Oh my, the liberals are in an uproar that we are daring…DARING…to call bulls&%t on this SCHIP family the Democrats pulled out of their hat this last weekend. My favorite comment on this KOS post sums it up:
Yes, they better not have a “high net worth value” before our society decides to assist them with anything for their kids healthcare bills. Bills that by my estimates most likely would be in the hundreds and hundreds of thousands and that might also result in the bankruptcy of even the most average middle class family that possessed health insurance coverage. Yup, the family should have been forced to suffer more (despite the fact the kids are lucky to be alive and will have lifelong issues to deal with from the TBI’s they sustained).
Yes, these people should be forced to suffer and struggle some more….they should have had to sell their small family business and been forced to give up the breadwinner’s income (and he should go work at McWal-mart) …because that is what a humane society insists upon before they provide them with healthcare assistance. Yup and they should have been forced to sell and move out of their house (that had most likely risen in value subtantially like most homes over the past decade did due to the housing bubble)and sold their granite counter tops and been forced to moved into a Section 8 funded apartment because gawd forbid they better most certainly be struggling before those kids and this family were aided by our American society in any way shape or form. That’s the spirit….the American way.
I’m sorry if I sound angry and sarcastic here, (because I am after reading this post)….but perhaps you just don’t fully understand just what this family went through. I have no personal knowledge of this family, but worked in a TBI rehab unit for many years….and it is one of those traumatic medical issues that can just devastate and rip apart people and their families in many many ways and not always just financially.
Well how about this instead Einstein. The family buys insurance at a cost of 400-500 bucks a month instead of buying that SUV, instead of buying those granite counter tops, instead of putting their kids into private school, instead of remodeling their house. That way the insurance then covers the hundreds of thousands of dollars in bills and TA-DA, problem solved.
This is just another Mary Ann Knowles:
Repeatedly throughout his campaign, Kerry has held up Hudson
resident Mary Ann Knowles as an example of President Bush’s failure to
ensure adequate health care for all Americans (as if a President can do
such a thing). Here is what he said during his acceptance speech at the
Democratic National Convention last month:“What does it mean
when Mary Ann Knowles, a woman with breast cancer I met in New
Hampshire, had to keep working day after day right through her
chemotherapy, no matter how sick she felt, because she was terrified of
losing her family’s health insurance? America can do better. And help
is on the way.”Thing is, Mary Ann Knowles did not have to work
through her chemotherapy to keep her health insurance. In fact, she has
great health insurance, which includes 26 weeks of paid disability
leave.Knowles chose to work through most, but not all, of her
chemotherapy because her husband was out of a job. (Kerry said she had
to work “every day” of her chemotherapy. His campaign chalked that lie
up to “a colloquialism.”)She and husband John did not want to
take the pay cut that would have come with disability leave, so Mary
Ann kept working. But that is not how Kerry tells the story. He
deliberately misstates her situation, saying she would have lost her
health coverage if she took a single day off.
Another Winifred Skinner:
It brings tears to your eyes. Here’s this adorable, elderly woman out in Iowa who’s so sick and so poor, that in order to pay for medicines she needs to stay alive, she has to scavenge in a local dump yard for cast-off tin cans.
~~~Mrs. Skinner, who first told her story at a Gore campaign event in Altoona, Iowa, repeated her sad story Tuesday to the nation at large — or Mr. Gore repeated it for her.
~~~As it happens, despite the impression given by Vice President Gore, Mrs. Skinner is not an itinerant hobo. She is not living “hand to mouth” as reported by Mr. Gore, but quite comfortably as the mother of a well-to-do businessman, Earl King, a successful specialist in heating and air conditioning. Mr. King and his wife, in addition to his routine work, raise horses (not a poor man’s hobby) on a farm west of Des Moines. They have made available to Mrs. Skinner a 900-square-foot Des Moines apartment where she would be welcome to live, but she prefers her old home.
~~~“She gets a small pension,” he said. “But in order to pay for her prescription drug benefits she has to go out seven days a week, several hours a day, picking up cans.”
It turns out, as the statement was rectified, Mrs. Skinner goes out zero days a week, for zero hours a day, and that she was only speaking “in the name of” people she assumes must do this. But in whose name was the vice-president speaking in his closing sentences of the debate? Apparently no one’s.
Or Jennifer Bush:
…Jennifer’s mother wrote a widely-publicized letter to the White House.
“Do you know what it is like to choose between purchasing groceries for
the week to feed your family or buying needed medications for your
chronically ill child?” Kathleen Bush asked. Pale and wan, young
Jennifer suffered from unidentified chronic digestive problems and
myriad ailments from birth. She had her gall bladder, appendix, and
fragments of her intestines removed. Those organs were replaced with a
tangled cable of feeding tubes that constricted Jennifer’s 43-pound
frame. Surgeons threaded a catheter into the girl’s heart. After 200
hospital visits and 40 operations, the Bush family had racked up
medical bills worth more than $2 million.~~~
Politicians unquestioningly embraced the Bushes and their tale of need.
Hillary cuddled with seven-year-old Jennifer for the cameras; their
mugs were splashed on the pages of USA Today and newspapers across the
country. Shamelessly coached, Jennifer gave the Clintons a lucky silver
dollar “to bring you good luck so everyone can have good insurance.” In
another pre-programmed, kiddie-sized soundbite, Jennifer dutifully told
the press: “I pray every night that I can get better – and that
everyone can have insurance.”~~~
But who was strangling whom? Several years before Hillary deified Mrs.
Bush and elevated Jennifer to poster-child stardom, suspicious medical
professionals had already begun questioning the mother’s role in making
her “beautiful little angel” sick. Nurses complained that Mrs. Bush was
force-feeding her child with unnecessary seizure drugs that made her
vomit. Independent specialists conducted extensive tests on Jennifer
and found no evidence of digestive disorders. When Jennifer was
separated from her mother for treatment at a Cincinnati hospital, the
starved child feasted mightily on pizza, hot dogs, and chocolate bars.
Meanwhile, authorities discovered that while the Bush family claimed
poverty because of Jennifer’s health problems, they had splurged on
trips to the Bahamas and Disney World, house remodeling, and a new
Harley-Davidson motorcycle.~~~
…[In February 2000], Kathleen Bush — Hillary Clinton’s once-proud
and loud sister in arms — was sentenced to five years in prison on two
counts of aggravated child abuse and one count of fraud. She also pled
guilty to a separate count of welfare fraud for misrepresenting $60,000
in assets on Medicaid forms. “There was probably more abuse in this
single case,” lead prosecutor Bob Nichols noted, “than in all of the
child-abuse cases I’ve prosecuted in my life combined.”Mrs. Bush’s behavior is an extreme example of the Nanny State
opportunism to which Hillary Clinton has dedicated her life. It’s
enough to make you sick.
That’s all this is. The Democrats chose to roll out a little kid to shamelessly plug for socialized medicine and its backfiring once more. Because any family that can afford a new SUV, a remodeled kitchen with granite countertops, tuition to private schools can damn well afford the 500 bucks a month for insurance. Will they have to do without on some things? Sure. Life is all about priorities. But as a business owner the father decided to spend their money on other things rather then insurance, and now look who paid for it. The taxpayers.
And where the hell was the auto insurance anyways? Did he not add medical to it?
UPDATE
…So executive vice-presidents’ families are now the new new poor? I
support lower taxes for the Frosts, increased child credits for the
Frosts, an end to the “death tax” and other encroachments on
transgenerational wealth transfer, and even severe catastrophic
medical-emergency aid of one form or other. But there is no reason to
put more and more middle-class families on the government teat, and
doing so is deeply corrosive of liberty.
UPDATE II
Good catch once again by the peeps at FR:
Note how Dailykos defends them with the following info: “Ths house that the Frosts currently reside in was purchased in 1990 for $55,000.”
As if that was some sort of proof of how downtrodden they are when in
fact, that is ever so slightly above the median range of housing in
1990:In Baltimore, median household incomes rose from
$24,045 in 1990 to $36,031 in 2006 in the Baltimore City-Towson area.
But median home prices in that same area went from $54,700 to $126,400,
according to census data.
Which also means they have a nice little nestegg of equity built up.
Still, why not get the taxpayers to pay for your insurance?
See author page
Didn’t this program actually pay the young kids (used in this slimey ad) medical bills brought on by the car crash. Funny that the president requested a $5 billion, with a B, increase in funding for the program but the democrats want it expanded to cover the Rockefeller and Heinz (Hanoi John) families.
If the family income is as reported they were already eligible for S-Chip in Maryland. The irony however is that at the end of the day this young man received hundreds of thousands of dollars of care at someone’s expense because he needed it, whether he had private insurance or public assistance. It would seem the real beneficiary here would be the hospital and doctors who weren’t paid for his care rather than the young man whose parents wouldn’t or couldn’t pay for private insurance and didn’t bother to apply for S-Chip in Maryland or didn’t know they could. Either way this bill is not the answer to this young man’s alleged problem.
I don’t really know much about this issue, but I am repulsed by using a child to make political points. (I seem to remember Pres. Bush parading around a fistful of infants when he vetoed the stem cell bill — did that bother you as much as it sis me?)
But really, 400-500 bucks for family insurance? YOU MUST BE BAKED. If you think you can get family insurance for less-than 1,200 a month, then I also have a bridge to sell you.
Hmmmm,
You do realize, because of the injuries sustained by their daughter, they will essentially be denied coverage by any private insurer at _any_ rate, much less $500 a month.
You do realize they don’t actually pay full tuition to those schools, that their son has a significant scholarship that pays for about 96% of the tuition costs?
You do realize there is nothing abnormal about a median-income family buying a (roughly) median income house in the 1990’s? The reason that’s mentioned on the Kos site (among others) is folks such as yourself have been pointing out the house value and effectively saying “hey, if they can afford payments on that house, they don’t need SCHIP” … ignoring the fact they aren’t making payments based on the home’s current value.
If you had bothered to check any of your facts, you might have found out that the boy only pays $500 in tuition per year at that “expensive” school, and that his house only cost $55,000 when his parents bought it, although the neighborhood has improved since then. (How dare a hardworking, honest family help a poor neighborhood to improve?)
Be careful how you sneer at that SUV. A lot of conservatives have been shrieking that an SUV is an absolute necessity for the safety of their children, and that anyone who wants to deprive a family of them must be an environmental terrorist. But when has cognitive dissonance ever bothered you guys, come to think of it? Go back to smearing children.
The GOP:
Smearing children and holding the powerless accountable since 1865.
Not BEFORE the accident. You know, when your supposed to pay for that insurance in the first place. Instead they chose to put that money into a kitchen and a suv. Priorities I guess.
Check the link out yourself.
Face it, this family made enough to get a SUV, to remodel their kitchen, and Im sure we will find out how much more they were able to afford in the near future INSTEAD of paying for insurance, or medical car insurance it seems.
Pathetic.
“Funny that the president requested a $5 billion, with a B, increase in funding for the program but the democrats want it expanded to cover the Rockefeller and Heinz (Hanoi John) families”
Funny that 5 billion, with a B, isn’t enough to fund the needs of the program at it’s CURRENT level.
Why don’t you just say what you really mean: “If you don’t have health insurance it’s your own fault and you deserve to get sick and die. And if you don’t like it then you’re a commie-pinko-treehugger-slacker-lowlife.” Don’t mask your neanderthal-based philosophy with fancy facts and figures — it’s embarassing.
Your damn right its your own fault if you can afford it, which this family most assuredly could.
Funny that 5 billion, with a B, isn’t enough to fund the needs of the program at it’s CURRENT level.
That is completely idiotic.
What’s interesting is that there isn’t really any reason to deny these people insurance. The money is only coming out of your pocket if you smoke, and if you smoke, you’re stealing money from my pocket because your healthcare costs this country billions more than non-smokers. And smoking certainly seems to be more of a choice than having a car big enough for your family, having a house, or “choosing” to follow the dream of working for yourself. Not only that, but all the choices that this family made are choices the boost the economy (choosing to have a family, choosing to buy a car, choosing to buy a house, choosing to be an entrepreneur instead of letting people from outside the country do that job).
A) Why do lower-income children not deserve healthcare? B) Why would you care unless you smoke since it’s not money out of your pocket? B.2) If you do smoke, do you think that YOU deserve the money more than that kid? Or, even if you don’t smoke, do you think smokers deserve that money even more than that kid? Even when health costs of smoking are astronomical? Even when smokers miss more work than non-smokers, costing employers and businesses millions?
And I’ve seen people talking about how smoking taxes punish the poor, but I’d rather punish the poor for smoking than punish their children for their parents being bad fiscal planners.
And finally, let’s assume this family is fairly well off. Would you deny all the families who are worse off healthcare and “let them rot” just because there are a handful of people who MIGHT not have need it (again, only according your misinterpretation of their financial circumstances). Don’t we want to reward people for having families? Look at how great rewarding home ownership worked out for america.
“Funny that 5 billion, with a B, isn’t enough to fund the needs of the program at it’s CURRENT level.
That is completely idiotic.”
But true, caveman. Sorry if the math doesn’t jibe with the cro-magnon mindset.
Oh yeah, your right…the math does say its not enough to cover those who truly don’t need the help but instead chose to spend it on big cars and new kitchens. What was I thinking.
You guys take the cake.
trex and sirocco…
do you really expect the right wing smear machine to check facts? think back to the swift boat vets. heres the key qoute from another right wing smear merchant…”… maybe money can be found for other things…maybe Dad should drop his woodworking hobby and get a real job that offers health insurance rather than making people like me (also with 4 kids in a 600sf smaller house and tuition $16,000 less per kid and no commercial property ownership) pay for it in my taxes.” the righties just want to tell everyone else how to live. they can’t help themselves. at the end of the day the insurance companies are thieves. the answer is fixing insurance, not growing government.
“Oh yeah, your right…the math does say its not enough to cover those who truly don’t need the help but instead chose to spend it on big cars and new kitchens. What was I thinking.”
Nice deflection, Piltdown Man. If you had a brain you would note that my argument had absolutely nothing to do with expannding SCHIP, just that Dear Leader wants to CUT it.
Here is a fact. A FACT, as in not debatable because it is true:
The administration’s request to increase SCHIP funding by $5B over 5 years is not enough to cover the children already enrolled in the program.
Try and refute this. You can’t. Because it is true.
And I am big enough to accept your apology for calling me an idiot when I was 100% right.
Because we commie-pinko-treehugger-slackers are a VERY forgiving group.
I love you and all the other Minions of Bush. I pray for you.
Check this out for facts lib, most states are already using their SCHIP funds for adults. Something SCHIP was never intended to be used for. Minnesota, Illinois, New Jersey, Michigan, Rhode Island, and New Mexico all show that they will spend more SCHIP money on adults rather then the children it was written and passed for.
The fact of the matter is that the increase suggested by the President would fund those who really need it, you know…the poor, who cant afford their own homes, nor SUV’s, nor new kitchens.
Admit it, you guys want socialized medicine.
What everyone else said.
Plus, I honestly don’t get it. What’s the problem? You guys act like health care for all kids, means everyone gets sent to Siberia and Stalin gets put on the $1 bill. Hasn’t happened in the UK, Canada, or any other NATO nations with health care; do you think America is weaker than them, and can’t handle public medicine?
You don’t have a problem with roads, do you? Roads are paid for by everyone via taxes, whether or not the individuals actaully use roads much, because good roads help *everyone* in the country.
Same for public schools, the military, and the space program. At the state and town level, same for police and fire departments. We all pay in for all these things, because they improve our living conditions. Even if we *never* send kids to school, other peoples’ kids getting educated means a better, happier workforce and a better economy. Even if your house never catches fire, you’re safer because someone will put someone else’s house out *before* it gets to yours. Etc. etc.
So, what’s the damage with SCHIP? Kids get health care, smokers get charged more. Win and win.
“Admit it, you guys want socialized medicine.”
I admit it. I’m not ashamed to admit it. God forbid we give healthcare to everyone. I mean, that would be HORRIBLE, wouldn’t it? It’s not like we’re the richest and most powerful country in the world or anything. Note to cavemen: We are the richest country in the world BECAUSE we are a welfare state, not in spite of it. Like ALL the other rich countries are too, right?
And personally, I don’t get all bent out of shape if a program is abused somewhat, as long as the core purpose is being fulfilled. And in the case of SCHIP it clearly is. If the program was corrupt, don’t you think Rush and all the other the other Minions would be screaming about it with their puffy red swollen faces? Of course they would be. But they’re not. Because it’s a pretty good program.
And that states are allowed to administer the program how they want to. That’s the ‘S’ in SCHIP, you know, for “State”.
And there you go. Redistribution of wealth. We are the richest BECAUSE of Capitalism, not because we have welfare.
If you libs want to take my taxes so a family that earns 80 grand a year (not the Frosts, what the libs plan calls for) can choose to spend their money on SUVs instead of insurance then you can expect a fight. SCHIP money going to those it was intended for, POOR KIDS, and you wont get a fight.
“And there you go. Redistribution of wealth. We are the richest BECAUSE of Capitalism, not because we have welfare.
If you libs want to take my taxes so a family that earns 80 grand a year (not the Frosts, what the libs plan calls for) can choose to spend their money on SUVs instead of insurance then you can expect a fight.”
You’re acting like you caught me in something. I know what I am saying. If it wasn’t for the New Deal, there would have been some sort of commie revolution here. You can pshaw all you want, but that’s exactly what a lot of people were afraid of at the time.
When capitalism was in full-bloom, pre-New Deal, we were a 2nd-rate world power both economically and militarily. Again, this is not a really arguable point.
So you’re quite literally saying we should throw the baby out with the bathwater. That because some people who YOU feel don’t deserve to qualify for SCHIP, the whole program should be underfunded as some sort of twisted Bushie-punishment?
Question: Would you support a full de-funding of SCHIP? Because socialized medicine is socialized medicine, right? Whether or not it’s helping anyone, as a market-driven culture no one should have insurance for free when others are paying cash, right?
“SCHIP money going to those it was intended for, POOR KIDS, and you wont get a fight.”
You’re a liar. Admit it — you were against SCHIP as soon as you heard of it. Which was probably just a few weeks ago.
The problem with SCHIP in its current form is that its eroding the private insurance market. I’m sure if the Frosts couldn’t get this taxpayer help they would have done what was necessary to get that insurance themselves, like get rid of the nice car and doing without the remodeled kitchen.
But, with SCHIP, they can insure the kids and not have to pay for it!
This kind of program, like most welfare programs, give incentives to people to work the system and get free service. They then spend the money on other things. The bottomline = SCHIP is often winding up insuring kids who would have been insured anyway.
With the Democrats new version every uninsured child signed up, TWO insured kids would be signed up, and removed from the private health insurance system.
Which erodes the private health insurance system.
Which increases government control of health care in the United States.
And then you have socialized medicine.
Curt you do know that already have a socialized healthcare system and its huge. Medicare and medicaid. I suppose you are stuck on the term socialized or its bogeyman other socialism. Get over it.
Second by allowing children to have regular checkups over all healthcare costs are REDUCED.
Third you are not following the story. The family makes 45k a year the kid is on a huge scholarship and the house was cheap when they bought it.
Ultimately that you would turn against the health and well being of children over a single example is not a good indicator of your moral center.
Wrong once again. Your making a habit out of this.
First, many of the states are using those funds for adults, not children. Second, I am following the story. They have a house with lots of equity built into, they have a nice new shiny SUV, they have a nice new remodeled kitchen, and they sent their kids to private schools at the cost of the taxpayers. Third, I’m turning against the fact that this couple prioritized wrong. No way they can explain not spending the 500 bucks a month rather then spend it on the SUV.
And bankrupting this country
Off to work, cya later libs
“With the Democrats new version every uninsured child signed up, TWO insured kids would be signed up, and removed from the private health insurance system.
Which erodes the private health insurance system.”
God forbid we erode the private healthcare system! Anyone who either explicitly or implicitly defends the insurance industry is either a) a fool, b) works for them, c) has never really had to deal with them, or d) is just trying to be cute and “anti”. Insurance companies are the AXIS OF EVIL, and you know that this is a well-entrenched stereotype.
I don’t understand why sending taxpayer money to the government, who we get to elect, is so much worse than forking it over to private industry. I don’t like giving my money to anyone. At least with the government greed doesn’t enter into it as often, and we can demand accountability. If CIGNA decides on a Wednesday to cancel your policy, oh well, you’re screwed.
And if you dare say “trickle down” then you’re even dumber than you sound.
Hey Curt — what happened to proving I was wrong about Bush’s lame-ass funding proposal?
Chicken-hawk. Run for cover, sweetie! You might have to back up your bluster with facts, and we can’t have that!
What the whacko neocon psuedo-libertarians here can’t seem to grasp is that the competition created by a government funded system will actually drive healthcare prices down.
Cue the inevitable right wing study to the contrary…
And there you go. Redistribution of wealth. We are the richest BECAUSE of Capitalism, not because we have welfare.
Right. And I’d like to know exactly how socialized HEALTHCARE AS AN OPTION is anti-Capitalist. You free market nutcases don’t even seem to understand the free market, nor the fact that TAXES have created lots of cool things for the nanny state conservatives – such as the corporation designation – a construct designed to protect the individuals involved; roads, airports, infrastructre, schools, and every thing else that NURTURES Capitalistic endeavors. But although everyone deserves a free education, the same can’t be said of healthcare?
You people are just pathetic.
Oh, BTW – and because I don’t have time to sit around and argue with a bunch of disingenuous blowhards today, I don’t recall anyone being in an “uproar” about the fact that the wing-nuts “questioned” the kid – it’s that you numbnuts didn’t even check the facts, and when called out on it all you have to fall back on is the tired old meme about the system being abused, you not wanting to pay for someone else’s healthcare (when you have no problem doing it for their education?), etc. ad-nauseum.
Here’s a thought. If healthcare was free for everyone, nobody could “abuse” the system because every citizen would have access.
“I don’t recall anyone being in an “uproar” about the fact that the wing-nuts “questioned” the kid”
Of course you’re right. But Minions of Bush need to feel oppressed. They need to feel like someone’s gittin’ sumpin’ they ain’t. They NEED to feel like they’ve earned everything they have while everyone else is getting free gub’ment cheese.
Let’s face it, they want to be an aggrieved minority.
The Federal Govt has done SUCH a good job handling money, yeah, let’s give them more to handle more responsibility.
I mean, if a Pentagon toilet costs $600, what’s a catheter gonna cost-$600,000?
If the IRS tax system sees it a national necessity to offer tax credits to Inuit whalers to offset the impact of international whaling treaties, then perhaps we can expect (under a Federally-controlled national healthcare system) to see tax credits for smokers to offset the impact of tax revenue lost from tobacco farmers due to a drop in tobacco sales as a result of Hillary, Obama, and Edwards’ plan for preventative healthcare tax credits?
If Medicare currently sees it as perfectly reasonable to subsidize and facilitate a new heart for McDonald’s addicts or a new liver for lifetime alcoholics, then why shouldn’t we expect better money management from a national socialized medicine administration?
Given that the Federal Budget is loaded with literally THOUSANDS of pages of pork barrel spending projects for new bike paths that cost $25million, or a national security office that does nothing in Jonestown, PA for Rep Murtha, or perhaps a water usage museum in the deserts outside Palm Springs…yeah, I think it’s safe to say that the Feds know how to handle money much more effectively than you know…a business.
Look, national healthcare is a great idea, but it’s a friggin pipedream. There’s no way it’s gonna happen, and just like Global Warming, opposition to the war in Iraq, calling Rush a racist-no wait, sorry, that was OReilly…point is the Democrats are feeding issues out there trying desperately to distract from reality so that they can keep their base energized as the truth has finally come out:
there is no stopping the Iraq War
Bush is not running again
Democrats LIED about having a plan to end the war…or even the motivation.
All this rhetoric about socialized medicine is a joke, but die-hard-Bush-hating-blind-partisans eat it up rather than dare to see the elephant in the room: they’ve been had.
Face it, the Federal government is not good at handling money, and you want them to handle the biggest, most complex, most ethically challenging, spending program in world history? Yeah, great idea. Brilliant. Tell ya what, if I have a history of drug addiction-like Congress has a historical addiction to spending money foolishly-would ya send me some money? No. Probably not, but yet the victims of the Democratic Party’s lies (ie the PEOPLE of the Democratic Party) will argue in defense of anything regardless of absurdity rather than put their own party and HOUSES in order.
Oh, and if you should feel like throwing good money after bad, toss it to the paypal button on this site. It’s not a required tax, but you’ll get more out of it than you do most of your tax dollars now and a lot more than you will after a national, socialized medicine program is enacted by the spending addicts on The Hill.
Scott Malensek at October 9, 2007 9:42 AM
Nice rant, Scott. Do I get fries with that?
I love when people (of any political affiliation) act like they have their finger on the pulse of America.
All the “rhetoric” about socialized medicine? Socialized medicine is not some pie-in-the-sky theory. It is alive and well in virtually every industrialized country in the world, to some extent. We should be talking about the pros and cons about each system, seeing what, if anything, can be adopted by this country.
But we can’t have that debate, all we can talk about is nonsense, because anytime anyone talks about changes to our healthcare system, idiots like you start screaming, “Socialized medicine! Socialized medicine! Run for the hills, it’s SOCIALIZED MEDICINE!”
Don’t worry, honey-buns. Karl Marx is dead. Stalin is dead. He’s not coming for you.
Government is inefficient? DUH! You know what’s NOT inefficient? Totalitarianism. Democracy is inefficient. Do you dislike democracy, commie-pinko-fascist-pig?
Ineffiecient does not mean evil. Inefficient does not mean useless. It would be nice if the world was black-and-white — that way people like you would have informed opinions. Unfortunately for you and your ilk, the world is full of nuance. Maybe you should defer to stronger brains, just like George Bush does.
Question: Would you support a full de-funding of Social Security, Welfare, Medicaid, Medicare, and SCHIP?
“Question: Would you support a full de-funding of Social Security, Welfare, Medicaid, Medicare, and SCHIP?”
Nope. I’d just limit the annual increases, reduce the income level of acceptable applicants to families making $50k a yr or less, and I WOULD NEVER give American taxpayer dollars to support illegal immigrants. There is NO reason in my mind at all as to why a person who is not an American should receive welfare aid from the American government: welfare, social security, SCHIP, medicare, medicaid. Not Americans-not getting American benefits.
Make those changes, and guess what…even GWB says he’d back it.
QUESTION (in return): if it’s perfectly acceptable to give an illegal immigrant welfare money, medicare, medicaid, SCHIP, socialized medicine, social security, drivers licenses, etc….what will distinguish an American from a non-American? The right to vote? Hardly a plus at all if politics is determined by PAC money coming from citizens of other countries (illegal immigrants).
Let SCHIP be SCHIP, and even W says he’ll sign it. Slipping in these bs lines that give American tax dollars to illegal immigrants is wrong.
Since I doubt seriously that the FACTS of this case will sway any of you Bush ass-lickers, I’ll refrain from repeating them.
You’re a bunch of despicable scum…..little boys, pretending to be tough…pathetic assholes somehow hoping to be thought of as men.
The core fact is simple:
The SCHIP legislation was modified in backdoor dealings (identical to the kind of law-making that Democrats vowed to eliminate if elected to control of Congress btw), and in those dealings, they upped the levels of income that can get coverage so that they could get more support, and then they added in coverage for non-Americans to get pac money from those illegal immigration pac groups.
I gotta laugh, I mean, if the left realized that all an Iraqi has to do to get medical coverage is to leave Iraq and sneak into the US, then this revised SCHIP legislation would be tossing more American money to Iraqis…something that the left rails about all the time, but ignores in this case.
Nope.
Give money to those Americans who need it. It’s that simple. Had the Democrats’ Congress left it that way, it’d have been signed and in action by now.
Scott, as obnoxious as I am (though I always aspire to add a little humor), I do appreciate that you actually responded to my comment.
I will answer your question, though I am certain you’re not going to like it.
Nowhere in our Constitution does it say that these rights are only for Americans — it’s more about what rights HUMANS should have. In practice, of course, we cannot make our laws universal, but the Constitution is by it’s very nature INCLUSIVE, not exclusive.
That said, my belief is that the people who are willing to pack their bags and come to this country deserve to be here. All we are is a country of people who packed their bags and came here, and I am not going to be the one to judge who came here for good reasons and who didn’t. If it were up to me, we WOULD let anyone in who wants to come. Of course it could tax the system, but in the end the system would survive, and we would continue to have a vibrant, growing country.
I told you that you wouldn’t like it.
“I gotta laugh, I mean, if the left realized that all an Iraqi has to do to get medical coverage is to leave Iraq and sneak into the US, then this revised SCHIP legislation would be tossing more American money to Iraqis”
That’s funny — I would have absolutely no problem with that scenario. Was I supposed to be thrown for a loop by this cute little conundrum? You’re very confused about what the left believes in.
I think we have a moral responsibility to let every single Iraqi into this country that wants to come in. We did royally f**k up their country, after all, apparently for their own good.
I wonder if all the morons here talking about how great socialized medicine is in other countries are aware of a few things? Like long waits for procedures you can get tomorrow in America. Like how not a single country in Europe has better cancer survival rates than the U.S. Like realizing the BS behind most rankings of Healthcare in the world.
Oh and realizing that all those countries with glorious socialized healthcare have realized that they can’t sustain it and working towards being closer to the US in that regard, while idiots in America want us to move towards them even though its proven to not work.
Nick, you’re wrong. I love your answer. I fully agree. I completely support and advocate people coming here-legally. Despite the great analogy you presented, the United States is not a nation of illegal immigrants-that’s not what Ellis Island was about (where my family came in, and became citizens). I support immigration, just not illegal immigration.
Now, as to the idea that it’s about HUMANS, I defer to the Declaration of Independence-not the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, and the only reason I do that is because the Declaration of Independence is the first heartbeat of our nation. In any event, I believe that all men are created equal-not just those born in an area between the Atlantic and Pacific and between Canada and Mexico. I believe everyone is given rights by God that cannot be dismissed. They are inalienable (see how the DOC gets more to the point of illegal aliens?). Those rights are the right to live, to live free under a government of their choosing, and to pursue their own happiness. These are rights given to Americans, to Mexicans, to Iraqis, to Afghans, to Iranians, to Somalis, to Rwandans, to Sudanese, and so forth. As such, if this nation is to accept the burden of subsidizing people when they are between lines on a map…then why not subsidize them overseas, protect those rights of men, and enable others to live, to live in a govt of their choosing, and to pursue their own happiness?
It’s a catch 22, if American treasure SHOULD go to pay for illegal aliens, then shouldn’t it go for them regardless of where they are? Why shouldn’t the US give a Mexican welfare, medicine, social security, etc if they live in Mexico? It’s not because they’re contributing to our society by living here since we live in a global economy; a world where it takes less time to fly to Iraq than it does to drive to San Diego (for me at least). No. Either we accept that the US should bear the world’s burdens, or not, and if we look for a middle of the road solution, then the answer is that we do what we can outside the borders, but for people who try to become citizens of the US, there are special benefits: medicare, medicaid, socialized medicine, welfare, protection by police, and the US military.
I’m still amazed at how the proponents of the left are ranting here that there’s something wrong about President Bush’s position on SCHIP since he’s taking the exact same stand on backdoor riders that Democratic Party voters took last fall (and conveniently ignore now since, you know…it’s ok for Democrats, and even if it’s not…we’ll let it slide).
“I wonder if all the morons here talking about how great socialized medicine is in other countries are aware of a few things? Like long waits for procedures you can get tomorrow in America. Like how not a single country in Europe has better cancer survival rates than the U.S. Like realizing the BS behind most rankings of Healthcare in the world.”
Let me get this straight, buzz: You’re saying that socialized medicine in Europe and Canada is not perfect? NO! SAY IT’S NOT SO! MY ENTIRE PHILOSOPHY DEPENDS ON IRRATIONALLY MYTHOLOGIZING ALMOST EVERYTHING!
Let’s get another thing straight, buzz: I am not a f***ing retard. You didn’t rock my world with your pithy analysis of the problems of socialized medicine. Long wait times? Why, I have never heard that before! At least not in the last 1/2 hour.
Questions:
1) Do you think our healthcare system is perfect?
2) Do you think that waiting times and cancer outlook are the only metrics by which to measure a system?
3) Do you think that having 40+ million uninsured people is functionally equivalent to healthcare rationing?
4) Do you think every socialized medicine system is the same?
5) Do you look for one or two cutesy little quips and factoids to define your beliefs, or do you believe that the world is complicated and often contradictory?
6) Do you wonder why so many AMERICANS go abroad for healthcare (mostly plastic surgery, I know, but not exclusively)?
7) Do you even give a flying f**k that many many people need to use emergency rooms for basic healthcare?
8) Do you even care about anyone that you isn’t just like you?
I have to say that I doubt any entity can compete for insurance companies for inefficiency. Claims that fall outside the nominal and routine take a very long time to resolve in the current system and this process in itself adds tremendous cost to the payout. Part of what makes healthcare so expensive is the very fact that insurance companies drag their feet paying what they owe. Hospitals are left in terrible cash flow straits, and they try to make this up by overcharging for their services. Of course this is not their only problem, but it is important to remember this when you’re comparing the existing system to some hypothetical single-payer system.
In addition, high insurance costs are often attributable to the markups charged at various layers of the current healthcare system by private entities (that’s right, private enterprise may occasionally rip people off). These middlemen stand to gain from almost every transaction in the healthcare arena.
Do you think, given their tremendous stake in the status quo from a dollars perspective, that insurance companies might be playing some role in the PR war against “socialized” medicine?
Interestingly, they’re slowly losing many of their traditional allies in this fight — namely corporations (to say nothing of small businesses). Recently GM’s CFO (I think CFO??) Rick Wagoner has made public comments intimating that companies like GM, strapped with huge health care burdens, would benefit tremendously from a single-payer system. And small businesses are growing ever more incapable of offering health insurance to their employees. The number of such businesses offering insurance drops every year.
S-CHIP is only one branch in the tree of healthcare debate, but the overarching anti-single-payer argument is reflexive and anti-capitalist. For a functioning capitalist system, you need regulation, maintenance, government, and some modicum of government-provided services. This is true of banking, manufacturing, infrastructure, everything. Healthcare is no different.
No less a capitalist than Henry Ford recognized the benefit of well-paid, well-fed, well-housed and healthy workers to his bottom line.
Inversely, we can all gauge the cost ramifications if people are unable to stay healthy enough to work.
Finally, taxes and government are necessities in everything. I always wonder how worked up anti-tax zealots get about their monstrous golf club membership dues. They apparently pay them willingly and in full understanding that these dues are necessary for the upkeep of their beloved clubs. Why then are they so unwilling to recognize that living in an organized and prosperous nation also requires some dues?
Due apologies to all you public course right-wingers….
“Like long waits for procedures you can get tomorrow in America. Like how not a single country in Europe has better cancer survival rates than the U.S. Like realizing the BS behind most rankings of Healthcare in the world.”
And I forgot to mention my favorite part about buzz’s rant: buzz belives the statistics about wait times whole-heartedly.
buzz deep-throats and swallows the statistics about cancer survival rates.
But the global healthcare rankings? buzz thinks they’re bs.
So, Mr. Statistics Expert Buzz, can you explain how you cherry-pick which stats you like and which you don’t?
…and wait times for certain procedures are unduly long in the States, whereas they are nonexistent for them elsewhere.
Like another commenter pointed out, having no coverage at all certainly represents a “wait time” for common procedures. Want a physical? No insurance? Please wait indefinitely….
Thanks again, Scott.
My feeling is that there should be no such thing as illegal immigration. My great-greats came through Ellis Island too. But Ellis Island didn’t really turn anyone away unless they had a disease. Quotas and limits came later.
Providing healthcare and education to anyone, citizen or any legal classification of immigrant, is an investment in the future of our country. Do we not want to poach the hardest-working, highly-motivated workers from everyone else?
I realize that a completely open-door policy is not really workable, and I exaggerated to make my point that too much immigration is not such a bad thing.
And we do provide much assistance to people that live in other countries. It is one of the things that makes our country great.
The SCHIP issue isn’t about whether or not the govt should help poor Americans who can’t afford coverage. If that were what SCHIP did, it’d have President Bush’s support. Instead, it goes beyond that in the riders Democrats put on in closed doors, and people are giving that action a free pass-even endorsing it by supporting the SCHIP as is (was). There’s actual common political ground there for using the Fed govt to provide some aid to Americans who can’t afford it, but the left wants to ignore the reason WHY it’s not gonna happen and spin this into a debate on socialized medicine as a whole while the real debate should be accountability for Democrats who behind closed doors put on riders and modified it so that it can’t be passed as is.
Can you explain why you think the solution to insuring 40 million people is to bankrupt the country? Can you explain why you want an organization so completely inept and inefficient as the federal government in charge of your health care?
As for fact vs. statistics. Fact is that nations gather their statistics differently. Fact is that the weighing of those stats are arbitrarily decided on. And part of that information revolves around cost. Fact is that there are wait times in nations with socialized healthcare to the point that there is rationing of treatment, and in countries like Canada people need to come to the US to receive treatment because their glorious system can’t handle them at the moment. Please take a number. And its not about the belief that I think our system is perfect in America. But it is knowing that what you would like to happen is wrong.
Fact is that in the US you cannot be denied medical treatment, even if you don’t have insurance.
And I will take the time right now to answer one of your questions.
“6) Do you wonder why so many AMERICANS go abroad for healthcare (mostly plastic surgery, I know, but not exclusively)?”
That’s easy, medical tourism is becoming big business. Countries are setting up hospitals to cater to foreign clients. You pay money to get treatment at a state of the art facility without the hassles of health insurance, likely treated by a physician who studied in America or Europe. Paying money in exchange for goods or services without interference by the government. Isn’t capitalism grand? Oops you probably don’t like the C word.
Psst.
The troops get socialized medicine.
Pass it on.
Anyone wanna say why SCHIP’s not gonna become law? Nah, let’s not talk about Democrats who promised integrity, open lawmaking, no more backroom deals…let’s not talk about how that Congress has now demonstrated yet ANOTHER lie from their 2006 campaign.
Let’s see, Culture of Corruption…unless you’ve got FBI cash in your freezer.
Um, New Direction in Iraq…yeah, how’s that one going a year later?
Hmmm, accountability for pork spending…nope. That was the first to be cast aside.
impeachment’s off the table, well not off, well not on, oh, we’re elected….fuhgetaboutit
backroom committee deals…see also SCHIP; poisoned in committee to die a public death and keep the base energized.
While people are out there debating whether or not socialized medicine is a good idea, they’re ignoring why this bill is DOA, and pretending like socialized medicine has a snowball’s chance in hell of becoming a reality at the same exact time as baby boomers retire and start sucking at the Federal tit of social security. Yeah, by all means Democrats, please, ignore the lies you voted into office, ignore the fact that the Dems have now managed to mislead even worse than the neocons, and let’s pretend socialized medicine is fiscally possible in the shadow of a bill that was effectively killed in committee.
And of course, when they put those riders on and modified SCHIP, the Dems who did it were shocked-SHOCKED that it wouldn’t pass anymore…yeah right. Might as well have put an Iraq timetable on it.
Democrats killed SCHIP, and yall wanna pretend that it’s “right wingers” opposition to socialized medicine. Yeah, ’cause George Bush hates black people, and poor too now.
Psst.
The troops get socialized medicine.
Pass it on.
Posted by: Robert at October 9, 2007 11:13 AM
see also Walter Reed scandal
“Can you explain why you think the solution to insuring 40 million people is to bankrupt the country?”
The most common cause of personal bankruptcy filings is high medical expenses. No idea whether this is for insured or uninsured patients, but my money’s on the insured ones being in the majority of this 80% (if memory serves) of bankruptcy filers. Despite the fact that it’s a great deal harder to declare bankruptcy now than it was four years ago, the number of filings continues to increase.
Personal bankruptcies cost everybody. You want to bankrupt our nation? Keep that up.
Socialized medicine would cost less than paying layer upon layer of private middlemen as we do now. Simple concept.
“Can you explain why you want an organization so completely inept and inefficient as the federal government in charge of your health care?”
Because it is less inept and less inefficient than insurance companies. There are more, and deeper, layers of bureaucracy in insurance companies than there are in the federal government.
Scottmalensk,
$600 toilets for the Pentagon!!
Yikes!!
Let’s stop giving one cent of taxpayer dollars to the wasteful Defense Department.
Maybe Uncle Joe McCarthy was right. Maybe the military is full of commies.
Buzz,
Bankrupting our country?
I love fish, but that herring is far too red for my taste. If I learned ANYTHING in the past 6 years it’s that the U.S. can never run out of money.
We found $600 Billion to fight a useless war AND gave the richest people in the nation a tax break.
1)Print it up.
2)Hand it out.
3)Quit your whining.
Scott,
Nice swipe at the dems.
You are right about one thing. They are a bunch of useless tools.
They remind me of the republicans. The other party of useless tools.
The only real difference between them is that Republicans only want to hold the poor and powerless accountable.
(Look way above the puppet politicians, follow the strings, and you’ll see both parties are manipulated by the same corporate interests).
We need to kill the 2-party system, because the 2-party system is already killing us.
Now that we both know it, will you help me do something about it, or are you just going to make believe one of the parties has your interests at heart?
Ya know, the kids’ Dad is a woodworker so he probably built his own kitchen cabinets that you seem so obsessed over.
Kid’s dad probably coulda sold the cabinets at an even greater profit then. Besides the point though. The bill is dead. Why? Why was it modified into an unpassable piece of legislation?
btw, following the money trail, 2 party system…ya know, that’s all well and good, but if partisan hacks refuse to even realize that they’ve been played, and refuse to call their own party to account (Republican or Democrat), then anything greater is moot. No, the very least, the very first thing to do is to be willing to look at one’s “own” party and say, “Hey, that’s not why I put you in office, either shape up or ship out.” Republicans did that last fall.
Democrats lack that political courage completely, and as evidence of that we have a huge thread here that no KOSsack has dared to even broach the subject of why the bill was modified into an unpassable piece of legislation by Democratic Party controlled committees.
When Democrats, progressives, liberals, whatever the name o the day is finally get up the courage to do what Republicans did last fall…then there’ll be some progress. Until then, we’ve too many partisan hacks who surf the web looking for ways to play gotcha politics over real issues while the politicians they blindly back get free passes to all the power they want.
Republicans put their party in check for not doing as expected.
Democrats don’t even have the fortitude to LOOK wrongly at their party lest they be Lieberman’d or banned from KOS. Ahhh, remember the good ole days when liberal meant open to new ideas; open-minded, etc.? Long gone.
…long gone.
So the Reagan Revolution and the mid-term election of 1994 were not victories for Republican ideas, but actually cases of Democrats holding their party accountable?
Just wow.
———————————-
I don’t have a party. I’m an Independent.
That allows me to look at the politicians objectively. That’s why I think the Clintons (both of ’em) are too Right-wing for this country.
“So the Reagan Revolution and the mid-term election of 1994 were not victories for Republican ideas, but actually cases of Democrats holding their party accountable?”
It’s probably a half full/half empty gig, but in the case of the 2006 election…every Democratic part idea has been cast aside without an iota of accountability from the Democratic party base.
And now…the base is asking, “Where’s the beef”
http://www.therant.us/staff/malensek/10082007.htm
But not enough. Those are token examples. If it were the norm (that a party were held to account by the people who voted them into office), then this entire thread would be discussing how and why a Committee leader from the Democratic Party would modify SCHIP from something that was passable and could do some good into something that couldn’t pass?
Wow Scott. You just blew my mind.
Here I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, I was dealing with someone who had more to say than just a string of cutesy quips, nonsecuiters, and slogans. Color me mistaken.
“Let’s see, Culture of Corruption…unless you’ve got FBI cash in your freezer.”
Wow — you came up with an example of a corrupt democrat. You are a super-sleuth — I bet an Eagle Scout too. I like to call that debating style, “WTF does that have to do with anything, Dr. Killpatient?”
“Hmmm, accountability for pork spending…nope. That was the first to be cast aside.”
Again, what is your point? Did you think they meant, “When we get elected, there won’t be anymore pork?” Are you a retard? There is a little teeny tiny bit more accountability now, but neither party has the stomach for more than that.
“impeachment’s off the table, well not off, well not on, oh, we’re elected….fuhgetaboutit”
Here is where I start to think you grew up around a lot of lead paint chips. Impeachment? Who has been talking about impeachment, in a substantive way? NO ONE. WTF are you talking about, moonbat?
“backroom committee deals…see also SCHIP; poisoned in committee to die a public death and keep the base energized.”
Were you born yesterday? Has there been any legislation in the past 100 years that didn’t follow the same path through Congress? You could’ve been describing any bill sponsored by either Democrats or Republicans, ever.
Scott, Scott, Scott. What are we going to do with you? Please note that not once in my response have I expressed a political view one way or the other. I have not denigrated Republicans or even your Dear Leader. I swear — go back and read it again and you’ll see it’s true.
You, however, are clearly very confused about how our government works, and you are very confused about who is to blame. Liberals did not create the situations you’ve described so un-eloquently, nor are they solving them. Just because you think something is stupid doesn’t mean it’s “liberal” — it might just be “stupid”.
“Republicans put their party in check for not doing as expected.
Democrats don’t even have the fortitude to LOOK wrongly at their party lest they be Lieberman’d or banned from KOS. Ahhh, remember the good ole days when liberal meant open to new ideas; open-minded, etc.? Long gone”
That is such disingenuous bs. What do expect of the Democratic Party, exactly? To be the sort of party that YOU think they should be? You’re a cro-magnon. To do all the things that the Republicans were and are completely incapable of doing? To be a shining light of morality and self-awareness and accountability? YOU’RE BAKED.
And WTF did your party do with those years of majority? Oh that’s right — they proved to be the most preening batch of blowhard incompetents we’ve seen in a while. How’s that anti-abortion bill coming along? What about that social security reform? And I’m still waiting for the anti-gay marriage law.
I know, I know, all those complete and utter failures were the Dems fault, of course. Don’t waste your breath on saying it.
Save your selective outrage for when you beat your wife and kids.
Wow Nick.
Selective outrage…
Man, you totally missed the point. I’m saying we should not have selective outrage, but you just defended it. Impressive rant-typical of a respond while reading reaction, but that’s ok. I can ignore the hypocrisy of your statements. I’ll take a similar pt-pt response, but I read your post first so as to avoid contradicting myself as you demonstrated so well in yours.
“Wow — you came up with an example of a corrupt democrat. You are a super-sleuth — I bet an Eagle Scout too. I like to call that debating style, “WTF does that have to do with anything, Dr. Killpatient?””
-There are too many to list, but that one’s my favorite. The point of listing the unchecked, unaccounted for lies from the Democratic Party was repeated no less than 10 times in my posts today (not including this one).
“Again, what is your point? Did you think they meant, “When we get elected, there won’t be anymore pork?” Are you a retard? There is a little teeny tiny bit more accountability now, but neither party has the stomach for more than that.”
-And they won’t if the supporters of each party continue to turn a blind eye, look the other way, blow this issue off as you advocate.
“Here is where I start to think you grew up around a lot of lead paint chips. Impeachment? Who has been talking about impeachment, in a substantive way? NO ONE. WTF are you talking about, moonbat?”
-Congressman Kucinich, Speaker Pelosi before the election, even various Democratic Senators. Seriously, I could give you a list if you really want, but…would you look at it and hold the people accountable for their stupidity and duplicity, or would you tell people to look the other way, live with it, that’s the way it is? I guess we need look no further than your next comment to know:
“Were you born yesterday? Has there been any legislation in the past 100 years that didn’t follow the same path through Congress? You could’ve been describing any bill sponsored by either Democrats or Republicans, ever.”
-ie, blow it off, look the other way, live with it, that’s just the way it is (despite the DNC promises to change that)
“Please note that not once in my response have I expressed a political view one way or the other. I have not denigrated Republicans or even your Dear Leader. I swear — go back and read it again and you’ll see it’s true.”
1) that’s why I didn’t direct my comments to that end to you, but to a demographic (please re-read them)
2) my “dear leader” as you so put it is not my dear leader. He was the flip of the coin for me in 00, and my 5th choice for the job in 04. I’m neither D/R. I go both ways. Clinton twice, Bush twice, Congress…usually D (lo that I dare to question my party’s actions-oooooooo)
“That is such disingenuous bs. What do expect of the Democratic Party, exactly? To be the sort of party that YOU think they should be? You’re a cro-magnon. To do all the things that the Republicans were and are completely incapable of doing? To be a shining light of morality and self-awareness and accountability?”
-I only expect them to be the party they claimed they would be, that they promised they would be last fall…when I voted for Congressman Tim Ryan (D) in my district.
“And WTF did your party do with those years of majority? Oh that’s right — they proved to be the most preening batch of blowhard incompetents we’ve seen in a while. How’s that anti-abortion bill coming along? What about that social security reform? And I’m still waiting for the anti-gay marriage law”
-and they were voted out because of their failure to do as promised/expected AND because Democrats promised/lied to do so much that R’s hadn’t.
pardon me, gotta go beat the wife and kids before I throw another mammoth on the grill
All this outrage and yet not one liberal has mentioned the cowardly actions of the Democratic party for sticking a child in the spotlight and HIDING behind that child instead fighting their own battles.
I know other groups that HIDE among civilians and children and then scream bloody murder when the civilian gets caught in the cross fire.
One group is Hizbullah and another is al-Qaeda.
Thee liberals must be so proud of their party for imitating TERRORIST TACTICS.
So proud.
spree,
Do you have to be wrong on every board?
The kid gave his opinion of the SCHIP plan and how well it has worked out for him.
On the other side we have Limbaugh, malkin, you, and the rest of America’s A-hole wing who have attacked the kid because no self-respectin’ human being can argue with what the kid actually said.
Lesson learned. The next time the Dems should just hide behind a guy in uniform, like our cowardly leader did with Petraeus.
#1 comp. health insurance= $1,700/mo.The fact that he is self employed means nothing He would have to by insurance at the same rate as any individual.#2 $55,000 is dirt cheap for any home any where.the current market value of his house is irrelevant, since he would have to make his family homeless to benefit by it.#3 You may have noticed there were six people in the pictures of the family?, well $45,000 is not a lot of money for that size family. #4 about that “remodeled” kitchen,the guy is a woodworker,kitchen cabinets, woodworker, are you seeing a connection here.For many years I built custom kitchens for a living, my own kitchen is worth $30,000, but there is no question I could not afford to buy my kitchen, if I had to pay what it is worth.I spent 60K and six years building my house. now worth 200K plus with no mortgage my current income is 17K am I rich?
Robert: Do you want to be taken seriously or dismissed for being a boob?
If you want to be taken seriously perhaps you might want to withdraw that comment about Bush hiding behind Petraeus.
General Petraeus is the man responsible for developing and implementing the strategy that is now seeing such incredible success in Iraq. Had President Bush kept him from testifying and simply given Congress a written report, which would have met the requirements of the law, you folks would have been screaming like children even louder than you did when Petraeus testified.
If I were to accept the linkage your comment implies it would be fair game for me to ask if this Frost kid is suddenly in charge of national health care policy. Of course he’s not old enough under our constitution to be elected to federal office and hasn’t been confirmed by the Senate in any official capacity.
So the only conclusion one can rationally draw is that he is nothing more than a puppet for Senate staffers who wrote the script and used this kid and his injury for an emotional, not fact based appeal.
And that is one of the concerns many of us have regarding this tactic. Using an injured child in an emotional way to override the policy concerns this vastly expanded health proposals by Democrats generates.
NickMuson wrote:
Do you not also have a job and a life? It’s laughable that anyone would call Curt a chickenhawk, given that he’s a former Marine and still protects society by serving in the LA County Sheriff’s Dept.
It’s going to take me all week to go through all these comments but that one from Nick that you highlighted Word made me smile. Scott took him to the woodshed a few times already so no need to belabor the point but he is one complete boob. Full of bluster and outrage, demands facts then when shown facts discounts them and then demands more. Typical lefty playacting.
Stilleto, no need to look very far into your comment since your first sentence is completely wrong:
Uh, no:
I do love this comment tho by Robert:
Oh, the kid wrote all that huh? Sure thing.
Democrats hid behind this kid and his family for their own gain, to try to bully a socialized medicine bill into law. Didn’t work. They never learn, Mary Knowles…didn’t learn, Winifred Skinner…didn’t learn, Jennifer Bush….didn’t learn. Now Graeme Frost. Wanna bet they still won’t learn?
Do any of you have a family member with a debilitating illness? Any cancer survivors out there? Diabetics? If your kid gets sick, should you have to sell your home or your business, etc. in order to get health care?
Try finding insurance if you do, and $500 a month is what insurance would cost for for a healthy family with NO known risks.
I know you don’t like the liberal media, but this isn’t making your point.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/washington/10memo.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1191985241-ltRuxlzL2VEs82spWkZeIw&oref=slogin
Do you not understand that our argument is that the family should of prioritized BEFORE the accident and got that insurance themselves. You know, thats what insurance is for.
Stop trying to spin this.
I forget which candidate had this line in the GOP debate tonight:
Where are all the Canadians going to go once Hillary and friends succeed in ruining America’s health care system?
Man, the blogosphere has sunk to a new low, smearing this family like this. Pathetic. It’s no wonder the GOP is sinking faster than the Titanic, if these people are it’s supporters.
“Do any of you have a family member with a debilitating illness? Any cancer survivors out there? Diabetics? If your kid gets sick, should you have to sell your home or your business, etc. in order to get health care? Try finding insurance if you do, and $500 a month is what insurance would cost for for a healthy family with NO known risks.”
Yes, my wife has MS, and we thank God for her health INSURANCE that the big corporation she works for pays. I’m acutely aware of how much insurance is, and since my parents, grandparents, godparents, and three sets of uncles all work in the medical field…yeah, I’m familiar with the cost of medicine as well.
But this thread is not at all about how SCHIP was nixed because of a socialized medicine aspect.
IT
WAS
NOT
It was nixed because Democrats who finished crafting the bill in committee (see, Dems control the committees now, so no bill gets out unless it’s crafted to their liking) chose to expand the coverage so that it no longer helps just poor American kids. They modified it to cover kids in families that can afford the insurance AND to cover NON-AMERICANS!?
So if anyone wants to discuss the merits of the SCHIP, the question is not about providing medical coverage to poor kids-W and Republicans want to do that-the question is why did Dems modify the bill so that it can’t be accepted by Republicans? Must be another example of that new spirit of bi-partisanship that Speaker Pelosi ranted about when she took the gavel, right?
Anyone wanting to discuss the SCHIP doa, should ignore the entire issue of providing medical coverage to poor kids as everyone wants that. The better question is why did Dems poison it in committee to die in public?
“Do you not understand that our argument is that the family should of prioritized BEFORE the accident and got that insurance themselves. You know, thats what insurance is for.”
But they DIDN’T. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Spilled milk. That’s not the crux of the argument. It can’t be because that’s not what happened, it’s not REALITY. Arguing about what ought to have happened with your perfect 20/20 hindsight surely makes you feel like a big winnah, but the logical extension of “They should have had health care” is “Since they didn’t, their kid should have just died.” Your argument is that the only way to teach those damn moochers a lesson is by letting their children die. And that means that you’re immoral and sick, and you know it’s so because you won’t come out and say “Their kid should have died” and instead focus on arguing about what you think should have happened instead of facing the reality that it DIDN’T, and their kid would have DIED without this program. That’s what the kid came out their to say. He was there to put a human face on this issue so that people who opposed the program would have to face the reality that “They should have had insurance, and if they didn’t the government shouldn’t help them” means “Graeme Frost should have died.” Not “some kid should have died,” but this living breathing boy, alive because his family had help.
And the libs have come out IN FORCE to defend this kid from the rank lies and bogus speculation on his family, so they’re hardly hiding behind the child. They gave him and his family the chance to stand up for something, and his family must have known what would happen, so I think that’s exceptionally brave to come out, stand up, and say how this program saved their children’s lives, even knowing they would be attacked and raked over the coals by unscrupulous so-called “citizen journalists” making baseless accusations formed entirely from guesswork and partisan suspicion.
The price of financial mistakes shouldn’t be your child’s life. That you think that’s perfectly reasonable makes you a bad person. Sorry, but that’s the way it is, and that is the argument here. You can sit there and shoulda woulda coulda all day if it makes you feel better about thinking people should pay with their children’s lives for making financial mistakes, but it doesn’t make you a better person.
P.S. Re the guy talking out of his ass about the Walter Reed Scandal, that’s kind of a bad analogy, because um…they privatized the health care there. Outsourced it to a private company. I figured someone else would hit that one but they just sorta let you go on believing the stupid, uninformed thing you said was true and I thought you should know, you know, facts, before you spoke on it again. Just trying to help.
“Anyone wanting to discuss the SCHIP doa, should ignore the entire issue of providing medical coverage to poor kids as everyone wants that. The better question is why did Dems poison it in committee to die in public?”
That would require intellectual honesty and thought. Everyone coming here is taking the emotional kneejerk reactions that you hate children. I wonder what their response would be if the GOP found a kid who could talk about how his parents lost their jobs because of BS tactics by unions. Or how they lost their home because taxes were too high? You think they’d stick up for that? Yeah me niether.
“P.S. Re the guy talking out of his ass about the Walter Reed Scandal, that’s kind of a bad analogy, because um…they privatized the health care there. Outsourced it to a private company. I figured someone else would hit that one but they just sorta let you go on believing the stupid, uninformed thing you said was true and I thought you should know, you know, facts, before you spoke on it again. Just trying to help.”
Oh gosh, thank you SO much. I had no idea SCHIP, hildocare, and other socialized medicine programs for non-Americans (and some Americans too btw) were to use government run hospitals. Here, I was under the impression that these ideas were to use government administrations (such as the DoD does via veterans affairs) to pay for services done by companies and private businesses…oh wait…that’d be exactly like what you said happened at Walter Reed unless the Federal government plans on seizing all the nation’s hospitals and conscripting doctors and nurses to work at the government hospitals.
Fool-you’re still missing the point: SCHIP was poisoned by Democrats in committee, and Democratic Party apologists don’t dare ask why. In fact, NO ONE is asking it. Instead they run to the Michael Moore sparked debate about socialized medical programs which have as much to do with the debate about why SCHIP was DOA as does Speaker Pelosi’s Maritime Museum Federal funding.
Brent: There’s no “smear” here. Simply questions about the propriety of using a child this way and questions about the true nature of the families situation.
I realize you folks come from a long line of liars who will use this mantra “for the children” and expect no criticism for such blatant emotive wankering, but that doesn’t make it a “smear” when we call you on it.
Imagine what would happen if Republicans brought out a child who had lost his or her parents on September 11th and had her reading a political script attacking Democrats? Would you sit still for that?
Hell no! You people attack anyone and everyone who dares to stand in your way and from what we’ve seen of REAL smears against Rush Limbaugh and others there’s no lie too low for you.
Well said Mike, and while they distract and attack with one hand, they deliberately turn a blind eye to their own party’s actions-even excusing their lies as ‘that’s just the way it is.’
I live in Canada, we have universal health care and our economy is leaving your’s in the dust, dollars worth more, job creation there’s no comparison, your housing market is crashing ours is surging…but you’re right, universal coverage will wreck your economy!!! it sure wrecked ours, errr wait no it didnt. Later third worlders, well your not quite yet, but soon.
ha! ha! nice one jugger! yeah, GOPs on its last legs and in desperation, they swipe at children.
I’m having flashbacks to 2004 when you libs believed the same thing. Don’t jump off a bridge when your proven wrong tho, because you will be.
Your point on the swipes at children have been addressed many times in this post, I know…you didn’t read it…just saw the link at Salon and being a good little lib you decided to go troll. The mothership is calling you back, heed its call.
Man o’ man, you guys really are retarded.
Canada – Unemployment – 5.9%
USA – Unemployment – 4.7%
(that 5.9% was a 33 year low btw, way to go Canada!)
Canada – New Jobs Sept 2007 – 55,000
USA – New Jobs Sept 2007 – 110,000 (The United States has added 1.6 million jobs in the past 12 months and over 8.4 million jobs since August 2003)
Canada – Projected growth rate 2008 – 2.8%
USA – Projected growth rate 2008 – 3.0% (2nd Qtr 2007 3.7%)
1 American dollar equals 98 cents Canadian.
And still all you Canadians come down here for your health care.
My parents and extended family live in BC btw, and every word you sputtered is the exact opposite of what they are saying.
But go ahead, believe the Government knows better then you and should take all that money to give away. Socialism and Communism has worked so well in the past.
Sigh….
Posted by: Curt at October 10, 2007 9:08 PM
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lol, guy cites the unemployment cause thats all you got, I specifically didn’t mention that, but give it another couple of months and that’ll be in our favour as well..remember it is a 33 year low, and it’ll just keep going down my friend 😉
and regarding the job creation, try it per capita genius 😉
oh and please quote an independent source and not a politicized gop mouthpiece re your links…if you look around without the blinders on you’ll get the real picture regarding the divergence of our economies and the long-term projections, ie our dollar will be worth 1.10 US in the 4th quarter next year, other economic statistics will follow the same path…au revoir.
Thats all you got? It WILL be?
Keep predicted the future Einstein. Your wrong on the present, and you will be wrong on the future.
Cya dummy.
oh and look at the type of job creation as well as the capacity of the economy versus the jobless rate and where the unemployment is occuring, it’ll enlighten you further re the reality of the situation. bon chance.
Cya dummy.
Posted by: Curt at October 11, 2007 9:12 AM
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thats all you have? Well played, well played. Your debating skills and intelligence have overwhelmed me…like I said though, good luck I really do hope you guys come out on the other side of this ok. I mean it. take care.
Yup, seeing as how I actually cited facts and you cited future predictions, it was well played. Keep it up tho, your a genius in your own mind.
Posted by: Curt at October 11, 2007 9:16 AM
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lol, charming….But lets be serious Kurt, the stats you quoted even if not massaged or revised on a monthly basis by the administration just prove my point, our economy has caught up to yours and is surpassing it in some regards, which historically hasn’t been the case (just regarding the stats you cite at he minimum), its just that simple…the gaps have narrowed or in terms of the currency flip flopped, your economy is weakening based on past trends compared to ours which is not a good thing, well for you anyway.
And remember to take in to account the population differences when comparing your apples to oranges (a per capita calculation), it’ll get ya comparing apples to apples and have a more meaningful comparison.
Take care and good luck.
Ahhh….I see your argument. The numbers I cited aren’t real, it’s Bush massaging them to make them look good when in fact they are really bad.
Sure thing.
Believe me Jugger, Canada is so closely tied to this country that when our economy turns down yours will also seeing as Canada is the stepchild to the US. Its great your economy is doing well, just too bad that your government sucks so much off your paychecks to pay for terrible health care for the masses tho.
But seriously, my Mom’s side of the family is Canadian. We were just up there last month and love Vancouver Island. But Socialism will keep your country down. You like it, cool. Stay up there. We will never allow socialism to take over our country without a fight tho.
Posted by: Curt at October 11, 2007 9:30 AM
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Alright Curt, so I’m poking at ya on the massaging of the numbers, but bottom line is the the gap has closed, and I do like it this way up here, and you’re entitled to like it your way down there. But things have definitely changed in the dynamic regarding our 2 countries, and yes we are tied by the umbilical cord, but my fed gov is making headway in diversifying our international trade, if only re our healthy stock of natural resources. I wonder if they (my gov) realize that being tied to the US economy or any one single economy so strongly is a bad thing. Regardless of the political implications.
Anyway, my viewpoint still stands, I do hope America emerges a stronger nation after all of this, but you guys are divided right now, snipping at each other and making no progress. It concerns me. But I do like our healthcare, it’s just a beast to manage, but definitely a thing worthwhile managing in my eyes as well as most Canadians, after-all Tommy Douglas was our most important Canadian in a recent survey, not a sports hero, not an entertainer but a stalwart conservative that realized a vision for the greater good and a minimum of care provided to our citizens, what some may say was a socialized vision embraced by a right-wing conservative, I do love my country and its diverse ideologies and commonsense, yes I do.
oh, I’m not the only one predicting things, one of the Right’s and businesses gurus says
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Warren Buffett was in Toronto to speak at the evening fundraiser, which organizers were hoping would raise $4-million for charity.
Asked whether now is the time for Canadians to buy U.S. dollars, the man known as “the Oracle of Omaha” said the United States has been spending $2-billion a day more on goods than it can afford to. Over time, that behaviour weakens the currency, he said. His guess is that, within the next five years, the Canadian dollar will appreciate even more against the U.S. dollar.
rest
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071012.wbuffett1012/BNStory/Business
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Perhaps that holds a bit more weight than my comment alone regarding the divergence of our 2 economies and the weakening of yours.