New Gallup Poll on Health Care Reform

[Doc]

The people that are against it don't really know or are lying about it.

The people that are for it don't really know or are lying about it.

The people that are undecided don't really know either but admit they don't really know.

 

Both bills do address skyrocketing premiums, they just don't address it nearly enough or get to the core problem. But you're lying when you say they arent addressed. They are addressed in a lot of ways.

As has been mentioned, there is a difference between addressing something and addressing it correctly. This is like "addressing" a house fire by pouring gasoline on it +/- thinking you were pouring water on it.

Taxes only on certain people or entities will go up. The vast, vast, vast majority of the population won't be affected by taxes. You're extrapolating and assuming things that aren't in the bills.

I see. As long as someone ELSE is paying for it, why should you care? That's the attitude that's killing this country.

Medicare monies and loopholes are being cut, most of which is abuse. There is no set drop in Medicare treatment. If you're on Medicare right now your coverage won't be affected hardly at all. No one knows what effect 10 years from now will be.

Wrong! As it stands, 40% of doctors are refusing to see new Medicare patients. If the 21% cut goes into effect, it will jump to well over 50%. Which makes the AARP's backing of the Health Plan all the more curious (although it's probably just as simple an explanation as the leaders are taking their cut, which insulates them from their actions, while selling-out their constituents).

A lot of the important provisions of the bills will be implemented sooner than the 3-4 years it will take to get a lot of it in place or to give people and employers time to transition. Much of the money collected you're complaining about will be used to give people health care now for people who can't get covered by private insurance because of pre-exisiting conditions. Certain elements will go into effect right away, or soon, and they need to be paid for.

You're sure about this? Just like the "stimulus money" went directly to the people, right? And there will be no fraud and inefficiency, unlike every other government program in US history? That's incredibly naive, Kelly.

[IDBillzFan]

Yesterday's Republicans are todays Independents, as the percentage of Americans identifying themselves as Republicans have dropped to the low 20%s.

 

The absurdity of the opposition to reform and the level of vitriol was displayed last week at the rally sponsored by the House Republican leadership that was officially billed as a G.O.P. press conference with the display of large signs showing piles of bodies at Dachau with the caption “National Socialist Healthcare.”

 

Anyone who characterizes this reform effort as a government takeover of healthcare and socialized medicine is simply either uninformed or purposely trying to misinform others to further their political agenda. Reform does not equal takeover.

This means nothing. Absolutely nothing. As usual, you find one idiotic sign in a sea of thousands and equate that with everyone who opposes this absurd attempt to FORCE Americans to buy something against their will. The only thing missing is Rachel Madcow showing a LaRouche poster of Obama as Hitler and suggesting THAT is what the extreme right is all about. It's ridiculous, you know it's ridiculous, so when armed with no ability to refute people's concerns, you demonize. If that tactic worked, people would have stopped protesting after April 15th.

 

And I have more bad new for you off-the-shelf liberals: it's not enough to just say "If you disagree, you're misinformed." People are attempting to be more informed than you would ever admit or imagine.

 

"Uh oh. Happy learned how to putt."

[DC Tom]

When you force people to buy insurance, and force companies to offer it to their employees, and tax certain segments of the population to help subsidize health insurance for others, and force health insurance companies to cover people that have pre existing conditions (which you dumbasses don't realize that will jack up everyone's premiums) and it is against the will of the majority of th public, than ya, THAT IS A GOVERMENT TAKEOVER of HEALTHCARE.

 

Actually, that's not a government takeover of health care. Aside from the fact that CARE occurs nowhere in there (it is at most a "takeover" of health insurance), a takeover would involve the government being actively involved in the day-to-day administration of everything. This doesn't have that feature; this is merely ham-handed government over-regulation of the insurance industry - which is actually worse, if you think about it.

 

And you forgot the part where the government forces insurance companies to operate at a loss by capping health care premiums without addressing actual health care expenses.

[Magox]

Actually, that's not a government takeover of health care. Aside from the fact that CARE occurs nowhere in there (it is at most a "takeover" of health insurance), a takeover would involve the government being actively involved in the day-to-day administration of everything. This doesn't have that feature; this is merely ham-handed government over-regulation of the insurance industry - which is actually worse, if you think about it.

 

And you forgot the part where the government forces insurance companies to operate at a loss by capping health care premiums without addressing actual health care expenses.

Ok, a government take over of Health Insurance

[DC Tom]

Ok, a government take over of Health Insurance

 

Yeah, I know, it seems like a picayune point. But it's an important one, because the bill, as 1900 pages of insurance regulation, does ****-all for health care.

[Kelly the Dog]

Ok, a government take over of Health Insurance

 

Actually, this is the main issue that few people are really talking about, and the ones that are, are being totally partisan in what they say, which is why I have less a problem with this bill and reform than I should have. Because it's not a great bill, it's lousy, overall.

 

Right now, as DC correctly points out, this is Health Insurance reform. And it's only half that. But because no one in government is really interested in doing what is best for the public, this is the way it has to be, IMO, for any real reform to come about (and when I say real reform, I don't mean what would really fix it, I mean what is possible to fix it given the crappiness of the political parties these days).

 

The Dems trying to get Insurance reform are getting what they want to put in because of their majority. That's mostly all health insurance stuff like pre-existing conditions and (close to) universal coverage and caps on out of pockets, which is all great stuff IMO but very little fixing of the problem. But that's all they can get right now because they're incompetent weenies. They don't have the stomach for real reform right now, and their opposition are even bigger asses because they're incompetent weenies as well as doing everything they can to hurt the general public by opposing everything regardless of what it is.

 

IMO, this is stage one of a four part reform problem, and parts 2-4 will have to be done at another time. Hopefully, as soon as possible but it's likely to be not nearly enough, not nearly as fast as needed. In fact, most of it might never happen. And parts 2-4 are (2) Health Insurance Cost Reform, and (3) Health Care Reform, and (4) Health Care Cost Reform. All four are difficult tasks as evidenced by the fight for part one. Only small parts of parts 2-4 have been addressed in this bill.

[The Big Cat]

The title of this thread is misleading. I saw 0 polls showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

[Magox]

I have put an enormous amount of time thinking about this problem that we have. Never have I thought about health insurance reform in the way that I have over the last few months, and I do believe that one of the good things that this debate has done, is put in the spotlight so we can all debate this issue.

 

I have some thoughts about we can do for reform.

 

1) To bring down health insurance premiums, the government should set up an exchange for those that have Pre existing medical conditions that the private insurers don't want to take on. The government could charge them normal rates and subsidize the rest of the cost.

 

What this would do is allow the private insurers to not have to take on these people, which forces them to raise everyone elses premiums. This way, it filters out the one's that are at most risk of having to pay higher reimbursements to the hospitals, doctors and etc.

 

2) Effective Tort Reform, this is estimated to reduce costs by $5-$10 Billion a year.

 

3) Reduce taxes on health insurers. That's right, Reduce them, and create a board to oversee that they credit those tax savings directly to people's premiums.

 

4) Allow intrastate competition between the health insurers to compete with one another.

 

In order to cover more people, instead of forcing people to buy health insurance, or companies to offer it to their employees, create medical facilities for the poor.

 

Build medical centers and hospitals that tend to the one's that don't have enough money to pay for health insurance. The government can hire doctors and staff to tend these people who can't afford medical care. This of course is very complicated, and alot more thought would have to go into it.

 

It could fall under Medicare, and raise everyone's medicare taxes slightly to pay for these services. Only people that fall under the "poverty" levels would be issued cards to provide ID to qualify for this. This could also be paid for with part of the money that they were planning to cut out of medicare. Also, to help pay for it, deductibles could help contribute. Private sector donations set up through charities with very friendly tax writeoff incentives could also help pay for it.

 

Since the medical centers, Doctors and staffers would all be government employees the expenditures wouldn't be as high as private hospitals.

 

These medical centers wouldn't pose any risks of unfair competition, since only certain people could qualify for these services.

 

It's a pretty radical idea, and I wouldn't be opposed to paying a few extra dollars a month to help fund this idea. This would bring down health insurance premiums for everyone. This would not raise everyone's taxes significantly. This would cover a lot more people than are being covered today. This would not put a burden on small businesses, actually it would help them because the premiums they have to pay out would be less. The problem of medical pre existing conditions would be solved.

 

I'm sure there are alot of holes in this idea, but I'm actually trying to think of ideas that would help solve our health insurance dilema

[murra]

The title of this thread is misleading. I saw 0 polls showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

 

So in your opinion the majority of the people are in favor of nationalized health care/abolishing health insurance?

[IDBillzFan]

The title of this thread is misleading. I saw 0 polls showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

Here.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 45% now favor the health care plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats. Most (52%) remain opposed.

 

Only 25% Strongly Support the plan while 42% are Strongly Opposed.

[Magox]

Here.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 45% now favor the health care plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats. Most (52%) remain opposed.

 

Only 25% Strongly Support the plan while 42% are Strongly Opposed.

Two-thirds (66%) say an increase in free market competition will do more than government regulation to reduce health care costs.

 

and I thought this was interesting:

Over the weekend, the abortion issue divided Democrats and created challenges for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Earlier polling showed that 48% nationwide favored the abortion ban but most supporters of health care reform didn’t want to address the issue. Just 13% of all voters wanted abortion coverage mandated in the legislation.

 

This abortion topic could be a deal breaker for many democrats, on both sides. The Liberals are hell bent on not allowing this to happen, even BO chimed in on that, but there are many centrists that support Pro Life that won't support it if they don't have it their way as well. Never did I think this was going to be such an issue.

[Chef Jim]

I have put an enormous amount of time thinking about this problem that we have. Never have I thought about health insurance reform in the way that I have over the last few months, and I do believe that one of the good things that this debate has done, is put in the spotlight so we can all debate this issue.

 

I have some thoughts about we can do for reform.

 

1) To bring down health insurance premiums, the government should set up an exchange for those that have Pre existing medical conditions that the private insurers don't want to take on. The government could charge them normal rates and subsidize the rest of the cost.

 

What this would do is allow the private insurers to not have to take on these people, which forces them to raise everyone elses premiums. This way, it filters out the one's that are at most risk of having to pay higher reimbursements to the hospitals, doctors and etc.

 

2) Effective Tort Reform, this is estimated to reduce costs by $5-$10 Billion a year.

 

3) Reduce taxes on health insurers. That's right, Reduce them, and create a board to oversee that they credit those tax savings directly to people's premiums.

 

4) Allow intrastate competition between the health insurers to compete with one another.

 

In order to cover more people, instead of forcing people to buy health insurance, or companies to offer it to their employees, create medical facilities for the poor.

 

Build medical centers and hospitals that tend to the one's that don't have enough money to pay for health insurance. The government can hire doctors and staff to tend these people who can't afford medical care. This of course is very complicated, and alot more thought would have to go into it.

 

It could fall under Medicare, and raise everyone's medicare taxes slightly to pay for these services. Only people that fall under the "poverty" levels would be issued cards to provide ID to qualify for this. This could also be paid for with part of the money that they were planning to cut out of medicare. Also, to help pay for it, deductibles could help contribute. Private sector donations set up through charities with very friendly tax writeoff incentives could also help pay for it.

 

Since the medical centers, Doctors and staffers would all be government employees the expenditures wouldn't be as high as private hospitals.

 

These medical centers wouldn't pose any risks of unfair competition, since only certain people could qualify for these services.

 

It's a pretty radical idea, and I wouldn't be opposed to paying a few extra dollars a month to help fund this idea. This would bring down health insurance premiums for everyone. This would not raise everyone's taxes significantly. This would cover a lot more people than are being covered today. This would not put a burden on small businesses, actually it would help them because the premiums they have to pay out would be less. The problem of medical pre existing conditions would be solved.

 

I'm sure there are alot of holes in this idea, but I'm actually trying to think of ideas that would help solve our health insurance dilema

 

Regarding your point about pre-existing condition my wife was recently denied a claim for a foot issue due to a pre-existion condition. Her reply "at my age, everything's a pre-existion condition."

[Magox]

Regarding your point about pre-existing condition my wife was recently denied a claim for a foot issue due to a pre-existion condition. Her reply "at my age, everything's a pre-existion condition."

[The Big Cat]

So in your opinion the majority of the people are in favor of nationalized health care/abolishing health insurance?

 

When did I offer my opinion on this matter?

[Magox]

The title of this thread is misleading. I saw 0 polls showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

so now I guess you've seen at least 1 poll showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

[murra]

When did I offer my opinion on this matter?

 

Alright.

[The Big Cat]

so now I guess you've seen at least 1 poll showing a majority of people actively against the Bill.

 

I have, thanks to the link that was provided AFTER the point was made.

 

However I wonder, as you pointed out, how thwarted these numbers are now because of the god damned abortion issue. Jesus, won't that **** just go away!?

[Magox]

I have, thanks to the link that was provided AFTER the point was made.

 

However I wonder, as you pointed out, how thwarted these numbers are now because of the god damned abortion issue. Jesus, won't that **** just go away!?

It will never go away.

 

It has got to be one of the most polarizing issues here in the U.S

 

And to answer your question, I don't believe it is skewing those numbers at all, if you look at the rasmussen poll, it shows that people have been against this sort of health reform for a while now, way before the abortion issue came back out to the forfront again.

[Nanker]

I've got an idea.

Why doesn't the federal government take over cell phone service first.

Once they get that right and demonstrate their competence in running a large and complex system to the American people, then they can propose "health care reform" - whatever the hell that means.

 

Are hearing aids, chiropractic, aspirin and bandages going to be covered? How about medical marijuana and gender reversing surgery and psycho therapy?

[/dev/null]

I've got an idea.

Why doesn't the federal government take over cell phone service first.

Once they get that right and demonstrate their competence in running a large and complex system to the American people, then they can propose "health care reform" - whatever the hell that means.

 

You mean like this:

https://www.safelinkwireless.com