5 ms·

Can someone explain to me how this can be passed off as anything but pure evil?

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
shams93 9y ago
The comedy in this is that the Republicans will continue to scream about "the shrinking middle class" but when every policy is designed to benefit the wealthy elite at the expense of the center the middle class will not magically re-appear.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  Very much looking forward to see which Republicans in swing states get the boot next year.
  - edgyswingset 9y ago
    I find your confidence in the stupid American voting population strange. In other words, I don't believe that they'll do anything like what you're implying they will.
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      This bill is going to end up killing people (through the removal of health insurance for the poor and those with "pre existing conditions"); even your most uninformed voter will come around once this starts being put into place. I'm hoping for riots, but will accept replacing representatives through the voting process.
      - munificent 9y ago
        Our health care story in the United States has been killing people for decades, yet here we are.
      - edgyswingset 9y ago
        > This bill is going to end up killing people I'm pessimistic that this will ever be known by those in swing states, let alone cared about. I've traveled to those places and met people there. They have normalized death due to medical complications and drug addiction. Why should more people dying make a difference there?
        maxerickson 9y ago
        Roughly half the people in a swing state would tend to be people that agree with you (because that's what a swing state is...). Edgy though, you hit that mark.
    - badlucklottery 9y ago
      > the stupid American voting population That seems a little unfair. I'd say they're more insulated than stupid. But when people inside their bubble start losing subsidies and getting hammered with the true cost of coverage, that might be enough to break through to some of them.
- donatj 9y ago
  The thousands I've paid because of the individual mandate sure didn't help my middle class status.
  - CalChris 9y ago
    So were you expecting free health insurance or were you expecting no health insurance?
    - Avshalom 9y ago
      The internet is full of people who seem to believe (at least for rhetorical purposes) that their insurances rates never went up before the ACA and were never going to go up, and they were never going to be dropped from their catastrophic deductible plan halfway through medical treatment for reaching a lifetime limit.
tunesmith 9y ago
Well, the 2% Medicare tax is, from their perspective, something that should never have passed in the first place. So repealing it is going back to a previous form of status quo. Beyond that, I think it's the basic philosophy that government should not be involved in funding health care for citizens (I think those high-risk pools are basically being set up to fail/abandon). I don't really understand it, because I don't see how the normal arguments of self-reliance and accountability translate to sickness, which is by definition out of our control no matter how self-reliant and accountable we are.
- lowtolerance 9y ago
  If these people demanding taxpayer-funded healthcare were responsible enough to get real jobs before getting cancer, then we wouldn't be having this discussion.
  - mevile 9y ago
    Is this satire? Are you serious? Do you know people get all kinds of illnesses at all ages and do you know that hospital bills are so high that even gainfully employed people in "real jobs" would have trouble paying for them with all their life savings? How much do you think a stay in the hospital is? How much do you think insurance will cost you if you have a medical condition? What if your insurance drops you or you lose it somehow and now you can't afford new insurance because you got sick?
    - lowtolerance 9y ago
      I know sarcasm doesn't always translate, but dude... come on.
    - kmicklas 9y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
- barrkel 9y ago
  Here's a different perspective: if the government is involved in paying for your healthcare, that gives voters a say in how you live your life. Taking too many risks? Like wine or soft drinks a bit too much? Maybe you enjoy rock climbing, or horse riding, or skiing, or some other dangerous activity? Well, maybe I don't want to pay for your risks, and I get to call you a drunk, fat and lazy, or foolhardy and reckless, needing more regulation and laws to keep you in your place - and your health costs low. We'll ban tasty food, nice drinks, and any activities that are more than a standard deviation or two out of the normal risk profile. We'll have a nice gentle bland life mapped out for you with low health costs. IMO the biggest elephant in the room is rationing. We can't give infinite healthcare to everybody for all their lives, particularly in very old age. We need to make hard trade-offs. In a free market system, the rationing is done by affordability and price levels: we choose who's more worthy of living longer by how much capital they've accumulated. In a more centralized system, we might choose to pay for interventions based on how much extra "life" they give, and ration by selecting a threshold for how much we pay for extra life year - this is how the UK NHS works, where life year is a QALY, quality-adjusted life year. But anything that doesn't address this elephant in the room, and appeals to emotions about the poor, sick, elderly, dying because they can't afford the treatment they need without considering who exactly we're going to leave to die and why, because we can't all be each other's caregivers for life, is intellectually bankrupt.
muninn_ 9y ago
Now, I'm in favor of single-payer healthcare. I can also understand the point of view of the "free market" health care solution. But calling a repeal of Obamacare "evil" is hyperbolic at best.
- ceejayoz 9y ago
  Taking away health insurance from 24M people isn't evil? Might need to recalibrate the evilometer.
  - muninn_ 9y ago
    That's quite the loaded question. If you're framing it as simply thus giveth, thus taketh then sure in a vacuum just taking healthcare away from people is evil (assuming a certain moral framework). But that's now what is happening here. There are some who believe that the government should stay out of healthcare (not me) and that prices will be lower, and care will be of higher quality. For them, repealing this act will move toward that outcome, which they believe to be good. There's certainly a philosophical argument to be made here. On the other hand, people such as myself believe that a nation should just provide healthcare for all citizens because we can afford to, and if managed properly (questionable at best considering the US government) could be cheaper and result in better care and will help make the United States more fair. So yes, I think it's quite hyperbolic to call the repeal of the ACA evil, and it's disingenuous to say that the repeal is simply "taking away health insurance from 24m people" as if that action is happening in a vacuum.
- badlucklottery 9y ago
  >But calling a repeal of Obamacare "evil" is hyperbolic at best. How about "profoundly amoral and uncaring"?
  - muninn_ 9y ago
    As I mentioned to another poster, it depends on your point of view. On one hand, I sympathize with people who believe in a minimal state, are are fearful of our (mostly shitty) government getting involved in the health care industry. It's uncaring if you believe that all people should have healthcare provided by the government and through taxation of other people whether they want it or not. It's not uncaring if you believe that people should provide for themselves. I am in favor of government run healthcare for a variety of reasons, but I don't consider the opposite point of view to be profoundly uncaring or amoral. In fact, I'd say that if you ignore that the intent of the ACA was to continue to entrench the government into the healthcare industry, it seems quite immoral to essentially guarantee corporate profits for health insurers. Neither the democrats or republicans in charge really want single-payer. I think at least the republicans are more honest about it.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

The comedy in this is that the Republicans will continue to scream about "the shrinking middle class" but when every policy is designed to benefit the wealthy elite at the expense of the center the middle class will not magically re-appear.

toomuchtodo 9y ago
Very much looking forward to see which Republicans in swing states get the boot next year.
- edgyswingset 9y ago
  I find your confidence in the stupid American voting population strange. In other words, I don't believe that they'll do anything like what you're implying they will.
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    This bill is going to end up killing people (through the removal of health insurance for the poor and those with "pre existing conditions"); even your most uninformed voter will come around once this starts being put into place. I'm hoping for riots, but will accept replacing representatives through the voting process.
    - munificent 9y ago
      Our health care story in the United States has been killing people for decades, yet here we are.
    - edgyswingset 9y ago
      > This bill is going to end up killing people I'm pessimistic that this will ever be known by those in swing states, let alone cared about. I've traveled to those places and met people there. They have normalized death due to medical complications and drug addiction. Why should more people dying make a difference there?
      - maxerickson 9y ago
        Roughly half the people in a swing state would tend to be people that agree with you (because that's what a swing state is...). Edgy though, you hit that mark.
  - badlucklottery 9y ago
    > the stupid American voting population That seems a little unfair. I'd say they're more insulated than stupid. But when people inside their bubble start losing subsidies and getting hammered with the true cost of coverage, that might be enough to break through to some of them.
donatj 9y ago
The thousands I've paid because of the individual mandate sure didn't help my middle class status.
- CalChris 9y ago
  So were you expecting free health insurance or were you expecting no health insurance?
  - Avshalom 9y ago
    The internet is full of people who seem to believe (at least for rhetorical purposes) that their insurances rates never went up before the ACA and were never going to go up, and they were never going to be dropped from their catastrophic deductible plan halfway through medical treatment for reaching a lifetime limit.

tunesmith 9y ago

Well, the 2% Medicare tax is, from their perspective, something that should never have passed in the first place. So repealing it is going back to a previous form of status quo. Beyond that, I think it's the basic philosophy that government should not be involved in funding health care for citizens (I think those high-risk pools are basically being set up to fail/abandon). I don't really understand it, because I don't see how the normal arguments of self-reliance and accountability translate to sickness, which is by definition out of our control no matter how self-reliant and accountable we are.

lowtolerance 9y ago
If these people demanding taxpayer-funded healthcare were responsible enough to get real jobs before getting cancer, then we wouldn't be having this discussion.
- mevile 9y ago
  Is this satire? Are you serious? Do you know people get all kinds of illnesses at all ages and do you know that hospital bills are so high that even gainfully employed people in "real jobs" would have trouble paying for them with all their life savings? How much do you think a stay in the hospital is? How much do you think insurance will cost you if you have a medical condition? What if your insurance drops you or you lose it somehow and now you can't afford new insurance because you got sick?
  - lowtolerance 9y ago
    I know sarcasm doesn't always translate, but dude... come on.
  - kmicklas 9y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
barrkel 9y ago
Here's a different perspective: if the government is involved in paying for your healthcare, that gives voters a say in how you live your life. Taking too many risks? Like wine or soft drinks a bit too much? Maybe you enjoy rock climbing, or horse riding, or skiing, or some other dangerous activity? Well, maybe I don't want to pay for your risks, and I get to call you a drunk, fat and lazy, or foolhardy and reckless, needing more regulation and laws to keep you in your place - and your health costs low. We'll ban tasty food, nice drinks, and any activities that are more than a standard deviation or two out of the normal risk profile. We'll have a nice gentle bland life mapped out for you with low health costs. IMO the biggest elephant in the room is rationing. We can't give infinite healthcare to everybody for all their lives, particularly in very old age. We need to make hard trade-offs. In a free market system, the rationing is done by affordability and price levels: we choose who's more worthy of living longer by how much capital they've accumulated. In a more centralized system, we might choose to pay for interventions based on how much extra "life" they give, and ration by selecting a threshold for how much we pay for extra life year - this is how the UK NHS works, where life year is a QALY, quality-adjusted life year. But anything that doesn't address this elephant in the room, and appeals to emotions about the poor, sick, elderly, dying because they can't afford the treatment they need without considering who exactly we're going to leave to die and why, because we can't all be each other's caregivers for life, is intellectually bankrupt.

muninn_ 9y ago

Now, I'm in favor of single-payer healthcare. I can also understand the point of view of the "free market" health care solution. But calling a repeal of Obamacare "evil" is hyperbolic at best.

ceejayoz 9y ago
Taking away health insurance from 24M people isn't evil? Might need to recalibrate the evilometer.
- muninn_ 9y ago
  That's quite the loaded question. If you're framing it as simply thus giveth, thus taketh then sure in a vacuum just taking healthcare away from people is evil (assuming a certain moral framework). But that's now what is happening here. There are some who believe that the government should stay out of healthcare (not me) and that prices will be lower, and care will be of higher quality. For them, repealing this act will move toward that outcome, which they believe to be good. There's certainly a philosophical argument to be made here. On the other hand, people such as myself believe that a nation should just provide healthcare for all citizens because we can afford to, and if managed properly (questionable at best considering the US government) could be cheaper and result in better care and will help make the United States more fair. So yes, I think it's quite hyperbolic to call the repeal of the ACA evil, and it's disingenuous to say that the repeal is simply "taking away health insurance from 24m people" as if that action is happening in a vacuum.
badlucklottery 9y ago
>But calling a repeal of Obamacare "evil" is hyperbolic at best. How about "profoundly amoral and uncaring"?
- muninn_ 9y ago
  As I mentioned to another poster, it depends on your point of view. On one hand, I sympathize with people who believe in a minimal state, are are fearful of our (mostly shitty) government getting involved in the health care industry. It's uncaring if you believe that all people should have healthcare provided by the government and through taxation of other people whether they want it or not. It's not uncaring if you believe that people should provide for themselves. I am in favor of government run healthcare for a variety of reasons, but I don't consider the opposite point of view to be profoundly uncaring or amoral. In fact, I'd say that if you ignore that the intent of the ACA was to continue to entrench the government into the healthcare industry, it seems quite immoral to essentially guarantee corporate profits for health insurers. Neither the democrats or republicans in charge really want single-payer. I think at least the republicans are more honest about it.