Trumpcare

[Gerry]

Gerry,

 

Could you quote in such a way that anyone reading this will know who wrote it and when. If you click on the bottom right corner you can edit and quote from there. There is a little quote icon on the toolbar on the editor.

 

Thanks

After sitting around I thought your question would work better for the other long post about Medicare/Public option.

 

The bulleted points about parts A, B and D  and secondary insurance were simple Google searches:  "cost medicare part a/b/d premium" then coping what popped up in the "box". 

 

I know I went to this site  for part b

https://www.medicare.gov/your-medicare-costs/part-b-costs/part-b-costs.html

https://www.medicare.gov/your-medicare-costs/costs-at-a-glance/costs-at-glance.html

Edited April 13, 2017 by Gerry

[Brian]

Brian it is HC costs! There will always be a big red flag.

That's not it... Well, that's only part of it.

 

Let's ignore for the moment that this is hugely illegal.

 

What you are proposing amounts to a soup-to-nuts take-over by the Federal government of the entire healthcare system, which is exactly what Obama intended ACA to accomplish.

 

You complain about "ratfuck" politicians but you are advocating for them, in collaboration with their corporate cronies and their sycophantic stooges, to control every aspect of the healthcare system -- not just "insurance" (which has increasingly become a misnomer) and delivery but education and research and development and treatment -- literally from cradle to grave.

 

History suggests that Washington will use "private-public partnerships" and "nongovernmental agencies" to effectuate this take-over, similar in approach to the way they have taken over college loans and college accreditation and home mortgages (each a topic worthy of extended personal investigation, BTW) but it will be Washington calling the shots. Washington defining "insurance plans" and setting rates, Washington establishing reimbursement rates (which means what providers can charge), establishing uniform standards of care (which means who gets what treatment), dictating devices and chemical entities and diagnostic procedures -- every aspect of healthcare, which will quickly extend into lifestyle choices. When NYC established that bizarre "Big Gulp" law, it was almost a joke; just wait until people like Nancy Pelosi and Lindsey Graham start deciding what recreational activities are too dangerous for the Federal government to allow to impact "the people's healthcare system."

 

Obama already explained to the doctors in the AMA how their jobs will work in the future -- they will be evaluated and compensated based entirely on how well they follow government mandates and they will be absolved of malpractice liability if they comply precisely with government standards of care.

 

Fellow Travelers on The Long March have been working towards this objective for almost a hundred years, Gerry. This is the lynchpin.

Edited April 13, 2017 by Brian

[Brian]

"god" help me... I'm still here.

 

I have not read in depth Brian's link just scanned it for now. From the article"

 

This does not say here that prior to medical indebtedness, that trouble paying bills was commonly a household issue and that was already placing these households at the edge of needing bankruptcy protections. Secondly the implication, as I read this, is some people who live on the margin, our working poor, struggle with finances. However these households while in debt are not households entering bankruptcy. What it is clearly saying, as I read this, is if you have an economically challenged household, medical debt will escalate [instantly?] your situation to the point of needing bankruptcy protections.

 

What I also read is a pejorative suggestion that these households were already no better than dead beats by their nature. For a unskilled household to struggle with bills is not an indication of a fundamental character flaw.

 

To personalize this... My daughter and her husband while working 80+ hours a week earn just above what 70% of households earn. The husband is employed through a temp agency which renders him vulnerable to intermittent layoffs. He does this because these temp jobs pay 150% to 200% of the pay for typical unskilled labor. These "typical unskilled" jobs are easy to get, but they also do not assure a 40 hour work week.

 

His skill, an Art major, is an area that is hard to find full time employment.

 

When he is between placements they struggle and might fit into the papers pejorative suggestions, that is their household is tending toward dead beat status. It is fortunate their health care is provided for by her employer. Their household is in the 70th percentile of American house holds. If my daughter lost her position, and depending on the insurance she might secure, their household's ability to pay their medical costs could force them into a very weakened situation. Going from the working poor to an impoverished household is a thin line.

 

If in the worst of all circumstances medical bills pushed their total indebtedness to the point of needing bankruptcy protections, the cause of the bankruptcy would be medical costs even given the associated other economic stresses.

You subsidize your daughter and her husband so they don't have to worry about being able to pay their medical expenses? You take care of their bills?

[Gerry]

You subsidize your daughter and her husband so they don't have to worry about being able to pay their medical expenses? You take care of their bills?

I will reread this.  I do not think you can read it that way.

 

• She has a full time long time job.  That job provides the household's HC.
• Her husband over the last 4 years [plus or minus]  has acquired employment via a temp agency. He is thus able to get 40 hours per week plus some overtime.  These jobs pay from $15 to $25 per hours but mostly about $20/hr.  [bTW: he is thus ineligible for unemployment insurance and receives zero benifits. ]
• When things are good, their total income is in the 70th percentile for American households.
• When he is between jobs their household struggles with meeting obligations.
• If HC was an added concern, medical bills for emergency services etc. would move them to the brink of bankruptcy if only one of them was unemployed.

 

Their's is a household which I would but in the working poor category, though when it is all working well they are low-middle class fro around here.

 

Now I have "picked" up the slack for them at times.  They have 3 kids, and I have paid for dance classes. There public pre-school was not free, and I have paid a month or two when needed. I tend to buy clothing etc. for the kids as needed.  I "loaned" them my Nisan Quest, and paid the insurance, for 4 years until it died. 

 

I go by the name Pa.  I am also called PaDayCare and have been that for the last 10 years.  At one point at least 5 days a week I cared for 5 infants from 6am to 5pm.  At one point I had 5 under 2 years old, and 3 of them were 3-5 months old.  If either of my daughters had to pay for daycare, it would have been an extreme economic hardship. [My other daughter is a school teacher and husband is a school administrator.]

 

One thing they are not is irresponsible dead beats.  Brian's Your linked article makes reasonable points, however I felt an overall tone was medical costs were only part of the issues for households already edging toward bankruptcy.  In tone, I felt they were just a hair from saying, "Well these were the type of household already  on the dead beat end of the scale. So what difference if some of their debt was medical.?"

 

I will go back and reread my original post to see how you got your questions.

 

Edit: on reread i saw that opps...

Edited April 14, 2017 by Gerry

[Gerry]

Fellow Travelers on The Long March have been working towards this objective for almost a hundred years, Gerry. This is the lynchpin.

 

 

I swear you eat "Conspiracy Flakes" for breakfast.

 

If I can make one of those "ratfucks" vote my way, then they are my "loveable" ratfucks.  Ya know, 'By any means"  to my ends.

 

 

What you are proposing amounts to a soup-to-nuts take-over by the Federal government of the entire healthcare system, which is exactly what Obama intended ACA to accomplish.

 

First, I do not see these things as you do.  But sure, this is sortofkindof what the ACA was intended to be. Well at least from you end of the stick.  Had those ratfuck traitor Dems sided with my man OB-Wan, and not with those coldblooded anti-human ratfuck bastards....  Well we just don't know.

 

 

... Lindsey Graham ..

Is he on your ratfuck list?

[Gerry]

 

Let's ignore for the moment that this is hugely illegal.

 

If you get it passed it is never illegal.  Who knows how SCOTUS might rule.

[Gerry]

The Long March (October 1934 – October 1935)

 

What hundred year long march?  Where those commies hiding under your bed. bead?  Bad commies!

Edited April 14, 2017 by Gerry

[Brian]

I swear you eat "Conspiracy Flakes" for breakfast.

 

If I can make one of those "ratfucks" vote my way, then they are my "loveable" ratfucks. Ya know, 'By any means" to my ends.

 

 

First, I do not see these things as you do. But sure, this is sortofkindof what the ACA was intended to be. Well at least from you end of the stick. Had those ratfuck traitor Dems sided with my man OB-Wan, and not with those coldblooded anti-human ratfuck bastards.... Well we just don't know.

 

Is he on your ratfuck list?

Conspiracy? Yep. Conspiracy theory? Nope, not when it is completely out in the open. Has been for years, with the exception of periodically denying it and claiming that they aren't communists, they're just socialists. (Marx explained when he switched from calling the movement the former to the latter, you know...)

 

You just haven't been paying attention. Or you believe Marxism is the right solution? You wouldn't be the only one on the forum who thinks so.

 

Philly is not terribly far from you, Gerry. Did you happen to attend this little gathering last Summer?

 

http://socialists.us

[Gerry]

You just haven't been paying attention. Or you believe Marxism is the right solution? You wouldn't be the only one on the forum who thinks so.

 

Philly is not terribly far from you, Gerry. Did you happen to attend this little gathering last Summer?

 

http://socialists.us

Not my thing.  To think this might have an appeal for me is to not understand me at all.  I am not a Marxists.  I am an odd variant that you might find some resonance in things I say and believe.  Last time I read Marx, and that was 90% his pre-economic thoughts, I was 20 and that was 48 years ago.  [The reason that my level of detail got the Lenin connection wrong.  The two of them were always tossed into the same salad.] Around the same dates in my history, and perhaps for 5+ years earlier, I was interested in the origins of communism [the community thing not the political derivative of Marx and Lenin] in America.  I found the Shakers interesting, and some local community in the NE area from about the same time as the Shakers.  I am relatively sure it was Brook Farm.

 

[ Edit:  I am sure that this is it.  They were in West Roxbury and I remmeber seeing one of those historical landmark bronze markers.]

 

So,  Yes these notions of share experience, community Communism, is fundamental to my perception of society.  On the other hand at the same time I was incredibly drawn to Phenomenology, mysticism, linguistics, and Eastern philosophy/theology.  I have told you before that this juxtaposition of philosophies had me telling my Marx/Lenin/Mao friends that they had their heads up their ass.

 

This is related to some of the camp fire and better species stuff.

 

What concerns me is you seemed obsessed with this stuf.

[Gerry]

 

(Marx explained when he switched from calling the movement the former to the latter, you know...)

You have dangled this twice, and since I do not care enough, would you like to be less obscure?

[Brian]

You have dangled this twice, and since I do not care enough, would you like to be less obscure?

Sure!

 

He was asked, and he explained that he changed the name from Communism to Socialism when he moved to England after having been chased off the Continent because the former had developed such a bad rap. There's no difference, you see, despite what the young Marxists think these days (you know, the Clinton fans, Bernie followers and Obama groupies and the like).

 

This "movement" changed its monikers like a snake shedding its skin -- "liberal," "Progressives," "Community Organizers," "Democratic Socialists" (that was Lenin's party before it was Bernie's), etc., etc. In 1984, they were "English Socialists" ("EngSoc" in NewSpeak) and the politcal philosophy was labeled​ "Oligarchical Collectivism."

 

I speak of the philosophy often in political threads because it is highly pervasive these days, just without being identified as such. Instead, leftist politicians and educators and journalists use phrases like "common sense" and "reasonable" and "moderate" to describe positions which come straight from Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao, Castro and Alinsky, pretending that this is "who we are..."

 

It is a societal disease like botanical root rot and, as with plants, societies rarely survive.

[Gerry]

 

(you know, the Clinton fans, Bernie followers and Obama groupies and the like).

Of the three only Bernie is a socialist.  Also because one person may have a descriptive pov called socialism, an others views, definitions, are not always the same.  To believe that is to have a blind spot.

 

My interests on the Shaker movement, or Brooks farm, and the Commune movement of the late 60's do not have to be painted as just more of the same.  I see problems with the wealth distribution in America.  I think those that revel in it are creating a climate where you can endorse schemes to redistribute this wealth for the general good.  I favor taxes as the means to redress this wrong.

 

For one to call that Marxism, Communism,  or theft from an individual sovereign is to be wrongheaded.

 

 

This "movement" changed its monikers like a snake shedding its skin -- "liberal," "Progressives," "Community Organizers," "Democratic Socialists" (that was Lenin's party before it was Bernie's), etc., etc. In 1984, they were "English Socialists" ("EngSoc" in NewSpeak) and the politcal philosophy was labeled​ "Oligarchical Collectivism."

Oh my son, we are in need of counsel.  I can perceive your twitching as you type this.

 

Instead, leftist politicians and educators and journalists use phrases like "common sense" and "reasonable" and "moderate" to describe positions which come straight from Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao, Castro and Alinsky, pretending that this is "who we are..."

As such, is this what you think of me?  Because I like to drink, am I also an alcoholic?

 

Here I was convinced that you are the the one with phobic neurosis.

Edited April 14, 2017 by Gerry

[Brian]

Of the three only Bernie is a socialist. Also because one person may have a descriptive pov called socialism, an others views, definitions, are not always the same. To believe that is to have a blind spot.

 

My interests on the Shaker movement, or Brooks farm, and the Commune movement of the late 60's do not have to be painted as just more of the same. I see problems with the wealth distribution in America. I think those that revel in it are creating a climate where you can endorse schemes to redistribute this wealth for the general good. I favor taxes as the means to redress this wrong.

 

For one to call that Marxism, Communism, or theft from an individual sovereign is to be wrongheaded.

 

Oh my son, we are in need of counsel. I can perceive your twitching as you type this.

 

As such, is this what you think of me? Because I like to drink, am I also an alcoholic?

 

Here I was convinced that you are the the one with phobic neurosis.

You might want to read Marx again. And Woodrow Wilson. And Alinsky.

 

Look into organizations like the Progressive Alliance, too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_Alliance http://progressive-alliance.info

[Brian]

Of the three only Bernie is a socialist. Also because one person may have a descriptive pov called socialism, an others views, definitions, are not always the same. To believe that is to have a blind spot.

 

My interests on the Shaker movement, or Brooks farm, and the Commune movement of the late 60's do not have to be painted as just more of the same. I see problems with the wealth distribution in America. I think those that revel in it are creating a climate where you can endorse schemes to redistribute this wealth for the general good. I favor taxes as the means to redress this wrong.

 

For one to call that Marxism, Communism, or theft from an individual sovereign is to be wrongheaded.

 

Oh my son, we are in need of counsel. I can perceive your twitching as you type this.

 

As such, is this what you think of me? Because I like to drink, am I also an alcoholic?

 

Here I was convinced that you are the the one with phobic neurosis.

The reason why the Shakers or the Kibbutz or the hippies of the 60s are substantially different is because they are entirely voluntary. Phrases like "the ends justify the means" or "by any means necessary" or "revolution" are not part of the vocabulary.

 

See the difference?

 

Ever hear a member of a 1960s commune talk about dragging people kicking and screaming into submission or compliance???

Edited April 14, 2017 by Brian

[Gerry]

The reason why the Shakers or the Kibbutz or the hippies of the 60s are substantially different is because they are entirely voluntary. Phrases like "the ends justify the means" or "by any means necessary" or "revolution" are not part of the vocabulary.

 

See the difference?

 

Ever hear a member of a 1960s commune talk about dragging people kicking and screaming into submission or compliance???

My god Brian!  You are so full of ____ I can catch a wiff through the screen.

[Brian]

My god Brian! You are so full of ____ I can catch a wiff through the screen.

Prove it, big-mouth. Point out one iota of inaccuracy in that post. Do your homework first, though, because I have...

[Brian]

My god Brian! You are so full of ____ I can catch a wiff through the screen.

You have demonstrated, and largely admitted, profound ignorance on the topic yet you hurl insults at me (over and over) for giving you frank answers to pointed questions, merely because my extensively researched answers don't jibe with your ill-conceived notions.

 

EDIT: I've noticed, BTW, that this modus operandi is consistent in other areas of the forum, too. It is quite a nasty habit, Gerry.

Edited April 14, 2017 by Brian

[wilfred]

at this point just let obamacare implode within the next couple of years, try and take none of the blame for it. like he said the negotation table will open the worse things get. if you can't go after big pharma hands and the real overspend areas your hands are tied.

Edited April 15, 2017 by wilfred

[Brian]

at this point just let obamacare implode within the next couple of years, try and take none of the blame for it. like he said the negotation table will open the worse things get. if you can't go after big pharma hands and the real overspend areas your hands are tied.

The was exactly the plan from the beginning -- Obama spilled the beans. Obamacare was designed to collapse in late 2017 or 2018 and to take the entire private healthcare system down with it (see "Cloward & Piven Strategy"). Hillary was supposed to be in the Oval Office now with Progressives controlling both Houses of Congress and they would say, "Well, we tried 'free-market capitalism' and look what happened! No choice now but 'Hillarycare.' (read: 'single-payer' Federal takeover)"

 

Venezuela, here we come! Except, oops! Turns out Hillary couldn't beat Bernie Sanders OR Donald Trump! They didn't anticipate that...

[Brian]

Worth a perusal, I think...

 

Toward a value-based model of healthcare

[Brian]

Mark your calendar -- today, July 26, 2017, is the day the US killed its private healthcare system.  It will take a few more years before the death-throes stop and we will see a corporatist facade for a while but it's like the interval between when a chicken's head is chopped off and when it stops running around.

 

I recommend finding Obama's speech to the AMA about what the future holds for them and then find where you fit in that future.  Or, if you are more ambitious, read Ezekiel Emmanuel's Complete Lives System.

[Marblehead]

I don't have a calendar.  The ones I get I give to my friend who needs them so much more than I do.

 

As soon as the requirement to buy and penalty for not buying is removed I will return to the system.  (I am VA medical qualified but I haven't been using it because it is still all screwed up.)