HarryTheSpider

This article highlights the many problems with ObamaCare as currently written.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/1...n_2220152.html

Whilst on the one hand you cannot blame private business for responding to ObamaCare this way, it brings the US closer and closer to tax payer funded healthcare for large groups of the population... Just for 2-3x the cost of what other countries pay, and with less coverage...

So is it time to go the whole way??

Mr Weeze

Yes.

Mr Weeze

Now if I mention Nazis we can effectively end the debate as we have gone off topic. Case closed.

Nazis. QED.

JRG67

The Walmart case will only affect the Chinese, surely?

RoadWarriorFromLP

Single-payer would never make it through the House of Representatives, so no, it probably isn't time.

Continually talking about healthcare only turns it into a political football, and only helps the Republicans by giving them ongoing opportunities to demonize and potentially derail a program that hasn't even yet been implemented. Patience is required for something like this.

Ethelred_the_Unready

I wish. The healthcare system here is a disgrace. I'd still feel exactly the same way about it if I were wealthy and had great health insurance.

A revolution is needed.

HarryTheSpider

Sadly, you may be right...

Lion in Winter

Yes, he should push for it. Not because I think he can get it through - I don't think he can. But by continuing to cause discussion, by continuing to put the ideas out there in the form of proposed policy, he starts to begin to make it possible for socialized medicine to happen at some point in the future. He starts to move the idea from "no one's even talking or thinking about it, it's considered far beyond the pale" to actually bringing it into the framework of the debate. That is progress towards a time when the debate evolves from "it can't be done" to "it can't be done this way" to "how can it be done".

Ethelred_the_Unready

I agree. I honesty think he should fight for it and at least spend the next 4 years trying to convince the American people that the current system is broken and that there are alternatives that don't involve the US becoming a giant Cuba. Many Americans do want universal healthcare, but many are either afraid to speak out or are shouted down by right-wing groups with corporate interests.

I hate to say it as it'll be bad, but the only way the system here will change is if it's either bankrupted by people who just refuse to pay anymore (on a massive scale) or via government intervention.

I MISS the NHS. For all it's faults, it's better than the nonsense here.

kimilseung

In the name of Egar Allan Poe, are you seriously suggesting that single payer health care is fascism, dear God. There was no smiley so I assume that is what you mean.

Michael

Unlike a parliamentary system like most countries have where the party in power can pass just about any type of laws that are desired, senate rules (which can be changed but no party dares to change them since changing them would allow the minority party to undo laws passed by the current majority when they got ito power) would pretty much not allow "single payer health care" to be passed unless the party in power had a super majority.

Although Harry Reid has proposed that the filibuster rule be changed (not drastically) and could be changed by a simple majority vote when the new session convenes (senate rules are the issue to be voted on) , I doubt that any changes will be made since once they are changed even by a minor amount, the democrats would likely worry that when the republicans would next get into power, they would change the filibuster rule to require only a simple majority to override the filibuster and then pass all of their 100 year old social and economic agenda and appoint supreme court justices that would make current republican appointees look like liberals. The republicans also don't dare to change the rules when they have power in the senate since they worry that the democrats will pass European style social programs when the democrats get back into power.

The last time that any major laws were passed was during the LBJ Administration (medicare, medicaid, civil rights, etc.) when the democrats had a super majority, moderate republicans were elected to the senate, and the southern senators were democrats. Although LBJ couldn't have gotten any of those programs passed with his super majority since the southern democrats would have filibustered most of those programs, the moderate republicans assisted LBJ in stopping the filibuster and getting those laws passed.

So the answer is "No" since any proposed "single payer" health care law would be as fruitless and as ridiculous as when the house republicans passed the Ryan's budget and anti abortion legislation more than 30 times during the last session.

For a single payer health care system to be passed, the democrats would need at least 65 senators (at least 5 will be moderates and moderates don't believe in a single payer system), control of the house, and a democratic president. Without all of the above, it would be considered a major political blunder by the Obama administration.

Because of senate rules, the US has had a more consistent (but not necessarily better) form of government than most other democratic governments around the world. Because of those rules, it is very difficult for laws to change drastically when either party is in power. Some consider that good and others consider that bad but generally they change their minds from bad to good when their preferred party is no longer in power.

Also you have to think of the US as more like the EU than a truly united country such as France. Because of the differences between states and states rights, it would be almost as hard to pass major laws at the federal level than it would be to pass laws by the EU that all countries in the EU would accept.

Lion in Winter

I think you can only look at his post #3 in the context of his post #2. Unless I've had too much sherry and can't understand any of this.

kimilseung

Sherry is the tipple of the day is it?, I was just making a Poe's law reference. Trumping Mr Weeze's Godwin, with a Poe.

Lion in Winter

Ooh, waaaay to much sherry to follow that level of sophistication.

Mr Weeze