Just ain't so.
And this:The latest iteration of Democrats-on-the-cross works like this: Obamacare hasn't delivered the big savings promised by the president -- $2,500 annually for the average family -- because Democrats ditched the single-payer model to mollify Republicans. In the Los Angeles Times, Harvard professor Jane Mansbridge writes,"The Democratic Party reluctantly adopted RomneyCare, a.k.a. Obamacare, to get Republican approval." What's more, House Republicans "coerced the Democrats into adopting a Republican health insurance reform plan."A reader emails me, "The Republicans who hate Obama would not permit the creation of a decent single payer plan which would allow private insurance carriers to participate on a competitive uniform benefit program." Another insists, "We wanted single payer! The GOP did not -- that was the compromise, and it was one of many from this president."Really? The Affordable Care Act did not win a single Republican vote on the House or Senate floor. If Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi abandoned single-payer to win GOP votes, they are the most incompetent negotiators in history.
Now, I won't deny that two decades ago, some conservative think tank swell came up with the term "individual mandate" -- which allowed other wonks to try to pin the tail on the elephant. But if liberals have to fish for a 1989 Heritage Foundation policy paper that had no Republican support in 2008, 2009 or 2012 to establish Republican paternity for the Affordable Care Act, that tells you one thing: They think Obamacare won't work.
Single payer is not at all dead. That said, there is something extremely mushy about Dems blaming a plan they ramrodded through in the middle of the night on the Republicans. How can we forget the ecstasy of Obama, Pelosi & Reid the morning after passage? They all make me want to hurl. See more at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1rF_zz3xok
ReplyDeleteYou will see uprising of a kind and degree unprecedented in your lifetime if it looks like single payer is anywhere close to being an actuality.
ReplyDeleteIt is a close call guy, but it helps that Obama so far has failed to deliver. You think you have some sort of majority? Anyhow, who takes over after you dismantle government? The military-industrial complex? I think the American people will see that pretty clearly.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately universal coverage will now come only after a long struggle. Some more time must now pass and the experience of all the other countries in the civilized world and even the state of Vermont which just implemented it will tell the tale. We are going to resist going back to the stone age of capitalism.
ReplyDeleteThe extent of government power put forth by James Madison is all we are after.
ReplyDeleteI ask once again, how did people in the year 1300 exercise their right to a triple bypass?
ReplyDeleteInnovation and advancement in human affairs only happens when people are free to profit from offering the world something of value.
Innovation and advancement in human affairs will continue. What does that have to do with a bunch of insurance companies bastardizing insurance in the name of their own and their stockholders' profit?
ReplyDeleteGo back over my position on this. People should pay out of pocket for most health care expenses. Catastrophic-care policies with high deductibles - the kind of insurance I have - should generally be all anybody needs. Get third parties out of it altogether for the most part. Don't shift- the third-pary role to the government, which is the least equipped to assume such a role of all societal entities.
ReplyDeleteYour confidence that innovation and advancement will continue is not so well-justified. Fiercely determined enemies of freedom could well smother any such aspirations of the human spirit.
ReplyDeleteWe are talking about social insurance. I will say that never have I seen such vociferous opposition to something in this country unless it was the Viet Nam war. Slavery was another polarizing issue. Actually Prohibition was too. Perhaps you can think of some more, but in my lifetime only the Viet Nam war has been as polarizing. I guess you could say the draft dodgers won because Uncle Sam gave up the draft, very smart move.
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