Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
|
|
LEB wrote: bob,
It has been better than 12 years so I should hope any episodes of sudden, unexpected grief and crying are brief. That is how these things are. They hit you when you least expect it. As for you, there are very few people on this site who truly are SOBs. I could count them on one hand and still have fingers left over. You will be please to learn, I am sure, that you number among them.
I feel the love Lois....I would think that you would make a few people list too.
|
|
bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
|
|
LEB wrote: But if you don't mind, let us not hijack the thread. You can send me "hate mail" if you want to pursue this discussion further. I want to talk about the topic introduced by the OP.
I have never sent anyone "hate mail" so why would I start with you??
As to hijacking...what does John Kerry have to do with OP??
|
|
Robb
Social climber
Pick Up Truck Heaven
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 12:35am PT
|
Ya know boys, Lois may have a point here...
"I think the biggest fear I have with government-controlled nationalized health care is that it will substitute one buracracy for another one which is even worse."
Can anyone name for me one thing that the government does truely well, and efficiently?
signed,
former government employee
|
|
Mtnmun
Trad climber
Top of the Mountain Mun
|
|
|
Topic Author's Reply - Feb 10, 2008 - 12:49am PT
|
Congress and the Senate enjoy socialist medicine. Everything is provided to them by us, the people of the USA. Yet they rally the troops, the liberals want SOCIALIST medicine, those liberal commies. Hypocrites!
|
|
bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 12:55am PT
|
Robb wrote: Ya know boys, Lois may have a point here...
"I think the biggest fear I have with government-controlled nationalized health care is that it will substitute one buracracy for another one which is even worse."
Can anyone name for me one thing that the government does truely well, and efficiently?
signed,
former government employee
I would stop blaming the "government" and start holding the citizens of the US accountable for what their government does and doesn't do.
Civil disobedience is a good place to start.
|
|
John Moosie
climber
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 12:57am PT
|
Those who hate the government often love the largest government institution.
..... The military.
|
|
divad
Trad climber
wmass
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 09:01am PT
|
Well, as far as I can remember, the last government program that was successful was WW2.
|
|
Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 10:26am PT
|
I think the government might be less efficient than it should be but folks claiming the government is unsuccessful with all it's programs and actions aren't really being honest about it.
Our system of roads is nearly all government and works great.
Medicare has problems but is administered with little overhead and people get care.
Social Security has been highly successful so far and is only endangered by those who rob from it and want it to appear to fail so they can pork up their wall street buddies with a new plan,
Compare that with our so-called big, big business and see how successful they are. The debt of our big automakers has been reduced to Junk and they have received bailouts. I'm glad we haven't been in the United States of Chrysler since WW2.
The Airlines are always going bust. I'm glad we haven't been in the United States of Pan Am since WW2.
THere is a huge list of banks that are now going bust. Then look at the Savings and Loan bust of a awhile back (wasn't that another Bush Gift?) I'm glad we haven't been in the United States of Citibank since WW2. (or have we?)
Somebody name a few mega-billion dollar corporations that have been as stable as the US over the past 70 years? Even Shell oil has had major scandals.
Peace
Karl
|
|
Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 10:36am PT
|
This thread has got me scared now that I realize that if I get sick or have a problem that forbodes ill for the future, that my private Blue Cross insurance will likely immediately price me out of keeping insurance. Anybody have any ideas on how to get on a "Group" catastrophic medical plan? I want protection from being priced out of the market. I have to admit, with my few assets, it's starting to look like reverting to "Uninsured" makes better financial sense since my insurance doesn't look like it would stick with me in rough times.
Hey Lois
I'm not trying to beat on you but want to get an idea of what is typical and what you think about it. Please answer a few short questions.
1. Do you know what patients are billed for the different services you provide?
2. Does cost to the patient and ability to pay enter into your calculation of what services to give a patient. Do you give them a choice with cost as a factor when an option is not medically critical to their care?
3. How hard is it for your patients to estimate the costs they are incurring if you don't know them? Do you know where to refer them and is it an onerous process?
4. Do you think this issue of patient involvement in cost management could be improved?
I banged my nose hard skiing moguls once. It crack and bleed so i went to the doc cause I didn't want lifelong breathing problems with a broken nose. They said if it was broken, it was only a tiny crack but got ready to send me for an X-Ray. I asked "will the results of the X Ray change your recommended treatment in any way? They said No but I'd feel better knowing what happened. I asked cost. They said $75. I said, I'd feel better spending $75 on a hot date than knowing whether my Nose was cracked or not.
Peace
karl
|
|
Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 12:34pm PT
|
Nice Lois. Good for you and hope you pass this patient empowerment on to those around you. It's not the kind of thing I've found is common enough.
I DO know that you are much kinder and more enlightened in your personal life and actions than in your theoretical views.
Peace
karl
|
|
divad
Trad climber
wmass
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 03:48pm PT
|
Karl,
Roads... except for a few bridges and the Big Dig.
Medicare. Even you admit there are problems.
SS. If you're 80 and retired for 15 yrs, sure it's successful, but for all the boomers facing retirement, perhaps not.
Many gov't programs have periods of success until eroded by corruption or diminishing funding.
|
|
happiegrrrl
Trad climber
New York, NY
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 03:53pm PT
|
The US Postal service works pretty well, and has even been preferable to some other delivery services(UPS, FedEx) for some people.
Unemployment Insurance seems to roll along fairly well, and went from mail-in reporting to using the telephone and online pretty well.
One thing that I think is a bit odd, about the fear of having our health care change.... Those who are most against it, who don't like the idea of paying for others who should damned well stand on their own two feet, and CURRENTLY doing JUST THAT!
 Their taxes help fund for medicaid/medicare
Hospitals get tax breaks on the losses incurred byt hose who can't pay their bills. If that weren't the case, the hospital would have a higher amount of tax going into the reserves - thus taking the burden off those poor old rich people so unfairly overtaxed.
Hospital procedures are jacked up in price to help "cover" those who can't pay, so those who DO have insurance are subsidizing those very people they don't feel deserve it in the first place!
On a THREEFOLD front, those who pay get the shaft with the system that is currently in place.
Switch over to the universal health care, and the burden of paying for the system immediately is redistributed over a much broader section of the population.
|
|
happiegrrrl
Trad climber
New York, NY
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 05:20pm PT
|
"Managed Care".... You mean when the HMO thing started occurring here in the US? Or are you talking about working for 2 doctors in another country and the switch to universal care? I'm not quite sure what you're talking about.
|
|
happiegrrrl
Trad climber
New York, NY
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 07:23pm PT
|
Lois.....The managed care you are saying ruined your associates practice is what we are saying is BROKEN and no longer find acceptable!!!!!
Edit: And not only that, it was the GOVERNMENT and it's policy which enabled the HMO plans to come in and murder health care!
|
|
Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 07:29pm PT
|
LEB, please pay attention. All health care systems entail bureaucracy. Usually significant bureaucracy. All bureaucracies - private and public - are inefficient and sometimes self-serving. ALL. Private bureaucracies in the health care system are always at risk of being compromised by a single-minded devotion to profit. Public bureaucracies are always at risk of disregarding cost. A balance has to be found.
The U.S. health care system is broken. Broken big time. It already has a major role for both public/governments and the private sector. It's grossly inefficient, whether in terms of percent of GNP used for health care, or results.
Other countries, including Canada, get better results when the government takes a more active role in managing health care. Setting aside prejudices, preconceptions, pseudo-ideology, and ignorance, don't you think it's worth a real look at alternatives?
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 08:05pm PT
|
I agree Lois.
Khanom you are one mean dude ......
|
|
bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 08:15pm PT
|
Lois...you seem so vindictive...
Keep it light girl.
I'll be in northern NJ in a couple of weeks...we should get together for coffee.
|
|
Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 08:35pm PT
|
Bob, perhaps you should take LEB climbing while you're there. :-)
Unless LEB = DMT, she is a mature, educated professional woman. She works in a profession that is semi-scientific, and sees a lot of humanity. It surprises me that she is so resistant to thinking for herself, and so gullible when it comes to political and public policy matters. In the case of the U.S. health care "system", perhaps it's understandable - she's so involved, she may not be able to see the forest for the trees. The entrenched interests (financial) have done a superb job of protecting their interests, largely through sophisticated agitprop, and she can't be blamed for being half-convinced. Still, I would have thought that being open to new ideas and new ways of doing things, and a fundamental practicality, would be more her modus operandi.
Cutting to the chase, when it comes to the health care system, follow the money, and look for the facts.
|
|
divad
Trad climber
wmass
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 09:06pm PT
|
Lois,
I've read less than .000001% of 1% of what you've posted here, so I'm not sure why you come here. If it is just to chat with climbers, I think that this thread (along with 600 others) is an indication that you couldn't have chosen a more tolerant, reverent, compassionate, tolerant, understanding, tolerant (did I say tolerant already?) group. I guess that is why you keep coming back.
cheerios :)
|
|
bob d'antonio
Trad climber
Taos, NM
|
|
|
Feb 10, 2008 - 09:50pm PT
|
LEB wrote: Let's face it. When DMT created LEB, he did a damn good job of it. All good novelists create complex characters full of contrasts. Would you have expected any less of DMT?
No...and that is why I love messing with the great LEB.
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!