I do not believe that Obama is trying to fix the health-care system. I think that Obama's goal is to increase the power, size and scope of the federal government. I believe that Obama wants to make more people dependent on the government. Socializing health care is a means to this end.
Everything that Obama is doing backs up my assertion that Obama's main interest is to increase government control, not to improve health-care. Recent examples of increasing federal control are the bailouts of GM, Chrysler, AIG etc., the stimulus plan, cash for clunkers, the appointment of 36 White House Czars, the cap-and-trade bill, the largest federal budget in U.S. history and more.
If 47 million new people get free health care from Obama's plan, who will treat them if we still have the same number of doctors, hospitals, nurses, clinics and medical laboratories.
If taxes don't go up, the existing doctors, hospitals, nurses and clinics will have to spend less time with each patient. Health-care providers will be forced to treat more patients for the same pay. The quality of care is sure to suffer and the doctors will become overworked. Some doctors will quit and fewer people will be attracted to a medical career.There will be no other option besides rationing. Costly health-care in the last years of life will be be doled out frugally. Some call the bureaucrats that make these tough decisions "death panels". Individuals, families and doctors will have less input on these tough end-of-life decisions while bureaucrats will make the tough decisions for them based on budgetary concerns.
I believe that rugged individualism is what made this country great. I believe that a "pay-as-you go" system will lead to the best doctors, who will make the most money and the most profitable drug companies will produce the best medications. Without successful doctors and drug companies, we can not continue to provide the best health-care and most innovative medications, diagnostic equipment and procedures on the planet. Success in these fields will attract many more people into these fields, thus making health-care more available to everyone.
Health insurance should be priced affordably for individuals as well as for groups. This way health-care will not be handcuffed to your job. Tort reform will reduce the high cost of malpractice insurance for doctors as well as reducing unnecessary defensive medicine designed to cover the doctor's behind, instead of helping the patient. Although all emergency room patients will be seen, regardless of their insurance, every effort must be made to collect unpaid medical bills. Wages should be garnisheed and money transfers to foreign countries like Mexico must be screened for medical debts before being sent to pay medical debts. People who demand emergency services for ailments other than true emergencies should be treated like people who make false alarms for fire and police emergency services. they should be prosecuted and fined.
Health insurance should only be used for unexpected and expensive treatment. Everyday medical issues should be paid for by the patient directly. Those who can't afford to pay, or those who have chosen to spend their money on other things instead, will be taken care of by generous relatives, church groups, charities, free clinics and charity hospitals. America is the most charitable nation on earth. However, if Obama gets his way, socialized health-care will squeeze private charities, free clinics and family help out of the marketplace.
This is what Obama wants. He has stated many times he wants a single payer government health-care system. This will give the government control over one-sixth of the economy and bureaucrats, not families and doctors, will be making medical choices for us.
Socialised health-care will undoubtedly lead to mediocrity, shortages and rationing, just like Cuba, England and Canada experience. The president is trying so hard to push through a complicated and convoluted plan that will undoubtedly cost taxpayers more money and limit the quality and availability of health-care to the majority of people who are satisfied with their current plan.
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The conviction on the part of the author with respect to this issue is extraordinary. It is also true that some of the facts are either totally wrong or well at the very least exaggerated a bit.
Unfortunately the points that have been posted does not help the argument in favor of the current system in the least.
First, the bailouts given by the American Government were never an instrument to increase the federal power. If they had not then even more number of people would have been without jobs now. Also the entire process of the bailing out the companies in these hard times was started well before Obama took office under the Bush Administration itself. So even if this act by the Government is considered an increasing influence in the business sector, the current administration cannot be blamed for the same, because all they are doing is continuing what has already begun under the previous administration. Also I have not seen a considerable majority of people from either parties oppose this. Although the argument in this case has been not to waste such a large amount of tax payer money on these corporations nobody has been able to come out with a solution to save millions of jobs without this kind of a stimulus plan.
Now coming to the main topic, the fact that the medical system is bad and hopeless in UK, Canada and Cuba is a blatant lie. Considering the small economy of Cuba, the medical care provided to its citizens is far better than what citizens of other countries with much bigger economies are provided with. And the health care system in Canada and UK is definitely not bad at all. If anything its doing great. Its citizens definitely think so. Both being democratic nations have had the system for several years and there has never been a call for a change. This is also the same case with France where the people of the nation are extremely vocal about all issues. If the socialised health care system is really as bad as it is thought to be and propogated to be, will not the people of these countries taken a cue from the highly influential American system and changed it a long time back. I am not saying that their system is perfect. But such a large group of people and not just in a single nation feel that their system of medical care is better than any other.
Also to say that the current privatized system of health care is perfect is rubbish. Several people cannot afford health care because of the high costs. Also insurance companies have just become bloodthirsty corporations where they try to find some way or the other from not paying the medical bills while you have paid them premium so well for several years. The pharmaceutical market is again completely private and the cost of simple prescription medication for the slightest of illness is so high that people without insurance simply cannot afford to go to a doctor at all.
The police department is socialised. People never complain about that because it is such an important and essential service. At any instant if a single body or person tries to influence this in their favor there is an outcry. The Fire Department is socialised. A large number of essential services are in the hands of the federal government and they have all provided a valuable service for years. Is the health care system also not that important.
America has a democratic society. Let the new system be implemented. The current system has a large number of problems. If the new system is truly as bad and evil as everyone claims it to be it can always be scrapped. It seems more to me that everyone is scared of the unknown and untested and are being strongly influenced by private companies who are against this because of the losses to them. They are really not bothered about the public and its well being. All they care about is their own bank balances. It is time that the country gives the new system a try before criticizing it.
It is true that the Republicans and the Bush administration did much to increase the size and scope of the federal government during the past 8 years. However, the current administration is carrying the ball down the field at light-break speed. The Bush administration ran up the highest federal deficit of all time. However, the deficit in the first year of the Obama administration surpassed the total deficit under 8 years of Bush, six of which had the benefit of a Republican Congress.
Canada's health care system is currently going bankrupt. Canada is now exploring the possibility of bringing back the "private option" back into the mix. England re-instituted private health care since the early 90's to provide coverage that the government was unable to supply. Cuba's health care system is miserable accept for the government elite. Still,many of the elites in Cuba prefer to go overseas for serious health concerns.
All three of those countries ration expensive medications and procedures and have long waiting lists to receive care.
The capitalist system in the US with its profit motive has supplied much of the research and development for modern medical innovations world wide. Without private enterprise in the medical field, the whole world would suffer. In a way, the research and development in the US private market, subsidizes health care costs worldwide. If American health care becomes socialized, medical advances worldwide would be slowed down to a crawl.
For more about healthcare please read: "Life, Liberty, Property and the Pursuit of Health Care" at http://garyganu.blogspot.com/2009/08/life-liberty-property-and-persuit-of.html
And also: "Is Healthcare Worth The High Cost?" at http://garyganu.blogspot.com/2009/07/is-high-cost-of-heathcare-woth-it.html
1. Canadians and Britons have to wait in much longer lines and waiting lists for doctors visits, emergency care, and specialists. Both are more likely to die while waiting for surgery or specialty treatment. Canadian and Briton patients have (sometimes dramatically) lower percent chances of surviving for 5 years, 10 years, or being cured of all forms of cancer (especially breast, colon, brain, testicular, and prostate), AIDS, or heart complications. The areas we suffer in: high general hospitalized mortality, because more Americans enter the ER as victims of murder (i.e. stabbed, shot, etc.); Americans have more doctors/hospital visits because of diabetes (we eat around 140 pounds of sugars per capita each year); accidents from foolish behavior, drugs, etc. Also, many more people in Canada and Briton die while on waiting lists or in ambulances (in Britons' case), and the World Health Organization does not count these mortalities toward their percentages as they do Americans who actually make it to the hospital, but were in critical condition.
2. Claude Castonguay (who headed the commission that designed Canada's government healthcare system) called the system a disaster and is now calling for more involvement of the private sector... which won't work because:
3. To add insult to injury, Canadians pay between 45-65% of their income in taxes, in addition to high federal and province sales taxes, between a quarter and a third of which fund their failing healthcare system. To hit up a private clinic for a basic doctors visit costs $900+ Canadian dollars (middle-class Canadians make a similar range of money as middle class Americans in their equivalent currencies). Now, how are the lower and middle class going to afford expensive private care when they are paying at least half their earnings in taxes? A half-private, half-government system just doesn't work either.
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