Leslie

States like California (a blue state which pays more into the federal government than it takes out, btw) are already paying healthcare costs for these groups because their emergency rooms are being used for non-emergency health issues. This is a cost reduction measure for a specific state's budget. If you want to get shitty about it, why don't you aim that bile at the criminals that employ these people illegally, paying them cash and defrauding the US government of taxes owed? Since you clearly don't know how any of this works, I'll type very slowly ... the whole point is to pay them only enough for sustenance with zero allowance for healthcare EVEN WHEN THEY GET HURT AT THEIR ILLEGAL JOBS. The money shot is how they then dump the cost on the law-abiding tax paying citizens of their own state, that's a feature not a bug.

There's nothing wrong with the sources of the articles. The fact that you misrepresent what they say and CLEARLY have zero grasp of the subject matter is what is "moronic".

Steerpike

+1

Giantaxe

Ingles

+3

zargof

I see Diamond Joe has the gaffe machine cranked up to 11.

Hiro11

Healthcare is a tough problem to crack. There are several roadblocks that must be overcome, I'll mention three that occur to me:

1. Voters will need to agree on the nature of the problem. Those on the left typically see the issue as being one of access, those on the right typically see the issue as being one of cost. Every person's political prejudices play a role in how we perceive the issue, complicating the debate. As with most things, the true cause is likely a combination of many, many factors. Tort law, R&D costs, spiraling administration costs... etc. All contribute to the problem. You wind up with a complex and tough-to-encapsulate political message that's hard to sell in speeches. This is why politicians are describing this incredibly complicated problem in over-simplified, binary terms. To me, this oversimplification helps no one.

2. According to the latest census, in 2017 56% of Americans had employer-sponsored health insurance and ~11% had private insurance. About 38% were covered by either Medicare or Medicaid (there is some overlap with those on private healthcare). About 8% of Americans had no coverage at all. These introduces several roadblocks. Speaking as someone who has an employer-subsidized PPO, I'm generally happy with my healthcare. People like me are going to be reluctant to make sweeping changes, and there are a lot of us. Medicare / Medicaid, while extremely expensive, has been shown in multiple studies to actually be one of the most effective and efficient government-sponsored entitlement programs. There are many good reasons to support the current Medicare/Medicaid programs. Again, this reduces some people's willingness to consider the large changes being proposed. These factors have blunted the appetite for change for many Americans.

3. Any centralized healthcare solution relies upon a large population of healthy people subsidizing a smaller group of less healthy people. To me, there are several incentive problems here. Many healthy people will resent paying for other people's healthcare costs and be incented to only pay for catastrophic healthcare coverage for themselves (or go without entirely). After all, healthy people generally don't need expensive maintenance coverage. People who are less healthy due to their own behaviors (examples: smokers, obese people) are less incented to adopt "better behaviors" if they know they can afford treatment regardless of their willingness to change their risky behaviors. The result of all of this is that most any centralized healthcare proposal is by it's nature "soclialistic". For better or for worse, that's something that many Americans balk at. Of course, there's a third population, those who genuinely need help. The difficulty will be in parsing these people from those who Americans consider to have "brought the problem on themselves". This inevitably gets into discussions around nebulous concepts like "fairness", something American politics is notoriously problematic in dealing with.

etc.

caretaker

True that! If he can't learn to answer questions, even loaded ones, he's going to have to learn to dodge them.

Steerpike

Hello Newbie. Please try to use punctuation and capitalization.

dc koop

Or that the Democrats keep attempting to convince people that the homeless are living proof of the failure of the Capitalist system

Giantaxe

Thanks for that "gem" in response to a post made over a month ago. On the ball as ever, I see.

Giantaxe

Once we got past the Dems scratching each other's eyes out about healthcare, I thought it was a pretty good debate that was well moderated compared to the previous ones. Of the front runners, I thought Biden did well in fending off attacks, despite a few weirdly contorted and jumbled answers late in the debate. Castro's "ageist" attack on him might have worked in some environments, but not tonight. Sanders looked off colour - literally. Apparently he was recovering from a cold? Warren was fine and probably got the better of Biden - slightly. Of the rest, I thought that Booker was outstanding -very clear and nuanced answers. But he was good last time around and it got him no traction in the polls. So for whatever reason, I can't see tonight moving the dial much for him. Ditto Klobuchar, who tries to play the I'm from the midwest card a little too often. Too bad, really, as they're both excellent people. Biggest disappointment for me continues to be Harris. I had high hopes for her after the first debate, but she just hasn't fulfilled them. Her defences of her DA/AG record don't sound convincing and her poll numbers have consistently declined since the bounce she got after that first debate.

Steerpike

Watching the democratic party debate tonight, and the CNN coverage afterwards, I saw reference to a poll statistic along the lines of: "Democrats prefer a candidate who wants to build on the existing ACA than replace the ACA with a Medicare-for-all plan ". I went searching and found this KFF poll - pretty detailed, and as recent as September - https://www.kff.org/health-costs/pol...eptember-2019/

Seems like Bernie and Warren are all in for a 'scrap and replace' approach, while Kamala Harris is hedging her bets.

I can barely watch Bernie, with his finger wagging style. He looks and sounds like an angry old man ... I think someone needs to tell him to lighten up. Biden looks tired. I'm not sure any candidate has what it takes, though I remain hopeful about Harris. I'm starting to brace myself for another 4 years of our current circus show.

scrubbedexpat099

The candidate does not have to one of the ten on display last night.

brexit

Sorry Guvnor didnt realise shakespearean formalities were needed here

zargof

Biden just isn't getting any better. He was barely coherent last night, just random fragments of sentences as he tried to assemble his talking points into some sort of order.
Warren did well, defended her policies well and didn't give in to the "taxes are going to go up" trap.
Bernie was Bernie, but a little off his game possible because of the cold.
Harris was a disappointment again. Laughing at her own jokes and not being able to defend her record.
Yang is becoming a broken record (on Biden's record player presumably) with nothing more to offer than his UBI bastardization.
Booker sounds good, but still doesn't give any reason to vote for him.
Castro was pretty good, got himself a moment in the spotlight for his "attack" on Biden. All the pundits whining about that as being too much seem to have forgotten who the President.
Beto actually did well for once. He spoke with passion and conviction on guns and immigration and actually impressed me. Shame most of his policies are terrible.
Buttigieg was very scripted with all his pre-rehearsed lines. The only memorable thing from his was story about coming out.
Klobuchar. Instantly forgettable again.