National Health Care

[iNow]

President Obama, if I'm remembering correctly, said that he will veto this if it doesn't have the public option.

I don't believe so.  They have not come out and said this, and always dance around the issue when it's brought up.  He's been careful not to make veto threats since it turned out so bad for Clinton when he did it back in '93.  What the administration officials keep saying is that, "We'd prefer a public option, and we think that's the best way to drive down costs and improve quality, but there are many different ways to arrive at that same outcome and we are not taking anything off the table."   ... I paraphrased, but that's the gist.


While I obviously disagree a bit with Andrews ideological stance, and we seem not to share similar underlying principles in this discussion on healthcare, I need to give him credit and acknowledge that he's probably right about one thing...  Even if this is a really crappy bill, it will probably still pass since the Dems cannot afford to look like they were too weak to get anything done with this.  They'd rather pass something bad than nothing at all.

TDS had a wonderful piece on how pathetic they are just last week.  Clip at the link below:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-s ... r-majority

Jon Stewart went off on Senate Democrats last night for failing to get their health care reform plan past the Senate Finance Committee despite having a super majority. The Democrats had the numbers on the committee, but several members of their party voted against the amendments despite 65% national approval for the plan. Stewart argued that the "Democrats couldn't get laid in a house [where people's] sole purpose is to have consequence and disease-free sex with legislators on finance committees."

[iNow]

But how do you know those things are there in ways that will work?  How can you know when congress isn't letting us see the bill?  Those things you've said are vague, they have to be implemented in some way.  How do you know that they are being put into law in a way that isn't riddled with loopholes if you can't see the bill?  Why are you just trusting that the result of all this will be what you've stated when you aren't allowed to see it?  (You clearly fall into category A) [support based on nothing more than faith]

I'm surprised I didn't catch this last night since you repeated it so many times.  This is plainly untrue, and can be classed as a meme designed to do nothing more than further propagate false information.

Evidence is always best, so I'll just share this link and let all of you figure out whether or not "Congress isn't letting us see the bill."  This was posted by the Senate Finance Committee on Friday night, and won't be voted upon until Tuesday:

http://finance.senate.gov/sitepages/legislation.htm
Specifically:  http://finance.senate.gov/sitepages/leg ... MENDED.pdf

[andrewclunn]

This is what I was referring to:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/art ... wD9AT460O0

I'll say more when I'm done reading...

[iNow]

This is what I was referring to:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/art ... wD9AT460O0

I know what you're referring to, Andrew.  I also know that while they voted down the specific Republican amendment (which, it can be argued, was only offered to allow private health insurance companies enough time to form a strong offensive prior to the vote to kill the process), the Democrats DID offer and implement an alternative.

The existence of the alternative is obvious, and demonstrated by the link I shared above... A link which clearly shows your assertions that they are "hiding it" from us and "not allowing us to review it to be completely nonreality based.  

So... to share a more rounded view of what actually happened, I offer the following:


http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/09/2 ... gislation/

The committee voted down an amendment by Kentucky Republican Sen. Jim Bunning to make the final legislative language available on the committee’s web site for 72 hours before members of the committee can vote on it. But it adopted a modified version of the amendment, proposed by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus of Montana, that requires the committee to post a plain-English summary with a complete Congressional Budget Office cost estimate of the bill before a vote on the legislation.

[andrewclunn]

Yes, and a "plain-English summary" is a load of BS.  But like I said, I'm reading.

[iNow]

Yes, and a "plain-English summary" is a load of BS.

You lose more credibility with me with nearly every post you make.  
It's rather interesting that you would say this, considering that's how it's been done on the Senate Finance Committee for decades by BOTH parties.

From my link above:

Republicans challenged a long-standing tradition of the influential Finance Committee, which has wide jurisdiction over trade, tax and health policy. Members of the committee â€" over the years â€" have embraced a practice of working from detailed, plain-language summaries of legislative initiatives, in part because many of the issues before the panel are dense. Those summaries are later translated into formal legislative language before any bill is brought to floor of the full Senate for debate. That has been the practice for yearsâ€"whether Democrats or Republicans controlled the panel.

[Whitney]

Ok......the bickering needs to stop.  There is no reason why adults can't discuss this issue without name calling and other insults.

[iNow]

I can appreciate that you may take issue with my tone, but I can't help but to push back a bit on your suggestion that correcting lies and standing up for truth and accuracy is a form of bickering... especially one which "needs to stop."

Andrew has in numerous posts presented falsehoods, half-truths, and comments which isolate facts in such a way as to make them no longer accurate representations of reality.  I am uncertain whether he is simply uninformed or if he's intentionally spinning things to support his preconceived notions, but I'm frankly rather surprised that I'm the only one knowledgeable and willing enough to call him out for it.


If you'd prefer to protect the jovial spirit of the site at the expense of accurate debate grounded in reality regarding real issues happening in our country right now, then mea culpa for my noncompliance.  As a general rule, I find the importance of truth and accuracy to supersede the importance of friendliness, but I also recognize that they are not mutually exclusive.  I've sharpened my rhetorical talons on these issues at other sites, and I sometimes forget the kumbaya theme here.

I want my commenters to be uncivil. There is no virtue in politeness when confronted with ignorance, dishonesty, and delusion. I want them to charge in to the heart of the issue and shred the frauds, without hesitation and without faltering over manners. These demands for a false front of civility are one of the strategies used by charlatans who want to mask their lack of substance â€" oh, yes, it would be so goddamned rude to point out that a huckster is lying to you. I am quite happy that we have a culture of being rude to frauds here.

[Whitney]

This is not debate...this is arguing....if you want to debate here that is fine but it is not okay (for anyone) to be calling each other names.  If you can't debate in a mature manner, don't try to debate here.

I don't plan on changing the forum rules just because someone doesn't like them:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1522

[McQ]

If you'd prefer to protect the jovial spirit of the site at the expense of accurate debate grounded in reality regarding real issues happening in our country right now, then mea culpa for my noncompliance.  As a general rule, I find the importance of truth and accuracy to supersede the importance of friendliness, but I also recognize that they are not mutually exclusive.  I've sharpened my rhetorical talons on these issues at other sites, and I sometimes forget the kumbaya theme here.

iNow, your statement is out of line and is the kind of straw man you seem to have such disdain for. Show me or anyone else here where we have written that we feel we need to compromise on accurate debate. Show me in the forum guidelines, rules, or in any post, that we've said truth, accuracy, honesty, or good debate must be sacrificed in order to be civil.

Just because you feel a certain way about how you want to debate does not make it the correct way. If you want your talons sharpened, feel free to do so on any number of other sites where incivility is more valued than civility.

You said yourself that you recognize truth, accuracy and friendliness are not mutually exclusive. That is correct. They are not. Your quote, however, tells a different story and it is a sentiment that is not one in which the founders of this forum believe in or follow. It effectively equates anyone who is civil with being a liar, or as PZ Meyers puts it in your quote, a charlatan. One can be civil and be truthful. Not everyone who is civil is a liar. Additionally, not everyone who is uncivil is a paragon of truth, either. Being civil or uncivil does not make one a liar or a truthful person.

This forum is not PZ Meyer's blog. Feel free to act any way you please there. In this forum, we ask for civility and truthfulness. Your derogatory, sarcastic name calling of this as "Kumbaya", is inaccurate, and not in keeping with what we strive for. You can accept that or not.

I want my commenters to be uncivil. There is no virtue in politeness when confronted with ignorance, dishonesty, and delusion. I want them to charge in to the heart of the issue and shred the frauds, without hesitation and without faltering over manners. These demands for a false front of civility are one of the strategies used by charlatans who want to mask their lack of substance â€" oh, yes, it would be so goddamned rude to point out that a huckster is lying to you. I am quite happy that we have a culture of being rude to frauds here.

[/quote]

[iNow]

This forum is not PZ Meyer's blog. Feel free to act any way you please there.

For the record, I've never once posted to his blog.  I do read it, though, and thought that quote summed up my point.

If you want your talons sharpened, feel free to do so on any number of other sites where incivility is more valued than civility.

Well... speaking of strawmen...   Either way...
Understood.  Take it easy, y'all.

[McQ]

If you want your talons sharpened, feel free to do so on any number of other sites where incivility is more valued than civility.

Well... speaking of strawmen...  

I've sharpened my rhetorical talons on these issues at other sites, and I sometimes forget the kumbaya theme here.

Straw Man? Don't think so.

[andrewclunn]

Yes, and a "plain-English summary" is a load of BS.

You lose more credibility with me with nearly every post you make.  
It's rather interesting that you would say this, considering that's how it's been done on the Senate Finance Committee for decades by BOTH parties.

From my link above:

Republicans challenged a long-standing tradition of the influential Finance Committee, which has wide jurisdiction over trade, tax and health policy. Members of the committee â€" over the years â€" have embraced a practice of working from detailed, plain-language summaries of legislative initiatives, in part because many of the issues before the panel are dense. Those summaries are later translated into formal legislative language before any bill is brought to floor of the full Senate for debate. That has been the practice for yearsâ€"whether Democrats or Republicans controlled the panel.

The fact that this is business as usual is no excuse.  The fact that the finance committee gets away with not having to hammer out the details, should worry you.  The articles you linked to paint the motion as nothing more than a Republican stalling technique.  here's an idea.  Maybe they wanted the details to be part of this bill.  Maybe because we can't meaningfully discuss this without talking about the specifics they wanted those specifics, because otherwise people can just hide behind vague generalizations.  (Of course that all assumes that you believe that the Republicans are real people who desire to have a system that works, and aren't simply evil hell spawn attempting to deceive and enslave us all.)  Either way, I have now read the pdf you linked to, so I'm as informed as I legally can be about what's in this proposal.  So if you'd like to continue this discussion, let me know.

[Ultima22689]

I haven't been keeping up with healthcare as of late but the last bill I saw, the Bacchus bill or whatever it's called. I hope that bill gets shot down and for once the republicans were right to shoot that horrible bill down. Now I would hope they can get something better up and even if the Republicans are still refusing to cooperate get a bill passed without their help that doesn't have all of the horrible things Bacchus put in there at the best of lobbyists. I don't know what the current consensus is right now as it's been a few days but I would [strike:3on8ilx2]dream[/strike:3on8ilx2] hope that Republicans and Democrats are being more reasonable with each other to get a proper healthcare bill passed. I'll probably be catching up with the news sooner or later.

[Big Mac]

now all you have to do is be alive to be taxed "for your own good."

Read more closely.  You only pay if you can afford it, and by every logical evaluation, the benefits of doing so FAR outweigh the costs.

The problem with that is the government and its bureaucracy tends to judge a lot of people of capable of paying their way. For example I do not qualify for FASFA because my mother makes 60K+ a year after working her ass off and getting a master's and getting a job as a school counselor. She does help pay for my college but I do not qualify for a dime of government aid so I have to work full time and go to school full time as well.

I cannot afford the cost of health insurance at this time. It would literally drain me of my small amount of emergency/fun money.

It's almost as if you are penalized for being responsible and actually having ambition in your life. It's total bullshit.