ttogreh

Did you get into a brawl with a bunch of union members, TM? I doubt it. Both sides are culpable for the violence that has come out of some of the meetings, but there is a difference of a concerned citizen expressing herself, such as you, and astro-turf thugs like the tea baggers screaming at their representatives and fighting with union members. Union members who have only gone to the town hall meetings in response to reports of bellowing epithets being thrown there.

Well, write to your senators, Reaper. That actually sounds like a reasonable compromise. What with 14,000 people getting kicked off of health insurance rolls a day, with the uninsured reaching 50 million, we have to accept that the old way of doing things just does not make any sense. If the Republicans would just push something like what you are suggesting in the public airwaves, instead of blaming Pelosi and sending tea-baggers to town hall meetings... we might actually not have to re-visit this after whatever the hell does finally get passed.

Oh, stop equivocating, Gaf. We all know what you were implying by throwing that particular nugget of the bill onto this thread without any context behind it. Stop making shit up.

... the Pulitzer prize winning website that I use...

As you can see, this is why I relied on politifact.com for clarification. Go ahead, TM. Read that section, and tell me that politifact.com is lying to me. I haven't read it fully, yet. I will start now, and I might just have to change my mind about politifact.com. I doubt it, though.

Not "some website", TM. The Pulitzer prize winning politifact.com, ran by the St. Petersburg times. Politifact.com has never, ever, ever lied to me. Gaf lies to me all the damn time. Like in posts numbered 55 and 58 of this thread.

I will trust politifact.com over you any day of the week, and twice on Sundays. "Direct, Real Time Access" sounds scary outside of the context of Insurance companies paying for services rendered. Stop making shit up.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2009/jul/30/e-mail-analysis-health-bill-needs-check-/ Stop making shit up.

Ok. Canada pays for medical coverage. The doctors are not employed by the government. Canadian doctors have the option to be part of private medical systems. Nearly none do, because while the doctors are not employed by the government, if they want to be paid by the government, they can't be part of a private health system. That's single payer. Canada actually has ten single payer systems, all administered by the provinces. Britain pays for medical coverage, and also employs the doctors. That's national health care. Once again, private health care is not illegal in Britain, but it is rare. Essentially, the National Health System or Britain would be like if the VA was expanded to all American citizens. That is not what Obama is proposing. What Obama is proposing is a public option, sort of like the Canadian model, except for one big difference. Doctors can be paid by private insurers, or the government. In other words, the government would directly compete with insurers. That is why HMOs are so vehemently against the plan that Obama is proposing. It is the first step towards single payer health care.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090810/ap_on_go_co/us_health_care_end_of_life_q_a There is no death Panel in the health reform bill. http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2009/06/15/obama-if-you-like-your-doctor-you-can-keep-your-doctor/ There is no provision to force people to change doctors. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124580516633344953.html An editorial in the Wall Street Journal, that bastion of conservatism, on why a public option is needed. This is what it is. It isn't perfect, but there you go.

Candyman, I would be less annoyed by the Republicans taking ammunition on this if they actually offered some kind of competing bill. An actual alternative rather than sophomoric astro-turf funding or the spreading of downright lies about the current bill. All the Republicans are doing is being the party of "No", because they know that whatever reform that does get past won't be enough. A group of obstructionists whose only objective is to maintain their base, which is demographically shrinking, with no substantive ideas at all... is not a political party. It's a cabal.

How much do you pay, Raev?

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sickaroundtheworld/countries/ No system is perfect. We have to realize that "reform" does not mean "resolution". Indeed, we can assume that any government intervention into American health care now will most certainly be not enough, and that we will have to fight this battle once again in this presidential term. Indeed, the fact that any reform will not be enough will give the Republicans ammunition. "See?", they will say, "After all that, it still doesn't work. Clearly, we should be in charge, since a system that took 230 years to get where it is at isn't fixed after three years." And people will believe them. Hopefully not enough people, though... That comes from a post in a Something Awful forum.

I hope the whole Mainland / Island disagreement won't stop America from helping the Taiwanese clean up...

Poor Billy Mays. He had no logical reason for his incredible success. He really didn't. For every Billy Mays, there is a literally an entire industry of people that are a fraction of his success that are just as talented as he is. So... he felt trapped by his apparent illogical success. He couldn't modify any aspect of it, because he had no bloody idea why it worked. So, when he didn't feel up enough, he had to get up. Success is a hell of a drug.