My post showed how healthcare would be cheaper then the current system that we already pay for, ergo we dont have to worry about how its gonna be paid for.
Flawed logic. We should be worrying about how things are paid for right now. If someone breaks into your house and steals your TV and your computer, you don't feel relief that he left you your toaster.
Source?
Source your own arguments, if you're going to play that game.
Mandatory checkups, thats cool with me, you dont get the checkup you dont get the heathcare. AOK! Already paid for with the healthcare, no reason to divorce medical checkups from a public option. Just cause they got a checkup doesnt mean they can pay for needed medicine or other services the checkup determines they need. Still falls through to the taxpayer to pay the indignant bill at the hospital.
I prefer the government stay out of what my business is. On that note, certain things that are known to cause bad health AND be addictive in a way that makes it hard for the everyday user to stop, I would support limited measures to curb their use. (FUll disclosure: Im also a smoker whos tried to quit a few times, wish I had never started.)
These two statements are inconsistent. How can you say that you want the government to stay out of your business, and then say that it's okay to mandate health checkups, or to take measures to curb the use of products that have a negative effect on one's health?
Every action the government takes is restrictive of your freedoms in some way; every action in some way "gets into your business". As a society, it's our responsibility to be sure that each of these restrictions is justifiable, according to a unified set of morals. Few would argue that the government is unjustified in setting laws to protect the individual rights and freedoms of its citizens, or from raising a military to protect its citizens from other nations, or from imposing appropriate taxes to support those things. But once we start letting the government legislate based on what is "good for us", we're giving up the necessary freedom of making those decisions for ourselves.
If you're okay with mandating checkups in order to receive government-sponsored health insurance, are you also okay with mandating that you see a doctor if you have symptoms of an illness? After all, the logical principle that's the foundation of your argument (i.e. "mandating public insurance available to all would be more cost-effective than our current system") is just as applicable in both cases; mandating that anyone who runs a fever or has a sore throat must go to the doctor will help prevent the spread of infectious disease. Just how invasive are you willing to allow the government to be?
I dont want to mandate insurance, I want a public option. There is a HUGE difference. I think mandating insurance might even be illegal.
What makes you think that the federal government, paragon of waste and inefficiency, is better able to run health insurance than a privately-held company?
I wholeheartedly support better regulation of the health insurance industry, or more accurately, I wholeheartedly support better ENFORCEMENT of the regulations already on the books. When a company violates the law, it should be punished; instead, our corrupted legal system has forced the government to weigh pursuing said violations against the time and cost associated with the corporation's ability to throw up a wall of lawyers and paperwork. Fix our legal system to limit the ability to stonewall justice with endless motions and hearings and filings and you'll see progress on a lot of our current problems. But more importantly, having the government run an insurance option is NOT going to make things cheaper in the long run. Corporations, at least, are beholden to their shareholders, and those that do not ensure competitive pricing for their services are destined
My post said NOTHING about which possibility is cheaper. Only that mandating access to health facilities and professionals does not come for free. Somewhere, someone has to pay for it.
That said, your analogy is tragically flawed. Lack of finances is not one of the main reasons why people don't get regular checkups and/or ignore signs of worsening health. Pride, ignorance, lack of time, and many other factors are far more likely to contribute to health negligence than lack of funds or insurance. In many, many locations around the country there are free clinics supported by either state funds or charity that will allow a person without insurance to get a checkup, and yet people such as the bread-winner in your example don't take advantage of them. What makes you think mandatory insurance will change that?
To take your analogy to its logical conclusion, instead of mandating health care for everyone, the government should go straight to mandating periodic checkups for everyone, and footing the bill through additional taxation. After all, those mandatory checkups will work even better than mandatory insurance; mandatory insurance doesn't force a person to see a doctor.
Come to think of it, we can further reduce the likelihood of high blood pressure by forcibly limiting the amount of high-fat/high-cholesterol foods that a person can eat in any given week. Also, we can levy a tax so that the government can produce/purchase vitamin supplements for the entire population, and then mandate that we take them. After all, daily vitamins are scientifically proven to cut down on the chances of any number of potential diseases.
We can drastically cut down on incidences of lung cancer by banning smoking. We can drastically cut down on incidences of cirrhosis and other health issues by banning alcohol. There are a thousand different mandates the government could enact which will enforce better health (and consequently fewer health-related costs) on everyone. Since you support mandatory health care on the grounds that it will be more cost-effective than our current system, do you support any of these other options, many of which would provide an even greater cost/benefit ratio than mandatory health care?
Throughout the entirety of human history, people have always made decisions that involve trading their health (short-term or long-term) for some other good (pleasure, money, procreation, etc.). These decisions are not always wise, but they are not always foolish either. Not only is it a bad idea to attempt to force people to take better care of themselves, it's a completely impossible idea to enforce. You can't make someone care more about their health simply by providing them with insurance. In fact, often providing insurance or safety encourages people to be MORE reckless with their health, not less; look at the studies regarding the improvements made in automobile safety over the past hundred years compared to the incidences of reckless driving and excessive speed. A person who knows they have a seatbelt and airbags and crumple zones to protect them in the event of an accident has less incentive to drive safely. This is not to say that seatbelts and airbags are a bad idea, only to say that they do not promote safe driving; rather, they mitigate the costs of unsafe driving. Mandating insurance on people without insurance is likely to have many of the same results.
(Not certain how this conversation sprang up in response to a TSA article. Let the offtopic modding begin!)
Here here! Although 1 is not quite right anymore: now everybody must buy a basic level of insurance. With the Strong Public Option, then you'd be right about 1, but as it stands it's not quite what was said.
Whether the public option is forced on the public through mandatory purchase or through mandatory taxation, it still has to be paid for. You can't just magic up health care out of sunshine and cotton candy.
""I have it on good authority that there are only two kinds of people who spend their time thinking about killing people, and only one of them is mystery writers."
I for one hope that all of our laws and protocols and recommendations have reasons behind them. "Good fucking common sense" is NOT a reason and should not be used to justify the creation of law or public policy. There was a day when it was "common sense" that the Sun revolves around the Earth. Or that the Earth is flat. Or that leeches are an appropriate treatment for an illness.
You're right, you don't get Google fanboyism. You focus on all the possible harm Google could do with its information. Google fanboyism focuses on the opposite.
I'm a Google fanboy. Why? Because they provide a ton of cool applications and tools, for "free". "Free" meaning that I don't have to send a check or swipe a credit card anywhere to use them whenever and wherever I want. Sure, I might be able to find free alternatives to most of these tools (e-mail, documents, maps, search, etc. etc.), but Google provides them all in one place and with a high standard of quality. And they're constantly coming out with more and more cool stuff, most of which has the potential to make my daily life experience better, simpler, more efficient, etc.
How do they fund all this? They collect information about their users and sell it to advertisers, to allow them better target me with ads that will encourage me to buy their products. On principle, I have no problem with this. I'd rather see ads for movies or music or games or other things that might interest me, even if I almost never click on anything, and even if my clicks of curiosity never lead to a purchase. That's a lot better than seeing ads targeted at "the population" for things I don't need, like an SUV or a quit-smoking patch or a pair of earrings. I know that many people are interested in these products, but I'm not, and it's a complete waste of my time to be distracted by those ads. The sooner Google learns that its only chance to get a purchase out of me is to show me a special sale on new electronics or a cool new video game, the better.
But what about my privacy? Well, I care about my privacy. I don't want everyone knowing my home address or my medical records or the sizes and locations of my bank accounts. But these are legal issues, not corporate ones. We get the correct law in place, stipulating that these pieces of information aren't to be disseminated, and then enforce the law with respect to Google and everyone else. Singling out Google and not applying the same scrutiny to every other company who can come into contact with this information is pointless. We can't reasonable expect Google to refuse to conform with the Patriot Act; it's the law, right or wrong, and it's our job as citizens to fix that, not Google's job as a corporation.
So what about my search information? Shouldn't the contents of my searches be my own business?
No.
Are you kidding me?
In my eyes, running a search through Google is the digital equivalent of walking into a mall or a convention and shouting "Hey, can anyone answer a question for me?". Only you're shouting to the whole world. There's no expectation of privacy here. As others have pointed out, your search has left the grounds of your home, and others have heard its contents. If you want the information, you have to accept that others will know you want the information.
So how do you get information if you don't want others to know you're looking for it? You learn how to anonymize yourself in the eyes of the search tool. To continue my earlier analogy, you'd shout your question while wearing a mask so no one can identify you. Your query is still public, but you are not.
Privacy ALWAYS comes down to personal responsibility. Know what precautions you can take when you don't want something known, and take them when appropriate. You can't expect the rest of the world to close its eyes and ears to you whenever you want it to, but you can learn to disguise yourself so that the world won't discover your identity, at least not without an intense devotion of resources.
So yeah, I'm a Google fanboy. They've provided a tool to help me keep track of what information I'm sharing every time I use one of their applications, which is more than I can say of nearly every other company out there that has some of my private info on file. I trust Google... to a point. And when there's something I don't want the world to know, I take the appropriate measures to protect that information: not through bitching and moaning that someone else might hear and remember me when I make a digital statement through a search engine, but through making sure that there's no identifiable link between myself and that query.
So only hermaphrodites and androgynes are qualified to write on topics which may involve gender bias?
Congrats, I think you just killed the mainstream media.
Neither of the analogies you provide are applicable here. The owner of the newspaper (good luck finding one of those, who the hell buys a newspaper any more?) could see you peeking and put the newspaper away. You yourself could edit or delete the contents of your post if you no longer desired to share them.
Slashdot Mirror
My post showed how healthcare would be cheaper then the current system that we already pay for, ergo we dont have to worry about how its gonna be paid for.
Flawed logic. We should be worrying about how things are paid for right now. If someone breaks into your house and steals your TV and your computer, you don't feel relief that he left you your toaster.
Source?
Source your own arguments, if you're going to play that game.
Mandatory checkups, thats cool with me, you dont get the checkup you dont get the heathcare. AOK! Already paid for with the healthcare, no reason to divorce medical checkups from a public option. Just cause they got a checkup doesnt mean they can pay for needed medicine or other services the checkup determines they need. Still falls through to the taxpayer to pay the indignant bill at the hospital.
I prefer the government stay out of what my business is. On that note, certain things that are known to cause bad health AND be addictive in a way that makes it hard for the everyday user to stop, I would support limited measures to curb their use. (FUll disclosure: Im also a smoker whos tried to quit a few times, wish I had never started.)
These two statements are inconsistent. How can you say that you want the government to stay out of your business, and then say that it's okay to mandate health checkups, or to take measures to curb the use of products that have a negative effect on one's health?
Every action the government takes is restrictive of your freedoms in some way; every action in some way "gets into your business". As a society, it's our responsibility to be sure that each of these restrictions is justifiable, according to a unified set of morals. Few would argue that the government is unjustified in setting laws to protect the individual rights and freedoms of its citizens, or from raising a military to protect its citizens from other nations, or from imposing appropriate taxes to support those things. But once we start letting the government legislate based on what is "good for us", we're giving up the necessary freedom of making those decisions for ourselves.
If you're okay with mandating checkups in order to receive government-sponsored health insurance, are you also okay with mandating that you see a doctor if you have symptoms of an illness? After all, the logical principle that's the foundation of your argument (i.e. "mandating public insurance available to all would be more cost-effective than our current system") is just as applicable in both cases; mandating that anyone who runs a fever or has a sore throat must go to the doctor will help prevent the spread of infectious disease. Just how invasive are you willing to allow the government to be?
I dont want to mandate insurance, I want a public option. There is a HUGE difference. I think mandating insurance might even be illegal.
What makes you think that the federal government, paragon of waste and inefficiency, is better able to run health insurance than a privately-held company?
I wholeheartedly support better regulation of the health insurance industry, or more accurately, I wholeheartedly support better ENFORCEMENT of the regulations already on the books. When a company violates the law, it should be punished; instead, our corrupted legal system has forced the government to weigh pursuing said violations against the time and cost associated with the corporation's ability to throw up a wall of lawyers and paperwork. Fix our legal system to limit the ability to stonewall justice with endless motions and hearings and filings and you'll see progress on a lot of our current problems. But more importantly, having the government run an insurance option is NOT going to make things cheaper in the long run. Corporations, at least, are beholden to their shareholders, and those that do not ensure competitive pricing for their services are destined
My post said NOTHING about which possibility is cheaper. Only that mandating access to health facilities and professionals does not come for free. Somewhere, someone has to pay for it.
That said, your analogy is tragically flawed. Lack of finances is not one of the main reasons why people don't get regular checkups and/or ignore signs of worsening health. Pride, ignorance, lack of time, and many other factors are far more likely to contribute to health negligence than lack of funds or insurance. In many, many locations around the country there are free clinics supported by either state funds or charity that will allow a person without insurance to get a checkup, and yet people such as the bread-winner in your example don't take advantage of them. What makes you think mandatory insurance will change that?
To take your analogy to its logical conclusion, instead of mandating health care for everyone, the government should go straight to mandating periodic checkups for everyone, and footing the bill through additional taxation. After all, those mandatory checkups will work even better than mandatory insurance; mandatory insurance doesn't force a person to see a doctor.
Come to think of it, we can further reduce the likelihood of high blood pressure by forcibly limiting the amount of high-fat/high-cholesterol foods that a person can eat in any given week. Also, we can levy a tax so that the government can produce/purchase vitamin supplements for the entire population, and then mandate that we take them. After all, daily vitamins are scientifically proven to cut down on the chances of any number of potential diseases.
We can drastically cut down on incidences of lung cancer by banning smoking. We can drastically cut down on incidences of cirrhosis and other health issues by banning alcohol. There are a thousand different mandates the government could enact which will enforce better health (and consequently fewer health-related costs) on everyone. Since you support mandatory health care on the grounds that it will be more cost-effective than our current system, do you support any of these other options, many of which would provide an even greater cost/benefit ratio than mandatory health care?
Throughout the entirety of human history, people have always made decisions that involve trading their health (short-term or long-term) for some other good (pleasure, money, procreation, etc.). These decisions are not always wise, but they are not always foolish either. Not only is it a bad idea to attempt to force people to take better care of themselves, it's a completely impossible idea to enforce. You can't make someone care more about their health simply by providing them with insurance. In fact, often providing insurance or safety encourages people to be MORE reckless with their health, not less; look at the studies regarding the improvements made in automobile safety over the past hundred years compared to the incidences of reckless driving and excessive speed. A person who knows they have a seatbelt and airbags and crumple zones to protect them in the event of an accident has less incentive to drive safely. This is not to say that seatbelts and airbags are a bad idea, only to say that they do not promote safe driving; rather, they mitigate the costs of unsafe driving. Mandating insurance on people without insurance is likely to have many of the same results.
(Not certain how this conversation sprang up in response to a TSA article. Let the offtopic modding begin!)
Here here! Although 1 is not quite right anymore: now everybody must buy a basic level of insurance. With the Strong Public Option, then you'd be right about 1, but as it stands it's not quite what was said.
Whether the public option is forced on the public through mandatory purchase or through mandatory taxation, it still has to be paid for. You can't just magic up health care out of sunshine and cotton candy.
""I have it on good authority that there are only two kinds of people who spend their time thinking about killing people, and only one of them is mystery writers."
Citations?"
Castle viewers hang their head. Whoosh!
I for one hope that all of our laws and protocols and recommendations have reasons behind them. "Good fucking common sense" is NOT a reason and should not be used to justify the creation of law or public policy. There was a day when it was "common sense" that the Sun revolves around the Earth. Or that the Earth is flat. Or that leeches are an appropriate treatment for an illness.
Ugh, formatting somehow got stripped out. Sorry about the wall of text. I fail at the Internets :(
You're right, you don't get Google fanboyism. You focus on all the possible harm Google could do with its information. Google fanboyism focuses on the opposite. I'm a Google fanboy. Why? Because they provide a ton of cool applications and tools, for "free". "Free" meaning that I don't have to send a check or swipe a credit card anywhere to use them whenever and wherever I want. Sure, I might be able to find free alternatives to most of these tools (e-mail, documents, maps, search, etc. etc.), but Google provides them all in one place and with a high standard of quality. And they're constantly coming out with more and more cool stuff, most of which has the potential to make my daily life experience better, simpler, more efficient, etc. How do they fund all this? They collect information about their users and sell it to advertisers, to allow them better target me with ads that will encourage me to buy their products. On principle, I have no problem with this. I'd rather see ads for movies or music or games or other things that might interest me, even if I almost never click on anything, and even if my clicks of curiosity never lead to a purchase. That's a lot better than seeing ads targeted at "the population" for things I don't need, like an SUV or a quit-smoking patch or a pair of earrings. I know that many people are interested in these products, but I'm not, and it's a complete waste of my time to be distracted by those ads. The sooner Google learns that its only chance to get a purchase out of me is to show me a special sale on new electronics or a cool new video game, the better. But what about my privacy? Well, I care about my privacy. I don't want everyone knowing my home address or my medical records or the sizes and locations of my bank accounts. But these are legal issues, not corporate ones. We get the correct law in place, stipulating that these pieces of information aren't to be disseminated, and then enforce the law with respect to Google and everyone else. Singling out Google and not applying the same scrutiny to every other company who can come into contact with this information is pointless. We can't reasonable expect Google to refuse to conform with the Patriot Act; it's the law, right or wrong, and it's our job as citizens to fix that, not Google's job as a corporation. So what about my search information? Shouldn't the contents of my searches be my own business? No. Are you kidding me? In my eyes, running a search through Google is the digital equivalent of walking into a mall or a convention and shouting "Hey, can anyone answer a question for me?". Only you're shouting to the whole world. There's no expectation of privacy here. As others have pointed out, your search has left the grounds of your home, and others have heard its contents. If you want the information, you have to accept that others will know you want the information. So how do you get information if you don't want others to know you're looking for it? You learn how to anonymize yourself in the eyes of the search tool. To continue my earlier analogy, you'd shout your question while wearing a mask so no one can identify you. Your query is still public, but you are not. Privacy ALWAYS comes down to personal responsibility. Know what precautions you can take when you don't want something known, and take them when appropriate. You can't expect the rest of the world to close its eyes and ears to you whenever you want it to, but you can learn to disguise yourself so that the world won't discover your identity, at least not without an intense devotion of resources. So yeah, I'm a Google fanboy. They've provided a tool to help me keep track of what information I'm sharing every time I use one of their applications, which is more than I can say of nearly every other company out there that has some of my private info on file. I trust Google... to a point. And when there's something I don't want the world to know, I take the appropriate measures to protect that information: not through bitching and moaning that someone else might hear and remember me when I make a digital statement through a search engine, but through making sure that there's no identifiable link between myself and that query.
So only hermaphrodites and androgynes are qualified to write on topics which may involve gender bias? Congrats, I think you just killed the mainstream media.
Neither of the analogies you provide are applicable here. The owner of the newspaper (good luck finding one of those, who the hell buys a newspaper any more?) could see you peeking and put the newspaper away. You yourself could edit or delete the contents of your post if you no longer desired to share them.