Here is a way to get out of the Health Insurance mandate part of Health Care Reform..

If you opt out, you opt out.

No medicaid, no medicare.

You will be returned your portion of the medicare payroll tax you have paid since Health Care Reform was enacted.

Then you are on your own.

You opt out, you are out.

No thanks.

Whose side are we on, anyway? The American people, or the health insurance companies that have made such a mess of healthcare?

at the very flawed but better than it was Reform Package that it will suddenly turn into a public option or a single payer system?

I certainly don't think that is going to happen.

Look, I was trying to make a point.

This mandate is upsetting to people on both sides of the political spectrum. The idea is that if everyone is in the system that the risk will be spread over and drive costs down.

That is the point.

If it falters, if president Obama backs off some of the provisions, it would all unravel.

Obama screwed up, pure and simple. Putting us at the mercy of private corporations is not progressive.

But it's not going to get better.

The only way to make this work as it stands now is to mandate people enter into the system.

But if that is in jeopardy, the whole reform will unravel.

That's the only way the Dems will come to their senses.

while they dismantle the country.

was to DISCREDIT what the righties called "government health care."

I refuse to participate in an overpriced rip-off so I'm barred from health care for life?

You must be either young or affluent to think that way.

to be passed in the near future.

If this bill unravels, if the law is taken apart bit by bit it will never come back.

Do you really think that something more progressive is going to come any time soon?

I certainly don't believe it will morph into some kind of public option.

This shit is NOT progressive. Nixon first proposed it and then Gingrich and Dole.

I really don't like how this turned out.

I wanted a single payer public option to compete with the private sector but that chance passed and so we have to make the best out of what is left.

I was very upset with president Obama's giving away a lot of progressive positions in order get something, but he got something.

If we take steps backward I don't see it getting better anytime soon.

Damn, I thought I could post here for almost nine years and wait until the exact moment to let go with my Insurance agenda...

Get real.

He gave everything away for a few scraps.

But what do you think will be different two years down the road. Four years, six years....

Seriously, this is it. We make this work or the goal of universal coverage will be added to the Equal Rights Amendment in the liberal file of what could have been...

in the mess it's in.

Medicare relies on the incoming funds of all workers. It's running a serious deficit, as it is, thanks to that Rx bill of Bush's.

Besides, didn't the employers also contribute?

That won't work. But the Republicans would love it.

This whole mandate thing makes me think Insurance Company stocks will be great investments for the middle class

:bounce:

I would love a single payer.

But I am concerned that if we don't do something to neutralize the opposition to being required to buy in the pool, the whole thing will unravel...

I would like to opt out, please.

especially with the cut backs to $500b medicare (yea, projected increase). That would be the end of Medicare and the new HCR if they actually gave us a chance to opt out. Be careful what you wish for

the teabaggers isn't that self-defeating.

and I do believe calling someone a teabagger (or insinuating it) is a violation of DU rules. ;)

just in a spiteful effort to make sure every soul pays their tribute to the insurance cartel overlords.

Brainless, banal, and evil. Not to mention bought to the soul for not a fucking cent. Just a lie of a program and a motherfucking PR guy of your liking.

do you honestly believe that given the political climate that has taken hold that something better than the plan that was passed is magically going to appear?

Sure, I want a single payer, I want public option.

But the way president Obama has tacked to the right on issues that are economic in nature, nothing more progressive is coming down the pike.

Tell me, given the circumstance that exist today, what is the alternative?

because I'll be damned if I'm gonna be forced to pay out and still get what I have now.... nothing.

will end up with nothing.

Do you honestly think that the Supremes are going to rule the mandate legit?

Cause if they do strike it down then the whole plan in place now will unravel.

And do you honestly believe that if that happens then a public option or a single payer plan with suddenly arise from the wreckage?

Or do you have a viable alternative?

Something realistic in mind?

The best chance for a single payer or a public option is through insurance companies being forced to cover everyone. That spreads the risk. That makes it viable. That makes it affordable.

Obama should have known better.

create some actual price controls, avoid taxing benefits, and embracing the "wise consumer of health care" bullshit mentality then doing nothing and letting the corrupt cancer consume its self on greed is the ticket.


Signed,

Ill at the moment, not a spring chicken, and among the working uninsured.

1. A robust public option with premiums based entirely on income (no age discrimination, no health discrimination), executives with civil service pay, and no deductibles.

2. Anti-trust provisions

3. Permission for the government to negotiate drug prices

4. Complete elimination (not just alleviation) of the Medicare D doughnut hole

But he didn't. Instead, he caved in to the Blue Dogs and twisted the arms of the Progressives saying, "Win one for me." It was all about him, not about what was best for the American people.

He could have given the Progressives what they wanted and twisted the arms of the Blue Dogs, but he didn't. Instead he wouldn't even talk to the single-payer advocates.

I had my doubts about Obama, even though I voted for him.

The health care mess convinced me that my doubts were correct.

:shrug:

I don't think so.

system that suddenly when they need that system it's all okay...

Why would anyone even participate?

If you opt out of the pool, then you are free to go out an buy your health care on the open market as a single unit. Because that is the alternative as it stands right now. See how much you can buy on your own.

The thing is that if the mandate isn't enforced, then the whole idea of spreading the risk across the whole country will fall apart.

Employer based health care benifits or extremly expensive personal health care insurance or if you are old or disable, medicare or waiting until you are so sick that the emergency room has to take you in?

That's worked so well up until now, hasn't it...

The little bastards will still refuse to cough up the money when you use it, just like the employer based plans and the personal policies. I should know, I've been fucked by both.

Are you going to change that too or are you just going to let everyone who opts out bleed to death in the waiting room?






This is among the worst ideas I have ever seen posted here.

My whole point is that if we don't get this system in place and up and running soon, the whole thing will unravel.

The people who show up at emergency rooms don't have access to health care.

Under the plan, there would be heavy subsidies for people to finally get into the system and stop waiting until they are at deaths door to take that trip to the emergency room.

Because if we don't move forward with the plan that is now in place, the whole reform will unravel and I, for one, would rather see this succeed instead of being way layed by a conservative Supreme Court and have to go back and start all over again.

This is an activist Supreme Court, they will do what ever they want and damn the consequences because frankly, what will president Obama do if that happens.

I want a single payer, a public option at least but that is not going to happen if the plan now in place unravels.

Die quickly.

unrec for SSDD





BTW The moment for public option didn't "pass" as you put it. The people asking to be seated at the table during the Senate discussions were shouted down, ridiculed, and arrested for their trouble.
The moment didn't pass, it was dealt away in back rooms by men & women elected to represent us; men & women who have no fear of losing everything they've worked for and still dying for lack of healthcare.

:grr:

the end result is there is no public option, there is no single payer and all we have left at this moment is a mandate to spread the risk around a bigger pool...

That's the reality.

And if the Supreme court over turns it, then it's game over.

If there is an opt out option on the table then it isn't a mandate and so they can't declare it unconstitutional which I am certain they will do without an opt out provision.

They de-elected Al Gore, they allowed all sorts of undocumented money to be poured into our electoral system so yes, they will over turn the mandate, they will gut the only realistic chance we have at sustainable health care reform and as I see it, offering people an option to opt out and not be a part a mandated system but have to suffer the consequence of that choice.

You can call me heartless, you can call me a shill for the Insurance companies if you so desire but I see it as the only realistic way to solve a dilemma.

I call it like I see it and I see nothing realistic from anyone on the left but demanding a single payer system or a public option when clearly, as it stands right now, they are both not in the cards as it stands now.

I wish it were different, but I can't see any other REALISTIC way to get around a right wing dominated Supreme Court, a right wing dominated press and a whole bunch of money from the conservative interests in this country itching to get rid this attempt at Health Care reform.

http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=hdqGnz6UqG

Candidate Obama speaking from Duncanville TX
...appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. In the interview, Obama made the following distinction between his health care proposal and Hillary Clinton’s:

“Both of us want to provide health care to all Americans…. But, she mandates that everybody buy health care. She’d have the government force every individual to buy insurance and I don’t have such a mandate because I don’t think the problem is that people don’t want health insurance, it’s that they can’t afford it.

So, I focus more on lowering costs. This is a modest difference. But, it’s one that she’s tried to elevate, arguing that because I don’t force people to buy health care that I’m not insuring everybody. Well, if things were that easy, I could mandate everybody to buy a house, and that would solve the problem of homelessness. It doesn’t.”

—Senator Barack Obama, February 28, 2008, on The Ellen DeGeneres Show



Then, after some secret meetings with health insurance lobbyists (while single payer advocates were being *ARRESTED*) he flipped a 180. This is why "it is what it is". But it didn't have to be this way. Obama said that during his campaign.

And here's the curious part: It went largely unreported.

Even more curious, the (R)'s failed to bring attention to this u-turn.

I have always been a strong proponent of a Single payer system.

I have a big stake in this since I am in the Lung Transplant program.

But I see the reality.

Upholding the rights of Americans is not "judicial activism", it is doing their jobs. The government doesn't have the right to order us to buy a for profit "product" based on the selection of our employers.

Legally dictated to buy from the company store is exceeding the definition of limited government. You are demanding we enable and embrace a government that can dictate our use of after tax dollars and even cut us out of the loop of deciding for ourselves which "product" we purchase under the mandate.

The position is fucking absurd and deep into fascism.

I've been called a lot of things in my life but never a fascist...

Stop letting emotions get the better of you and look at reality.

All this vitriol from you and yet not one VIABLE alternative.

Way to go.

The law is fascist and that is that. If there is no "viable" alternative then my recommendation is jack apple shit because our very system of government is designed to keep this kind of nonsense from be forced onto a free people.

How is this "viable"? Because you could get a bunch or corrupt and foolish old millionaires to vote for it?

The law is fascist and pushing it to the point of destroying Medicare to get it is the move of a stone cold fanatic. A fascist fanatic. A zealot for corporate dominance over self determination.

No one has to give you a "viable" alternative because "viable" by your definition is these abomination.

I gave you a viable alternative, it was jack apple shit, aka the status quo.

Your "viable alternative" seems to be structurally more insane and immoral than what we have, standing most proudly on insurance companies being forced to take whatever money we and the government can scrap together and write us a policy. Well, not quite because some folks will make too little to buy their piece of shit policy even with subsidies and will be allowed to have nothing without a fine.

You are pushing fascist policies and willing to use fascist sticks and carrots to achieve them, that makes you something in that neighborhood.

Viable to you means nothing other than Congress will pass the bill and a President will sign it into law. You could give a fuck about functionality and being actually within our legal construct. Common sense can go fly a kite.

Clearly, there are aspects of implementation you are ill equipped to discuss because rather than debating them you assign emotion and vitriol to me and dance around like the sugar plum fairy. I have little emotion to spare on you, I've got real fish to fry on that level. If you don't want a cold accusation of fascism then perhaps you ought to give more consideration to your positions, regardless of your assessment of their viability and what viability means in real world application.

The only one we are more than likely are going to get...

this is a start but far too many people wish to jettison what was enacted and hope for something better to come down the road.

But the Congress DID pass a bill and the president DID sign that bill and the bill DID become a law.

The whole purpose of what I said was to set in place something to stop the Supreme Court from overturning the law as it exists in the here and now.

You see I am talking about a bill that DID pass and that I am talking about the bill as it was passed.

It is "realism" that we will be the only Western country that forces its citizens to buy profit-making insurance that has high deductibles and high co-pays expensive enough to prevent people from getting actual CARE.

That is why I dropped my insurance last spring. Their premiums (which would have gone up 34% on my last birthday), were a huge burden, and because of my $5000 deductible (the only way I could come close to affording the premiums), it took me seven months to pay off the bills when I actually needed CARE.

That's REALISM for you.

And since I'm over 50, Obama's bill still allows the bloodsuckers to charge me more than they charge a younger person--something also unknown in other countries.

Fuck that.

I'm not happy with the way things are, far from it, but if we couldn't do better when we had overwhelming majorities and a "liberal" president, what makes you think something will magically change and we will have a Single Payer system run by the public for the public?

Seriously, there are no viable alternatives as things stand now.

And since the Supreme Court will more than likely declare the Mandate unconstitutional, what makes you think that Health Care reform will ever be brought back up for serious discussion.

have helped advance the cause. We need someone who will talk about spreading the risk, why should the government be ultimately responsible for any shortfall for those who are the most needy of HC and subsidize the purchase of for profit HC for people who use the least amount of HC?

Makes no sense to me.

Or is it that you just don't agree and that was all you could come up with...

it eliminates the insurance companies for basic care. Everyone is enrolled in it so there is no reason for a mandate. Various tax schemes pay for it. Canada does it and we should do it.

We all wish for a more progressive solution but this is the reality on the ground right now.

I'm sorry, I just don't think if we don't get this up and running with a mandate then it will be picked to death.

Look how much president Obama gave away when we had control of both houses.

What makes you think that anything will change especially after the November election.

the momentum will be irresistible. Imagine employers moving there because their costs will be so much lower than elsewhere in the U.S. We'd better pull for success in Vermont, which is actually going along this road. And if California can get its budgetary house in order, they could be the second.

and if I somehow manage to increase my income to the required level to live in the U.S. (word of advice, if you want to live in the U.S., don't marry a foreigner unless you're rich), then guess which state I'm going to move to.

and not because they simply don't have the money.

enrollment in a plan will still have access to health care...

A scale that often has nothing to do with what people can afford. People have different circumstances, expenses, and so forth.

One person making $46k (or whatever the cut off is) might have low expenses and no problem - someone else may live in an expensive city, have a high mortgage or who knows what other sort of expenses and in no way be able to afford hundreds of dollars extra a month.

This whole argument is heartless and uncivilized. Why are we protecting a middle layer (insurance companies) to profit from people's need for health care? Why the hell can't we just put a civilized, single payer or medicare for all system in to place?

to provide care..." Dr. Marcia Angell

Conyers asked that she be invited to the WH summit on HC, his request was denied. But Karen Ignagni was invited and Obama called on her to speak. Then at the WH townhall meeting, his personal physician of 20+ and a SP supporter was invited by ABC, but was suddenly cancelled, Obama called on Ron Williams of Aetna to speak who was allowed to attend.

Dr. Marcia Angell
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/slipslidingaway/86

The Dems silenced anyone who would speak against the for profit industry. I'm not buying the idea that universal HC will not pass when the Dems did everything they could to silence NFP advocates and make deals behind closed doors. If this fails then the Dems own it!

Forcing people to buy "insurance" or pay a fine is not what the Democratic party should be advancing... IMHO.


AHIP & BCBSA support guaranteed issue and individual mandate
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/slipslidingaway/96


It's Time for a Real Debate on National Health Insurance
May 12,1993
http://journals.democraticunderground.com/slipslidingaway/93

"...In 2006, a Congressional Task Force created by the 2003 Medicare Modernization Act hosted 29 town hall meetings across the U.S. to ask Americans what type of health care reform they favored. The results of the “Citizen’s Health Care Working Group” were overwhelmingly in favor of single payer health insurance..."

Look this getting people who don't have insurance now is the main priority of this bill.

For what ever reason, president Obama and the democrats in the congress decided that a single payer was not going to make it through so they cobbled together this approach.

My contention, and it is born from a deep distrust of the people in congress now, is that we have to take what can be given and then run with it.

I firmly believe that the Supreme Court will rule the mandate as unconstitutional and that would be that.

I am fifty-three and have been waiting for health care reform to make it out onto the floor for over 20 years now.

I am convinced that this mandate is the only way they could get it through. It's here now. My proposal was to protect the program from constitutional scrutiny.

Agree with me or disagree, I believe we have to take what they passed and run with it. If it fails, it will be worse than it was before when most insurance was doled out due to the benevolence of a company.

If this comes back to step one, I see companies dropping Health Care as a benefit.

This opt out would survive, I firmly believe, would survive constitutional scrutiny.

The reality is when the dem's controlled the whole shebang they couldn't or wouldn't back a one payer system. Nothing that has happened since then points to a progressive resurgence anytime soon. So I figure the best thing to do is strengthen what we have and try tp make it better down the road.

That's such a Republican meme (and the mandate was, of course, a Republican idea.) What we're paying so much for is for the insurance execs to get filthy stinking rich. It's one of the most profitable businesses in the freaking universe. Blaming it on the people who can't pay for emergency room visits is just wrong... morally and factually.

You know who pays for those people's care? NOBODY! That's why they end up in the emergency room instead of getting preventative care in the first place. What usually happens is people just end up with massive debt and lose their house and everything they own and become impoverished... but in the end, they quite often pay up. And the ones that can't? Well, we'd be paying for them anyway if we had single payer, and that would work out just fine. It would be cheaper, even, because they'll get preventative care. And these are the people who can't afford insurance anyway, mandate or no mandate. Some of them will be eligible for government assistance, some of them will simply have to pay the fine because they still can't afford health insurance.

This is a disaster. And too many people are buying into the argument that these people are costing us money. Yeah, them and the welfare queens, they're the ones causing our economic distress as a nation, not the ones that suck up all the money, don't pay any taxes, and gamble away the housing market. Too many of us are starting to sound like Ronald Reagan, and all because supporting the mandate means supporting our guy in the White House.

The mandate sucks, and the Republicans won three times because they got what they wanted, got to blame the Dems for it, and got us libs to defend it.

"The mandate sucks, and the Republicans won three times because they got what they wanted, got to blame the Dems for it, and got us libs to defend it."




x3


If McCains henchman (see: Baucus)had single payer advocates *ARRESTED* at a *HEARING* this place would have literally erupted. Daily protests, marches on DC, civil disobedience... all and more... It's surreal.

I may only have 300 posts but I've been lurking since the Dean Scream and I would bet every single cent I have on that statement.

The Dems pass this convoluted, unworkable mess of a plan that

1) Rewards one of the nastiest industries in the country instead of regulating it or abolishing it

2) Forces people to buy insurance they can't afford that will pay no medical bills because the deductibles will be too high

3) Won't even affect most people till 2014, when they find out that they've gotten not the single-payer health care they were hoping for (or fearing) but more of the same, only compulsory this time

and the Republicans get to blame the Democrats for it.

Such a deal.

The Democrats shot themselves in the foot again because they listened to their Republican Lite wing and strong-armed the Progressives instead of the other way around.

Are you aware that government funded insurance is about 100 times cheaper than private insurance?

So what matters if it does exsist in a working form...