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This is just such monumental stupidity because I would say at least half of their clientele is probably liberal/hippie/democrat/whatever. I don’t ever think boycotts have any noticeable impact but if there is one (which I’m hearing/reading about) it would definitely hurt them.
a related article http://tinyurl.com/oofmpf
This health care stuff is driving me nuts because I feel completely and totally stupid about it. I want to get pissed off at this asshole for making the false assumption that socialism is inherently wrong and pushing, again, for the high-deductible bullshit that just gets insurance companies out of paying for day-to-day care like dialysis and sick nephews — the shit that really bankrupts people — but I just don’t know. It’s all greek. When we do open enrollment at work, I leave bewildered and confused. I’m even more so when I read stuff like this.
I mean, a public option makes sense to me. Perfect sense. But so does what this guy is saying. And what Dean Kamen was saying. So who the fuck is right? I mean, aside from Sarah Palin and her death-panel bullshit.
Alot of these people are going on about violating the constitution, but…
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
It’s right there at the top.
To be perfectly honest, as someone who has fantastic health care (that I never use) I don’t really have much inkling to support any of this, especially since anyone with a brain could see it’s just going to throw us deeper into debt. But if the government isn’t there to ensure safety and welfare for its citizens, then whats the point? Why bother even having one if it’s only going to defer to the entities most capable of existing and thriving without it?
I feel like the whole healthcare debate has been totally eclipsed by these whack jobs screaming at all the town halls, and I actually think it will pass, albeit in some sort of watered down, congress like way. But I think these protesters are, at least to me, bringing up perhaps the opposite issue that they were initially intendiing to. After you get past your garden variety racist and anti-democrat republican and idiot, there’s a real wave of libertarianism going on here that I think raises the issue that if you don’t want the government helping you, healing you, teaching you, etc. then why bother with one at all? And when you see these random folks like the gun toter or the lady that screamed at Arlen Specter on TV, they suddenly aren’t as loud or forceful or even sure of themselves as they were earlier. Its just like all those anti war people who show up, shout about “No war” and “screw Bush,” but in the end turn out to be completely clueless to any situations or solutions related to said war.
I guess I’ve been watching all of this and thinking that it’s finally happened, the fickle, ADDlike, mindless mindset of the internet and TV news is finally transferring to our actual behavior and intellectual discourse, and we are forever going to be worse of because of it.
That means it’s partly twitters fault.
Evan, that was a great post. Seriously.
That being said, the problem as I’ve posted before is that this is being phrased and sold as “health care” reform rather than insurance reform.
Even if we don’t get some kind of public option (I’m hoping we still do but let’s say we don’t), if the bill includes regulating the insurance industry to stop them from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions, or dropping policies once someone gets sick even though they’ve paid their premiums up until that point, putting in some solid out of pocket caps on things……then I think that will be a victory. I mean I think something like 50% of bankruptcies in this country happen to people who came down with some sort of medical hardship, and something like 75% of those are people who actually had insurance.
As I’ve also mentioned before, for my son I have great insurance, and we double cover him with my wife’s great insurance. Even with that, due to them denying certain things due to ridiculous fine print technicalities, needing to go to out of network doctors because the only other doctors who perform certain procedures were too far away, etc our out of pocket expenses each year on medical stuff are thousands. Luckily we’re in a position to be able to cover than and handle it, but it’s a number that would severely impact a lot of people. Plus, my son’s condition, while bad is not as bad as so many we’ve seen and his will eventually get better whereas so many of these people are dealing with things for life.
With all out time in and out of hospitals we’ve seen so many things happen to people with no insurance or bad insurance and it’s just insane. I’m really mad about how these screaming loons have hijacked the debate, and really mad about how the insurance industry has worked them like puppets and gotten most of these people to act against their ultimate self interest, but if nothing else comes of this but insurance reform that puts the brakes on some of these shady practices….then I’m all for it.
Also, the other thing about all this is that I’m a reasonably well educated person with a fairly good command of the english language and business language. I also work in an office that provides me with the flexibility and access to phones to make calls during the day, and I also have access to the internet. This allows me to have had the time over the past 3 years to fight things, follow up on things, find out the legal acceptability of some things that were done or denied, etc. I can’t tell you how many parents who just didn’t have the background or the experience or even the command of the language or who worked factory jobs where they couldn’t make calls during the day to doctors or insurance companies, etc. The way the entire for profit insurance system is set up to be a purposely confusing maze for people to have to navigate is horrible and I wish more people had an up close chance to see it’s impact in action because it’s a heartbreaking thing and it will change you forever.