How to get rich . . .

[ZONDA371]

damn liberals, id rather be a conservative nut job rather than a liberal with no nuts or no job!

[00wnerz]

I live ion Norway and we got free healthcare

SUCKERS! (THOSE WHO DON'T)

[Tommygun696969]

well i live in canada n we have free health care...SUKERS!!!!!! (who live in the states)

[chrstilen5]

Why dont you make a good one then????

[ninjatheavengahzzzzz]

This is why we desperately NEED healthcare reform because of all the greedy fatcats in the health insurance industry racket.

[ALobsterRib]

Rock on Health Care Reform

watch?v=hCnusSpg4p4

[rff2206]

Doctors who were in it for the money will get out and that's a good thing. We need to pay for medical school and their medical malpractice insur, and we'll have plenty of new doctors who may even know something about nutrition (gasp!). We have too many specialists (because it makes more money). We need some FRESH faces in the medical field, and we need to attract them using the quality schools and hospitals already in place. The older (golfing) doctor who is hard to reach is leavg. Hurrah!

[hvacrdude1]

FactCheck. org

Is for the Chicken Little Regime, and their town hall terrorists using fear propaganda mixed with hate and racism propaganda to take back control over America in the sole interest of the Corporate Sector/Banks, Insurance Companies, Drug Makers to profit and stay unregulated, with deregulation bills from the right wingers against the private sector.

[savvy1954]

they forgot, that all the white-collar criminals are going to shift their resources and scheme into auto and life insurance....SEE THERE REPUBLICANS, YOU CAN STILL GET GREEDY ELSEWHERE!! (I.E. PRECONDITION LUNG CANCER = 0 LIFE INSURANCE)

[CommonSenseJoe]

That's not greed. Why would a company insure a person's life when they know he or she is going to die?

[studape]

Universal health care for all!

[EmilyDu]

Some things shouldn't be for profit and health care is one of them.

[CommonSenseJoe]

Tell your doctor, your pharmacist, and your hospital.

[CommonSenseJoe]

An ad could done about professional sports as well. The point here is to make insurance companies out to be the bad guy.

[sliznim]

the difference is professional athletes don't kill people for profit

[CommonSenseJoe]

Neither do insurance companies. This is the flawed part of this whole reform nonsense. Blaming the insurance companies for the cost of healthcare is wrong. They simply provide insurance against the financial loss of illness, not the choice of treatment.

People with great insurance die everyday. We must deal with the cost of healthcare from the providers prospective, not the insurance company.

[sliznim]

In my opinion, dropping people once they get sick even though they have always paid their insurance premiums counts as killing for profit. I suppose you think that is just fair business practice?

[CommonSenseJoe]

I am not convinced that is happening to any great degree. However, if it is, then it can address through new laws and regulations. The point is health insurance is not the same as healthcare.

[atlant80]

It happens rather extensively. 25 million people are under insured, meaning they pay their premiums, and then when they get sick, service gets denied. This figure is completely separate from the 46 million uninsured.

And insurance companies are they ones that are jacking up rates, making it much harder to pay for insurance. Our health care cost is increasing faster than that of any other industrial nations. Much faster. So it's not a systemic problem of medicine. It's an insurance problem.

[CommonSenseJoe]

No, being under insured results from NOT purchasing enough coverage. All these figures are bogus anyway.

The cost of insurance and the cost of healthcare are not the same thing. You cannot address the cost of healthcare by punishing the insurance companies.

[atlant80]

Yes, they purchase basic plans in the individual market, and get dropped or see their premiums shoot through the roof when they get sick. I'm sorry if some people don't have jobs that provide health care or aren't rich.

The cost of insurance is increasing at a much faster pace than it should be. In every other first world nation, they spend less on care and get better results, and their costs are increasing much slower. You can fix the problem with a single payer system.

[CommonSenseJoe]

As one who has purchase his own health insurance for decades, I know the cost has gone up. The problem is you are blaming the insurance companies, not the ones who are actually causing the cost to rise: THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.

If you want single payer then the President should propose that. He is not. He is lying the American people and that is wrong.

[atlant80]

Yes, the evil government, making us all pay more for health care! Please explain to me how the government makes medical costs go up, because the KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation) did a study that showed that the cost of medicare has risen 20% slower than the cost of private insurance over the last decade.

And Single Payer is political suicide, as demonstrated by Clinton. Obama isn't lying, he is doing the politically intelligent thing.

[CommonSenseJoe]

Why do you think the cost of medicare is 20% slower than private insurance? THINK! That's because Medicare does not pay the full cost of the care provided to patients. Some studies say 15-20% of the actual cost. But for the sake of discussion, I would accept 50%. Where do providers get the other 50% not paid for by Medicare? THINK! They charge the other patients MORE! This means people with private insurance.

He is lying and he knows it. He intends to kill private insurance.

[atlant80]

No, the vast majority of doctors accept medicare rates because medicare pays pretty decently. And if they paid 15-20% of the cost.... THINK! No doctor would accept medicare! And the cost shifting hypothesis is invalidated by the fact that private insurance companies have not seen their profits drop on bit in the last decade. In fact, they've gone up about 400%. THINK! If private insurance had to pay more due to medicare, wouldn't their profits go down over a whole decade? THINK!

[CommonSenseJoe]

Doctors are dropping out of Medicare by the thousands. Providers can no longer shift the cost to other patients. Big insurance companies have some leverage and can get better prices than smaller ones. Going from a 1% to 4% is a 400% increase. That is meaningless.

You need to think. The reason the Democrats need health INSURANCE reform is to get their hands on the trillions of dollars in the market. They know Medicare is going broke. They cannot cut the reimbursement rates anymore.

[atlant80]

Most doctors who are dropping medicare are primary care doctors, that's true. However, health care reform bills now will increase payments to primary care doctors, resolving that issue.

And insurance companies don't make 1% profit. They make between 2-10%, depending on their size. If cost shifting happened, profits would go DOWN, not up, over an entire decade.

No, health insurance reform is needed not only to help medicare, but to insure more people, stabilize insurance, and control costs.

[CommonSenseJoe]

Not enough to keep them in the game. It is not only primary care doctors, specialists, and other providers are getting out.

Cost shifting does not eliminate profits, but it does increase the cost of medical care.

How is reform going to stabilize insurance?

The restrictions will make next to impossible for a company to make any profit at all.

Nothing in the bill controls MEDICAL costs.

[atlant80]

It's mostly primary care doctors, and I have read that from a conservative source (WSJ). If medical costs increased, how come profits have not only been untouched, but have increased 400%?! Do you see how illogical that is? Reform is going to stabilize insurance by increasing competition through the exchange, and not allow insurance companies to drop people. And oh god help us if the insurance companies cannot make a profit by dropping sick people! And comparative research controls medical costs

[CommonSenseJoe]

Well, I have talked with providers, hospitals, doctors and specialists. They are getting out of Medicare assignment. Patients will have to pony up the difference and that is going make a lot of seniors mad.

Profits have not been touched because the insurance companies have raised premiums. I have already pointed out your 400% is a bogus number.

What if insurance companies just stop writing health insurance all together? Who benefits from that scenario? The President! He gets single payer

[atlant80]

Maybe Obama would want private insurance dead, but I doubt it. I think he wants private insurance playing a supplemental role to government provided insurance, like they have in France, the empirically best health care system in the world.

[1996adamlagrave]

@atlant80 fuck obama

[heteroglossiamerica]

Damn straight.

[soablackjack]

Those are highly exaggerated figures, and if they are true, did they teach you to cite your sources?

[Gordafarid]

BRAVO! ^^

[narddogg420]

word up