I won't.

Because you're blind, deaf, and dumb if you believe this.

If not... Then I accept the sarcasm as it was meant.

HG, could you possibly be saying something less relevant?  Old people don't have kids.  If someone on medicare is having children, someone needs to shoot them.  The risk of severe retardation at that age is obscene.

To paraphrase a programmers idiom:

Person 1: "We have a problem!".

Person 2: "I know! We'll get government to fix it!".

Well, now you have two problems.

You may infer from my idiom that I am opposed to government controlled health care (or government controlled prety much anything).

You would be right. All you get when you ask government to fix a  problem is the original problem, with the government superglued to it. The problem still exists, but, by God, it now has a government stuck to it, so it must be better.

Here's the big question:

What do you get when you ask government to do something for you? You get an agency (bureaucracy) to oversee it.

What is the primary goal of a bureaucracy?

The primary goal of a bureaucracy is the perpetuation of the bureacuracy. The original 'purpose' of the bureaucracy comes in at a distant second.

If actually solving the problem would result in the cessation of the bureaucracy, then the bureaucracy will *never* solve the problem.

Now, we get to health care controlled by the government.

It *will* be a bureaucracy. If you think otherwise, you're naive.

Here's another bit of info to digest:

The 'goverment must control health care' group quotes the 'statistic' that some 46 million people are without insurance.

The truth is that of those 46 million, the majority are either eligible for insurance from their employer (but choose to not take it), or make more than $75,000 a year, and could afford it if they choose.

Once you get down to it, there might be as many as 6 million who don't have insurance, and don't have easy access to it.

Given that, why don't we spend our time and effort so that we can provide those outliers with insurance, rather than trying to force everyone into a one size fits all program?

Now, we come to the point where the nanny state advocates rail against the 'profits' gained by the 'evil' insurance companies.

Well, here's an interesting issue for you. The power that the insurance companies currently have? Yeah, that comes as a direct result of government intervention.

The laws that mandate specific coverages. The laws that state that insurance companies cannot compete across state lines.

And many more. These are the direct results of lobbying by various interests, with the result that they limit the options available to individuals.

There's room for reform of the current health care landscape. Those reforms are best accomplished by enabling the free market and competition, not by giving even more power to a central authority of any sort (especially government)

Contrary to the beliefs of some, there is nothing wrong with making a profit. That's how real work gets done.

There *is* a problem, caused entirely by the existence of a large and powerful government, with industries that lobby that government for special favors, because those favors give them a government supplied advantage to potential competitors.

We don't need government to provide health care. Done right, we can cover the outliers with sensible changes to the base rules, and letting the free market do its job.

The relevancy is that not always is ones impact on society apparent during their lifetime, and In my hypothetical scenario the impact would have out weighed the cost. surely I figured you would have been able to gleen a bit of the meaning without having to pick it appart.

 Also your saying they spent over 1.2 million to beat it? on average the typical highschool graduate earns 1.2 mil over their life time.. so either many of your family never graduated atleast highschool muchless college, or the treatments were in excess of 1.2 mil on up depending on how many children he had.

over an adult's working life, high school graduates can expect, on average, to earn $1.2 million; those with a bachelor's degree, $2.1 million; and people with a master's degree, $2.5 million.

Persons with doctoral degrees earn an average of $3.4 million during their working life, while those with professional degrees do best at $4.4 million

Aleatoric, well said.

HG_Eliminator, 4.4 million over a lifetime of ~74 years amounts to around 60,000 per year.

If taken from the 18th birthday, it would be closer to 78.5k per year.

And that is with a 'professional degree' (as you put it - something past a Doctoral degree) from the 18th birthday.

And the number of people that make such a great impact that is only apparent after their death is very small indeed.

If, as you say, the average highschool student earns 1.2 million over their lifetime - then they would make an average of 21.5k per year from age 18. Just enough to get by on, but not enough to pay for a projected cost of their entire lifetimes of earnings to go to health care - especially in their later years.

And since most people fall into this group, what makes Obamacare so affordable?

Even if most fell into 'Group #2' with twice the income, the outcome would be the same. There is not enough money in taxes to cover the expenses unless you increase taxes to such a degree that no one will have any incentive to make more money.

Particularly pages 425-430.  Mandatory end of life canceling and limited care for older people is in the bill.  This is one way that socialized medicine in other countries cuts costs, because older people typically have higher health care costs.   

Control = reelection.  If lobbyists supply you the money you need to run expensive reelection campaigns and the voters depend on you for their retirement and health care, it makes it more likely that you can get reelected. 

We need health care reform.  They should start with the programs that they already control, Medicare, Medicaid and the VA health services.  We need tort reform.  About 25% of all testing is CYA by the doctor to limit lawsuits and medical malpractices insurance adds a lot to their overhead. 

The bottom line is that we can’t afford the plan before congress now.  And it isn’t a good plan for those that would be on it.  This is how you can tell-an amendment was introduced into a house committee that would have made it mandatory for all congressmen to be covered by this plan and it was voted down within an hour.  If the people creating the plan don’t want it for themselves or their families—then you don’t either

The Doublegood Think police think this is a wonderful Idea.  They can also install monitors in your home and when you use the word nagger you can be arrested as a racist...

Because its too close to another word that has such 'terrible' conotations....

That word is bad let's strike it from our language.

OKAY make its so.  The office of the ThinkSpeech is born.  See 1984 for more WONDEROUS examples of what government is trying to get done here...

Meech Lake (Failed by some Alberta's natives & by Newfoundland (not yet tied with a silly Labrador ampersand) prime minister intervention & indirectly by the Night of the Long Knives backstabbing of other Provinces against Québec) or Charlottetown constitutional "agreements" about First-Nations rights & distinct society amendments (Which only New-Brunswick, Newfoundland, Ontario, PEI & NT (soon be split into TWO Nunavuts territories) voted for, btw)?

Or the Québec's sovereignty **Local** Referendum on 30/10/95? That resulted in a 50.6 to 49.4 democratically & extremely slim margin, IIRC... with a 96%+ participation ratio (some of which freshly received as Canadian and International immigrants into mostly Montréal urban area.) Need i remind you of the "Sponsorships Scandal" commission which proved that a result could be bought or influenced enough to tilt in favor of a country suddenly aware that unilateral secession was quite legal & probable?

None of which were about French/English "relations" but more about specific political controls over de-centralization of some economic sectors & focused development decisions that concern provincial populations at best.

PS; sorry for straying a bit off-topic but i HAD to ask which "Referendums" you meant, the_Monk.

You think that American doctors make millions of dollars every year?

Are you taking crazy pills?

Just a little acticle that was written in "LA RESSE" on August 19th 2009 in Québec.

In english Via bable fish translastions sinc ei am short on time. But I did a few translation corrections so it make sense and proper sense.

Basicaly the Canadian healtcare systemt hat teh oposition is bad mouthing to try and prevent this reform will find it's self improved by the U.S. reform. For the simple fact that the salaries of doctors in the U.S. (highest in the world by a  long shot) will go down some bit. So this should help stem the bleeding tide of the doctors we have going south.

Canada shouldn't blame the United States for losing its best doctors.  Its not our fault they pay their doctors less than we do.  If Canada wants to attract and keep good doctors it should consider increasing salaries for them.

I never stated obama care was affordable nor was I promoting it.. infact if you read all of my post, I believe if they get involved they will fubar it, Goverment has a way of messing things all up..

What I said tho is the people are getting tired of working their whole lives and not being able to afford health care, because of the rampant prices to be treated.. and if the Medical profession wont listen then the people will turn to the government to step in.. as is what is happening now.. The Top heavy Medical administration really need to decide if they must have 2 summer homes, a villa in Tuscany, a $80,000 a year membership to a country club.etc or which Roll's to buy for the Mrs...while the majority of the work force dies off before ever getting a chance to retire.

And I was Making the point to psychoak that having the scrooge like attitude that the poor should die off quicker to ease the burden on the wealthy, could have catastrophic ends. Not all great contributors to society came from wealth, so to lessen the value of their contributions to the world is absurd. As well as not all contributions to society can be measured by ones dollar worth.. Rousseau Died broke and alone, but his contributions to society and the awareness of our contract to each other is imeasureable..

Lets say the Water companies decide to act like the Healthcare profession and raise their prices 500% Why not ? they give life sustaining water to the masses. Without it people would die so why not milk them for all they can too? If they tried it there would be over night rioting, the Healthcare profession has done it slowly over years..but it is coming to a head.

As i said earlier If the Healthcare Corporation wont start trying to reform/regulate them selves, the people ( for the good or bad) will get the Gov involved.

Nobody forces any of these doctors to stay or leave. It's THEIR personal decisions... if they're in this sector for the money (Be it US or Canadian), they weren't carefully listening in some ethics class when the subject of vocationals "Oath to Life" came into focus.

Or perhaps they think that their training and abilities are more valuable than what public healthcare offers? I suppose it's unethical to ask for a raise when you need to finance the education of your children, right? Why do teachers' unions lobby for higher salaries? Shouldn't teachers accept their role and put "ethics" ahead of salary?

Money is not evil.

(Brad here posting under my Draginol account)

Every country likes to talk about cultural diversity but Canada is basically 90%+ European descent. It's like Britains debating the differences between Wales, Scotland, and England.

In the United States, when I speak of diversity, I don't mean it in the nice, tolerant sense but rather very very deep suspicions and groups with vastly different outlooks on what individuals should be responsible for and what society should be responsible for that are simply irreconsolible (however you spell that <g>).

And no, the US has had 51/49 issues on very key things for years and we don't have civil wars about them.