Health care in the UK is funded by National Insurance. And it's been called that since the beginning over 50 years ago. The word has a looser definition than you think.
Did you read my post? In your selfish system people don't get things checked out until they end up in the emergency room and then the government pays anyway, because no civilised nation lets hospitals turn away people in critical condition. Ill health is punishment enough for bad life choices. Getting lung cancer from smoking will often still kill you. Getting leukaemia and then going bankrupt from medical bills? The illness is awful, and the bankruptcy is a fucking travesty.
I really can't argue with you. Because you are relying on the fact that no one would ever want to assist other unfortunate human beings. You also seem to be under the impression that your health is your own choice, when really it is mostly down to luck. Not getting sick is really its own reward. At least now people unfortunate enough to get a chronic illness won't be hit by the double whammy of bankruptcy too. Do you object to paying for the fire service because your house hasn't yet caught fire?
Do you extend this argument to the fire service? Or the police? Or schools? Why is health care any different? And the idea that all people's injuries are their own fault is wrong. Being genetically pre-disposed to leukaemia isn't a choice.
Non-American here too! I'm not exactly sure how the government will keep premiums down, but as the fed will become the largest customer of health insurance companies they will have significant weight on them. They also have the threat of further reform.
On top of that, what happens when someone who has no health insurance and who hasn't paid any fines goes to the emergency room? Are they turned away now? Or given free insurance on the spot?
Well under the current system they are either turned away or forced to pay some exorbitant amount. I would imagine that since the vast majority of people will be covered under the new system hospitals will be less concerned about getting their insurance money before treating people.
Who is happy with their insurance? Premiums have been skyrocketing because insurance companies, hospitals, and doctors practically collude to hide the massive amounts of money that they move into their pocketbooks. Now they still get to do that, but we have an extra trillion dollars (and do you think that's the total bil??) to pay for with taxes and other costs that will make it back to consumers.
If the Republicans had allowed the majority to govern, just like in every other democracy then the USA might have ended up with a government option, which would have really reduced costs. But the Democrats had to make some shitty concessions in order to get ANY form of reform through.
The idea that using reconciliation to pass the bill is a scandal is stupid. A democracy is not able to operate when a supermajority is required to pass any legislation. And with the Republicans totally unwilling to negotiate the Democrats had no other option. If the largest majority in the Senate in decades is not a mandate, then what is?
Which is worse? People taking advantage of the welfare state, or people dying because of inadequate healthcare? You can't have a welfare system with cheaters. They can be prosecuted under fraud legislation. Of course some will slip by and get away with it, but this way is dramatically the lesser of two evils.
Here's something funny: if everyone jointly pays for healthcare and everybody gets treated health costs go down. This is because no one puts off going to the doctor because of expense. Cancers are caught sooner, infections are treated before the victim starts coughing up blood. What selfish libertarians like yourself don't realise is that a persons health is mostly unrelated to their choices. No one chooses to get prostate cancer, no one chooses to get bitten by a rabid dog.
So the bill does a lot of good things. It stops insurance companies basically doing whatever they like, which was the main problem with the US health system. But it actually rewards those same insurance companies by delivering millions of new customers to them. A competitive public option would have pushed down insurance company margins and made them actually compete for business, instead of retaining their confusopoly. And then there's the issue that women will now be required to purchase abortion coverage separately because the government is forbidden to pay for that procedure. This is basically a regression, since lots of plans will probably stop covering abortion in order to be eligible for government subsidised customers. Overall though, lots more people who were unable to get coverage will now be able to get it. Imperfect as it is, this bill will save lives, and contrary to what Fox will tell you, it will not affect anyone who is currently happy with their insurance.
You can disagree with them, but to call them hypocrites is wrong. They take a different interpretation of the constitution from you. Given their interpretation their policy is completely consistent.
For some reason in the UK we have exceptions for certain laws if you are a member of a religion. For instance, if you are a Sikh you are allowed to use a motorbike without a helmet since you have a turban in the way (although to be honest, in that case your violation doesn't harm anyone else). In a more outrageous exception, churches are allowed, when choosing a candidate for a job, to discriminate against gays and in the Catholic church's case women. It's one rule for us, and another for them. As the gentleman in the article has demonstrated this is extremely silly. Who defines what a religion is?
In fairness to the Lib Dems this isn't an official policy. This is a group of their lords, and as you know, lords can pretty much do what they like with no recourse from the party that put them in the house.
But it still implicates innocent people with no relation to the crime. Do you think all the police in the country can be trusted not to immediately take out a search and arrest warrant on every match?
Yes but just imagine: you could one day have a knock at the door, and the police have a warrant to arrest you and search your house. You have no idea why, but as it turns out your DNA matched that found at the scene of a crime. It could take months or years to clear your name. Imagine further that this is some kind of horrific rape or murder. You could lose your job, be threatened by vigilantes, lose friendships.
Well I've looked it up now and according to WIkipedia it's somewhere between one in 5 million and 1 billion. Even if it is one in 1 billion you might have thousands of cases using it a year and you're pretty quickly going to run into collisions.
Slashdot Mirror
Health care in the UK is funded by National Insurance. And it's been called that since the beginning over 50 years ago. The word has a looser definition than you think.
Did you read my post? In your selfish system people don't get things checked out until they end up in the emergency room and then the government pays anyway, because no civilised nation lets hospitals turn away people in critical condition. Ill health is punishment enough for bad life choices. Getting lung cancer from smoking will often still kill you. Getting leukaemia and then going bankrupt from medical bills? The illness is awful, and the bankruptcy is a fucking travesty.
Bullshit. Thousands of people every year die because they leave it too late to get symptoms checked out, or are dumped by their insurance company.
I really can't argue with you. Because you are relying on the fact that no one would ever want to assist other unfortunate human beings. You also seem to be under the impression that your health is your own choice, when really it is mostly down to luck. Not getting sick is really its own reward. At least now people unfortunate enough to get a chronic illness won't be hit by the double whammy of bankruptcy too. Do you object to paying for the fire service because your house hasn't yet caught fire?
Excellent, glad to hear it. People who have chronic conditions will be able to be treated for them!
Do you extend this argument to the fire service? Or the police? Or schools? Why is health care any different? And the idea that all people's injuries are their own fault is wrong. Being genetically pre-disposed to leukaemia isn't a choice.
Non-American here too! I'm not exactly sure how the government will keep premiums down, but as the fed will become the largest customer of health insurance companies they will have significant weight on them. They also have the threat of further reform.
The Democrats ran on the platform of healthcare reforms. And they won! By a sizeable margin! This is what we call a mandate.
Well under the current system they are either turned away or forced to pay some exorbitant amount. I would imagine that since the vast majority of people will be covered under the new system hospitals will be less concerned about getting their insurance money before treating people.
If the Republicans had allowed the majority to govern, just like in every other democracy then the USA might have ended up with a government option, which would have really reduced costs. But the Democrats had to make some shitty concessions in order to get ANY form of reform through.
The idea that using reconciliation to pass the bill is a scandal is stupid. A democracy is not able to operate when a supermajority is required to pass any legislation. And with the Republicans totally unwilling to negotiate the Democrats had no other option. If the largest majority in the Senate in decades is not a mandate, then what is?
Which is worse? People taking advantage of the welfare state, or people dying because of inadequate healthcare? You can't have a welfare system with cheaters. They can be prosecuted under fraud legislation. Of course some will slip by and get away with it, but this way is dramatically the lesser of two evils.
Wait, so people with chronic conditions will be able to get healthcare now? The horror!
Here's something funny: if everyone jointly pays for healthcare and everybody gets treated health costs go down. This is because no one puts off going to the doctor because of expense. Cancers are caught sooner, infections are treated before the victim starts coughing up blood. What selfish libertarians like yourself don't realise is that a persons health is mostly unrelated to their choices. No one chooses to get prostate cancer, no one chooses to get bitten by a rabid dog.
So the bill does a lot of good things. It stops insurance companies basically doing whatever they like, which was the main problem with the US health system. But it actually rewards those same insurance companies by delivering millions of new customers to them. A competitive public option would have pushed down insurance company margins and made them actually compete for business, instead of retaining their confusopoly. And then there's the issue that women will now be required to purchase abortion coverage separately because the government is forbidden to pay for that procedure. This is basically a regression, since lots of plans will probably stop covering abortion in order to be eligible for government subsidised customers. Overall though, lots more people who were unable to get coverage will now be able to get it. Imperfect as it is, this bill will save lives, and contrary to what Fox will tell you, it will not affect anyone who is currently happy with their insurance.
Java enabled? When was the last time you used a Java applet? Certainly it has nothing to do with 'web 2.0'.
You can disagree with them, but to call them hypocrites is wrong. They take a different interpretation of the constitution from you. Given their interpretation their policy is completely consistent.
I didn't know what that was. After looking up I find it's an American organisation having no relevance to the discussion at hand.
On the plus side they make excellent organ donors.
For some reason in the UK we have exceptions for certain laws if you are a member of a religion. For instance, if you are a Sikh you are allowed to use a motorbike without a helmet since you have a turban in the way (although to be honest, in that case your violation doesn't harm anyone else). In a more outrageous exception, churches are allowed, when choosing a candidate for a job, to discriminate against gays and in the Catholic church's case women. It's one rule for us, and another for them. As the gentleman in the article has demonstrated this is extremely silly. Who defines what a religion is?
In fairness to the Lib Dems this isn't an official policy. This is a group of their lords, and as you know, lords can pretty much do what they like with no recourse from the party that put them in the house.
It's also posted on every discussion tangentially related to XML. And is no longer funny.
The DNA isn't actually sequenced. That would take too long.
But it still implicates innocent people with no relation to the crime. Do you think all the police in the country can be trusted not to immediately take out a search and arrest warrant on every match?
Yes but just imagine: you could one day have a knock at the door, and the police have a warrant to arrest you and search your house. You have no idea why, but as it turns out your DNA matched that found at the scene of a crime. It could take months or years to clear your name. Imagine further that this is some kind of horrific rape or murder. You could lose your job, be threatened by vigilantes, lose friendships.
Well I've looked it up now and according to WIkipedia it's somewhere between one in 5 million and 1 billion. Even if it is one in 1 billion you might have thousands of cases using it a year and you're pretty quickly going to run into collisions.