Belmont31R
12-23-09, 22:45
Its certainly interesting, at least to me, to listen to the "debate" on health care. Lots of senators giving their 10 minutes right now...next vote is tomorrow at 7AM ET.
http://www.c-span.org/Watch/C-SPAN2.aspx
Just my general thoughts on listening to a few hours of debate tonight.
1. Most of the democrat argument revolves around some sort of moral or ethical responsibility to provide health care for all people. Tonight Harry Reid even said they are "creating a right". Anyone with a basic Constitutional understanding would know the people who wrote the document believed our rights come from our creator. Humans did not give other humans rights. They do have the choice to honor and recognize those rights. But what separates our founding fathers beliefs from the likes of Harry Reid is Harry Reid believes he is the creator of rights such as health care. Truly disgusting, and to me that means he thinks himself on the same plane as our creator.
2. I wish Republicans were more heavy handed in their debate time. Some very good points about the constitutionality of some key points, some good analysis of the budgeting behind this, etc, but their approach is bland and boring. If they were IMO more people would be eager to support them. They could help get more people fired up to put pressure on their reps if they are supporting this bill.
3. Listening to the democtats arguments I do not see, at all, how this is going to lower costs. No pre-existing conditions for kids, no yearly or life time cap on benefits, some preventative care is free, regulating compensation of insurance company works, mandating a certain percentage of income be used for health care cost payouts, "children" can be on their parents plan until age 26, and quite a few other points. An insurance exchange is going to be setup where the cost for that insurance is based on your income. The poor will pay next to nothing, and the cost goes up from there. Exchange eligible people will be charged no more than 10.2% of their income for insurance.
How this comes across to me is fedgov is basically taking over our insurance companies just short of renaming them to fedgov insurance company. The sheer number of regulations they are going to have to operate under takes most control of their operations out of their hands. No longer can a business refuse service to anyone. They cannot choose how much people get paid. They cannot choose how to run their company by allocating funds. Basically they are being turned into a public servant with the fed gov there to tell them what to do. Who to provide services to, how to do it, how much to charge, et cetera. This is yet another major US industry under the heavy thumb of fedgov.
Where I dont see how its going to reduce costs is how much more services they are going to have to provide. When all these sick people with no insurance jump in the pool our costs have to go up. There is not money hidden in CEO pay to provide services to these people. The cost for them has to come from somewhere, and these companies no longer have a choice to cover them or not. Its going to start out with kids, and then all adults in a few years. This is going to add untold amount of costs to insurance companies.
THREE major ideas that dont cost tax payers any money, and which most definately would lower costs are not in this bill. TORT reform, reimportation of drugs, and insurance across state lines. None of this costs us any money in the future. Its just a change in laws, and allowing for a more free market and a return of integrity to the justice system. We are still going to be forced to work with whatever insurance companies operate within our states, drug companies win due to trade law, and doctors will continue to get sued by people looking to make a buck.
Further compensation to doctors providing services to people on government plans is being further reduced, and to make up for this people with insurance get charged more. This will add to the issues that have caused insurance costs to rise...not make anything better. It saves the government money, and that is the only benefit to this.
4. Democrats are looking at any way to reduce services. One senator wants a 75% reduction in people in nursing homes most of which are on a government plan right now. So instead of sending your folks to get cared for at a facility these benefits will be reduced so you are forced to take care of them at home.
You are also seeing things like the age for mamograms being raised. Women are going to be put at more risk due to cost cutting.
Look for lots of corners to be cut in regards to care in the name of cost savings. The above are a couple examples of this cost cutting while putting further burden and risk on the people. Our quality of care is going to have to go down.
5. Democrats do not have an answer to the quandry of no surge of doctors to treat all these newfound people with insurance. So wait times will have to go up, quality of care will go down, and prices will rise. The old economic certainty that is supply and demand. Supply remains the same yet demand rises by 30 million +-.
6. We are going to see a few years of this exchange in operation yet get taxed on it for 10 years. So what about the following 10 years? If they have to fudge numbers and play games to get it "deficit neutral" in the first 10 years how is it going to be "deficit neutral" 2020-2030 which will be 10 years of taxes and 10 years of services? The only answer is it will become a debt hog and or our taxes will have to rise dramatically.
7. Crap economy right now, and this bill is going to make things all that much harder on people and businesses. Something like 500 billion a year in new taxes. That is 500 billion a year less people will spend in the market, money for employers to hire people...its just money taken out of the free market. Also look for employer benefits to be lowered as its simply cheaper to cut medical insurance as a benefit, pay the fine, and let their employes go get cut rate insurance through fedgov. A business who looks to trim as many costs as possible will do this.
8. Last but not least just for being a human being in the USA you will be required to carry insurance that meets the fedgov standards. HSA's do not qualify. So you will enroll in the fedgov exchange, and pay whatever rate you qualify for, buy insurance on your own (which HAS to go up), have employer provided insurance if your job still offers it, and if you do not do this you will get fined. The IRS is going to be in charge of this fine collecting. If you do not pay the IRS this fine you can be charged with tax evasion, and be thrown in jail.
http://www.c-span.org/Watch/C-SPAN2.aspx
Just my general thoughts on listening to a few hours of debate tonight.
1. Most of the democrat argument revolves around some sort of moral or ethical responsibility to provide health care for all people. Tonight Harry Reid even said they are "creating a right". Anyone with a basic Constitutional understanding would know the people who wrote the document believed our rights come from our creator. Humans did not give other humans rights. They do have the choice to honor and recognize those rights. But what separates our founding fathers beliefs from the likes of Harry Reid is Harry Reid believes he is the creator of rights such as health care. Truly disgusting, and to me that means he thinks himself on the same plane as our creator.
2. I wish Republicans were more heavy handed in their debate time. Some very good points about the constitutionality of some key points, some good analysis of the budgeting behind this, etc, but their approach is bland and boring. If they were IMO more people would be eager to support them. They could help get more people fired up to put pressure on their reps if they are supporting this bill.
3. Listening to the democtats arguments I do not see, at all, how this is going to lower costs. No pre-existing conditions for kids, no yearly or life time cap on benefits, some preventative care is free, regulating compensation of insurance company works, mandating a certain percentage of income be used for health care cost payouts, "children" can be on their parents plan until age 26, and quite a few other points. An insurance exchange is going to be setup where the cost for that insurance is based on your income. The poor will pay next to nothing, and the cost goes up from there. Exchange eligible people will be charged no more than 10.2% of their income for insurance.
How this comes across to me is fedgov is basically taking over our insurance companies just short of renaming them to fedgov insurance company. The sheer number of regulations they are going to have to operate under takes most control of their operations out of their hands. No longer can a business refuse service to anyone. They cannot choose how much people get paid. They cannot choose how to run their company by allocating funds. Basically they are being turned into a public servant with the fed gov there to tell them what to do. Who to provide services to, how to do it, how much to charge, et cetera. This is yet another major US industry under the heavy thumb of fedgov.
Where I dont see how its going to reduce costs is how much more services they are going to have to provide. When all these sick people with no insurance jump in the pool our costs have to go up. There is not money hidden in CEO pay to provide services to these people. The cost for them has to come from somewhere, and these companies no longer have a choice to cover them or not. Its going to start out with kids, and then all adults in a few years. This is going to add untold amount of costs to insurance companies.
THREE major ideas that dont cost tax payers any money, and which most definately would lower costs are not in this bill. TORT reform, reimportation of drugs, and insurance across state lines. None of this costs us any money in the future. Its just a change in laws, and allowing for a more free market and a return of integrity to the justice system. We are still going to be forced to work with whatever insurance companies operate within our states, drug companies win due to trade law, and doctors will continue to get sued by people looking to make a buck.
Further compensation to doctors providing services to people on government plans is being further reduced, and to make up for this people with insurance get charged more. This will add to the issues that have caused insurance costs to rise...not make anything better. It saves the government money, and that is the only benefit to this.
4. Democrats are looking at any way to reduce services. One senator wants a 75% reduction in people in nursing homes most of which are on a government plan right now. So instead of sending your folks to get cared for at a facility these benefits will be reduced so you are forced to take care of them at home.
You are also seeing things like the age for mamograms being raised. Women are going to be put at more risk due to cost cutting.
Look for lots of corners to be cut in regards to care in the name of cost savings. The above are a couple examples of this cost cutting while putting further burden and risk on the people. Our quality of care is going to have to go down.
5. Democrats do not have an answer to the quandry of no surge of doctors to treat all these newfound people with insurance. So wait times will have to go up, quality of care will go down, and prices will rise. The old economic certainty that is supply and demand. Supply remains the same yet demand rises by 30 million +-.
6. We are going to see a few years of this exchange in operation yet get taxed on it for 10 years. So what about the following 10 years? If they have to fudge numbers and play games to get it "deficit neutral" in the first 10 years how is it going to be "deficit neutral" 2020-2030 which will be 10 years of taxes and 10 years of services? The only answer is it will become a debt hog and or our taxes will have to rise dramatically.
7. Crap economy right now, and this bill is going to make things all that much harder on people and businesses. Something like 500 billion a year in new taxes. That is 500 billion a year less people will spend in the market, money for employers to hire people...its just money taken out of the free market. Also look for employer benefits to be lowered as its simply cheaper to cut medical insurance as a benefit, pay the fine, and let their employes go get cut rate insurance through fedgov. A business who looks to trim as many costs as possible will do this.
8. Last but not least just for being a human being in the USA you will be required to carry insurance that meets the fedgov standards. HSA's do not qualify. So you will enroll in the fedgov exchange, and pay whatever rate you qualify for, buy insurance on your own (which HAS to go up), have employer provided insurance if your job still offers it, and if you do not do this you will get fined. The IRS is going to be in charge of this fine collecting. If you do not pay the IRS this fine you can be charged with tax evasion, and be thrown in jail.