President Donald J. Trump

[Dr. MD MD]

Damn!  She kicks ass!!!
Marine Le Pen savages Merkel, to her face in EU Parliament.

https://youtu.be/ieKYwTFUV5Q

You go, girl! She can't become the leader of that country fast enough for me. 

[starrmtn001]

You go, girl! She can't become the leader of that country fast enough for me. 

With ya 100% Doc.

[pyewacket]

Another woman to admire.

Chao’s Choo-Choo Stop
A $647 million grant two days before Obama left the White House.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/chaos-choo-choo-stop-1488755853

[Meister_000]

What happened to "A day without a woman"?

Well, to start things off;
Lady Liberty "mysteriously" went Dark for two hours on Tues night.
"Rogue" electrons?, or . . .  ;-)

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/08/us/statute-of-liberty-dark-trnd/index.html

[GravitySucks]

http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-na-pol-obamacare-repeal/#nt=oft12aH-1gp2

Taxes
Most of the taxes set up under Obamacare to pay for subsidizing insurance would be scrapped. The GOP proposal does not include any new tax to offset the loss of revenue.

Under the Affordable Care Act

Insurance companies and medical device makers, which benefit from new customers under the law, pay more taxes
Taxpayers with incomes over $250,000 are also taxed more

Under the GOP proposal

Medical device makers, insurance companies and wealthy Americans would all receive a big tax
cut

Hmm...Tax cuts for the wealthy, but no mention of how to recapture loss of revenue from ACA? Ryan and his GOP comrades must take the American public for stupid.

Ryan is an idiot. He voted with Obama whenever they needed his vote and he does not represent the conservatives.

They need to repeal Obamacare. At this point any replacement plan will be a no-win situation.

Anyone that currently has Obamacare should be grandfathered into a market-based plan.  Your worry was about preexisting conditions. Well, if they had preexisting conditions before Obamacare, and they followed the law, then they now have coverage so your concern on that point is moot.

I don't have the answers for a replacement plan, and it is clear noone else does either. I beleive the "crisis" was entirely made up before the ACA was passed. No matter what solution the federal government comes up with, it will suck ass.

Until then I will just keep bugging the shit out of my congressman and senators to remind them that if they vote for Ryan's plan, I will support evey effort to elect someone else in the next election.

[GravitySucks]

Another woman to admire.

Chao’s Choo-Choo Stop
A $647 million grant two days before Obama left the White House.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/chaos-choo-choo-stop-1488755853

Damn. He was only trying to give the Palestinians $220 million. These California train peeps must be extra special.

[albrecht]

Damn!  She kicks ass!!!
Marine Le Pen savages Merkel, to her face in EU Parliament.

https://youtu.be/ieKYwTFUV5Q

One of the benefits of BREXIT, whether or not it will go through or in what manner, was that it woke people up about the EU and the fact that the EU is, basically, an end-run against Germany's losses, twice, to "unite Europe" under their aegis. The nascent nationalism of countries, like France, and many others is rising as they see this and they see Germany using immigration and "refugees," in addition to official EU and economic policies against them. An attempt to force the citizens of X,Y,Z countries to plea to the EU ("Germany") "save us!" (from the migrants, from our corrupt politicians, from our crumbling economy, etc.) But people aren't buying it any more and the BREXIT has taken the UK counter-balance out and so the EU is now seen for their true colors: German, and not the good kind of Germany but more of the East German commie, top-down control, decadent elites, totalitarian state type of thing, eventually.

[JesusJuice]

Well, to start things off;
Lady Liberty "mysteriously" went Dark for two hours on Tues night.
"Rogue" electrons?, or . . .  ;-)

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/08/us/statute-of-liberty-dark-trnd/index.html

The "temporary, unplanned outage" occurred after a lighting system controller was switched off to change out faulty lighting equipment, said Jerry Willis with the National Parks Service. When the repair was completed, the lighting system controller wasn't properly reset, leading to the outage, he said.

[mikuthing01]

Meister_000 if you are going to post fake news click bait please use http://archive.is

[albrecht]

Well, to start things off;
Lady Liberty "mysteriously" went Dark for two hours on Tues night.
"Rogue" electrons?, or . . .  ;-)

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/08/us/statute-of-liberty-dark-trnd/index.html

Sabotage or accident, as the officials claim: either way if it cause some "migrant's" vessel to get lost and turn around- I'm good with it!

[Lt.Uhura]

I don't have the answers for a replacement plan, and it is clear noone else does either. I beleive the "crisis" was entirely made up before the ACA was passed. No matter what solution the federal government comes up with, it will suck ass.

There was indeed a health care crisis before the ACA. In the years leading up to the ACA the Big Bank$ were orchestrating the housing crisis, leaving working class families vulnerable. As the recession unfolded, folks began losing their jobs--along with their employee health plans--right and left. Of the few jobs available, many were part-time, without benefits. Also people seem to forget that health insurance premiums were rising before the ACA. In fact I bought my own plan and had to let it go cause I could no longer afford it. While briefly without coverage and searching for another plan one of my children needed surgery. I was self-pay, and it cost me thousands of dollars. We are healthy, I thought we'd be fine for a few months...Murphy's law was an expensive lesson.

Meanwhile, the ERs were filling up with people with no health insurance, and in many cases, people who waited too long to seek medical attention because they weren't covered, requiring longer hospitalizations, or more extensive care.

We can not go back to a time when Americans had no health insurance, or even insufficient coverage. Since our economy is based on the utilization of minimum wage and low wage employees, we must offer them adequate health care coverage at rates they can afford. Ditto for the elderly and disabled on fixed incomes. If the GOP can't come up with a plan that serves everyone, they can kiss their asses (and their own primo, taxpayer-provided health care) goodbye next election.

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

There was indeed a health care crisis before the ACA. In the years leading up to the ACA the Big Bank$ were orchestrating the housing crisis, leaving working class families vulnerable. As the recession unfolded, folks began losing their jobs--along with their employee health plans--right and left. Of the few jobs available, many were part-time, without benefits. Also people seem to forget that health insurance premiums were rising before the ACA. In fact I bought my own plan and had to let it go cause I could no longer afford it. While briefly without coverage and searching for another plan one of my children needed surgery. I was self-pay, and it cost me thousands of dollars. We are healthy, I thought we'd be fine for a few months...Murphy's law was an expensive lesson.

Meanwhile, the ERs were filling up with people with no health insurance, and in many cases, people who waited too long to seek medical attention because they weren't covered, requiring longer hospitalizations, or more extensive care.

We can not go back to a time when Americans had no health insurance, or even insufficient coverage. Since our economy is based on the utilization of minimum wage and low wage employees, we must offer them adequate health care coverage at rates they can afford. Ditto for the elderly and disabled on fixed incomes. If the GOP can't come up with a plan that serves everyone, they can kiss their asses (and their own primo, taxpayer-provided health care) goodbye next election.

Unfortunately, health care is going to be a mess as long as legislators aren't required to find and pay for their own insurance just like the people they're supposed to represent.

Cheers, Uhura!

[mikuthing01]

BREAKING: Possible Obama DOJ Cover Up Regarding Terror Suspect Days Before Election

Obamas DOJ aided a terrorist days before the election.

TRUMP WAS RIGHT AGAIN!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEFSCkCesu0

[starrmtn001]

Americans Going Back to work: Hiring at Three-Year High in February!  3.8.17.

https://youtu.be/P3DxbwN_x6A

[GravitySucks]

There was indeed a health care crisis before the ACA. In the years leading up to the ACA the Big Bank$ were orchestrating the housing crisis, leaving working class families vulnerable. As the recession unfolded, folks began losing their jobs--along with their employee health plans--right and left. Of the few jobs available, many were part-time, without benefits. Also people seem to forget that health insurance premiums were rising before the ACA. In fact I bought my own plan and had to let it go cause I could no longer afford it. While briefly without coverage and searching for another plan one of my children needed surgery. I was self-pay, and it cost me thousands of dollars. We are healthy, I thought we'd be fine for a few months...Murphy's law was an expensive lesson.

Meanwhile, the ERs were filling up with people with no health insurance, and in many cases, people who waited too long to seek medical attention because they weren't covered, requiring longer hospitalizations, or more extensive care.

We can not go back to a time when Americans had no health insurance, or even insufficient coverage. Since our economy is based on the utilization of minimum wage and low wage employees, we must offer them adequate health care coverage at rates they can afford. Ditto for the elderly and disabled on fixed incomes. If the GOP can't come up with a plan that serves everyone, they can kiss their asses (and their own primo, taxpayer-provided health care) goodbye next election.

I am sorry to hear you had that situation.

You seem to stress the part about takes on medical device providers... if you honestly think that medical device manufacturers pay the tax, you are tragically misguided. Any tax paid by any industry is paid for by the consumers. That much is fact.

Any profits made by any insurance company or medical device manufacturer is also taxed at 35%. If they pay dividends out of what profits are remaining after taxes, those are then taxed when the recipients file their taxes. The government makes a killing off of health insurance.

I actually tried to do some out of the box thinking and the best I could come up with is to have insurance companies be treated like public utilities.

Some things are similar. One could say everyone needs electricity. Being in Texas, it can be viewed as more of a necessity  than health insurance. While I need to buy it, there is competition, at least in the metropolitan areas. In rural areas, like where my land is, I only have one option, and that is theough a co-op. But in either case, I control a large part of my spending for that electric service.

Where I am currently living I have several choices for buying my electric. I pay less per kwh today than I did even 10 years ago because of competition and I keep my bills down by making my home more energy efficient and by adjusting my thermostat to fit my budget. Maybe health insurance could be set up with sone type of rebate based on going 6 months without a claim.

The health sharing network I am in has a long track record for keeping costs well below normal insurance plans but as it is set up, it is definitely not for everyone.

Downside is that it doesn't cover prescriptions. I am lucky in that I don't smoke, don't drink, had no prexisting conditions and don't take any prescriptions. They do have a discount plan for prescriptions but Walmart/sams is usaully cheaper for generics anyways.

Several aspects of these type plans may be worth investigating for a revamp of health insurance.
I have had it for 30 months. The rate has stayed at $199 for my single coverage. They must be doing something right to keep their admin costs down. When I looked into health insurance 30 months ago as my COBRA ran out, if I remember correctly, it was over $900 per month with a $5000 deductible. I could not afford that (for the Bronze plan).

I really don't have the right solution for a nationwide plan, and like I said, noone else does either. I am against a large federal government and feel that any government run plan is going to be wasteful, prone to corruption and will cost much more than a free market solution.

There should be some way to provide a basic safety net for the poor while providing free market solutions for the mainstream (which doesn't require a huge federal bureaucracy). I do agree with you that an ER should not serve as primary care.

Maybe taking lessons learned from the creation of public utilities (which are still profit-oriented) and best practices from the health sharing networks could provide some answers. You will still have insurance companies lobbying against any changes, but you must realize these same companies were lobbying the democrats when the ACA was passed.

It is hard to listen to whining from the health care industry when you take a walk through some of the hospitals in downtown Houston and they look like a combination art gallery/Palm Springs health spa. MD Anderson has common areas in the wards that have giant flat screen TVs with reclining massage chairs just in case visitors get uncomfortable while visiting actual patients. 

TL;DR Health insurance is complicated - one size does not fit all - nothing is free

[Dr. MD MD]

one size does not fit all - nothing is free

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cF0AkC3Y9g

[Robert Ghostwolf's Ghost]

I am sorry to hear you had that situation.

You seem to stress the part about takes on medical device providers... if you honestly think that medical device manufacturers pay the tax, you are tragically misguided. Any tax paid by any industry is paid for by the consumers. That much is fact.

Any profits made by any insurance company or medical device manufacturer is also taxed at 35%. If they pay dividends out of what profits are remaining after taxes, those are then taxed when the recipients file their taxes. The government makes a killing off of health insurance.

I actually tried to do some out of the box thinking and the best I could come up with is to have insurance companies be treated like public utilities.

Some things are similar. One could say everyone needs electricity. Being in Texas, it can be viewed as more of a necessity  than health insurance. While I need to buy it, there is competition, at least in the metropolitan areas. In rural areas, like where my land is, I only have one option, and that is theough a co-op. But in either case, I control a large part of my spending for that electric service.

Where I am currently living I have several choices for buying my electric. I pay less per kwh today than I did even 10 years ago because of competition and I keep my bills down by making my home more energy efficient and by adjusting my thermostat to fit my budget. Maybe health insurance could be set up with sone type of rebate based on going 6 months without a claim.

The health sharing network I am in has a long track record for keeping costs well below normal insurance plans but as it is set up, it is definitely not for everyone.

Downside is that it doesn't cover prescriptions. I am lucky in that I don't smoke, don't drink, had no prexisting conditions and don't take any prescriptions. They do have a discount plan for prescriptions but Walmart/sams is usaully cheaper for generics anyways.

Several aspects of these type plans may be worth investigating for a revamp of health insurance.
I have had it for 30 months. The rate has stayed at $199 for my single coverage. They must be doing something right to keep their admin costs down. When I looked into health insurance 30 months ago as my COBRA ran out, if I remember correctly, it was over $900 per month with a $5000 deductible. I could not afford that (for the Bronze plan).

I really don't have the right solution for a nationwide plan, and like I said, noone else does either. I am against a large federal government and feel that any government run plan is going to be wasteful, prone to corruption and will cost much more than a free market solution.

There should be some way to provide a basic safety net for the poor while providing free market solutions for the mainstream (which doesn't require a huge federal bureaucracy). I do agree with you that an ER should not serve as primary care.

Maybe taking lessons learned from the creation of public utilities (which are still profit-oriented) and best practices from the health sharing networks could provide some answers. You will still have insurance companies lobbying against any changes, but you must realize these same companies were lobbying the democrats when the ACA was passed.

It is hard to listen to whining from the health care industry when you take a walk through some of the hospitals in downtown Houston and they look like a combination art gallery/Palm Springs health spa. MD Anderson has common areas in the wards that have giant flat screen TVs with reclining massage chairs just in case visitors get uncomfortable while visiting actual patients. 

TL;DR Health insurance is complicated - one size does not fit all - nothing is free

I particularly like the rebate idea, because I've been paying for health insurance my entire long adult life and have been fortunate enough not to have needed it so far. That definitely should count for something.

[Meister_000]

Texas pickup lines √

[Lt.Uhura]

...I actually tried to do some out of the box thinking and the best I could come up with is to have insurance companies be treated like public utilities.

Some things are similar. One could say everyone needs electricity. Being in Texas, it can be viewed as more of a necessity  than health insurance. While I need to buy it, there is competition, at least in the metropolitan areas. In rural areas, like where my land is, I only have one option, and that is theough a co-op. But in either case, I control a large part of my spending for that electric service...

That is a good analogy. The primary difference between electricity and health insurance, is we purchase electricity directly from the provider. In health care there is a 'middle man'--the insurance companies.

There are a number of successful HMOs who administer their own services as intergrated managed care groups. Kaiser is one I am familiar with, I once worked for them. Their plan was popular with working families with kids as it was easy to use, get same day clinic appointments when the kids were sick, etc. Many employers offered a choice between Kaiser and another insurance option from the open market. Over the years their premiums have also risen as elsewhere, with people paying a larger portion of their income for their plan. Rents and home prices have skyrocketed too in many urban areas, and salaries haven't kept up. Thus, the shrinking middle class. Still, I think self-administered HMOs are a viable option for many.

You are right about the private hospitals looking like country clubs. This is a relatively new phenomenon over the past few decades, as for profit hospitals compete for revenue. They're after the heavily insured and private pay 'clients' who are having elective surgery, but the average Joe who's poor and sick--not so much.

In fact in many, if not most cities across the U.S., private, for profit hospitals never have enough in-patient beds, leaving sick people waiting hours--even days, in over-crowded ERs for a bed on the wards. I know for a fact that new hospitals have been built by administrators knowing full well they would be inadequate for the size of the community they serve. In other words, too few in-patient beds to accommodate the sick people who they lose money on. Yet their lucrative out-patient services; i.e elective surgeries, are spacious and plush.

Of course hospitals are expensive to run, but like the health insurance industry, being a for profit entity invites an inherent moral dichotomy between patient care vs profit. I think that is the best argument for some kind of government-administered option, or at least a hybrid so that the sickest and most vulnerable patients are not left in the care of greedy gatekeepers. Decades ago we had government-run "county hospitals" for the poor, and I worked at one of those too. Yes there were problems, but I think patient care was decent to excellent, and sick people were not seen as profit losses.

[Meister_000]

Sarah Silverman shared,
on this special day:

"If pregnancy is God's Will, so is . . ."

[Meister_000]

From Congressman Swalwell:
"Top of the Charts" ~ Kremlingate

[Meister_000]

New York Times ~ March 8th 2017:
Who wins and who loses under the Republicans' health care plan
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/03/08/upshot/who-wins-and-who-loses-under-republicans-health-care-plan.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

Kill the Poor ~ Dead Kennedys 1980

https://youtu.be/L8zhNb8ANe8

[paladin1991]

Unfortunately, health care is going to be a mess as long as legislators aren't required to find and pay for their own insurance just like the people they're supposed to represent.

Cheers, Uhura!

Shhhhh.  The Lt. is sleeping.  You might wake him.

[paladin1991]

Sarah Silverman shared,
on this special day:

"If pregnancy is God's Will, so is . . ."
The chick holding the sign would be my cure for a limp dick.

[Lt.Uhura]

Shhhhh.  The Lt. is sleeping.  You might wake him.

I'm NOT asleep! But I'm wondering how Paul Ryan can sleep after offering up that pathetic alternative to the ACA. 

[Lt.Uhura]

Where are the gutsy men like George C. Scott today? He would kick that little pansy Paul Ryan's ass for running such a shit show. lol!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HftRP0NAJYg

[Meister_000]

I'm NOT asleep! But I'm wondering how Paul Ryan can sleep after offering up that pathetic alternative to the ACA. 

Etta James ~ I'll Take Care of You
https://youtu.be/vqmLcKUin0U

(img) Kiss of Death

[Meister_000]

oh, and also yesterday (also NYC) . . . :
Empire State Building shines Pink in solidarity with Women marching below ~ Rogued again!   [per Huff]
(or is that Rouged again ;-)

[Meister_000]

Newsweek ~ March 4th 2017
The Press must stand up to Trump’s Bullying
http://www.newsweek.com/press-must-stand-trump-bullying-562989

"President Donald Trump’s relentless media bashing has become one of the most persistent tropes of his cacophonous early time in office.

He and his administration have called the press an “enemy of the people,” slammed leading media outlets as purveyors of “fake news,” dealt harshly with individual reporters at press conferences, excluded leading outlets like The New York Times and CNN from White House press briefings and promised that things will “get worse every day” for the “corporatist” and “globalist” media.
   
Trump’s treatment of the press has editors, journalists and media freedom advocates rattled, shattering conventional understandings of an adversarial but mostly respectful relationship of leaders to the press in free countries where the so-called fourth estate is recognized as indispensable to democracy . . ."

[Meister_000]

I wonder how this is going to work out.  I know that where I work, nobody was talking about this.  And I do have a number of snowflakes employed there, is this a secret strike? . . . 

You will enjoy this hashtag: #WeShowUp