posted 21:52, 08/18/2009
Nothing but the White House and huge majorities in the House and Senate.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 9:31, 08/19/2009

Realclearpolitics has his approval numbers in a steady decline since elected. His disapproval numbers have been on a steady incline since elected. With 41.4% currently disapproving and 52% approving, Congressman who are up for re-election next year are having to think long and hard before hitching their wagons to this healthcare horse. Look at http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_obama_job_approval-1044.html the chart clearly shows what people think about our current leader. With re-election in about 14 months, Congressmen are feeling the pressure from their people back home.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 16:46, 08/19/2009
Wow, it went down even more since I posted last night. Approval 51.4% down from 52% Disapproval 41.4% same as last night

hambone	Posted 12:25, 08/20/2009
obama is now bringing religion into the health care issue. He told a large group of religious leaders it was their moral duty to try to convince people to agree with the plan. What happened to the separation of church and state? I suppose obama is exempt from constitutional law.

FED UP	Posted 13:26, 08/20/2009
I knew it, SBD...they are gonna give your money to Acorn.

FED UP	Posted 13:44, 08/20/2009
I know, Diesel..what's next? Killing granny? Death panels? Where will it stop? And, to top it off, Obama is not even an American citizen!!! He was born in Kenya, delivered by Sarah palin's witch doctor!!!!

FED UP	Posted 19:15, 08/20/2009
Amen! and amen! I've finally seen the light..... Halleleuja! I've hung out on this site so long I'm as crazy as ya'll are. I'm moving to Yakkin' county next week. Hey, does anyone know if there are any 8' wide, empty trailers for rent in SBD or Grams neighborhoods?

nasty	Posted 21:31, 08/20/2009
Why are the liberals blaming the republicans for holding up the healthcare bill? The blue dog democrats are the ones that obama can't count on. Now FED UP, be a man and answer these questions without acting like a child.

walks the talk	Posted 6:19, 08/21/2009
Teleprompted crowd: "Somebody here who, uhh, has a concern about health care that has not been raised or is skeptical and suspicious and wants to make sure that -- because I don't want people thinking I -- I -- I just have a bunch of plants in here." --Barack Obama to a bunch of plants at a town hall meeting in Portsmouth, New Hampshire dummy. thug. liar.

wizard

Posted 8:31, 08/21/2009

No one knows whether obama has a good health plan. obama is always complaining about people lying about his health care program, but he can't explain to the american people what his plan is about. All obama cares about is trying to rip this country apart. He acts like a five year old, wanting people to tattle on anyone that does not agree with him.

FED UP, I would say the reason the blue dogs are not charging to support obama is they may want to be reelected. If the liberals shove this thru, there will be some out of work liberals come mid term elections. Do you agree with this?

Walks the Talk	Posted 0:31, 08/22/2009
^^^what a donkey's a##^^^ You do not have to post here with the yadkinites. You don't live here so what is your problem? Good grief, donkey boy, when will you surpass being 12 years old? obama sucks.

OOgie	Posted 9:11, 08/22/2009
Death panels are real! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70KcaXbkJw4

wizard	Posted 12:15, 08/22/2009
FED UP, I need to thank you for talking about Fox News. You raised my interest enough to watch the channel. Until now I did not realize just how stupid and harmful the liberals are to the US.

wizard	Posted 15:37, 08/22/2009
Seems to me the liberals are the ones with a low IQ. They are trying to sell a health plan to the American people that they know nothing about themselves. All the liberals do is complain about the republicans lying, but they give no facts about the plan. You just keep your hand on obamas thigh, he will eventually lead you to his promised land.

wizard	Posted 20:19, 08/22/2009
You are such a silly little person. You are just like the other liberals, you have no idea what the plan is but everything you hear is a lie. You are just not smart enough to have a discussion about the bill. Sorry!

walks the talk	Posted 4:34, 08/23/2009
michele, michael moore endorses the obamacare, and since moore is fed-up's hero.. fed-up doesn't have to read the bill or think about it. He just knows it's a good thing.

walks the talk

Posted 3:5, 08/25/2009

that was interesting^^^^^^^

President Obama's handling of health care is unpopular with a majority of
Americans and a majority of self-proclaimed independents. Focusing on the town
halls has its merits, but if you actually wanted ObamaCare to pass, casting a
majority of Americans as the stooges of racist goons may not be the best way to
go. ... It's funny how these supposed champions of the Enlightenment can't grasp
that people can disagree with them for honest reasons. Instead, we simply must
be [Rush] Limbaugh's automatons, which is to say racist, fascist thugs. In
addition to the slander, such complaints are monumentally, incandescently lame
coming from a party that controls Washington. According to liberals themselves,
these evil-mongers are a tiny minority, a bunch of 'AstroTurf' frauds.
So why
not ignore them and get on with the work you were elected to do? ... But no.
Obama wants the debate to be about angry white men. And, as lame as that is,
that's what's happening. It won't make ObamaCare a reality, but it will shift
the blame from where it rightly belongs. pp

trash	Posted 8:26, 08/25/2009
so America has become a socialist state? I would contend that the previous administration destroyed more of my rights than any perceived attack from congress, or the current administration

OOgie	Posted 8:54, 08/27/2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G44NCvNDLfc&feature=player_embedded

FED UP	Posted 19:36, 08/30/2009
LMAO...SBD...I checked out one of your sources, rense.com. I couldn't help but laugh when the first thing I saw, at the top banner was "PHYSICAL IMMORTALITY IS NOW POSSIBLE" WTH do you people get these nutcase websites? And HTH do you believe them?

SBD	Posted 20:41, 08/30/2009
fu idiot it even had the pages picked out for you to read. BTW, they sell ads just like the journal and liberal wxii.

walks the talk

Posted 2:11, 09/05/2009

Let me get this straight:

Obama's health care plan will be written by a committee
whose head says he doesn't understand it,
passed by a Congress that hasn't read it and whose members will
be exempt from it,
signed by a president who smokes,
funded by a treasury chief who did not pay his taxes,
overseen by a surgeon general who is obese
and financed by a country that is broke.

Now, what could possibly go wrong?

michelekibbler	Posted 14:17, 09/05/2009
Any of you going to DC on 9/12? Government run health care would be a disaster. We need more competition with the Insurance companies to keep prices in check. There are many solutions to fix the health care crisis, government control should not be one of them.

snoopy	Posted 11:11, 09/06/2009
michelekibbler..I heard there are two bus loads from this area going. They are trying to fill a third. Call H & R Tours in Bonneville to find out more details.

OOgie

Posted 11:37, 09/16/2009

Noteworthy: Baucus anounces the Senate version of Obamacare: The Magic Number is 13 percent
That's the amount of your annual income Baucus envisions you paying for your family's health care BEFORE co-pays, deductibles, and any other coverage split.
For a family with two kids and $100k income, thats THIRTEEN THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED DOLLARS to start, or almost ELEVEN HUNDRED DOLLARS PER MONTH, plus all the other items you'll pay when you actually use it.
Without having hard figures at hand, I'd say that represents about TWICE the amount most families now pay currently for personally paid family health insurance policies., with the only added benefit being no exclusion for pre-existing conditions.
What a deal!
And it's clear that the 10 year, $856 billion cost numbers being projected are a joke.
Noteworthy:
"The CBO's cost estimate understates the number who would receive the subsidy because it ignores the incentive for many firms to drop employer-provided coverage. It also ignores the strong incentive that individuals would have to reduce reportable cash incomes to qualify for higher subsidy rates. The total cost of ObamaCare over the next decade likely would be closer to $2 trillion than to $1 trillion."
This is nothing more than a major disaster for the nation.
It's time to make this piece of excrement die once and for all, and start over again on health care reform.

Eagle Eye

Posted 21:22, 09/16/2009

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of Government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment own, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with a result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship...Benjamin Franklin.

SBD	Posted 12:47, 09/23/2009
OBAMA LIED: HE SUPPORTS HEALTH CARE FOR UNLAWFUL IMMIGRANTS http://www.newswithviews.com/Wooldridge/frosty500.htm

OOgie

Posted 19:0, 09/25/2009

This week most eyes have been on the Senate Finance Committee as they continue to work on a health care reform proposal introduced by Senator Baucus (D-MT) last week.
An amendment introduced by Senator Bunning (R-KY) that required the health care reform bill and estimates of its costs to be available to the public 72 hours before the final vote in the Finance Committee was rejected by a vote of 11-12. This amendment would have given Senators and the American people the opportunity to analyze and understand what is being voted on by the Committee.
So why are they afraid of us having a little advance notice?

Big Kahuna

Posted 20:50, 09/27/2009

Subject: Fw: This was a "letter to the editor"
in (August 29) Jackson, MS newspaper.

This was a "letter to the
editor" in yesterdays
(August 29) Jackson, MS
newspaper:

Dear Sirs:

"During my last night's
shift in the ER, I had the
pleasure of evaluating a
patient with a shiny new
gold tooth, multiple
elaborate tattoos, a very
expensive brand of tennis
shoes and a new cellular
telephone equipped with her
favorite R&B tune for a
ringtone.

Glancing over the chart, one
could not help noticing her
payer status: Medicaid.

She smokes more than one
costly pack of cigarettes
every day and, somehow,
still has money to buy beer.

And our president expects me
to pay for this woman's
health care?

Our nation's health care
crisis is not a shortage of
quality hospitals, doctors
or nurses. It is a crisis
of culture - a culture in
which it is perfectly
acceptable to spend money on
vices while refusing to take
care of one's self or,
heaven forbid, purchase
health insurance. A culture
that thinks "I can do
whatever I want to because
someone else will always
take care of me".

Life is really not that
hard. Most of us reap what
we sow.

STARNER
JONES,
MD

Jackson,
MS

michelekibbler	Posted 8:32, 09/28/2009
Walks, I'll bet she is an Obama supporter too.

Cletus	Posted 10:38, 09/28/2009
All I can say is, that if this is true, its is honestly terrifing ! What has become of our country? Where is our country headed?

SBD

Posted 16:35, 10/09/2009

Urgent to Readers from Dick Morris:

The Senate Finance Committee will vote this Tuesday on sending the Obamacare plan to the full Senate.
Dick Morris says we need get our message out until the very last minute. Our 15 second TV ads are having a dramatic effect.
You can see the new TV ad � Go Here Now.
Dick is encouraging you to donate to help us do one final push this weekend and Monday in key states.
Please help us � Go Here Now.
In case you missed it, please read Dick's important message below.
League of American Voters

Dear Newsmax Reader:
The Senate Finance Committee will soon be voting on the Obamacare plan to radically overhaul our healthcare system. Then the full Senate will take up the matter.
We need your urgent help to stop Obamacare.
Dick Morris, the Fox News analyst, says we can still defeat Obamacare.
Dick is the chief stategist at the League of American Voters.
He says the coming votes will be very close.
In the past week, we have been airing a 15-second TV ad in Maine, Arkansas and North Dakota, 3 crucial states, exposing the Obama plan which will cut up to $500 billion in Medicare for Seniors.
We are clearly having an effect.
But we need to do more, and be prepared as this bill goes to the full Senate and House.
Dick is urging you to support our TV campaign in this final push, please Donate Here Now.
Also read Dick's latest column below that reveals our strategy.
Bob Adams
Executive Director

OOgie

Posted 18:45, 10/17/2009

"Faced with a need to scrounge for revenue to fund his plan for health care, President Barack Obama and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus have come up with a brilliant new idea: Tax the sick!
In a new amendment to the health care bill, they propose to limit the deductibility of medical expenses on income taxes.
Now, taxpayers may deduct any medical expenses that exceed 7.5% of their Adjusted Gross Income. Obama and Baucus want to raise that threshold to 10% as long as the taxpayer is under 65.
Eight million Americans are sick enough and poor enough that they have to pay more than 7.5% of their income in medical expenses. And it is these folks that the liberals Obama and Baucus plan to tax! Six million of them earn less than $75,000 a year!
For a family earning $75,000 a year and facing out-of-pocket medical bills of $7, 500, this proposal would cost them about $600 a year in extra taxes."

Stokes	Posted 19:51, 10/18/2009
home forclosure numbers for the 3rd quarter this year - set another record up 23% over the 3rd quarter of 2008 - 987,340. Yet Biden stated recently the stimulus was working beyond his wildest dreams. Obama continues to say the stimulus is working.

OOgie

Posted 8:4, 10/27/2009

Dick Morris: "The more fiscal details of the health care bills emerge, the more appalling they seem. The Senate Finance Committee bill includes a broad provision taxing all manner of medical devices. This tax includes such frivolous luxuries as pacemakers, stents, artificial heart valves, defibrillators, automated wheelchairs, mechanized artificial limbs, replacement hips and knees, surgical gurneys, laparoscopic equipment and the like. President Obama is planning to reduce the cost of medical care by taxing it!"
Read more here:
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1009/morris102509.php3?printer_friendly

fiesta pantalones

Posted 9:58, 10/27/2009

Read the AP article on it last night of YV homepage. This thing has just gotten too big. Some Dems up for re-election next year are jumping ship. They went for too much and may end up getting nothing done except wasting a year of our money on their salaries when this bill goes nowhere. That is fine with me though. The more laws Senate gets writtened and passed, the more of our freedoms go away. I hope they waste another year on it.

Grams

Posted 16:10, 10/27/2009

Commonsense, I don't need any POLITICIAN to tell me anything because it will be a lie. I can read and I have read and read and read this health care bill and it sucks. This last fiasco they are contemplating - no one has read it and Mr. Obama who said EVERYTHING will be on the internet 5 days before a vote when he was campaigning has lied. This last fiasco WILL NOT BE ON THE INTERNET BEFORE THEY VOTE. Why do you think that is commonsense? Why did Obama lie? What does TOTAL transparency mean to him? Obviously not the same thing that it means to taxpayers. They do not want any of us to know so we won't protest like we have been doing all over the country this summer. You don't need to be a rocket scientist to figure this out. Maybe you should do a little reading of your own.

Good grief, when a NON PARTISAN organization that almost all small and large businesses belong to takes on the president and congress because of what it will do the small business, what more does ANY ONE need to know this is bad legislation as it is written!!!

Grams

Posted 21:17, 10/27/2009

Kate, I want you to tell me just exactly how something that is right now being put together in the senate and behind closed doors with only democrats behind those doors has been online since October 19th? Furthermore the senate voted to NOT put it online for the public to read.

Yes there are texts online. That is what I have been reading and reading but the FINAL bill that they are going to vote on will NOT be online prior to their voting unless a new vote is taken and passed to do so.

michelekibbler	Posted 0:1, 10/28/2009
What about tort reform? Let insurance companies compete nation wide. What about Obama's campaign promise to let the people see the "Bills" online for 72 hours?

OOgie	Posted 7:35, 10/28/2009
Here are comments on a blog by a Greensboro physician. Worth reading. http://guarino.typepad.com/guarino/2009/10/opt-out-public-option.html

Hoss	Posted 9:2, 10/28/2009
You tell her Stokes ! Obama, destroying America from within !

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 16:50, 10/28/2009

Yeah, Stokes! You go on and tell me! ~head shake~ Seriously, you're right. There were other proposals and I was lazy in my reply to Grams. I ought to have double checked my own memory.

The fundamental gist, though, I will stand by. This is something that has been kicked around for a century. We are the leader of the Western World and we are well behind most of the rest of the industrialized world in access to health care.

We need to fix this.

KateRauhauserSmith	Posted 16:53, 10/28/2009
JustA Guy, Keith Olbermann talked about this report last evening. It's ... frightening, really. No wonder there is so much push back coming from the insurance industry and many points in the medical services front.

OOgie	Posted 18:41, 10/28/2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmNdV0PSRy4 I guess this guy got kidnapped somewhere along the way, and was replaced with the impostor who's currently playing the role of President of the United States.

Stokes	Posted 21:50, 10/28/2009
justaguy, I am sure that a lot of that article is true but if the government takes over health care it will only get worse, not better. The government is awful at ANY TYPE of money or waste managing - social security, medicare, budgets, all of these are busted.

Stokes

Posted 0:43, 10/29/2009

Oh so you are telling me I am buying lines being cast out by Americans and I need to find out more from nonbiased and informed sources?? Gee whiz Kate, why are you insulting my intelligence? I would rather be called a bad name than insulted. Do you honestly think that you are the ONLY one that knows anyone in Canada or Great Britain or the only one that is informed on health insurance matters? Maybe you just think your are MORE informed than anyone else. Is that it? Furthermore we certainly were not bankrupted with my wife's breast cancer and we had blue cross. I certainly won't be able to say that should she have a reoccurence with this damn government run medicare that you think is going to be so great for everyone.

Please answer my question: why it is not going to be good enough for the legislators and the union members??? I am not just a little sheep that follows along and says ok master when big brother speaks.

justaguy

Posted 9:6, 10/29/2009

I know youall probably just love Al Franken but here is a point of view on Medical Bankruptcy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgqqSHr0wVA

Also, since it seems that everyone seems to know someone in Europe or Canada with a horror story I thought I would ask Europeans and Canadians themselves, and see what they have to say. I posted the following question to a large networking board I belong to that has lots of Europeans and Canadians as members:

As youall probably know...there is a standup knockdown drag out battle going on over here in the US about national healthcare. I have not seen an easily identifiable thread discussing European and Canadian healthcare pros and cons by Europeans and Canadians themselves. We Americans seem to know all about either how great the service it provides is, or how bad the service it provides is because, at least in my case, we have been told on the web by other Americans who know somebody who knows somebody who has dealt with European or Canadian healthcare. So I thought it might be a good idea to go to the source and ask Europeans and Canadian themselves what they think of their Healthcare system. I know I was treated very well by the German Healthcare system when I was over there...but in my case it was an American Healthcare system dealing with the German healthcare system...so my treatment might not have been the same as a German going thru the German system.

So can you Europeans and Canadians on the board let me know if you think your system is good, adequate, sucks...etc.

JustAGuy

Posted 10:21, 10/29/2009

I figured I would post responses here....as it is a Living History website's Political area of their message board. Most of the website and message boards areas has to do with non-politcal specifics of interest to us Living History types, and I thought would not be of interest to those on this website...but if you want I can. The Living history bunch pretty much runs the whole spectrum from wild eyed liberal thru liberal and conservative moderates to the religious right and even a reactionary quasi fascist or two. The website is the armor archive
http://www.armourarchive.org/

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 13:32, 10/29/2009

Wait, Stokes. I'm a bit lost in our exchange and I'm going back through the several posts to sort it out.

However, more important, I think something I wrote came across as confrontational or belittling and I did not mean to do so. I am sorry for writing what obviously hit a note as being insulting. It was not intended to be so.

The bit about the 'buying the line cast out' is reflective of my frustration with much of the chatter put out against the healthcare systems in other countries that are very obviously spun to suit the purposes of the sponsors of studies and reports.

I meant that as a general statement though it obviously rings as a statement directed specifically at you. It was not and, again, I am sorry for appearing to direct it at you.

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 17:37, 10/29/2009

Stokes, you asked me:
As for health care, who are we behind? It certainly is not Canada or Great Britain or any of the countries that have universal health care.

I will begin with a question back to you. By what standard are you making your assertion that our health care system is not behind that of "any of the countries that have universal health care."?

I stand by my belief and statement that we surely do. Not all of us, no. But our nation as a whole surely does. I base this stand on studies and rankings done by various organizations such as the World Health Organization.

http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

France has the lowest number of preventable deaths (65 out of 100,000 in 2002-03 ... the US has 110 per 100,000 putting us in 14th place, both Canada and the UK do better then we do.), the third longest life expectancy in the world (73.1 years, Japan is first at 74.5 ... the US is 24th at 70.0 years, Canada is at 72 years and the UK at 71.7), and their health care system is ranked as the best in the world by the World Health Organization.

It is a universal health care system. Not a single payer, but universal, none the less.

The information can be checked at http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html

Stokes I'm very glad your lady wife is a survivor. I lost a dear friend to breast cancer this year but she stuck with us four years longer then the doctors told her she would.

I'm also very glad for you that you have had good coverage in your life. I agree that it isn't fair you were forced to Medicare if you'd have preferred to stay with Blue Cross (I think that's what it was you said you'd had)

We're also very fortunate and have had pretty good medical insurance through my husband's employer for the last dozen years. But I know too many people who do not have coverage and I remember what it was like when we were pregnant with the kids and we didn't have insurance.

We were fortunate again, that things went smoothly and we lived in an area that had a non-profit hospital with a good teaching clinic that calculated cost on ability to pay.

I don't believe what they're looking at is the perfect solution. Nor do I think it's what's going to pass but I believe strongly that it is well past time to actually DO SOMETHING to fix the disparity between the people who have jobs that provide insurance and those that don't.

I am gratified that Pres. Obama has held the Congress' feet to the fire on this. Do something. Do it now. Hammer it out.

The burden is on us, the citizens, to stay informed and guide our legislators. To drown out the voice of special interests and lobbyists with the will of the people.

I hope this makes some level of sense.

Stokes

Posted 0:0, 10/30/2009

Kate if you are giving numbers from 2002 & 2003, they cannot be relevant to 2009 and I also do not think preventable deaths has anything to do with the quality of healthcare. For example, if someone destroys their liver from drinking, that has nothing to do with the quality of their health care, it has to do with abuse of the body. I would even go so far as to say that life expectancy is not tied to the quality of our health care - once again in the majority of cases, this is determined by how one treats their body. I base my opinion of Canada's healthcare on family that has lived there for several years. I base my opinion on Great Britain by my friend's statements that now lives here but was born and raised there and his family still lives there. Furthemore I would not trade living quarters with anyone in any country.

I have stated more than once that our health care system needs some overhaul but Obama and Pelosi want to be in control of our healthcare. They do not give a damn if it is better for the citizens. Kate it is all about power and showing everyone that disagrees with them that he can shove this thing down the American people's throat. That makes him and the democrats the winners. Well guess what, if they pass a law that is anywhere close to the proposals, all of us will be losers. THE GOVERNMENT CANNOT RUN ANYTHING SUCCESSFULLY. NOTHING!!! Furthermore the insurance companies cannot compete with a government run health insurance company. If all those employees are put out of work, unemployment will go to 15% and that just might be the catalyst for another serious depression. That health insurance that your husband now has will be controlled by the government because it will be cheaper for employers to pay the penalty for not furnishing employees health insurance than it will to pay the premiums. Those idiots in Washington will be between you and your doctors. I am sure you do not believe this because of your liberal statements and support of your president but once this legislation is passed, it will be too late for reconsideration.

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 8:6, 10/30/2009

Stokes, I'm not really sure how to respond to your last post. I'm not even sure I ought to but I'm bull-headed if I'm anything so ...

Preventable Deaths, as calculated for these studies and rankings, have little to do with individuals' abuse of their bodies. We're not talking about people drinking themselves to death. We're talking about people who had cancers that went untreated for lack of access to health care, strokes, heart attacks, pneumonia, epilepsy ...

Reuters did a decent job with an article on such a study dated from Jan 2008. If you read it you'll note that France and Japan have been at the top since 1995 and we've not been ... and have fallen in that time, not improved. http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN07651650

CBS, talking about a study reported by the Washington Post Oct 6, 2009 http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/10/06/politics/washingtonpost/main5366248.shtml

Now, to give the devil his due, there are preventable deaths that are aggravated by poor lifestyle choices ... use of tobacco, over-eating, unhealthy eating in regards to salt intake and so forth. People who have access to regular health care, who develop a relationship with a medical team, are counseled on healthy choices, they're warned and educated. Those who don't have access do as they've done, as their parents did, as their grandparents did ... and it kills them.

The figures from six years ago are entirely valid. The world, in relation to our health and our healthcare expenditures, simply does not change that quickly. Valid and vetted numbers take a while to process from countries.

But, ok, newer figures ... From the CIA World Fact Book, 2009 estimates of Life Expectancy. I found a table on-line and double checked with someone who actually owns the book to make sure the Wiki author represented the information correctly. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy

Japan 3rd of UN Member States 82.12
Canada 8th of UN Member States 81.23
France 9th of UN Member States 80.98
UK 25th of UN Member States 79.01
US 35th of UN Member States 78.11

It is unbelievable that we, the greatest nation in the world as many of us hold, lags so far behind other countries (Freakin Macau has the longest life expectancy for goshsake. Macau! I can't even place that on a map but it is a holding of China.)

You know people who have poor opinions of other countries' systems. I know people who both like and dislike the systems in those countries. You don't like Medicare. My grandmother loves it.

Personal pools of information are small so we look at the larger figures for the country.

I take exception with your tendency to assign malice to people based on opinions they hold that are different then yours. What constructive purpose does that serve? I didn't agree with many things Pres. Bush II did, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt that he acted on what he felt was best ... not some desire to destroy.

We do agree that there needs to be an overhaul. Do we agree that it's easier for our legislators to argue about it then to do something about it?

That's not a cut, that's just an observation. I don't want their jobs. Can't imagine the stress of doing that job correctly.

But THEY DID want the job so they need to stick to it and fix the situation and make health care reasonably accessible to every American citizen.

Stokes

Posted 9:33, 10/30/2009

KateRauhauserSmith Posted 8:6, 10/30/2009
Stokes, I'm not really sure how to respond to your last post. I'm not even sure I ought to but I'm bull-headed if I'm anything so ...

Kate, with your bull-headedness you are evading the most important point - THE GOVERNMENT CANNOT RUN ANYTHING!!!!!

And how I think your president feels about the citizens in this country will not change and the only thing that will change the course he is on are next week's elections should the democrats get beat. I base my opinion on his actions for the last 10 months. Not only does he not care, he is incompetent. Forget about Fox news but putting the Chamber of Commerce on an enemy list? Give me a friggin break. If he cared he would be listening to the people. Since you must have the last word, have at it.

OOgie

Posted 10:33, 10/30/2009

Other countries compile their statistics on health and deaths differently from the USA. A direct comparison of raw data is very misleading. Some of the European countries do not include the deaths of those under age 1 in their statistics. So their infant death rate looks better at first glance. But if the USA used the same criteria here, the USA would have the better record. There are many other differences also.

Betsy

Posted 12:25, 10/30/2009

I just have one question for Obama and his supporters. If you are going to change healthcare, then why are you not making it better? Nothing I have seen, read, or heard anywhere is making it better. You want to waste these trillions of dollars to change healthcare but you are NOT making it better. You are ONLY making it different and WORSE.

SO IF YOU ARE NOT GOING TO MAKE IT BETTER, LEAVE IT AS IT IS!!!!

Professor	Posted 15:8, 10/30/2009
Some on here have questioned the Republicans for not offering their input on this debate. Here is a summary of but a few...http://republicanleader.house.gov/news/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=139708

OOgie	Posted 19:16, 10/30/2009
Here is another for Kate http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/3468018/Womens-life-expectancy-among-the-poorest-in-Europe.html

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 20:50, 10/30/2009

Grams, what I have noticed in your posts quite frequently is that you put your own assumptions and biases onto the person you're discussing as fact.

Which, quite frequently, puts you in the position of being completely wrong.

You said earlier: "Kate, if you are so bull-headed, then tell me why you are following along with Obama's healthcare BS like a good little sheep?"

What I have stated is that reform is needed and I'm happy that it's finally being made to happen.

I've not said I accept or support anything in particular. Just that things need to change and I intend to keep an open mind. O, and that I hope others keep an open mind and stay informed and involved in the process as well.

How is that being a sheep? Please.

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 21:17, 10/30/2009

Rivers, I make a great effort not to presume anyone's intentions or assign malice. I ask a lot of questions regarding the intentions of posts trying to understand differing points of view ... some even get answers.

More frequently the thread devolves into name calling and wide brush painting into categories of the post author's biases. You might know a little something about that yourself.

Nope, I"m no angel and I make mistakes, but I try and when I realize I've made that error, I apologize and try to improve.

Reform is needed. Our health care is the one of the most (if not the most) expensive in the world and it is not the best in the world ... and it is not available to a great lot of people...and a lot of people who have health care access are ok with that ...

That needs to be fixed in some way. And THAT is all I'm saying. Why is this an issue?

Rivers Edge

Posted 21:34, 10/30/2009

Its an issue becasue I dont think the current health care reform plan has been thought out. Damn, the dumbocrats would have thrown out a plan in 24 hours if we would have let them. What the hell kind of planning, and thought process is that? I'll tell you what? Irresponsible, and ignorant. If you are going to do something, do it right or dont touch the damn thing. Trippling our national debt in 9 months wasnt enough, now the Dumborats want to "throw" healthcare reform together without truly knowing how much it will cost us in the long run, and who will suffer for it. Reform means to improve, if you are going to call it reform, make damn sure everyone, and I mean everyone benefits from it. Right now alot of people are going to suffer physically, and financially from this so called "reform."

Grams	Posted 22:35, 10/30/2009
speaking of blindly following the herd. . . . .

Grams	Posted 23:9, 10/30/2009
That's really funny slab. I don't give a crap who you are so why do you care who I really am? It would not change my opinion or your opinion either for that matter. All you good little sheep keep on following your leader with no questions. That is his plan.

slab

Posted 23:24, 10/30/2009

grams, who is my leader? Seriously you can do better than that. I know you try to make me seem like a good little sheep following the president, but I didn't vote for him. I know that ruins your post, but you should know by now I didn't vote for him.

And by the way, I am still upset with you over Foxx and her unemployment extension vote, or lack thereof. That thread proved to me that you, stokes, oogie and the rest are nothing but the true sheep following the herd. There is NOTHING you can say to prove otherwise as much as you'd like to try.

You should be in bed by now.

Stokes

Posted 8:49, 10/31/2009

slab, I cannnot speak for Grams, but I do not need to prove anything to you or Kate or anyone else for that matter. You guys just keep on following along. I am a fiscal conservative first, party affiliation second and no Bush was not a fiscal conservative. However the one we have now -there is not liberal enough words to describe him. He, Pelosi, and Reid are not only just putting our country in the toilet, they have flushed it. So once again, those of you that approve keep on following along and I will keep on speaking out.

OOgie	Posted 13:43, 10/31/2009
Recent information indicates that States can indeed opt-out. Great choice available, right? The part that we are not being told is that any State that opts out must still pay for the "plan" but they get no benefits. Ain't liberalism wonderful?

Car54	Posted 15:25, 10/31/2009
i think that everyone who is working at least 32-40 hours per week and the elderly and disabled should have insurance. I don't care whether it is at my expense or whomevers.

OOgie	Posted 18:1, 10/31/2009
http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/rulings/promise-broken/

slab	Posted 18:32, 10/31/2009
Oogie thanks for the link. I am going to favorite it.

slab	Posted 23:26, 10/31/2009
Ok, I agree with Grams mostly. The only unanswered problem is how to make sure the premiums are low and affordable. Would you say competition or maybe regulation like in car insurance?

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 9:10, 11/01/2009

Stokes, Thank you for articulating this.

Both your posts (one quoting Grams which original post I hadn't read and the other, I assume, simply your thoughts) make a great deal of sense and move the conversation forward. They edify me as the reader and say a great deal about your thoughts on the topic.

This is why I cannot abide the vitriolic name-calling that so many posts devolve into. They simply derail the conversation and obscure your very valid points.

OOgie	Posted 19:42, 11/01/2009
Do a tally back through the posts here. Kate is the one who singles out others by name to challenge their position. She starts it more than does anyone else. Yet she throws out the accusation of "vitriolic name calling". A real parallel to those who play the Race card to distract attention away from their baseless positions.

KateRauhauserSmith	Posted 20:12, 11/01/2009
Oogie, I single out people by name, as I just did with your name, so that people know to whom the question is directed or to which information I'm referring. How is that either equivalent to name calling or playing the race card? How am I distracting from the topic when what I'm generally doing is posting information, questioning or thanking for facts?

slab	Posted 20:58, 11/01/2009
stokes, very good regarding what you think should happen. regarding kate, I don't think I've ready many of her posts that attack. Maybe you guys can copy and post some to prove me wrong, but I think you are giving her a bad rap. Just because she is a liberal, I can tell from her writing, she is not far left. I won't name any names, but anybody want to guess who is far right?

Naomi	Posted 18:51, 11/02/2009
Kate, What else would you expect from this site?

merv	Posted 19:59, 11/02/2009
them are my favorite kinda women lol

JustAGuy

Posted 8:24, 11/05/2009

OK here is the stuff from the thread I started on the armor archive about universal healthcare...it took a while to get started...The format on Yadkin View does not handle the cut and paste very well. If you are really interested it might be a better idea to just join the the armor archive...I gotta tell ya..the politcal forum and the off topics forums are full of stuff you won't find anywhere else...especially in support of conservative stuff.

Maeryk
Objectionist

Joined: 24 Nov 2003
Posts: 38097

Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:12 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well, I can give you my experiences watching my Canadian Mother in Law navigate the system, if that helps. I have quite the _large_ family in the Great White North.
_________________
fundamentum sum super facio
http://ootwoods.livejournal.com/
Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God
Anyone using "unchivalrous" as a hammer, has already lost the argument.

Back to top

Strongbow
Archive Member

Joined: 02 Aug 2004
Posts: 6189

Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:17 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can I counter with a story about getting my insurance company to pay for claims that are OBVIOUSLY covered? Or about how my Dad's insurance denied his cancer treatment because it only had a 20% chance of success?
_________________
Michael de Bernay

aka

Strongbow

Back to top

Maeryk
Objectionist

Joined: 24 Nov 2003
Posts: 38097

Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 7:19 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Did it happen in Europe or Canada, Strongbow? Or are you just following people around yelling "THEY DID IT TOO!" just like the other guy does now?
_________________
fundamentum sum super facio
http://ootwoods.livejournal.com/
Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God
Anyone using "unchivalrous" as a hammer, has already lost the argument.

Back to top

ULTRAGOTHA
Archive Member

Joined: 30 Jan 2001
Posts: 2026
Location: Merovingia
Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 10:25 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I have been personally treated for a broken bone in my wrist in Britian, and DW was treated for some kind of weird insect bite in Denmark.

Both times we were seen promptly in the A&E ward. DW was seen in a smaller city in Denmark and was seen faster than I was in London. But even my wait time was short.

We were dealt with professionally by competant medical personnel. I had an X-ray and my wrist was immobilized in a cast with advice on follow-up for the doctor in the US who would remove my cast.

DW was examined and had antibiotics prescribed. We received directions to the nearest pharmacy.

Neither of us was charged one cent, even though we were aliens and had US-based insurance that covered the visits.

DW lost her antibiotic pills and they were re-filled without charge.

I would welcome similar health care here in the US, though I would advocate for a copay for both Emergency Room visits, prescriptions and office/outpatient visits.

Back to top

Sgt. Heinrich
Archive Member

Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 1353
Location: Kentucky
Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 10:30 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I almost died in a waiting room in Calgary, Alberta because they were so backed up. And that's not a euphemism or exaggeration, that's what the doctor who finally saw me said. Course I didn't see much of what he did because I was already unconscious by that point....

Also waited 8 hours in another Calgary hospital for a doctor to examine my (obviously) broken arm. That one was awesome.

Having said that:

My mom has a longterm condition (fibromialgia) and they did an OK job with that, except that the only speciliast in Canada had a yearlong waiting list and so my mom had to come down to the US for her initial treatments.

These are obviously anecdotes. I'm not telling them to make the whole system look bad, only to counter the view that socialized medicine is a panacea for all of the medical system's ailments.
_________________
John Adams wrote:
"In politics the middle way is none at all."

Back to top

maverick666
Archive Member

Joined: 27 Jul 2009
Posts: 319

Posted: Thu Oct 29, 2009 11:48 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

i just did a report on the health care system in the UK for my english class

they have awful dental care (around one dentist per 2000 population whereas the US has something like 6 per 2000) and about 10% of the population opts to pay for their own private care. dentists admit to just shoving people through the system that are on the public care and telling people that if they want better care they have to go private.

wait times are long for cancer tests, surgeries, etc.

their cancer survival rates are awful compared to the US

when it was instituted in the 40s they promised that efficiency would go UP and costs would go DOWN as time went on. neither of those has happened.

NICE is the govt agency that rations care and procedures. they base whether you get treatment based on the % of success and QALY (quality adjusted life years) you will live after the procedure. so if your old no treatment, or if its a low percentage success treatment you dont get it.

HOWEVER

public opinion is high they love their universal coverage. on average they live much longer than us. everyone has coverage which means children arent dying in the streets because they cant get emergency treatment. their %GDP costs of health care are HALF ours.

it is obvious that it is an excellent system and we need something similar.

Back to top

Sir Axel
Archive Member

Joined: 06 Nov 2002
Posts: 553
Location: Barony Sacred Stone, Atlantia (NC)
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 6:43 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

***bump***

Back to top

Lucius Marius Scaevola
Archive Member

Joined: 20 Jan 2008
Posts: 1525
Location: The People's Democraric Free Republic of Maryland. Leave your freedoms at the border, please.
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 7:02 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am very OK with the government insurance providing a basic standard of care, and people paying for service beyond that.

If someone wishes to provide a service, who is the government to tell them they can't?
_________________
Priests, crooks many of them. I just talk directly to whatever god I'm doing business with. Bugger the priests. --Titus Pullo HBO Rome

Back to top

Signo
Archive Member

Joined: 25 Jul 2002
Posts: 1909
Location: Italy
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 7:18 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't think we can provide you with a useful view of a system, even if we use them more or less frequently. Like anytime you meet another human, you can have a good or a awful experience. The same structure can care me at their best today and forget about me the next time I sit in the E.R. for hours.
The problems that our system face are mainly due to "waste of public money" , nepotism and corruption, area that are more affected by those problems have worse hospitals.
The other problem is that unless your doctor give you a priority, you can access to instrumental exams (X-rays, echography and so on) often only after a waiting list of months, if you can't pay to have those same exams done in a private structure.

Back to top

JT
Editor

Joined: 30 Sep 1999
Posts: 1008752
Location: Bloomington, MN, USA
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:08 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
...
I would welcome similar health care here in the US...

How much of an increase in taxes would you welcome, in order to pay for the "free" services you received?

Back to top

Maeryk
Objectionist

Joined: 24 Nov 2003
Posts: 38097

Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:19 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JT wrote:
ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
...
I would welcome similar health care here in the US...

How much of an increase in taxes would you welcome, in order to pay for the "free" services you received?

Also, where are you comfortable with the breakover being between it _truly_ being free for some (who pay no taxes to gain it) vs gouging of the successful to pay for it?
_________________
fundamentum sum super facio
http://ootwoods.livejournal.com/
Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God
Anyone using "unchivalrous" as a hammer, has already lost the argument.

Back to top

Saritor
Archive Member

Joined: 20 Dec 2004
Posts: 4638
Location: El Paso, Texas
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:32 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

maverick666 wrote:
... which means children arent dying in the streets because they cant get emergency treatment.

Uh...it's already illegal to withhold emergency medical treatment to anyone in need of it.
_________________
Fide et Amore

Back to top

ULTRAGOTHA
Archive Member

Joined: 30 Jan 2001
Posts: 2026
Location: Merovingia
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:42 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JT wrote:
ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
...
I would welcome similar health care here in the US...

How much of an increase in taxes would you welcome, in order to pay for the "free" services you received?

At least as much as I currently pay in premiums and taxes on imputed income. And probably more.

To not have to worry about losing coverage it would be worth it.

Back to top

ULTRAGOTHA
Archive Member

Joined: 30 Jan 2001
Posts: 2026
Location: Merovingia
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:48 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Maeryk wrote:
JT wrote:
ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
...
I would welcome similar health care here in the US...

How much of an increase in taxes would you welcome, in order to pay for the "free" services you received?

Also, where are you comfortable with the breakover being between it _truly_ being free for some (who pay no taxes to gain it) vs gouging of the successful to pay for it?

If we took a decent chunk of all the premiums currently paid to private health insurance companies, plus current taxes, we could have a pretty good 50+ payer system (administered by the states/districts/etc. and funded jointly by Fed and State). That would eliminate a lot of the duplicate administrative costs. (And, incidentally, probably put my own job in jeopardy.)

That isn't going to happen. But I don't think it would cost much more than it does now.

Back to top

ULTRAGOTHA
Archive Member

Joined: 30 Jan 2001
Posts: 2026
Location: Merovingia
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 8:51 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Saritor wrote:
maverick666 wrote:
... which means children arent dying in the streets because they cant get emergency treatment.

Uh...it's already illegal to withhold emergency medical treatment to anyone in need of it.

Didn't we have someone on this very board who was trying to adopt her friend's child because the friend was dying of cancer and had no way to pay for treatment?

Back to top

mordreth
Archive Member

Joined: 22 Dec 2001
Posts: 14164
Location: Levittown, NY
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:09 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lucius Marius Scaevola wrote:
I am very OK with the government insurance providing a basic standard of care, and people paying for service beyond that.

If someone wishes to provide a service, who is the government to tell them they can't?

I take it you haven't looked too closely at the regulations for Medicare?
_________________
deeds feed ravens, words feed trolls.

Back to top

Wulf
Archive Member

Joined: 14 Jan 2006
Posts: 1586
Location: Chicago
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 9:13 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
Saritor wrote:
maverick666 wrote:
... which means children arent dying in the streets because they cant get emergency treatment.

Uh...it's already illegal to withhold emergency medical treatment to anyone in need of it.

Didn't we have someone on this very board who was trying to adopt her friend's child because the friend was dying of cancer and had no way to pay for treatment?

Sorry but cancer treatment is not emergency medical treatment.
_________________
Homie don't play dat!!
BEER ME!!!!!!!!!
Remember folks farts are NOT warm and lumpy!!!

Condi Rice isn't really "black", she's a conservative.

Back to top

Hubert
Archive Member

Joined: 11 Sep 2002
Posts: 5226
Location: Denial
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:50 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Canadian system sucks major donkey balls.

There IS rationing

There are HUGE queues

There is substandard care as a result

For years good Canadian medical personnel (doctors and nurses) fled Canada for the US so they could make money since Canadian costs are capped.

Taxes are significantly higher as a result of the Canadian single payer system.

All of that is from previous experience (given that I emigrated from Canada) and current experience.

Some examples with correlations where possible (I'm leaving out a lot of other items that are probably less relevant due to age and what were likely common treatments at the time, such as dislocated kneecaps being casted, concussions being you'll be fine etc.):

Example 1

In 1985 I was stabbed in my left eye (okay okay it wasn't some cool knife fight, I was working on something and the knife slipped). My mother rushed me to CHEO (Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, I was fifteen at the time). After four hours of waiting (with liquid dripping from my eye), I was finally seen in the ER.

The "doctor" (who we found out later was an intern) took a very brief look (as of course the ER was packed), told us that I'd merely scratched my cornea and I'd be fine, come back to general admissions in three days for a follow up.

Three days later, still in agony I board the bus and go to the hospital for my follow up (after all it was just a scratched cornea right? so my mom was at work). After two hours of waiting in general admissions, the doctor (another resident I think) takes me back looks in my eye and literally runs out of the room, a bunch of people come back, throw me onto a gurney (before they tell me what happened mind you) rush me into a darkened room, call my mom of course, and tell me that I had a punctured cornea and that it was possible I would lose my eye (or rather gone blind in it, thankfully that didn't happen as the puncture was too low and in the white). I was told flat out that had proper testing been done this would have been caught. As it was I was walking around with a punctured cornea for three days, and had that puncture been higher up I probably would be blind in my left eye now as putting pressure (such as you know being upright) was causing significantly more damage.

Example 2

In 1994 as a junior in University I suffered a terrible trio in my right knee. What this means is I suffered a tear of the ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), MCL (medial collateral ligament), and LCL (lateral collateral ligament). The knee has four ligaments those three plus the PCL (posterior collateral which runs behind the knee). If anyone remembers the Willis McGahee injury when he was in college its the same injury.

I was taken to the hospital where they took dum dum dum X-rays because x-rays as we all know are the best possible thing for SOFT TISSUE injuries. Now that's all well and good as a first piece (see 2a) to validate that the bones aren't broken, this is invariably followed up in the US with an MRI as they are fairly certain there are soft tissue injuries. In Canada of course (and this was Toronto btw, the LARGEST city in Canada by far) there are so few MRI machines that getting an MRI is next to impossible. I was told by the doctors that, "nothing's broken, its a sprained knee you'll be fine in a week or so".

Needless to say I obviously wasn't fine in a week or so. Went to my regular GP, who referred me to an Orthopedic surgeon. He did the pull the front of the shin test (which given that I had one working ligament in my knee it kinda swung around like mad). Told me that it looks like I have a torn ACL, I'll need a scope to determine the extent of the damage (remember NO POSSIBLE MRI as the hospitals etc are owned by the government and thus they don't have the money to buy MRI machines). So I needed exploratory surgery to see how bad my knee was. His first opening would be the second week of MAY, that would be great if it wasn't the second week of SEPTEMBER.

So EIGHT months of hell later (since I couldn't run, any slip or slide on ice would cause my knee to buckle etc. which led to a sedentary life and of course my weight started to gain) I was wheeled into the OR for the scope. My veins tend to roll and are fairly deep, when having blood drawn the tech usually has to stick me a couple of times. This time the anasethesiologist had to stick me eight times (and started getting mad at me btw, as though his inability to hit the vein was my fault) before I was knocked out.

During the surgery the surgeon (who was decent mind you) fixed my torn MCL/LCL (which weren't complete tears thankfully), cleaned out all the torn cartilage etc. Of course being a scope, in 1994 you couldn't fix a torn ACL and that wasn't really the point of this surgery either it was to see exactly how much damage there was (he told me afterwards that he couldn't find any trace of my acl).

The scope itself wasn't too bad, which was good as there was no physiotherapy. I was told to keep off of it for a week or so and I'd be okay in a month. See him a few weeks later for a follow up etc.

At the follow up was where he told me I'd need an ACL reconstruction. I was able to get a surgery appointment shortly after my birthday which would be great if it wasn't JULY and my birthday wasn't in FEBRUARY.

So seven or so months later I finally got my ACL rebuilt. This was an iliotibial reconstruction (which was on its way out at the time, but fine and no arguments on it).

I was in a solid cast for six weeks afterwards, then they put me in a hinged cast for another six weeks, at which point I got the surgical staples out. Ever had surgical staples removed three months after they're put in? Did you know your skin grows over them? Did you know it hurts?

So I was finally out of the casts, still on crutches of course as I had absolutely no muscle tone left in my right leg. So when could I get into physio. Hmm looks like that would be a wait of FOUR MONTHS.

Thankfully I was able to get into a local college who had a sports therapy program (this of course wasn't covered under OHIP) in three weeks, so I was able to get my therapy that way.

So from the time of tearing my ligaments to being out of therapy, took from the beginning of my Junior year of University (or third year if you're Canadian and have no clue what Freshman/Sophomore/Junior/Senior mean) through graduation to having to quit therapy early because it was impacting my first post graduate job.

Example 2a (corollary)

July 5th, 2008 I was painting my office, stepped awkwardly off the step stool (cause I was too stupidly lazy to get my proper stepladder), fell, hit the paint tray and tore my acl (same ACL I tore in 1994 previously coincidentally).

First steps were the same, went to the hospital, they took x-rays to make sure nothing was broken. They then scheduled an MRI for the next day. MRI came back and said my ACL was torn.

Saw the surgeon, had surgery six weeks later (could have been sooner but six weeks fit MY schedule). Within a week I was in physio, walking fine within six weeks, kicked out of physio a few months later (cause literally there was nothing more they could do, when I was doing the stack on their leg press with my one leg etc.).

Now an insignificant part of the time can be attributed to the different types of surgeries (ITB for the first one vs. cadaverous donor for the second), but we're talking weeks not years difference.

Example 2b (to show consistency and rationing)

My mother is now 67 years old. She has torn cartilage undoubtedly in her knee and has some difficulty walking as a result. Due to her age, the doctor doesn't want to open her up even for a scope unnecessarily (understandable) and says she needs an MRI first. No worries, except that she's been on the waiting list for an MRI since she was 64. She's old, she's not dying, so its not considered an emergency need, so she's way down on the waiting list. They need to have the waiting list because there are FOUR MRI machines in Ottawa (a TINY city of over a MILLION people when you include the burbs and Hull). So anyone who tries to claim there is no rationing in the Canadian system is either clueless or flat out lying to you.

Example 3) (Drawing a corollary) Heart surgery.

We're always told that for elective surgery (you know like major knee reconstruction) that okay the Canadian system isn't great but if you have a heart attack etc its free right? Well technically that's true.

Now let's look at two scenarios, both of which are true. On the one hand we have one we all know of Animal (I hope he won't object to me using him as the example here). Animal recently underwent open heart surgery which was thankfully successful (I believe it was a multiple bypass, I hope I'm correct on that), from there he's gone into physical therapy.

Another archiver (Bob H?) had a similar in the Canadian system, had surgery and was told go home and don't die.

Now to put that in perspective that is not isolated. About four or five years ago, my uncle Terry had open heart surgery (double bypass). Had the surgery and was sent home. Saw him at Christmas and he was pulling open his shirt all the time to show off his scar (okay so he's a nutter). Again no follow up therapy. Because there isn't any.

So yes, he had heart surgery, it was successful and that's where it ended. I had no idea (nor did my relatives in Canada when I mentioned it to them), that there is physical therapy for heart patients and arthroscopic knee surgery, none of them had ever heard of such a thing (including those who have gone through the procedures).

BTW, many people in Canada carry supplemental insurance, as dental, prescriptions etc. aren't (or at least weren't when I last checked) part of your "free" governmental healthcare. Remember also that income tax brackets in Canada are significantly higher than they are in the US, not to mention the added VAT tax (what's known as the GST). Your healthcare is far far far from free, and it is vastly inferior to what we have in the US.

My average wait time in an ER in Canada was four to six hours. I have never waited longer (or been with someone at an ER) in an ER in the US than twenty minutes.

In short, when I say DO NOT WANT to public healthcare there is a reason, and it is not a reason based in "der you a racist and hates Obama!" or "right wing talking points" or some other FUD that mindless sheep who have no idea what a single payer system really means drone on about.
_________________
Hubert d'Aigues-Mortes
I'm only slightly mad, the rest of me is the king of Sweden
Knickers to You!

Last edited by Hubert on Tue Nov 03, 2009 11:08 am; edited 2 times in total

Back to top

Hubert
Archive Member

Joined: 11 Sep 2002
Posts: 5226
Location: Denial
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:54 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JT wrote:
ULTRAGOTHA wrote:
...
I would welcome similar health care here in the US...

How much of an increase in taxes would you welcome, in order to pay for the "free" services you received?

Don't be silly, taxes are for other people to pay! Reminds me of the moronic masseuse I saw the other day for my back while here in California (okay surprise surprise), who flat out told me that she wished they'd pass something for students that if they were enrolled full time in school that they didn't have to work (in her defence she was fairly young, and seemed intellectually younger than she was physically). She was flabbergasted when I mentioned that someone else would have to pay for that. That never occurred to her.
_________________
Hubert d'Aigues-Mortes
I'm only slightly mad, the rest of me is the king of Sweden
Knickers to You!

Back to top

Larmer
Archive Member

Joined: 25 Aug 2005
Posts: 320
Location: Ealdormere
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 11:09 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I will try to post more later but here is thumbnail answer.

I have lived in Canada all of my life and have various experiences with the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP*) for both myself and close family members (my ex used it a lot). Overall I am pleased with it. It is far from perfect. Too few family doctors, insufficient numbers of high end diagnostic equipment (MRI etc.) and wait lists are significant issues. Still it is nice to know that you do not need to worry about how to pay for a visit to the doctor or getting cancer or having a baby etc.

*Health care in Canada is a Provincial responsibility so the plans vary between each Province. The Federal government with broader taxing powers gives billions to each Province to pay for the plans so the Feds mandate certain rules and standards. Obviously this is an on-going issue of squabbling between the two level of governments.

Back to top

Raeven
Archive Member

Joined: 03 Jul 2005
Posts: 2276
Location: Ozark, Alabama
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 12:32 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Strongbow wrote:
Can I counter with a story about getting my insurance company to pay for claims that are OBVIOUSLY covered? Or about how my Dad's insurance denied his cancer treatment because it only had a 20% chance of success?

Can we counter with the statistics that Cancer survival rates are better in the U.S. than nearly anywhere else? Btw, what insurance are you and your dad under?

I'll give on one thing. Insurance rates are outpacing COL increases. That is something that needs reform. I can't see going with a system that has failed everytime it has been tried in the states as reform though.
_________________
Mordreth wrote:
Beating yourself to death with a bat would show a level of determination and resolve that any samurai would have to admire.

Back to top

Raeven
Archive Member

Joined: 03 Jul 2005
Posts: 2276
Location: Ozark, Alabama
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 12:33 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Larmer wrote:
Still it is nice to know that you do not need to worry about how to pay for a visit to the doctor or getting cancer or having a baby etc.

You are still paying for it, you know that right? Far more than anyone in the U.S. is actually paying for health insurance over the same lifetime.

In the 15 years I've been in the work force I have paid an average of about 5-7% of my income towards insurance. That's just MY income, not my wifes (if she is working). Right now that runs about 3-4 thousand a year, give or take major illness that requires hospital stays. Over my lifetime, I'll probably spend anywhere from 100k to 200k to keep my family healthy. The result, I get health care pretty much on demand. I might have to wait 45 minutes for a regular doctors appointment, but I've never fallen out of the queue in ER triage, or seen anyone fall out of it in the many visits I've made to ER's.

Canadians, on the otherhand, pay an extra 10-20% a year *per person* in taxes to cover health care, which is "free" and doesn't include the price of your supplemental insurance (which we both have to certain degrees). You have huge waiting periods and sub standard care, for 100-500% of the price tag we pay.

Isn't that a problem?
_________________
Mordreth wrote:
Beating yourself to death with a bat would show a level of determination and resolve that any samurai would have to admire.

Back to top

JT
Editor

Joined: 30 Sep 1999
Posts: 1008752
Location: Bloomington, MN, USA
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 1:20 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Raeven wrote:
In the 15 years I've been in the work force I have paid an average of about 5-7% of my income towards insurance.

Is that what you have paid, or is that the total cost paid by you plus your employer (paying it as a non-taxed benefit)?

Back to top

Raeven
Archive Member

Joined: 03 Jul 2005
Posts: 2276
Location: Ozark, Alabama
Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 1:40 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

JT wrote:
Raeven wrote:
In the 15 years I've been in the work force I have paid an average of about 5-7% of my income towards insurance.

Is that what you have paid, or is that the total cost paid by you plus your employer (paying it as a non-taxed benefit)?

What *I* have paid. When I was not employed by someone who would insure me, I had to find a private plan. The plans are crap, but you can find plans that mainly give you big ticket emergency coverage for about the same you'd pay while insured by an employer.
_________________
Mordreth wrote:
Beating yourself to death with a bat would show a level of determination and resolve that any samurai would have to admire.

Back to top

Larmer
Archive Member

Joined: 25 Aug 2005
Posts: 320
Location: Ealdormere
Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 11:20 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Raeven wrote:
Larmer wrote:
Still it is nice to know that you do not need to worry about how to pay for a visit to the doctor or getting cancer or having a baby etc.

You are still paying for it, you know that right? Far more than anyone in the U.S. is actually paying for health insurance over the same lifetime.

In the 15 years I've been in the work force I have paid an average of about 5-7% of my income towards insurance. That's just MY income, not my wifes (if she is working). Right now that runs about 3-4 thousand a year, give or take major illness that requires hospital stays. Over my lifetime, I'll probably spend anywhere from 100k to 200k to keep my family healthy. The result, I get health care pretty much on demand. I might have to wait 45 minutes for a regular doctors appointment, but I've never fallen out of the queue in ER triage, or seen anyone fall out of it in the many visits I've made to ER's.

Canadians, on the otherhand, pay an extra 10-20% a year *per person* in taxes to cover health care, which is "free" and doesn't include the price of your supplemental insurance (which we both have to certain degrees). You have huge waiting periods and sub standard care, for 100-500% of the price tag we pay.

Isn't that a problem?

I am well aware that my medical care that is provided through OHIP is paid through my taxes and the taxes of fellow citizens and businesses. Note my earlier comment on the effect this has on 'sin' taxes. So my medical fee is buried in my taxes. How that stacks up to your user pay annual fees and co-pays I do not know. No doubt research has made a comparison but I have no interest in looking into that. I would rather fix my armour.

I am not prepared to debate the Cdn system versus the American system. It is not what was asked in the question. I do not have time for such a debate nor is it my place to debate it. That conversation needs to held amongst your citizens.

I would like to clarify a few points though. I have waited more than once in Pennsylvania ERs for well over an hour. I have experienced similar waits in Ontario ERs. I have has waits of zero minutes in ERs in Oregon and similar experiences in Ontario even on a Saturday night. In my experience it comes down to the timing of your visit and triage. ER wait times are an issue in Ontario. They have been partially eased by Tele-health Ontario (RNs on a toll free line to answer questions which I have found very helpful) and the growth of after hour clinics.

Back to top

Larmer
Archive Member

Joined: 25 Aug 2005
Posts: 320
Location: Ealdormere
Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 11:23 am Post subject: Re: A Question to the Europeans and Canadians about healthca

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sir Axel wrote:
As youall probably know...there is a standup knockdown drag out battle going on over here in the US about national healthcare. I have not seen an easily identifiable thread discussing European and Canadian healthcare pros and cons by Europeans and Canadians themselves. We Americans seem to know all about either how great the service it provides is, or how bad the service it provides is because, at least in my case, we have been told on the web by other Americans who know somebody who knows somebody who has dealt with European or Canadian healthcare. So I thought it might be a good idea to go to the source and ask Europeans and Canadian themselves what they think of their Healthcare system. I know I was treated very well by the German Healthcare system when I was over there...but in my case it was an American Healthcare system dealing with the German healthcare system...so my treatment might not have been the same as a German going thru the German system.

So can you Europeans and Canadians on the board let me know if you think your system is good, adequate, sucks...etc.

Thanx,
Axel

Sir Axel I suggest you watch this You Tube video put together by Canadian Medical Professionals who support our national medical system. It is one well put together POV. Not all medical personal support our system and many have complaints about the details (like my GP).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXXBCFnhsUc

Back to top

brunoG
Archive Member

Joined: 29 Jan 2006
Posts: 1274
Location: Padania (waking up from slumber)
Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 12:13 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Italy is not consistent in health care as teh South is ruled by mafia, so much that southerners flock to our hospitals to get proper health care.

First of all, in the North it is efficient, it is rather fast, excluding ER in small hospitals, but still patients must sustain part of the cost for medical analysis and some therapies.

I'm reasonably satisfied, once I got a chip under an eyelid from a grinder, I was treated fairly well, swiftly and by a competent team.

For that time I paid nothing. However, more than half of my stipend goes into taxes, and most of the taxes are used for financing healthcare and pensions.

This is true for every enterprise, so much that as of today very few people dare to open new ones, as taxes are very high.

As I wrote alreday on this board, public health care is still a big social cost, as what you get apprently for free is actually well paid.

The high taxation of enterprises also damages social mobility as they tend to pay less workers because of this, reinforcing the idea that what is apparently free is actually not such.

Back to top

Stump
Archive Member

Joined: 23 Sep 2000
Posts: 4487
Location: End of the road, last house on the right, West Virginia.
Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 12:30 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hubert wrote:
The Canadian system sucks major donkey balls.

There IS rationing

There are HUGE queues

There is substandard care as a result

For years good Canadian medical personnel (doctors and nurses) fled Canada for the US so they could make money since Canadian costs are capped.

Taxes are significantly higher as a result of the Canadian single payer system.

All of that is from previous experience (given that I emigrated from Canada) and current experience.

Some examples with correlations where possible (I'm leaving out a lot of other items that are probably less relevant due to age and what were likely common treatments at the time, such as dislocated kneecaps being casted, concussions being you'll be fine etc.):

Example 1

In 1985 I was stabbed in my left eye (okay okay it wasn't some cool knife fight, I was working on something and the knife slipped). My mother rushed me to CHEO (Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, I was fifteen at the time). After four hours of waiting (with liquid dripping from my eye), I was finally seen in the ER.

The "doctor" (who we found out later was an intern) took a very brief look (as of course the ER was packed), told us that I'd merely scratched my cornea and I'd be fine, come back to general admissions in three days for a follow up.

Three days later, still in agony I board the bus and go to the hospital for my follow up (after all it was just a scratched cornea right? so my mom was at work). After two hours of waiting in general admissions, the doctor (another resident I think) takes me back looks in my eye and literally runs out of the room, a bunch of people come back, throw me onto a gurney (before they tell me what happened mind you) rush me into a darkened room, call my mom of course, and tell me that I had a punctured cornea and that it was possible I would lose my eye (or rather gone blind in it, thankfully that didn't happen as the puncture was too low and in the white). I was told flat out that had proper testing been done this would have been caught. As it was I was walking around with a punctured cornea for three days, and had that puncture been higher up I probably would be blind in my left eye now as putting pressure (such as you know being upright) was causing significantly more damage.

Example 2

In 1994 as a junior in University I suffered a terrible trio in my right knee. What this means is I suffered a tear of the ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), MCL (medial collateral ligament), and LCL (lateral collateral ligament). The knee has four ligaments those three plus the PCL (posterior collateral which runs behind the knee). If anyone remembers the Willis McGahee injury when he was in college its the same injury.

I was taken to the hospital where they took dum dum dum X-rays because x-rays as we all know are the best possible thing for SOFT TISSUE injuries. Now that's all well and good as a first piece (see 2a) to validate that the bones aren't broken, this is invariably followed up in the US with an MRI as they are fairly certain there are soft tissue injuries. In Canada of course (and this was Toronto btw, the LARGEST city in Canada by far) there are so few MRI machines that getting an MRI is next to impossible. I was told by the doctors that, "nothing's broken, its a sprained knee you'll be fine in a week or so".

Needless to say I obviously wasn't fine in a week or so. Went to my regular GP, who referred me to an Orthopedic surgeon. He did the pull the front of the shin test (which given that I had one working ligament in my knee it kinda swung around like mad). Told me that it looks like I have a torn ACL, I'll need a scope to determine the extent of the damage (remember NO POSSIBLE MRI as the hospitals etc are owned by the government and thus they don't have the money to buy MRI machines). So I needed exploratory surgery to see how bad my knee was. His first opening would be the second week of MAY, that would be great if it wasn't the second week of SEPTEMBER.

So EIGHT months of hell later (since I couldn't run, any slip or slide on ice would cause my knee to buckle etc. which led to a sedentary life and of course my weight started to gain) I was wheeled into the OR for the scope. My veins tend to roll and are fairly deep, when having blood drawn the tech usually has to stick me a couple of times. This time the anasethesiologist had to stick me eight times (and started getting mad at me btw, as though his inability to hit the vein was my fault) before I was knocked out.

During the surgery the surgeon (who was decent mind you) fixed my torn MCL/LCL (which weren't complete tears thankfully), cleaned out all the torn cartilage etc. Of course being a scope, in 1994 you couldn't fix a torn ACL and that wasn't really the point of this surgery either it was to see exactly how much damage there was (he told me afterwards that he couldn't find any trace of my acl).

The scope itself wasn't too bad, which was good as there was no physiotherapy. I was told to keep off of it for a week or so and I'd be okay in a month. See him a few weeks later for a follow up etc.

At the follow up was where he told me I'd need an ACL reconstruction. I was able to get a surgery appointment shortly after my birthday which would be great if it wasn't JULY and my birthday wasn't in FEBRUARY.

So seven or so months later I finally got my ACL rebuilt. This was an iliotibial reconstruction (which was on its way out at the time, but fine and no arguments on it).

I was in a solid cast for six weeks afterwards, then they put me in a hinged cast for another six weeks, at which point I got the surgical staples out. Ever had surgical staples removed three months after they're put in? Did you know your skin grows over them? Did you know it hurts?

So I was finally out of the casts, still on crutches of course as I had absolutely no muscle tone left in my right leg. So when could I get into physio. Hmm looks like that would be a wait of FOUR MONTHS.

Thankfully I was able to get into a local college who had a sports therapy program (this of course wasn't covered under OHIP) in three weeks, so I was able to get my therapy that way.

So from the time of tearing my ligaments to being out of therapy, took from the beginning of my Junior year of University (or third year if you're Canadian and have no clue what Freshman/Sophomore/Junior/Senior mean) through graduation to having to quit therapy early because it was impacting my first post graduate job.

Example 2a (corollary)

July 5th, 2008 I was painting my office, stepped awkwardly off the step stool (cause I was too stupidly lazy to get my proper stepladder), fell, hit the paint tray and tore my acl (same ACL I tore in 1994 previously coincidentally).

First steps were the same, went to the hospital, they took x-rays to make sure nothing was broken. They then scheduled an MRI for the next day. MRI came back and said my ACL was torn.

Saw the surgeon, had surgery six weeks later (could have been sooner but six weeks fit MY schedule). Within a week I was in physio, walking fine within six weeks, kicked out of physio a few months later (cause literally there was nothing more they could do, when I was doing the stack on their leg press with my one leg etc.).

Now an insignificant part of the time can be attributed to the different types of surgeries (ITB for the first one vs. cadaverous donor for the second), but we're talking weeks not years difference.

Example 2b (to show consistency and rationing)

My mother is now 67 years old. She has torn cartilage undoubtedly in her knee and has some difficulty walking as a result. Due to her age, the doctor doesn't want to open her up even for a scope unnecessarily (understandable) and says she needs an MRI first. No worries, except that she's been on the waiting list for an MRI since she was 64. She's old, she's not dying, so its not considered an emergency need, so she's way down on the waiting list. They need to have the waiting list because there are FOUR MRI machines in Ottawa (a TINY city of over a MILLION people when you include the burbs and Hull). So anyone who tries to claim there is no rationing in the Canadian system is either clueless or flat out lying to you.

Example 3) (Drawing a corollary) Heart surgery.

We're always told that for elective surgery (you know like major knee reconstruction) that okay the Canadian system isn't great but if you have a heart attack etc its free right? Well technically that's true.

Now let's look at two scenarios, both of which are true. On the one hand we have one we all know of Animal (I hope he won't object to me using him as the example here). Animal recently underwent open heart surgery which was thankfully successful (I believe it was a multiple bypass, I hope I'm correct on that), from there he's gone into physical therapy.

Another archiver (Bob H?) had a similar in the Canadian system, had surgery and was told go home and don't die.

Now to put that in perspective that is not isolated. About four or five years ago, my uncle Terry had open heart surgery (double bypass). Had the surgery and was sent home. Saw him at Christmas and he was pulling open his shirt all the time to show off his scar (okay so he's a nutter). Again no follow up therapy. Because there isn't any.

So yes, he had heart surgery, it was successful and that's where it ended. I had no idea (nor did my relatives in Canada when I mentioned it to them), that there is physical therapy for heart patients and arthroscopic knee surgery, none of them had ever heard of such a thing (including those who have gone through the procedures).

BTW, many people in Canada carry supplemental insurance, as dental, prescriptions etc. aren't (or at least weren't when I last checked) part of your "free" governmental healthcare. Remember also that income tax brackets in Canada are significantly higher than they are in the US, not to mention the added VAT tax (what's known as the GST). Your healthcare is far far far from free, and it is vastly inferior to what we have in the US.

My average wait time in an ER in Canada was four to six hours. I have never waited longer (or been with someone at an ER) in an ER in the US than twenty minutes.

In short, when I say DO NOT WANT to public healthcare there is a reason, and it is not a reason based in "der you a racist and hates Obama!" or "right wing talking points" or some other FUD that mindless sheep who have no idea what a single payer system really means drone on about.

This is a Very good post! Thank You Sir.
_________________
bad, and counter-revolutionary...with sparklies

Back to top

_Gideon
Archive Member

Joined: 22 Dec 2005
Posts: 1108

Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 12:36 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

brunoG wrote:

The high taxation of enterprises also damages social mobility as they tend to pay less workers because of this, reinforcing the idea that what is apparently free is actually not such.

TANSTAAFL

Should be posted at the entrance to every public building.
_________________
"I bark at no man's bid. I will never come and go, and fetch and carry, at the whistle of the great man in the White House no matter who he is." Davy Crocket

Back to top

Alan Frize
Archive Member

Joined: 23 Feb 2006
Posts: 247
Location: Perthshire
Posted: Thu Nov 05, 2009 12:26 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

maverick666 wrote:
i just did a report on the health care system in the UK for my english class

they have awful dental care (around one dentist per 2000 population whereas the US has something like 6 per 2000) and about 10% of the population opts to pay for their own private care. dentists admit to just shoving people through the system that are on the public care and telling people that if they want better care they have to go private.

wait times are long for cancer tests, surgeries, etc.

their cancer survival rates are awful compared to the US

when it was instituted in the 40s they promised that efficiency would go UP and costs would go DOWN as time went on. neither of those has happened.

NICE is the govt agency that rations care and procedures. they base whether you get treatment based on the % of success and QALY (quality adjusted life years) you will live after the procedure. so if your old no treatment, or if its a low percentage success treatment you dont get it.

HOWEVER

public opinion is high they love their universal coverage. on average they live much longer than us. everyone has coverage which means children arent dying in the streets because they cant get emergency treatment. their %GDP costs of health care are HALF ours.

it is obvious that it is an excellent system and we need something similar.

Not all of that is strictly true: It depends a lot upon where you live in the UK. For example, Scotland has lower waiting lists than England, although at the same time has a higher rate of cancer than anywhere else in Europe. Northern Ireland used to have dreadful waiting lists, but there's been cross-party support for the NHS which has seen them fall.

Cancer rates in Britain are bad, although that has more to do with one of the worst diets in Europe, it's been estimated that the diet that civilians had in WWII was actually better than the one that exists now!

Dental care is a mixed bag - some areas will have excellent dental care, the problem with it is that it was never originally intended to be part of the NHS, it was to be private with only some dental operations carried out by NHS surgeons. Although it is part of the NHS, the only people who get free NHS dental care are the unemployed and those under 18, the rest of us have to pay. It's not something I'm particularly happy about, not so long ago I had to have an abcess operated on and an emergency appointment cost me �25. That said, I can get a same-day appointment through the NHS.

The biggest problem the NHS has always faced is funding: Some political parties will pour money into it, the trouble is that this usually means that somewhere else (defence or education) loses money. Other parties will try and sell it off (like the Tories in the 1980's) with the end result that the hospitals end up losing out and the politicans make more cash....
_________________
I re-enact therefore I am

Back to top

Raeven
Archive Member

Joined: 03 Jul 2005
Posts: 2276
Location: Ozark, Alabama
Posted: Thu Nov 05, 2009 3:47 am Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Larmer wrote:
It is not what was asked in the question. I do not have time for such a debate nor is it my place to debate it. That conversation needs to held amongst your citizens.

No problem. You're response just gave me an opportunity to make the point I did.

Quote:
I would like to clarify a few points though. I have waited more than once in Pennsylvania ERs for well over an hour. I have experienced similar waits in Ontario ERs. I have has waits of zero minutes in ERs in Oregon and similar experiences in Ontario even on a Saturday night. In my experience it comes down to the timing of your visit and triage. ER wait times are an issue in Ontario. They have been partially eased by Tele-health Ontario (RNs on a toll free line to answer questions which I have found very helpful) and the growth of after hour clinics.

ER wait times mean little, unless you are high on the triage list. I've waited 6 hours in an ER to get stitches once because a young girl was touch and go from an allergic reaction and the Resident was busy. It's what triage is for. Now, if that girl had to wait because there weren't enough doctors or equipment and her situation worsened because of it, that's a failing of the hospital.
_________________
Mordreth wrote:
Beating yourself to death with a bat would show a level of determination and resolve that any samurai would have to admire.

Back to top

Display posts from previous: All Posts1 Day7 Days2 Weeks1 Month3 Months6 Months1 Year Oldest FirstNewest First View previous topic :: View next topic

All times are GMT - 6 Hours

Page 1 of 1
Watch this topic for replies

Jump to: Select a forum Making It----------------Armour - Design and ConstructionArmour: I want to be a...Classifieds / Want AdsArmour of the Month Living It----------------Historical ResearchInterpretive Re-creationPhilosophy of ChivalryMedieval Combat and WeaponsMelee Combat TacticsThe Warrior EthosAsk Duke Paul Registered User Area----------------Meet And GreetOff Topic PostsPolitical Conversations

You can post new topics in this forum
You can reply to topics in this forum
You can edit your posts in this forum
You can delete your posts in this forum
You can vote in polls in this forum

[ Chat | Patterns | Essays | Archive-FAQ | Archive Search | What's New? ]

Contact an Admin

Powered by phpBB � 2001, 2005 phpBB Group

fiesta pantalones	Posted 10:30, 11/05/2009
JustAGuy - Thanks for that. It was an interesting read.

OOgie

Posted 17:19, 11/07/2009

The Health Care Disaster in Canada: "After more than a decade of public health care with mandatory coverage, so many Canadian doctors have left the practice and so many young people have entered other fields that Canada ranks 26th of 28 developed nations in its ratio of physicians to population. Once, Canada ranked among the leaders in the number of physicians � but that was before government health care drove doctors out of the practice in droves.
The fundamental fact is that we cannot cover 36 million new patients without more doctors and nurses, much less with the declining census of medical professionals the Canadian experience points to.
A recent survey of doctors by the Pew Institute found that 45 percent of all practicing doctors would consider retiring or closing their practices if the Barack Obama health care bill passes. This scarcity of medical personnel heightens the likelihood of draconian rationing, lengthy waiting lists and lower quality medical care for all of us, particularly for the elderly.
This physician shortage leads to massive and never-ending waiting lists. In 1993, for example, there was an average wait of 9.3 weeks from the time a patient got a referral from a general practitioner to the time he could see a specialist in Canada. By 1997, the wait was up to 11.7 weeks. Now it's 17.3 weeks � over four months just to see a specialist!
In Canada, unions control the entire health care process. In Manitoba, for example, there is an eight-month wait for colonoscopies, yet the unions do not permit weekend or evening procedures, thereby extending the waiting lists.
The unions are doing to health care in Canada what they have done to education (The NEA!) in America � stifling creativity, reinforcing bureaucracy and extending waiting times.
Because of these long waits for colonoscopies, there is now a 25 percent higher incidence of colon cancer in Canada than in the United States. And, because the leading drugs that we routinely use to treat the malady in the U.S. are banned in Canada because of their high cost, 41 percent of Canadians who get the cancer die of it, compared with only 32 percent in the United States. Overall, the cancer death rate in Canada runs 16 percent higher than in the United States. Cancer does not wait for waiting lists to clear.
The potential of health care changes to shrink the doctor population, exacerbating scarcity and extending waits, is even worse now that it is apparent that we have overestimated the number of doctors in the U.S. Where we once thought there were 840,000 doctors, the total is now estimated to be only 760,000.
The proposed $400 billion cut in Medicare raises the probability that more and more of those doctors who do practice will refuse to accept Medicare patients, aggravating the doctor shortage among the elderly, the population that needs them the most.
As Obama's program moves through Congress, despite the fierce opposition of a majority of American voters in virtually all the polls, it becomes clear that those moderates who vote for it will face harsh retribution at the polls from their outraged constituents. A kind of suicide-pact mentality is gripping the Democratic majorities in Congress, akin to that which came over it when Congress passed President Clinton's tax package in 1993.
This disregard for the will of the marginal voter may make sense for those representatives who come from safe districts � it makes none for those who come from swing districts. For them, suicidal conduct leads to political demise."
By Dick Morris & Eileen Mc Gann

lost

Posted 19:22, 11/08/2009

Washington 'Shall' Control Your Healthcare

By David Harsanyi

The King James version of the Bible runs more than 600 pages and is crammed with celestial regulations. Newton's Principia Mathematica distilled many of the rules of physics in a mere 974 pages.

Neither have anything on Nancy Pelosi's new fiendishly entertaining health-care opus, which tops 1,900 pages.

Health care

So curl up by a fire with a fifth of whiskey and just dive in.

But drink quickly. In the new world, your insurance choices will be tethered to decisions made by people with Orwellian titles ("1984" was only 268 pages!) like the "Health Choices Commissioner" or "Inspector General for the Health Choices Administration."

You will, of course, need to be plastered to buy Pelosi's fantastical proposition that 450,000 words of new regulations, rules, mandates, penalties, price controls, taxes and bureaucracy will have the transformative power to "provide affordable, quality health care for all Americans and reduce the growth in health care spending . . . ."

It's going to take some time to deconstruct this lengthy masterpiece, but as you flip through the pages of the House bill, you will notice the word "regulation" appears 181 times. "Tax" is there 214 times. "Fees," 103 times. As we all know, nothing says "affordability" like higher taxes and fees.

The word "shall" - as in "must" or "required to" - appears over 3,000 times. The word, alas, is never preceded by the patriotic phrase "mind our own freaking business." Not once.

To vote for the bill, a legislator must believe a $1 trillion price tag is "revenue neutral," or that it alleviates any of the pain higher costs bring to the average American. This would require alcohol.

Real competition, as far as anyone can tell, is antithetical to the authors of this bill. Remember, you can purchase oranges from Florida and whiskey from Kentucky, yet you're prohibited from buying health insurance from anywhere outside your state . . . so sayeth Nancy Pelosi.

Instead of creating a new market with interstate trade, what we get is the institution of the pleasant-sounding "Health Insurance Exchange," which exists, it seems, only to accommodate a non-competitive, government-run insurance option.

Now, finding a name for a state-run program without offending the lingering capitalistic sensibilities of bourgeoisie has been problematic. So Pelosi went with the innocuous "consumer option" - known for a fleeting moment as the "competitive option" and popularly as the "public option." Whatever your preference is, it's the option that leads to a single-payer insurance program.

Democrats say we can save billions by funding a plan that uses billions of wasted tax dollars from another public plan that we already supplement with billions. Make sense?

In actuality, we pay for all this by "cost sharing," or "sharing the cost" of insuring everyone through higher prices and taxes. But no fear. The legislation taxes "the rich." The bill doesn't index the tax to inflation so more of you will be on the hook as inflation rises due to the tragically irresponsible behavior of Congress and the White House. The rich - many of them small-business owners - are already set to see their rates go up in 2010.

Hey, who needs those jerks to create real jobs when we have Washington pretending to do it?

All of this, as Madame Speaker says, constitutes a "a historic moment for our nation and families." True. No legislation in modern American history compares when in comes to injecting itself into the everyday decisions of the citizen.

And few can compete with its deception. The bill's intentions are cloaked in euphemisms and it is teeming with ulterior motives, all cobbled together in closed-door meetings where industry payoffs are offered using taxpayer dollars to facilitate a power grab of unprecedented cost.

All of it, rolled right into a neat 1,900 pages.

FED UP	Posted 6:15, 11/09/2009
Thanks for lettin' us know that, walks....er, I mean God.

Stokes	Posted 9:42, 11/09/2009
39 democrats voted no to Pelosi's destructive plan. That says everything. There will some of those that voted yes that won't be there to cast a vote after 2010.

walks the talk	Posted 4:7, 11/10/2009
Hey, Friends of pelosi: Have you told your children and grandchildren what they already owe on the national debt? Or do you prefer to ignore that little tidbit?

Stokes	Posted 9:22, 11/10/2009
FU, why are you lying to walks???

FED UP	Posted 10:21, 11/10/2009
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html

KateRauhauserSmith	Posted 10:50, 11/10/2009
O, glory days, Fed Up. I love you, man! =oD Thanks for digging up clearly stated documentation for what some of us have known for years. And that last line? ~high five~

FED UP

Posted 11:40, 11/10/2009

party britches...I understand what I'm reading...and, so do you, admit it or not.
And your references to sheep and ditto heads is ironic, since yours is the party of same, along with the Beckerheads.
"History revision"? Isn't that what republicans have been doing for years? Even blaming the Great Depression on FDR instead of Herbert Hoover? And now even going so far as claiming George W Bush has an IQ higher than a empty mailbox?
Thanks, Kate. I have read and admired your posts with interest for a while now. You have some really good points, but, if you'll take my advise, you're wasting your time arguing with these people. I've been on this site for a couple of years now, and I have learned a valuable lesson, and, here it is. YOU CAN'T DEBATE PEOPLE WHO BELIEVE THE EARTH IS ONLY 6,000 YEARS OLD AND ADAM AND EVE RODE TO CHURCH ON A DINASAUR.

OOgie	Posted 12:35, 11/10/2009
And this is not supposed to take effect until 2013. Why not permit a week for study prior to a vote? In 2009? What is a week out of 3+ years? This thing smells like a scam.

earl	Posted 13:21, 11/10/2009
FED UP calm down an ass is the symbol of demoncrats and libby's like you..

earl	Posted 13:52, 11/10/2009
fiesta pantalones....FED UP is from Surry County..you know where they are born democrats..most of us call it incest!!!!!

commonsense	Posted 14:51, 11/10/2009
fiesta, That is interesting you claim to have such a high IQ. You are the same person that posted on another topic that you believe most animals have the ability to speak. Please don't expect us to think you have an IQ higher than the average five year old child with such a claim as animals having the ability to talk to us.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 15:38, 11/10/2009
Even better yet....Show me where what I said is wrong. That would actually make you look somewhat relevant rather than just pathetic with your diversions.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 16:1, 11/10/2009
LOL - I went back and actually looked at that zfact site that Rushed Up referenced. What a joke. Why don't you just reference Kayne West as a resource? Another great thing I noticed is that chart only graphs the debt up to Feb 27, 2009. That is very fortunate. It sure would look bad to see what Obama ran up during his spending spree. It wouldn't fit too well in a left wing dittohead site.

commonsense	Posted 17:6, 11/10/2009
fiesta, Why don't you check what you posted on 8/10/2009 at 13:47 where you said you believed talking animals to be common once. So how am I mistaken now on what you said? I hope your IQ is higher than your honesty.

FED UP

Posted 18:39, 11/10/2009

fiesta..what was it we got out of the spending of the republicans? Two wars and a collapsing economy?
And, what terrorist attack since 9/11? Are you talking about the army Major at Fort Hood? I knew it wouldn't take long for that line of attack to take root, even though anyone not a dittohead would not compare actual terrorists crashing 2 planes into buildings, after much planing, to a nutcase with 2 handguns. Let's see, now, since Little George was in charge on 9/11, but somehow it was Clinton's fault, how come this attack is not Bush's fault, if you want to call it a terrorist attack?
BTW, is it still treason to criticize a President during war time or was that just when it's a republican President?

fiesta pantalones	Posted 19:12, 11/10/2009
Rushed Up - Now what to you think about the crackhead spending spree our current President is going on? I answered you so please answer me. I showed you where he jacked up the debt 8 times faster than Bush!!! (He raised it the same percentage amount in less then 1 year than Bush did in 8, while fighting a successful war on terror) Don't hide behind the winger site. Please give your opinion.

commonsense	Posted 21:26, 11/10/2009
fiesta, You can tip-toe around it all you want. First you denied saying it. Then you say that is not what you meant when there is proof you said something so stupid. Fiesta you are a LIAR and no one should take you serious.

walks the talk	Posted 2:32, 11/11/2009
fiesta: "Reagan/Bush..about 35% increase vs GDP in 12 years W. Bush......about 20% increase vs GDP in 8 years Obama.....about 18% increase vs GDP in 11 MONTHS! Thank you very much. Or as liberals say, 'high five'.

JustAGuy

Posted 9:24, 11/11/2009

Walks, if we Libs go start are own site, all we would have is a site with no Conservatives, just liberals preaching to the choir. We are not looking for a site full of �Wild-Eyed botox Pelosi" supporters and �Obamamessiah shiverers� reinforcing their own over the top world view, and further polarizing the liberal point of view for less liberal members of the site. You know much like what, what might happen here if most of the liberals left, and all that was left was a bunch of moderate conservatives being fed an over the top world view by Cheney Neo-Fascists and, conservative supporters of Bush style McCarthyism. We Liberals are here, in my opinion, to provide a sanity check when the rhetoric goes over the top. While most of what we say will fall on deaf ears as the starting point of the world view of many conservatives on this board is so different than many lierals, every once and a while some aspect of our point of view will make sense and maybe the wide gap between our points of view will narrow just a little, just like every so often youall say something that moves our opinion a little further to the right on a specific subject.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 9:32, 11/11/2009
JustAGuy - That is what makes this site interesting. Some of my opinions have changed since joining here. Some peoples mind is so narrow there isn't room for it move left or right.

OOgie	Posted 11:22, 11/11/2009
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oUx0S6Foss

infoguy	Posted 11:53, 11/13/2009
The Whole Story!!! RNC to opt out of abortion coverage http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29456.html

commonsense	Posted 12:50, 11/13/2009
Fiesta, Where are you at on this one. I figured since you need to have the last word on everything you have jumped in by now with your superior intelligence and showed me where I was wrong. I would think you could tell us people of just average smarts how the words in that article mean something different than we read.

snoopy	Posted 20:2, 11/13/2009
Besty...commonsenseless is like most liberals..they think that everybody's money is their money and their business!!!!!

walks the talk

Posted 2:0, 11/14/2009

Where is the constitutional authority for a federal mandate that individuals
must buy health insurance?

Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat in red-state Nebraska, pleaded the Fifth: "Well, you
know, uh, uh, I don't know that I'm a constitutional scholar, so, I, I'm not
going to be able to answer that question."

Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI) likewise dodged the question, saying, "I'm not aware of
[any constitutional authority], let me put it that way. But what we're trying to
do is to provide for people who have needs and that's where the accessibility
comes in, and one of the goals that we're trying to present here is to make it
accessible." Right. "Provide" for them by mandating they do something under
penalty of massive fines and/or imprisonment -- that's leftist "compassion" for
you.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) answered, "The United States Congress passed laws
regarding Medicare and Medicaid that became de facto mandatory programs. States
all the time require people to have driver's licenses. I think that this is a
bit of a spurious argument that's being made by some folks." Uh, states require
licenses only for the privilege of driving.

Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), a member of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions
Committee -- one of two committees that wrote and approved health care
legislation -- pointed to precedent as justification: "Let me see. I would have
to check the specific sections, so I'll have to get back to you on the specific
section, but it is not unusual that the Congress has required individuals to do
things, like sign up for the draft, uh, uh, and do many other things too, which
I don't think are explicitly contained [in the Constitution]. It gives Congress
a right to raise an army, but it doesn't say you can take people and draft them,
uh, but since that was something necessary for the functioning of the government
over the past several years, the practice on the books, it's been recognized,
the authority to do that." So because Congress has acted unconstitutionally
before, they can do it again now? Our guess is he understands health care about
as well as he comprehends the Constitution.

nocommonsense(D-State of Looney):
"I love playing the game of 'STUPID" because I always win."

slab	Posted 7:34, 11/14/2009
Regarding a requirement to purchase health insurance - I am not sure how I feel about that either. I think it is a tax really, even though Obama doesn't want to admit it. Is Social Security and medicare taxes a mandate? Is it in the constitution? So that is how I see this healthcare requirement.

commonsense	Posted 12:26, 11/14/2009
Slab, I know how group insurance packages are setup. I also know people read them and find out what the coverage is. It's imposible to believe no one looked at the policy for eighteen years. They only became so called "outraged" about it when in became known by the media.

slab	Posted 13:36, 11/14/2009
common - I guess because I have dealt with people everyday regarding insurance I know that nobody knows what the he** is covered or not. I can see how it was overlooked. I don't see this as a big deal, even though I do think both parties are hypocritical all the time.

commonsense	Posted 18:52, 11/14/2009
Slab, another thing, if I didn't have personal knowledge of the way insurance companies operate behind the scenes I might not have such a poor opinion of them. I know how crooked they are and how they control the republican party.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 19:47, 11/14/2009
infoguy - It is common knowledge. Just like Haliburton controls the democrat party since Clinton awarded them no bid contracts.

Betsy	Posted 20:45, 11/14/2009
commonsense, the point IS ABOUT THE MONEY! It is about tax dollars paying for abortion in a universal healthcare plan. Pro life does not mean just republican. Being pro life does not address what is in an insurance policy. You have continued to insult my opinion so KMA, you idiot.

snoopy	Posted 21:14, 11/14/2009
commonsense...I believe you will find this very interesting reading in light of your earlier posts on this thread.. http://www.democracynow.org/2009/6/16/report_senator_max_baucus_received_more

commonsense

Posted 21:18, 11/14/2009

Betsy, Why do you keep saying it is ABOUT THE MONEY. Show me anywhere in what I posted where I was trying to make the point about money. I don't care if tax dollars or whose dollars pay for abortions. A person has to get one before any dollars are spent. I personally would not want anything to do with an abortion. A person should be taught morality by thier parents though not the government. Sadly not all parents do a good job at it and people get abortions and other bad things. The abortion issue was decided by the supreme court around forty years ago if my memory serves me right. I just believe after all that time, you need to get used to the idea that abortions will never be banned wether you and I like it or not. I don't know why you can't see my point that the Republican leadership looks pretty foolish trying to stop health care reform over this issue while at the same time buying insurance that does the same thing. So now maybe this time you will see my point is not about the money.

Slab, You are one hundred percent correct about Edwards. He is a low-life lying pig and I am thankful he did not get the nomination. I also think his running mate in '04 John Kerry was full of s!&* and worried more about his hair and tan more than anything else.

Stokes

Posted 22:9, 11/14/2009

Well, Snoopy, I will be damn. Is that not just amazing?

I noticed that commonsense did not respond to your link.

The universal health care abortion issue is: republicans and some democrats do not want tax dollars used for abortion. What part of that do you not understand, common? There is no connection between that argument and your statement about the insurance coverage that the republican nation committee employees have. You have been drinking too much koolade.

commonsense

Posted 22:49, 11/14/2009

Stokes, I fully understand republicans saying they don't want tax dollars spent on abortion. I am saying they are not sincere in their convictions here. It should be obvious they have only been using this to fool their redneck constituents into being against health care reform so they can represent the insurance companies that own them. Now hopefully it didn't go over your head and you get it now, but I doubt it.

snoopy, sorry I had things to do besides get back to you. I read it and you have done a great job pointing out one democrat owned by insurance companies. Unlike you guys however I don't think someone is a good guy just because we belong to the same party, I didn't have the party I would join stamped on my butt at birth and then brainwashed to blindly follow like you guys.

snoopy	Posted 5:22, 11/15/2009
commonsense...now if you had read all of it you would have mentioned not just one but several democrats that have taken money from insurance companies....wonder how many members of both parties own stock in insurance and drug companies? Maybe you could do some research and share that with us....if you are non-partisan that is!!!!!

easternbender

Posted 18:37, 11/15/2009

I just want to know one thing from you healthcare supporters..WHERE will the money come from to pay for this?
SOmeone last year mentioned Ireland.. The BOTTOM income earner pays 21% in taxes.. Ask yourself if you can stand for your income to decrease by 21% to pay for your healthcare..or you maybe the one who pays in 30% or 40%...You still want governement run healthcare if you have to pay in 30% of your income in taxes to support it?
There will be no low income exempt persons under a new system. By the time they get done taxing everyoen to pay for it then another 17% of people will qualify for welfare..Which means taxes go higher to cover them...then more taxes puts more people under the poverty line..No problem raise the taxes more.. It becomes a never ending cycle.
I agree there needs to be some alternative healthcare plans BUT I also think that there can be other solutions for paying for it, I don't think the government taking over is going to the walk in the park some of you believe.

Big Kahuna	Posted 19:27, 11/15/2009
OOgie what is the salary #'s for the lowest income earners?

Stokes

Posted 22:35, 11/15/2009

Beware Swine Flu Vaccination
It Can Weaken Your Immune
System and Damage Your Brain!

See How Big Government and Big Pharma
Conspire to Force Medicines on You!

Dear Friend,

All across America, people are speaking out on healthcare reform . . .

What will it cost?
Who will make medical decisions?
What might the government force on us?
What isn't being discussed is how Big Government and Big Pharma already have colluded to force medications on us, including some that are truly harmful.

Take government's aggressive promotion of the swine flu vaccination . . .

Flu vaccinations contain a full dose of mercury, the most toxic substance known to man.

No amount of mercury is safe. Even very small amounts can weaken your immune system.

Vaccinations also cause brain inflammation. And severe brain inflammation will lead to . . .

Behavioral problems and language difficulties in children!
Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases in adults!
Hello, I'm Dr Russell Blaylock. For 26 years, I've been helping folks in my medical, neurosurgical, and nutritional practice not only get off of dangerous drugs that do little or no good but also get natural solutions that actually work!

As the editor of Newsmax's popular health letter, The Blaylock Wellness Report I routinely cover . . .

Important health issues in the news
Dangerous and ineffective drugs to avoid
Propaganda from Big Pharma and the U.S. government
Most important, I offer safe and effective natural therapies for preventing and treating . . .

Heart disease, cancer, arthritis, neurodegenerative diseases . . .
Fatigue, headache, allergies, digestive ailments . . .
Diabetes, skin disorders, sciatica, bone health, and more!
Today, I'm going to give you a far safer and more effective remedy for preventing flu. In fact, I want you to have a FREE copy of my report on this, Vaccinations and Brain Injuries � Are You at Risk?

But first, I want you to know that . . .

Big Pharma's Far-Reaching Power

I've never been more concerned about Big Pharma's near total control of medical information in this country, as well as our government's "bought-and-paid-for" role in pushing its agenda.

I'm especially worried that, as we move toward universal healthcare � a euphemism for socialized medicine � we'll ultimately see government bureaucrats controlling medications for the entire population.

Today, they're pushing risky vaccinations that do more for Big Pharma's bottom line than for the health of the American people . . .

But there's also talk of putting everybody on a "polypill" that combines aspirin, blood pressure medicine, and cholesterol-lowering medication.

I'm not kidding! This crazy idea comes from the United Kingdom and � and it has been proposed here to control healthcare costs. It's bad enough that . . .

Big Pharma wants everybody on cholesterol-lowering drugs, including children . . .

Cholesterol does NOT cause heart disease. And taking cholesterol-lowering drugs will not prevent heart attacks or heart disease but will do bodily harm. See my report, "Cholesterol Drugs Are Dangerous" by going here.

I want you to be aware of Big Pharma's hidden agenda, and how companies get our government and media to promote their drugs, even when those drugs are harmful or ineffective.

That's why I want you to have a FREE copy of Vaccinations and Brain Injuries � Are You at Risk? Let's see what's in this valuable report for you . . .

Why Three Flu Shots This Fall?

You've seen the media blitz: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says you'll need two swine flu shots, as well as the regular seasonal flu shot.

Yes! Incredibly, it's urging three flu shots this fall! But why? Let's follow the money to find the answer . . .

When the swine flu story first broke, experts warned that it could be the worst flu since the 1918 pandemic that killed more than 50 million people worldwide, including 700,000 Americans.

But who were these experts?

People on the pharmaceutical and government payroll, that's who. They said it was the most unusual virus they had ever seen . . . that it could kill in large numbers . . .

Overnight, a compliant media spread this alarming news was spread far and wide.

Parents were scared out of their wits. Schools were closed. Millions with flu symptoms flocked to doctors and hospitals!

And what happened? Across the globe, 429 people died. Yes, that's unfortunate, but compared with the 36,000 people that die each year from regular flu it wasn't a serious threat.

Swine Flu Found to be Weak Virus

The Chicken Little doomsayers (read "drug company executives") were disappointed in these statistics. But now they're back scaring the public again, saying the "big event" is coming this winter!

And surprise of all surprises, drugmaker Novartis has a swine flu vaccine all ready to go. And the company says it won't give the vaccine away to the poor. Everybody must pay!

Imagine if it could sell 2 billion doses worldwide and get $5 a piece for them. That's $10 billion.

Neat trick. But to succeed, it will need governments around the world insisting that their citizens get vaccinated while using taxpayer money to buy the vaccine for the poor.

Washington is on board. Can you guess why?

Big Pharma is the biggest contributor to Washington politicians � both Democrats and Republicans. President Obama himself collected $1.2 million during his presidential campaign.

Just be aware of what's going on . . .

Washington Politicians Bought

Already, Big Pharma's chief lobbyist, Billy Tauzin, has cut a secret deal with President Obama ensuring that drug prices won't be negotiated any lower in any healthcare reform legislation.

The American Medical Association, which is Big Pharma's silent partner, has a deal, too: No reduction of its lucrative licensing fees on "medical billing codes" will be allowed in any legislation.

Have you noticed that Big Pharma and the AMA are on board with Obama's healthcare plan? Even over the objections of most doctors!

Meanwhile, nobody is allowed to offer alternatives for preventing swine flu. Government medical bureaucrats are the sole source of official information, and they're getting their marching orders from Big Pharma, while you pick up the bill!

Well, I'm blowing the whistle!

As a neurosurgeon, I can tell you that vaccinations are not safe. They can weaken your immune system, cause brain inflammation, and even lead to neurodegenerative disorders such as autism, Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's.

Why risk these serious diseases when you can get better and safer alternatives for flu prevention and treatment?

Now's the time to take control of your healthcare decisions, get the best medical solutions, and not be tricked or coerced by Big Government and Big Pharma.

. .

Stokes

Posted 0:6, 11/17/2009

Below is a copy and paste from the article above. commonsense, really what is your comprehension problem of what you read?

Hello, I'm Dr Russell Blaylock. For 26 years, I've been helping folks in my medical, neurosurgical, and nutritional practice not only get off of dangerous drugs that do little or no good but also get natural solutions that actually work!

As the editor of Newsmax's popular health letter, The Blaylock Wellness Report I routinely cover .

fiesta pantalones	Posted 0:9, 11/17/2009
Stokes - Charger has no clue what he reads. He just responds based on what he thinks he reads. In this case he missed the name. In many cases the post is just over his head and it is dumbed down in his mind to something he can understand. Unfortunately that often changes the whole meaning of the post.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 9:31, 11/17/2009

Charger - I know this went over your head so I will try to dumb it down so you can understand it.

Charger is made by Dodge. Most of the time you can't intellegently discuss a topic or just can't understand it so you "Dodge" it. Hence the name Charger.

Pinto is just an old cheap car. It doesn't work the same way so...it is just an incredibly lame joke.

Oh yeah...from my post "In this case he missed the name.".....from your post "I just missed the name and wanted to know who it was. Why don't you try comprehending what YOU read"

Again another case of you just can't understand what you read. Slow down, take a breath, and read a post twice. Then wait 30 minutes and read it again before you post. You MAY have a chance comprehending what you read that way.

Go try again. This post was just to try to help you save the future embarrasement from not understand the Charger nickname. I consider it charity. You will have to do better in the future to earn a response.

Grams	Posted 11:44, 11/17/2009
commonsense, it is amazing how you respond when you HAVE EMBARASSED YOURSELF. You asked a stupid question about Stokes' post and got called on it. Now you want to belittle the callout person. How childish and whiny is that? Geez, you are pitiful.

fiesta pantalones	Posted 13:35, 11/17/2009
Charger - LOLOLOL!!!!! This is too great. Is that really the best you have? You can't figure out how to counter any point so you try to say I am not a man? LOL. Yep. There's our old Charger. I think I will be having a lot of fun with you.

fiesta pantalones

Posted 14:26, 11/17/2009

Stokes lap dog? You mean the person you were agreeing with? Are you sure about what you are trying to say? I think you have confused yourself again.

BTW...Which am I supposed to be, Yankee or Redneck? On these few threads are you saying I am a man or a woman? Do you also think I am the whitest black man you ever saw?

Think hard. Take a breath, and try to get your insults straight. If you aren't clever enough to keep it consistant for 30 minutes then don't try to step into the ring.

commonsense	Posted 11:30, 11/18/2009
Grams, get somebody to read my previous post to you. They will tell you I said in the first sentence I said "You know I agreed with stokes on the post." Now how do you get I was agreeing with you on something. People might not disagree with you so much if you weren't so hoplessly stupid and unable to comprehend anything said., written or communicated in any way to your ignorant A%$.

commonsense	Posted 12:21, 11/18/2009
pinto, It is good that you can laugh. I'll bet your wife laughs everytime she sees you in the shower.

Grams	Posted 14:9, 11/18/2009
Boo Hoo, commonsense is leaving. Our only intelligent poster is gone. I am so sad.

black boy

Posted 8:24, 12/08/2009

FINALLY...SOME ONE ASKED HIM THE QUESTION!

YESTERDAY ON "ABC-TV" (BETTER KNOWN AS THE ALL BARRACK CHANNEL)

DURING THE "NETWORK SPECIAL ON HEALTH CARE".... OBAMA WAS ASKED:

"MR. PRESIDENT WILL YOU AND YOUR FAMILY GIVE UP YOUR CURRENT HEALTH CARE PROGRAM AND JOIN THE NEW 'UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE PROGRAM' THAT THE REST OF US WILL BE ON ????". (BET YOU ALREADY KNOW THE ANSWER)

THERE WAS A STONEY SILENCE AS OBAMA IGNORED THE QUESTION AND CHOSE NOT TO ANSWER IT !!!

IN ADDITION, A NUMBER OF SENATORS WERE ASKED THE SAME QUESTION AND THEIR RESPONSE WAS. "WE WILL THINK ABOUT IT."

AND THEY DID. IT WAS ANNOUNCED TODAY ON THE NEWS THAT THE "KENNEDY HEALTH CARE BILL" WAS WRITTEN INTO THE NEW HEALTH CARE REFORM INITIATIVE ENSURING THAT CONGRESS WILL BE 100% EXEMPT !

SO, THIS GREAT NEW HEALTH CARE PLAN THAT IS GOOD FOR YOU AND I... IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR OBAMA, HIS FAMILY OR CONGRESS...??

WE (THE AMERICAN PUBLIC) NEED TO STOP THIS PROPOSED DEBACLE ASAP !!!! THIS IS TOTALLY WRONG !!!!!

PERSONALLY, I CAN ONLY ACCEPT A UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE OVERHAUL THAT EXTENDS TO EVERYONE... NOT JUST US LOWLY CITIZENS... WHILE THE WASHINGTON "ELITE" KEEP RIGHT ON WITH THEIR GOLD-PLATED HEALTH CARE COVERAGES.

disgusting	Posted 0:5, 12/24/2009
I want all you messiah lovers to tell me how you feel about North Carolina citizens having to pay a share of Nebraska's medicaid bill FOREVER?

cletus

Posted 9:41, 12/24/2009

Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska besically traded his vote that what "disgusting" is talking about. Now Nebraska is the only state getting 100% funding from the Federal Governement for Medicade expansion. Therefore, we will be helping to pay the bill there too.

Here is a paragraph from the Winston-Salem Journal. "

Reid nailed the last votes down in a rush of dealmaking in the last week that is now coming under attack because of special provisions obtained by a number of senators. In Nebraska, home to conservative Democrat Ben Nelson, the Democrats' crucial 60th vote, the federal government will pay 100 percent of the cost of a planned Medicaid expansion in perpetuity, the only state getting that deal."

Read the full story here:

http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/dec/24/240822/senate-oks-health-care-measure-reaching-milestone/

michelekibbler	Posted 13:39, 12/24/2009
It looks like the other Sentors took off their prom dresses too easy, they could have had a sweet deal like Nelsons.

KateRauhauserSmith

Posted 0:54, 12/25/2009

Well, Bookworm, it hasn't been at the top of my priorities this week. What with Christmas and getting ready for travel to PA to visit the assorted families. I can only deal with so much bickering and the politicians' lost out this time in favor of the kids and the in-laws.

But the ginger cookies turned out great!

Cletus, thank you for the info and citation.

Slab, I agree with you ... everytime they do this crap. A bill should deal with the topic of the bill ... not the twenty seven special deals made to buy the votes. There should be a law ...

Merry Christmas, everyone!

lucifer	Posted 13:34, 12/26/2009
Definitions from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary: whore: a venal or unscrupulous person prostitute: to devote to corrupt or unworthy purposes I think Nelson,Landrieu, and the other 58 senators who supported the Messiah's health care scam, are his whores and prostitutes!!!

FED UP	Posted 13:36, 12/26/2009
lucifer, same question I asked Stokes. Are the republicans whores also for selling their votes to the insurance companies? I know your answer..."Of course, they're not...they are republicans, by God".

lucifer	Posted 14:8, 12/26/2009
FED UP another interesting link: Big Business Goes Big for Health-Care Reform http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/12/big_business_goes_big_for_health-care_reform_97859.html

FED UP

Posted 15:13, 12/26/2009

lucifer....of course big insurance is all for the health care bill.....NOW. Now that the republicans got in amendment after amendment. The spineless dems gave in to them thinking they would vote for it afterward. The repubs watered the bill down till it is a giveaway to the ins cos. They got out any meaningful reform, like the public option, just like their masters told them to. So, now you're saying it's the democrats who are in the pockets of big business and not the republicans? Fox News has scrambled your brains, lucifer.

lucifer

Posted 18:14, 12/26/2009

Fed UP apparently you failed to read any of the links I posted...but then I am sure you would argue with anything from CNN. Do only Republicans own, work, have stock in insurance? I bet not...I bet from the insurance companies all the way down to the 401k's you will find plenty of democrats making a killing on insurance. That's unless you are so stupid to think that ONLY Republicians have CONNECTIONS with insurance and drug companies. But, then you are a OMAMABOT!

nasty	Posted 18:31, 12/26/2009
fu, the democrats killed the public option. The republicans have not added anything to the bill. That is all democrat, right or wrong.

nasty	Posted 4:18, 12/27/2009
There were enough democrats against the public option to kill the bill. What you don't understand, the 60 votes the democrats had blocked a filibuster. If the majority didn't rule, there would be no health care give away. Sorry you didn't understand what happened in Washington.

nasty

Posted 8:12, 12/27/2009

The blue dog democrats were the ones that would not let the public option in the reform bill. Everyone but you know that. You do not understand the democrats did not need the republicans to pass the bill. The democrats were fighting among themselves over the bill. Please feel free to mention ONE thing the republicans added to the bill. Most of the time, I think you are just messing with folks, but then again, that stupid act may not be an act.

The Conservative News