Can't really think of any other nonsense your thought process would be rooted in so I'll just leave it at that. It's possible you just refuse to think for yourself and like spouting conservative talking points but maybe I'm wrong and you'll reconsider your position.

By the way, if you think the government is shitty at getting stuff done you may note we put a man on the moon, have the most powerful military in history and are as of yet still the only super power. Also the US Military is the largest socialist economy in the world currently. Although China is quickly approaching us.

welcome back veta?

"Also the US Military is the largest socialist economy in the world currently."

what?!

Because nothing is more socialist than forcing a government on millions of people that don't want it.

@kdiceprincess18

If you look at the health care market today, in my opinion much of the drugs, services, etc. are entirely optional. When you have drug companies drumming up demand with advertising, and millions on "chronic" drugs that they plan to take their entire lives, I will not buy any argument that all of that is compulsory.

Even for a particular medical service, there are differences in cost and quality. You choose whether to go to the doctor for many things, and where to go. I have chosen to pull into the ER when I felt woozy with fever while driving. It turned out to just be the flu. I've also chosen many times not to go to any doctor for many minor aches and pains.

My wife went to a doctor and after describing her own symptoms, was given prescriptions for five chronic medications, none of which she ever filled, because she did not want to take drugs for the rest of her life. She's a pretty healthy person too, she runs marathons.

A month ago at a baseball game, my son had a kid dead to rights trying to steal 3rd base, and the kid decided to take a running leap and jump kick my son's forearm. I could have chosen just to ice the arm and see what happens, but instead I chose to go to the doctor to see if it was broken. The doctor examined him, and when she saw him lift himself up bearing weight on the forearm, she said it's almost certainly not broken and said we probably didn't need an x-ray. I chose to get the x-ray anyway.

I make choices like this all the time, and so do millions of other people. Starting this year for me, it is as close to a free market choice as we have right now--I have a high deductible health plan, so other than a catastrophic illness, all of these costs are directly coming out of my pocket.

For most people though, it's an all you can eat buffet. You're *forced* to pay a high premium, and then no matter how much or how little you use, you pay pretty much the same. This encourages bad decision making, wasteful spending on unnecessary drugs and procedures.

You can call out the catastrophic illness stories all you want, but at a national scale, most people are generally healthy at any given time. Most spending is not on the really catastrophic stuff. Insuring against the catastrophic illnesses wouldn't cost nearly as much. No ER is allowed to refuse emergency care to anyone, even if they have no insurance, and that has been federal law since 1986 (wait, who was president back then?).

We can't afford to put the entire country on this all you can eat buffet. That fact won't change, even with Obamacare in effect. Raising taxes won't solve it. First, look at the Laffer Curve, or the study by Kurt Hauser, that demonstrate that raising tax rates does not raise overall tax revenue. Second, even if they could raise overall tax revenue, it would still never be enough. Most likely, it will be quality of health care for the poor and middle class.

My argument is not flawed. I paid plenty of attention in Econ. I'm not spouting any talking points. I honestly don't even know the Republican or other conservative platforms that well. I think you're quite arrogant to believe that anyone who disagrees with you is just spouting talking points. I'm telling you what I think and believe, and what I've observed to be true.

Obama in office is sinking our country's future, and he needs to go.

Oh, and putting a man on the moon? Have you noticed that the space industry just got privatized? Why is that, do you think?

We have a low premium/high out-of-pocket plan that my family is on at work. My wife freaked out when we went to that plan and she tried to convince me to go work for Norfolk Naval Shipyard so we could get the "good" insurance. I had to literally speel out both plans to her and do the math to tell her why our plan was better (and cheaper).

Even in the case of a catastrophe, the stop pay points aren't different enough to make a life-changing effect on your finances if your family happened to have a terrible year health wise. The differnce between max stop pay points plus the premiums paid was less than $1,000....and that's if all three of us maxed out our plans in one year, which I'd wager will NEVER happen.

I agree that Americans are extremely dumb with their healthcare spending. They make the wrong choice when choosing a plan and they make poor choices at the doctor/hospital/pharmacy. This is a huge reason why healthcare costs are so high.

speel = spell*

/end edit

Those in the military receive free education, healthcare, stipends, and a pension kakku. Google largest socialist economy and us military (on my phone so I can't do it for you).

To proxy: you may choose sometimes where and when you go to the doctor but when you get sick you go to the doctor by compulsion, usually to where your "free market" HMO dictates you go. So yeah it sounds like you're making my point for me. It's a market of compulsion, furthermore the nation's health and education, much like it's security, safety, and national defense are public goods. As such they should be operated by a collectivist institution, for instance police departments for safety and the military for national defense. How ridiculous would it be if there we still operated on mercenary armies and paid "insurance" for them akin to what happens in the Godfather. If you have a fiscal objection to these notions I'd like to note it's in fact cheaper for the nation if we had universal healthcare and education and ultimately makes us a more productive people (re: Germany). If you have a authoritative qualm you should note the role of the government is to serve it's people, not the other way around. So yeah mate, I hope you learn to think for yourself and maybe if you're a real patriot you'll understand why such reforms are not only necessary but essentially to our nation's future success.

If you have a pragmatic objection to these notions then I will be frank. People are making too much money right now to ever let us create a private public hybrid in the healthcare industry like what we have in mail industry (USPS, ups, fedex). Same goes for student loans, their subsidies and rising tuition costs.