These people win because they wear us out. Will insurance companies, hospitals, etc. eventually fail, like the car companies, because they keep resisting change?

I like the "discussion" they have regarding health care reform on talk radio. Callers phone in expressing their fears that this is a back door effort to withhold care and eventually kill off Republicans. Hosts agree.

No calls whatsoever from people who are being screwed today by the system.

Fair and balanced.

Brian A.
I'd rather be cycling.

The Republican argument seems to be that we just need to let the free market take care of the problems in health care. Private enterprise has had decades to develop a functional system and has failed miserably. Government has done nothing but try to cushion that gross failure. So, conservatives, why has your beloved free market been such a colossal failure in this instance? How is claiming that it's the cure anything but insanity?

I'm not sure what you expected from the Sentinel. Can you imagine how much work it would be to go out and track down people who have been denied coverage, etc., etc.?

A mandatory single payer system based on Medicare would cover everyone. Probably for less.

Less than the trillion over ten years, or less than the two trillion per year?

That two trillion per year that you mention, what is that? Are you saying that that's the total amount of money in the system? Services delivered, hospital costs, private insurance, public insurance, the whole thing?

I'm not questioning you personally, but these numbers are always so suspect. All of them. The trillion in ten in Harrington's piece has the fragrance of a figure freshly plucked out of someone's booty. The two trillion annually is so staggering it's just hard to believe.

I'm mostly not a fan of government intervention in private enterprise, but the insurance industry is so heavily intervened-in and on-behalf-of that it hardly qualifies as private anymore. However, I fear that the government could totally screw up the healthcare system by implementing a single-payer system, or by any other such intervention. The VA fiasco is a prime example of where that fear is located. Theoretically, I'd be much more comfortable with an approach that forces decency on the part of insurors since they've set themselves up to profit from standing between doctors and patients, but otoh could their function of pooling resources simply be done away with? Sure, insurance companies ration care, but would a government-based replacement actually be an improvement?

But I'm still way in the weeds on this one. Articles like the one you link to are entirely unhelpful. Everyone seems to agree that they'd like to see universal, or greatly expanded, access to healthcare. It may be a magical wish, but I'd like to see someone make a really cogent case for reform that gets us there without removing incentives for medical and pharmaceutical innovation. Is anyone making a case like that?

That two trillion per year that you mention, what is that? Are you saying that that's the total amount of money in the system? Services delivered, hospital costs, private insurance, public insurance, the whole thing?

HHS figures for 2007:

http://www.cms.hhs.gov/NationalHealthExpendData/02_NationalHealthAccount...

The state of health care in Tennessee:

http://www.healthreform.gov/reports/statehealthreform/tennessee.html

Referencing the VA system with "fiasco" is so inaccurate it's parody. The VA system serves millions of current and retired vets and their families by providing them routine primary care and specialized surgeries. The VA system services were consolidated and upgraded under Clinton's Director of Veteran's health affairs. He pioneered electronic medical records, improved broad outreach services, and increased incentives for physicians. You can visit the Johnson City Center if you want to make a more informed judgment.

Your reference to "fiacso" may be referring to the actual fiasco that was reported by Dana Priest in the WaPo at Walter Reed Medical Center where thousands of disabled vets were ignored or refused treatment for months and years and who lived in rat infested barracks. Walter Reed is not under the VA system. Those services were outsourced and PRIVATIZED under Bush's appointed director, who was faced with an influx of seriously wounded soldiers that a) they were not prepared for, and b) have extremely expensive, complicated and lifelong injuries that cut into the corporate bottom line. Therefore, to save money, services were cut to a bare minimum and the staff was underpaid and untrained.

Too many of us have lived through the private health care, managed care, TN care fiasco to take arguments in favor of maintaining it with a grain of salt.

jcg

especially because the White House won't guarantee that current health benefits won't be taxed.
You can't create a new tax or raise existing taxes.You just can't as it will help the repubs make a comeback and we can't allow that to happen...

I would prefer health reform fail than for it to squeek through and the repubs use new taxes created for it to make a comeback..

I want the repub party out of power for the forseeable future.

"I would prefer health reform fail than for it to squeek through and the repubs use new taxes created for it to make a comeback.."

Atta girl, ANGRYWOLF. It always amuses me to see how easily liberals will sell out their own beliefs and values.