ikol

Could I have a PM?

Well, being very ornery, I'm going to continue to say "awnry."

I tried either a 4 or 5 blade razor once, and it clogged up on the first stroke. I've never tried the double edge razor.

Then you're not drinking the right beer.

Good job on refusing to correctly interpret my views! That was very astute of you to infer that I have no problem with people not receiving medical care because they lack insurance. Although I never stated that to be the case, I did indeed state that the government shouldn't pay for healthcare. Obviously, any problem of importance should be solved by the government and not private citizens and charities. Rather than taking measures to decrease the cost of healthcare by removing the government interventions that increased it in the first place, we should probably just have the government pay fo

We have nothing to do with Kansas.

Infectious diseases are nowhere near the top of the list of causes of death in America. Heart disease, strokes, and cancer are all much bigger problems and they are all (as far as we know and with some exceptions for cancer) not infectious. And it's not about outweighing threats from other nations. There is a difference between protecting people's right to live by preventing other people from voluntarily killing them versus subsidizing their healthcare so that they might live longer (assuming they abide by the treatment and it works). Using your logic that the right to life implies a right to

Up until several months ago, I didn't realize that the word pronounced "awnry" is the same as the one spelled "ornery."

So every death is a violation of rights? The purpose of the government is to ensure that we don't die...ever? Or is it possible that the Founding Fathers meant that we had a right to not be killed by other people?

Tastier than candy corn.

Trick or treat!

Anyone who hands out candy corns is evil. Those things are nasty.

So you're saying that money is more important than people, eh? I bet TheMaker wants you to kill yourself.

Not really. Does the person/group that developed the cure have the right to do with that cure as they please? If all medical researchers quit doing medical research, would sick people have the right to compel them to do research? No...or yes...damn negative questions.

their, their

It gets more complicated with children. Ideally, I would say that children have positive rights but that it's the parents' rather than the government's responsibility to provide them. Unfortunately, that's not realistic, but programs like vouchers could at least move things in that direction.

Agreed. Except the exact opposite.

Because rights are things we have (not something the government gives us) that the government protects. We have a right to not be killed by other people, and the government exists to prevent others from killing us. Healthcare is something that other people produce. It can't be the recipient's right unless the producer has no right to it.

I didn't say it was completely socialized either. Maybe you would be able to afford health insurance that would pay for your hypothetical heart surgery if you as an individual could get the same tax break as a business for buying your own health insurance or if insurance wasn't kept artificially expensive by laws arbitrarily mandating what health insurance had to cover. And my comments didn't ask for your forgiveness.

One thing I don't understand is why the problems with America's healthcare system are used to argue that privatized healthcare doesn't work. I would love to find out where this privatized healthcare is.