It was an observation from a person who was part of a system trying to understand why things were so different in the U.S. It was accompanied by an explanation of how things were perceived to be changing by an influx of immigrants and there had been a lot more legislation trying to restrict eligibility for benefits to combat perceived abuses and so on. Now that Denmark has passed legislation to collect valuables from migrants to help offset their upkeep I would say my au pair was a prescient observer of her own country. Donāt worry, I wonāt be quoting you as an authority on anything, not even your own NHS.
I disagree. Clinton hit him hard in the first part of the debate, while he was serving up his usual lines about corrupt political system, etc, etc. etc. She came out shooting fire and he knocked him off his game. After the break she pulled it back in and he stayed on his best behavior.
As I said on another thread, there was an unusually high number of āYeah, I agree with what she saidā comments coming from Sanders tonight. Nothing wrong with that on the surfaceā¦on occasion Hillary will say the same thing.
But when Sanders says itā¦he just leaves it at that, surrendering the point to Hillary. When Hillary says it, she expounds upon the point to at least cast it in her own view.
1 Like
And what will that FUCKING DO???!!
2 Likes
Do you really think that Hillary came off as more authentic than Bernie?
Itās almost not a fair question.
She has to master a hundred different issues and deal with nuance while he can just talk about the one burning issue that defines him and heās lived for.
You canāt fake that and Hillary canāt match that passion on any issue.
Not if sheās going to win for us in November.
It depends on how you work the system.
Last year, we got through a Medicare bill that forever ends the annual attempt to cure the ādoc fix.ā
Also last year, we got the Iran nuclear agreement ā against the opposition of the majority.
My prediction: if elected Clinton will put through a sizable infrastructure/stimulus bill largely financed through tax reform in her first year. It will create millions of jobs and bring hundreds of billions in investment dollars into this country.
2 Likes
Sounds good to me.
1 Like
Putting aside your over the top rhetoric, then answer me this questionā¦
Where precisely is Bernieās plan to go from the ACA to Single Payer? Because that āhere is where magic stuff happensā box is pretty darn big right now on that process flow.
For the really big exampleā¦tell us what happens to the 500,000+ jobs and $7+ trillion dollars in revenue that the health insurance business generates? Does it all just disappear on the day his bill is signed into law? If not, how does you phase such an enormous change in?
How do hospitals receive funding to stay open? How much will medical practitioners make? Will they be government employees or private contractors?
Bernie stays away from all of those issues. Because they are tough, and in many cases,unpalatable answers. Its much easier to talk about how swell things will be in a perfect world, than it is to talk about all the dirty things requires to get there.
I mean seriouslyā¦until he is willing to go into those details, all we are hearing from Bernie is the stuff dreams are made of.
3 Likes
Basically, he would lump Medicare, Medicaid, and all other payment systems into one pool. And one version of his bill ā although he recently said heād modify it based on Hillaryās critique ā would provide for states to have a say in administering it, which I feel is a cause for concern.
So what crumbs from the insurance industry should we be permitted to ask for? Will the companys reply directly, or will they use willing politicians as their mouthpieces?
1 Like
I think youāre right ā surprisingly, he does seem to have a sort of ācharisma.ā I say surprising not so much because Iām personally surprised, Iāve seen him speak in the past. But most Americans havenāt. Not saying he has Gandhi or Nelson Mandela or MLK Jr level charisma. But he does have his own kind, whatever it is based on (authenticity + chutzpah?) and heās making it work for him better than anyone, probably including Bernie, would have expected.
2 Likes
If FDR could rise from the dead to run again, then Ronald Reagan would also arise so that he could vote for FDR!
1 Like
My view of Sandersā plan is that he wrote it to address the desire of his own state to adopt a single payer plan. He has Vermont as the model of what he is trying to do, because Vermont couldnāt do it without having all these disparate programs funneled into one pool. There is a state that has been able to persuade the federal Medicare program to go along with its unified rate setting, and that is Maryland, which went from being a state with higher than average per capita costs to one with much lower per capita costs. But the programs themselves are still disparate. Vermont is even smaller than Maryland and it did not just want to set rates, but to adopt universal coverage without using private insurance. Not all states are like Vermont. In that respect, Sandersā plan founders on the same shoals as the ACA, at least for poor people who are already on the margins to the extent it gives states the right to administer the program or set priorities.
1 Like
Social Security initially excluded many jobs that employed blacks.
Especially with the Hyde amendment prohibiting federal funds paying for abortion.
Thatās a possible consequence of Bernieās single payer bill.
Fortunately, Bernie can stay in the Senate and keep pushing us to the left.
But thatās part of the problem. The crap we have to deal with now about money going to insurance subsidies is bad enough. When the government directly runs the health care system it becomes even more of a political football. When we have a single-payer system and a Republican Congress and President, how long do you think it will be before they eliminate any coverage for abortion and birth control? And that would make them virtually impossible to get by putting providers out of business.
And part of the reason the Irish system works passably is that a doctorās appointment costs about ā¬40 in cash (thereās no coverage for them), which is only slightly more than the copay for a typical visit in the US, where the cash price is usually about $180 just for a general physician.
Basically, the way it works is that treatment in state hospitals is free, as are drugs for a group of specific chronic conditions (e.g. epilepsy, diabetes, heart problems, etc.). Everything else, youāre on your own. I donāt think that kind of system would work here, on the scale of the US.
1 Like
Heās been here a lot longer than you, pal! Do your homework first, if you wish to fit in.
Yeah, I really do.
Look, I get you like to play the provocateur role and then back off and say āOh, I am good with Clinton in the endā, but its a cop out.
Your response peppered with lines like,
border on insulting, knowing that you are going to fall back on ābut I think Hillary is the better candidateā once you get the response you were fishing for.
My standing is pretty clear. So let me ask you sort of the same question in reverse. How precisely can you say that Bernie is speaking from the heart, when he is delivering precisely the same lines, word for word, that he has been delivering in every stump speech and public appearance for months??
Thatās not from the heart. Thatās from rote memory.
He doesnāt expand upon them, and when asked any other question, 90% of the time he returns right back to exactly the same lines. Rigged economy. Corrupt fiance system. All the income goes to the 1/10 of the top 1%.
Another great example of that is when Todd, in his moronic fashion, was pushing about why Sanders doesnāt use public financing for his campaign. Of course, Sanders is right, public financing for presidential elections is a joke the way it is now. But you want to fix the ācorrupt finance systemā, you donāt just wait for Justices to die and then replace them and hope for a case to come up so they can strike down CU. You put down a plan to pass legislation to overturn it. Or better you, you advocate for an actual, workable, at all levels, real public financing of elections plan.
Bernie doesnāt go there. Its easier to just remember ācorrupt finance system, no super PAC, $27/ average donationā. Because its not from the heartā¦its cheap revolutionary rhetoric.
1 Like
If thatās her plan, she should talk about it a lot more. As you probably know, itās one of the main planks of Bernieās economic platform too. Maybe thatās why we arenāt hearing as much about it as we would if it was an area of disagreement. But in any event itās a a crucial part of what this country needs.
Even most Republicans, if they werenāt terminally allergic to paying their fair share of taxes, would have to agree that a nation with crumbling, outdated and in some cases outright dangerous infrastructure (for example, the levees that failed during Hurricane Katrina, laying waste to a large part of a major American city) will be in no position to compete with China and India and a whole host of rapidly industrializing, modernizing nations.
It comes down to this ā you want a functional modern civilization, you have to have proper infrastructure, properly maintained. Anything else is like building a house on soft ground, without a foundation, and roofing it with cardboard. No matter who you hire as your interior decorator, itās not going to work out well in the long term.
3 Likes
Authenticity goes a long way, and it is irreplaceable.
1 Like