ikol

For the people who don't currently have coverage, it does a lot more than not expanding coverage does. Healthcare reform should be about choices, first and foremost - namely, providing an affordable choice to people who don't currently have one.

And when given the choice, about 2/3 of people choose against complying with medical treatment, which in the long run is not affordable regardless of who is paying.

Therefore we should keep others who currently don't have Medicaid/Medicare from having low-cost access to preventative care?

That conclusion draws more heavily on other premises. I was just pointing out that expanding coverage doesn't really solve the problem.

Okay, then: They need to go somewhere where uninsured and underinsured people die in massive amounts of debt quietly in their homes, leaving their equally stretched relatives saddled with the burdens of that debt that more privileged people will never know. Hopefully, that place also has lots of people who can't afford to go to the doctor for preventative care, and are forced to go to the ER instead of primary or urgent care, where they are again saddled with massive amounts of debt.

Actually, many that already have Medicaid/Medicare still go to the ER for their primary care because they either don't utilize preventative care and thus wait for their chronic conditions to have acute exacerbations or they don't want to deal with the inconvenience of making appointments.

Earthquakes we can't do anything about. Global warming we can do something about.

Global warming is so 2006.

For the record, I'm in favor of a booze-filled healthcare summit.

What's the IPA situation there?

I voted!

Edit: btw, I think the first step should be combining the healthcare summit with the beer summit. Then we should offer tax credits for the consumption of IPA.

I think it's pretty short-sighted and oversimplified to state that, as we don't have any evidence one way or another to tell us that the whole universe even still exists.

I think maybe half the universe exists.

I can't get no friggin answers

Yes, and it's much worse than we feared, as the entire world is dead. See the frozen wasteland thread.

I haven't been reading all the junk in this thread, so have we reached a consensus?

That bit's played, man.

It's a very prolific bit.

All of the Huffington and Sullivan articles point to studies (not men in wife beaters, but like, science, dude) that address trends (things that happen over time, not, like, instances, dude). Do you deny that a longitudinal study of data will likely yield a more accurate long-term trend than a single one-time measurement of data (or a screenshot of a man in a wife-beater) will?

I'm here trying to be a smartass, and you're just determined to pin me down to a serious argument. I've never seen the Nobel-prize-winning treatise An Inconvenient Truth, but isn't the robot that presents the arguments in that film wearing an Al Gore mask, much like the one featured in the music video to which you refer? Yeah, all things being equal, longitudinal studies addressing trends are better than a dude in a wife-beater picking a banjo (or a dude in an Al Gore mask telling us Florida will be under water if we don't immediately stop using fossil fuels).

As you can see here, isadorah is not using the storm to validate global warming, but to define what the phrases "global warming" and "climate change" mean, in order to correct someone (OP) who was misuing the phrases - perhaps because he was not clear on the their definitions. She uses her knowledge of the definitions of "climate change" and "global warming," and her knowledge of these trends she talks about, to come to what she thinks to be a reasonable conclusion about the recent extreme weather systems occuring in her neighborhood.

OK, but climate change is an objective description of what happens naturally, not some Michael Bay big-budget disaster movie.

I disagree. That would be no different than saying, "Look at the snow! Global warming is a hoax!".

My point exactly, though it's much sexier when done with sarcasm.

Before your post, did anyone in this thread validate it?

Al Gore did, but he deleted his post after I made mine. There was also a post doing so at the same time as I posted mine. Regardless, I wasn't aware that we were only allowed to address arguments made within a thread. I think at the very least, any argument ever made on the Huffington Post or by Andrew Sullivan are fair game since they vicariously participate on so many of our threads.

Of course every time we have a hot summer or a hurricane (edit: or a blizzard!), it's OK to use that to validate global warming.

I believe my first post on this board was calling Edwards a douchebag in 2004.

They're supposed to show impartiality when you disagree with his decision. If you're in favor, it's the passion of his reasoning.

Really? Where in the Constitution is that?

And, to further this view, Alito, by engaging in theatrics when Obama voiced his objections to the decision engaged in theatrics, waived any hint of impartiality and became defensive, showing it was personal and, as such, political.

Is he supposed to be impartial with respect to his own decisions?

They've been doing it for a century or two without incident, so I don't know why he had to go make an ass of himself now.

Back in the day, people used to beat each other with canes in the Capitol. And again, Obama publicly criticized the Supreme Court to their faces. If anyone was making an ass out of himself...And for the record, I don't think anyone was making an ass out of themselves (at least not moreso than usual). If we've really reached the point where mouthing "not true" is considered offensive, then we've truly become a nation of pussies. The way I see it, Obama checked the Supreme Court, and Alito balanced his ass.

It's unprofessional, plain and simple. If I disagreed with something a client said and chose to express myself that way in a meeting, I would be reprimanded, if not out of a job. If a doctor expressed himself that way to a patient who disagreed with a diagnosis, same thing.

So Obama is akin to the Supreme Court's client? A more accurate analogy would be if Obama said that the citizens were all a bunch of whiny freeloaders, he would probably be out of a job.

To me, it was the unprofessional nature of the act; it was not the right setting for him to do something like that. Everyone here knows how to be tactful in professional situations, and everyone here knows that was not professional.

Except Obama.

Now I must go wash up... I defended Alito and agreed with ikol.

Pretty soon you'll be joining the NRA!

Yeah, after the whole "You lie!" business, I am a bit suspicious of Alito. If you are smart enough to be a Supreme, you are smart enough to know a camera is on you. Maybe he even tipped off the media beforehand. Or it could have been an honest impulse.

Well, that's obviously why Alito did what he did. To act like there is anything "dignified" or "professional" in that setting is ridiculous. It's a room full of politicians congratulating themselves on their stances on the issues. While the Supreme Court is supposed to be uniquely nonpartisan and professional, if they have to sit there and watch Obama publicly criticize a decision that they made, a mouthing of "not true" is the least they can do.

So Obama publicly calls the Supreme Court out on their case and states something that (at least in Alito's mind) is factually incorrect, and Alito is in the wrong for mouthing "not true"? I don't think being nonpartisan means being neutral on your own decisions.

Forget most divisive President, who was the most prolific President in history?

I absolutely agree, but as I said earlier, we really don't have any solid numbers on who is saying they should get "free" health care without making a modest tax contribution. Talking about "those people" doesn't really get anyone anywhere.

That's true, but both versions of the healthcare reform bill (and I realize you oppose them) mainly focused on adding taxes to higher income earners (whether through income tax increases or higher taxes on their health insurance premiums) to pay for the increased spending.

I agree that $200,000 is more than enough to live comfortably on, but I think some of the resentment of having to pay higher taxes comes from the fact that half the nation pays no federal income taxes other than Medicare/SS. With those kind of numbers, we're not talking about just those living in poverty. And most of the proposed healthcare changes are going to benefit those same people more so than those paying a third of their income in taxes. I'm not saying everyone should be paying 30%, but to expect "free" healthcare without making even a modest tax contribution is insane.

How is the current senate bill a "government takeover" of health care?

It's more of a half-assed takeover. It not only mandates that you should have insurance, but what kind. If the Senate deems that it doesn't cover enough, you're fined. If it's too much, it's labeled a "Cadillac" plan, and you're subject to additional taxes. If you prefer to have a high deductible plan with health savings accounts to cover out of pocket costs, the governments further limits what you can put into those accounts. I don't see the need for these mandated insurance exchanges, when they could just make it legal to buy insurance from across state lines. And they're paying for this bill through Medicare cuts. Primary care doctors are already being screwed by low Medicare reimbursements, not to mention refusal to reimburse for treating "hospital-acquired" infections and hiring private companies to meticulously audit medical records for overbilling so that they can collect a portion of the refund. If you're going to further cut Medicare and then propose a bill that sets the stage for further government control of payments (and thus a bigger portion of their income subject to the whims of the government), you're going to have a lot of 50 year doctors retire.

The feeling is mutual. What makes you think corporations will not see the investment of buying a few elections and the subsequent removal of profit-inhibiting laws as a wise one? Do you not understand how capitalism works?

Oh, and add "Net neutrality" to my above list.

It seems like an exaggeration to me. No one hates free market capitalism more than big corporations. They would much rather buy politicians to regulate their competitors out of existence than to do away with regulations that would make it easier for smaller companies to compete.