I don't understand the bait and switch comment, they seem to be doing what they have been saying for over a year now. Most of these issues can be resolved by adding a single payer system which will probably be added later after first adding a public option. I agree they should have gone with single payer from the beginning and eliminated the middle man (insurance companies) but too many of our polititians are being bought off by the healthcare industry.

Exactly. I firmly believe the role of the federal government is to only fund a small set of essential services and not to assume that it has the right to redistribute my income.
Those wealthy people who believe income should be redistributed to the poor would have a whole lot more credibility if they spent their net worth, including the value of their home down to something under $5 million helping the poor. It's rather hypocritical for somebody like Ted Kennedy to have a yacht and expensive property and then claim that the government has the right to redistribute my income because I'm better off than somebody who earns less than I do.

Do you think it is actually important? And, it not as if the most current or the previous reports are hard to find for anyone interested in reading fantasy material. But here is the link as requested, sir.

http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/113xx/doc...onProposal.pdf

and here is another from the initial Senate version:

http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/108xx/doc...tion_Noted.pdf

Well we wouldn't want you to be incoherent so I will explain it to you. See, Otto listed 20 items you might not like about the bill. The 20th item said, "5% charge on cosmetic surgery (Section 9017)."

I added "Section 9017-a Except Nancy Pelosi". The reason that is funny is because the woman has more surgery than Micheal Jackson and would go broke having to pay such a fee.

So, I have let you in to our little private language which flowed absolutely perfectly if one read the posts. I do apologize for you not getting the joke, though.

P.S. The "Well we wouldn't want you to be incoherent" is another joke and a play on words. The reason others will find that funny is because the most incoherent poster in this forum is accusing others of being incoherent. That's not even Alanis Morissette Ironic - that's "real" ironic. Don'tcha think?

The text of the bill is online. Why people can't check these things before passing them on is amazing to me.

1- Says nothing about small business. It is just a clever way to spin the basic fact that there is a mandate. Yes, there is a mandate and the fine will eventually scale up to $750. Of course, people must dress that up with the "killing small business" thing for some reason.

2- Section 2701 says nothing of that. It is a section prohibiting discriminatory premium rates for small or individual coverage. And in fact it allows for "discriminatory" premium rates for smokers.

3- Is just spin of a well known feature of the legislation

4- Section 2712 says nothing of the sort. It is actually the section that prohibits recissions

5- Section 2714 says nothing about employers being mandated to cover children up to 26 years of age. It says that dependents can stay on a plan until 26 years of age, but nothing on who must pay for the dependent's insurance.

6- Nowhere it says that everyone must be covered for all those things. It just defines those as "essential health benefits."

7- goes back to the mandate. I mean, if the mandate didn't have a minimum coverage, what would be the point?

8- Same as above, and again nothing about small businesses there.

9- Misleading at best. Employers will only be fined for each full time employee that enrolls in the subsidized health exchange programs. This is merely a provision to discourage employers from dumping their coverage so employees get on the subsidized plan.

10- That section doesn't say that. It just says that employer contributions will not be treated as qualified benefits for tax purposes if the employee contributes more than 2,500 of his own money towards that.


I could go on, but the 20 points are simply spin related to the two unpopular features of the plan: there are mandates, and certain specific taxes will go up.

---------- Post added at 12:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:49 PM ----------


I get it, it wasn't enough that all the other threads were derailed by rants, falsehoods, and generic spin. Maybe robot parade needs to start yet another thread, and then instead of saying "Please, please, stick to facts about the actual bill...not the process, not conspiracy theories...the bill." he could say "Please, please, PLEASE stick to facts about the actual bill...not the process, not conspiracy theories...the bill."

I believe roachboy was referring to staying on topic and not letting the thread go down the shitter by posting smartass comments or emoticons that do nothing for the thread or any members reading the thread.

If you are coming to this thread for some sort of enlightenment, that was lost 85 posts ago. You can't derail a derailed train.

I just check in the laughs and the extent to which those opposed to the legislation will spew the same old debunked myths again and again. :)

As far as I'm aware, the healthcare bill, does *not* prevent insurance companies from having lifestyle choices influence the cost of insurance - I could easily be mistaken here, but I've never read that in any of the summaries of the existing bill. It *does* prevent them from denying coverage or charging differently based upon pre-existing conditions. So, a person with lung cancer can still get insurance, but (again, I could easily be wrong about this) a smoker could be charged more than a non-smoker.

Insurance is already about those who don't need it subsidizing those who do - that's the whole point. Your homeowners insurance premium pays for all of those people whose houses burn down when yours doesn't.

Would you seriously ever choose to go without health insurance if you could afford it? Would you then say "Ok, I've got prostate cancer, but I can't afford treatment. I deserve to die the horrible death that awaits me because I decided to roll the dice and lost."?

The difference here is that the government is requiring you to have health insurance, subsidizing you if you can't afford it, and taxing you if you chose to roll the dice - because some percentage of the people who chose to roll the dice *will* end up in the hospital and expect the rest of us to pay for their care.

I am for this bill. But one thing I want to point out is that I think the ban on pre-ex's is going to have some unanticipated consequences. If I am a 22 year old healthy male, just out of college and working at my first job, I am not buying insurance. I will pay the fee(whatever it may be cause it's still cheaper than insurance) and wait till I actually get sick then hurry up and buy insurance since I can't be denied. I think this might end up being the mentality of alot of people.

But I could be wrong

@Rahl - That's money you aren't supposed to be forced to give away.

from Frederic Bastiat's "The Law"

That is a drawback, one could argue that the penalty should be higher. But, consider - you're a 22 year old healthy male, who just got wheeled into the ER with acute appendicitis. It's too late to sign up for health insurance, and that hefty hospital bill just might teach you a lesson about rolling the dice.

Otoh, if it's lung cancer, then sure, you can still get insurance, even though any idiot can guess that your going to be a financial liability for the insurance company. And I, who plan to live a long life and have health and wealth and all that, will be the one subsidizing that guy. Personally, I'd rather live in a world where I have to pay a few hundred dollars more a year and lung-cancer-man gets proper care than the world where I have those hundred dollars and lung-cancer-man almost certainly dies in agony.

---------- Post added at 08:59 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:52 PM ----------

Without all those things, you have nothing but anarchy, which is useless other than as an intellectual exercise.

Would you do without the armed forces? Police? If you want to do away with taxes (sorry, "legal plunder"), you have to do away with those, as well as a whole raft of other things you probably enjoy.

At what expense do we get the things we enjoy, my friend?

Are the things you enjoy worth the things that humble me so?

I don’t like it and you can say all the good and wonderful misconceptions about this bill you want to, in the end however you cannot change the simple fact, this singular fact;

It is UNCONSTITUTIONAL to do this to the American people; the Federal government cannot mandate all Americans to purchase whatever they decide we should buy.

The 10th Amendment of the Constitution was created to prevent this from happening, to prevent the Federal Government from doing this to its people, from requiring the people of the U.S. to participate in the purchase of health insurance, or anything, as a demand or be penalized.

Say all you want deny all you want, cover and cherry coat all you want, but it is wrong, it will always be wrong, and if you deny this fact, you deny the fundamentals of the America way.

If they want to tax us, TAX US, a flat rate for health care, that may be a consideration, but then the insurance companies would be out, and they don't want that, the insurance companies would not have helped to push it through.

Don't any of you get that the insurance company wanted this too, they paid and pushed for it to pass and not because they love Americans, but because they love the money it will make them, what’s with the middle man Obama, why pay a middle man for health care when the government will inevitably be in control.

The bill states over and over again how there will be governmental intervention in all aspects of health care from preventative care to end of life, and not just hello care, we are talking affirmative action care with investigations on all matters from you to the doctors to the hospitals.

If you look you can find plenty of articles that talk of the down-fall of governmental health care, the delays the lack of continuity the lack of follow-up and follow-through the lack of equipment and the shortages of supplies, etc.

This is the wrong bill. It really is that simple and those who disagree don’t truly understand the freedom of being an American, and what the repercussion of the loss of that freedom this represents, not to mention the precedence it will set if it does become law and what additional doors of socialist impositions it will open.

It time to wake up and shake off this attempted takeover people, unless you’re just done with personal freedom.

I’m not against health care for the masses, but this isn’t the answer, to violate our freedom, to violate our trust with the backroom shenanigans, this isn’t the right way to treat this country, or the amazing people who reside within it.

They'll understand it as soon as their lives begin to crumble, and they start to realize how they really DO belong to someone else.


[FUTURE MODE]

"Greetings, 523-22-2193, we're from the government, we're here to help."
"What is going on?"
"GET ON YOUR KNEES! PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR BACK MOTHERFUCKER!"
"WAAAAA"
*FISTPUNCH_TO_FACE*
"QUIT MOVING! QUIT MOVING!"
*cough*"I---"
"Take him to the truck."

[/FUTURE MODE]

I bet that poor citizen was thinking, as the AO crushed his jaw with his knee, "HEY, THAT'S UNKAWNSTATOOSHUNALL!"

Yeah, and so was everything else they did. So what?

As has been noted before, the Constitutional argument is weak....both in terms of the taxing powers and the commerce clause....even many conservative Constitutional lawyers admit as much.

But it might make an interesting case....if it ever gets to the Supreme Court.

And, it probably wont happen any time soon.

First, there is the question of legal standing. Do the Republican State AGs (most of whom probably want to run for governor in the future) even have legal standing to sue?

They (and the state) are not the potentially injured party. That would be the persons forced to buy insurance or pay the tax.

And then, can those potentially injured parties sue before they are injured? That is, before they are forced into buying insurance or paying and tax, which wont happen until 2014.

My god, it's like pan and dk had a baby

Levying taxes and providing for the general welfare are both constitutional, last time I checked. Sure enough, there are constitutional challenges to the bill, and guess what? We have a supreme court to decide these issues.

Yes - the insurance companies like this bill as well - they will indeed make more money. Conservatives should love this bill, because of how pro-business it is.

Where in this bill is doctor-patient privacy removed? Where is this government intervention you speak of? For most of us, the government intervention is in the form of the mandate. For insurance companies, the trade-off they pay for the mandate are regulations like no more recisions, no more denying coverage based upon pre-existing conditions, etc. Most people get coverage, people who can't afford it get subsidies. Various other fixes for government programs, etc.

And if you look you can find that *every* other industrialized country provides healthcare for all of their citizens for far less money per-capita, and usually at least as good quality - in terms of life expectancy, patient satisfaction, etc. If they can do it, why can't we?

In reality, this is a *very* conservative bill. There is no loss of freedom for Americans - none. Zero. Zip. a tax isn't a loss of freedom. You could argue that government-controlled healthcare like in Great Britain would be a loss of freedom...but look at how much less they pay per capita for essentially the same outcomes.

The courts exist to decide what is and is not constitutional. So far, they don't seem to be on your side.

Actually, we do understand this, and you'll find many of us would prefer single-payer. Setting aside the issue of how much we need election reform and how that relates to this topic, the United States is designed, in many ways, to elicit compromise. As much as you may not like it, this bill does represent a compromise between the two major sides on this issue, because if you hate this bill just imagine if me, many other TFPers, and, well, most people I know wrote the bill. This bill is not an overhaul - I struggle to even call it a reform - it is really just a tweak in health insurance regulations. Many other Americans would prefer something much more overtly socialist (yes, I said it), but we're accepting of this compromise because we understand that's how the process works. You'll note, by the way, that the constitution does not require that we remain now and forever a capitalist nation.

How many times do we have to ask for citations before we actually get any? You've got someone associated with the insurance industry (rahl), public policy (dc_dux), and electoral politics (me) in here - you can't just say "the bill does X!" and expect us not to ask where you get that from.

You can find plenty of articles on anything under the sun. The question is not how many anecdotes you can find, but what the general result is. So far, looking around the world, government-run healthcare is looking pretty good compared to our system.

Now here we get to a part that I take offense to, because it reads much like Sarah Palin's assertion of "real Americans." I've tried to point it out before, but I'll say it again: we are just as American as you are. This is, for many people, a moral imperative. Funny how for all the talk of the US being a "Christian nation" (not necessarily by you), there are so many people who are unwilling to admit that access to health care is a fundamental right. That is yet another way in which the United States is lagging behind the rest of the world. More unfortunate is that we have declared that health care is a human right, in the form of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which was written, in part, by Eleanor Roosevelt, and adopted by the United States. These are not new ideas, and the really amazing thing amidst all this outrage is that this "reform" is ridiculously tame compared to what most proponents of health care reform would prefer.

About 1/3 of your income, if you're relatively well off.

Is that worth it to have clean water, safe food, safe roads and cities, freedom from dictators, thugs, and despots?

Uh...yes?

Damn....I missed this one...or just glossed over it, having seen it so many times before....and never once documented with specific provisions of the law.

Dont you have the intellectual curiosity to read the law and not just the misrepresentations of the right wing talking heads and bloggers...or are you in the Pan camp and "couldnt find it" even though it has been posted on the House website, the Senate website, the WH website, Thomas-the LoC website, c-span...?

Fact;

Fact.

Cucinelli and other AGs can sue anyone they want....for whatever reason they want - legal or political. That doesnt mean any court will hear it.

The question is whether the federal district court will rule that the AGs have legal standing on the matter and take the case....since it does not adversely impact a state law or powers specificially designated to the state, but impacts individuals. State AGs dont represent individuals, they represent the state.

The "injured" parties certainly have legal standing...but the question is can they sue before they are injured?

Guys... the 10th Amendment is very clearly about the relationship between the Federal Government and the States. It does not state that what has just been done is Unconstitutional.

It does, however, give a place where a state can challenge the federal government to exempt them from the law on a constitutional basis. In other words, this is for the courts to decide.

You have your knickers in a twist over a procedure that applies to nearly every Federal Law enacted and has only been successfully used a handful of times. Jeez. You'd think there were Federal jackboots storming your streets.

But Cuccinelli (R) went his own way, arguing that a Virginia law enacted this month that prohibits the government from requiring people to buy health insurance creates an "immediate, actual controversy" between state and federal law that gives the state unique standing on which to sue.

I'm middle-class and 1/3 of my income already goes to a variety of state, local, and fed taxes (SSI is a tax).

Regarding your question: I like the whole clean water, safe food, roads and cities thing. I don't get the second part of your statement. We have several new regulatory dictatorships, thugs and shakedown organizations like SEIU, Acorn, The Apollo Alliance, the Center For American Progress, and the brand new IRS Healthcare Gestapo. Which leaves us with the despots... the President, Nancy Pelosi and the US Congress.

Perhaps if the question began with "Let me be clear".

---------- Post added at 11:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:35 PM ----------

It relates to interstate commerce. Health insurance is not sold across states. It's a reasonable test. I think it would be a healthy exercise.

They're afraid of the gosudarstvennyi doktors.

THe SEIU, ACORN, the Apollo Alliance, Center for American Progress....are arms of the government?

Or should not have the constitutional right of freedom of expression?

IRS Gestapo powers....a new low.

They are major advisers and contributors to the crafting of the stimulus and health language. The president works very closely with each of these organizations. Andy Stern is a top "insider".

Yes the new IRS Gestapo is a new low... just wait and see.

Are you an attorney? (where is loquitor when you need him?)

Im not and dont claim to be, but from what I have read, the issue of legal standing is the first step and there is alot of skepticism that it will pass that test. A state does not have presumed legal standing simply by passing a state law that says it will ignore a federal law.

---------- Post added at 11:44 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:42 PM ----------

Ah...I get it now...a vast left wing conspiracy.

You left out medical organizations (doctors, nurses, hospitals admins), patient advocacy organizations, social service organizations, and probably the boy scouts and the pta.

Every major health insurance company operates in virtually every state in the union. They are required to conform to each individual state's insurance laws set forth by the state's dept. of insurance.

So yea they sell across state lines.

Oh...and the "Supremacy Clause":

The Supremacy Clause is a clause in the United States Constitution, Article VI, Clause 2. The clause establishes the Constitution, Federal Statutes, and U.S. treaties as "the supreme law of the land." The text establishes these as the highest form of law in the American legal system, mandating that state judges uphold them, even if state laws or constitutions conflict.

Supremacy Clause - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Virginia has a very weak argument and, IMO, purely political on Cuccilleli's part.

Nope...the ones with legal standing are the "injured" persons....but can they claim they have been injured before the provisions of the law in question are imposed in 2014?

The PTA maybe, but never the Boy Scouts! Nice diversion, kind of combines using Rule 5 or 11 (RfR) :thumbsup:

BTW - Doesn't SEIU's Andy Stern sit on the President's National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform? I believe he's number 1 on the White House visitors log.

Per Harry Reid

Yep..and the Republicans have six seats on the Commission as well.

So what?

So - relatively well off. I'm also in the middle class, and have about the same tax rate. If I were richer or poorer, a smaller percentage of my income would go to taxes (at least, if you include investment income). If I were very poor, and had kids I would get money from the government (net, counting for all social programs, food stamps, etc).

I believe the first four organizations you quote are in no way government entities, have little or no relationship to the healthcare debate, so I don't see how they are relevant to the discussion. The IRS, like death, will always be with us. You are now taxed if you are foolish enough to go without health insurance. If you can't afford health insurance, the government will provide a subsidy to you to help pay for it. Hyperbole aside, none of the members of government you mention are anything like despots. Please use words in the ways they are consistent with their actual definitions.

Let me be clear: hyperbole, exaggeration, and lies degrade all parties and make intelligent discourse impossible.

While companies may have an interstate/national presence, they can only sell state-exclusive products to those citizens. The freedom to conduct interstate sales was one of the many proposals to the legislation which was summarily dismissed without debate. If the language was put in to law, the states would not have a leg to stand on in their constitutional challenge.

In fact, it was discussed and debated.

The proposal offered by the Republicans would have allowed insurance companies to domicile in the state with the least regulation (including American Samoa and Guam, if I recall) and sell across state lines under those weakest regulations, offering little, if any, consumer protections.

The proposed amendment was wisely defeated.

It was dismissed because that was one of the proposals republicans wanted to put forth. It already exists, insurance companies sell across state lines.

I'm not a lawyer, I'm just telling you that they already operate in multiple states. Whether that gives congress the right to regulate it is a matter for the courts to decide, but in my opinion selling a product in multiple states means interstate commerce.

And your point is...?

These organizations are tightly entwined in the executive and legislative power structure. While not official government entities, they are all documented as players in the crafting of these measures. The perception of hyperbole is in the eye of the beholder. Unsavory facts mixed with sarcasm may sound like hyperbole if you are unaware of the documented connections mentioned. They don't hide it, it's just not what some want to hear.

Amen. That's what I'm talking about brother! See how the use of LMBC makes everything sound authoritative.

People who claim that the United States is some sort of actual dictatorship should live under one before embarking on a "woe is me, I live in a dictatorship because I have to pay taxes and there are some regulations" rant.

Again, they operate in multiple states as an umbrella, but the products are state-exclusive. I used to work for Anthem Blue Cross of KY. Guess what, there's one for Indiana, and so on.... They are regulated as such.

---------- Post added at 12:40 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:37 AM ----------

Who here claims that the US is a dictatorship?

Um....you?

Dictators, thugs, gestapo and despots. :eek:

And they also had a circus... I mean a PR stunt... I mean a bipartisan health care summit.

So you are saying that SEIU has no influence with the president?

---------- Post added at 12:46 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:45 AM ----------

The statement said "REGULATORY DICTATORS" (like the EPA). Reading is fun-da-mental.

Is this really the best you can offer in the way of opposing the legislation? What did I misread about "despots"

As to the influence of the SEIU....hell, farmers had more influence with Thomas Jefferson than bankers and businessman.

So what's new.

All they would have to change is that they would tax people without health insurance, then use the military government contracting method to fund the private health insurance companies.

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

I am still unclear on how selling insurance across state lines would change the system. I can think of some good things if there are fewer 'national' plans, but I worry about having to go through 250 plans from 3 or 4 different carriers to find the best one. I also am concerned that people living in expensive areas (NY, NJ, CA...) where incomes are high, would flood the poorer states, as well as the insurance companies. They would be able to get tax breaks and control state laws like credit card companies do. The only real benefit would be for HR departments of large multi-state companies only needing a single plan.

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

Does this bill require companies that hire people for 39 'part-time' hours to provide insurance or some assistance for them?

Didn't say anything was new. In fact, the associations and influence from these groups is well documented. I find their organizational structure and affiliations with the highest reaches of government to be unseemly. If you honestly believe SEIU is just a union representing the working man, then you've got some reading to do. However, I believe you are more astute regarding the strategies and interrelationships of the organizations that operate under the Tides Foundation and the Democracy Alliance. That should cover the majority of the entities I have mentioned (and many more) regarding influence and power sharing. And from your responses, there is familiarity in the language used to deflect attention from them. That's really all I need to know regarding our conversation.

Please...then document how they influenced the legislation? How did they influence the "despots" in the WH and Congress?

Or offer any facts that addresses your concern with the legislation and not the same old rhetoric.

I'd suggest instead that you head on over to youtube and watch back to back footage of Obama giving speeches to not only the nation, but also to news reporters, SEIU conventions, AIPAC conventions, etc etc. You'll get all the info you need. I'd also happily post links to all the videos I'd recommend, but I don't have 15 posts yet, and don't feel like subverting rules.

Not videos about these people, but videos of these people saying quite plainly how they believe, in public, on camera, just as a drunk woman would talk dirty to her boss at a party and not even realize it(or realize that her video is on youtube)

For the most part, he enacted what he campaigned on:

* providing accessible, affordable insurance to those uninsured...through an insurance exchange of private insurance providers.
* eliminating exclusions of pre-existing conditions and establishing limits on out of pocket expenses
* providing tax credits to small businesses and to working class families
* promoting preventive care by eliminating co-pays and deductibles
* investing significantly in health care technologies

Since you said please...

We'll start with some pictures linking organizations and names. Feel free to challenge any of these connections... and we can go from there. And BTW - the connection is to the White House. But I'm sure you're already aware of this. I'm curious to see what new responses are being crafted and circulated.

Perhaps something from "Tactics" (Rules for Radicals)
Rule #3. Or Rule #13 Democracy Alliance,Tides Foundation and SEIU
http://go2.wordpress.com/?id=725X134...y-alliance.jpg

Map of Apollo Alliance and Alliance for Climate Protection (global warming legislation should be coming up right behind health care)
http://romanticpoet.files.wordpress....protection.jpg

Obama’s Media support mechanism "They Work For Us" Organizational Map
http://romanticpoet.files.wordpress....ork-for-us.jpg

Damn...a Democratic president who listens to workers and unions, health care professionals, social service organizations, consumer advocacy organizations, women and minority groups, etc. and enacted, for the most part, what he campaigned on and was elected to accomplish....despite the blatant lies and fear mongering that was the well-funded strategy of the opposition.

A despot!

Dood, this isn't coincidence. This is war, this is real life, this is everything that is of value. Don't you know, then, that the best way to control the opposition is to lead it?

They are the opposition!

There is one force for the first half of the masses of the USA.
There is another force for the second half of the masses of the USA.

These forces act in unison to avoid having the power of their drivers usurped by the entirety of the non-masses of the USA.

IMO, your war is based on ignorance fueled by fear-mongering.

Sweet dreams!

I don't have a war, I'm just stuck in the middle of a bunch of extremely unhappy people. I'm not unhappy myself, though.


There's half of the masses of the country that are more comfortable with being perceived as wimpy and altruistic.

There's another half of the masses of the country that are more comfortable with being perceived as tough and reasonable.

Then there are the people who are who they are, and don't really worry about how people perceive them so much, but these people typically don't bother anybody, because they're too focused on staying the hell alive, healthy, and productive.


.gov as a whole uses both halves of the masses to shut out the voices of the rest of the country, and then throws in the faces of all of us that "The majority won.. so STFU ALREADY!"

Cool! I'm glad you are not at war.

Here is an example of the ignorance fueled by fear-mongering -from a new Harris pol - and characterized by the author of the article as the Obama Derangement Syndrome:
Scary shit, indeed....and ignorant!

Wow. Loaded language much?


What makes you think that being altruistic is some how equated with being wimpy. Or that being reasonable is somehow to be equated with being tough? Or for that matter how being altruistic and reasonable are somehow at odds with each other?

You say you aren't at war but your choice of language suggests otherwise.

So, when you see that the simplest individuals in the country are either democrat or republican...

When do you start to wonder why the simple are so powerful, and the not-so-simple are so irrelevant?


*facepalm*

"OH, I know! Because some douchebag did ./reverse_the_power_for_individual_gain in /USA, and now a group of men control enough other, sheepish, ignorant men, despite the fact that half these men hate them, to usurp the power of ALL men. Dang, I wish I'd thought of that.."


@charlatan -
I'm practicing brevity.

For starters, I'm not bashing democrats or republicans, I am only enumerating their vulnerabilities which are being exploited by social engineers all over the country.


altruism has nothing to do with being wimpy, hence "wimpy AND altruistic" not "wimpy == altruistic"
Similarly, "tough AND reasonable" is not the same as "tough == reasonable"

Tough is tough -- physically tough, mentally tough, resilient, adaptable, able to cope with things that are damaging.
wimpy is the opposite of tough in this exactly. Physically inept, mentally fragile, unable to adapt effectively, and unable to cope with things that are damaging.


generally speaking -

The democrats advocate that people should have compassion for one another, and that government should provide for the people, and that kind of thing. These people are ideal subjects for the use of the teachings of Karl Marx, because they are perfectly vulnerable to this sort of attack. They have an inbuilt desire to put in place the most urgent and necessary sounding "save the <insert stuff here>" propositions. As long as your message comes off sincere, sappy, and with enough "McMansion's For Everybody" dreamyness, these braindead retards will die for you.

The republicans, on the other hand, are less about the compassion for one another, and more about the compassion for themselves.
They possess a radically different vulnerability than the democrats, and that is their inbuilt ability to trust what sounds good to them.
As long as your message comes off sincere, honest sounding, and with enough fluff to make it interesting, these braindead retards will buy into and clap for whatever you say.

Are you really shocked that there's a vast progressive conspiracy to bring about progressive political goals? Why do these diagrams mean anything?

I guess the answer to the question posed by the op is that there is damning evidence in the form of diagrams from the internet which provide proof that health care reform is part of some vast conspiracy whereby ostensibly progressive people and organizations work with ostensibly progressive politicians to subvert The American Way under the guise of enacting ostensibly progressive goals.

geez, so much for talking about the actual bill. now we're off in some surreal paranoid alternate reality complete with good old fashioned john birch society-style BUT THE GOVERNMENT IS OVERRUN WITH COMM-U-NISTS idiocy, metaphysical statements about the "lost freedom in america" which presumably had something to do with keeping 30 million people without access to health care....by what logic 30 million people not having insurance meant that the right could imagine itself living in a land of freedom, i have no idea. i see alot of handwaving in the direction of crackpot interpretations of the constitution which i assume are to function as figleafs over this basic matter--two days ago the right was free, now they live in some imaginary despotism. all thats really changed is the enactment of a modest-to-weak version of health care reform.
so it has to follow that the ultra-right defined freedom itself around the fact that 30 million people did not have access to health insurance.
this must be what qualified as this delusion of ""tough but reasonable"....

as if this wasn't enough, there's a spate of limbaugh-specific red-baiting concerning the seiu, which presumably has replaced acorn at the center of reactionary grouphate for the time being.

it's pretty amazing stuff, this phase of collective dissociation.

Woah, check out the new guys...and to think I was accused of derailing. :D

I'm not sure if it as mentioned before but Gallup just released a post-passage poll. This pole states that 49% believe the reform is a good thing and 40% believe it is a bad thing.

Except the 'braindead retards' came up with a plan that will improve things and may very possibly lead to lower costs to the government. Their plan wasn't even a 'Karl Marx' style government run single payer system. It just sets up some basic regulations over the private health insurance companies.

The Republicans came up with a half-ass attempt and no plan that would actually work. Then Sean Hannity said yesterday that "they (republicans) could have fixed health insurance if they wanted to." But, for some reason when they controlled the congress and Presidency, it didn't come up. Things like Health Savings Accounts (with horrible interest rates even when they were high), and high deductibles did nothing for people who were worried about losing coverage, not being able to afford it, or worried about paying for COBRA if they lost their job. Their plan was basically, if you are rich or from a well off family, then you can use your money to pay for the best care, if you don't have coverage then you aren't worth our time.

OK roachboy... your quick-to-slander demagoguery is once again like clock-work. It seems you may also be a fan of "rules for radicals". If not, you should give it a quick read, you're a natural :thumbsup: I would expect to see this type of a response from a participant, not as a moderator. IMO, these roles often appear blurred, but (hopefully) not purposely divisive.

I don't believe anything I've said is typical (verbatim) of the fringe corner you tend to quickly paint folks in. I believe you, as with dc_dux, are much too invested ideologically to be tolerant or objective. The same with the conservatives that also regurgitate their herd-speak. This thread reads like a Media Matters or Media Research Center seminar.

Points have been made regarding details. And they are often managed (as in your post) with with the intent to ridicule and deflect, while entertaining yourself and the like-minded with tired stereotypes. I'd say your response fits nicely with your description of "reactionary grouphate". As in countless other threads where the bobble-heads are suddenly presented with a different perspective, vigilance is maintained by quickly isolating, mocking and marginalizing the "target" (adversary).

Fine, play the game. However, the relationships of power and influence I presented do exist. But I think you already know this. It's not in your best interest to entertain such whimsy.

If persons and organizations operate openly in the arena of politics, the people will adopt or choose an ideology they trust. Open discussion, discourse, conducted honorably within a procedural framework... where ever that leads, the destination should withstand scrutiny. But this is not how the heath care bill, stimulus, cap and trade, and climate legislation were crafted. Some of the groups I mentioned had significant influence in both the language and purpose of the legislation.

There was no transparency, and the associations of influence from these groups is highly suspect. If you truly believe otherwise, then we will never agree. However I'm fairly confident you know exactly what I'm talking about.

---------- Post added at 01:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:05 PM ----------

I believe if you honestly look at these groups, the people behind them, and the level of input to the legislation, you would see a the scale of influence from these entities. You may be happy with that. If so, be blissful in your assessment.

I responded to a question about my assertions of power political influence in the crafting and promotion of the health agenda. The charts represent actual structures behind these relationships. This is the just the organizational mapping. It gets more unseemly as you drill down to the individuals, their history and affiliations, and relationships with the administration and Congress. But again... if you are comfortable knowing all this... then enjoy your "free" healthcare.

otto.

i have a book written by the reverend billy joe hargis published in oklahoma city 1963 called "the far left" that demonstrates in exactly the way you demonstrate that the entirely of the government (federal state and local) and media (television radio newspapers) and non-protestant denominations of religious persuasion (take your pick) were all dominated by Communist Party members who were on the payroll of the kremlin. the book is chock full of charts and lists and other "evidence" of this vast leftist conspiracy to overthrow all that's righteous and true about the (protestant fundamentalist) u.s. of a. a land that's free to not allow access to 30 million citizens to basic health care because they cant afford insurance so they should die.

the cover's particularly great; it has a white statue of liberty (what else could she be?) with a knife run through her heart bleeding great drops of patriotic blood as she weeps.

i keep it on my bookshelf. it make me laugh.

so does this entire conservative armageddeon time tea-bagger carnival that the ultra-right has managed to put into motion in order to effect a power shift inside the republican party by pulling it even further to the right and themselves something to talk about that does not inevitably refer back to the fucking disaster that was the period of the last conservative dominated government.

i've read through this thread. i find the level of conservative attacks on this bill to be unbelievable. i'd have written more often but much of what you folks have been posting is so entirely off the wall that's i find it alternatively funny (but not as funny as the weeping statue of liberty) and pathetic (because, well, it is).

but when i open up "the far left" by the reverend billy james hargis and read through it, the **same** language is everywhere.

so otto you may not personally have drifted into some john birch society place---you didn't have to---the marginal right has come to you.

it's old school. look for yourself. track down any birch society pamphlet. that conservatives don't know the history of the own movement really doesn't speak well about conservatives.


as for attempting to use my mod status as some cheap device, when i am operating from that position you'll know.
when i am not operating from it, i'm a member like you.

It seems to me that many liberal groups did not get very much of what they wanted in this bill. Single payer was taken off the plate in the very beginning and the public option was discarded shortly thereafter. In my opinion this bill demonstrates the power of the insurance industry, drug companies and other special interests which finance many of our politicians.

So groups with common interests get together and try to influence politics and policy? And sometimes they succeed? Isn't that how democracy is supposed to work?

And are they really doing this in secret when they have webpages with missions statements? Or are you some sort of undercover agent who had to dig deep to find all of this out by yourself?

Wow, that's a dramatic statement. Talk about blurring the lines of reality. I won't speak for everyone opposed to federal government healthcare, but I can say with great certainty that I don't think they should die. Unfortunately, they will though. So will you. So will I.

I'm keeping a scratch pad and this will be the fourth time I have agreed with roachboy. He can and will take a punch.

Have you people really never been scammed? Never gotten the shaft? Never gotten screwed, taken, had, made a fool of?

How, pray tell, is it so hard to see that there are crooks in the whitehouse, and there have been every since its establishment.

What is different now from its inception, is that the system is hundreds of years progressed, and the issues that were being dealt with way back when have mostly been conquered. NOW, with GREATER NUMBERS, and a DUMBER, MORE CORRUPT PUBLIC, they can whack away at more supporting structures, and send the country further into decay..

What do I mean decay? I mean instead of reading 27 different stories about rape and murder, then reading 15 different stories about child rape and murder, you'll be reading 33 different stories about murder, and 35 different stories about "unlawful" kid sex and subsequent dismemberment. It's only unlawful for a little while longer, as the decay gets worse and worse.

I mean instead of randomly taking a tour of a school, and witnessing 3 fights, 12 kids that are obviously on drugs, 42 pregnant teenagers, 8 deadbeat teachers that buy drugs from the kids, and 2 assistant principles that are having sex with their faculty, you'll be going through school and seeing television ads promoting such behavior, and even more participation, and even more unusual activities that have little to do with being human, much less education.

I mean, THE SOUL OF THIS COUNTRY IS ROTTING, and you wish to speak to me as if its the most wonderful smell.. I vomit at the smell of death and decay!

What, exactly, does this have to do with the apparent vast left wing conspiracy that has overrun this country?

I am not talking about whether the people elected truly believe the things they say to certain groups when they are pandering to them. But when a union organizes and tries to elect a pro union representative, that is not some seedy underhanded thing, it is actually what democracy is supposed to be about.

This is why there can be no intelligent discussion. When you can't point to specific passages in the actual text of the bill to post why you disagree(be it fundamentaly or idealogicaly)we end up with 7+pages of things like this.

I'm not specifically pointing you out Winchester, just that virtually all the opposition to this bill is the same. And it sounds something like this:Those against "rabble rabble rabble SOCIALISM" Those for "there's nothing in there that's socialistic" Those against "rabble rabble rabble your killing america" Those for "How?" those against "rabble rabble rabble DICTATOR, THE GOVN"T IS TAKING OVER HEALTHCARE" Those for "go and read the bill, there's nothing in there about the govn't taking over healthcare, it's still privately owned" Those against "rabble rabble rabble I DON"T NEED TO READ IT, I CAN TELL WHEN AMERICA IS DIEING"

i'm just working with the conservative arguments, trying to figure out what they're really on about by swapping out the screen-claims for what's actually happening. that's where things arrive. it's a simple logical procedure.

my own views are quite different from this. i think the existing law went nowhere near far enough. i support free universal access to basic health care as a fundamental human right. i think the debate was badly framed not only in political and ethical terms, but also in that the english/canadian model was posited as the only alternative to the american and that simply on the basis of linguistic chauvinism so far as i can tell. the french system is far more flexible, far better in terms of service delivery and is a more viable alternative than the single payer. but that wasn't the debate. language chauvinism is a pitiful thing to allow to control central aspects of a debate this important, but there we are.

i think the communications strategy about this whole thing was a fiasco.
i think the fact that **anyone** is listening to conservative dissociation in opposition to this legislation at this point is testimony to just how badly done was the framing of this issue.

and i think the right is becoming genuinely dangerous at this point. were i in power, things would be getting ugly. i do not believe there should be a tolerance for fascism on free speech grounds. i do not believe racism should be understood as acceptable speech. but that's just me.

and this

is drama queen horseshit.

This always makes me chuckle, the sky is still apparently falling on some people on this forum, hope they remember their unbrellas when they go out. Reminds me of high school girls, oh my god my life is over, I have a zit.......

I was staying out of this one, but reading this thread I've had the same thought's as above. But, pertaining to both sides of the argument. Frankly I down loaded and began to read the health care bill. By page 250 my head was swimming. There are so many amendments it's hard to follow.

Both sides of the argument are based on heresay. I don't recall a single line of the bill being post by those for or against. Of course that would mean posting the lines that amend or rescend the original line as well.

What I see here is the same thing I've seen and heard for the past year:

1. Conservatives think Oblahblah is the anti-christ.
2. Conservatives are creating conspiracies in their heads.
3. Conservatives want poor people to die.

1. Liberals think Oblahblah is the savior.
2. Liberals think the world is rainbows and unicorns.
3. Liberals want to save everyone with other peoples money.

From my point of view, if there is some sort of conspiracy, this type of debate is exactly how one would want to hide it.

For a minute forget about the '30 million' uninsured. Yes it is a huge number, but it is only 1/10th of the population. It is unrealistic and counter productive to cater to such a small segment of society. Remember too, they do have access to health care through emergency rooms. They are not left out of the system.

Does anyone wonder why it takes 2000 pages to introduce what has been tagged here as a 'basic' health care reform? What would a comprehensive reform bill look like? 10,000 pages? Why do the government and union systems remain untouched? Where is all this money really coming from? Why overhaul something that works at 90%, wouldn't rational thinking dictate you fix the 10% that's not working? What is going to happen when 100,000,000 illegal aliens are granted amnesty and introduced to the program? Why can't the bill be written in a readable manor?

Politically I'm just about dead center, with a slight lean to the right. Which I believe is what would best represent this country in government (or a slight lean to the left, slight being the operative word here on both sides). This bill is pushing everyone to the extremes in an effort to make a point.

I for one, would like to get back to the OP's format. But for both sides. If you aren't posting an actual line from the bill, it's simply opinion. Supporting or not, post an actual line to argue. What do you say??

Meanwhile I'm going back to melt my brain with another 250 pages of double talk and amendments.

Have fun.


...

..

Ya'll missed it.. My post aint about the bill in question individually, but about all bills of similar nature that have ever been passed.

.....and the significance of my first line is that if you'll notice, ALL THE BILLS go through this same process. Whitehouse will talk about it, forums will rant and rave about it, and the same damn conclusions will be drawn by the same people over and over again. YET NOTHING EVER CHANGES.

There is more here than the bill, the people arguing over the bill, and the speculation as to what the bill might actually "do".

Seriously... these bills...

They aren't the friendly, do-gooder processes that people perceive them as, they are indeed ways for people to take money from other people in ways that would otherwise, were it not for the law, be illegal.

In this way, the individuals of the country are more and more placed in a position of "fight dirty or suffer economic failure." This, I will describe as a rot of sorts, and with particular relation to the "soul of" or "spirit of" or "enthusiasm of the individuals within the country for" the country.

To say it another way, "The individuals of the country must accept that their actions in almost all situations related to the compliance with government mandates will impact and degrade another in his efforts to do the exact same thing, as required by law. "


These situations cause a lack of respect for the law, which are directly absorbed by the children of this country, who quickly get the idea that, "Hey, if my parents hate it so much, why do I HAVE TO MESS WITH IT AT ALL?"

When that happens, it becomes possible to inject further social disease into the system by way of rules and regulations regarding "bad children" that "don't care about anything." Once that happens, kids belong to the government as much as their parents do, and as such, are almost entirely separate from their parents.


I ask you, seriously, am I wrong in my observations? Is this not true? If it is true, is this not terrible? Does this not matter? Is it acceptable to us all to live indifferently from one another, caring not about any subject but those created and discussed by our "leaders"?

Is it acceptable to ignore that which is most threatening, in favor of that which is said to be most threatening?

For an alternate discussion on this very same topic, please head to the philosophy sections thread -

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/tilted-...ed-humans.html

Take this for what's it worth, but for my inner peace and as I am learning more about myself... I have to say this:

After a few days of cooling down, I want to truly wholeheartedly appologize to anyone my rants on the health care bill may have offended. Politics and I have always been volatile and I tend to lose my cool. That is no excuse for the language and nastiness I spewed. Again, I am deeply sorry.

End threadjack.

I'm curious about this concept. How exactly does one make it free? If you can truly make it free, I am totally on board with you. Please elaborate.

---------- Post added at 04:11 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:10 PM ----------

Pussy. :D

I keed. I keed.

Also clarification may be needed...

Free as in freedom or free as in free beer?

I am what I eat..

Every year I celebrate my sobriety from gambling (March 20th, was 11 years), I make a promise to work on bettering my life in 1 way. I decided this year I was to learn to control my tongue and passion and work them in positive ways. It's a lesson in humility and working to better me as a person.

Dissent can be and should be shown more civilly and not in negative ways. I allowed myself to be a negative person in my dissent. I was wrong to.

Again, end threadjack.

this isn't rocket science, folks. free as in a decision is made by the electorate through representatives that allocating resources presently allocated in other ways so that basic health care is provided free of charge. then those resources are redirected.

the french system is two-tiered: free access to basic health care and compulsory private insurance for more advanced medical treatment the cost of which is sliding, so that the poor pay little or nothing and those who can afford it pay more.

the implementation of this also entailed some changes in the professional standing of doctors, a relative levelling in the hierarchies of doctors and nurses (relative to the united states), changes in salary structure and education (medical school does not come with hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt)...but it can be done.

and the french system is rated consistently as the best in the world.

it's a system-level decision that can be made, that has been made, that's been implemented and that works better than the american model in terms of care delivery and in terms of research and development.

go figure.

So by "free", you mean that the government taxes the people with money and then uses that money to pay for services offered to people who do not have money?

same way that things like military expenditures and prison construction happens, yes.

you know, the same way that programs that manly conservatives tend to conflate with social programs they like (killing people, putting them in prison)

btw if you click here:

ICPS :School of Law :King's College London : World Prison Brief : King's College London

you can look at international statistics concerning prison populations and amounts spent on prison construction by country. the united states emprisons more people than any other country on earth.
there's something seriously fucked up about the priorities that allow for that outcome.

but i have no problem with democratic socialism except that typically it's too conservative.
so i doubt we're going to agree on anything.

VERBATIM from bill H.R. 3590

So, The Secretary, “Federal Government,” in conjunction with the Doctors, and the Stake Holders, or insurance companies shall all work together to discuss how best to get you out of the hospital as quickly as possible and reduce your return, (obviously this will save them money, correct) All sounds good until you realize the control they will have in this process of “helping you to get better swiftly and stay that way, lets see how they will so graciously help you.

So we will have “highly trained” individuals who will obviously be in this more for “our blessed help” than their own money, quotas, or answering to the Government and the Insurance company as to why they failed and you became a burden once again on the new governmental health care system.

You will be monitored as they will do everything within their power to reduce the number of readmits, as well as the number of admits to begin with.

You can bet your PCM(your new Primary Care Manager) will document if you smoke, drink, exercise, etc…. and this information will be available to other “professionals” who will attempt to reduce health care uses by reducing health risk issues.

You will be that health care risk, somebody will be contacting you to help you with your problems, so as to help all our people reduce the health care bill you must also participate not only in your share of payment but in your share of healthy lifestyle participation, so all Americans can live a better life, you to must participate in these programs, or maybe we will penalize you. These go hand in hand.

If you think this will stop at your door step and you can remain anonymity in the new nation of “support” I fear you will be greatly disappointed, It comes to my attention to ask all of you who think this is the greatest gift, to tell me how many times you have had a governmental agency show up at your doorstep because you receive assistance from their funding, it is a mandatory inclusion to have physical social assistance directives arrive knocking when you receive free assistance from the government, we have let them pass it, and when they come knocking, you will be required to open your door.

Why do I say this, my son received assistance for speech therapy through the government as a Tricare benefit referral by my governmental paid Dr. Before any assistance was granted, I had to submit to a in house meeting with the speech therapist and a home counselor, then we had weekly to bi-weekly in home speech therapy for over a year, when he enrolled into government paid child assisted programs for children with developmental disabilities, again before he was admitted an in home interview was required.

The government is going to take every opportunity to protect its assets and by that it needs to assure its investments are sound, you will be its investment, you will be sound.

Ask me about social services and how lovely that arena is, how great the governmental agencies of care and fostering for the safety of your children are. There is simply nothing as great as private practice, private assistance, private, private, private. That privileged assistance will become an exclusive club retained only for those who can afford it, and after all these new taxes and fees and mandated purchases, we will all be broke so don't expect any privacy, especially if you ask for help.

The realities of what you are signing away when you receive you brand new Health care Card with your special number will be less a gift and more a responsibility to the government, don’t you remember the most fundamental saying in situations of fraud, if it sound to good to be true…… and NOTHING, NO, NOTHING IS FREE.

There is still a lot more of this bill to read, and yes I will interpret it from the viewpoint I feel best answers my questions, but at least I am questioning this “law” I am not just looking to the sky and dancing for the new free bandages falling from it.

Not to be an asshole or to get this thread off track, but doesn't this happen in every thread pan? You rant, rave, make false claims, like Kucinich saying he was browbeaten, ask for answers, get said answers, ignore said answers, then repeat the cycle all over, then either blog an apology, or make a post saying you made a mistake, and were emotional in your posts, like that makes all the falsehoods you've claimed go...poof, I mean wouldn't it be easier to just I don't know use facts rather than emotion to get your point across in the first place? You say you're tryingto better yourself and that's great, I respect you for doing that, but making the same emotional posts over and over again doesn't help you do that.

See, why do you have to go there? "Manly conservatives?" I'm really trying to have a dialogue here...

As for prisons, I actually agree with you. That's because of our ridiculous drug laws. I'll bet if you eliminate those in prison on petty drug charges, the numbers are pretty equal. However, I haven't researched.

You limp-wristed marxist, you. :D

Idyllic, Your post started out to be fairly objective until you brought up your experience with tricare. After that you then made assumptions about the new system(which is still private)that the "man" is gonna be knockin on all our doors tellin us what kind of care we get. Might have well just said "Death Panel" and have been done with it. If these things don't exist in other countries where there is actually true socialised medicine, why on earth do you think it would happen to a system that is still privately owned?

As for tricare, I understand that with ANY system of insurance there will be horror stories. I sell supplemental insurance, generally used to fill the gaps that mainstream health insurance doesn't cover. When speaking with employee's during their enrollments(I usually speak with about 5 thousand employee's a year) I come across a small percentage who are in the military and have tricare. They NEVER buy anything from me. Their answer is always "nope don't need it, I've got tricare" This is also true for retired military who also have govn't benefits. They completely outshine most "cadillac" health plans. They won't even sign up for their companies group plan, even when it's 100% employer paid(which I admit is very rare anymore)

Did you happen to read the part where Tricare forwarded me to the government services, the government ran the Special Ed school my son attended, not Tricare. I needed a referral from a Dr. to enroll him just as any parent will require a Dr. referral for any child with a disability to receive free services. Tricare had nothing to do with this except to refer me to the governmental funded assistance program. This is the system.

You need a referral from your primary care dr. now to see any doctor other than him, or an ER visit. Otherwise they will either deny the claim, or pay a small percentage of the bill. That is nothing new.

You still miss my point, once you step into the government assisted realm you cross over from the concepts of private, period. If you want to go to a private dr. you will pay higher premiums I'm sure, if you only purchase the governmental buy in insurance (at minimum mandate) you will be going to the hospitals that will be under the umbrellas of the government, it is in the bill, they will pay the hospitals they will pay the dr.s those will be the places the governmental insurance is welcome.

Just as with tricare, my choices are limited if I want to pay less, I can choose whoever I want but the more private and elite, the more it costs, simple. This is a business and the government will protect it's assets to the best of it's abilities, and we all know the government runs a ship exactly as tight as they want it. You will see, when "I just never imagined" becomes reality, this sentiment will echo every where when it come to this Health care reform bills' effectiveness. I don't have to be dramatic with the 'death panel" scare tactics, I just have to be patient and listen. I won't hear anything I didn't already know will occur, we all know it, we just would rather make lemonade, but remember it's still just sugared water and lemons in the end., just easier to swallow, kinda like kool aid.

Idyllic, could you enumerate some of the reasons why "more private" positively correlates with "more expensive" when discussing healthcare?

And again, if this is not the case anywhere else that actually has socialised health care, why would this be the case here when it's still private?

One I could say your animosity towards me leads you to dirct negative comments my way in every thread, trying to make it personal.

Two, I am not apologizing or backing down from what I said or believe, I am solely apologizing for the WAY I said things. That is all.

Pan, I have no animosity towards you, I don't even know you, so why would I waste my time being angry at someone I don't know aside from posts they make on a forum?

How come everyone else who disagrees with your opinion is fine, yet me it's trying to make it personal? I have negative comments about your opinion as people have negative comments about my opinion, it happens pan, I have no negative comments about you as as person, as already stated I don't know you. I have never personally attacked you on this forum, you've tried to play victim a lot but never have I attacked you, the mods have never warned me, and trust me, they have before if I cross the line, I get a warning.

You made this personal when you made this apology, you made it about yourself, I merely pointed out this seems to be a trend with you in the majority of threads, I mean am I lying about that? The truth is in this forum, ranting, emotional posting is the norm for you.

You do understand that there is no public option, right? As such, there is no "umbrellas of the government," right?

Also, last I checked Tricare is not mandatory. It is mind boggling that someone who is and continues to be part of a public single payer system can consistently keep saying the kind of stuff you say about public healthcare. This is not to pick on you personally, but the way you are voting with your money, electing to stay on tricare, tells me a LOT more than anything you post here. And given the proportion of people who stay on tricare for their entire lives vs the proportion of people not eligible for tricare who dump their insurance companies after a while, I must say that it really can't be that bad.

pan....you think Kucininch was brow beaten into writing what is reported to be his first fund-raising letter for the DCCC ever?
Just messin with you. :)

I'm just saying that the ability to draw up organizational diagrams doesn't amount to much. It doesn't surprise me that a lot of lefty organizations have some people in common. I imagine you could draw up similar charts showing the connection between different companies for any arbitrarily chosen industry. You could even probably make ominous statements about the histories of those involved.

No offense, but after seeing some of the other pieces of evidence you find credible in this health care discussion, I'm not in a big hurry to chase you down this particular rabbit hole. If that means ignorantly submitting to a new secret socialist order of fascist communists, then I'll deal.

Deal me in.

A bill that meets many of Obama's campaign promises on the issue with the exception of the MOST liberal or progressive provisions is somehow the result of influence of the vast left wing movement?

The ironic thing is, on a socialist scale of 1 to 10, this bill rates a "what the fuck are the insurance companies doing in there?!"

I know. Anyone who calls this thing socialist is either ignorant or a liar. I imagine most card carrying socialists resent the way they've been associated with the current administration.

I still think most of the opposition to this bill came from people who want the current administration to fail so they will get the power back in Nov and in 2012. They could have added every single Republican idea and scraped just about every positive thing from this bill, but they would still have been against it.

I will say that Idyllic did a good job arguing with the actual text up there a few posts ago. But, quite frankly, I don't have a problem if the private health insurance companies offer and give assistance to people who want to become healthier, and give information to those who choose not to.

And if you had no health insurance for your son, but made just enough to disqualify for gov. assistance, then he wouldn't have been able to get any care, and that's not right.