Sessions isn't "dismantling" anything. The commission was created in 2013 and was supposed to do its job by 2017. It apparently has done that, Sessions has thanked them. The Trump administration is now deciding what to do next.
Calling this "ordering the Justice Dept. to end forensic science commission" or "dismantling forensic science commission", as if Trump or Sessions had taken extraordinary steps to kill the commission, is tendentious, politically motivated b.s. that reflects badly on the Washington Post and the submitter.
Look at your last election. The rest of the world is laughing at you. Sad little man.
As I was saying before: I want to thank you for your brutal honesty about your life and the kind of support and guidance Canadian society has given you. You certainly confirmed again my impressions of Canada. I hope and trust my fellow Americans will draw the right conclusions from your example and from your conduct.
Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates): http://www.nationmaster.com/co... [nationmaster.com]
Yes, for the simple reason that healthcare spending has little to do with either life expectancy or teenage pregnancy rates. So why are you dragging it into this discussion?
Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.
Actually, the UK has about average taxes among OECD countries at around 35% of GDP; the US is on the low side at about 26%. Of course, given that US per capita GDP is about 35% higher than that of the UK, the US actually collects more in taxes per capita than the UK, and it spends even more because it runs a deficit.
What makes the average tax burden in Europe so high is middle-class taxes: that's what pays for the European welfare state. So, when you hear the Warrens, Clintons, and Sanders out there saying that the US should become more like Europe, you need to understand that in order to pay for that, taxes on people making $50000 and up would have to go up by 10-15%; US top marginal tax rates are already comparable to European top marginal tax rates.
For example, an average wage earner in Germany pays 39.6% income tax, while he pays 25.8% in the US (the difference is even more pronounced because the average income earner in Germany earns substantially less than in the US, even in terms of $PPP).
To drop from over 40% prior to surgery to 4% after is an incredible success story. Stop selectively quoting without looking at the context.
You're comparing "suicidality" from a US survey with actual suicides from a Swedish study. Talk about dishonest use of statistics.
In any case, it doesn't matter anyway. "I'm suicidal unless you amputate a body part" is neither medically nor ethically a sound justification for government-financed major surgery.
Too bad that in the US, society is letting transsexuals down by continuing to pass laws against them, as well as making it hard to obtain surgery that, as the figures show, saves lives.
It is very easy to obtain gender reassignment surgery in the US, and should continue to be so. However, it is something people should pay for themselves; government should not mandate that Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance pay for them.
So if you just did the same things we do, which result in longer lifespans, it would be less than half what you're using as a comparison.
Canada is 35 million people occupying the second largest country in the world, with enormous natural resources, strict immigration restrictions, few geopolitical concerns, and with little diversity. Your idea that other countries can simply choose to be like Canada is as profoundly ignorant and arrogant as royalty saying "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche".
Secondly, Americans simply don't want to be like Canadians. Forcing people to maximize their life expectancy is not what life ought to be about. If it were, why stop at national health care and commercials? Why not force everybody into institutionalized living, with controlled living conditions and food intake? No, Americans still generally believe that people should be treated like responsible adults, and despite progressive inroads, I hope that will never change. It's why I chose the US; it's pretty much the only major country that still operates that way.
The kind of broken life you have led is symptomatic of progressive societies, and it is not only unsustainable for a society as a whole, it is also deeply unfair to individuals, including yourself. Instead of ranting and raving about Trump and what Americans ought to do, you should direct your anger at Canadian society, because that is what made you what you are today. And to be clear: your life and your conduct certainly do not reflect positively on Canadian society.
No - the original study that it quotes only has 17 subjects, and dates ton 1975
Did you even look at the paper? It follows a cohort of more than 3500 people over decades. Stop making things up!
Here's a simple test - go in person and talk to a specialist in the field who knows what they're talking about.
Geez, what possible motivation could a surgeon have to convince you of the benefits of the kind of surgery they perform? Are you really that naive?
Suicide rates now are barely above the general population post-surgery with proper care.
I'm still waiting for any evidence of that. So far, all we have is "we asked around, and people who had the surgery and responded think it helped them".
I fixed the problem and feel great.
You are, by your own description, a disabled, out-of-work, half blind, angry 60-something transsexual with a history of sexual abuse, PTSD, and depression living on a small pension. Do you seriously want to claim that that amounts to "fixing the problem" or "feeling great"?
And the sad thing is that most of those problems were likely avoidable if your society and your medical system hadn't let you down.
So my experience is typical. It comes with the territory, and the problem isn't transition, the problem is men who think with their dicks. Nice victim-blaming you've got going there, jerk.
Oh, please, spare me the obvious histrionics. Medically, sexual assault is simply a risk factor after MTF gender transition. That is objectively relevant when judging the risk/benefit and cost/benefit ratios of your procedure. The choice of undergoing a major surgery followed by life-long hormonal treatment for what is essentially a mental or neurological issue does not even come close to surviving a risk/benefit analysis, let alone a cost/benefit analysis; there are many body identity disorders, and yours is the only one that is "treated" with surgery.
In a large enough population, you're going to get some people who, just at random, have a much higher number of "bad things" happening to them than others
No, I'm sorry, things that happened to you were not "just random". You made choices and they had consequences; you can argue that you were entitled to making those choices, but that doesn't prevent the consequences or make them "just random". The way other people stay healthy, safe, and financially sound is by avoiding choices that they are technically entitled to make but that entail risk.
And no, medicare/medicaid don't account for about half of US health spending. Total health spending in 2015 was 3. trillion, of which Medicare combined accounted for $1.191 trillion [cms.gov], out of 3.2 trillion total health care spending. That's 37%, a far cry from half.
Well, so you looked it up and admit the basic fact then, namely that Medicare/Medicaid spend significantly more money per patient than private insurance. Great! You're now just quibbling about percentages.
Where is your proof for the claim that the public health care system (medicaid/medicare) in the US isn't working? Are you saying that people with no health care do better than people with health care? Absurd, but that's what your statement leads to.
These are people who would have NO care without it.
Obviously, there are people who have NO care without it. There are also people who have no care BECAUSE OF it. You're cherry-picking your criteria to suit your argument. The question to ask is whether Medicare/Medicaid are more effective at delivering health care in the US than the private system, and they are not.
Also, since you cited Israel and Greece as doing better, you proved my point. They both have universal public health care plans.
And I'd be overjoyed if the US federal government extended Medicare/Medicaid to all Americans while spending $2000person/year and allowing private insurance on the side. You know, like Canada, Greece, or Israel. And the nice thing about that is that it can be financed out of the existing Medicare/Medicaid budgets while even lowering taxes.
The trouble is that "universal health care" proposals in the US try to force everybody into public health plans that spend $10000/year/person and limit the ability of Americans to buy private health plans. That is, the proposals are actually nothing like what Canada, Greece, or Israel have. And ignorant Canadians like you keep advocating for that b.s.
I am the rare exception - it's bound to happen statistically - where things just keep going wrong. Most people never have to deal with a murder, or flesh-eating disease. Half of all women have to deal with sexual assault - and that is the same in the US - so I'd say society is failing women in general.
To see what really went wrong in your case, one would have to look at your medical history in detail, but it is highly implausible that all these problems were unrelated and accidental; that would be extraordinary and would require extraordinary proof. In fact, many of the conditions you list are preventable and/or related.
(In fact, there is one area where there is clearly a relationship even based on the limited information you give: while you may think that transitioning to a woman decreased your risk of suicide, it clearly greatly increased your risk of sexual assault.)
For every additional hundred dollars spent on health care in Canada, per capita, life expectancy was extended by nearly two months.
Nice quote, but it doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Greece and Israel spend half as much per capita than Canada and have longer life expectancies. In fact, if you look internationally, beyond about $2000/capita/year, there is no improvement in life expectancy. Another example of how your analysis doesn't make sense is if you look at life expectancy by race in the US. Asian-Americans and Latinos have longer life expectancies than Canadians, while white and African Americans have lower life expectancies.
Your system just doesn't deliver the bang for the buck.
Oh, that's quite true...
That's a fact. Sometimes the government CAN do things more efficiently than the private sector
Medicare/Medicaid are government programs and account for about half of US health spending but only cover 1/3 of Americans, so this is clearly not true for the US. In fact, if we simply extended Medicare/Medicaid to the entire US population, it would spend about as much per American as the Canadian health care system spends per Canadian. The problem in the US is clearly that the public health care system isn't working well, and imposing it on more Americans clearly would make the problem worse.
and when it comes to people's health, it should.
Long life expectancy and health are largely determined by lifestyle choices, nutrition, and prevention, not medical care.
The study you and many fundy christians quoted is old (the previous century), and only has a total of 17 subjects.
Actually, it has 324 sex reassigned subjects and 3240 controls. The study is from 2011, so it's not old. It does look at long-term effects of gender reassignment and objective criteria, which is a good thing. And suicides occur at significant rates until the end of the study, so you cannot explain the results by social changes.
Here's one from 2012 with 889 subjects. It shows that suicidal ideation is mostly caused by rejection and lack of support before transition.
That study is based on self-reported narrative of non-representative samples with no control group, apparently close to transition. It's been cited 4 times. I have no doubt that most people who go through transition will afterwards say that it was good for them. It's basic cognitive dissonance. It's meaningless in terms of outcomes.
So, your beliefs and statements remain contradicted by scientific facts.
Or do you believe that taxes are a one-way street - the government taketh, and the government giveth not?
No, I think health care should be privatized and insurance based: the government should (usually) neither give nor take when it comes to healthcare. Government and charity should be reserved for people who are indigent and have no other options.
I didn't ask to be sexually assaulted, I didn't ask for PTSD, anxiety disorder, or persistent depressive disorder with major depressive episodes.Then there's the whole problem with vision loss. For a couple of years, I was mostly blind. And the bout of flesh-eating disease. And a few other medical problems (work accidents, etc).
The only "deduction" I'm making is that your society has failed you, because your life is clearly not the path a life should take. I think you are a poster child for what is wrong with "liberal" progressive societies. In a decent. compassionate society, nobody should end up like you have ended up. And your obsession with bringing the same kind of system you live under to the US is evidently an attempt for you to cope with, and rationalize, your reality.
I will forgive your rudeness and insults because it's obvious you are suffering and you probably just don't know any better. I suggest that if you can't cope with opposing views, don't participate in US political discussions. But I will speak out when people like you advocate for bringing their dysfunctional societies and cultures to the US.
If I hadn't emigrated to the US as a young man, my life might have taken been wrecked in similar ways as yours. I cannot let views like yours stand without speaking out against them, because kids deserve better than what you got and what you are advocating for.
Wrecking the economy? That is what the fossil fuel industry would have you believe, becausr they have the most to lose.
No, that's what I believe based on looking at the data. Oh, and the fossil fuel industry doesn't care; when the government starts pouring billions into "new energy", they simply become "new energy companies", like "BP = Beyond Petrol".
But every great economic advancement was kicked off by some new technological discovery, so it follows that if government policy was to invest in new technology to lmit the impact of climate change, it would actually stimulate the economy.
There are a couple logical errors there.
First, you are saying that a new technological discovery is necessary for great economic advancement; let's assume for the sake of argument that that were correct (actually, it is not; many great economic advancements have been triggered by social, cultural, or economic changes). When D is necessary for A, it doesn't follow that D is sufficient for A. That is, there are many technological discoveries that don't trigger economic advancements.
Then you assume that government investment in technology results in faster technological advancement. Where is the evidence that it does that for alternative energy? In fact, if you look at the cost of wind and solar, they show simple, long-term trends over the last 40 years, the result of lots of little advances.
It would be a net gain (as we're already seeing with some energy segments, there is much more job creation in new energy than old).
That kind of "job creation" isn't a net gain to the economy, because it suggests that you are replacing a highly automated and efficient energy source with one that requires much more labor. In fact, you really can't "create jobs" in any meaningful sense: almost all people who can be working in an economy are working (even if it is as "homemaker"). All government can do is subsidize people to move from one occupation to another, and since you're subsidizing them, the outcome is less rational and less efficient.
And if you don't believe is new energy, then invest in climate control technology, or technology that can make arid land more usable.
I do believe in new energy and I do believe in investing in it. What I don't believe is in government taking my and everybody else's money and then subsidizing research and companies with it.
See, the market already has very strong incentives to move to new energy sources, to come up with solutions to extreme weather events and coastal erosion, etc. Investors have strong incentives to invest their money accordingly, in companies that show promise, act honestly, and live up to their commitments. Politicians and administrators don't have such incentives; they don't have to care whether the money they spend on subsidies ("invest") yields something useful down the road: their own money is not on the line, and politically, it makes no difference. So, they don't subsidize based on economically and scientifically rational criteria, they subsidize based on political criteria: placating environmental activists, getting good press for flashy projects, "creating jobs", and giving money to companies owned by big donors.
There are solutions, and they all involve R&D, and some of them will require and government incentives.
No, they don't "require government incentives". To the contrary, government spending targeting particular R&D areas may even hurt them. Government R&D subsidies are short-term and unpredictable. Researchers don't want to build long term careers and companies don't want to build long term businesses based on funding that can go away with a simple change of administration in Washington. In addition, government funding tends to attract people and companies that substitute political connections for competence, creating a further disincentive for people with skills and competence to stay in that area.
You were indeed victimized, by parents, teachers, and a society that evidently didn't teach you what you needed to know. Life stories like yours are exactly why I believe the US should turn around and not go down the path of the social welfare state any further: your life didn't have to go this way.
Obviously, from the work you put into googling me and reviewing my posting history, I've struck multiple nerves.
I didn't have to "review" anything; we both have been on the site for a decade.
You need other countries that rank higher on freedom [freedomhouse.org] to remind you of what you've lost.
You like Canada, great! I'm happy there is a place for people like you. I immigrated to the US by choice, and because it is different from Canada or Europe. I have never said anything about what Canada or Europe should do; I simply don't care. What I do care is that the US is different and stay different. Why do you have this compulsion to prove that the Canadian system is better? Why are you trying to change a country that you don't live in?
Now as to my being a transsexual, that should be irrelevant,
It is quite relevant in the context of medical costs and coverage, since it is a costly and life-long medical condition, and it goes to the core of your values and beliefs. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm assuming here that if you're typical, your lifetime medical bills for you conditions have been substantial and that you didn't pay for them yourself.
I'm just wondering what's going on in the heads of people like you. Why do you believe that other people have a moral obligation to forego having kids or having a good retirement, just so that people like you can get costly, non-essential medical procedures done? Because that's what it ultimately comes down to.
Yes, we ARE talking cause and effect. Cuts to budgets result in firings.
"Resulting in firings" isn't the same as "firing". If I stop going to my local neighborhood cafe and it closes, I didn't "fire" anybody.
People do NOT "always find ways to pay physicians." Otherwise, they wouldn't need medicare and medicade
Medicare and Medicaid aren't free; people pay for them. They cost several times as much as they should cost and are not sustainable. They also only spend around 8% on physician salaries. So, eliminating and replacing them with something more efficient would mean that people spend less on healthcare and have the ability to spend more on physicians. Of course, since most Americans have been paying into these systems without ever getting any benefit, they would have to be compensated for the money they lost, probably around $100000 for the average American worker close to retirement.
Somalia has no government interference
It was socialism that turned Somalia into the shithole it is today, and despite all the decades-long chaos that usually goes along with the fall of socialist regimes, in the case of Somalia, life actually seems to be improving there now that socialism is gone.
Why don't you go live in your libertarian paradise
When I search for you on Google, and based on your posting history, you appear to be an out-of-work transsexual living in Canada. So why don't you worry about extracting free stuff from Canadians instead instead of chiming in on US politics? You have made your bed, now lie in it.
It shows a complete lack of statesmanship, putting party before country.
Sorry, no. Republicans genuinely believe that progressivism and the welfare state are bad for the country and are massively hurting people. You're welcome to disagree with their political beliefs, but you have no basis for accusing them of "putting party before country".
Just like Democrats, Republicans believe that they represent what's good for the country, otherwise they wouldn't be Republicans.
So let me understand this. Obama and his appointees don't represent those of us who elected him TWICE.
Well, as someone who actually voted for Obama, I can say: he never represented me. Obama ran against a senile, war-mongering fool (McCain), and was saying the right things during the election about constitutionality and privacy. Obama won by process of elimination. After the election, Obama turned into what most American presidents turn into: corrupt, war mongering demagogues.
The idea that someone who gets around 20% of the votes of the American people after a contest between two candidates somehow "represents" the American people is laughable. The plurality of the voters stay home because it's not worth their time to participate in that circus.
In any case, my point was much simpler: Americans overall tend to be more conservative/moderate than progressive:
And if you really think Republicans won't attack you, go outside, proclaim yourself a progressive liberal democrat, and watch what happens.
I can only speak for my own experience there. I'm a gay atheist and I used to be a vocal "progressive liberal Democrat" for a couple of decades. I never experienced threats of violence or even nastiness from conservatives; occasionally, they'd express their pity for me for being a sinner, others would just have me over for dinner. On the other hand, when I told progressives or Democrats that I couldn't in good conscience support Hillary and was just not going to vote, the amount of abuse, ostracism, and vitriol I was subjected to was just astounding.
I don't get it, are you saying that Trump who did not get the votes of the majority of the people
Nobody ever gets the votes of the majority of the American people. Hillary and Trump each got about 20% of the votes of the American people. The rest either couldn't vote or didn't choose to vote (like myself, who thought that both candidates were awful).
and HIS appointees are the ones who represent the American people? Perhaps you are retarded?
I'm saying that the US is a moderately conservative and libertarian country, and that Sotomayor and Kagan do not represent that. Who won the popular vote is irrelevant to that analysis.
[Citation needed.] Let's look up some stats [cornell.edu], shall we?
I wasn't making a statement about whether majorities like them, I was making a statement about whether their beliefs actually align with the beliefs of the American people, and I don't believe they do. Nevertheless, if you do want to talk about polls, look at the page: in 2016, 37% say the court is "too liberal", vs 20% saying that it is "too conservative", and SCOTUS approval ratings have dropped sharply under Obama. The only reason approval ratings are still as high as they are is because courts and decisions are strongly distorted by the MSM.
If you check the news stories from last year and this year, you'll also see that people widely perceive SCOTUS nominations as a reason why people are might be/are/have been voting for Trump.
And you need to realize that polls tend to be biased in favor of the left because conservatives, libertarians, and/or independents rather hang up than voice a negative opinion to an anonymous stranger that has their personal information. People don't get fired, attacked, or beaten up for approving of Obama or progressive causes, but they do get fired, attacked and beaten up for supporting Trump or opposing affirmative action or opposing gay marriage. Keeping quiet in RL about conservative, libertarian, or independent viewpoints is pretty much ingrained now in many people.
"tilted any further to the left" cause 4 out of 9 is "tilting to the left".
You misread. I didn't say it was already a "left wing court". Right now the court has a moderate conservative majority. If it "tilted any further to the left", it would have a progressive majority, which is too far.
also, you're fucking stupid if you think the conservatives, pro-business and anti-public as they are, are more representitiive of the people than Obama and his noms were
The Democrats are in the pocket of billionaires, unions, academics, and media companies. You are delusional if you think that those groups govern in the interest of the people.
You're a moron if you can't follow the chain of cause and effect.
We're not talking about cause and effect here, we're talking about "firing". "Firing" is something employers do to employees. Trump can't "fire" doctors because he doesn't employ them. End of story. Your hare-brained theories about what the consequences of ending Medicare would be are irrelevant to the question of whether doctors are employees of Trump.
And how are they going to pay those doctors if they can't bill patients? And all those doctors running their own clinics - if they can't bill medicare/medicaid, they're not going to be able to have as many doctors in their group, It's not just hospitals.
Well, I suppose you are to be forgiven for your economic delusions, being effectively a ward of the state. However, markets generally expand, not shrink, when government involvement is reduced. Furthermore, demand for essential health care is highly inelastic, so people will find ways to pay physicians. (Note that physicians' salaries are about 8% of total health care spending.)
Or are you going to argue that Trump's cuts to the EPA aren't going to result in people being fired/laid off/out of a job?
Unlike physicians, EPA employees are actually government employees, so Trump can fire them. Unlike physicians, their skills also have little value in the free market. So, he can fire them, they will have to change careers, and that's a good thing. Keeping my fingers crossed here.
Really? None of those programs employ doctors? Medicare and medicaid don't pay the doctor's bills at the hospital, etc?
They pay doctors, they don't employ them.
if the Republicans had their way cutting funding, they wouldn't have been able to afford to see a doctor.
Even if that were true, it wouldn't mean that Trump can "fire" those people, so your statement is wrong. If you meant that they might not get paid, then you should have said that.
Of course, it's not true anyway. Without those shitty, inefficient, crony-capitalist programs, medical care would be more affordable and demand for it would go up.
Well, except that people like you wouldn't get free sex change operations. But fortunately, there isn't a lot of demand for those to begin with.
Slashdot Mirror
Sessions isn't "dismantling" anything. The commission was created in 2013 and was supposed to do its job by 2017. It apparently has done that, Sessions has thanked them. The Trump administration is now deciding what to do next.
Calling this "ordering the Justice Dept. to end forensic science commission" or "dismantling forensic science commission", as if Trump or Sessions had taken extraordinary steps to kill the commission, is tendentious, politically motivated b.s. that reflects badly on the Washington Post and the submitter.
You can't stop confabulating, can you? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
As I was saying before: I want to thank you for your brutal honesty about your life and the kind of support and guidance Canadian society has given you. You certainly confirmed again my impressions of Canada. I hope and trust my fellow Americans will draw the right conclusions from your example and from your conduct.
Yes, and the highest private education spending in OECD
Yes, for the simple reason that healthcare spending has little to do with either life expectancy or teenage pregnancy rates. So why are you dragging it into this discussion?
Actually, the UK has about average taxes among OECD countries at around 35% of GDP; the US is on the low side at about 26%. Of course, given that US per capita GDP is about 35% higher than that of the UK, the US actually collects more in taxes per capita than the UK, and it spends even more because it runs a deficit.
What makes the average tax burden in Europe so high is middle-class taxes: that's what pays for the European welfare state. So, when you hear the Warrens, Clintons, and Sanders out there saying that the US should become more like Europe, you need to understand that in order to pay for that, taxes on people making $50000 and up would have to go up by 10-15%; US top marginal tax rates are already comparable to European top marginal tax rates.
For example, an average wage earner in Germany pays 39.6% income tax, while he pays 25.8% in the US (the difference is even more pronounced because the average income earner in Germany earns substantially less than in the US, even in terms of $PPP).
Forbes Magazine has only existed for 100 years. And companies make and drop off that list for all sorts of reasons.
In any case, use your head: companies constantly reinvent themselves in response to technological changes. It's the norm, not the exception.
And you are living under a rock if you haven't seen the stories about fossil fuel companies exploring alternative energy sources:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news...
https://www.theguardian.com/bu...
http://www.reuters.com/article...
Etc.
You're comparing "suicidality" from a US survey with actual suicides from a Swedish study. Talk about dishonest use of statistics.
In any case, it doesn't matter anyway. "I'm suicidal unless you amputate a body part" is neither medically nor ethically a sound justification for government-financed major surgery.
It is very easy to obtain gender reassignment surgery in the US, and should continue to be so. However, it is something people should pay for themselves; government should not mandate that Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance pay for them.
Canada is 35 million people occupying the second largest country in the world, with enormous natural resources, strict immigration restrictions, few geopolitical concerns, and with little diversity. Your idea that other countries can simply choose to be like Canada is as profoundly ignorant and arrogant as royalty saying "Qu'ils mangent de la brioche".
Secondly, Americans simply don't want to be like Canadians. Forcing people to maximize their life expectancy is not what life ought to be about. If it were, why stop at national health care and commercials? Why not force everybody into institutionalized living, with controlled living conditions and food intake? No, Americans still generally believe that people should be treated like responsible adults, and despite progressive inroads, I hope that will never change. It's why I chose the US; it's pretty much the only major country that still operates that way.
The kind of broken life you have led is symptomatic of progressive societies, and it is not only unsustainable for a society as a whole, it is also deeply unfair to individuals, including yourself. Instead of ranting and raving about Trump and what Americans ought to do, you should direct your anger at Canadian society, because that is what made you what you are today. And to be clear: your life and your conduct certainly do not reflect positively on Canadian society.
Did you even look at the paper? It follows a cohort of more than 3500 people over decades. Stop making things up!
Geez, what possible motivation could a surgeon have to convince you of the benefits of the kind of surgery they perform? Are you really that naive?
I'm still waiting for any evidence of that. So far, all we have is "we asked around, and people who had the surgery and responded think it helped them".
You are, by your own description, a disabled, out-of-work, half blind, angry 60-something transsexual with a history of sexual abuse, PTSD, and depression living on a small pension. Do you seriously want to claim that that amounts to "fixing the problem" or "feeling great"?
And the sad thing is that most of those problems were likely avoidable if your society and your medical system hadn't let you down.
Oh, please, spare me the obvious histrionics. Medically, sexual assault is simply a risk factor after MTF gender transition. That is objectively relevant when judging the risk/benefit and cost/benefit ratios of your procedure. The choice of undergoing a major surgery followed by life-long hormonal treatment for what is essentially a mental or neurological issue does not even come close to surviving a risk/benefit analysis, let alone a cost/benefit analysis; there are many body identity disorders, and yours is the only one that is "treated" with surgery.
No, I'm sorry, things that happened to you were not "just random". You made choices and they had consequences; you can argue that you were entitled to making those choices, but that doesn't prevent the consequences or make them "just random". The way other people stay healthy, safe, and financially sound is by avoiding choices that they are technically entitled to make but that entail risk.
Well, so you looked it up and admit the basic fact then, namely that Medicare/Medicaid spend significantly more money per patient than private insurance. Great! You're now just quibbling about percentages.
That's not my main point, but that seems to be the case
Obviously, there are people who have NO care without it. There are also people who have no care BECAUSE OF it. You're cherry-picking your criteria to suit your argument. The question to ask is whether Medicare/Medicaid are more effective at delivering health care in the US than the private system, and they are not.
And I'd be overjoyed if the US federal government extended Medicare/Medicaid to all Americans while spending $2000person/year and allowing private insurance on the side. You know, like Canada, Greece, or Israel. And the nice thing about that is that it can be financed out of the existing Medicare/Medicaid budgets while even lowering taxes.
The trouble is that "universal health care" proposals in the US try to force everybody into public health plans that spend $10000/year/person and limit the ability of Americans to buy private health plans. That is, the proposals are actually nothing like what Canada, Greece, or Israel have. And ignorant Canadians like you keep advocating for that b.s.
To see what really went wrong in your case, one would have to look at your medical history in detail, but it is highly implausible that all these problems were unrelated and accidental; that would be extraordinary and would require extraordinary proof. In fact, many of the conditions you list are preventable and/or related.
(In fact, there is one area where there is clearly a relationship even based on the limited information you give: while you may think that transitioning to a woman decreased your risk of suicide, it clearly greatly increased your risk of sexual assault.)
Nice quote, but it doesn't stand up to scrutiny. Greece and Israel spend half as much per capita than Canada and have longer life expectancies. In fact, if you look internationally, beyond about $2000/capita/year, there is no improvement in life expectancy. Another example of how your analysis doesn't make sense is if you look at life expectancy by race in the US. Asian-Americans and Latinos have longer life expectancies than Canadians, while white and African Americans have lower life expectancies.
Oh, that's quite true...
Medicare/Medicaid are government programs and account for about half of US health spending but only cover 1/3 of Americans, so this is clearly not true for the US. In fact, if we simply extended Medicare/Medicaid to the entire US population, it would spend about as much per American as the Canadian health care system spends per Canadian. The problem in the US is clearly that the public health care system isn't working well, and imposing it on more Americans clearly would make the problem worse.
Long life expectancy and health are largely determined by lifestyle choices, nutrition, and prevention, not medical care.
Actually, it has 324 sex reassigned subjects and 3240 controls. The study is from 2011, so it's not old. It does look at long-term effects of gender reassignment and objective criteria, which is a good thing. And suicides occur at significant rates until the end of the study, so you cannot explain the results by social changes.
That study is based on self-reported narrative of non-representative samples with no control group, apparently close to transition. It's been cited 4 times. I have no doubt that most people who go through transition will afterwards say that it was good for them. It's basic cognitive dissonance. It's meaningless in terms of outcomes.
So, your beliefs and statements remain contradicted by scientific facts.
The study is from 2011 and is the most highly cited study on the subject. If you have a more recent study, feel free to share it.
No, I think health care should be privatized and insurance based: the government should (usually) neither give nor take when it comes to healthcare. Government and charity should be reserved for people who are indigent and have no other options.
The only "deduction" I'm making is that your society has failed you, because your life is clearly not the path a life should take. I think you are a poster child for what is wrong with "liberal" progressive societies. In a decent. compassionate society, nobody should end up like you have ended up. And your obsession with bringing the same kind of system you live under to the US is evidently an attempt for you to cope with, and rationalize, your reality.
I will forgive your rudeness and insults because it's obvious you are suffering and you probably just don't know any better. I suggest that if you can't cope with opposing views, don't participate in US political discussions. But I will speak out when people like you advocate for bringing their dysfunctional societies and cultures to the US.
If I hadn't emigrated to the US as a young man, my life might have taken been wrecked in similar ways as yours. I cannot let views like yours stand without speaking out against them, because kids deserve better than what you got and what you are advocating for.
No, that's what I believe based on looking at the data. Oh, and the fossil fuel industry doesn't care; when the government starts pouring billions into "new energy", they simply become "new energy companies", like "BP = Beyond Petrol".
There are a couple logical errors there.
First, you are saying that a new technological discovery is necessary for great economic advancement; let's assume for the sake of argument that that were correct (actually, it is not; many great economic advancements have been triggered by social, cultural, or economic changes). When D is necessary for A, it doesn't follow that D is sufficient for A. That is, there are many technological discoveries that don't trigger economic advancements.
Then you assume that government investment in technology results in faster technological advancement. Where is the evidence that it does that for alternative energy? In fact, if you look at the cost of wind and solar, they show simple, long-term trends over the last 40 years, the result of lots of little advances.
That kind of "job creation" isn't a net gain to the economy, because it suggests that you are replacing a highly automated and efficient energy source with one that requires much more labor. In fact, you really can't "create jobs" in any meaningful sense: almost all people who can be working in an economy are working (even if it is as "homemaker"). All government can do is subsidize people to move from one occupation to another, and since you're subsidizing them, the outcome is less rational and less efficient.
I do believe in new energy and I do believe in investing in it. What I don't believe is in government taking my and everybody else's money and then subsidizing research and companies with it.
See, the market already has very strong incentives to move to new energy sources, to come up with solutions to extreme weather events and coastal erosion, etc. Investors have strong incentives to invest their money accordingly, in companies that show promise, act honestly, and live up to their commitments. Politicians and administrators don't have such incentives; they don't have to care whether the money they spend on subsidies ("invest") yields something useful down the road: their own money is not on the line, and politically, it makes no difference. So, they don't subsidize based on economically and scientifically rational criteria, they subsidize based on political criteria: placating environmental activists, getting good press for flashy projects, "creating jobs", and giving money to companies owned by big donors.
No, they don't "require government incentives". To the contrary, government spending targeting particular R&D areas may even hurt them. Government R&D subsidies are short-term and unpredictable. Researchers don't want to build long term careers and companies don't want to build long term businesses based on funding that can go away with a simple change of administration in Washington. In addition, government funding tends to attract people and companies that substitute political connections for competence, creating a further disincentive for people with skills and competence to stay in that area.
I did. Gender reassignment surgery increases rates of suicide and psychiatric disorders. That's, in fact, consistent with your history of depression, sexual assault, and deep-seated anger.
You were indeed victimized, by parents, teachers, and a society that evidently didn't teach you what you needed to know. Life stories like yours are exactly why I believe the US should turn around and not go down the path of the social welfare state any further: your life didn't have to go this way.
I didn't have to "review" anything; we both have been on the site for a decade.
You like Canada, great! I'm happy there is a place for people like you. I immigrated to the US by choice, and because it is different from Canada or Europe. I have never said anything about what Canada or Europe should do; I simply don't care. What I do care is that the US is different and stay different. Why do you have this compulsion to prove that the Canadian system is better? Why are you trying to change a country that you don't live in?
It is quite relevant in the context of medical costs and coverage, since it is a costly and life-long medical condition, and it goes to the core of your values and beliefs. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm assuming here that if you're typical, your lifetime medical bills for you conditions have been substantial and that you didn't pay for them yourself.
I'm just wondering what's going on in the heads of people like you. Why do you believe that other people have a moral obligation to forego having kids or having a good retirement, just so that people like you can get costly, non-essential medical procedures done? Because that's what it ultimately comes down to.
"Resulting in firings" isn't the same as "firing". If I stop going to my local neighborhood cafe and it closes, I didn't "fire" anybody.
Medicare and Medicaid aren't free; people pay for them. They cost several times as much as they should cost and are not sustainable. They also only spend around 8% on physician salaries. So, eliminating and replacing them with something more efficient would mean that people spend less on healthcare and have the ability to spend more on physicians. Of course, since most Americans have been paying into these systems without ever getting any benefit, they would have to be compensated for the money they lost, probably around $100000 for the average American worker close to retirement.
It was socialism that turned Somalia into the shithole it is today, and despite all the decades-long chaos that usually goes along with the fall of socialist regimes, in the case of Somalia, life actually seems to be improving there now that socialism is gone.
When I search for you on Google, and based on your posting history, you appear to be an out-of-work transsexual living in Canada. So why don't you worry about extracting free stuff from Canadians instead instead of chiming in on US politics? You have made your bed, now lie in it.
Sorry, no. Republicans genuinely believe that progressivism and the welfare state are bad for the country and are massively hurting people. You're welcome to disagree with their political beliefs, but you have no basis for accusing them of "putting party before country".
Just like Democrats, Republicans believe that they represent what's good for the country, otherwise they wouldn't be Republicans.
Well, as someone who actually voted for Obama, I can say: he never represented me. Obama ran against a senile, war-mongering fool (McCain), and was saying the right things during the election about constitutionality and privacy. Obama won by process of elimination. After the election, Obama turned into what most American presidents turn into: corrupt, war mongering demagogues.
The idea that someone who gets around 20% of the votes of the American people after a contest between two candidates somehow "represents" the American people is laughable. The plurality of the voters stay home because it's not worth their time to participate in that circus.
In any case, my point was much simpler: Americans overall tend to be more conservative/moderate than progressive:
http://www.gallup.com/poll/180...
I can only speak for my own experience there. I'm a gay atheist and I used to be a vocal "progressive liberal Democrat" for a couple of decades. I never experienced threats of violence or even nastiness from conservatives; occasionally, they'd express their pity for me for being a sinner, others would just have me over for dinner. On the other hand, when I told progressives or Democrats that I couldn't in good conscience support Hillary and was just not going to vote, the amount of abuse, ostracism, and vitriol I was subjected to was just astounding.
Nobody ever gets the votes of the majority of the American people. Hillary and Trump each got about 20% of the votes of the American people. The rest either couldn't vote or didn't choose to vote (like myself, who thought that both candidates were awful).
I'm saying that the US is a moderately conservative and libertarian country, and that Sotomayor and Kagan do not represent that. Who won the popular vote is irrelevant to that analysis.
Why are you angry at me? I'm just telling you what happened. I didn't vote for either of them.
But your reaction shows why Democrats keep losing politically: instead of facing reality, their supporters just become rude and throw temper tantrums.
I wasn't making a statement about whether majorities like them, I was making a statement about whether their beliefs actually align with the beliefs of the American people, and I don't believe they do. Nevertheless, if you do want to talk about polls, look at the page: in 2016, 37% say the court is "too liberal", vs 20% saying that it is "too conservative", and SCOTUS approval ratings have dropped sharply under Obama. The only reason approval ratings are still as high as they are is because courts and decisions are strongly distorted by the MSM.
If you check the news stories from last year and this year, you'll also see that people widely perceive SCOTUS nominations as a reason why people are might be/are/have been voting for Trump.
And you need to realize that polls tend to be biased in favor of the left because conservatives, libertarians, and/or independents rather hang up than voice a negative opinion to an anonymous stranger that has their personal information. People don't get fired, attacked, or beaten up for approving of Obama or progressive causes, but they do get fired, attacked and beaten up for supporting Trump or opposing affirmative action or opposing gay marriage. Keeping quiet in RL about conservative, libertarian, or independent viewpoints is pretty much ingrained now in many people.
You misread. I didn't say it was already a "left wing court". Right now the court has a moderate conservative majority. If it "tilted any further to the left", it would have a progressive majority, which is too far.
The Democrats are in the pocket of billionaires, unions, academics, and media companies. You are delusional if you think that those groups govern in the interest of the people.
We're not talking about cause and effect here, we're talking about "firing". "Firing" is something employers do to employees. Trump can't "fire" doctors because he doesn't employ them. End of story. Your hare-brained theories about what the consequences of ending Medicare would be are irrelevant to the question of whether doctors are employees of Trump.
Well, I suppose you are to be forgiven for your economic delusions, being effectively a ward of the state. However, markets generally expand, not shrink, when government involvement is reduced. Furthermore, demand for essential health care is highly inelastic, so people will find ways to pay physicians. (Note that physicians' salaries are about 8% of total health care spending.)
Unlike physicians, EPA employees are actually government employees, so Trump can fire them. Unlike physicians, their skills also have little value in the free market. So, he can fire them, they will have to change careers, and that's a good thing. Keeping my fingers crossed here.
They pay doctors, they don't employ them.
Even if that were true, it wouldn't mean that Trump can "fire" those people, so your statement is wrong. If you meant that they might not get paid, then you should have said that.
Of course, it's not true anyway. Without those shitty, inefficient, crony-capitalist programs, medical care would be more affordable and demand for it would go up.
Well, except that people like you wouldn't get free sex change operations. But fortunately, there isn't a lot of demand for those to begin with.