Conservative Cognitive Dissonance on Public Healthcare

The problem here is that public education is riddled with problems that are rarely solved because doing so would require changing the regulations for every such school in the country. As such, local problems are ignored or taken care of ham-fistedly (see: zero tolerance).

Ah, zero tolerance. It's the best way to avoid thinking.

Unfortunately for the people reading this blog you made the mistake of comparing public health care services with public fire services. The two are ultimately different and therefore cannot be compared.

Let's start out with your question that conservatives need to answer:

What is the difference between someone’s home being on fire and someone’s child needing chemotherapy?

Your answer is nothing. Well that's actually not true.

Public Fire Services are designed with efficient processes and have been proven to work very well. One of the reasons is that a fire is basically a fire, whether it's your home or someone elses. With Public Fire Services its basically one size fits all.

Public Health Services are designed to deliver health care to everyone at the same level at a reduced cost. This can only be done through rationing and providing a one size fits all plan.

The inherent problem with that is, unlike a fire at a home being the same for everyone, each body and its health needs are different.

So what you have in Public Healthcare Services is a degradation of health services and care and thus a degradation in quality of life for each individual.

How can I assert this? Take a look at any country providing Public Health Care Services and I can show you in EVERY country how the society has experienced degradation in their quality of life.

So let's not start lumping healthcare into 'other' public services. Because they're absolutely nothing alike.

"Public Health Services are designed to deliver health care to everyone at the same level at a reduced cost. This can only be done through rationing and providing a one size fits all plan."

No. It can be also done also by refusing to accept Pfizer's drug into the plan unless they sell it at a price we want to pay. It can also be done by removing redundant beurocracies for multiple insurance providers. It can also be done by economies of scale.

Australia has had extraodinary success by refusing to subsidise various drugs unless the price is right; companies are free to sell their drugs at the chemist at full price, but usually don't bother.

Why do you people just make assertions (this can only be done...) without even trying to prove them?

"Take a look at any country providing Public Health Care Services"

Canada. Oh and I add that you have to show that the alleged degredation was caused by the public health care.

You don't disregard the failings in the Canadian system do you? Canada's system is state run, and it's broken. I think it's a fair example of what we could expect in America under a complete nationalized system.

Broken? Can you please cite studies/sources that explain how it's broken?

I'll participate in this exercise once, but showing a study that says Canada has problems is just going to solicit a response that my study is performed by a bunch of politically motivated antiscientists, and only the group that agrees with you has good data. Fact: America's healthcare system delivers the best critical care in the world, and it fails to serve a substantial portion of the population even decently. Canada's healthcare system rations healthcare and forces people to wait, denying them the option of a private (more expensive) insurance option that would liberate them from limitations.

I doubt you'll have a hard time finding serious fault with Canada if you look at their system, not to mention realize that if it weren't for the overpowering expensive research done thanks to US spending, many modern medicines and treatments wouldn't exist. History indicates higher spending in the US' competitive medical development field results in many successful treatments that then distribute throughout the world. Everyone benefits from America's unbridled spending.

http://www.heritage.org/research/healthcare/hl8...

Yes, these are capitalists. But, it's a good read even if you burn Ronald Regan's picture in effigy while you read it.

There's a reasonably balanced report on Wikipedia that highlights some of the problems in both systems, but wait times for serious illness are the single largest complaint about the single-payer healthcare systems.

In the US, if you have private insurance you won't likely have to wait long for diagnostics or treatment for serious illnesses.

"For example, 21% of Canadian hospital administrators, but less than 1% of American administrators, said that it would take over three weeks to do a biopsy for possible breast cancer on a 50-year-old woman; 50% of Canadian administrators versus none of their American counterparts said that it would take over six months for a 65-year-old to undergo a routine hip replacement surgery."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_and_Ameri...

The Wikipedia article cites reports, surveys and studies.

@ Jsasonn,

WTF, are all Americans armchair medical economist experts on the Canadian health care system?

Canada's system is not broken, it only lacks certain ineffiencies at certain points of the system that are needed to deliver more bang for the buck.

It is not broken at entry level to the system. Every single Canadian can walk into a clinic or hospital and receive an initial diagnosis and initial treatment for acute symptoms. I seem to recall the figure that there are more Americans in TOTAL that can not do that then the total number of people in Canada.

It is with follow-on treatments that rationalization begins as a form to set ceiling limits for the totals being spent.

The American system for the most part, operates on an profit motive, and that is why one can receive services/treatment more quickly if one can afford to pay. I also believe that a two-tier system where those with money can go to other markets is fine, since it removes people from the line-up.

The double edge sword of that motive is that it also provides an incentive for private insurers to refuse treatment to clients who actually hold insurance. One might recall in SICKO the allegation that the majority of those forced into bankruptcy were holders of private insurance who were refused treatement, and why greedy executives from such companies make such obscene amounts of money.

There are advantages of early treatment of course, in terms of savings, so Canada wins there. The practioners have as their focus care of the patient. In Canada, it is cost containment by rationalization due to years of overall government waste and mismanagement that has squandered the taxpayer's purse. In the states it is so profit focused that hospitals spend much more on administrative costs for billing purposes (about 10 times or more).

Real cost efficient care of the patient will not occur unless the drivers become more balanced on both sides.

First error, Americans don't go w/out healthcare because they can't pay for it. That's crap. Most cities (if not all) have public hospitals that are required by law to take patients regardless of ability to pay. And, ALL hospitals are legally responsible for life threatening treatments for all people that walk into them, regardless of financial compensation.

My baby daughter had a broken leg and they set it w/out any guarantee of payment. That required urgent treatment, surgical treatment and follow up work from the doctor. We were poor, destitute and had no way of paying the bills. The hospital and doctor did the work expecting to write off the entire expense and that was a private "for profit" hospital and doctor.

Don't get me wrong. Insurance companies are not my friend. I've been stuck for tens of thousands of thousands of dollars in medical bills thanks to unscrupulous health insurance companies. But, I've never been denied healthcare, not even extremely expensive high quality care. Of all the poor and neurotic people I've known, I've never known anyone actually denied healthcare, even extremely expensive and advanced procedures.

America's biggest problem is a lacking free and public basic level healthcare system. We have a lot of mental illness suffering patients that clog the hospitals to seek drugs or attention, which would be far better served by wellness services and councilors.

In my home town we have a private for-profit hospital and a local humanitarian healthcare group that both offer virtually unlimited free services to the uninsured. And, if you live in America and you actually can't afford the $400-$1300 a month for family private health insurance, you can usually get on public insurance free. We have Medicaid fro children, disabled, poor and Medicare for anyone over 65.

People keep talking about America's for profit healthcare system. Who works for free? Do all the Canadian doctors, nurses, researchers and drug companies do all their work for alms? No. Everyone works for profit. In the US, providers often do work for which they're not compensated. In Canada, the state pays. Most people Iv'e talked to that use both systems prefer the US model.

It stinks. But, it's the best I've ever witnessed first hand.

Canadian provincial governments try and contain spending, and the public pays through taxation if they don't, and it knows it.

Canadian hospitals are not profit driven, they are care delivery driven and their goal is to not operate within budget. Private American hospitals ARE profit driven. Only doctors are not on salary in Canada, operating most of the time for a fee for service with ceilings for billing per set period, also set by the government.

Rationalization is necessary in an environment where poor management does not optimize value for investment, and political interference by the party in power interferes with long term progress. But unltimately, we do have a " free and public basic level healthcare system." It is for the next levels of treatment that inefficiencies rear their ugliness.

freakwent,

Refusing to accept Pfizer's drug into a government plan unless they sell it at a price you want to pay is price rationing.

No Government Health Care plan has EVER reduced bureacracies.

Subsidizing anything means someone else is paying the difference and that always translates to the consumer paying the difference one way or another.

Canada? You've got to be kidding? Let's just use Canada's wait lists as an example. Wait listing is one form of rationing. There are many examples of cancer patients, heart patients, etc., waiting for treatment. During their wait, everyone one of those people experience a degradation in quality of life.

BTW, you see many Canadians come down to America to get health care services that they need. I can't find one American cancer patient or heart patient that has gone up to Canada for health care.

Nu-uh. Your Canada facts are made of fail. Purely anecdotally, I've never had to wait longer than 4 hours (for something non-critical but painful, in the ER) in my entire life. My parents both had heart surgeries done in the same weeks they were diagnosed. And you forget to mention that the people who go down to the US for treatment were SENT THERE by their doctors, and that the tab was picked up by their respective provincial healthcare agencies. I can personally name at least three expat Americans who *moved* to Canada as they admired our system of government, wanted accessible, quality higher education for their kids, and wanted some of that delicious socialist healthcare of ours. I'm sure they're not the only ones!

Hmmm seems like all your stuff is purely anecdotal. Guess, according to you,
thats made of fail. Thanks!

Peter, you're accusing the blogger of writing an oversimplified analogy. Obviously a fire has much simpler solutions than cancer. Cancer is unbelievably complex. But, wildfire isn't nearly that simple. The solutions are technically complex. Or, better yet how about a war analogy? Policing is incredibly complex and yet we trust the state to do that. What about public transportation, roads, rail, etc.?

I see a flaw in these comparisons. If your argument starts with "It's complex," and ends with "and states that do it fail miserably," that's also an overly simple answer. But, then what can we do on blogs? We'd need months of discussion to even formulate a complex basis for debate on something as complex as healthcare. And, perhaps that supports your idea that healthcare is so complex we should allow free market forces to work out for themselves various levels of quality and delivery. Wait, I just messed up your point with my own.

The better argument free market vs. universal (state paid) healthcare, if you were to make a free market stand, is liberty and freedom to succeed and fail. The same thing that makes a faster PC, a better car or flatter clearer television screens also benefit the healthcare technology sector.

Public health is so complex that a free market allows for some people to suffer miserably bad healthcare while others benefit from a choice of superior healthcare, and we all benefit from dissemination of the better solution when it proves itself.

But, the state healthcare proponent is just going to counter with some concoction of market forces in the state paid system. And, let's be fair. America's healthcare isn't exactly free market. When's the last time someone paid for a bypass surgery out of pocket. It doesn't happen often. Or, what about chemo? Is there really pure market forces at work? Don't the health boards decide what protocols are acceptable and the poor patient subjects himself to the whim of the health insurance company as to what procedures or treatments they consider worth their money?

No, we long since stopped being "free" and we now suffer a concoction of private and public already. A significant amount of healthcare is delivered to people in their last years, meaning it's paid by public systems already. The argument you make would be best made against the straw man of public employed physicians and salary caps. By the way, that kind of stuff is in the plans before Congress. That part is a legitimate argument. Quite a different argument, and one which I've not yet seen a strong defense of, is this idea that we shouldn't offer payment for those services from a public source so that we don't have people who die because they don't have the money.

Jason,

I'm stating the blogger is comparing apples to oranges.

My idea, that you incorrectly stated, is this: The patient and the doctor are the ones that can most effectively deliver quality health care. It's NEVER been a Government.

You are confused about what free market is. Free market does not mean that the service is free. Free market is a market based solution with the least possible government regulation and interference as possible. Should we have smart regulations? Absolutely. For example a huge reduction in the cost of health care can be accomplished regulating malpractice, thus reducing insurance costs for everyone.

For the people that can't afford health insurance because they can't work or are incapable there are solutions that don't involve putting all people under a Government Health Care plan so a few have it.

Finally, most people have forgotten that health care is a personal responsibility and not a right. If you practice unhealthy habits in a market based solution, you as an individual have the personal responsibility of bearing that financial burden.

I just don't know how to address the idea that free market = free. Obviously, I'm talking about state paid solutions vs. private sector solutions. I doubt anyone reading this misunderstands the differences between free market and state solutions.

The erroneous position is that state paid health coverage = no free market. Such a plan is infected with the problems and personality of bureaucratic styled systems run from the state, but then so is everything in this so-called "free enterprise" driven society. America is not a "free market" country in a pure sense, not in the least.

We've not been a laissez' faire marketplace in quite some time. And, this is especially true when it comes to healthcare. Healthcare is largely already paid by public funds. Hospitals, training institutions and all sorts of medicine are delivered on the backs of taxpayers. Secondly, it's one of the most regulated services the private sector provides, to the point it's almost dishonest to call it private at all.

Conservatives call a national healthcare insurance program socialism and then call federal oversight of banking "regulation." It's the picking and choosing that the blogger takes issue with, and quite frankly I've yet to see a conservative squarely address the issue with sound logic.

To inform you, because you so badly misunderstand my position, I once would have called myself a "conservative." But, I've since developed a sensitivity that such a classification is tantamount to calling myself a religious Republican. And, I find myself more and more out of step with an increasingly anti-intellectualized party of emotion vs. critical thought politics. This is exactly what I disliked about the Democratic party.

Now, let me deal with your sound arguments.

1) Public insurance for people who can't care for themselves does not require an umbrella for the millions that can pay their own premiums.
2) Healthcare is a personal responsibility.

I wholeheartedly agree with both statements. And, you can defend those statements logically. But, the premise the blogger poses has yet to be defeated. You're just saying you believe in something. You're not addressing his claim that your position is inconsistent.

Why do you fail to do that? You allow him to keep his position when it is flawed. He's absolutely correct that many conservatives have no problem spending state tax dollars to fund state systems for the things they think are best run by the state. But, that's not an intellectual's position. It's a simple party position help by the masses.

My argument against state run anything is the state does a terribly ineffective and inefficient job doing anything it does. Sometimes, a state system is the most efficient because as a public service we can agree to the inefficiency and bureaucratic costs since publicly funding and managing a single source makes more sense. This is true for roads, public water works, sewers, etc. But, would you let your local water board make your healthcare decisions? What if they had medical degrees? No, we can afford for water to be overpriced and badly managed. In most cases we don't notice. Roads are the same. No road system is well managed. They run like crap, run over budget, typically involve pay offs, over pays, and millionaire cousins. But, we all benefit so much from the relative cheapness of a public road system that we tolerate the bureaucratic costs.

Healthcare, on the other hand, is quite another animal. In a pure free market economy, the costs would plummet. Much of the rise in cost is regulatory and public fund related. If it weren't for Medicare how much of the extreme costs involved in later life care would still cost what they do, and perform as poorly as they do? There is zero market force involved in late life care today, because the free market doesn't negotiate price or quality, government does. If you want to see how a government run system will work for all of us, just go to the local VA or hang out with your favorite 70 year old. But, even that is somewhat effected by the private market forces because they use facilities and doctors that fall under private market pressures.

So, the truth is this is an extremely complex debate. It won't fit into a neat 5 second snippet that some polished nubile Fox News anchor can slather between shows, nor does it fit the rhetoric of some angry CNN correspondant. It's a legitimate conversation that should have taken place decades ago about how public systems most often encourage corruption and waste and private systems leave many people uncovered.

If you were a free market purist, you wouldn't suggest we have any public coverage. What's wrong with that? Well, we seem to agree that old people shouldn't be left out of the system just because the free market doesn't offer a present day solution to provide them services they can afford. And, that's factual. Without government insurance, most people over 65 wouldn't have adequate healthcare.

It's broken. I think we all agree on that. But, it's not so broken that it doesn't continue to serve most of us pretty well. The big question is how do we stop it from bankrupting our country? Medical costs soar. People continue to lose coverage. Nobody wants to discuss making healthcare insurance portable, so when we lose our jobs we often lose our access to any form of coverage. Instead of screaming "commie!" or "stupid!" we may want to sit down and rationally negotiate a better solution.

Jason,

The correct position is that a Government run healthcare system = no free
market. If you read the entire bill you will see that Obama and Dems, over a
period of years, through regulations and unfunded mandates seek to do
exactly that.

You're point of health care being largely paid by the public funds is
correct. Only 12% of healthcare is being paid out of pocket by consumers.
Which, correctly proves what I'm trying to say - We would be all better off
if government was limited.

It's very simple and proven over and over again - the more government
involves itself into our lives the worse are lives become.

The Obamacare plan isnt about healthcare at all. Its about control and
power. If that's not evident to everyone then its their duty to read the
entire bill as I have and see for themselves.

Additionally - You merely have to listen to Obama and his buddies themselves
tell you so - The Public Plan
Deception<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZ-6ebku3_E>

Holy crap, that was awesome. Please come back often.

"Finally, most people have forgotten that health care is a personal
responsibility and not a right."

Somehow you missed the entire point.

Then by all means, what was your point?

The exact opposite of the quote of yours I posted.

Daniel, I think your point (in this blog post) is that Republicans that say public healthcare is a socialist pariah are inconstant when they support other public works but choose this line to draw in the sand.

Actually, that sounds like a good beginning for a much needed debate.

The question for someone who favors free market (making my own argument now) is that it simply does a better job. The problem is how do we choose a free market solution for everyone. The answer is you can't. That's the whole point of a free market solution. You must have the option of not buying it at all. So, insuring everyone with a private market solution is impossible. If you force me to buy it, it's not free market.

So, the debate continues.

A free market police or fire department may well provide better services as well. Crime goes up, a neighborhood fires the sheriff and hires a new guy. Houses burn to the ground every day because of lacking supply or planning at the public level. Crime prevention is miserably poor. And, do we need to debate public education. Fail, fail, fail.

The issue I would take with your example if that you provide two glaring examples of state failure.

Who wants to go to a cancer treatment facility with the success rate similar to that of crime prevention or the average fire? The average fire results in serious property destruction. So, like the CDC, we may stop your disease from killing others, but you're likely going to die or suffer permanent damage from any serious illness if that's the standard.

Well then I didn't miss the whole point. You stated that health care is a
moral & societal obligation. I disputed that. The health and care of an
individual's own health is their own.

You stated that the difference between public fire service and public health
care is nothing. I disputed that as well.

Interesting thinking, and it does follow a logical patter I'll admit. But, the question ultimately arises: does anyone have a right to charge for anything? Should we sell food, cleaning supplies, transportation, housing? Aren't all these things part of a civil first world life? Why should my lack of skill deny me the same square footage your skills supply you? It's a slope argument. But, it's a slope you've stepped onto. The conversatives are just a few steps behind you on the same slope.

food, cleaning supplies, transportation, housing?

Typically most nations fix these problems by providing a minimum welfare payment sufficient to provide a basic level of dignified life. The details vary.

Health is a special case, you can eat for $1.50 a day, clean with water, old bicycles are cheap and housing can be had very cheaply if you aren't fussy.

Medical care is a special case because a broken arm from falling off a bike (or a heart attack...) has a bigger impact on your life than missing a meal or a week on the streets, AND it's a thousand times more expensive, a double whammy.

This is a logically fallacious line of reasoning. Public services such as fire and police departments exist because the liberty to maintain the domicile in such a fashion that an individual can effect these services for themselves has been regulated away. Public fire suppression services make a great deal of sense because fire can spread. Public militia (in the form of a police force) persists because of the conundrum over the individual ownership of firearms and other self-defense mechanisms. (Coincidentally, health care and individual ownership of firearms works really well in some of the example countries provided in support of the pro-public-healthcare debate.) Public healthcare already exists -- maybe in a stunted form, but having arisen out of need -- because a healthy population where disease is controlled benefits the populace as a whole. So you're correct in that this is an argument over process and policy, but you seem to (erroneously) imply that public healthcare is a new addition to the pantheon of social services that we've tendered over to the government. You've stumbled onto a scope mismatch. If a modern society is one that fosters programs to aid the individual aimed at improving life for the whole, curing one child of leukemia doesn't necessarily benefit society in a meaningful way, whereas vaccinating a million children against tuberculosis does... and while this would have been a more potent and valid way to end your editorial, it turns out that we've already done that. Your point is moot.

As an aside, it seems to me that this is one of the reasons why we can label each other as liberal and conservative. There are many logically sound reasons to experiment with social programs, the most powerful of which is that they already exist because they did arise out of need. But glib comparisons that belittle others' beliefs -- in religion or politics -- are patently offensive. They polarize people where fraction is really not necessary for progress. Calibrate your words more carefully.

There is no difference between "someone’s home being on fire and someone’s child needing chemotherapy"? Is this a joke? A fire takes a number of hours to extinguish, it can take a large number of years for a person to beat cancer. Also, it is extremely rare for a fire department to respond to more than one fire at once, however, hospitals are constantly treating thousands upon thousands of cancer patients. Lastly, the price difference is impossible to ignore. The difference in price between hiring a crew of firefighters to fight a single fire and hiring a full medical staff to treat a cancer patient for a number of years is remarkably large. When you consider the amount of patients that the government will be handling at once, it is impossible to argue that public healthcare will be no worse than our current healthcare system. The government already takes 6 months or more to process a simple blood test for an OWI case, while a hospital can do it in 6 days. That is 30 times as long. It takes the government 30 times longer to process a blood test than it takes a hospital. If you think that treating cancer patients 30 times slower and 30 times more inefficiently is the way to go, then you clearly haven't done much research on cancer. Then again, the author of this article thinks that cancer and fire are the same thing, hopefully his public healthcare will have lots of luck curing cancer by spraying it with hoses!

You compared one fire dept with many hospitals.
You compared cancer with a single fire. You could comapre with an oil refinery fire, or a blevy.

Please cite your source on the OWI case assertions you made up.

"When you consider the amount of patients that the government will be handling at once, it is impossible to argue that public healthcare will be no worse than our current healthcare system."

That's the most ridiculous thing I've seen yet. That's basically saying that the Government can't govern because there are too many people.

The nation currently 'handles' 945,199 hospital beds (http://www.aha.org/aha/resource-center/Statisti...)

The Government handles:

1,473,900 active armed forces (with beds)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_arme...

2,300,000 prisoners in the prison system (with beds)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_t...

138 million taxpayers (they don't get govt beds)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxation_in_the_Un...

So what makes you think that the glorious USA can't count to 950 million? Before you suggest that most health care doesn't need a hospital bed, I'll offer that a system that only covered hospital beds would make many people happy enough, that many more searches and arrests are shown than the incaceration numbers, that the armed forces figure does not include all personell with some sort of security clearance, and that many more people are registered with the IRS than currently pay tax.

Stop being an ass and take the issue seriously.

The question wasn't one of logistics or ease of implementation; it was
one of moral and societal obligation.

Really - we are allowed, by law, to set up and choose private fire services and police services? We are allowed to redirect our funding from public schools to the private school of our choice?

Didn't think so.

Your understanding of conservative thinking on what is rightfully part of government function is lacking... and, yes, it is about time we had a review of the rightful function of government - every part of it.

Your argument comes down to
- Because a range of n services are provided by government, then n+1 should be acceptable
- Most other societies offer n+1 services and we want to be a modern society (as if conservatives want to have a pre-modern society), then we must offer it.
- Conservatives will not challenge you on the n services, therefore they cannot challenge you on the one additional service

Clever attempt, but until you really understand how conservatives view the role of government, you won't be able to argue well with them. I suggest gaining an understanding of negative and positive rights and conservatives' views with respect to them.

As for morality, we fought a huge battle in the US over slavery. Socialism is hidden slavery - force masquerading as compassion.

The historical movement has been towards more freedom - socialism is retrogressive, moving us back to slavery - and has failed everywhere it has been tried.

"Clever attempt, but until you really understand how conservatives view the role of government, you won't be able to argue well with them."

Perhaps, but you haven't explained how the house on fire differs from the leukemia-stricken child. I'll answer; because the fire threatens the property of other people, but the sick child doesn't.

It's the same with the police force and public education. All three services are paid for by everyone, but disproportionately protect or enhance the property of the rich. With education we see a system which strongly promotes ignorance, obedience and narcissim, exactly what you want from employees and consumers.

So when there's a cost to private enterprise, it's socialised. Mining subsidies, agricultural subsidies, military subsudies, anything to support industry and the flow of resources.

However, when it comes to allocating to citizens directly; individuals instead of sectors; suddenly it doesn't pay to live in the USA. There are more people than oppportunities so the dream that anyone can succeed (and afford proper medical care) is one thing, but for the society as a whole what matters is what the average gets.

It's not a conspiracy, it's an emergent property of a skewed society.

If you want to talk about positive rights, I'll point out the limits on free speech and on voting, and the rights of people to organise a union.

If you want to talk about freedoms, I'll laugh in your face loudly about the restrictions on drug use and nudity in the USA.

I don't agree with you that the battle over slavery was based on morality.

Equating socialism (the common agreement of many people to pool resources for the common good) with slavery (the sale of humans as animals) is like comparing an agreement to split a dinner bill evenly with a mugging.

Quite frankly, it's a democracy, so if the majority vote for nationalised health care then that's what you should damn well have, no matter what you think about it, and if you aren't willing to abide by the mechanisms of your society, _legally_ implemented that result in a decision you don't agree with, then you're not really showing any dedication to the democratic process.

Implying that historically we have been moving towards more freedom does nothing to suggest that this is a good thing. A complete lack of all government power, total anarchy, is not really where conservatives are going, so don't pretend that it is.

You have a quarter of the planet's resources, you can put men on the moon and return them, you have global satellite networks and power projection, so don't come crying to us and say that it's too complicated to too expensive to find a way, any way, to stop simple medical conditions from bankrupting typical people.

I think you're living in a theoretical world of absolutes and ideals. Show me successful societies based on libertarianism. Show me successful societies based on your "freedom". Now compare their numbers to those of "socialist" societies.

I think you'll find your model doesn't fair well.

> Socialism is hidden slavery

Bullshit.

> socialism is retrogressive, moving us back to slavery - and has failed everywhere it has been tried.

You're an idiot, much of the world is socialist, it's been wildly successful.

You miss SO many things with this post, the main one being the difference between federal and state government.

The ONLY responsibilities of the federal government are those enumerated in the constitution. Everything else is supposed to be designated to the states a la the 10th amendment.

That's why there's NO FEDERAL FIRE DEPARTMENT!

However, the constitution can be changed. It's your nation, it doesn't have to be the way it is, you are allowed to change it and the founding fathers even allowed a mechanism for you to do so.

If it makes good sense for the Fed to run health care, the constitution is not a good reason against it, if everyone agrees, just change it with another amendment!

There is actually a federal fire department. They only protect federal assets though.

Ron Paul Conservatives would tell you that public schools are a waste of time and money.

But would they necessarily be correct? I don't believe so.

But I don't support public schools, fire departments, or police force...

That's ok, but you might be interested in looking over history to times when these institutions did not exist, especially regarding fire services, which were owned and run by insurance companies. Each had to run their own hydrant network.

Remember that supporting a particular social structure based on a pure ideology does not necessarily always make practical sense when applied to the real world of physical constraints and finite resources.

Then you're an idiot.

I was thinking about this yesterday on my ride home from work. We need to shed this capitalism vs. socialism nonsense that is so much apart of this debate. Socialized solutions can sometimes be good. Market-based solutions can sometimes be good. It is not so cut-and-dry as the pundits on TV make it out to be. Once we embrace then we can start discussing where that line ends.
Nobody should have to pay a policeman to come out and investigate their vandalized house. At the same time we don't want to the government developing the next cell phone technologies.
I think health-care absolutely falls on the side of services that need to be socialized. I had to live five years with gal stones because it took me that long to get a job where I could afford the out of pocket expenses and I had insurance that would pick up the rest of the bill. For five years I had frequent attacks that where as painful as being stabbed with a knife because my employment status (that is, being employed at the "wrong" places) was not up to par enough for society to deem me worthy of getting a very basic surgery. That is not moral for our society and it certainly does not fall in line with the teachings of Jesus that so many of these so called capitalist claim to hold so high.

At the same time we don't want to the government developing the next cell phone technologies.

Why not? 802.11 (wifi) was developed a Govt organisation in Australia, and is now widely used all over the world.

Well said, David.

The challenges of our economy are putting our public services at risk. Across the nation, police and fire stations are cutting back hours, even consolidating and shutting down stations, basically reducing their available services.

Can we say this is the right time for universal public health? IF we saddle the Nation's credit account with another expense, how much would we need to cut in other areas?

Worse, the threat to a reasonable, feasible form of universal health care has not been addressed. Costs are out of control. Bureaucracies are serving their self interests instead of their stated missions. Lobbyists and PACs are rampant in DC always seeking, and daily getting, the ever cherished blank check contract, and Congress now won't perform without them.

Finally, there is a vague concept as to what we are getting. The experts who tout having read the proposal thoroughly won't endorse it. Those who have experienced modern forms of universal health care cannot condone doing so to the one country they look for as a fallback to reasonable care, the U.S.

I am for getting more from our government. In my ideal world, for the taxes I paid, I expect free water, electricity, and phone, well before I expect my health care options to be rationed and doled out as some unknown official sees fit.

In the real world, cost cuts from the economic recession recently forced me out of a better paying job in a series of lay offs. This year, I cannot afford the taxes due to the state or the federal government.

As it stands, and as it stood, I cannot afford any bigger, or any more potentially corrupt, a government than I have already.

As we all now become adrift in the plentitude of possibilities, I forecast a rough, chaotic ride, and must wish you all the best, no matter what our masters decide for us.

-=T=-

"IF we saddle the Nation's credit account with another expense, how much would we need to cut in other areas?"

Clearly that depends on what the amount in question is.

Amsa reckon under 70 billion
http://www.amsa.org/uhc/CaseForUHC.pdf

Fox reckon 1,500 billion
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/first100days/20...

Let's assume the truth is halfway between; 1500-70 = 1430. 1430 /2 = $715billion needed.

medicare+medicaid is 680 bln, so the answer is that we need 35 billion. As luck would have it, VA spends 35 billion per year on medical costs alone, so that gets us our figure, assuming of course that universal health care would be at least as good as the veteran's are getting now.

So the answer to your question is "none".

So the USA already spends $715 billion on public health care today. However, because the two figures above are so diverse, it's impossible to get a proper figure.

(Of course, if you think that the VA is special and that the $750 - 1,000 bln per year on defence is sacred and can't be touched, that's predicatable, but at some point the Christian right has to decide if healing is more Christian than killing. What would Jesus fund?)

I think you make good points--most of which I agree with. But it seems, however, that we are actually agreeing that public healthcare *is* something that we should have--that it's something that should be a basic service just like public schools or the fire department.

Your argument seems to be with failed implementation, and being stretched too thin on resources. And again, I agree on that. But I'd say the solution is to fix our waste issues, to fix corruption, and to fix--above all else--our education system to avoid adding additional load on all the systems mentioned.

The solution is NOT, in my opinion, to say we're too broken already to take on public healthcare.

....."we are actually agreeing that public healthcare *is* something that we should have..."

You have me correctly. It is not a matter of it not being a good idea. It is as proper as universal education. It is a matter of resource, implementation, timing, and process. Without the proper amount and form of each, we are only creating a long drawn out disaster, mandated by legislature and enforced under threat of penalty.

"The solution is NOT, in my opinion, to say we're too broken already to take on public healthcare."

I contend with this statement. Looking at the limitation of resources, this new social program can be started, but we are too broken to MAINTAIN it. In this list of cutbacks, this experimental program, unproven as more efficient than what is in place, and proven as more unaffordable compared to what is in place, would be for the first to go.

Speaking in terms a liberal should appreciate, let's abort this baby, before it does any (more) damage to our future.

-=T=-

EDITED by Daniel: fixed typo and added content for him.

"Speaking in terms a liberal should appreciate, let's abort this baby, before it does any (more) damage to our future."

Dude, way over the line. But in a good way. :)