If Trumpcare turns out to be garbage...

Greenbeard said:

If you want proof of that, you can just look at what happened to any of the states that in the early '90s tried what the GOP is now proposing: Kentucky, New Hampshire, Maine, New York. Their markets entered death spirals.

As would all markets under the legislation you're talking about.




There's a reason the GOP sent that bill to Obama's desk but not Trump's. No one in their right mind would pass it if they thought someone would actually sign it into law.

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Actually the bill was passed in Jan. 2016.

It denounced the law’s expansion of Medicaid as one of the most egregious parts of ObamaCare.”
Medicaid, the government insurance program for the poor, is traditionally for the “aged, blind and the disabled” and that ObamaCare wrongly expanded it to people who are “working age” and “able-bodied.”
The bill scrapped some of Obamacare's central elements, including the expansion of Medicaid and the federal subsidies. But then and still now it is a reconciliation bill that can not completely repeal the entire thing.

While you bring up the lack of coverage for millions. May I remind you there are states now where they can no longer get Obamacare coverage because they have no providers and 30% of states only have one insurance provider to choose from. Their premiums have skyrocketed. And what good is having insurance if you can't afford the premiums? The deductibles in Obamacare have greatly increased and people were not getting treatment because they couldn't afford the deductible.

The whole thing has become a steamy pile of fail.

The 2016 bill also got rid of the mandates for individuals to have health insurance and or employers to provide it, as well as repeals a range of taxes, such as those on medical devices and high-cost health insurance plans. *

The bill being worked on now has pretty much the same things in it. The sticking point is on those who want to keep the Medicaid expansion. Until they reconcile that one it will not pass in the Senate.

vesper said:

It denounced the law’s expansion of Medicaid as one of the most egregious parts of ObamaCare.” *

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The 2016 bill also got rid of the mandates for individuals to have health insurance and or employers to provide it, as well as repeals a range of taxes, such as those on medical devices and high-cost health insurance plans.

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No kidding! That's why their bill would've raised premiums so dramatically, while driving more insurers out of the market and stripping tens of millions of coverage.

Exactly the reasons they haven't resurrected it and sent it to a president who might just be dumb enough to sign it.

Perotista said:

Have we, the collective we, lost our sense of being self reliant? Taking care of ourselves personally? Have we become totally reliant on government to take care us? I suppose so. Having grown up in the 1950's I have seen where government has replaced family, charities, neighbors, churches, and on and on when it comes to helping others and caring for others. Instead of helping one's neighbor or community with one's own time, energy, money etc. we now send them down to the nearest government office.

I suppose you're right.

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I don't like saying so, but I believe we have.

I believe we have grown too soft in many ways, not just government dependence. For example, how many people growing up today even knows how to sew a button? It's easier to just go buy a new shirt.

I can sew a button, and have before, albeit not in over 10 years. I'm not super good at it, but can do so in a pinch.

Russell797 said:

In modern everyday culture it is impossible to be self reliant. We all depend immensely on others for our very existence. From our water, food, jobs, medicine, schooling, car repair, plumbing, electric and just about everything else we depend on the collective knowledge of the society we live in for our standard of living. The days are long gone when all one had to worry about was if it were going to rain tomorrow. Modern life is far, far to complicated for any one person to grasp. You don't even know 1% of what is required to support modern life even if you are the smartest person on Earth.

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100% self-reliant is pretty difficult anymore, and I don't think most people mean or imply that extreme. We have, however, become too reliant and lazy in many ways, and governments feeds into that for it's own benefit.

radcen said:

I don't like saying so, but I believe we have.

I believe we have grown too soft in many ways, not just government dependence. For example, how many people growing up today even knows how to sew a button? It's easier to just go buy a new shirt.

I can sew a button, and have before, albeit not in over 10 years. I'm not super good at it, but can do so in a pinch.

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Being as old as I am, I can remember what they call or called darning socks, sewing up rips in blue jeans etc. Planting a garden and growing our food, hunting, fishing, working on my families car, truck and tractor. Painting barns and the house, fixing the roof. Although my dad did the plumbing into the house from our well. Stuff like that.

Retired now, but I built my own screen in patio, keep a 30 year old craftman's riding lawnmower running along with a couple of other 20 plus year push mowers. A bunch of stuff like that. If I had to go into the mountains alone, I could survive nicely. At least for awhile. But going to the grocery is a lot easier than messing with a garden these days unless one does so for fun. I still hunt and fish, I would say at least half of all our meat is provided that way. Although with all this EPA junk on cars, I do take my vehicles into the shop nowadays. Easier, not enough room to even get my hands down where they need to go to fix anything these days.

Now I was born and raised on a farm, pretty independent then and still am for the most part. But I can see where city folk probably need all that government assistance or have the need to rely pretty much on everyone else.

Russell797 said:

In modern everyday culture it is impossible to be self reliant. We all depend immensely on others for our very existence. From our water, food, jobs, medicine, schooling, car repair, plumbing, electric and just about everything else we depend on the collective knowledge of the society we live in for our standard of living. The days are long gone when all one had to worry about was if it were going to rain tomorrow. Modern life is far, far to complicated for any one person to grasp. You don't even know 1% of what is required to support modern life even if you are the smartest person on Earth.

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I wouldn't say impossible. I still am pretty much self-reliant. But I am an old foggie who been doing a lot of what you stated myself for quite a long time. Now schooling, I went to an old country school and my kids, grandkids and great grandkids are now going to public schools. But you're correct, not even I am totally self-reliant. I also think most people today don't learn a bit of everything that it takes to be self-reliant either. Especially city folk. Too easy to rely on someone else.

I see that in my kids and grand kids. Society has changed. Yeah, going to the grocery store is a lot easier than having one's own garden, canning tomatoes, corn, beans etc., putting potatoes in the celler, hunting and fishing for a lot of your meat, stuff like that. I bet most folks don't even know how to can or even what canning is.

Perotista said:

I wouldn't say impossible. I still am pretty much self-reliant. But I am an old foggie who been doing a lot of what you stated myself for quite a long time. Now schooling, I went to an old country school and my kids, grandkids and great grandkids are now going to public schools. But you're correct, not even I am totally self-reliant. I also think most people today don't learn a bit of everything that it takes to be self-reliant either. Especially city folk. Too easy to rely on someone else.

I see that in my kids and grand kids. Society has changed. Yeah, going to the grocery store is a lot easier than having one's own garden, canning tomatoes, corn, beans etc., putting potatoes in the celler, hunting and fishing for a lot of your meat, stuff like that. I bet most folks don't even know how to can or even what canning is.

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Sure, things have changed an awful lot in just several decades. In just a very few centuries we have gone from a largely agrarian society to a highly industrialized one. Population has grown exponentially. It's not the same world as it was 20 years ago, let alone 50 or 100 or 300 years. Everything has grown and grown immensely. More and more people fall behind the curve in terms of real numbers. That population growth places increasing stress on all systems, including those of government and particularly government assistance programs. Growth always comes at a cost to someone or some thing.

Now, it is still possible to live the life of a hermit or a vagrant living under a bridge, but my comment was intended to refer to a modern traditional life style. We all need tremendous support, some more than others for it to be sustainable.

Perotista said:

Being as old as I am, I can remember what they call or called darning socks, sewing up rips in blue jeans etc. Planting a garden and growing our food, hunting, fishing, working on my families car, truck and tractor. Painting barns and the house, fixing the roof. Although my dad did the plumbing into the house from our well. Stuff like that.

Retired now, but I built my own screen in patio, keep a 30 year old craftman's riding lawnmower running along with a couple of other 20 plus year push mowers. A bunch of stuff like that. If I had to go into the mountains alone, I could survive nicely. At least for awhile. But going to the grocery is a lot easier than messing with a garden these days unless one does so for fun. I still hunt and fish, I would say at least half of all our meat is provided that way. Although with all this EPA junk on cars, I do take my vehicles into the shop nowadays. Easier, not enough room to even get my hands down where they need to go to fix anything these days.

Now I was born and raised on a farm, pretty independent then and still am for the most part. But I can see where city folk probably need all that government assistance or have the need to rely pretty much on everyone else.

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Great post.

Saw this earlier on Facebook and thought of this.

radcen said:

Great post.

Saw this earlier on Facebook and thought of this.

View attachment 67215134

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Good one, that is true today. I thought of another thing passed on down, canning. Another thing, fruit usually was eaten when I was young is what fruit was in season. No year around watermellen, cherries, strawberries, and the like. We put our potatoes in the celler for the winter. I remember picking off all the eyes around Jan/Feb time frame, some three and four inches long. It was the eyes that got planted in the spring to grow our own potatoes. I don't think there were too many refrigerated trucks back then. Besides, semi's were a third of the size they are today. Trains delivered a lot of the goods. Passenger trains were still up and running back then, now it's only AMTRAC and the government must pay for a lot of that.

But that picture is exactly right. Much more easier and less time consuming just to go to the grocery store.

Perotista said:

I wouldn't say impossible. I still am pretty much self-reliant. But I am an old foggie who been doing a lot of what you stated myself for quite a long time. Now schooling, I went to an old country school and my kids, grandkids and great grandkids are now going to public schools. But you're correct, not even I am totally self-reliant. I also think most people today don't learn a bit of everything that it takes to be self-reliant either. Especially city folk. Too easy to rely on someone else.

I see that in my kids and grand kids. Society has changed. Yeah, going to the grocery store is a lot easier than having one's own garden, canning tomatoes, corn, beans etc., putting potatoes in the celler, hunting and fishing for a lot of your meat, stuff like that. I bet most folks don't even know how to can or even what canning is.

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Another lost art is sewing. I don't know anybody who has a "rag bag" or a button box. (I inherited my grandmother's eons ago and still marvel at it the way I did as a little kid.)

nota bene said:

Another lost art is sewing. I don't know anybody who has a "rag bag" or a button box. (I inherited my grandmother's eons ago and still marvel at it the way I did as a little kid.)

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Darning socks, sewing n buttons, yep. Even I could do that. I thought it was great when they came out with these iron on patches for blue jeans. You're right, very little of anything got thrown away. With strawberries, oranges, pears and cherries in season, my mom used to make her own preserves or jelly as I called it.

Another thing my mom did was bake bread. There really was no better thing than homemade bread.

Perotista said:

Darning socks, sewing n buttons, yep. Even I could do that. I thought it was great when they came out with these iron on patches for blue jeans. You're right, very little of anything got thrown away. With strawberries, oranges, pears and cherries in season, my mom used to make her own preserves or jelly as I called it.

Another thing my mom did was bake bread. There really was no better thing than homemade bread.

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Oh, yes. My mother made wonderful bread.

And she was famed for her pie crusts. (I never tried but know the secret was ice water.) I remember coming home from college and congratulating her on how wonderful her pie crust was and her sheepishly showing me the empty box of Pillsbury crusts, and hey, if that was good enough for Mom, it was good enough for me.

I do have a friend who married a rancher and moved to the country, and now she cans and has also learned how to make kolaches using her husband's family's super-duper secret (Czech) recipe.

Georgef said:

The election is only....you lost ..get over it

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Geeze, not another one.
Listen up, George. That heady, triumphant week or two after the election when Trump supporters were all squirmy and peeing themselves, that gigglefest has past. Hillary,s just a bad memory, Obama is just a retired civil servants and your boy Trump is front-and-center, target pinned to his chest, and lying his ass off.
Get over it.

nota bene said:

Oh, yes. My mother made wonderful bread.

And she was famed for her pie crusts. (I never tried but know the secret was ice water.) I remember coming home from college and congratulating her on how wonderful her pie crust was and her sheepishly showing me the empty box of Pillsbury crusts, and hey, if that was good enough for Mom, it was good enough for me.

I do have a friend who married a rancher and moved to the country, and now she cans and has also learned how to make kolaches using her husband's family's super-duper secret (Czech) recipe.

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I have no idea what kolaches is, but if it is Czech that explains it. Yeah, times change and now we have become a society relying on technologies and other to get us everything we need. Whereas one was good at many, many things in the past and could do almost all of them for himself and family, today we specialize and technoliyze and are good at basically one thing. Generally speaking.

If something ever happened where people were forced to fend for themselves, Chaos would be too mild of a word. I am glad I live out in the country.

A kolache is a pastry that can be filled with fruit or meat, and in areas where a lot of Czechs have settled, there are even kolache festivals that often include a polka church service. Yes.

nota bene said:

A kolache is a pastry that can be filled with fruit or meat, and in areas where a lot of Czechs have settled, there are even kolache festivals that often include a polka church service. Yes.

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There is a large Czech population around here and kolaches are very common.

radcen said:

There is a large Czech population around here and kolaches are very common.

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Here too and lots of "Jak se mas?" [What's up?] bumper stickers.