Well Flower, I spend most of my time with an old Geeezer. I have to see the bill first.

We have a while to go before I am going to demur on legislation that has not been written.

Guess I'm not as old as I though I was. This is exactly my reaction to the DC BS.

C

Thanks for posting, flower.

Yez, and his reforms will become law. Some comfort, eh? Like Clintons reforms? No enforcement and the law is meaningless. Totally.

It's all a moot point anyway, when the Roberts Court gets done with allowing corps to run our elections, it'll be over. It's making me sick hearing these SCotUS justices complain that corps are people. I have two questions for these immoral ignoramuses. Do people die? Yes. Do Corps? Do Corps dies? No.

Then WTF are you arguing that they are people or "persons"? That would be a determining factor. Louts.

I dunno. It's obscene and I empathize plenty with the youngster. It sucks for us somewhat oldsters, too.

Yep, it's a pretty good solution they have, Larry, if it's the latter half, because the loss of this young person to another country would be a shame for ours.

I disagree with the idea that we are mandating company profits... that sounds too benign... Without including a strong public option, the effect of a mandate is to PRIVATIZE TAXATION.

~flowerchild~, here's what I would like to say to your young friend:

First, welcome to the army of supporters of a single payer health plan! We need you. Signups on the first floor. Some day, we might succeed in getting such a plan. Then, young friend, you will pay for health insurance through taxation or payroll deductions. You will probably pay significantly less than you are being asked to pay now, because the burden will be more equitably distributed, and because the government insurance plan will operate with much lower administrative overhead, and without extracting profits.

Unfortunately, we are not getting a single payer plan at this time. It doesn't matter how many new ideas Barack Obama has, and it's not really his fault. Single payer is in fact an old idea, with very old and very powerful enemies, and it will take a long battle to defeat those enemies. You should understand this clearly as you sign up to help. The hard awareness of how powerful our enemies are is dismaying and daunting, but even the most progressive among us understand those present political realities. Ask Maxine Waters, Anthony Weiner and Dennis Kucinich.

Many of us think the best thing we can do at this point is to get our foot in the door with a public option in an insurance exchange. That option can be improved and expanded over time to pressure down costs, give private insurance stiff competition, and provide a low cost option to more and more Americans. Who knows? It may grow so large and powerful that it evolves into a single payer system over time. But even if it doesn't, it can be used as a powerful political tool to pry more and more of the public benefits of a single payer plan out of the existing system.

As we move forward with our struggle for equity and universality, we are going to need everyone to chip in, in some way, to cover the heavy costs of providing health care to all of our citizens, especially the most sick, hurt and challenged among us, people who are not able to care for themselves, or work to support themselves.

Have you ever had to use medical services of any kind, yourself? How were they paid for? You may be vigorous and healthy now. But if you do get sick, he will be very glad others have been required to purchase insurance. The costs of treating you may very well exceed any amount you have paid into the system yourself, and are being drawn from the pool of funds that others are providing by their payments into their own plans. The more people who chip in, the less we all have to provide. Health insurance, whether public or private, is a purchasing cooperative that spreads costs around, including on the healthy, so that they do not fall entirely on the sick.

It is admittedly an annoying and bitter fact that you and I and everyone else are being compelled to share this burden at a higher than necessary cost, so that we can fulfill not just our obligations to each other, but also provide monstrous salaries and obscene profits to a few privileged individuals. Help us change that. But in the meantime, we all need to do our share, even though there is unfairness and waste in the system - it's the only system we have. Requiring a contribution from everyone who can afford one, in an amount proportional to what they can afford, is the fairest thing we can do.

Until we have won our struggle, and I know this might strike you initially as a condescending and irritating thing to say, try not to think too much about yourself, and try to think about what you are doing for others. Yes, some of what you pay into the current system will be wasted on profits and unnecessary administrative costs. But even with the inefficient and unjust system we have now, most of what you pay in is going into a pool to pay the costs of treating some very sick and hurt people. And that is something you can be proud of, something that might make the real hardships you have to endure and good things you have to forgo just a little easier to accept. It moves you out of childhood, and makes you one of society's responsible elders, shouldering our common burden of caring for each other.

Help us make sure that the mandated insurance requirements are set up so that people like you are paying rates that are income and age appropriate, with subsidies where needed, and that they are not placing burdens on you that are proportionally unfair, given what the rest of us are paying as well.

We progressives are trying to rebuild a stronger sense of a social contract in this country. As we begin to succeed, young friend, you may come to feel that being required to chip in some of your hard-earned cash to the health insurance pot is an obligation paid forward to the elderly, infirm and unfortunate who have helped build the society you are part of. It will be paid back to you by your children, grandchildren and their peers when you are elderly, infirm or unfortunate yourself.

Dan, you say it so well, and so movingly. We can not move forward if we are not willing to make changes. Not all the changes will be good, but what we have now is certainly not good, or affordable, or available to those who need healthcare. The need for healthcare touches us all - if we are young and healthy, we have parents who might not be; and even the young get struck by terrible diseases. We must ALL be able to see a doctor when we need to.

"Either I'm done with this country or I'm going to change it" - I hope you keep at it, it's a long haul. And it's really, really hard.

My understanding is that Obama proposes the same health care deal that a janitor working for the Federal government would get. I can hardly believe that these janitors pay $400.oo a month. There are people around this country doing rather bottom echelon tasks, such as removing trays from a hospital cafeteria, that have excellent coverage at accessible cost thanks to being part of a massive group plan. I, myself, get rather cushy coverage for a fifth of what this person is dreading having to pay due to a corporate group plan that is much, much smaller than that offered by the Federal Government.

In that sense, I do not understand how so many intelligent people here in this forum could possibly believe that these numbers make any sense. I can understand and expect the other side fearing death panels and such. However, $400.oo strikes me as immensely inflated under a massive group plan scenario, and I wonder how no one seems to notice this. Please correct me if I am wrong.