6 ms·

It is not whataboutism. It is pointing out outcomes in the other approaches may not be as good sounding as they are. You know how NIMBYism is done in Californi

It is not whataboutism. It is pointing out outcomes in the other approaches may not be as good sounding as they are. You know how NIMBYism is done in California? It is usually along the lines of "We can't let developers profit!!" and "They are going to build luxury homes and not affordable homes!!".

liveoneggs 3y ago
So you think rejecting federal money to expand medicaid is good?
- cscurmudgeon 3y ago
  Where did I say that? I was responding to the ill-informed rant about state-govt websites and corruption while hilariously ignoring the article stems from corruption and issues in the original healthcare.gov website. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HealthCare.gov#Concerns_about_the_website https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HealthCare.gov#Concerns_about_...) Do you think not addressing root cause for high medical costs is good? https://harvardmagazine.com/2020/05/feature-forum-costliest-health-care https://harvardmagazine.com/2020/05/feature-forum-costliest-...
  - liveoneggs 3y ago
    if you weren't addressing my point (medicaid expansion) then why are you responding with random articles? I, in fact, think things like negotiating drug prices is good, sadly it was outlawed by republican policy: Medicaid Part D (One of the most expensive policies ever) -- the Biden "Inflation Reduction Act" addresses this Bush-era money-grab for drug companies.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - Aloha 3y ago
      I will still give Bush immense credit for passing Part D, even if it blew a hole in the federal budget - there is no way politically it would be possible today, and it was almost not possible then.
- mattmcknight 3y ago
  It will be interesting to see what happens as that funding is starting to be phased out. https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/fiscal-implications-for-medicaid-of-enhanced-federal-funding-and-continuous-enrollment https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/fiscal-implications... Meanwhile, finding lower cost ways of providing health care still seems elusive in the face of provider and pharma legal efforts.
  - deciplex 3y ago
    Providing lower-cost ways of providing health care is directly contrary to the interests of anyone with political or economic power in our country: the hospitals and pharmaceutical companies that directly benefit from high prices, the politicians who receive bribes in exchange for passing laws that keeps prices high (or just failing to pass laws that would lower prices), and the typical employer who can use the increasing importance of health insurance and the threat of medical bankruptcy as leverage against his employees when negotiating work conditions and pay. Our health care system is, like basically any other institution of note in the US, first and foremost a means to effect the transfer of wealth to our economic and political elites from the rest of us. We need to first come to recognize that our system is currently working as intended before we can think clearly on what to do about it and take effective action.
    - 0xDEAFBEAD 3y ago
      "Our system is currently working as intended" implies that someone designed the system to work the way it does. What you're really arguing is that no actor is incentivized to improve things, and multiple actors are incentivized to preserve the status quo. I'd argue that strident condemnations (ala your "our system is currently working as intended") is actually one of the features of the US political system that tends to create/preserve a subpar status quo: https://twitter.com/JohnArnoldFndtn/status/1106302246449369088 https://twitter.com/JohnArnoldFndtn/status/11063022464493690... I don't believe that the US has a monopoly on greedy businesspeople or politicians, relative to other countries. But I do find myself wondering if the toxicity of our politics tends to filter out candidates with a good faith desire to serve the public. People who enjoy conflict tend to be jerks. EDIT -- Here is some specific evidence that US elites are not uniquely rapacious: A solid majority of Giving Pledge signatories hail from the US: https://gpcatalysis.blob.core.windows.net/gphostedcontent-prod/tgp_site_infographic_count_241.png https://gpcatalysis.blob.core.windows.net/gphostedcontent-pr... From the bottom of https://givingpledge.org/ https://givingpledge.org/ While the US only has 735 of the world's 2640 billionaires: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of...
deathanatos 3y ago
> It is not whataboutism. When someone points out Republican's cronyism leads to bad outcomes in healthcare, and you respond with an opinion piece whose thesis is roughly "Blue states have bad policies that lead to unaffordable housing" … like that's basically textbook whataboutism: > the technique or practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counteraccusation or raising a different issue. Literally "what about housing" is raising a different issue here, one that's not related to healthcare, nor the Republican anti-pattern being discussed in this subthread… You're further implying that Democrats are hunky-dory with the housing policy in states like CA, when they're not. Some are, some aren't, and AFAICT it wasn't exactly a partisan thing. As I alluded to, a lot of the YIMBY-iers there advocated for things like better mass transit — which isn't exactly a very Republican position. > You know how NIMBYism is done in California? > It is usually along the lines of "We can't let developers profit!!" and "They are going to build luxury homes!!". I'm a former resident of Silicon Valley. I'm well aware how it's done. That doesn't make this not whataboutism, and it doesn't mean that there aren't democrats in those states who are fiercely against that line of argument.
- parineum 3y ago
  > When someone points out Republican's cronyism leads to bad outcomes in healthcare Why would you expect a party's cronyism to be restricted to one industry? If you're implying that Republican's shouldn't be in charge of healthcare because it will result in cronyism, pointing out the cronyism is far from a partisan issue is not whataboutism.
  - lern_too_spel 3y ago
    The latter isn't cronyism. There isn't some anti-developer who is lining politicians' pockets with money created by not developing. In fact, what we're seeing is Democratic state politicians in these blue states making laws that limit NIMBYism like SB 35, against the wishes of local governments voted in by local NIMBYs.
Aloha 3y ago
I dont believe the dichotomy that its a choice between government and public. Both parties are fundamentally wrong on a whole host of issues - the democrats are wrong on how markets work, and republicans treat poverty like it's a moral failing. I dont know how to fix this situation, I need to see how the realignment we're in works out.
seanp2k2 3y ago
Fixing zoning and prop 13 would go a long way in fixing these things over the next few decades. https://edsource.org/2022/californias-prop-13s-unjust-legacy-detailed-in-critical-study/674412 https://edsource.org/2022/californias-prop-13s-unjust-legacy... has some details there, but there is some progress on the zoning front like https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/housing/new-sf-housing-legislation-would-make-key-zoning-change/article_d8ef6332-f8e1-11ed-a5d9-5f5a8bbe3a60.html https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/housing/new-sf-housing-legis... and https://www.planetizen.com/news/2022/06/117643-san-francisco-just-ended-single-family-zoning https://www.planetizen.com/news/2022/06/117643-san-francisco... . https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-11-10/proposition-15-commercial-property-tax-defeated https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-11-10/proposit... was unfortunate in my opinion.

liveoneggs 3y ago

So you think rejecting federal money to expand medicaid is good?

cscurmudgeon 3y ago
Where did I say that? I was responding to the ill-informed rant about state-govt websites and corruption while hilariously ignoring the article stems from corruption and issues in the original healthcare.gov website. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HealthCare.gov#Concerns_about_the_website https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HealthCare.gov#Concerns_about_...) Do you think not addressing root cause for high medical costs is good? https://harvardmagazine.com/2020/05/feature-forum-costliest-health-care https://harvardmagazine.com/2020/05/feature-forum-costliest-...
- liveoneggs 3y ago
  if you weren't addressing my point (medicaid expansion) then why are you responding with random articles? I, in fact, think things like negotiating drug prices is good, sadly it was outlawed by republican policy: Medicaid Part D (One of the most expensive policies ever) -- the Biden "Inflation Reduction Act" addresses this Bush-era money-grab for drug companies.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Aloha 3y ago
    I will still give Bush immense credit for passing Part D, even if it blew a hole in the federal budget - there is no way politically it would be possible today, and it was almost not possible then.
mattmcknight 3y ago
It will be interesting to see what happens as that funding is starting to be phased out. https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/fiscal-implications-for-medicaid-of-enhanced-federal-funding-and-continuous-enrollment https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/fiscal-implications... Meanwhile, finding lower cost ways of providing health care still seems elusive in the face of provider and pharma legal efforts.
- deciplex 3y ago
  Providing lower-cost ways of providing health care is directly contrary to the interests of anyone with political or economic power in our country: the hospitals and pharmaceutical companies that directly benefit from high prices, the politicians who receive bribes in exchange for passing laws that keeps prices high (or just failing to pass laws that would lower prices), and the typical employer who can use the increasing importance of health insurance and the threat of medical bankruptcy as leverage against his employees when negotiating work conditions and pay. Our health care system is, like basically any other institution of note in the US, first and foremost a means to effect the transfer of wealth to our economic and political elites from the rest of us. We need to first come to recognize that our system is currently working as intended before we can think clearly on what to do about it and take effective action.
  - 0xDEAFBEAD 3y ago
    "Our system is currently working as intended" implies that someone designed the system to work the way it does. What you're really arguing is that no actor is incentivized to improve things, and multiple actors are incentivized to preserve the status quo. I'd argue that strident condemnations (ala your "our system is currently working as intended") is actually one of the features of the US political system that tends to create/preserve a subpar status quo: https://twitter.com/JohnArnoldFndtn/status/1106302246449369088 https://twitter.com/JohnArnoldFndtn/status/11063022464493690... I don't believe that the US has a monopoly on greedy businesspeople or politicians, relative to other countries. But I do find myself wondering if the toxicity of our politics tends to filter out candidates with a good faith desire to serve the public. People who enjoy conflict tend to be jerks. EDIT -- Here is some specific evidence that US elites are not uniquely rapacious: A solid majority of Giving Pledge signatories hail from the US: https://gpcatalysis.blob.core.windows.net/gphostedcontent-prod/tgp_site_infographic_count_241.png https://gpcatalysis.blob.core.windows.net/gphostedcontent-pr... From the bottom of https://givingpledge.org/ https://givingpledge.org/ While the US only has 735 of the world's 2640 billionaires: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of...

deathanatos 3y ago

> It is not whataboutism. When someone points out Republican's cronyism leads to bad outcomes in healthcare, and you respond with an opinion piece whose thesis is roughly "Blue states have bad policies that lead to unaffordable housing" … like that's basically textbook whataboutism: > the technique or practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counteraccusation or raising a different issue. Literally "what about housing" is raising a different issue here, one that's not related to healthcare, nor the Republican anti-pattern being discussed in this subthread… You're further implying that Democrats are hunky-dory with the housing policy in states like CA, when they're not. Some are, some aren't, and AFAICT it wasn't exactly a partisan thing. As I alluded to, a lot of the YIMBY-iers there advocated for things like better mass transit — which isn't exactly a very Republican position. > You know how NIMBYism is done in California? > It is usually along the lines of "We can't let developers profit!!" and "They are going to build luxury homes!!". I'm a former resident of Silicon Valley. I'm well aware how it's done. That doesn't make this not whataboutism, and it doesn't mean that there aren't democrats in those states who are fiercely against that line of argument.

parineum 3y ago
> When someone points out Republican's cronyism leads to bad outcomes in healthcare Why would you expect a party's cronyism to be restricted to one industry? If you're implying that Republican's shouldn't be in charge of healthcare because it will result in cronyism, pointing out the cronyism is far from a partisan issue is not whataboutism.
- lern_too_spel 3y ago
  The latter isn't cronyism. There isn't some anti-developer who is lining politicians' pockets with money created by not developing. In fact, what we're seeing is Democratic state politicians in these blue states making laws that limit NIMBYism like SB 35, against the wishes of local governments voted in by local NIMBYs.

Aloha 3y ago

I dont believe the dichotomy that its a choice between government and public. Both parties are fundamentally wrong on a whole host of issues - the democrats are wrong on how markets work, and republicans treat poverty like it's a moral failing. I dont know how to fix this situation, I need to see how the realignment we're in works out.

seanp2k2 3y ago

Fixing zoning and prop 13 would go a long way in fixing these things over the next few decades. https://edsource.org/2022/californias-prop-13s-unjust-legacy-detailed-in-critical-study/674412 https://edsource.org/2022/californias-prop-13s-unjust-legacy... has some details there, but there is some progress on the zoning front like https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/housing/new-sf-housing-legislation-would-make-key-zoning-change/article_d8ef6332-f8e1-11ed-a5d9-5f5a8bbe3a60.html https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/housing/new-sf-housing-legis... and https://www.planetizen.com/news/2022/06/117643-san-francisco-just-ended-single-family-zoning https://www.planetizen.com/news/2022/06/117643-san-francisco... . https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-11-10/proposition-15-commercial-property-tax-defeated https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-11-10/proposit... was unfortunate in my opinion.