Tried and failed

**lakeman** · 7th October 2009 09:20 AM

This is an article that discusses just how most of the health care reforms under consideration have already been tried and have already failed.

"Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis famously envisioned the states serving as laboratories, trying "novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country." And on health care, that's just what they've done.

Like participants in a national science fair, state governments have tested variants on most of the major components of the health-care reform plans currently being considered in Congress. The results have been dramatically increased premiums in the individual market, spiraling public health-care costs, and reduced access to care. In other words: The reforms have failed. "

The article goes no to list just what was tried and just how it failed.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...453947646.html

"Despite these state-level failures, President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats are pushing forward a slate of similar reforms. Unlike most high-school science fair participants, they seem unaware that the point of doing experiments is to identify what actually works. Instead, they've identified what doesn'tâ€”and decided to do it again."

**Dr.Knuckles** · 7th October 2009 09:24 AM

And yet 30+ countries have done it on the national level for half a century without greater success than the current US system.

**Feslin** · 7th October 2009 09:29 AM

[quote name='Dr.Knuckles' date='07 October 2009 - 04:24 PM' timestamp='1254929085' post='33965']

And yet 30+ countries have done it on the national level for half a century without greater success than the current US system.

[/quote]

Yeah, and the one country that spends the highest percentage of tax dollars on healthcare is the United States of America.

Want to see a good healthcare system? Get rid of the socialism.

**Dr.Knuckles** · 7th October 2009 10:07 AM

political economic ideologies are tools - they are fitted for specific jobs and should be used for those jobs they suit. Try using social economic theory for farming and you get a whole lot of hungry people. Capitalist theory gets food on the table, but it is the worst possible way to handle law enforcement or a judiciary.

Fuck the idological lines in the sand. If the job needs a wrench, use a wrench. If the job needs a hammer, let go of the damn wrench. Health care is an emergency service. Emergency services work best with the economcy of scale that comes with the public option. Look at the best systems in the world and they all have the same thign in common - public insurance / private services.

**Feslin** · 7th October 2009 10:13 AM

[quote name='Dr.Knuckles' date='07 October 2009 - 05:07 PM' timestamp='1254931660' post='33974']political economic ideologies are tools - they are fitted for specific jobs and should be used for those jobs they suit.[/quote]

A political idealogy is need to figure out what those "jobs" are.

No matter how you look at it idealogy is always gonna be there.

Try using social economic theory for farming and you get a whole lot of hungry people. Capitalist theory gets food on the table, but it is the worst possible way to handle law enforcement or a judiciary.

No it's not, since most capitalists aren't anarchists. Most capitalists are adults.

Emergency services work best with the economcy of scale that comes with the public option. Look at the best systems in the world and they all have the same thign in common - public insurance / private services.

Wrong. The Swiss system, which is one of the most effective in the world, if not the most effective, has no public option.

...not that I like their system.

**Freedom for All** · 7th October 2009 10:47 AM

[quote name='Dr.Knuckles' date='07 October 2009 - 08:24 AM' timestamp='1254929085' post='33965']

And yet 30+ countries have done it on the national level for half a century without greater success than the current US system.

[/quote]

The US system works fine. If you're sick, pay for your own care.

Nothing can be better than that. There's certainly no reason I should have to pay for someone else's care.

**Freedom for All** · 7th October 2009 10:49 AM

[quote name='Dr.Knuckles' date='07 October 2009 - 09:07 AM' timestamp='1254931660' post='33974']

political economic ideologies are tools - they are fitted for specific jobs and should be used for those jobs they suit. Try using social economic theory for farming and you get a whole lot of hungry people. Capitalist theory gets food on the table, but it is the worst possible way to handle law enforcement or a judiciary.[/quote]

You didn't used to post such ignorant crap like this.

What happened to you?

You want to pretend true capitalism would include the police and the courts?

Why are you being ignorant. Capitalism NEVER assumes the legitimate roles of government, capitalism is about the freedom of the commercial market, not government.

**Pragmatist** · 7th October 2009 11:13 AM

[quote name='Freedom for All' date='07 October 2009 - 12:47 PM' timestamp='1254934036' post='33980']

Nothing can be better than that. There's certainly no reason I should have to pay for someone else's care.

[/quote]

Then why aren't you bitching about the current system? Or are you just too fuckin stupid to realize you are paying for someone else's healthcare?

**kmiller1610** · 7th October 2009 01:30 PM

[quote name='lakeman' date='07 October 2009 - 11:20 AM' timestamp='1254928832' post='33964']

"Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis famously envisioned the states serving as laboratories, trying "novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country." And on health care, that's just what they've done.[/quote]

It's interesting to note that the states were also the laboratory for the bill of rights.

Let the states prove what we already know. Universal health care is not even a good idea. You more you provide, the more they will use and the more the prices and costs will go up.

At a state level, try universal major medical with a large deductible. That's a plan I'd like to see tried.... In fact, I'd bet it has been tried.

It makes no sense to have your doctors and health care facilities tied up with voluntary admissions and exploratory visits and "I think my doctor is sexy, so I want to see him today" visits.

**Djinn** · 7th October 2009 01:52 PM

I don't know if anyone here reads the "Doonesbury" comic strip, but a week or two ago, they had a very nice bit in which the main Mike Doonesbury's geriatric mother attended a protest against health care reform, "on behalf of our nation's terrified senior citizens."

To make her point against the evils of socialism she burned her Medicare card. Unfortunately, in doing so, she burned her hand, and was unable to receive treatment at the local hospital because she didn't have a Medicare card.