God, I hope we didn't spend a penny on someone colluding with Islamic terrorists.

Their guess is likely better than CBO's since the CBO can only use the statements in the bill, even if they are absurd.

The CBO has to swallow at face value claims that X amount of revenue will be forthcoming due to some part of the bill for example, even if that is predicated on unrealistic economic growth, or other BS assumptions.

The original "mission" of healthcare reform according to Obama was to "bend the cost curve down."

This bill does worse than nothing to do that. The argument that to be against it is to be for some sort of broken status quo is misleading because the bill in question INCREASES COSTS. Doing nothing actually does less harm, LOL.

There are few ways to reduce costs, and this bill does none of them.

1. Malpractice reform. Malpractice and insurance (except for OB/GYNs) is not really the issue, that's an insignificant % of total costs. The issue is defensive medicine, and malpractice reform could absolutely bend this down over time (it would likely require a new generation of docs to see full effect, defensive medicine is 100% "trained in" at this point). Still, this would be not huge, maybe 10% of total cost.

2. "Conservative" care. Studies have shown that docs out here in "flyover" states practice more conservative medicine—likely this is largely due to a shortage of docs. Outcomes are virtually identical, but FAR less money is spent. They looked at Medicaid patients who died of bad illness, and they spent literally 10X as much per patient in the last 2 years in New York as Iowa—and all the patients in the study died in their 2 years of care. Similar numbers for other urban areas... and who is pushing for "reform?"

3. If you want draconian reform, ration care. Over 90% of lifetime healthcare costs are incurred in the last months of life. That means other than that, all care could magically cost $0.00, and you'd only drop total expense by under 10%.

Care in the last months of life is by definition ineffective, right? (otherwise they'd not be last months of life).

If the government stopped messing with insurance (it is pegged to Medicare, after all, so it is HIGHLY regulated right now), they'd be far more free to do what they should to ration care—they'd charge way higher premiums for people at risk, or already sick. This is a GOOD THING. Yeah, if it's you, it sucks, but the reality is that you'll likely die anyway in these cases. It;s cold, but that's the way it is. If the government rations care, you have no recourse, you are SOL. If Blue Cross does, you can always try another insurance, sell the house, whatever.

Cut defensive medicine, and practice conservative care (both closely related) and you can bend down the curve without sacrifices in quality of care. Leaving some avenue for aggressive care is clearly good, as the US has the best outcomes when you look at treatable but fatal disease (breast cancer, prostate cancer, etc). Clearly some of this is aggressive care that doesn't work for most, but works for enough that it's worth the shot if it is your life on the line.

Well someone's a bit of a stereotypical and ill-informed jerk. She wasn't "colluding with Islamic terrorists" as you put it. That fact aside, do you really think that a bunch of radical Islamics who treat women like dirt, let alone an American, would actually accept one to help them to begin with? Hell no. She was trying to keep the Israelis from bulldozing a Palestinian pharmacist's house down, because they claimed it was in an area where there were guerrilla hideouts and tunnels and that it was necessary to keep the peace (even though, as the Wiki stated, they never produced any evidence to prove this to the public).

The Israelis have a nasty habit of pulling this kind of stuff with the Palestinians, because they know, as far as international law is concerned, no action will be taken by any governments in the West and they can consequently get away with it. And if any controversy does arise, it's always from private groups and organizations that can do very little to interfere. Take these examples:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2RiEXrJ69o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQyIKyd2gqA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bdbA2Ka3Bo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BXRKqSSKWo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mO8CWSam2o

And then there's of course the Muhammad al-Durah Incident at Netzarim Junction.

http://blog.france2.fr/charles-ender...08/05/28/73147

Some claim that it was all some kind of elaborate hoax, but nobody has ever launched a scientific debunking investigation into it (the government hasn't anyway). There's been YouTube documentaries by third-party "investigators", and I stress the third-party part (the "Three Bullets" documentary is about as enlightening as the Zeitgeist documentary; they're both originally just Internet videos).

Not to say all Israeli soldiers in Palestine are this bad. That would be stupid. You have bad and good ones, with everything. Like this guy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJGyf...eature=related

Even so, we should be doing more to prevent the bad ones from remaining out there in the field. And we should also be monitoring more and more the actions the IDF is taking (as in operations they're launching, tactics they're using, etc.).

I could have sworn that ISM is made up of people from the all the big three Abrahmic branches and has a policy of non-violent protest.
Its amazing how something like that can suddenly be transformed into colluding with islamic terrorists....or was it just a throwaway knee jerk statement based on pure ignorance that Tater made.

So if you did away with more restrictions then more people can be stripped of their cover, employers would end up paying more for less, the already ridiculous levels of bankrupcy due to health costs could be increased and more people would become entirely reliant on government handouts and healthcare which taxpayers would then have to fund.

What about people who collude with state terrorists like Israel?

Oh wait, the US is the biggest state terrorist in the world.

:timeout:

Stepping in front of a bull dozer and hoping it will stop is idiotic. Glad she's out of the gene pool, frankly. I feel sorry for the driver.

There could have been a peaceful, 2-state solution ages ago if not for islamic terrorists. Heck, they had a solution that even the Saudis said was "criminal" that they didn't take during the Clinton Administration. Curse it was not in Arafat's personal interest to solve anything, it would have prevented him lining his Swiss bank accounts. But go ahead, side with them all you like.

The Slaughter Solution
 

An interesting take: http://washingtontimes.com/news/2010...the-president/I couldn't agree more with this, and anyone who thinks that such a move could actually be justified Constitutionally, is being intellectually dishonest.

Does anyone really think that liberals would not be claiming the exact same thing should, say, conservatives move similarly on an abortion ban?

Update: They apparently just abandoned the idea. Good.

Still, I'm concerned that such a concept could even be considered.

Their brazenness has reached new highs.

I dont think they can pass it with a vote as alot of them realize this will be their last term if they do so.

It's simple voting against the will of the pepole is not a good idea.

What I am afraid of is politicians that are willing to walk the plank and follow through with this monstrosity contrary to the american will just to secure the Obama legacy and garner even more control over the citizens.

How in the hell did this thread turn into a discussion on terrorisim?! :nope:

It wouldn't have been the first time - both sides have used it before. However, I am glad to see it off the table. Question is - how many reps have the will to vote for the original bill?

Both sides have used it for budget processes, yes. However, budget processes are not laws.

This would have been entirely unique.

Hardly, when it comes to this cause. The fact is she had done this many times before and nothing this deadly had ever happened before. This certainly doesn't satisfy to dispel our suspicions. I must agree with the lot that has concluded that the driver did this intentionally.

I was about to say the same about him. Apparently, he was a Russian immigrant to Israel who was killed after a gravel truck rolled over with him in the cab in 2008, working for the IDF to the end.

Oh please. When Palestine was carved up for the creation of Israel by the UN, there were no Islamic terrorist groups even in existence in the region. Hamas, Hezbollah, none of these groups existed there. The only real reason why Israel was created was to provide a safehaven for the Jews of Europe in the aftermath of the Second World War and after details of the Holocaust had been brought to light. What kind of crappy justification is that for completely revamping the homelands of a settled people who had lived there for hundreds of years already? Thousands were forced out of their homes and made to settle down elsewhere where they would be accepted. Had Israel never been allowed to have been created, or at least never encouraged by the United Nations, this would not have been an issue to begin with. There would not have been a war like this to begin with. These terrorist groups in that specific region would not be what they are today, if they were even brought into existence. The Jews of Europe could have settled back down where they had lived- and had long, happy lives in peace.

The Saudi Arabians never called the Hebron nor the Wye Agreements "criminal". The 1993-1996 agreements were almost entirely strictly between Israel and Egypt.

Correction: Yasir agreed to both the Hebron ad Wye Agreements. Hell- the Wye Agreement he signed in the presence of then-President Clinton. Netanyahu also signed it. The problem is that when Ehud Barak was elected Prime Minister of Israel, he tried in 2000 to convince the Palestinians to allow 69 Jewish settlements to be built in their territory and also allow the IDF military access to reach these settlements, though 95% of the West Bank and some of the Gaza Strip would be given to them in exchange. With that said, military access is still a very unreasonable demand on the part of the Israelis, especially considering that it was the Palestinians they were making this demand towards (the same people who's land they, the Israelis, were living on after it was taken from its rightful former owners).

Not that his finances have anything to do with Israeli-Palestinian relations or the Hebron and Wye Agreements, but whatever.

Ok.

Thank Tater for his statement that: God, I hope we didn't spend a penny on someone colluding with Islamic terrorists. :roll:

Thats easy.
You just get someone to ignore the Christian/Jewish /Israeli /American aspects of the specifics of a topic which unless by a divine miracle that cannot be explained......
then(apart from that of pure ignorant bias) and you end up with ("islamic terrorist").....simple isn't it:yeah:

Though to be fair the question of US citizens paying for Israeli government stupidity is a moot point...they just pay for it and in general(on a vocal level) tend to cheer the unending waste of tax dollars.

Look its gulliver on his travels:hmmm: