Obamacare, they should have READ IT, and it is going to hit home on the Hill soon

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/obamacare-to-hit-home-on-the-hill-89161.html

Yep, should have read something that they had no clue about, but voted on anyhow at the insistance of the pair of idiots Pelosi and Reid.

PACEDOG#1 wrote:http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/obamacare-to-hit-home-on-the-hill-89161.html

Yep, should have read something that they had no clue about, but voted on anyhow at the insistance of the pair of idiots Pelosi and Reid.

And yet some say this was the major accomplishment of the cowh's first term...The rhetoric was...this will not cost Americans 'one thin dime' and they will be allowed to keep their physician...seems that almost on a daily basis there are problems identified with [name] cowh healthcare...The Health and Human Services Secretary says the opposite that rates will go up and then blames republicans for a democrat plan that was rammed down Americans throats...Then the talk begins of doctor shortages in the near future....So this plan is neither good on the economic or medical side?...Nice accomplishment by the cowh....

When we open the floodgates to immigration and allow everyone to come there'll be doctors and nurses from around the world flooding into the United States and we'll be saving billions of dollars by eliminating all those agencies that deal with immigration, border control, etc..., that are no longer required.

Besides with the floodgates open we can have a Asian restaurant in every town in the United States because...

*****CHUCKLE*****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NH2P_pVze6s

Well seems to me now at this point the repubs wants it as much as the dems. I just read a bill that the republican congress is trying to rush thru to the white house to fund the pcip plan for the rest of the year and open it back up. I had a feeling all along that they were not really against it. They have had plenty of time to not fund it, tweak it or do something. It has become one party in D.C. a party not for the people but rather for the politicians.

doubtingthomas wrote:Well seems to me now at this point the repubs wants it as much as the dems. I just read a bill that the republican congress is trying to rush thru to the white house to fund the pcip plan for the rest of the year and open it back up. I had a feeling all along that they were not really against it. They have had plenty of time to not fund it, tweak it or do something. It has become one party in D.C. a party not for the people but rather for the politicians.

yeah, we are pretty fucked. that's how I see it too.

thank god for alcohol and sex.

At a certain point subsistence is as rewarding as the opportunity to succeed.

PkrBum wrote:At a certain point subsistence is as rewarding as the opportunity to succeed.

yes and at some point sex and alcohol are more rewarding than caring about succeeding.

reverse, the worlds in reverse lol

Preexisting conditions as a bar to coverage is going to be very liberating to most Americans who are shackled to jobs. There are many flaws, but the path to sanity has begun. Now if I was one of those large manufacturing companies who was paying peanuts for wages, but provide health insurance.....my indentured servants are about to be liberated.....so pump some more criticism about the Affordable Care Act.....yep......Americans who actually have health care which is portable.....freedom.........how do you keep those boys on the farm when they have visited Paris...........

Chrissy wrote:

doubtingthomas wrote:Well seems to me now at this point the repubs wants it as much as the dems. I just read a bill that the republican congress is trying to rush thru to the white house to fund the pcip plan for the rest of the year and open it back up. I had a feeling all along that they were not really against it. They have had plenty of time to not fund it, tweak it or do something. It has become one party in D.C. a party not for the people but rather for the politicians.

yeah, we are pretty fucked. that's how I see it too.

thank god for alcohol and sex.

yea its a wonder they dont try to put a tax on sex-geeze-----tax-tax-tax--geeze

2seaoat wrote:Preexisting conditions as a bar to coverage is going to be very liberating to most Americans who are shackled to jobs. There are many flaws, but the path to sanity has begun. Now if I was one of those large manufacturing companies who was paying peanuts for wages, but provide health insurance.....my indentured servants are about to be liberated.....so pump some more criticism about the Affordable Care Act.....yep......Americans who actually have health care which is portable.....freedom.........how do you keep those boys on the farm when they have visited Paris...........

I was beginning to think I would never live to see this day, Seaoat. I have no children, but at least my myriad number of nieces, nephews and great nieces and nephews will be assured of access to comprehensive health care. I feel good about that. I am also convinced that the ACA will lead to single payer shortly down the line.

Nothing I have written or said as an individual over the years affected this whole issue, but I do know how much time and effort many of us put into it over the last two decades. In my lower moments, it helps me see that my life really did have meaning.

Some folks think, I'm sure, that I just blather on about this topic with little to no knowledge of what I write, but I've been working in the trenches for years to promote single payer. I've written often about the Physicians for a National Health Care Plan, but I was not just a member. I was a guest speaker at their convention in Boston back in 1998. A week or before that convention, five members of our nurses' group - a national group we formed to promote single payer - were killed in a tragic accident, so I don't even recall much of what I said at that convention. I do know I felt honored to be in the company of such a committed, ethical and moral group of people.

Perhaps my memory of that trip to Boston has been triggered by the bombings is Boston. I lost a dear friend in that accident in the days leading up to that convention in Boston, so my own memories of being in Boston are clouded by that grief.

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

*****SMILE*****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=if34bKbBqXI

Damaged Eagle wrote:

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

*****SMILE*****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=if34bKbBqXI

I completely agree. You'll find no argument here. In my opinion, the ACA is but a stepping stone on the path to single payer.

Also, I wasn't referring to the group of people who wrote the ACA. I was talking about the members of the PNHP I met at that convention in Boston.

Single payer has always been the path to sanity. It will liberate our industrial base to free themselves of costs, and it will finally streamline and take unnecessary costs out of the system. What I think people must also understand, that any system will have limits. I understand that under the single payer system of Medicare, that my current two shots will be limited to just one shot per month, and that if I am fortunate enough to make it that far, I will shortly thereafter pass because of the lack of the second shot.

We must recognize that single payer does not mean utopia, but simply efficient and cost effective delivery of medical care to all our citizens. Mr. Markle is quick to point out the failings of other countries medical systems, but fails to see our own failings. We can and must do better, and the Affordable Care Act in its imperfection is the beacon of hope that we can finally start doing things efficiently and equitably for Americans.

http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/294501-baucus-warns-of-huge-train-wreck-in-obamacare-implementation

Yep, dems are a doubting Thomas now.

I agree Medicare for all.

It will be more like medicaid for all... except worse.

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

Let us not forget where the idea of the individual mandate originated:

Funny how it is all in the "framing". Back when the Heritage Foundation thought individual mandates were great they said it was to make sure that EVERYONE TOOK PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN HEALTH INSURANCE/CARE, you know, so that those who dug in their heels and didn't want to do the responsible thing were not carried along like MOOCHERS on the health insurance premiums the rest of us pay.

I don't give a FRAK where individual mandates originated. The moochers you talk about will be there regardless what is done. Just look at the government entitlement system and how if you don't want to work you don't have too.

If you think healthcare should be available to all as a basic right then nationalize the GOD DAMNED industry. While we're at it I mean ALL people are covered by it in the same way and all people working for the industry are paid off a federal pay scale. Let's make it simple for our Congressmen/women to do their job and anyone receiving federal money for pay are on one pay system/scale like the military pay scale. Nurses get paid enlisted pay while doctors and specialists are paid as officers. One pay scale for our Congressmen to decide the pay increase for ALL federal employees should make their job a lot easier.

*****SMILE*****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tna0Mmu1XlI

the left politicians are getting scared as we inch closer and closure to the truth.

Damaged Eagle wrote:

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

Let us not forget where the idea of the individual mandate originated:

Funny how it is all in the "framing". Back when the Heritage Foundation thought individual mandates were great they said it was to make sure that EVERYONE TOOK PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN HEALTH INSURANCE/CARE, you know, so that those who dug in their heels and didn't want to do the responsible thing were not carried along like MOOCHERS on the health insurance premiums the rest of us pay.

I don't give a FRAK where individual mandates originated. The moochers you talk about will be there regardless what is done. Just look at the government entitlement system and how if you don't want to work you don't have too.

If you think healthcare should be available to all as a basic right then nationalize the GOD DAMNED industry. While we're at it I mean ALL people are covered by it in the same way and all people working for the industry are paid off a federal pay scale. Let's make it simple for our Congressmen/women to do their job and anyone receiving federal money for pay are on one pay system/scale like the military pay scale. Nurses get paid enlisted pay while doctors and specialists are paid as officers. One pay scale for our Congressmen to decide the pay increase for ALL federal employees should make their job a lot easier.

*****SMILE*****

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tna0Mmu1XlI

This will surprise you, I'm sure, but what you just wrote makes perfect sense to me.

By the bye, I'm an anarchist-pacifist, not the other. Think Thoreau, Gandhi.

I predict we will have a single payer system within ten years. And yes, I believe health care is a basic right.

Below is a really good letter. It's long, but it may help some to understand if they take time to digest what is says.

It's Time for Single-Payer

By Dr. James Mitchiner
American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) News, 08/07/12

"You can always trust the Americans to do the right thing, once they’ve tried everything else."

Winston Churchill’s iconic remark, reportedly issued at the dawn of America’s entry into World War II, is equally applicable to the present American health care debate and the crisis that spawned it.

Regardless of whether you are elated or disappointed with June’s historic Supreme Court decision upholding the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act, it is certainly no panacea for the problems facing U.S. health care. Even with the law intact, and despite its best intentions, it will still leave some 25 million uninsured, underinsure millions more, expand the corporatization of health care, and do little to control the escalating costs of care over the long term.

So it’s clear we need to do the right thing: the creation of a national, universal, publicly funded health care system, free of the corrupting power of profit-oriented health insurance, and at the same time capable of passing constitutional muster. In short, the right thing is an expanded and improved Medicare-for-All program, otherwise known as single-payer.

Don’t be so shocked. For the last 30 years, we have tried all the alternatives, and none of them have worked. We have experimented with HMOs, PPOs, high-deductible health plans, health savings accounts, pay-for-performance, capitation, and disease management. These ideas have been promoted in various iterations, often with great fanfare, by public and private payers alike, yet none of them have shown long-term success at bending the cost curve. And the promise of the latest reforms du jour, such as Accountable Care Organizations and Patient-Centered Medical Homes, is speculative at best.

American health care is unique among the world’s democracies in that it was never planned in terms of enabling legislation or explicit constitutional authority. As others have stated, our employer-based insurance system, which now covers about 160 million Americans, was an accident of history. Its lineage can be traced to FDR’s wage and price control policies during World War II, where employers were permitted to offer workers health insurance in lieu of higher wages as a job inducement.

This benefit has evolved piecemeal into the Rube Goldberg complexity that is contemporary employer-sponsored health insurance, with some 1,200 private plans each doing the same things – medical underwriting, coordination of benefits, claims adjudication and denial, marketing, public relations, lobbying, litigating, and paying shareholder dividends and inflated CEO salaries while forcing individuals to pay a higher share of premiums, increased deductibles, expanded copays, or a combination of all three.

Taken as a whole, private insurers’ activities are duplicative, inefficient, wasteful of scarce health care resources, conducive of job lock, and completely misdirected in supporting the 21st-century health care agenda that America needs and deserves.

The objective of the ACA’s individual mandate was to remedy a flaw in the market for health insurance: the expectation by the uninsured that the costs of their inevitable illnesses would be benignly transferred to those fortunate to have coverage. If you believe that guaranteed issue and community-rating requires 100% participation in the health insurance market to sustain financial viability, clearly the most efficient mechanism to achieve this is not through an individual mandate, in which the heavy hand of government coerces people to do what they otherwise would not. If the federal government has a professed welfare interest in controlling health care costs, it can – and should – accomplish that goal through a more economically efficient single-payer mechanism.

Given that the primary business objective of a for-profit insurer is to make a profit, the fundamental question we should be asking is this: What is the marginal value of private health insurance? That is, what advantage vis-à-vis a single-payer model like Medicare does our system of private, profit-oriented health insurance convey to patients, providers, and employers? What exactly do private insurers do, above and beyond what Medicare does, that is deserving of their inflated premiums? To my knowledge, there is no evidence that commercial insurance provides easier access or less hassle-free care, is more cost effective, produces care of higher quality, or has better consumer satisfaction ratings than Medicare (if anyone has evidence to the contrary, from the peer-reviewed health policy literature, please advise). And according to a recent poll, most Americans prefer to keep Medicare as it is, rather than switching to a premium-support financing mechanism as advocated by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). Whatever bad things you can say about our government, at least the Feds are not required to make a profit but are required to answer to all taxpayers, rather than private shareholders who are concerned only with the bottom line.

Under a single-payer system, every American would receive a basic package that would include inpatient and outpatient care, primary care and specialty physician services, emergency care, preventive and restorative care, mental health and substance abuse services, dental care, prescription drugs, home health care, and long-term care. Doctors and other providers would be paid based on a fee-for-service schedule, as negotiated with state governments, with funding coming from progressive payroll taxes paid by both individuals and employers. Quality would be monitored and publicly reported, with financial incentives awarded to providers who followed clinical guidelines endorsed by their medical specialty societies. All services provided would be publicly accountable. Medical decision making at the bedside would be left to the physician.

Conceptually, single-payer is imbued with many myths and misconceptions.

Myth #1: Single-Payer Is One-Size-Fits-All

The No. 1 myth – the alpha myth – is that single-payer represents a choiceless, one-size-fits-all, government-run health care monopsony. This is a blatant falsehood. Single-payer is simply a more efficient and more equitable way of financing health care – and nothing more. By consolidating the administrative functions of insurance, it eliminates bureaucratic duplication and reduces administrative waste, saving time and money for employers, providers, state governments, and consumers alike. It would remove the profit motive from financing care, but not from delivering it. Single-payer would efficiently provide for all Americans – regardless of age, health condition, income, or employment status – universal health care that is portable, affordable, equitable, nonterminating, publicly accountable, and funded through progressive taxation, which for the average family would imply a small additional payroll tax that is much less than its current outlay for insurance premiums. A single-payer system would not supplant the private practice of medicine; you could go to a primary care doctor, specialist, hospital, pharmacist, and lab of your choice.

Myth #2: Canadian Health Care Would Be Bad for America

Americans love to repeat anecdotes about the supposedly lousy medical care our northern neighbors receive from their single-payer system, by demoralized and overworked doctors who work at ill-equipped hospitals with out-of-date technology. This is rubbish. Do Canadians often wait for weeks to see a specialist? Yes. Do Americans also wait? Yes. There is no evidence that Canadians are dropping dead in the streets while waiting for their emergency bypasses or appendectomies, nor is there any evidence that Canadian physicians are emigrating to the U.S. or other countries en masse. Further, there is no evidence that the quality of care in Canada, across the board, is inferior to that practiced in the U.S. Despite comparable rates of smoking and alcoholism, Canadians on average live longer than Americans by more than 2 years, and their infant mortality rate is less than ours. Finally, consider this: Canadians spend much less than we do for health care, both in per-capita dollars and as a percent of GDP, so I have no doubt that if we were to adopt a Canadian-style system and fund it to the tune of $2.6 trillion annually, we would not have 9-month waits for MRIs, even if every one of them was clinically indicated.

Myth #3: Market-Based Medicine Trumps Single-Payer

Some argue that our private, market-based system is fundamentally sound, that it should be freed of government regulation and tweaked to promote greater competition based on price, and thus choice of health insurance plans. Really? Does anyone seriously believe that purchasing health care services is fundamentally no different from buying a new car or a flat-screen TV? (If so, I suggest he or she take a course in health economics.) And would anyone seriously believe that Americans want a choice of health insurance, when what they really desire is a choice of doctors and hospitals? What could be more American, more consumer-friendly, and more constitutional than the ability to choose your health care provider based on whatever criteria you deem important? So why not cut out the middleman and let doctors, hospitals, and other providers compete on such things as quality, service, reputation, convenience, and other personal preferences, rather than having private insurers make these choices for us?

Just consider what "The Market" has done for health care in the last 30 years: a steady increase in the number of uninsured; a decrease in the choice of providers; diversion of resources into more profitable hospitals and services; consolidation of HMOs into health care oligopolies; underfunding of less profitable endeavors, such as public health, trauma centers, and mental health services; unaffordable prescription drugs; dissatisfied patients; frustrated physicians; and of course, an inexorably increasing trajectory of health care costs.

Myth #4: Single-Payer Would Stop Medical Innovation

To my knowledge, there is no correlation between innovation and a country’s method of health care financing. Many technologies and medical advances we now take for granted originated in nations with national health insurance, for example, CT scans and MRIs (Great Britain), laparoscopic cholecystectomy (Canada), percutaneous coronary angioplasty (Germany), and H. pylori treatment (Australia). The largest single source of funding for medical research in the U.S. is a government agency – the National Institutes of Health – which provided almost $31 billion in funding for medical research in fiscal year 2012. And in terms of per-capita drug R&D costs, the U.S. lags behind Britain and Sweden.

Myth #5: Single-Payer Is Impossible to Enact Politically

Perhaps this is true – for now. But if social change depended solely on what was politically pragmatic, women would not have achieved the right to vote in 1920, civil rights legislation would not have been enacted in 1964, and Medicare would have failed in 1965. We should always be careful to distinguish between what’s desirable and what’s doable. The fact that tort reform is certainly desirable, but not politically doable at the present time, has not stopped ACEP from investing significant time and financial resources to advocate for change. Public opinion polls have consistently shown that the level of public support for single-payer is 60% plus. A survey of physicians published 4 years ago showed that single-payer garnered 59% support among the 2,193 physicians polled (support among emergency physicians was even higher, at 69%). Despite this, there is no question that moving to a single-payer system will face enormous obstacles. What is needed, as columnist David Lazarus of the Los Angeles Times pointed out, is a "massive infusion of political courage and the willingness to forsake political purity."

Myth #6: We Can’t Afford Single-Payer

Given our current system, perhaps the better statement would be "we can’t afford not to have single-payer." The most recent financial projections portend no overall decrease in the cost trajectory for health care over the next 8 years, even if the ACA remains intact. Under a single-payer model, a modest increase in taxes would be overshadowed by savings from elimination of insurance premiums, offsets from economies of scale, decreased out-of-pocket payments, and the disappearance of cost-shifting. The annual savings from transforming to a single-payer system are estimated to be $400 billion. If you look at the cost curves for U.S. and Canadian health care, they were identical until the mid-1970s, when Canada’s health system was fully implemented. From then on, the curves diverged, with America’s climbing much faster than Canada’s. When Taiwan converted to single-payer in 1995, the costs went up in the first year, as expected, and then leveled off to a reasonable increase of about 3% per year.

What Does This Mean for Emergency Medicine?

Well, consider the ED as a de facto single-payer environment. Patients come to us by choice without needing to first check with their health plan (assuming they have one) to see if their ED visit is covered. We see them without asking them to pay in advance for their ED services, and their care is not predicated on their job, income, or insurance coverage. As emergency physicians, we have more autonomy than our primary care colleagues in terms of making diagnostic and therapeutic decisions without the nonsense of "pre-authorization" or other interference from an insurer who is interested only in the bottom line. While it’s nice to be able to make medical decisions without checking on insurance status, it would be even nicer if we actually got paid for every ED patient treated. Private insurance companies simply have no incentive – in fact, it’s not at all consistent with their business model – to pay for EMTALA-mandated services provided by out-of-network emergency physicians.

Looking again to Medicare as a single-payer model, consider how we emergency physicians interact with Medicare vs. private insurers. In 29 years of practice, I have never had to seek permission from a CMS official to admit a fee-for-service Medicare patient, have never had a consultant refuse a referral for a Medicare beneficiary, and have never had a pharmacist call me to say the prescription for my Medicare patient was not covered by the formulary. This is not true for some of my patients in managed care plans, including those who were sick enough to be admitted but had to be transferred because my hospital (which the patients self-selected) did not participate in their plan.

Single-payer is the only remaining option to simultaneously and synergistically expand access, control costs, preserve choice, and reduce disparities. There is simply no other efficient and constitutionally safe way to do this. Any other proposals are nothing more than tinkering around the edges and based on blind faith that some kind of future financial salvation will somehow save us from the impending health care meltdown. A single-payer, improved Medicare-for-All program would overhaul our dysfunctional health care financing system so that it works best for patients – and for physicians.

Dr. Mitchiner is an emergency physician in Ann Arbor, Mich., a former president of the Washtenaw County (Mich.) Medical Society, and a member of Physicians for a National Health Program. ACEP News is a publication of the American College of Emergency Physicians.[/b]

I think Teddy Roosevelt (R) was actually the first over a hundred years ago.

Nationalize a sixth of the economy... what could go wrong?

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

Let us not forget where the idea of the individual mandate originated:

Funny how it is all in the "framing". Back when the Heritage Foundation thought individual mandates were great they said it was to make sure that EVERYONE TOOK PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN HEALTH INSURANCE/CARE, you know, so that those who dug in their heels and didn't want to do the responsible thing were not carried along like MOOCHERS on the health insurance premiums the rest of us pay.

I don't give a FRAK where individual mandates originated. The moochers you talk about will be there regardless what is done. Just look at the government entitlement system and how if you don't want to work you don't have too.

If you think healthcare should be available to all as a basic right then nationalize the GOD DAMNED industry. While we're at it I mean ALL people are covered by it in the same way and all people working for the industry are paid off a federal pay scale. Let's make it simple for our Congressmen/women to do their job and anyone receiving federal money for pay are on one pay system/scale like the military pay scale. Nurses get paid enlisted pay while doctors and specialists are paid as officers. One pay scale for our Congressmen to decide the pay increase for ALL federal employees should make their job a lot easier.

*****SMILE*****

It is odd that you now claim you don't care whose idea the individual mandate was however you called the people calling for it an immoral group. So the Heritage Foundation is also an immoral group to you?

I agree with your recipe for curing the system, just nationalize it and pay doctors etc. a set fee. That's what they do in Great Britain and it seems to suit them. Doctors don't make the super-mega buck they do here but they don't have to pay for mal-practice insurance either. The system is completely different and everyone is covered. I think you are on to something here.

I also agree with PBull's great letter shooting down so many standard talking points brought up by those who are in love with the pre-aca system

....................................

About 5 years ago, I suggested that we form a National Healthcare Corps as a branch of the DoD. Transfer the VA to it and build more treatment facilities and hospitals. Treatment at those facilities would be aimed at the general public with a yearly premium. The treatment they received would be equivalent to what is available at DoD Hospitals, and no person is turned away.

To staff those facilities, use the same system as the DoD. Give scholarships to qualified med students who in return owe at least 8 years of service to the Corps.

Leave existing healthcare systems in place with the Health Corps relieving a lot of the strain on the private system.

As you can probably guess, I was not just shouted down...I was accused of being a commie, etc.

William wrote:

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

othershoe1030 wrote:

Damaged Eagle wrote:

A moral group of people does not force others to purchase something from a private business, just because they happen to be breathing, by making government legislation.

Let us not forget where the idea of the individual mandate originated:

Funny how it is all in the "framing". Back when the Heritage Foundation thought individual mandates were great they said it was to make sure that EVERYONE TOOK PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THEIR OWN HEALTH INSURANCE/CARE, you know, so that those who dug in their heels and didn't want to do the responsible thing were not carried along like MOOCHERS on the health insurance premiums the rest of us pay.

I don't give a FRAK where individual mandates originated. The moochers you talk about will be there regardless what is done. Just look at the government entitlement system and how if you don't want to work you don't have too.

If you think healthcare should be available to all as a basic right then nationalize the GOD DAMNED industry. While we're at it I mean ALL people are covered by it in the same way and all people working for the industry are paid off a federal pay scale. Let's make it simple for our Congressmen/women to do their job and anyone receiving federal money for pay are on one pay system/scale like the military pay scale. Nurses get paid enlisted pay while doctors and specialists are paid as officers. One pay scale for our Congressmen to decide the pay increase for ALL federal employees should make their job a lot easier.

*****SMILE*****

It is odd that you now claim you don't care whose idea the individual mandate was however you called the people calling for it an immoral group. So the Heritage Foundation is also an immoral group to you?

I agree with your recipe for curing the system, just nationalize it and pay doctors etc. a set fee. That's what they do in Great Britain and it seems to suit them. Doctors don't make the super-mega buck they do here but they don't have to pay for mal-practice insurance either. The system is completely different and everyone is covered. I think you are on to something here.

I also agree with PBull's great letter shooting down so many standard talking points brought up by those who are in love with the pre-aca system

....................................

About 5 years ago, I suggested that we form a National Healthcare Corps as a branch of the DoD. Transfer the VA to it and build more treatment facilities and hospitals. Treatment at those facilities would be aimed at the general public with a yearly premium. The treatment they received would be equivalent to what is available at DoD Hospitals, and no person is turned away.

To staff those facilities, use the same system as the DoD. Give scholarships to qualified med students who in return owe at least 8 years of service to the Corps.

Leave existing healthcare systems in place with the Health Corps relieving a lot of the strain on the private system.

As you can probably guess, I was not just shouted down...I was accused of being a commie, etc.

I don't recall that conversation, William, but I do think it's a good idea. And I've been called a commie more times on this forum than I can count. Ce la vie.

This was a good thread. I spent some time editing that email from the emergency room physician. Yet now we have oodles of other threads just to direct people away from reading the letter I sent. It burns me some.

I think I'm going to start spamming with that letter in each and every brand new thread you all start!

EDIT: Please forgive the spamming. I had a moment. Or two. Or three.