Science will force us to improve health care coverage

[Silat]

Deleted/Locked.

15- Threads started or, posts made, with the intent to inflame, incite will be considered trolling and not allowed.

[Delirium]

Half truth, half politics... 1 out of 2 ain't bad.    

I'm looking forward to the projects completion, but that doesn't mean that the results have to be given to your insurance company nor the goverment (there is a scary thought).

It will require special legislation, not the abolishment of insurance as a whole or the the creation of a national health care system.

Granted, the health insurance system is faulty but mostly because of number and scope of suits and the treatments for ailments that would of been untreatable 10-20 years ago.

Besides, how do you expect to abolish Health Care companies when they have so much money to lobby with? Better yet, how do you expect the government to pay for healthcare when Social Security is in question by many already?

[ChickenHawk]

Modern medicine focuses too much on nature and not enough on nurture.

[GRUNHERZ]

Jim McDermott, wasnt he the tool Senator who cozed up with Saddam just before the war?

[BluKitty]

How often do you deal with health insureance companies?

Well everytime I do I get stonewalled....  They tend to try to claim I'm not covered or I need a referal from a non-exsistant primary care physician or something.....(I'm a cobra out-of-state student if you know what that means)  So I end up handing my problem off to the Corprate "pro's"..... Funny how I always get my bills paid once a 'professional' talks to them.  That's basicly a professional at dealing with tightfisted insureance.....tight-fisted to a point near contract breach.....I've been through this a number of times.... every time I call them myself I hope they can do something beside say 'your not covered for that', they don't...... funny how they always pay when the 'pros' call them.......funny that you need "pro's" just to talk to them.

is that broken?

Same typically goes for your doctor-I've heard .... He/She doesn't choose many of the tests to be done ....  it's often dictated by what the insurance will pay for based on some likelyhood %...... If your doc has a bad feeling about something .... wouldn't you want the test done?  If it's a MRI or something ... can you cover the cost yourself?

is that broken?

and ever seen
GATTACA
| ||| || |  ?
CTAATGT

It's not really that far fetched if you make incentives to 'screen' embryos for genetic issues...... The current insurance industry is certainly set up that way.

Outlawing, or controling non-lethal embryonic screening would be a good idea when things become cheap, and consistant enough to do it.  Fact is it's already been done for known genetic disorders such as Tay Sachs... but this is a good idea for a fatal disorder.  How long until timely, cheap screening ability moves to not so leathal things.... then to everything?  Proably in young folks lifetimes.  

I just hope the Chinease don't start engineering themselves really small until you need fish breath to survive....  never read Slapstick?
Still waiting for a low gravity day.  I think I might have had some heavy ones.... but proably just a hangover.

[eagl]

So they're saying that if a drug addict welfare case with multiple genetic "predispositions" has 10 kids, I should be obligated to pay for their health care in a universal care system, whether or not they ever contribute back to society?

I sure hope not.  TANSTAFFL, and don't expect me to pay for your lunch either.  If I want to pay (either charity or just 'cause I like you), that's one thing.  Forcing me to pay for someone else's crappy decisions (welfare druggie mom having 10 kids) is another thing entirely, and I feel zero moral obligation to assist those people living longer than "nature" intended.  If they have something to contribute, society will reward them with something we call "money", and they can pay for their own needs without needing handouts.

[BluKitty]

Originally posted by eagl
 If they have something to contribute, society will reward them with something we call "money", and they can pay for their own needs without needing handouts.

Ya that would work if the money system wasn't a joke on the poor.   It's modren aristocracy too a point....Tax breaks for the Rich

Name something the Wal-Mart kids have done for society, besides donate daddy's money?
I guess you feel no obligation to a country built largely on the backs of blacks, who still receive very little assitance(Jim Crowe laws are a pretty recent thing).....Wonder how you and your family would be doing if you were transported to say .... India with zero money, freinds, or common culture.... Would your family recover in a generation?  Two? on your own backs and sweat?....  Because we all know the US isn't racist and there are no castes in India.

You must live in the "burbs", where people who do that kind of thing really are just lazy.

[eagl]

blukitty,

You're deluded and you've bought 100% into the weak minded I'm-a-victim culture perpetuated by the jealous and lazy in the US.  For anyone but the mentally or severely physically impaired, it's a BS justification for remaining poor and in a rut.

Aside from the thousands and millions of people who founded the US, prospered, and crossed the continent without anything but what they could carry or drag with them, it's obvious to anyone not utterly blinded by jealousy and selfish laziness that it IS possible for ANYONE to get ahead in the US if they only take a little care and think before acting and making decisions.

My grandfather grew up on a dirt-poor farm, joined the navy in WWII, after WWII he went into road construction and although he didn't have a college education, by the time he retired he was a reserve navy commander (O-5) and one of the lead construction engineers in CALTRANS in the SF Bay area.  Although he started out with quite literally nothing except what the navy issues enlisted troops in time of war, at his death his estate was worth over 3.5 million dollars.

He had no sugar daddy, received no gifts during his life.  He worked hard, never made excuses for himself, never blamed anyone but himself for setbacks, paid for everything he ever got, and died a proud man with 5 grandkids and 5 great-grandkids, none of whom is receiving welfare.

There were 2 black women where I worked, both who enlisted in the USAF to get out of their ghetto homes.  They were both fairly bright/intelligent, but their lives took dramatically different courses based on their CHOICES.  One did it "right", saved her money, didn't get married until age 23, and didn't have kids until a few years later.  She drove a cheap used car and didn't even own a TV while living in the military dorms on base.  She saved a little here and a little there, and she put more than 20% down on a nice 3 bdr home she and her family can OWN.  She has no debt, and has no real monetary problems.  The other girl got married right out of tech school, had a child but gave it up for adoption because she got divorced.  She bought a new car which was repossessed due to not making payments.  She got a new TV.  She has more than $15,000 in credit card debt, her paycheck has mandatory allotments taken out to pay down debt, and she rents a crappy little apartment.

They both do their jobs with equal skill, yet somehow the one with no dependents or other obligations is deep in debt while the one who is married with a child (her hubby is also enlisted) is doing extremely well.  The difference is how they approach life.  The in-debt one thinks the world owes her something and she has a chip on her shoulder.  It's always someone else's fault when she gets in trouble and she feels no need to be accountable for her decisions because either "the man" is keeping her down or "those greedy rich bastards" have somehow put her in the situation she finds herself in.  You can already see how the other one behaves in a much more responsible fashion, and she's reaped the rewards just like all the other rich greedy bastards.

Flash over to a black doctor I know...  He started low-middle class, busted his butt in school while everyone else was doing drugs, and scored a scholarship to college.  Busted his butt again in a real degree program instead of some BS multi-cultural whinefest major, and got a scholarship to med school, partially paid for by a govt grant.  Yea, the man sure as hell kept him down...  Or maybe the govt kept his peers down by forcing them to do pot and crack instead of studying?  This black doc must be worth a few mil by now and he's only in his mid 40s.  By your racist view of the world, I guess that makes him a traitor to his race in addition to being a rich greedy bastard?

I have more examples of personal friends who've dragged themselves up out of bad situations...  The girlfriend who's situation growing up could be described best as "poor white trash" in southern california, but she decided to speak and dress nicely so after high school she landed a nice retail job selling jewelry.  Had she kept it up instead of getting married, there is no way she would have remained in the trailer park, held down by the rich bastards.

But way to go trying out the race card.  *golf clap*

[BluKitty]

joined the navy in WWII

ya .. because the armed services weren't racist in this era... and Jim Crowe laws didn't exsist......

My grandfather was born in 1907, he's about to turn 100 ,  Don't you think there is still a few people around affected by such things that might need health care?  Many are not in a stage in thier life where work is an option.  But I guess you just think they are liveing past thier 'natural' life span .. whatever that means.
____________________

I asked you how long would it take for your family in India.... Well in the US it took a generation in a soceity where war veterans were prefered, let alone whites-all of this in one of the most properous times in history.  My grandfater gradurated college in 1929..... not so prosporous a time.... but like you, my family is not on welfare-and all educated(that side).  But we are white, and have a long tradition of middleclass life..... With the caste sysem in India.... would your family do so well there? Would mine?  Would a black family do so well after 'share'-cropping and Jim Crowe.  I mean there's noone still alive from that era (I'm being sarcastic agin).  So for many more it's only 1 -2 generations from that.....in a country that certainly still has racist undertones.  Let alone the other typical outgroups Americans pick.

So don't we owe something to all poor alike?  Doesn't your money and education make money and education for the next generation?  It does with most families I know.  And if you consider it work ethic... isn't that education?

I know pleanty of poor Black people, or poor immagrant Latino's,  etc that have done great in the US.... that doesn't change history or where we are currently.  That doesn't change the life some people are born into.  There are homeless families in this small U.S. town... I guess it's the kids fault for haveing 'lazy' parents.

It's not a fair world, it's getting better than it used to be.

Free Health service, but no choice of who your doctor is, would be my solution. If you want a 'good' doctor, you can have private insureance or pay for it yourself.......it sounds like the best of both worlds to me.... You can offer doc's, and basic med students money for education-then have them work as a free doctor- for a term based on the student loan amount.  We need more doctors anyway.... so money to educate them is needed.

Why are there so many 'pork' projects that folks don't get up and fight aginst, but for health care you do?  I don't notice many pork projects getting talked about on these boards.
The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer..... meanwhile tax cuts for the rich??!?  Subsideies for the rich?  Corprate tax breaks?.... Meanwhile you have homestead tax. I just don't understand why you can't write that off as a work expense.... you need a place to sleep.... right?

[Yeager]

McDermott is a certified whack job who makes cindy sheehan look like an neo con.

[Nash]

Originally posted by eagl
blukitty,

You're deluded and you've bought 100% into the weak minded I'm-a-victim culture perpetuated by the jealous and lazy in the US.  For anyone but the mentally or severely physically impaired, it's a BS justification for remaining poor and in a rut.

No, instead, you've bought into the myth that is "I'm okay, so why the hell aren't you?"

Guess what? Society isn't made up of super-human clones. It is made up of both the strong and the weak. People, being what they are, are made up of bones and blood, being offered the best and the worst their parents happened to bring them into this world with - be it mighty genes or autism, be it a loving home or an abusive one, be it a high school education or an Ivy League one or none at all.

When kids get squeezed out into this world, it's a hell of a crap shoot. Hell, most of 'em don't even find themselves taking their first breath as Americans. Some of them? They pop out, and the first thing they see is a Horsewood tree and think to themselves "Sweet damn! Africa! I am so screwed."

The ones so fortunate as to be able to breath some bona fide Freedom Air? Whew! Yet they aint outta the woods yet... Because while some may breath a temporary sigh of relief, so many others' breaths are cut short when taking stock of their situation in light of your words, which, if you had anything to do with it (and you do) manifest themselves into policy:

"So they're saying that if a drug addict welfare case with multiple genetic "predispositions" has 10 kids, I should be obligated to pay for their health care in a universal care system, whether or not they ever contribute back to society?" - Eagl

That sucks. Pure and simple.

So you acknowledge that these 10 kids born of one drug addict mother are screwed. I know that. You know that. They are in some kind of 100 meter life dash, but when the gun fires, they're starting from 2 counties away.

And I know that, and you know that.

So tell me... Where do these 10 kids fit into your grand idea of what a society should be? Some perfect civilization where there is no weakness, where there is no disadvantage, where every man oughta be able to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and turn a pig farm into a corporation.

Please. Don't give me your creds based on the hard work your Grandpa had to do. Was your grandpa born to a crack addict? No - so how does this comparisons make sense?

And isn't it peculiar? This immigration argument you hear all the time. It goes like this: "My grandpa came over on a boat, worked his arse off, raised my dad who scraped together a few dollars that put me through school enabling me to say: "screw the immigrants!"

It's like some kind of twisted circle jerk, the money-shot being: "My poor grandpa worked hard, so screw the poor."

Me? I'm kinda thinking that the poor, the weak, and every person who falls into any derogatory category that you can come up with are not an exception, but are the rule. They are a staple of society. They have been around for as long as we have been around, and are never going to go away. The Greeks and Romans had beggars. They just are not going to go away.

They are always going to be here as long as we don't have the magical drugs to root out weakness and abuse and disease. So it seems to me that for guys like you so offended by it, you have two choices:

1) Be a dick about it, or..

2) Advocate for their banishment.

Is it just me, or why do I have the sneaking suspicion that a whole whack of church-goers see nothing whatsover wrong about that?

Oh what a world we live in.

Me? I acknowledge what is basically a sad statistical reality, and offer help and compassion, accepting that this has always been with us, is with us now, and probably will always be.

Stop judging, start accepting, and most of all, show some compassion a little once in a while. You won't win many arguments here, but you're gonna feel a little better about things, I'm certain.