I understand you are not starting an argument but the system here is broken. For starters and I have stated this before, malpractic insurance is phenominal. My dad paid over $100k per year for insurance with his group of doctors that contracted on for the ER. Tort reform, although attempted in one state, needs to be done in all states and it needs to be scrutinized as much as each case should be. People sue at the drop of a hat. Case and point, man shows to my dad's ER. He is at the counter answering questions and has a massive heart failure. My dad arrives with a crash cart and revives this man. In the meantime, when the man went into heart failure he dropped to the floor and broke his nose in the process. So, as he lay dead with a broken nose my dad revives him. The mans wife started a lawsuit over the broken nose. That is a fine how do you do. Save her husbands life but sue because he broke his nose when he went down from cardiac arrest. At any rate, like you stated, the hospital gives you a bill. Well sure. They provided a service. Ok, fine. I have been paying premiums for years. So insurance pays for me. What is he difference? I already paid up front. What is the great mystery here. Ok, I paid $600.00/month for 12 months over 10 years. That is $72,000.00 dollars. Sure, I went in for a sniffle or my spondaneous pneumothorax and I was covered. Well sure, I paid in advance! It is like paying for an extended warranty on your new car purchase. Basically you are paying for repairs in advance. See what I mean? At any rate, you said you paid $25.00/week for healthcare. That is swell. However, why must I pay $25.00 for the government program which will be crap and also pay for what I have now which is good? Do you see the picture now? So, not only am I paying higher premiums for the uninsured already but I will have to pay additional to take care of everyone. This does not seem right. Why should I have to do that. How does this benefit me? All it is does is benefit those that are taking from the system already. I'm a bit tired of paying for that also. If it was so cut and dry there would not be a 1900 page bill full of legal jargon that was crafted by a tired old hag named Pelosi. Once again this is being shoved down our throats and we have no say. As you can see, this runs deeper than just a healthcare bill. This is another and one of many to come were the people have zero say about it. As of now the government has intruded on our lives more than any government at any time. What they are doing makes the Patriot Act look like a comic book. If they want healthcare for all then create a program that is affordable. Leave me out of paying for it if I do not use the program.

No argument, just a general understand of how screwed the system is and throwing more of my money at it is not the answer. It is just a damn Obama legacy he dreaming of and Pelosi's hope of making the history books. She does not give a crap about anyone's health. She is covered and that is all she needs to know.

OK forgive me for asking a few questions here....

Your apparently under the age of 65, so your not on Medicare.

Your obviously retired by choice, or disabled by requirement, since you mentioned the "fixed income" fact.

You don't have health insurance through any private entity.

If your retired by choice, why are you not going out and doing for yourself for a time while things are tight? I don't mean to be an A$$, but if your retired and not able to do the things you want or need to, then you need to step up and do for yourself, not gripe about how those of us who do work don't want to pay for your health care. Alot of folks are doing things they don't want - like working 2 jobs, to make ends meet.

If your disabled and thus unable to do for yourself, then your entitled to Medicare even if your not 65 or over. There is a waiting period, but for folks on SSD, the income is low enough to entitle you to get Medicaid until Medicare kicks in. Sure, it takes swallowing some pride and going to the office with all the people who don't speak english, but its there for you. If you can't swallow pride enough to do that, why are you here telling people "thanks" for not wanting to give MORE of a handout?

Again with the comment of "fixed income", just note that often times that income is low enough to qualify you for help. Go get it, instead of denigrating those of us who are already providing help for a lot of people as it is and not wanting to create more government ENTITLEMENTS.

Also, and this is not aimed but is a simple comment. Live within your means. Can't find anything to cut back on? Call me a self righteous elitist, but I have had times when I have had to say no to the internet, unlimited long distance calling plans, cable or satellite TV, etc etc... to make sure the important things were taken care of.

I am not trying to give anyone a hard time, but the reality is that there IS a safety net already there, and I am already paying for it. I really don't appreciate someone complaining because the net wasn't big enough to catch them.....

Its like telling the fireman who just saved you from your burning home how crappy he is because he didn't save the house too when you started the fire by smoking in bed.

He is in the US Capthaplo. I do not know how the lack of healthcare insurance is handled for the individual in his country. Although I agree with your assessment for people in the US. The safety nets are there.

Keybd.. - I am not trying to single you out, don't feel targetted. There are different systems, but ultimately, since your in the US now, there are options for you.

I don't want you or your wife to suffer. No one should need to. That's why there are the nets out there. But those of us providing the nets have gotten tired of being told we aren't doing enough, while we see people abuse the system, milk it for all its worth, and refuse to do for themselves. That is why I say avail yourself of the things that are there, or do for yourself, or both.

I will keep you both in my prayers as well.

To CaptainHaplo: Hey, I don't feel targeted or singled out! :) It's always interesting (read that as "good") to hear other people's points of view on any subject whatsoever.

At this point I had typed a whole paragraph explaining my (our) situation, but decided against it as it would only lead to further "discussion", which I see has already become way too heated for truly objective debate.

Apart from my age, all your other assumptions about me were incorrect, lol. A public forum, however, isn't a place I'd want to discuss my personal circumstances - indeed, the only point I ever had in mind when I made that first post some hours back, was to try to show that there are a lot of people out there who would dearly like to have an option to obtain health care at a cost they could afford - I used myself as an example only. Not to plead my plight. :)

"Living within one's means"? A nice thought. I know you didn't mean it to sound critical so I didn't take it that way, but we don't have cable, or satellite or a telephone. The car we have was given to us (a 14yr old clunker, but it goes!) BUT... once a year, around March, we receive a tax refund which affords us the opportunity to treat ourselves. This year it was my turn, so I bought a computer. You could argue that I should have bought a year's-worth of health insurance, lol. Well, it would have covered three month's-worth anyway. My only defence is that we look upon that money as our Christmas, by the time Dec 25th arrives there's no spare cash for gifts, lol.

I mention all of the above solely because you asked. No whining, no complaining. All-in-all, I consider myself quite lucky; I have a wonderful and loving wife and a roof over my head. As I have already said, there are far worse-off people around, I know two on a personal basis, one a lad of 22 and the other a widow of 68. But they have no-one to speak for them or plead their case.

Finally - I loved your analogy. That's a compliment, I'm not being sarcastic. And thank you for your prayers - they're appreciated. I hope you include all those who are dying for want of professional treatment as well. (And THAT wasn't meant in any other way except sincerely - I understand that in a textual message, intonation is completely lacking and therefore the words can be misunderstood, please don't misunderstand mine.)

Our health system may have issues:doh:, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. Ore-gone has a state funded medical system, and they are the biggest deniers of care! The creator of the oregon system has called it a total failure. I can't wait to have the state tell me that "we don't cover" that expensive insulin anymore, but we will cover this 40 yr old beef insulin:yeah:. When I had my eye issues, do you know how long I had to wait to see a doctor? 1 hour. And do you know how long it took to see a specialist? 2 hours later THAT DAY! Socialized medicine can't deliver that level of service, so take your DMV medical coverage and shove it!:yeah:

I don't want sub standard medical coverage for everybody. Just wait for the first doctor's strike because they aren't happy with their pay:yeah:.

There has to be a better solution than gov't managed~run health care.

I would settle for some sort of insurance reform.

but how dare the government mandate to the people that they HAVE to buy a particular product or service???

Congress needs to...

1. Print money
2. levy taxes
3. Manage national defense
4. manage interstate and international trade
5. leave everything else the hell alone.

Thank you. I very much agree. Basically you have like 3.3% of the American population chronically unable to afford coverage. They have access to healthcare in the ER and such, but they don't pay for any coverage. Do we really want or need to overhaul the entire health care system by putting government in complete command control of it? Like Democrats are telling us we need to. I say no. Not just no....but Hell no! Open up the competition among carriers in the various states is a good way to spur more competition without soaking the taxpayers, and creating another layer of unneeded and very expensive bureacracy. The government needs to change the rules and get the hell out of the way, and provide nothing more than oversight. Nothing more. If competition is what's needed...let the insurance companies compete.

If this whole thing winds up passing, I wonder if they could get it ruled as un-constitutional, as with many of FDr's policies?

To comment on your last few sentences and what I have been harping all along...the system needs to be fixed. Throwing tax money at it to cover more people under a broken system is not the answer and will never be the answer.

More and more this is looking to be nothing more than a Obama legacy he has been crafting over many years as he worked his way to the Presidency. I believe we are looking at a 4 year Obama and out.....

Why pass a bill so bloated and out of control before it takes effect?

They say you won't even start getting any health care help for four years after the health care bill passes (if it passes)

Why not take another year and spend some serious public tax money of say 1 bilion dollars to study the problem of spending 1.3 trillion dollars and then present a well thought out plan for health care.

and why do they confuse the problem with saying this is all based on a ten year forecast.

Why ten years?

Where is the 500 billion dollars in cut medicare spending coming from?

is that a one time cut or counted as a ten year savings.

How can you honestly say this won't cost the American public something?

You can't ...

It is reported that the nations ER rooms are operating at a 2 billion dollar a year loss ... heck just give them an extra four billion dollars a year and take care of a lot of the problems they want to solve in this health care bill.

Yeah sure geetrue...throw logic in our face...see if we care. :O: What you are saying makes to much sense and that does not follow in DC. Yesterday Bill Clinton was pushing and saying hurry hurry get it passed. Get the ball rolling. That is all this is....getting the ball rolling. That strategy sucks...plain and simple. So much more needs to be looked at and you know what, if they took the time to do so a bill could be drafted that could possibly get countrywide approval. But no, they are going to hurry and slap together a crap bill riddle with holes and open ended directives. All this in the name of getting the ball rolling. All of this to make the people feel excluded and railroaded much like we have been in the past 9 months. :down:

That is one thing i have never trusted about this bill.

everyone who is in favor of it seems to be in such a rush and insists that it is the best for the nation... but they hold all their meetings behind closed doors on nights when most normal Americans are watching the football game.

"no no no dont look at the facts just pass it, it will be ok just hurry!! hurry!!! get this thing going pass it now! do it pass it now!!!"

lets look at a scenario for a moment...

You have a motor company that builds cars. 90% of the cars they have EVER built are junk... but now they have come out with this newest model. There is not a great deal of information about it available to you, but it advertises a lot of horsepower and options... sticker price: $150,000.00

would you buy it if the dealership's sales pitch was:

"Its cool bra... just buy it, but whatever you do buy it before lunch time! Interest rate??? forget that, its got leather seats! hurry up and buy this thing! warranty? you know if it costs 100 thousand dollars it MUST have a decent warranty right? forget that, just take my advice... buy this car RIGHT NOW AND HURRY!"

no... you wouldnt buy it. not only is it out of your budget by a WIDE margin... but the dealer has given you almost no facts or information about the vehicle.

so why are there ANY people willing to buy a $1,300,000,000,000.00 health care package which you know almost nothing about when certain political individuals are using that exact same sales pitch???

We need health care reform in America. everyone with half a brain knows that

but this particular package is not the answer.

lets do something bipartisan, lets do a few years of research to assure the best possible deal for everyone, lets do the homework now so we get a good grade on the test later.

i think that is a concept we can all agree on for the time being.

I wouldnt buy that car... Too many 0s for my budget...:rotfl2:

strap this number to your sore wallet

$1,300,000,000,000.00

that translates to a little over $4,300 in annual taxes PER PERSON IN THE USA (man woman and child)

thats an aweful lot of zeros to be DEMANDING from the public for a health care system that will no doubt be broken and flawed when my children are my age - especially when asking for that cash during the "worst recession in decades".