re: MTG Goes to war…. In support of Obamacare

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Sure it does

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It does if you’re okay with some people not getting any healthcare.

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Hate to say it, but if health premiums double while the Republican's are in charge of the White House, House and Senate, they will be completely and utterly wiped out in 2026 and 2028.

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Yep. In the end, it's is inevitability always the working middle class that decides every election.

...and it's the working middle class that happens to be the only demographic in American society that worries about Healthcare premiums. Low/no-income families get taxpayer funded Healthcare, and the top 10% don't worry much about the costs.

If the (R)s don't get off their nuts and do something drastic to address this issue, then it's pretty apparent that they don't like the power of being in charge and just want to go back to being controlled opposition.

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data centers are jacking up consumption and we are paying the difference, not the multi billionaire corporations.

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What percentage of utility increases are driving by “green” initiatives?

We were already seeing skyrocketing costs even as data centers started booming.

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There is no good way to fix it. Healthcare is expensive and every system has pros and cons. The free market just doesn’t work in healthcare and there are issues with National Healthcare also. There is no “fix”. Pick your poison.

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This is absolutely correct with the exception of one statement, which kind of ruins the whole thing.

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The free market just doesn’t work in healthcare

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The free market absolutely works in healthcare. It certainly works as well as any other model and works better than the rest when it comes to routine care.

But I agree with the rest of your post. There is no "fix" like people such as the poster to whom you replied thinks there is.

There's no such thing as maintaining quality of care, quantity of coverage, and low costs. You want to improve one point on that triangle, it's going to cost you in at least one other one, and sometime both of the remaining ones.

People have become so simple these days that they can't think things through even to the point of realizing that about health care. They can't process beyond, "Muh gov't needs tu fix this!"

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Maybe she should spend her energy drafting a bill that would fix health insurance

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And the GOP can be counted on to support it?

Get real.

The GOP is FOS and 0bamacare (gee, thanks SCOTUS) was always designed as a rigged economic time-bomb.

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Cut them out and blacks will rampage with Dem leaders urging them on. This is a known fact and we are held hostage by this fact.

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These cuts won't affect most black people. It will mostly affect middle class white people. It's simply a return to the original Obamacare laws that cut off subsidies at an income greater than 400% of the poverty level.

It still sucks, but that's what it is.

Some Republicans are willing to work on extending the subsidies, but not as part of the CR to keep the Gov. open.

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It was free market prior to the sixties.

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It was cheap then too

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In 1950, the country spent less than $100 a year — or $500 in today's dollars — on the average person's medical

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Should there be employer insurance or should everyone have to buy it on their own?

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Employer provided insurance should be taxed as income. That would end that perversion.

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Are you okay with people not getting any healthcare because they are poor? This includes kids. Or should there be government programs for that like there are for food.

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Why not think in a more integrated manner instead of being so binary?

For example, we could have taxpayer funded clinics that any citizen could avail themselves of while also maintaining private clinics and hospitals. No insurance to bill, no administrative nonsense, just show a driver's license or passport or some other proof of citizenship and you get the care.

You could still have private health insurance—which would be much cheaper if you dropped all of the nonsense regulations binding them up now—or you could pay cash for the private care. People who could afford it would, people who couldn't would still have the public care.

Just like we do with education.

Now...that would likely be quite expensive tax-wise. Not sure how expensive it would be once you drop the regulations and administrative costs from the 3rd party billing (Medicare/Medicaid) and account for the fact that lots of people would choose not to also buy private insurance, so they would save that money. Even with all of those savings, taxes would go up.

But again, that's the triangle. Increase coverage, you're going to feel it in the other two points.

I'm with you there.

I do think there's probably a better way than what we're doing now...how much better and whether it would be worth what it would cost, i don't know.

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We never gave it a chance. There is nothing free market about healthcare.

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There is, albeit limited to certain procedures.

Anything that isn't currently covered by insurance is subject to free market forces. Lasik eye surgery, for example. Lots of psychological counseling is conducted cash-pay, as well as lots of dental procedures and orthodontic plans, plastic surgeries, compounding drugs, smoking cessation, weight loss, supplements, and veterinary care for pets.

If people want something, they'll pay for it.