Gould 0738 wrote:

Even those "millions" have access to health care. What they don't have
is
health care insurance and many of them CHOOSE not to.

There's a difference between access to health care and (practical) access to
health care insurance, particularly for poor or middle income people.

Fact is, the majority of poor people work at
low wage jobs. They are on the battle lines of American commerce, actually
delivering the services or building the widgets at $10 an hour, or often less.
These jobs rarely include health insurance any more. When you're paying
$1000-1200 a month for a worker's wages, adding 30, 40, 50 percent
to that total to fund health insurance doesn't make economic sense.

Even middle income jobs have tightened up on health insurance benefits. At my
wife's bank, they pay the premiums for the
employee only and the employee must pay the premiums for the family members.
(Not entirely unfair, why should party "A" with six kids be compensated more
highly than single person "B" for doing the same job? If the bank had to pay
for everybody, people with lots of kids would be less employable and have
trouble finding work).

A great observation.


And its not just corporate greed, it's the "global economy".

So, why don't poor folks just park the "$150 sneakers" and turn off the "big
screen TV"? and buy health insurance instead?

The cost is prohibitive. My wife and I could make a choice at any time to
retire. It wouldn't require much reorganizing of things to live a simpler, but
acceptably comfortable lifestyle for just about forever. We don't seriously
consider it for two reasons. 1) We both enjoy our work. 2) Health insurance.

We have looked into private health insurance in our state. $1000 deductible
plans for healthy adults in their early 50's run about $500 a month. *Each*.
The cost goes up at age 55, and again at age 60, and can go up in any
particular year when the health insurance companies decide their costs have
increased too much or their profits haven't increased enough.

You forgot to mention one of the greatest sources of increased premiums;
Increased payouts due to increases in damages awarded by overzealous
lawsuits, and a legal system which favors putting the screws to a large
company to pay for claims that exceed normal allowances for "pain and
suffering".


We could probably handle a giesel a month, but who wants to be in a position of

having to return to work 5 or six years from now because health insurance costs
have gone from $1000 a month to $2800?

So think of the poor mini-wage family.
Poppa, Mama, three or four kids...... probably $1200 to $1500 a month locally
(for health insurance that doesn't have such a ridiculously high deductible
that for most poor people with minor illnesses it would be a moot point whether
they had insurance or not).

Pretty tough to write even a single person a take-home check for $200-300 a
week and expect him to run out and buy a health insurance policy for $500 a
month.

So the observation is correct. The poor do have access to health insurance- but
not health insurance *and* groceries, rent, transportation, clothing, etc. "Big
screen TV's and $150 sneakers" aren't keeping the poor from health coverage, in
spite of the derogatory sterotypes.

The costs are high. So what do we do about it?

Dave

The costs are high. So what do we do about it?

Dave


You won't like my answer.

1) Face the fact that the uninsured are currently being treated at the expense
of the rest of society in the US, at very expensive hospital emergency rooms.

2) Reinvigorate the Public Health services gutted by the present and previous D
and R adminsitrations kow-towing to the medical lobbies

-or-

3) Formalize the de-facto public funding of health care services and institute
strict cost controls.

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
The costs are high. So what do we do about it?

Dave


You won't like my answer.

1) Face the fact that the uninsured are currently being treated at the
expense
of the rest of society in the US, at very expensive hospital emergency
rooms.

2) Reinvigorate the Public Health services gutted by the present and
previous D
and R adminsitrations kow-towing to the medical lobbies

-or-

3) Formalize the de-facto public funding of health care services and
institute
strict cost controls.

#3 could work, but people who think Karl Marx is the guy with the moustache,
the cigar and the three goofy brothers will say "socialism".

Doug Kanter wrote:

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
The costs are high. So what do we do about it?

Dave


You won't like my answer.

1) Face the fact that the uninsured are currently being treated at the
expense
of the rest of society in the US, at very expensive hospital emergency
rooms.

2) Reinvigorate the Public Health services gutted by the present and
previous D
and R adminsitrations kow-towing to the medical lobbies

-or-

3) Formalize the de-facto public funding of health care services and
institute
strict cost controls.

#3 could work, but people who think Karl Marx is the guy with the moustache,
the cigar and the three goofy brothers will say "socialism".

The problem with this, or any other "socialist" solutions, is that when
you place tight cost controls, you remove the incentive for many people
to choose the health services as a career. If healthcare workers become
the same as teachers, what will happen to the quality of our care?

Dave

and is anybody taking notice of north korea's actions weighted against what
is being said about iraq?


North Korea will get its turn, at least according to the New American Century
game plan.

Bush needed to do Iraq first. There's an election coming up, and all his Texas
big oil funders had to have some reason to open their checkbooks. Remember what
happened to the price of gas the last time GWB ran for office?

NOYB equivocated:

Remember, the key statement in Bush's speech was "the British Government has
learned...". Since MI6 *still* stands by their original intelligence, then
Bush's statement is 100% accurate.

Depends on your definition of "is". Really.

Do you see some sort of major moral difference between simply making a false
statement and repeating a statement (known to you and your advisors to be
false) made by somebody else to achieve the same effect?

You can weasel around and say, "But Bush himself was not informed! He's too
stupid to follow intelligence briefings from the CIA! His staff and cabinet
were able to hide the facts from him!" Fine. If so, should such a man be
POTUS? And even so, the SOTU speech is a speech outlining the positions of the
Bush Administration, was written by the Administration, and Bush is ultimately
responsible for the actions and activities of his underlings.

Where the moral high ground now? You Bush fans ought to be ashamed to defend
this bald faced manipulation.

It means he is sticking by his original statement that Iraq was trying to
buy uranium from Niger "according to British Government intelligence data".

"Trying to buy" (and being told "no') doesn't make a country an imminent
nuclear threat.

(sound of phone ringing)

1: "Hello, President of Nigeria? This is Saddam Hussein. Long time no see. Did
you get that container full of hand woven rugs I sent you for your palace?"

2: "Saddam! How have you been? That golf swing of yours still as bad as ever?
Yeah, I got the carpets, but you need to knock that sort of stuff off. People
might talk."

1:"Well, the main reason I called was to see if you've got any excess uranium
lying around that I could buy sort of under the table."

2: "Oh, hell, Saddam. You know we can't sell you uranium. It's been illegal
since 1991. Let's talk about something else.
Isn't it your birthday soon? I'll have my presidential bakery put together
something nice for you, to show you how much I appreciate the bribe, er I mean
"gift" of carpeting. Do you like chocolate?"

1: "Well, if it's all the same to you, I'd prefer a yellow cake."

.........................

(Next day we'd have the WH announcing absolute proof that yellow cake had been
shipped from Niger to Iraq.) :-)

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...
NOYB equivocated:

Remember, the key statement in Bush's speech was "the British Government
has
learned...". Since MI6 *still* stands by their original intelligence,
then
Bush's statement is 100% accurate.

Depends on your definition of "is". Really.

Do you see some sort of major moral difference between simply making a
false
statement and repeating a statement (known to you and your advisors to be
false) made by somebody else to achieve the same effect?

You can weasel around and say, "But Bush himself was not informed! He's
too
stupid to follow intelligence briefings from the CIA!

Bush *was* informed. Tenet already said it was his fault the line wasn't
pulled from the speech. The CIA reviewed the speech beforehand and didn't
have him pull it.


His staff and cabinet
were able to hide the facts from him!" Fine. If so, should such a man be
POTUS? And even so, the SOTU speech is a speech outlining the positions
of the
Bush Administration, was written by the Administration, and Bush is
ultimately
responsible for the actions and activities of his underlings.

Where the moral high ground now? You Bush fans ought to be ashamed to
defend
this bald faced manipulation.

Hogwash.

FACT: MI6 said Iraq was trying to buy uranium from Niger.

FACT: Tenet and the CIA couldn't confirm nor deny that report.

FACT: Bush stated "the British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

FACT: Even today, MI6 says their original assessment was accurate.

So where's the lie? Where's the "manipulation"? Hmmmmm?

"Gould 0738" wrote in message
...

And even so, the SOTU speech is a speech outlining the positions of the
Bush Administration, was written by the Administration, and Bush is
ultimately
responsible for the actions and activities of his underlings.

Delegation of responsibility, according to Nookular Boy: The buck stops
here, except when I want it to stop somewhere else.