"Obamacare" - The USA Hard Right vs. the NHS

Since when do the ravings of paranoid schizophrenics count as "debate"?

They don't. Barney Frank told one such person that talking to them was like trying to talk to a desk.

He was then accused of talking down to people. :lolinsane:

*watches Youtube video*

Woah.

By which I mean, SHIT, I've NEVER seen anybody as arrogant, small-minded, selfish and set in their ways as that woman.

It was hilarious to see her admitting:

1: "Yeah, we've got Health Insurance already. No problems with healthcare here. Therefore I have the right to argue against free healthcare for the less fortunate."
2: "My husband pays the bills. I don't even know how much he makes a year. I just spend his money."
3: "I have paid absolutely no attention to politics previous to today. I'm not interested in events that may have something to do with the rest of the world."
4: "I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT POLITICS WHATSOFUCKINGEVER. Yet I'm sitting on this show trying to argue against socialism even though I clearly have no idea what it means."
5: "My parents are gonna use Medicare when they hit that age. I didn't realise that was socialism because I'm ignorant about politics."
6: "This bill only affects the richest of the rich. I fear I may be among those people, and I don't want my taxes raised. But I'm not sure because I don't deal with the bills."

By the end, my mouth was just hanging open as I stared at this woman, amazed at the CHEEK she's got, to come on TV and try to argue a point when she's clearly ignorant.

I think I know this kind of person. See, she likes being rich, and healthcare is not a right, it's a fucking privilige, and one that only she and her rich buddies should have. She also likes things remaining the way they are. War doesn't affect her, but free healthcare might change things and she's terrified of change. In fact, she's one of those people who prefer stagnation in the negative, than change for the better.

I used to know somebody called Katy Abraham. Incidentally, I didn't like her much.

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Reviving this thread for another thread you HAVE to read. We're a small collection of people, so there're not much stories here, but SA is where it's at.

So many infuriating health care stories, you will explode. Or cry. Read it. From start to finish, all 40 pages.

Actually, I've got something a bit more relevant to the larger community in general than SomethingAwful.

FUCKING BILL O'REILLY.

I was at the DFAC this morning for breakfast, and AFN was showing Fox this time, and Bill O'Reilly had Nancy Grace on his show. For me, this was like watching a perfect storm of suck.

I had no idea what I was in for when the commercial break ended. He brought these two blonde chicks on to start a Two Minute's Hate on Oregon.

So, during this segment, first they talk about a hippie chick who washes her car naked, because there's no law in Oregon against public nudity. Then they talk about that attention whore transexual mayor who was asked to stop behaving inappropriately in front of children. This was the set-up, the proof that Oregon was a lawless, liberal hellhole. One of the blonde chicks said that she saw a man expose himself as a child and it DAMAGED HER FOR LIFE so of course SOMETHING HAD TO BE DONE in Oregon FOR THE CHILDREN.

So then they went to a lung cancer patient who died in 2008 because Oregon's public health care would pay the $50 for assisted suicide medication but not the $4000 for treatment. Given the option of "no treatment or die quicker," she went with "no treatment" and eventually died from the cancer.

THEY WENT ON TO SUGGEST THAT THIS FATE AWAITS ALL OF US IF WE GET PUBLIC HEALTH CARE FOR THE REST OF AMERICA AND WITH COMPLETELY STRAIGHT FACES SAID THAT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN WITH PRIVATE INSURANCE.

They went on about how horrible it was that the DEMON PUBLIC HEALTH CARE that would place a value on all our lives, and it was only fifty bucks.

They basically said, with straight faces, that a private health insurance company would never let a customer die just to protect their bottom line.

At the rate I'm going I think I'd better just hide in my room with a fifth lest people start spontaneously melting in my presence.

I fear I may be getting into it with my friend again over this. She's one of the ones who got it into her head that people who don't have health insurance 'chose' not to have it. She's also convinced that "almost everyone" who wants the public option is a Fatty McFatty who smokes eight packs a day. She got very quiet when I pointed out that basically all of our friends cannot afford health insurance and work in places that either don't offer it or where it's too expensive to afford.

Penguin wrote:

...lest people start spontaneously melting in my presence.

Admit it. That would be fucking awesome.

rae wrote:

Penguin wrote:

...lest people start spontaneously melting in my presence.

Admit it. That would be fucking awesome.

Yeah, I admit, it would be. I just don't know how much control I'd have over it, which would mean the difference between becoming a human superweapon, and being sealed away and left for dead. :lolinsane:

Penguin wrote:

FUCKING BILL O'REILLY.

AAAAARG.
Well, I won't lie, I'm relieved that the show does that bullnuts to everyone and not just the Netherlands liberal European countries. Why does that show even exist? Someone please tell me because I don't get it.

Verandering wrote:

Penguin wrote:

FUCKING BILL O'REILLY.

AAAAARG.
Well, I won't lie, I'm relieved that the show does that bullnuts to everyone and not just the Netherlands liberal European countries. Why does that show even exist? Someone please tell me because I don't get it.

Because there are Fox viewers who think he's pretty liberal.

Penguin wrote:

Verandering wrote:

Penguin wrote:

FUCKING BILL O'REILLY.

AAAAARG.
Well, I won't lie, I'm relieved that the show does that bullnuts to everyone and not just the Netherlands liberal European countries. Why does that show even exist? Someone please tell me because I don't get it.

Because there are Fox viewers who think he's pretty liberal.

...

Does not compute.

Billo's gotta be feeling the pressure, though. When Glen Beck is let out of his padded room to babble about his paranoid fantasy world where the President is a Kenyan who wants to kill your Grandma and indoctrinate your children with the Socialist ethic of "Work Hard and Stay In School", or Rockefeller Center is the Holy Grail in some sort of Communist DaVinci Code, Billo starts to look rational in comparison.

And "rational" just doesn't sell on the Fox Comedy News Channel.

Psy-4 wrote:

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Reviving this thread for another thread you HAVE to read. We're a small collection of people, so there're not much stories here, but SA is where it's at.

So many infuriating health care stories, you will explode. Or cry. Read it. From start to finish, all 40 pages.

I am watching "Sicko" right now and it's breaking my heart. I am sure there are lots of unpleasant things to be said about Michael Moore, but just watching people tell you how they lost people they love because some numbfuck denied them necessary treatment is heart wrenching.

My aunt is undergoing breast cancer treatment right now. She's understandably shaken and worried about what may come, and there are costs for her (such as some special alternative treatments, homeopathic pills and so on), but she knows that all necessary tests and the chemotherapy will be covered, no questions asked. I'd take our screwed up German system over this health insurance abomination any day.

Chocho wrote:

My aunt is undergoing breast cancer treatment right now. She's understandably shaken and worried about what may come, and there are costs for her (such as some special alternative treatments, homeopathic pills and so on), but she knows that all necessary tests and the chemotherapy will be covered, no questions asked. I'd take our screwed up German system over this health insurance abomination any day.

Totally this. I grew up under the German system, and aside from a monthly deduction straight out of my paycheck once I started working, buying the occasional OTC and medicine copays which never went beyond about $7 tops, I never, EVER had to pay anything for medical care, not even for going to the ER (where I was about to move in thanks to school sports for quite some time...). I know there's low quarterly copays for doctor visits now and serious illnesses always cost a little more on the side, especially when experimental treatments are sought, but at least no one FUCKING HAS TO DECLARE BANKRUPTCY BECAUSE THEY GOT SICK. EVER.

Imagine my joy when I got sick while visiting my then-boyfriend-now-husband in the US for the first time and ended up with about $600 in hospital bills and an additional $200 for meds. For a bladder infection, which was very painful, but hardly life-threatening. Since then I've managed to incur even higher bills, and noticed that docs here tend to be very good at treating symptoms instead of fixing problems at their root - after all, that's how you keep 'em coming back, right? I'm sorry, but that is motherfucking ridiculous, and anyone who thinks this is normal and should stay that way needs a headshot. :hair:

Verandering wrote:

Penguin wrote:

Verandering wrote:

Penguin wrote:

FUCKING BILL O'REILLY.

AAAAARG.
Well, I won't lie, I'm relieved that the show does that bullnuts to everyone and not just the Netherlands liberal European countries. Why does that show even exist? Someone please tell me because I don't get it.

Because there are Fox viewers who think he's pretty liberal.

...

Does not compute.

He is considered an independent on there. My step-dad says he's liberal because he doesn't believe in the death penalty.

I do not miss the days where I had to watch that crap show.

Chocho wrote:

I am watching "Sicko" right now and it's breaking my heart. I am sure there are lots of unpleasant things to be said about Michael Moore, but just watching people tell you how they lost people they love because some numbfuck denied them necessary treatment is heart wrenching.

I've seen Sicko. Like most of his stuff, it needs to be taken with a heavy dosage of salt. Especially when they go to Cuba.

It gets me that people act like if there's free healthcare, the Insurance agencies will collapse into bankrupcy.

Well, maybe they will, but that would be because the Health Insurance of the USA is crap, and doesn't DESERVE to stay up.

Even here in the UK, where we have the NHS, you can still get Health Insurance. And you know what? You won't be denied it because your appendix burst when you were 8.

American Health Insurance is comparable, if not worse than our Travel Insurance, which will do just about anything and everything to squirm out of paying for your ruined holiday, the minor difference being that even if you can't go on holiday for some reason, you won't start coughing up blood.

Personally, I think travel insurance is a retarded concept anyway. I mean, who thought that'd be a good business to go into in the first place?

"Oh I'm sorry you were stuck in your hotel because you took a trip to Jamaica during hurricane season. Tough beans, mister."

Well, it's a little more complicated than THAT, Penguin. More like, "Oh, the hotel in your package holiday had closed down by the time you got to it? Tough beans mister."

That's a little LESS fair, but ironically that's more how it goes.

And likewise, that's how American Private Health Care goes too. Like I said though, the difference being that it's HEALTHCARE.

When I hear these stories about Health Insurance having to be taken to court to pay for something vital, I always feel like they're hoping like hell that you'll drop dead before you can win your case and get treatment.

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

When I hear these stories about Health Insurance having to be taken to court to pay for something vital, I always feel like they're hoping like hell that you'll drop dead before you can win your case and get treatment.

They are.

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

It gets me that people act like if there's free healthcare, the Insurance agencies will collapse into bankrupcy.

Because a company could stand up to being undercut by another company that was above the law and could print money in the basement, and has almost complete control over the media?

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

Well, maybe they will, but that would be because the Health Insurance of the USA is crap, and doesn't DESERVE to stay up.

What about the UAW & the american Auto-making industry? What about all those banks that have been propped up despite failing?
Hell, what about the fucking Marshall plan?

unskilled78 wrote:

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

It gets me that people act like if there's free healthcare, the Insurance agencies will collapse into bankrupcy.

Because a company could stand up to being undercut by another company that was above the law and could print money in the basement, and has almost complete control over the media?

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

Well, maybe they will, but that would be because the Health Insurance of the USA is crap, and doesn't DESERVE to stay up.

What about the UAW & the american Auto-making industry? What about all those banks that have been propped up despite failing?
Hell, what about the fucking Marshall plan?

Unskilled, NOBODY, not even the government is above the law. They act like they are, but they're not. And the government can't just print more money. There can't be more money in circulation than there is gold in the vaults. Or something like that. Well, legally there shouldn't be.

And somehow I doubt the Insurance industry is gonna run out of money.

theweirdkind wrote:

He is considered an independent on there. My step-dad says he's liberal because he doesn't believe in the death penalty.

He also refuses to deny that global warming is real, and will in fact argue with guests who say that it isn't. Offhand, those are the only two good things I can think to say about him.

unskilled78 wrote:

Harley Quinn hyenaholic wrote:

It gets me that people act like if there's free healthcare, the Insurance agencies will collapse into bankrupcy.

Because a company could stand up to being undercut by another company that was above the law and could print money in the basement, and has almost complete control over the media?

The government has control over the media? Are you serious?

You cannot be serious. Do you know who owns the media? Companies like General Electric, Universal, Westinghouse, and Disney. Do you know who would lose if the progressive/liberal agenda were passed in whole (including health care reform)? Companies like General Electric, Universal, Westinghouse and Disney.

Drug companies spend millions every year to advertise on these channels. Millions that these companies would lose if health care reform were passed.

And the government is already "running the presses hot" in terms of money. That's why, when combined with the currently low interest rates, there is a concern of a total deflationary spiral.

Haven't we all learned by now that Unskilled's knowledge of economics revolves around the allowance he gets?

Probably true. I'm afraid I took Business Studies when I was younger. It wasn't easy to learn from a lesson so intrinsically, brain numbingly dull, but hey.