Health Care Bill Passed. Fallout?

[Lago PARANOIA]

Or you could just give the finger to people who ever need medical care, like we did in the good ol' days.

Seriously, fuck those little shits, getting sick on us.

[TavishArtair]

Illness does not necessarily precipitate all health costs. For instance, the fact that the Wicked Witch of the East did not receive adequate health care was chiefly due to the current insurance system's failings. If she had been treated in time without fiscal issues then she could continue her reign of terror unabated. The Evil Overlord vote should never have swung Republican in the first place, but now without Dick Cheney in a position of power, and with this latest bloc opposition from the Republicans, I expect that the Wicked Witch of the West's outcry will serve as a rallying point for a new progressive Evil Overlord vote. Far from a negative event, I believe this will eventually become a major political victory for the Democrats because the Republicans insisted on looking like asshats to the very end. That neither party has aggressively pursued another Lunar mission to emplace a Moon-based death ray, admittedly, will give some hesitance to the Mad Scientist vote, but I am confident that if the Democrats adopt internet-freedom policies to ensure maximum transmission of their latest supervirus / Sharon Apple style idol AI, and not giving preferential bandwidth to someone's latest Redtube viewing just because they paid for premium service, that they too will vote mostly left in the upcoming elections.

[Kaelik]

If you want to pretend there's some sort of prestige in being acknowledged by you as "not an idiot", you shouldn't overuse it.

Or alternatively, if I want their to be prestige in not being called an idiot, me not calling people an idiot should be rare. Take a supply and demand class. If only 4 people have I acknowledged as "not an idiot", you can be sure those four people are much smarter than all the dumbasses.

If I acknowledge lots of people as not idiots, then it wouldn't mean anything.

2) You think you "thoroughly slammed me" and that my previous reasons for saying that Gelare should not be able to choose to avoid healthcare insurance is stupid?

Guess what, you are stupid. I never said that. I correctly pointed out that people have biases and hangups, such as wishful thinking and inability to understand probability and ignorance of any actual statistics, that prevent them from correctly assessing their risk.

That is true. At no point did I say that people should not be able to make the decision themselves, only that they are incompetent at making the decision.

The only reason you could possibly disagree with me and think my "reasons" are stupid for the thing you have claimed I have said, even though I have not, is if you think that individual people are not subject to an assortment of biases that result in them being not capable of accurately assessing risk.

If you think that, you are stupid.

[NineInchNall]

My original statement was said in the context of the HEALTH CARE BILL. Crissa gave examples that were widely UNrelated to it.

Her examples were related in the primary aspect: spending X leads to more/improved results and saves Y over time. That's called analogy, and it made sense to everyone else in the thread. Why didn't it make sense to you? At this point I'm genuinely curious and not intending to be condescending. I would like to understand how your thought process went, especially with respect to why you considered each of her examples inapplicable to the health care situation, so that I'm better able to explain similar concepts to the people I talk to on a daily basis.

[Zinegata]

My original statement was said in the context of the HEALTH CARE BILL. Crissa gave examples that were widely UNrelated to it.

Her examples were related in the primary aspect: spending X leads to more/improved results and saves Y over time. That's called analogy, and it made sense to everyone else in the thread. Why didn't it make sense to you? At this point I'm genuinely curious and not intending to be condescending. I would like to understand how your thought process went, especially with respect to why you considered each of her examples inapplicable to the health care situation, so that I'm better able to explain similar concepts to the people I talk to on a daily basis.

Which is why, as I keep saying, she's comparing apples and oranges. She's talking about spending money to make money in very, very general terms, whereas this thread is about the healthcare bill.

Her points made sense. But they're not relevant to the subject at hand. See my reply to Kaelik why each of her examples was inapplicable to the healthcare bill. Seriously, are you gonna argue that the healthcare bill lowers the deficit by putting the money away in a savings account and letting the American people reap the profits from the interest?

Just because it makes sense does not mean it's on-topic.

[violence in the media]

What's so magical about the healthcare law that prevents people from using analogies when discussing it? Can it only be discussed in literal terms for some reason?

[Kaelik]

Zinegata, you are a fucking idiot.

When you say X is like Y, you are not saying X is Y. So when you say that a healthcare bill is like other methods of spending money to make money, you are not claiming that it is identical.

They are examples of different ways to spend money and therefore save money.

If someone were to say "I don't understand how growing apples results in less oranges." I might try to demonstrate the principle of substitute goods with many analogies that are not in every way identical to apples and oranges.

Likewise, if someone claims not to understand how spending money can save money in a specific instance, I might use analogies to demonstrate the fact that there are many ways to spend money to save money.

tl;dr:

Apples and Oranges are both fruit borne of trees grown in orchards, and as such, fuck you, it makes perfect sense to compare them when someone is talking about fruit bearing trees grown in orchards.

I'm a Shark. I'm a Shark. Suck my Dick, I'm a Shark.

[Neeeek]

Zinegata, you are a fucking idiot.

That. The problem isn't Crissa, it's you.

[CatharzGodfoot]

The real problem is that, when this is all over, Zinegata will probably go away thinking 'What a bunch of dogmatic assholes, I couldn't get through to them at all.'. And we'll go away thinking 'Yet another right-wing moron immune to logic.'. Energy will have been spent, arguments will have been made, but no work will have been accomplished. Just a lot of waste heat, and everyone will be less willing to engage in rational discussion in the future.

And I'm too biased to even contemplate why this is.

[NineInchNall]

And I'm too biased to even contemplate why this is.

This, maybe?

[RobbyPants]

And I'm too biased to even contemplate why this is.

I find myself falling into this more and more myself. I'm noticing I'm getting more and more knee-jerk to right-wing idea, which is really kind of sad; I'd like to think I'm making informed opinions and not just deciding based on what I want to believe.

Oh my god! I've become what I hate!

I'll have to work on that.

[NineInchNall]

Which is why, as I keep saying, she's comparing apples and oranges. She's talking about spending money to make money in very, very general terms, whereas this thread is about the healthcare bill.

"Apples and oranges" doesn't refer to "specific versus general".

Her points made sense. But they're not relevant to the subject at hand. See my reply to Kaelik why each of her examples was inapplicable to the healthcare bill. Seriously, are you gonna argue that the healthcare bill lowers the deficit by putting the money away in a savings account and letting the American people reap the profits from the interest?

The thing is that your initial statement, reproduced below, read to some like you're challenging the very concept of spending money to make money - in the general sense.

It still boggles the mind how they are gonna spend 1 trillion dollars to save 200 billion

Crissa's analogies, while they did not explain the manner in which the health care bill will accomplish those numbers, did in fact address the perceived challenge to the general case. So while your actual, intended concern is not handled by her examples, the intent that people read was.

That's the thing that bugs me about this discussion: people are arguing right the fuck past each other. You voiced a concern that appeared to mean one thing (to most of us here). They responded based on what they interpreted. You said that they didn't address your concern, which is fair enough, since they didn't address what you meant. What they inferred, however, they did address.

[Gelare]

Really the whole discussion about spending money to save money was fairly pointless, since that's not going to be the effect of the health care bill anyway. In the best case scenario - where the bill does what is actually intended efficiently - it'll add a half trillion dollars to the debt over the next decade. And if that's actually all it contributes to the debt, I'd be okay with that, because I know the government can piss away half a trillion dollars like it's nothing. It's the extremely likely increase of those deficits that worries me.

(Oh shit, it's the former director of the Congressional Budget Office writing in the New York Times, rather than someone on Fox you can easily ignore!)

[Lago PARANOIA]

In all seriousness, though, paying a half-trillion dollars over a decade to get everyone ensured is a fucking deal of a lifetime, considering that spiralling health insurance costs is what is eating at the American paycheck.

I think that when everyone gets ensured, though, the Democrats can immediately campaign for a Medicare-for-All (single-payer) to drive down costs even further. Which will save people even more.

Seriously, it's like printing your own money.

[Username17]

Really the whole discussion about spending money to save money was fairly pointless, since that's not going to be the effect of the health care bill anyway. In the best case scenario - where the bill does what is actually intended efficiently - it'll add a half trillion dollars to the debt over the next decade. And if that's actually all it contributes to the debt, I'd be okay with that, because I know the government can piss away half a trillion dollars like it's nothing. It's the extremely likely increase of those deficits that worries me.

(Oh shit, it's the former director of the Congressional Budget Office writing in the New York Times, rather than someone on Fox you can easily ignore!)

I read his piece, and it really seemed like a bizarre partisan hack job. He's saying that the congressional bill has set up a set of sleight of hand, where it starts raising money now and spends it later, so that in 10 years it's ahead, but the reality is that it would be spending net money at that point. Which is a fine piece of criticism. I personally am offended by the deficit wanking that people do all the time, and I really wish that people would just roll out programs rather than unroll them over a period of six years just to change the 10 year budget analysis.

But they did do that. He can make the argument that doing so is dishonest or pointless. And I'd probably agree with him. But arguing that because of that they are actually spending more money in the next ten years than they say they are is even more dishonest. Yes, rolling out the spending over six years instead of doing it right now is dishonest. But pretending that money is somehow actually being spent during the six years that the programs aren't being fully funded is bat shit fucking insane.

As for ignoring him? Oh hell yes. He's from The American Action Forum. And yeah, he was the director of the CBO. But that doesn't actually make him non-partisan or even a competent accountant. The CBO as a whole is non-partisan, but the director is just a political appointee chosen by the Speaker of the House and the President Tempore of the Senate.

So seriously, this guy's only known qualification is that from 2003-2005 he was able to convince Dennis Hastert and Ted "Series of Tubes" Stevens that he would spout ideas about the budget that they would like.

-Username17

[Crissa]

Yeah, that status quo is that those who need healthcare don't have insurance, and those who don't need healthcare don't want insurance. That doesn't make healthcare actually happen, you know?

How does someone mistake 'Crissa' for a boy's name? With a picture of a girl, for that matter?

Lastly, my water heater example was comparing an insulated 30-gal standard with a new forced-exhaust complete-combustion tankless. Personal experience, dontcha know.

The answer of why is the health care bill going to save money? Because it doesn't plan on spending any money that aren't already (or will be) represented by taxes and fees. Basically, paying for everyone to get care now is cheaper than the ER. Keeping people healthy means less medicare expenses. Forcing insurance companies to cough up the dough instead of the feds filling in the cracks. There's dozens of examples of low-hanging fruit there, which Frank pointed out the most obvious one and Tavish in accounting pointed out the largest one. Others involve studying the efficaciousness of tests and treatment regimes (those thousands of new 'powers' the HHR has) and limiting insurance company raw profit margins.

Basically, the bill is a trillion dollars because of two things: It represents ten years of expenditures; and we already spend a trillion dollars on medical care.

It would be hard for this to not save us money.

-Crissa

[Meikle641]

Zine, stop embarassing yourself, man. This is bad as when you argue with BFK in the chat.

[Zinegata]

Zine, stop embarassing yourself, man. This is bad as when you argue with BFK in the chat.

Fine, I'm stopping. *grumbles*

Also, Crissa, like I said (regarding your gender) -> Whoops.

[Zinegata]

That's the thing that bugs me about this discussion: people are arguing right the fuck past each other. You voiced a concern that appeared to mean one thing (to most of us here). They responded based on what they interpreted. You said that they didn't address your concern, which is fair enough, since they didn't address what you meant. What they inferred, however, they did address.

You are correct. Which is why I didn't say "You are a fucking idiot for answering stuff about banking". I said "Apples and Oranges". Which was meant to say "That's not really related to what I'm talking about. It's a whole different category".

If they had actually read all of my posts as opposed to just Crissa's, they might have noticed how I thanked Cthulu and Frank for giving reasons as to why the Healthcare bill saved money, because *they* answered my concerns.

And it's worth noting that only Crissa answered me in extremely general terms not related to healthcare, and that the majority are simply jumping to her defense because I had the temerity to say "But that's not related to Healthcare!". And I'm getting the reponse "You're an idiot for not understanding what she said!"

Now, if you guys wanna claim that "specific vs general" is not compatible with the term "Apples and Oranges", that's fine. I'm NOT gonna argue anymore and just shut up about it.

If you wann say it's impolite, then yeah, you have the right to claim that. So Crissa, if you felt it was impolite, sorry.

Because quite honestly it's clear that anything I say will just result in an "You're an idiot" response. Again. Which I don't think is warranted for a simple semantic disagreement on what falls under Apples or Oranges.

And frankly, it hurts to be jumped on and called an idiot for one simple mistake. Well, karma's a bitch, and everyone makes mistakes.

Thanks anyway for taking the time to listen.

[Zinegata]

The real problem is that, when this is all over, Zinegata will probably go away thinking 'What a bunch of dogmatic assholes, I couldn't get through to them at all.'. And we'll go away thinking 'Yet another right-wing moron immune to logic.'. Energy will have been spent, arguments will have been made, but no work will have been accomplished. Just a lot of waste heat, and everyone will be less willing to engage in rational discussion in the future.

And I'm too biased to even contemplate why this is.

Nah. I hang out in the Den specifically because I think most people here aren't dogmatic assholes.

Kaelik I now visualize as Titanium Dragon though.

[CatharzGodfoot]

That makes me feel better. I was mainly referring to the impression I got when Tzor finally stormed off, but maybe I was reading it entirely wrong then too. Reason enough for optimism.

[Zinegata]

That makes me feel better. I was mainly referring to the impression I got when Tzor finally stormed off, but maybe I was reading it entirely wrong then too. Reason enough for optimism.

Like I told NineInchNails, outside of the wailing over "Apples & Oranges", the Den actually gave very good answers, and nobody was insisting on standing by answers that defied the laws of physics..

[RandomCasualty2]

So paying people's actual bills in actual money for preventative care costs less than not paying any money at all and having those people go to the ER more often and skip out on the bill. This is actually pretty similar to Crissa's Water Heater example - you're going to end up paying for all the gas anyway, paying "more" for a better insulated heater actually makes your total bill less.

Yeah, finding medical problems early almost always saves money in the long run. It's a lot cheaper to treat the early stages of an infection with penicillin tablets than have to go to the hospital for IV antibiotics. There are also a great deal of surgeries that can also be avoided if a problem is identified quickly enough.

[Vnonymous]

As far as I can tell, the bill appears to just be a gigantic, mandatory transfer of funds from people to the insurance companies.

Making it punishable by fine for people to not buy your product is a dream come true for most businesses, and I'd imagine it'd be a great gift for the lobbyists. Somebody is going to be making an awful lot of money from this bill, and I doubt that most of the "profit" is going to be going to the public.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Ask me how I feel sometime about having to pay utility companies for electricity or pay for car insurance or paying out the wazoo for money going to the military-industrial complex.

Yes, it's possible to frame it in such a way, but people should only accept the 'forced to pay money for profit-hungry corporation products' if they're just that narrow-minded.

And I don't want to hear shit about how I don't 'need' to have electricity or a car or garbage collection. You know, I personally don't, but a certain portion of modern American society on the whole needs to have electricity/car/garbage collection. I'm as sympathetic to this kind of handwaving as hearing that I don't need insurance.

If you really find people paying money to corporations for a product they need to have in order to get on with their day (otherwise they'll have their children taken away in the case of electricity, otherwise they'll lose their job if they don't have a car, otherwise they'll pay a fine in the case of government insurance) then start with nationalizing the utility and banking industry. I'm not saying I'm against nationalizing those things, I'm saying that until there's a credible movement to start doing those things you can shut the fuck up about your selective condemnation.