The Republican Thread

[Balta1701]

Why pass healthcare? Because then more babies can be aborted and the government can save more money!

 

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=M...mE3Y2ZlZDQ5NTY=

Looks like Stupak backed off that one pretty quick.

Congressman Stupak called NRO to clarify his comments. In recent conversations, he says that some Democratic members, not Democratic leaders, have been citing a Congressional Budget Office report that says his amendment will cost $500 million to implement over ten years. “I did not mean to infer that the leaders are using financial arguments to deny my amendment,” he says. “We have spoken about the CBO and my amendment’s costs, but the leadership has not said that it costs too much money. My point here was that if cost is becoming a concern about my amendment, then that should be addressed, since this is the sanctity of life we’re talking about. We can address those costs. Cost should not be a reason to deny my amendment.”

[southsider2k5]

Looks like Stupak backed off that one pretty quick.

 

Of course he did. Did you honestly think he would stand behind something so stupid?

 

By the way you are totally trolling

[Balta1701]

Of course he did. Did you honestly think he would stand behind something so stupid?

Frankly, until the Dems decide they're going to act like the Republicans and start making people lose seniority over statements/votes like his, yeah, I'm surprised.

[southsider2k5]

Frankly, until the Dems decide they're going to act like the Republicans and start making people lose seniority over statements/votes like his, yeah, I'm surprised.

 

Why? The Democrats have been doing all kinds of things to people who aren't falling into party lines, including the worst punishment of all, trying to get them out of office by running other people against them. I know that isn't the popular theme, but its not like they are standing by and just accepting people not following marching orders. There are plenty of pissed of Dems too.

[Balta1701]

Why? The Democrats have been doing all kinds of things to people who aren't falling into party lines, including the worst punishment of all, trying to get them out of office by running other people against them. I know that isn't the popular theme, but its not like they are standing by and just accepting people not following marching orders. There are plenty of pissed of Dems too.

It depends on who you define as "The Democrats" and whether you focus on the ones in office, who come to the defense of their brethren against primary challengers (it worked great when they defended Lieberman, I tells ya) or the actual people on the ground or outside groups (i.e. Moveon). There's a reason why the Republicans are able to keep single voters from supporting an opposing president's legislation while 30% of the Dems would wind up breaking ranks to vote with the Republicans on stuff Bush wanted, and it's not "they might face a primary", both sides have that threat starting to work right now.

[southsider2k5]

http://www.calgarysun.com/news/canada/2010...6/13138731.html

 

Sick man faces bankruptcy — or death

Cancer patient must pay for drug needed to keep him alive

 

Kent Pankow and wife Deborah, fought the Alberta government to have his brain-cancer treatment paid by the province. Kent Pankow lives in Edmonton, in a province and a country that is trying to either kill him or bankrupt him.

 

No sense mincing words.

 

Suffering from brain cancer, Kent Pankow was literally forced to go to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. for lifesaving surgery — at a cost to family and friends of $106,000 — after the health-care system in Alberta left him hanging in bureaucratic limbo for 16 crucial days, his tumour meanwhile migrating to an unreachable part of the brain, while it dithered over his case file, ultimately deciding he was not surgery worthy.

 

Now, with the Mayo Clinic having done what the Alberta Cancer Board wouldn’t authorize or even explain, but with the tumour unable to be totally removed, the province will now not fund the expensive drug, Avastin, that the Mayo prescribed to keep him alive and keep the remaining tumour from increasing in size — despite the costs of the drug being totally funded by the province for other forms of cancer.

 

Kent Pankow, as it turns out, has the right disease but he has it in the wrong place.

 

Had he lung cancer, breast cancer, or colon cancer, then the cost of the drug — $4,555 per treatment, two times a month — would be totally covered by Alberta’s version of OHIP.

 

But he doesn’t.

 

And so he is not only a victim of brain cancer, he is also a victim of arbitrary discrimination.

 

Full disclosure. Kent Pankow, a 40-year-old Red Seal sous chef, is a son of the man who married the spouse of my late brother. And it was while vacationing with them at their winter home in Los Cabos, Mexico, recently that this story began to unfold back in their home province of Alberta.

 

But do not think, even for a moment, that this could never happen in Toronto or other parts of Ontario.

 

Our supposedly universal federal health care system, the pride of most Canadians and the political struggle of America, is only as good as the length of the waiting line and whether you have the right disease at the right time.

 

After writing more than 150 letters to everyone from the prime minister to virtually all health authorities both federal and provincial, and being ignored in return, Kent Pankow’s wife, Deborah Hurford, decided to finally go public.

 

CTV Edmonton did a major feature on the family’s plight on the 6 o’clock news and, almost before the program ended, Alberta’s health and wellness minister, Gene Zwozdesky, was on the phone to their home — ensuring himself some positive press in the followup that aired later that night.

 

Then, when he heard the Pankows had filed a human rights complaint against the province, justifiably citing medicare-based discrimination, Zwozdesky suddenly went mute — stating he could no longer discuss the matter publicly.

 

Ten years ago, when first diagnosed with a glioblastoma multiforme brain tumour (GBM), Kent Pankow was given five years to live.

 

After beating it down once, however, with his first surgery having been performed in Alberta, he spent nearly seven years in remission until the cancer’s return in 2008.

 

And he is not prepared to give up.

 

“He’s a fighter,” says his wife, admitting, however, that the cost of the drug has been a significant drain on friends and family who have not only donated large sums of their own money, but have also organized fundraisers to keep hope alive, including school penny drives.

 

“When Kent goes for his Avastin IV injection, he sits next to patients who receive the same drug for free because they have another type of cancer — like colon cancer,” Hurford says.

 

“Brain tumour patients deserve the same rights as other cancer patients, including access to the same lifesaving treatments — and without additional costs.

 

“I can’t begin to tell you how frustrated, angry, disgusted and appalled I am with both the Alberta health system and the individuals within the system who continue to perpetuate such an archaic and inhumane approach to the treatment of patients.” she says. “It seems like they are doing everything in their power to ensure that Kent succumbs to an early and unnecessary death.”

 

“The Avastin is working. The size of the remaining tumour has remained static since October,” she says.

 

“But how can anyone afford almost $10,000 a month for a drug — even if it is saving a loved one’s life?”

 

When Alberta health minister Gene Zwozdesky called the Pankow home on the night CTV Edmonton aired its story, he purportedly blamed the feds, namely Health Canada, for deciding what drugs are covered, and for what.

 

Federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, however, in a letter to Deborah Hurford, wrote that “while Health Canada is responsible for the market authorization of drug products, the province and territorial governments are responsible for managing the list of drugs for which public reimbursement from government drug plans is available.”

 

This, too, is passing the buck.

 

What Aglukkaq would not explain to Hurford — citing confidentiality — was why Avastin received a notice of compliance from Health Canada for other forms of cancer, but not yet for brain cancer as in the United States.

 

Nor would she offer any information regarding any application before her department for the use of Avastin in the treatment of brain tumours.

 

“Based on Kent’s MRI’s and radiology reports, and analysis by his surgeon at the Mayo Clinic, Avastin is playing a key role in stabilizing Kent’s tumour,” says Hurford.

 

“Without it, Kent’s tumour will grow and he will die.

 

“So why then,” asks Hurford, “is (everyone) choosing not to help Kent and other brain tumour patients who are forced to go public with their private health issues and fundraise for their lifesaving medical treatments?

 

“Where is the dignity in that?”

[NorthSideSox72]

http://www.calgarysun.com/news/canada/2010...6/13138731.html

If your main point is that Canada's system isn't some awesome thing, then, I don't see who would disagree. If your point is that socialized medicine is somehow going to do this more, or less, than private health insurance... then I think you are mistaken. This could just as easily happen with a private insurer. Individual corner cases like this are not a reason to choose one model over the other - they are a reason to fix whichever one you have.

 

[StrangeSox]

Yeah, that is just an example of a government system capable of being as bad as our private system. It's still not a good defense of our private system.

[KipWellsFan]

http://www.calgarysun.com/news/canada/2010...6/13138731.html

 

Seriously, that situation should be rectified as soon as possible. I think most Canadians would agree that the Alberta government should pay for that medication, and the surgery if it's not available here. People should never go bankrupt because of their health. The health problem itself is enough of a burden.

 

Besides that, bureaucracies get frigged up. It happens a lot. And I think from all the stories I hear about south of the border, that would be the same in the private and public sphere. And while bankruptcies related to health issues seem pretty rare here, it's apparently more of a problem down south. Despite our bureaucratic monster I believe Canadians still have a longer lifespan, and health costs per person are less. Of course that doesn't mean we don't have HUGE problems.

 

Not sure if it's really relevant to the issue but in Canada, health care is a provincial area of jurisdiction, but with a large amount of the funding coming from the federal government, that is, if provinces continue to provide the care according to certain tenets of universal care. Alberta is Canada's most conservative province. They haven't really elected a centrist or center-left government in probably over 75 years. During the most recent national election, the Conservative Party won 27 of 28 seats. 28 the election before that. It's kind of like Texas, except I'd argue that the separatist notions are more real here. So I think that's also something you should consider. Especially if you're trying to make us out to be some kind of socialist (marxist if you're Kap) monster.

[kapkomet]

Canada is the model of the Western Euroweenie socialism. They (well maybe not you) even admit it. And then b**** about their taxes while they're at it.

[KipWellsFan]

Canada is the model of the Western Euroweenie socialism. They (well maybe not you) even admit it. And then b**** about their taxes while they're at it.

 

You might be joking but I'm not sure...

[lostfan]

Why? The Democrats have been doing all kinds of things to people who aren't falling into party lines, including the worst punishment of all, trying to get them out of office by running other people against them. I know that isn't the popular theme, but its not like they are standing by and just accepting people not following marching orders. There are plenty of pissed of Dems too.

 

 

It depends on who you define as "The Democrats" and whether you focus on the ones in office, who come to the defense of their brethren against primary challengers (it worked great when they defended Lieberman, I tells ya) or the actual people on the ground or outside groups (i.e. Moveon). There's a reason why the Republicans are able to keep single voters from supporting an opposing president's legislation while 30% of the Dems would wind up breaking ranks to vote with the Republicans on stuff Bush wanted, and it's not "they might face a primary", both sides have that threat starting to work right now.

I've been trying to say this for a while but I never manage to get it out b/c it's always in the middle of a rant about something else but that's one of the fundamental differences between liberals and conservatives. Conservatives (in politics, just about all of them, and it includes media, think tanks, donors, etc.) all see themselves as part of a "movement." You'll never hear a Democratic politician talking about a "liberal movement" because there is none, just people with different ideas about how the government should function and they don't always align with each other. This is why Republicans can do anything with near-total cohesion and Democrats are always a clusterf***.

[kapkomet]

I sure as hell don't see myself as a part of a "movement". I just want to be left the hell alone. And I think most people do.

[lostfan]

I sure as hell don't see myself as a part of a "movement". I just want to be left the hell alone. And I think most people do.

I don't mean voters, I mean mainstream politicians and the support structure around it. If you look at the positions of each conservative in government they are almost all exactly the same because they all revolve around the same philosophy. For example who is the last Republican to vote for a tax increase since 1994?

[kapkomet]

I don't mean voters, I mean mainstream politicians and the support structure around it. If you look at the positions of each conservative in government they are almost all exactly the same because they all revolve around the same philosophy. For example who is the last Republican to vote for a tax increase since 1994?

 

 

Yes and no. John McCain certainly isn't 1994 breed. But he's a douchbag anyway.

[lostfan]

Yes and no. John McCain certainly isn't 1994 breed. But he's a douchbag anyway.

Yeah he kind of belatedly joined that group when he decided sometime around 2006 that he wanted to run for president. Didn't work, obviously.

[southsideirish71]

Just had the pleasure of watching how a person who is on government assistance buys groceries. Now I know this is not all of those who are on government assistance, but still this is comical. I was up at the Jewel getting garbage stickers for Downers when a man and his wife start to split up their very sizable grocery carts, 2 of them mind you. They proceed to break them into bundles, and purchase them with this government checks, and that Link card, and a WIC check, etc etc. It was over 300 dollars in food. Then the man proceeds to purchase about 75 bucks in hard alcohol. He uses cash for that. He pulls out a wad of 100 dollar bills, saw him breeze through about 9 of them before he got to the lower bills. He purchased this in cash, then took his two carts of food and booze and proceeded to the parking lot. I come out moments later to see him loading a very large brand new Mercedes SUV with the food. Thank God we can provide for the less fortunate.

Edited March 18, 2010 by southsideirish71

[NorthSideSox72]

Just had the pleasure of watching how a person who is on government assistance buys groceries. Now I know this is not all of those who are on government assistance, but still this is comical. I was up at the Jewel getting garbage stickers for Downers when a man and his wife start to split up their very sizable grocery carts, 2 of them mind you. They proceed to break them into bundles, and purchase them with this government checks, and that Link card, and a WIC check, etc etc. It was over 300 dollars in food. Then the man proceeds to purchase about 75 bucks in hard alcohol. He uses cash for that. He pulls out a wad of 100 dollar bills, saw him breeze through about 9 of them before he got to the lower bills. He purchased this in cash, then took his two carts of food and booze and proceeded to the parking lot. I come out moments later to see him loading a very large brand new Mercedes SUV with the food. Thank God we can provide for the less fortunate.

That's pretty disgusting, though I tend to think the majority of people on food stamps are probably not like that guy.

 

[Controlled Chaos]

(not my words author at end.)

 

My Healthcare Plan

 

Liberals keep complaining that Republicans don't have a plan for reforming health care in America. I have a plan!

 

It's a one-page bill creating a free market in health insurance. Let's all pause here for a moment so liberals can Google the term "free market."

 

Nearly every problem with health care in this country -- apart from trial lawyers and out-of-date magazines in doctors' waiting rooms -- would be solved by my plan.

 

In the first sentence, Congress will amend the McCarran-Ferguson Act to allow interstate competition in health insurance.

 

We can't have a free market in health insurance until Congress eliminates the antitrust exemption protecting health insurance companies from competition. If Democrats really wanted to punish insurance companies, which they manifestly do not, they'd make insurers compete.

 

The very next sentence of my bill provides that the exclusive regulator of insurance companies will be the state where the company's home office is. Every insurance company in the country would incorporate in the state with the fewest government mandates, just as most corporations are based in Delaware today.

 

That's the only way to bypass idiotic state mandates, requiring all insurance plans offered in the state to cover, for example, the Zone Diet, sex-change operations, and whatever it is that poor Heidi Montag has done to herself this week.

 

President Obama says we need national health care because Natoma Canfield of Ohio had to drop her insurance when she couldn't afford the $6,700 premiums, and now she's got cancer.

 

Much as I admire Obama's use of terminally ill human beings as political props, let me point out here that perhaps Natoma could have afforded insurance had she not been required by Ohio's state insurance mandates to purchase a plan that covers infertility treatments and unlimited OB/GYN visits, among other things.

 

It sounds like Natoma could have used a plan that covered only the basics -- you know, things like cancer.

 

The third sentence of my bill would prohibit the federal government from regulating insurance companies, except for normal laws and regulations that apply to all companies.

 

Freed from onerous state and federal mandates turning insurance companies into public utilities, insurers would be allowed to offer a whole smorgasbord of insurance plans, finally giving consumers a choice.

 

Instead of Harry Reid deciding whether your insurance plan covers Viagra, this decision would be made by you, the consumer. (I apologize for using the terms "Harry Reid" and "Viagra" in the same sentence. I promise that won't happen again.)

 

Instead of insurance companies jumping to the tune of politicians bought by health-care lobbyists, they would jump to tune of hundreds of millions of Americans buying health insurance on the free market.

 

Hypochondriac liberals could still buy the aromatherapy plan and normal people would be able to buy plans that only cover things such as major illness, accidents and disease. (Again -- things like Natoma Canfield's cancer.)

 

This would, in effect, transform medical insurance into ... a form of insurance!

 

My bill will solve nearly every problem allegedly addressed by ObamaCare -- and mine entails zero cost to the taxpayer. Indeed, a free market in health insurance would produce major tax savings as layers of government bureaucrats, unnecessary to medical service in America, get fired.

 

For example, in a free market, the government wouldn't need to prohibit insurance companies from excluding "pre-existing conditions."

 

Of course, an insurance company has to be able to refuse NEW customers with "pre-existing conditions." Otherwise, everyone would just wait to get sick to buy insurance. It's the same reason you can't buy fire insurance on a house that's already on fire.

 

That isn't an "insurance company"; it's what's known as a "Christian charity."

 

What Democrats are insinuating when they denounce exclusions of "pre-existing conditions" is an insurance company using the "pre-existing condition" ruse to deny coverage to a current policy holder -- someone who's been paying into the plan, year after year.

 

Any insurance company operating in the free market that pulled that trick wouldn't stay in business long.

 

If hotels were as heavily regulated as health insurance is, right now I'd be explaining to you why the government doesn't need to mandate that hotels offer rooms with beds. If they didn't, they'd go out of business.

 

I'm sure people who lived in the old Soviet Union thought it was crazy to leave groceries to the free market. ("But what if they don't stock the food we want?")

 

The market is a more powerful enforcement mechanism than indolent government bureaucrats. If you don't believe me, ask Toyota about six months from now.

 

Right now, insurance companies are protected by government regulations from having to honor their contracts. Violating contracts isn't so easy when competitors are lurking, ready to steal your customers.

 

In addition to saving taxpayer money and providing better health insurance, my plan also saves trees by being 2,199 pages shorter than the Democrats' plan.

 

Feel free to steal it, Republicans!

 

 

Ann Coulter

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

 

Copyright © 2010 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.

Edited March 18, 2010 by Controlled Chaos

[Balta1701]

Because it worked GREAT for the Credit Card industry.

[NorthSideSox72]

Because it worked GREAT for the Credit Card industry.

Actually it did, for the most part.

 

Private business is usually better at controlling costs and putting out efficient products for people to use. But the way the current health care matrix is set up, with insurance companies as intermediaries... the usual free market stuff simply won't work. At least, not in the absolute sense.

 

You cannot expect health care in its current form, even if freed from anti-trust exemptions and certain regulations, to lower costs as other industries do. The fundamental dynamics don't work the same - demand and supply curves are wholly different, the consumer choice aspect is shot to hell, and the provision of quality product is not the determining factor of economic success. Therefore, pure capitalism won't work here.

 

[StrangeSox]

It lead to all credit cards coming from a handful of places where they're allowed to charge upwards of 30% interest. I'd hardly say the expansion of expensive credit worked well for our economy.

[southsider2k5]

Just had the pleasure of watching how a person who is on government assistance buys groceries. Now I know this is not all of those who are on government assistance, but still this is comical. I was up at the Jewel getting garbage stickers for Downers when a man and his wife start to split up their very sizable grocery carts, 2 of them mind you. They proceed to break them into bundles, and purchase them with this government checks, and that Link card, and a WIC check, etc etc. It was over 300 dollars in food. Then the man proceeds to purchase about 75 bucks in hard alcohol. He uses cash for that. He pulls out a wad of 100 dollar bills, saw him breeze through about 9 of them before he got to the lower bills. He purchased this in cash, then took his two carts of food and booze and proceeded to the parking lot. I come out moments later to see him loading a very large brand new Mercedes SUV with the food. Thank God we can provide for the less fortunate.

 

I TOLD YOU NOT TO TELL ANYONE ABOUT THAT!!!

[EvilMonkey]

Just had the pleasure of watching how a person who is on government assistance buys groceries. Now I know this is not all of those who are on government assistance, but still this is comical. I was up at the Jewel getting garbage stickers for Downers when a man and his wife start to split up their very sizable grocery carts, 2 of them mind you. They proceed to break them into bundles, and purchase them with this government checks, and that Link card, and a WIC check, etc etc. It was over 300 dollars in food. Then the man proceeds to purchase about 75 bucks in hard alcohol. He uses cash for that. He pulls out a wad of 100 dollar bills, saw him breeze through about 9 of them before he got to the lower bills. He purchased this in cash, then took his two carts of food and booze and proceeded to the parking lot. I come out moments later to see him loading a very large brand new Mercedes SUV with the food. Thank God we can provide for the less fortunate.

When I worked grocery for a short while, I would see many food stamp and assistance people come in, buy mostly regular food items with their stuff, and then as you saw, pull out a wad of bills to buy junk food and booze. And my son complains of all the people in his high school getting free lunch, but yet spending another $3 or 4 per day buying other crap top eat as well.

[mr_genius]

When I worked grocery for a short while, I would see many food stamp and assistance people come in, buy mostly regular food items with their stuff, and then as you saw, pull out a wad of bills to buy junk food and booze.

 

entitlements