• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

House Bill Defunds Health Care

There's nothng for the GOP to be ashamed of. They did what they said, they FINALLY SHOWED A SPINE. This is what the People have been asking for. This is what will fire up the base, this is the will of the People. All polls show no one wants this.

RealClearPolitics - Election Other - Public Approval of Health Care Law

Nice try. People are too ill-informed and misinformed to know anything about Obamacare. By this time next year, after people actually live under the full law, we'll see how they feel.
 
Nice try. People are too ill-informed and misinformed to know anything about Obamacare. By this time next year, after people actually live under the full law, we'll see how they feel.

There is no trying here, what try? I posted a slew of polls that showed the majority doesn't want this. All you're saying is that Big Brother knows what's good for Americans even if they don't. That's a very dangerous presumption to make.
 
There is no trying here, what try? I posted a slew of polls that showed the majority doesn't want this. All you're saying is that Big Brother knows what's good for Americans even if they don't. That's a very dangerous presumption to make.

This line of reasoning is so backwards. People have been asking for healthcare reform for decades! They were asking for it up to and during the drafting of Obamacare. Once it was passed a bunch of panicky idiots started crying "death panel" and "socialism" and gave enough people pause, until actual experience will set them straight.

It is the conservative ideologues that rule the Republican party that think they know better than Americans what's good for them. Their answer is freedom, freedom, all the time freedom, hammered home so incessantly that the word becomes devoid of meeting. Freedom, in this case, of course, means the freedom from having the government help you get health care when the free market denies it to you. At what point does the abstract concept of unfettered freedom become inferior to the very real security and piece of mind of healthcare?

Republicans are the ones who believe that more freedom and more uncertainty are better for Americans than more security.
 
This line of reasoning is so backwards. People have been asking for healthcare reform for decades! They were asking for it up to and during the drafting of Obamacare. Once it was passed a bunch of panicky idiots started crying "death panel" and "socialism" and gave enough people pause, until actual experience will set them straight.

No it isn't. People have wanted HCR for decades, but not just any old, see look what we gave you, you're gonna love it after ya hate it BS that comes along. I keep repeating myself on this but to give you the benefit of the doubt of not having seen -- I am a supporter of UHC. I prefer the Nordic Way as something we should have modeled ours on. The Nordic Model though has a different outlook. The Nords said at the start we are going to give each and everyone of our citizens the very best possible HC we can. That's not what this is. This is us saying everyone should put money in the kitty and pay insurance companies billions to allow any Tom, Dick, or Barry to get treated like welfare patients anytime they need it. We didn't follow the Nordic Model we have a train wreck, just to say we have reform no matter what it costs us.

It is the conservative ideologues that rule the Republican party that think they know better than Americans what's good for them. Their answer is freedom, freedom, all the time freedom, hammered home so incessantly that the word becomes devoid of meeting. Freedom, in this case, of course, means the freedom from having the government help you get health care when the free market denies it to you. At what point does the abstract concept of unfettered freedom become inferior to the very real security and piece of mind of healthcare?

Republicans are the ones who believe that more freedom and more uncertainty are better for Americans than more security.

The Establishment is neither conservative nor ideologues, and they run the GOP. Don't let Mother Jones, Adbusters, MSNBC, or Salon send you astray. Freedom shoud never become inferior to security. Never. And freedom isn't an abstract concept being free to no have money taken out of your check one way or the other and be forced to purchase something is very tangible.
 
No it isn't. People have wanted HCR for decades, but not just any old, see look what we gave you, you're gonna love it after ya hate it BS that comes along. I keep repeating myself on this but to give you the benefit of the doubt of not having seen -- I am a supporter of UHC. I prefer the Nordic Way as something we should have modeled ours on. The Nordic Model though has a different outlook. The Nords said at the start we are going to give each and everyone of our citizens the very best possible HC we can. That's not what this is. This is us saying everyone should put money in the kitty and pay insurance companies billions to allow any Tom, Dick, or Barry to get treated like welfare patients anytime they need it. We didn't follow the Nordic Model we have a train wreck, just to say we have reform no matter what it costs us.



The Establishment is neither conservative nor ideologues, and they run the GOP. Don't let Mother Jones, Adbusters, MSNBC, or Salon send you astray. Freedom shoud never become inferior to security. Never. And freedom isn't an abstract concept being free to no have money taken out of your check one way or the other and be forced to purchase something is very tangible.

Nordic model - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Nordic model is distinguished from other types of welfare states by its emphasis on maximizing labor force participation, promoting gender equality, egalitarian and extensive benefit levels, the large magnitude of wealth redistribution, and liberal use of expansionary fiscal policy.


Universal Health Care sounds great to me, but from that description I doubt it would satisfy your idea of freedom. If you hate the idea of a 1% tax penalty for opting out of ACA, what do you think you will pay for true UHC?

We both know that health care has been dismal, and that any reform to it would be met by fierce opposition given that, as has been pointed out, the industry represents 17% of our economy. Any solution that could realistically have succeeded had a necessity to maneuver around the myriad obstacles in its path. That's why the law is 2000 pages long and not 20.

I'm a liberal, but I'm a pragmatist first and foremost. I much prefer a moderate plan that succeeds to the ideal plan that never sees the light of day.
 
Universal Health Care sounds great to me, but from that description I doubt it would satisfy your idea of freedom. If you hate the idea of a 1% tax penalty for opting out of ACA, what do you think you will pay for true UHC?

We both know that health care has been dismal, and that any reform to it would be met by fierce opposition given that, as has been pointed out, the industry represents 17% of our economy. Any solution that could realistically have succeeded had a necessity to maneuver around the myriad obstacles in its path. That's why the law is 2000 pages long and not 20.

I'm a liberal, but I'm a pragmatist first and foremost. I much prefer a moderate plan that succeeds to the ideal plan that never sees the light of day.


I think you confuse my resistance against who I'm paying with having to pay at all. I have insurance. I get it through my wife now but there was a time not too long ago I was paying 100% out of pocket for it. So I'm not sitting here like some Randian school boy talking out his Atlas...

I don't see a law chocked full of loopholes, exemptions, kickbacks, twists, turns, bobs and weaves as being a pragmatic solution. And last I checked we elect our government, we can make them set up any type of HCR we want...
 
This line of reasoning is so backwards. People have been asking for healthcare reform for decades! They were asking for it up to and during the drafting of Obamacare. Once it was passed a bunch of panicky idiots started crying "death panel" and "socialism" and gave enough people pause, until actual experience will set them straight.

It is the conservative ideologues that rule the Republican party that think they know better than Americans what's good for them. Their answer is freedom, freedom, all the time freedom, hammered home so incessantly that the word becomes devoid of meeting. Freedom, in this case, of course, means the freedom from having the government help you get health care when the free market denies it to you. At what point does the abstract concept of unfettered freedom become inferior to the very real security and piece of mind of healthcare?

Republicans are the ones who believe that more freedom and more uncertainty are better for Americans than more security.

Ben Franklin
"People willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both."


"In a state of tranquillity, wealth, and luxury, our descendants would forget the arts of war* and the noble activity and zeal which made their ancestors invincible. Every art of corruption would be employed to loosen the bond of union which renders our resistance formidable. When the spirit of liberty, which now animates our hearts and gives success to our arms*, is extinct, our numbers will accelerate our ruin and render us easier victims to tyranny. If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude than the animating contest of freedom—go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"

Sam Adams
 
This line of reasoning is so backwards. People have been asking for healthcare reform for decades! They were asking for it up to and during the drafting of Obamacare. Once it was passed a bunch of panicky idiots started crying "death panel" and "socialism" and gave enough people pause, until actual experience will set them straight.

It is the conservative ideologues that rule the Republican party that think they know better than Americans what's good for them. Their answer is freedom, freedom, all the time freedom, hammered home so incessantly that the word becomes devoid of meeting. Freedom, in this case, of course, means the freedom from having the government help you get health care when the free market denies it to you. At what point does the abstract concept of unfettered freedom become inferior to the very real security and piece of mind of healthcare?

Republicans are the ones who believe that more freedom and more uncertainty are better for Americans than more security.

So Right. They want freedom alright. The want to free women from making choices about their own bodies, free minorities from the bother of voting, and of course free the poor from the ability to get health insurance. It's like Animal Farm.
They complain that hiring is being slowed by "uncertainty" and then their leaders follow a path that provides uncertainty after uncertainty in the form of short term CR's and pointless debt ceiling posturing. How stupid do they think the American people are?
 

The Nordic model is distinguished from other types of welfare states by its emphasis on maximizing labor force participation, promoting gender equality, egalitarian and extensive benefit levels, the large magnitude of wealth redistribution, and liberal use of expansionary fiscal policy.


Universal Health Care sounds great to me, but from that description I doubt it would satisfy your idea of freedom. If you hate the idea of a 1% tax penalty for opting out of ACA, what do you think you will pay for true UHC?

We both know that health care has been dismal, and that any reform to it would be met by fierce opposition given that, as has been pointed out, the industry represents 17% of our economy. Any solution that could realistically have succeeded had a necessity to maneuver around the myriad obstacles in its path. That's why the law is 2000 pages long and not 20.

I'm a liberal, but I'm a pragmatist first and foremost. I much prefer a moderate plan that succeeds to the ideal plan that never sees the light of day.


The Dutch government has all but declared the Nordic model to be unsustainable. So judging by the path of the current US administration that means they're really going to start the heavy push now to implement it and use The Netherlands as their model.

I mean, we lauded the Spanish energy policy while it was in the process of melting down, and the Massachusetts health insurance reform as it was eating the state budget alive, and pressured Chrysler into selling to Fiat when Fiat couldn't even sell cars in Italy. So sure, why not push for a welfare state that is in the process of unwinding...
 
Ben Franklin
"People willing to trade their freedom for temporary security deserve neither and will lose both."


"In a state of tranquillity, wealth, and luxury, our descendants would forget the arts of war* and the noble activity and zeal which made their ancestors invincible. Every art of corruption would be employed to loosen the bond of union which renders our resistance formidable. When the spirit of liberty, which now animates our hearts and gives success to our arms*, is extinct, our numbers will accelerate our ruin and render us easier victims to tyranny. If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude than the animating contest of freedom—go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"

Sam Adams

Fish and house guests both stink after three days.
-Ben Franklin

So deep!
 
I think you confuse my resistance against who I'm paying with having to pay at all. I have insurance. I get it through my wife now but there was a time not too long ago I was paying 100% out of pocket for it. So I'm not sitting here like some Randian school boy talking out his Atlas...

I don't see a law chocked full of loopholes, exemptions, kickbacks, twists, turns, bobs and weaves as being a pragmatic solution. And last I checked we elect our government, we can make them set up any type of HCR we want...

Excellent. Let's make them set up one that isn't chocked full of loopholes, exemptions, kickbacks, twists, turns, bobs and weaves.

Meanwhile, let's not go back to the pre Obamacare system. That one just doesn't work.
 

Let me start by reiterating my appreciation for your intelligent response in that you supported your position. This is unlike some other yahoo on this board who simply chose to call me ignorant to the claim that the Heritage Foundation had nothing to do with the individual mandate. Of course, he chose not to even attempt to back up his claim. Like far too many DP posters, he simply chose to substitute insults, anger and arrogance for competent evidential matter proving only that he is a weak debater. You did not. Thank you.

Though I doubt you will agree with my conclusions, hopefully you can respect what I have to say as an intelligent response.

Given the audience of this Friend of the Court Brief, I assume (I think rightfully) this is the Heritage Foundation's best argument in distancing itself from the notion that it endorsed the individual mandate. As I suspected, however, their argument is nuanced. As I did not expect, their argument was remarkably weak.

As to the nuance, pages 8 and 9 of their Brief says that unlike the PPACA, they only supported the mandate for catastrophic coverage and only to the extent there were tax credits. Sorry, but this is an argument of form, not substance. I am not sure what the substantive distinction is between forcing someone to buy catastrophic coverage vs. broadening that to essential coverage (with the argument about what is essential); nor to I find substantive distinction between tax credits vs. other tax benefits afforded participants in the PPACA.

As to how weak the argument is, they never deny that the mandate was their idea. In fact, The Heritage Foundation admits it. Instead, they are forced to diminish its significance by trivializing it. Instead offering of litany of papers, speeches or other documents that refute the original idea since 1989, they instead fall on saying that the idea of a mandate was derived from an individual speech by, what they almost imply as a low level staffer and ,by the way, taken out of context and occurred 21 years ago. Their whole argument is to downplay the introduction of the mandate. In that, they admit it. They can not deny the fact, so they are forced to deny its significance. Then, when telling us they have long-since changed their position, their argument here is also very weak. It seems the earliest cite for this change of way was 2006, some 17 years after it was introduced. Contrary to what many would have you believe, there is NO evidence that they retracted their position for 17 years. Curiously, the first evidence for their backpeddling was in 2006, curiously, is the year it was actually implemented in Massachusetts.

Meanwhile, during the time the Heritage Foundation did not deny the mandate, the Republicans chose to embrace it. In 1993, Senators Hatch and Chafee introduced legislation to reform the healthcare industry the individual mandate as its central tenant.

Hatch supported individual health mandate until Obama did
Understanding health care reform: The individual mandate | ksl.com
Summary Of A 1993 Republican Health Reform Plan - Kaiser Health News

Then, of course, in 2006, Massachusetts, under the leadership of then Republican governor Mitt Romney, actually implemented a healthcare reform with the mandate as its core.

All in, this Friend of the Court brief is extremely weak. It does a better job of affirming my original assertion than it does to deny it. To recap, the Heritage Foundation admits it was behind the idea, and is asking for forgiveness of its sin having become enlightened 17 years later (and 13 years after it was a centerpiece of Republican led legislation). The first evidence within their brief that they challenged the constitutionality of it was in 2009, curiously as the PPACA was in its final stages of legislative approval.

Again, it safe to assume this is the Heritage Foundation's best argument to say it had nothing to do with the current PPACA. Given the dates that the Heritage Foundation cites in its cross references, the Brief is remarkably transparent. Collectively, the document is so weak that it better serves to affirm that they were, in fact, a part of the PPACA family tree.

Again, thank you. Next time someone tells me (the other guy) how it is widely known the the Heritage Foundation dismissed its own creation of the mandate as unworkable, I have good evidence that was not so, and that they are simply changes colors like the rest of the Conservative chameleons.

If the PPACA is a crime, the Republicans fingerprints all over it make them at least an accessory.
 
Last edited:
There's a downside to those Medicare Advantage Plans. It's very confusing and sometimes it's difficult for the healthcare providers to get paid because of all the plans they have to keep track of.

Yes, doctors having to deal with multiple health insurance companies can be very confusing and difficult. We appreciate your excellent argument in favor of single payor.
 
Yes, doctors having to deal with multiple health insurance companies can be very confusing and difficult. We appreciate your excellent argument in favor of single payor.
Or even better the free market with no government involvement whatsoever.
 
Or even better the free market with no government involvement whatsoever.
hells yeah do it

do it today!!!!
Imagine if you just went and paid for stuff at the doctor yanno like at the grocery store?
 
Let me start by reiterating my appreciation for your intelligent response in that you supported your position. This is unlike some other yahoo on this board who simply chose to call me ignorant to the claim that the Heritage Foundation had nothing to do with the individual mandate. Of course, he chose not to even attempt to back up his claim. Like far too many DP posters, he simply chose to substitute insults, anger and arrogance for competent evidential matter proving only that he is a weak debater. You did not. Thank you.

Though I doubt you will agree with my conclusions, hopefully you can respect what I have to say as an intelligent response.

Given the audience of this Friend of the Court Brief, I assume (I think rightfully) this is the Heritage Foundation's best argument in distancing itself from the notion that it endorsed the individual mandate. As I suspected, however, their argument is nuanced. As I did not expect, their argument was remarkably weak.

As to the nuance, pages 8 and 9 of their Brief says that unlike the PPACA, they only supported the mandate for catastrophic coverage and only to the extent there were tax credits. Sorry, but this is an argument of form, not substance. I am not sure what the substantive distinction is between forcing someone to buy catastrophic coverage vs. broadening that to essential coverage (with the argument about what is essential); nor to I find substantive distinction between tax credits vs. other tax benefits afforded participants in the PPACA.

As to how weak the argument is, they never deny that the mandate was their idea. In fact, The Heritage Foundation admits it. Instead, they are forced to diminish its significance by trivializing it. Instead offering of litany of papers, speeches or other documents that refute the original idea since 1989, they instead fall on saying that the idea of a mandate was derived from an individual speech by, what they almost imply as a low level staffer and ,by the way, taken out of context and occurred 21 years ago. Their whole argument is to downplay the introduction of the mandate. In that, they admit it. They can not deny the fact, so they are forced to deny its significance. Then, when telling us they have long-since changed their position, their argument here is also very weak. It seems the earliest cite for this change of way was 2006, some 17 years after it was introduced. Contrary to what many would have you believe, there is NO evidence that they retracted their position for 17 years. Curiously, the first evidence for their backpeddling was in 2006, curiously, is the year it was actually implemented in Massachusetts.

Meanwhile, during the time the Heritage Foundation did not deny the mandate, the Republicans chose to embrace it. In 1993, Senators Hatch and Chafee introduced legislation to reform the healthcare industry the individual mandate as its central tenant.

Hatch supported individual health mandate until Obama did
Understanding health care reform: The individual mandate | ksl.com
Summary Of A 1993 Republican Health Reform Plan - Kaiser Health News

Then, of course, in 2006, Massachusetts, under the leadership of then Republican governor Mitt Romney, actually implemented a healthcare reform with the mandate as its core.

All in, this Friend of the Court brief is extremely weak. It does a better job of affirming my original assertion than it does to deny it. To recap, the Heritage Foundation admits it was behind the idea, and is asking for forgiveness of its sin having become enlightened 17 years later (and 13 years after it was a centerpiece of Republican led legislation). The first evidence within their brief that they challenged the constitutionality of it was in 2009, curiously as the PPACA was in its final stages of legislative approval.

Again, it safe to assume this is the Heritage Foundation's best argument to say it had nothing to do with the current PPACA. Given the dates that the Heritage Foundation cites in its cross references, the Brief is remarkably transparent. Collectively, the document is so weak that it better serves to affirm that they were, in fact, a part of the PPACA family tree.

Again, thank you. Next time someone tells me (the other guy) how it is widely known the the Heritage Foundation dismissed its own creation of the mandate as unworkable, I have good evidence that was not so, and that they are simply changes colors like the rest of the Conservative chameleons.

If the PPACA is a crime, the Republicans fingerprints all over it make them at least an accessory.

Whatever.
 
Back
Top Bottom