Medicare is a good alternative to nothing for a thing that everybody needs. The postal service is a good alternative to nothing for something of debatable neccessity.




What a preposterous argument, if that were true, no government program would ever change, get replaced, or be abolished. This happens all the time. What people tend to forget is that it's rare because there usually isn't public DEMAND to a great enough extend to warrent it.

And its a vicious cycle with no beginning or end. People with your perspective assume the system is immutable and thus do nothing to actually try and organize meaningful change, treating your government as though its totally out of your hands. Then, shocking gasp, the government is run as though it's totally out of your hands, and this creates the kind of apathy that feeds into that perspective. Chicken. Egg. Chicken. Egg. Chicken...


I don't need the gravy train... I work in the field and my insurance is actually great. If everyone could pay what I pay for health care and get the same coverage, I would have no complaints.

But I think to some extent, at least, control in healthcare is more false than people realize. How many people do you know who come in to see a doctor, judge them incompetant, and choose to see another one? I'm not saying it never happens, but even you must admit that it's pretty damned rare.

The idea that we're paying out of our asses for decent care, or settling for horrible care, all in the name of choosing between caregivers we are either physically incapable of choosing because we've collapsed at our desks, or proffesionally incapable of making an informed decision about because we lack the education needed is reprehensible.

At the end of the day, my arguments on this are largely moral. I would rather pay into a system, even if it meant a much higher tax rate, that actually covered everyone. I'd sleep better at night knowing that just because I'm getting good care woudln't mean that there were five other people who couldn't have it, which is how things are now. Besides, I'm healthy... it' stupid to be in a system where a healthy person who doesn't make much use of the health care he has can't share it.

That's not entirely true, I've lived in a socialized system for a year, Japan's, and while i had some issues with how they do medicine in a more general sense over there (making people swallow the yucky powders inside the pills instead of just putting into pills themselves, don't ask me why) I didn't feel like the care was insufficient.

Also I payed a lot less for it then I could for insurance here, even though I was paying something like two or three times the usual rate for care over there.

What people here don't seem to get is that if EVERYONE pays into a system, it actually gets way cheaper then if the system is only put onto the backs of a few of us and our employers.


You know this is an interesting postulate. I'm going to do a little research when I have time later today and see what I can come up with comparing those numbers, as well as the numbers of pregnant women using drugs and alcohal in the other countries.

Just out of curiosity, if our rate of pre-natal substance abuse is higher, why do you think that is? I don't have a good answer, I'm just wondering.

Well yeah, I don't want communism, I just think that there are some areas where we could be using our government as a tool instead of bitching about it as some unstoppable force in our lives.

And individual responsibility stops at the door of disease, plain and simple. No one chooses to get sick. The idea that we apply the rules of free-market capitalism to ANY area of society where the laws of supply and demand fall apart is the acme of foolishness.