www.ditl.org

Rochey - I twice read your question about Medicare, and there is a similar system set up for the underprivileged, called "Medicaid." It's not very good health insurance, but it is available.

Malpractice insurance is one small part of why health care is so expensive. The staggering cost of a medical education is another. Also a factor is the fact that health care costs are grossly overstated to pad figures on both the providers' and insurers' ends. I have very good helath care coverage, and when I see the difference between the "retail" fee for a service compared with what the providers have agreed to charge to my PPO, it's disgusting. If that much discount is available, then the starting point is WAY too high.

Atekimogus wrote:It works quite well in most of the EU and I see no reason why it couldn't work also in the US or why this would be a bad thing. Or do you think once all got insurance no one will want to work anymore?

It needs to be done VERY carefully. The easiest way to institute national health care would be something like the Italian system, which would lead to, very frankly, AWFUL health care.

The problem with governmentally controlled health care... well have you heard about the War in Iraq?

Most everything that the government controls gets messed up. I'm not saying that that means they shouldn't be government controlled. Just not with the recent stupidity we've had. Maybe in the future, things will change.

Rochey wrote:So you believe that your political system precludes any real chance of it succeeding?

I think it makes it very unlikely it will succeed. The biggest problem is simple, the two party system. Once it become politicised its now an issue. In that case as a government run service it should be an issue, don't get me wrong, but with a two party system how do you deal with that? It's bad enough having just two options when it comes to stances on many, many, issues but now we're adding a HUGE one to the ticket.

In the long run I see it becoming another social security. Where the only thing we're allowed to talk about is throwing more money at it. No one will have the stones to actually reform it. Don't kid yourselves either, no government institution can afford the need to reform. The beaurocracy will pile up on top of it and start to choke the life from the system and it will need to be swept clear but no one will be able to if they want to get elected.

Again, I can't really speak on that. So again I'll take your word on it.

Ask Tsuki what he thinks of the education system, a government run institution. Hell ask me, I think it's a colosal clusterfuck myself. I honestly find it bewildering that people have such issue with so many government run institutions and yet are so eager for the government to take over another.

To be honest, I sometimes wonder why you're with the. It seems that you take the opposite stance to them on just about everything.

Actually, I consider myself a real conservative/republican, one who remembers what the party was supposed to be about. It's been taken over by a bunch of fucking idiots who've forgotten that the whole point of party is serve the people, not beat the democrats.

A real republican/conservative's position on gay marriage would be "None of our fucking business what you do and who you do it with. Talk to your clergy." A real republican wouldn't be making scare ads and demonizing the opposition, they'd be talking to the American public like they were rational, clear thinking adults and coherently explaining what we believe in and what we think and trusting in the people to make the right decision.

So the high costs are due to the doctors needing to insure themselves against malpractice sueing?

Honestly that's a far greater problem than profits in my book.

I think I know where I saw it last. I'll look it up and get back to you on that. If not tonight, then tommorrow morning.

Any luck?

A Dartmouth College study indicated that most of the blame lies on malpractice insurers themselves and not on jury awards.

Tyyr wrote:Ask Tsuki what he thinks of the education system, a government run institution. Hell ask me, I think it's a colosal clusterfuck myself. I honestly find it bewildering that people have such issue with so many government run institutions and yet are so eager for the government to take over another.

Yep, education is f*cked up. So is healthcare, currently.

The government doesn't screw up everything - the IRS works like a charm.

Tsukiyumi wrote:

Tyyr wrote:Ask Tsuki what he thinks of the education system, a government run institution. Hell ask me, I think it's a colosal clusterfuck myself. I honestly find it bewildering that people have such issue with so many government run institutions and yet are so eager for the government to take over another.

Yep, education is f*cked up. So is healthcare, currently.

The government doesn't screw up everything - the IRS works like a charm.

Yeah. One thing that works too well.

Tsukiyumi wrote:The government doesn't screw up everything - the IRS works like a charm.

Well of course that's the one institution they'd keep running at high efficiency.

Because it's a simple process. Once a year, the IRS makes you put all your money in your pockets and jump in a lake. Whatever doesn't get wet, you can keep.

stitch626 wrote:The problem with governmentally controlled health care... well have you heard about the War in Iraq?

Most everything that the government controls gets messed up. I'm not saying that that means they shouldn't be government controlled. Just not with the recent stupidity we've had. Maybe in the future, things will change.

Ok, but how come that it works reasonably well in, for example, sweden, germany or even my own country austria? Setting up a reasonable working system isn't exactly rocket science.

Atekimogus wrote:Ok, but how come that it works reasonably well in, for example, sweden, germany or even my own country austria? Setting up a reasonable working system isn't exactly rocket science.

Because the average American barely understands what a rocket is, let alone the science behind it.

I'm not saying the NHS is great. Personally I think The NHS has so many potholes it really does fuck things up over here. However, I am comfortable knowing that if i get badly burned in a house fire, I will be taken to hospital and treated without charge. I think taxes cover it.

Right.

I, personally, would rather have crappy free healthcare than no healthcare at all because I'm too poor to afford it.

Oh it works. My appendicitus operation, I had it out within a day. And in a pinch it works. Administratively, and tax wise, it is rather...costly, but its there.

The way it is here right now, if I broke my arm today, I'd set it myself; there's no way I could go to a hospital without ruining my credit.

Tsukiyumi wrote:The way it is here right now, if I broke my arm today, I'd set it myself; there's no way I could go to a hospital without ruining my credit.

That is horrible from my point of view and really no offense meant.

If I only think off the surgery's I already had (appendix, hernia, tonsillectomy) I would probably be broke if I lived in the US.