dcdededede wrote:
The judge rejected the argument that the penalties for not having health insurance were a tax.
tx
dcdededede wrote:
The judge rejected the argument that the penalties for not having health insurance were a tax.
tx
Keith Stone wrote:
Unlike conservatives who take one or two anecdotal cases use that as a basis for public policy, I've actually spent quit a bit of time talking directly with people in Europe who are quite pleased with their health care system. I worked in Switzerland for a few months with people from Switzerland, France, and Germany. The vast majority were very happy with their plans. Sure there were people that didn't like some aspects, but it wasn't like there was any mass dissatisfaction. All three countries have a base program paid for through tax dollars and the option to purchase options for enhanced coverage; for example one colleague has a daughter in gymnastics and wanted specialized physical therapy.
pot. meet kettle. you attack people who use anecdotal evidence by using your own anecdotal evidence. very persuasive stuff. unlike you, who has been busy merely talking to foreigners, i actually have lived in europe for a considerable amount of time and, contrary to what you claim, most people there do not think they have a great health care system. there are huge shortages and you have to wait a long time to see a doctor and for treatment (it kind of make sense when everyone has access to a finite amount of doctors and treatments).
Keith Stone wrote:The whole "Canada health problem" is a red herring tossed around by conservatives who get all their information from talk radio and Fox News instead of factual sources. Intelligent and informed people know that while the Canadian health care system does have funding issues it's not a debacle and is frankly much more efficient at delivering services than the US system.
am i to presume that you consider yourself to be one of the "intelligent and informed"? very amusing. some of us actually know canadians and, sorry to report, their health care system is a disaster. i got an mri this past fall. do you know how long it took me to get it? 8 hours. i have a friend who lives in canada who is a fairly elite athlete with a good job and she needed an mri on her back. guess how long she had to wait? 3 months. she would beg to differ with you. also, if canada has such a great health care system, then why is there a cottage industry of hospitals that have sprouted up on the us/canadian border with the main focus of caring for canadians who either cannot or don't like what they get in canada? if canada were so great, i would think that these hospitals would have sprouted up on the other side of the border.
Keith Stone wrote:As far as medical tourism, average people from other countries are not coming to the US for treatment. Wealthy people from other countries are coming to the US for treatment. Average people from the US are going to Mexico, India, and European countries. A friend on mine who was uninsured found it was cheaper to fly to London, spend a week in a hotel, and fly back than it was to get treated in the US. I've had other friends who've received excellent, prompt, and inexpensive care when they've been injured in accidents in Europe.
um, yeah. did you expect that average people from austria could afford to fly to the us and pay out-of-pocket for treatment??? if they could afford it, they most surely would -- just like their wealthier countrymen do in droves. this is one of the more asinine arguments i have read on here. btw, saudi arabia's king abdullah had a herniated disk in december that needed surgery. he can afford to go anywhere in the world. did he go to canada or one of your european countries to get it done? no, he came to new york and had it done at cornell.
Keith Stone wrote:There is also no solid evidence the US consistently provides the best care. Surely for those that can afford it it provides the most prompt care. Most studies that look at the success rate of care rank the US somewhere around 20 to 25, not anywhere close to #1.
this is another completely moronic statement by the self-professed intelligent and informed. what are your "most studies" or did you just make that up too? if you look at the US system on the whole, which includes the poor and masses which drag everything down, it's not going to measure up with a small homogeneous country like switzerland. however, i don't care what our treatment is like for some homeless guy in harlem who does drugs and doesn't take care of himself. i care about what the high-end is like in the US and the high-end is as good or better than anywhere (which is why so many foreigners, who can afford to come here for procedures, come here).
what was dat? wrote:
THIS IS THE MOST HYPOCRITICAL POST ON letsrun OF ALL TIME.
Since it's obvious you lack the intellectual capacity to understand the most fundamental issues, it's pretty funny you pick a word like hypocritical when you don't know how to use it in context. It's really highlights your ignorance of the language, and quite frankly of the topic at hand.
Go back to your room little boy, let the adults have a conversation now.
X-Runner wrote:
It takes away freedom from people is a legitimate response to oppose this.
"Freedom" is a pretty generic term and there are plenty of things we are not free to do.
And there are many things that are mandatory to pay.
When I was in my twenties I did not have insurance and this law would make it tough on me.
I want to know if the opposition are concerned for this type of person.
It's a little beyond the thread to spell out an entire political philosophy but I understand that it is a generally broad term.
My only concern for this type of person is that they are now able to use resources (emergency room physicians and hospitals) whether they are willing to pay for them or not.
I have always had insurance even when it was very tough on me when I was in my 20s. I considered it a priority and sacrificed in other areas.
They're against the clause that all individuals have to BUY health care, not that all individuals have to HAVE health care. On top of that, despite frenzied liberal attempts to assure the public otherwise, the basic economic reality of the Obamacare system is that those of us who are young, healthy, and decently well-off will be subsidizing the rest to an even greater extent than we already are. I'm not against the more fortunate giving back to those who have less, but I am against that sort of philanthropy being mandated left and right. Among the noblest of the human capacities is the ability to choose be charitable when we don't have to be. There's nothing noble, or exceptionally human, about being forced to subsidize everybody else.
Yes, I realize we do this in many ways already, but usually only when the cost being subsidized is the maintenance of something we have always considered a basic human right. The right to health insurance is not such a right. It doesn't even exist. This is completely beyond debate. Health insurance is a totally artificial economic cost-sharing system. That sort of thing is NEVER a fundamental right. Imagine a constitutional right to home insurance. Ridiculous. I realize liberals THINK they're battling over the fundamental right to health CARE, not health INSURANCE, but they are not; even if the right to health CARE does exist, the current system honors it just fine.
The current health care system allows for disparate excess to care levels of varying quality, but it doesn't shut anybody out. Our system doesn't tell a poor person with a broken leg "go eff yourself," but it might tell them, "Here's a cast, I'll put it on, and then you be careful. We're going to be busy putting a lot more work, and the latest technology, into fixing this other kid's leg who comes from a wealthy family with great insurance." Nobody has been shut out of access to health care, here. Somebody has been shut out of access to the same quality of health care available to those with greater means, but that is not the same thing.
I'm not making this distinction up. It has reared its head in various Supreme Court cases before. For example, even if access to health care WERE a basic right, like the right to have an attorney represent you at the critical stages of a criminal proceeding in which you are the defendant, the above state of affairs would pose no problem, because nobody has an unlimited right to the attorney of their choosing at the critical stages of a criminal proceeding in which they are the defendant. The Supreme Court has often been made aware that giving an indigent defendant an overworked public defender straight out of law school is not qualitatively the same thing as giving them a Johnny Cochran, but THEY DON'T CARE. SATISFYING a constitutional right does not require LEVELING THE PLAYING FIELD. Of course, the right to counsel inherently contemplates some minimal level of competency in representation - if an appointed lawyer (or paid lawyer) fails to meet that standard, an ineffective assistance of counsel suit may be brought to validate the injured defendant's interest.
The health care situation should be no different. You show me somebody who was given NO health care when they needed it, and I'll show you somebody who screwed up. Emergency room doctors are professionally bound to treat whoever comes in, at least to a stabilized condition, and current government safety nets exist to cover basic health care costs for low income people. If those doctors treating lower income people fail to work at a level of professional competence, medical malpractice suits are available to vindicate the injured plaintiff's interest. (Lawyers in these cases work on a contingency fee basis, and even if they didn't, legal aid clinics can help.) There you have it, the right to health care, even it exists, has been adequately protected.
The whole debate takes on a partisan character because the bottom line is that most modern American liberals don't understand how rights work. (Classical liberals sure do - they would and do agree with me 100%). Fundamental equality does not require universal sameness. The right to life, perhaps more fundamental than any other of which man can conceive, cannot be taken away from you except in the most grave circumstances, when you yourself have forfeited that right by rending the social fabric yourself - as when you attempt to kill another and they therefore retaliate with force. But the right to life does not mean you have the right to live the same life I am living. You do not have a fundamental right to my salary, you do not have a fundamental right to my career, you do not have a fundamental right to have a family like mine. You have a right to life. Equality DOES NOT MEAN sameness.
To bring it back full circle, even if you have a right to health care (and this is still just an assumption), you do not have a right to the best health care technology can achieve. You do not have a right to the same health care that Bill across town who is the VP of a big local manufacturer receives. You have a right to basic competent health care. Our system already provides it. The rest of us already pay for it.
What more do you want? Better health care, that we still have to pay for? That's not how it works. Health insurance, that we have to pay for? Please, show me where you find the basis for a fundamental right to health insurance, in the constitution, in the natural law, in the writings of any philosopher... Please.
And since the right to health insurance does not exist, good luck getting a court of law to find it a sufficient counterweight to balance an unconstitutional extension of congress's powers through the individual mandate. We all know the commerce clause won't work. Necessary and Proper clause? Necessary and proper for what, the protection of a right that doesn't exist?
eb white wrote:
pot. meet kettle. you attack people who use anecdotal evidence by using your own anecdotal evidence. very persuasive stuff. unlike you, who has been busy merely talking to foreigners, i actually have lived in europe for a considerable amount of time and, contrary to what you claim, most people there do not think they have a great health care system. there are huge shortages and you have to wait a long time to see a doctor and for treatment (it kind of make sense when everyone has access to a finite amount of doctors and treatments).
You may have lived in Europe, but I call BS on your claims. There is no evidence anything you say is true, so either you didn't talk to anyone in the real world or you're flat out lying. There are people that may not consider their health care "great" but two seconds in Google tells you that only a small minority would do away with it.
am i to presume that you consider yourself to be one of the "intelligent and informed"? very amusing. some of us actually know canadians and, sorry to report, their health care system is a disaster. i got an mri this past fall. do you know how long it took me to get it? 8 hours. i have a friend who lives in canada who is a fairly elite athlete with a good job and she needed an mri on her back. guess how long she had to wait? 3 months. she would beg to differ with you. also, if canada has such a great health care system, then why is there a cottage industry of hospitals that have sprouted up on the us/canadian border with the main focus of caring for canadians who either cannot or don't like what they get in canada? if canada were so great, i would think that these hospitals would have sprouted up on the other side of the border.
It's clear I consider myself on the intelligent and informed, and it's also clear you are not. You clearly have problems with comprehension. Let's look at your elite athlete friend. While a back problem may be a problem for an athlete for the general population it's a lower priority. It's called prioritizing care and it happens today in the US. On the other point you couldn't have thought about the illogical nature of your point. There is a cottage industry of people of means from Canada coming to the US for care considered optional. The reason there aren't everyday Americans going the other way is Canada doesn't allow it. It's also against US law to bring back pharmaceuticals but even then busloads of senior citizens go to Canada to buy them.
um, yeah. did you expect that average people from austria could afford to fly to the us and pay out-of-pocket for treatment??? if they could afford it, they most surely would -- just like their wealthier countrymen do in droves. this is one of the more asinine arguments i have read on here. btw, saudi arabia's king abdullah had a herniated disk in december that needed surgery. he can afford to go anywhere in the world. did he go to canada or one of your european countries to get it done? no, he came to new york and had it done at cornell.
So, rich people come here to go to a limited number of locations. What's your point? The fact that a few institutions have rich people from around the world coming there means nothing is terms of the quality of care available to the average person. The effectiveness of THAT care is what is lacking. A few people getting high quality care doesn't make a health care system.
this is another completely moronic statement by the self-professed intelligent and informed. what are your "most studies" or did you just make that up too? if you look at the US system on the whole, which includes the poor and masses which drag everything down, it's not going to measure up with a small homogeneous country like switzerland. however, i don't care what our treatment is like for some homeless guy in harlem who does drugs and doesn't take care of himself. i care about what the high-end is like in the US and the high-end is as good or better than anywhere (which is why so many foreigners, who can afford to come here for procedures, come here).
You clearly have not done any real research, which validates the point I've made all along. If you has spent even a few minutes looking at legitimate studies that a few seconds of Googling would have put at your fingertips you would be forced to admit that most of your claims are either flat out lies or just innocuous bulls**t.
World rankings:
http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.htmlA whole bunch of links on Canadian health care:
ttp://blogs.chicagotribune.com/news_columnists_ezorn/2009/08/never-mind-the-anecdotes-do-canadians-like-their-health-care-system.html
There are more links than I have time to cut and paste about European systems. The basic fact is the Canadian and European systems deliver a higher quality of care to a larger number of people. In general the citizens of those countries are more interested in tinkering around the edges to improve services or cost, and not interested doing away with their systems.
Interestingly enough the places that deliver the highest quality care for the best price in the US are borrowing concepts from the Canadian and European systems. For example the Mayo Clinic has doctors paid on salary instead of by the procedure or office visit.
Not saying the above guy is wrong, but does anybody else think it is hilarious that these days "real research" means linking some random website (admittedly with a WHO ranking, but you get my point)? I've seen people attack somebody else for not doing any real research and then citing CNN.com articles or something back at them. Does nobody rely on peer-reviewed sources anymore?
Canadian and European health systems are generally massively popular. It is a wholesale lie, promoted entirely by conservatives, that people hate these systems and that they are disasters. The biggest sign is that nobody's trying to dismantle public health systems - not even conservative parties! Why's that? It's because these systems are enormously popular with the public.Satisfaction with English system:
An independent survey conducted in 2004 found that users of the NHS often expressed very high levels satisfaction about their personal experience of the medical services they received. Of hospital inpatients, 92% said they were satisfied with their treatment; 87% of GP users were satisfied with their GP; 87% of hospital outpatients were satisfied with the service they received; and 70% of Accident and Emergency department users reported being satisfied.
Canada:
85.2% of Canadians reported that they were "satisfied" or "very satisfied" with the way health care services are provided in their country and an even higher number (89.8%) rated their physician in the same way though slightly lower ratings were awarded to hospitals (79.9% being "satisfied" or "very satisfied")
Finland:
The quality of service in Finnish health care is considered to be good and according to a survey published by the European Commission in 2000, Finland has the highest number of people satisfied with their hospital care system in the EU: 88% of Finnish respondents were satisfied
Various Europeans not hating their systems:
A third of Americans said they believe the U.S. system "has so much wrong with it that we need to completely rebuild it," while only 9% in the Netherlands hold such a sentiment about their health-care system. Twelve percent of Spaniards favored a complete overhaul, compared with 15% in France, 17% in New Zealand, 18% in Australia and 20% in Italy.
Keith Stone wrote:
You may have lived in Europe, but I call BS on your claims. There is no evidence anything you say is true, so either you didn't talk to anyone in the real world or you're flat out lying. There are people that may not consider their health care "great" but two seconds in Google tells you that only a small minority would do away with it.
first of all, where did i argument that europe should "do away" with its health care system? nice just simply making up things. also, nice job "calling bs" on europeans who complain that their level of care is substandard and that they have to wait a long time to get basic care. i'm not talking about the unemployed lazy european -- he thinks it's great. i'm talking about europeans who have money who don't like having to wait for substandard care. what part of this do you not understand?
Keith Stone wrote:It's clear I consider myself on the intelligent and informed, and it's also clear you are not. You clearly have problems with comprehension. Let's look at your elite athlete friend. While a back problem may be a problem for an athlete for the general population it's a lower priority. It's called prioritizing care and it happens today in the US. On the other point you couldn't have thought about the illogical nature of your point. There is a cottage industry of people of means from Canada coming to the US for care considered optional. The reason there aren't everyday Americans going the other way is Canada doesn't allow it. It's also against US law to bring back pharmaceuticals but even then busloads of senior citizens go to Canada to buy them.
i am aware of that. you already proclaimed it. i'm glad that you think a herniated disk is a low priority. other people disagree. moreover, you missed my ENTIRE point -- that to get an mri, she had to wait months (and she has money and insurance). you may be happy with a system that allows the government to prioritize ailments to the point that, painful ones to people with means have to wait months for a basic mri, but myself and others are not. if i am paying a lot of insurance and i want an mri, i want it asap like i did last fall.
canadians are coming to the US for a lot more than facelifts and botox treatments. again, i don't want a system that allows the government to decide that if i have a torn acl, it's not very important, and i therefore have to wait a year to have surgery on it despite the fact that i pay over $10,000 a year in insurance premiums. if i am paying, it should be up to me to decide the importance.
you also are 100% wrong that canada doesn't allow americans to come across the border for treatment. ever hear of a guy named tiger woods? tara torrest? arod? time to do a little more homework to hold up your "informed" claim.
Keith Stone wrote:So, rich people come here to go to a limited number of locations. What's your point? The fact that a few institutions have rich people from around the world coming there means nothing is terms of the quality of care available to the average person. The effectiveness of THAT care is what is lacking. A few people getting high quality care doesn't make a health care system.
i know that my prior point flew over your head, but i will repeat it again. many people, who who have the means to get treated anywhere in the world, often choose to come to the US for treatment because, shockingly to you, it's the best in the world at the high end. your argument that the average person in europe, who has very little money, doesn't come to the US to pay for care he can't afford shows how bad the US system makes no sense at all. also, it's a lot more than "a few" people who currently have access to the high-end of the US system -- it's the 10s (100s?) of millions of people who currently have health insurance. what you want is to tell everyone who currently is paying for outstanding and prompt health care to take a back seat and (1) pay more and (2) be prepared to wait a long time once the government decides what your issue is isn't very important.
Keith Stone wrote:You clearly have not done any real research, which validates the point I've made all along. If you has spent even a few minutes looking at legitimate studies that a few seconds of Googling would have put at your fingertips you would be forced to admit that most of your claims are either flat out lies or just innocuous bulls**t.
There are more links than I have time to cut and paste about European systems. The basic fact is the Canadian and European systems deliver a higher quality of care to a larger number of people. In general the citizens of those countries are more interested in tinkering around the edges to improve services or cost, and not interested doing away with their systems.
Interestingly enough the places that deliver the highest quality care for the best price in the US are borrowing concepts from the Canadian and European systems. For example the Mayo Clinic has doctors paid on salary instead of by the procedure or office visit.
so now you claim your "real research" amounts to nothing more than a quick google search that pulled up a few random sites? very funny mr scholar. yes, we get it that the average health care delivered to someone in the UK probably is better than the average health care delivered to someone in the US because the low end is higher in the UK (everyone is covered). i don't care about the low and middle ends. i care about the high end, which i am willing to pay for, and it's the best in the US (again, that's why people who have the means come from all over the world to get treated here but very few americans get treated abroad for ailments that are treatable here). obamacare will kill the high end and, over time, we will have the same mediocre system found in europe and canada.
eb white wrote:
Keith Stone wrote:Unlike conservatives who take one or two anecdotal cases use that as a basis for public policy, I've actually spent quit a bit of time talking directly with people in Europe who are quite pleased with their health care system. I worked in Switzerland for a few months with people from Switzerland, France, and Germany. The vast majority were very happy with their plans. Sure there were people that didn't like some aspects, but it wasn't like there was any mass dissatisfaction. All three countries have a base program paid for through tax dollars and the option to purchase options for enhanced coverage; for example one colleague has a daughter in gymnastics and wanted specialized physical therapy.
pot. meet kettle. you attack people who use anecdotal evidence by using your own anecdotal evidence. very persuasive stuff. unlike you, who has been busy merely talking to foreigners, i actually have lived in europe for a considerable amount of time and, contrary to what you claim, most people there do not think they have a great health care system. there are huge shortages and you have to wait a long time to see a doctor and for treatment (it kind of make sense when everyone has access to a finite amount of doctors and treatments).
Keith Stone wrote:The whole "Canada health problem" is a red herring tossed around by conservatives who get all their information from talk radio and Fox News instead of factual sources. Intelligent and informed people know that while the Canadian health care system does have funding issues it's not a debacle and is frankly much more efficient at delivering services than the US system.
am i to presume that you consider yourself to be one of the "intelligent and informed"? very amusing. some of us actually know canadians and, sorry to report, their health care system is a disaster. i got an mri this past fall. do you know how long it took me to get it? 8 hours. i have a friend who lives in canada who is a fairly elite athlete with a good job and she needed an mri on her back. guess how long she had to wait? 3 months. she would beg to differ with you. also, if canada has such a great health care system, then why is there a cottage industry of hospitals that have sprouted up on the us/canadian border with the main focus of caring for canadians who either cannot or don't like what they get in canada? if canada were so great, i would think that these hospitals would have sprouted up on the other side of the border.
Keith Stone wrote:As far as medical tourism, average people from other countries are not coming to the US for treatment. Wealthy people from other countries are coming to the US for treatment. Average people from the US are going to Mexico, India, and European countries. A friend on mine who was uninsured found it was cheaper to fly to London, spend a week in a hotel, and fly back than it was to get treated in the US. I've had other friends who've received excellent, prompt, and inexpensive care when they've been injured in accidents in Europe.
um, yeah. did you expect that average people from austria could afford to fly to the us and pay out-of-pocket for treatment??? if they could afford it, they most surely would -- just like their wealthier countrymen do in droves. this is one of the more asinine arguments i have read on here. btw, saudi arabia's king abdullah had a herniated disk in december that needed surgery. he can afford to go anywhere in the world. did he go to canada or one of your european countries to get it done? no, he came to new york and had it done at cornell.
Keith Stone wrote:There is also no solid evidence the US consistently provides the best care. Surely for those that can afford it it provides the most prompt care. Most studies that look at the success rate of care rank the US somewhere around 20 to 25, not anywhere close to #1.
this is another completely moronic statement by the self-professed intelligent and informed. what are your "most studies" or did you just make that up too? if you look at the US system on the whole, which includes the poor and masses which drag everything down, it's not going to measure up with a small homogeneous country like switzerland. however, i don't care what our treatment is like for some homeless guy in harlem who does drugs and doesn't take care of himself. i care about what the high-end is like in the US and the high-end is as good or better than anywhere (which is why so many foreigners, who can afford to come here for procedures, come here).
there is SO much wrong with this eb white rant, I wouldn't even know where to begin. so much you really do not know or care about. so uninformed - just arrogant I guess.
How do you feel about philanthropy to the war profiteers who have stolen zillions from taxpayers for years? The same war profiteers Eisenhower warned us about?
How do you feel about philanthropy to the oil companies who have benefited so much from oppression and turmoil in the middle east?
Or philanthropy to the massive Wall St. banks who stole more money than you could ever count?
I was thinking about this healthcare stuff last night, wondering when a God fearing Christian neocon judge might get around to calling it unconstitutional that a kid goes hungry, goes to a horrible school, or goes without healthcare. That these things are allowed to happen in our country is not just unconstitutional but also unconscionable.
dsrunner has the day off wrote:
How do you feel about philanthropy to the war profiteers who have stolen zillions from taxpayers for years? The same war profiteers Eisenhower warned us about?
How do you feel about philanthropy to the oil companies who have benefited so much from oppression and turmoil in the middle east?
Or philanthropy to the massive Wall St. banks who stole more money than you could ever count?
I'm against all of these corporate subsidies as well. You are right, they are all unconsciouable. You can add in the car companies if you want as well.
Eb White for the win. Keith Stone- FAIL
I didn't see any facts by eb. just rhetoric and talking points, strictly opinion. "heath care can't be good if you have to "wait" for non-emergency procedures like your meniscus.....so it must be "bad".
bullshit
FAIL
Vets need to speak out about the importance of a prepared citizenry to repel Al Quaeda terrorists.
To bring it back full circle, even if you have a right to health care (and this is still just an assumption), you do not have a right to the best health care technology can achieve. You do not have a right to the same health care that Bill across town who is the VP of a big local manufacturer receives. You have a right to basic competent health care. Our system already provides it. The rest of us already pay for it.
more of the "me first, screw everyone else" rhetoric. This person wants to live in a world where an insurance company can drop your daughter or spouse because they got cancer - and now it is too costly for them to pay for your treatment...maybe you can go to the emergency room and ask for "cancer treatment" for your daughter...that sounds real reasonable.
what the me first screw everyone else generation doesn't get is that YOU ALREADY PAY FOR IT when others do not pay. The medical system always gets their portion - they ain't giving anything away for free. You pay in premiums and co-pays, blah, blah.....and do you really think that you deserve better health treatment because you work somewhere that has insurance? well, hang on to your hat big boy - because as the cost rises, that could go away at any minute as well as the "retirement" plan they are telling you you have in 30 years. Than you can go out on the streets and pay $3000 month so you get great care - and f*cking forget it if you or a member of your family has diabetes, asthma or cancer. must be nice in your make-believe world. Just about everyone is one sickness away from bankruptcy, even though I'm sure you don't believe that. naive
Let me rephrase, Eb White pwns Keith Stone and you too.
Nevermind. I just read the rest of the thread. Ed....YOU LOSE!
I don't think you read my post carefully. I made it abundantly clear that I know we already subsidize health care costs. On top of that, you are confusing several different questions in your mind.
There's nothing "me first" about my post. It might be nice to live in a world where everybody has access to the best healthcare money can buy without fiscally overburdening society; I don't know, I've never been there. But that doesn't mean we have a fundamental right to health insurance. I don't think I "deserve" any better health treatment than anybody else - but I also know there's nothing unconstitutional about me, or anybody else, getting better health care based on the insurance we pay for than somebody else does who doesn't pay in a dime.
I'm not sure where you're seeing the naivete in my post. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who posted in this thread who 1) addressed the topic of the thread and 2) actually seems to understand the questions involved.
You want the whole debate, even in the courts, to be about whether we think universal health care would be a nice thing to have. That's naive. It isn't like that. Not everything that you think is an appropriate means to achieving a just end is actually a constitutional means to achieving a just end. Not everything you think is unjust is a violation of the constitution. The courts exist to pass on constitutional questions in this context, not to determine when the education a kid gets is good enough, or when the food a kid gets is healthy enough, as another poster a few lines up indicated. Trust me, you don't want the courts monitoring those sorts of things. The same idiot also was ranting about "neocon judges," as though there are meaningful political parties on the bench.
Anyways, this thread was started, as the title evidences, to discuss the constitutional question, not just what you think is good for society. I briefly offered my personal thoughts on what is good for society (because let's face it - none of us can resist), and then discussed the constitutional question. It's abundantly clear that the commerce clause is not going to cover the individual mandate. Somebody brought up necessary and proper, and I explained at length why that won't do it either, because the protection of "the right to health insurance" isn't a legitimate congressional purpose. The right doesn't exist. If you're going to respond, please don't just feed me some "if the right to health insurance isn't in the constitution, then what is??" I'll even let you play around with penumbras and emanations in your response, but I just want to know specifically what part of the constitution or bill of rights provides for a right to health insurance.
My guess is you'll dodge the question and try to find a right to health care in there instead. But if you read my previous post carefully, you'll see I already addressed that issue, and it still wouldn't make the individual mandate constitutional. You haven't replied to an ounce of the substance of my previous post. You just pulled some language that you didn't contextually understand, ranted against kids these days, try to "learn me a few things," and called me naive. It's time to try again, and be a little more thoughtful this time. Your attempt to be profound with the "one sickness away from bankruptcy" line is pathetic and irrelevant to the constitutional question. Everybody is also one freak accident away from death, one bad decision away from bankruptcy (try hitting somebody with you car because you're texting while driving), etc. That's just called being alive, buddy. It's not an argument for the constitutionality of the individual mandate.
watch at 2:35
you all have a right to be angry, you should be angry
but take your anger out on the right people
watch at 2:35