Harry Guerrilla

I'd like to note that I absolutely HATE AARP.

Of course no one will do anything about it, the only way to push prices down is to expose people to the actual cost of the services they are receiving.

I can already imagine the calls of "people dieing in the streets" from the lunatics in our country. That phrase should be included as an amendment to Godwin's Law.

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Democracy is also a form of worship. It is the worship of Jackals by Jackasses.- H. L. Mencken

AlbqOwl

Not quite that easy at this stage, but at least the law still requires a CBO mark up on costs. Currently the CBO not only says that the cost will likely far exceed any numbers we are being spoon fed, but that the savings will be no more than a couple of billion against a trillion plus in increased spending, and even that couple of billion in savings is unlikely.

Do you ever hear the President or Pelosi or anybody else pushing this mentioning what the CBO says? Of course not. But still you trust them.


Some of the second bailout was used for the auto industry, but it wasn't sold that way. And no, nobody does know what they did with most of that money. They don't even know what happened to most of it. But right now, our government is using that money--OUR money--to pay people $9000 to trade in an old car on a new one just so long as it is a GM or Chrysler product. Maybe you think that is a proper use of your tax money. I will be doing everything I can do to eject those in Washington who have so little understanding of the economy, who would screw over honest business enterprises that way, or who have so little concern for the taxpayer money.

(P.S. A substantial majority of Americans do not want the government to own the auto industry, the banks, or any other major industries. But it seems to own an awful lot of that right now.)

And if the economy was in so much crisis that they had to do this, why are they now saying that we can't expect any significant 'rescue' of the economy for a year or two. Of course they hope we'll forget what they initially said and promised by the next election day.

I have been listening to what the President and the experts say. You obviously have not though I think you mean well. But I think it unwise to trust any government with 17% more of the economy especially after witnessing what they are doing with that they have already seized.


The leftwing bloggers are fond of posting stuff like, well at least the President is doing something and nobody else has come up with a plan. The GOP is the party of NO. Etc. Etc. And most seem to be as trusting and willing to turn their lives over to more and more government control as you are.

But some--most of us now--are not willing to do that and don't trust government to have our best interests at heart considering how much they are lying to us to convince us that they do. It is not only necessary but critical to dig in our heels and try to stop this train wreck before it happens.

Thomas Sowell once said: "When you put out a fire, what do you replace it with?" I think most of us are attempting to put out a fire that, if left unchecked, could permanently change our glorious Republic experiment into something far less satisfactory. And we will not easily get it back.

Not everything is appropriate for government to "fix". And the more it arrogantly presumes to do so, the worse it will make things. We are witnessing that now.


You are a far more trusting soul when it comes to handing people power over your life than I am.

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"I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it." --Benjamin Franklin 1776

donsutherland1

When it comes to past health care reform efforts, Washington has made little meaningful effort to address budget neutrality, which is, in part, a function of addressing the persistence of health expenditures rising faster than economic growth. Instead of making tough, unpopular, but necessary choices, two common devices have been used to try to circumvent the costs/budget impact:

1. Savings will appear from technology or efficiency gains. In reality, such savings have been very small relative to political expectations. Of course, government is not alone in touting such savings. One sees similar statements following mergers. In a majority of cases, those savings either never materialize to the level that had been expected and, in some, don't materialize at all.

2. A board will be created to help oversee expenditures growth.

CBO has done a good job to date in addressing the budget and cost impact of the proposed health care legislation. The reality is that such legislation is not paid-for and it would not address the critical issue of rising health expenditures that has put the nation's finances on an unsustainable fiscal course.

In a hint that Congress lacks the resolve to bring about budget neutrality, the recent pay-go legislation is filled with loopholes. One such loophole would exempt increases in Medicare payments to physicians from triggering offsetting budget cuts/tax hikes to maintain budget neutrality.

On the point of the loopholes, CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf explained:

However, the proposed process has other features—a proposed temporary rule to score certain changes in spending and revenues relative to “current policy” rather than current law; a modification of the baseline’s treatment of some expiring mandatory programs; and new procedures for scoring legislation that would convert programs’ spending from discretionary to mandatory—that could lead to greater spending or reduced revenues in the coming decade than would occur under the existing House and Senate rules. In addition, some features of the bill’s proposed sequestration mechanism would limit its usefulness in deterring increases in spending.

katyang

•►`That's an interesting plan everyone, a health plan..!









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AlbqOwl

The point you make is critical to the debate. In the President's eagerness to add meaningful healthcare reform to his legacy, and in some of Congress's eagerness to insert government control into every facet of the American economy and structure, they intentionally or negligently omit many many considerations that have to be included to show the American people what they are buying. So Congress lies, and the President obfusicates in his press conferences, and we are left trying to dig out the facts as best we can.

One elephant in the room not being discussed is this:

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"I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it." --Benjamin Franklin 1776

phattonez

Good luck. People are already so stuck in their sentimentalities that they don't care to see what would actually improve things.

__________________
" Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. " - Matthew 5:44-45
"Our politicians do not purchase votes, the advocate 'social' programs. It comes to the same thing." - Frank Chodorov

celticlord

Excellent point about cap-and-trade padding health care costs. Proves yet again that government control of any industry is at best a blunt instrument that is nearly impossible to wield without doing more harm than good.