but who the f are "we"? who is our drummer and how is he different from the other bloke?

seriously where am i lol?

bush tax cuts expire this year finally.

From an economical standpoint, wars are not that expensive as the belief is that you recoop $0.44 on every $1 spent back into the economy. Tax credit checks (such as the one Bush did) are believe to only recoop $0.08 on each $1. Social Welfare programs are along $0.11 with infrastructure projects being the best at $0.46. I am not going to debate the legitimacy/moral standpoint of each program.
It is accepted that Tax systems do not promote economical growth in any way, but allow for the government to function and may have impact on redistributing the wealth though no one can really put a math model on it.


My point about Health Care was the cost to the nation (group of citizen, not government context) was growing at an exorbitant rate. Close to 11% YoY and while is not counted in the inflation index (one should really see Crash Course on the web if you get a change) it is counted for GDP growth and accounts for about 25% of our economy now.

Something needed to be done to control the cost.

Sammy I am on the other side of the coin.

I was in the insurance industry for around a year, I sold fing insurance. I had some kidney issues during a transitionary period from one employer to another during which time I was on a temporary insurance plan. While my kidney expenses were covered by a fair amount of the insurance during the in between period it has made it so I could no longer get insurance after, at any reasonable cost what so ever. I have secondary FSGS in my kidneys and it is 99% non deteriorating yet insurance companies treat me the same as if my kidneys were already failing or going to fail 100% of the time, therefore requiring a transplant.

Yes, I understand those that are healthy and have health care plans through employers do take a hit but without fixing the current system people in my scenario are pretty much screwed. I'm not saying its right to punish those that are healthy and pay their dues through current insurance plans but you also can not allow insurance companies to hang people such as myself out to dry.

Also you make a great point about something having to be done about the cost as well. I know the health care plan isn't just about including people such as myself but also finally reigning in the insurance and health care companies that have basically had a choke hold on their specific industries for a very long time.

I personally believe everyone should have Health care coverage, and I don't think inurance companies should be able to drop people from coverage whenever they want. I just don't like the way THIS bill is written. I actually like the first one the most.

whataver. Most of my friends here in San Diego complain about the bush tax cuts but don't really understand them. There effective tax rates are around 11% and complain the rich don't pay any taxes. My effective tax rate for 209 was 53%, so they can **** off.

Its just a low content thread for the µNL residents. The place to discuss sports, politics, books, jobsituations, relationshipproblems with the different gender, in some cases relationshipproblems with the same gender and of course poker is allowed as well. Like the stars or FT regsthread, just with less pictures. Mostly the pics will be selfshoot or are foodporn.

I agree that the employer-based system is fundamentally flawed. But this fix is worse than the problem, imo.

This, +100000000000000000000000000000

It is a fundamental problem with unlimited democracy that smart political theorists identified at least as early as 1954. People will continue to vote themselves bread and circuses. The fairly obvious fix would be perceived as unAmerican, though, so I think that we are, long-term, destined for a boom/bust cycle. We are currently overbought, and the bust is not far off.

bah. Wars are one of the core responsibilities of government. health care, education lending, social safety nets--none of these was contemplated by the founders as within governmental power. We spend vast sums on things the government should not even be involved in.



everyone has health care coverage. It's just not delivered in a terribly efficient manner. But, for instance, if you are uninsured, get seriously hurt in a car accident (or come down with cancer), you CAN already get treatment.

People object to the current system because getting health care under existing law in the above scenario will leave you bankrupt. My response is: so what? bankruptcy equals free health care. Seems fair to me.

funkyj explanation: Apparently the USA pays 15% of GDP for healthcare (pre Obamacare) and millions of people are uncovered. In every other first world country they pay 8-10% of GDP for healthcare and cover everybody and have better medical outcomes (e.g. longer life expectancy and better infant mortality rates).

Now if you are the person spending the money you say "duh, I want to spend 10% of GDP like those folks there and get the same or better outcomes like they do" right? But going from 15% of GDP for healthcare to 10% of GDP for healthcare means some folks in the healthcare biz are losing 5% of the GDP that they used to be getting and guess what these folks are going to do? Lobby like mad to stay as close to the status quo as possible.

The healthcare industry, like the financial industry, have a lot of lobbying power so if you try to take away 5% of the GDP that they are used to receiving you do this at peril of your political career.

Both GW Bush and Obama caved to the pharma companies and promised to not use the government's bargaining power to negotiate rock bottom drug prices. Can you imagine Intel, Google or Microsoft agreeing to not negotiate for the lowest possible prices from their suppliers given that they buy in huge volume?

While I can listen to the conservative argument that Obamacare is too expensive, I have trouble paying attention when they say that there is nothing wrong with the healthcare status quo.

IMO we are in the "empire in decay" stage. Any industry with big bucks pretty much writes any new legislation that affects them.

****s all ****ed, go find someone and love them

i managed to score a few face to face conversations with professors who study the history of health care reform (officer of college democrats ftw) and they all said that creating a "public option" would be one of the best ways of keeping the health care prices low by forcing insurance the insurance companies to compete with the government standard through things like cost saving and efficiency improvements while cutting wasteful spending. this provision was of course killed as being too "socialist"...like that has any meaning (ok it was really killed by the ridiculous constant threat of filibusters which i think is something i think everyone can agree needs to be jettisoned asap). everyone knows that the legislation is imperfect, it is however a crucial first step forward that also includes many necessary provisions. the fact is that if this was not passed now then serious health care reform would be dead in this country for the foreseeable future and the devastation that health care is wreaking upon our national economy would continue to spiral out of control.

posted by mpethybridge: bah. Wars are one of the core responsibilities of government. health care, education lending, social safety nets--none of these was contemplated by the founders as within governmental power. We spend vast sums on things the government should not even be involved in.

the founding fathers' thoughts are irrelevant. what we have is a basic frame work that evolved with society. the original constitution also did not call for direct taxation or that the president and vice president be from the same party or that senators be elected directly. that was all changed via amendment. now modern health care is a concept that did not exist in the 18th century. the purpose of government is to best serve the people. and i think the way to serve us best is by ensuring things that we now recognize as fundamental rights. furthermore congress is using its legislative power to exert further controls over interstate commerce.

i agree with funkyj about lobbyists. but i disagree about too expensive since the office of congressional budgeting (or some office in that general vicinity of naming) said that it estimated that the plan would decrease health care costs over the next decade or two. if republicans have so many ways to improve the system why did they refuse to offer any alternatives? they either have nothing to offer, are in the pockets of someone else, or are trying to score cheap political points. or maybe a combination.

Vanguard, how long do you have to keep the donkey avatar? Until the end of the month?

At the beginning it cracked me up but now I'm tired of it. If you do another prop bet like this, the winners should be required to provide a new insulting avatar each week so the rest of us can be more amused (yes, I am ENTITLED to amusement hence the weekly avatar tax levy on propbet winners).

The CBO thing is a problem. The CBO has to score the expense according to the text of the law they are scoring. So if Congress writes a bill that says the necessary revenue will derive from two sources: increasing marginal rates and by the 1 trillion in the pot at the end of the rainbow guarded by a magic unicorn," the CBO is legally obligated to score the bill as if the pot actually exists.

The pot at the end of the rainbow in this bill exists in any number of ways: raising taxes (often results in a net loss of revenue), "medicare cuts," which are double counted, and costs being shifted to state budgets by increasing medicaid rolls, an effect that doesn't exist as far as the CBO is concerned.

This bill was written in a way that it would score as a deficit reduction plan. It's actual effect will be to balloon health care costs. Intuitively, any thinking person must know that you can't cover 30 million more people for less money.

Almost every sentence in this quote is anti-constitutional. Many of us perceive this thinking as exactly the problem in this country. The Constitution is not supposed to "evolve," with society, except through the amendment process, and no amendment has addressed health care.

Health care is not a fundamental right. It is not a marginal right. It is not a sort of right. It is a service that is purchased on the open market.

To the extent that you believe that health care is a fundamental right, you necessarily are claiming that you have a right to the labor of another person. Really? You think you have a RIGHT to force another person to perform a service for you?

Our political philosophy is premised on the notion that people derive their rights from God, not government. The problem with recognizing as a "right," something that government can give you, is that if you acknowledge the government's ability to give it to you, you are also admitting its right to take it away.

The constitution acknowledges the existence of negative liberties--areas of your life that the government cannot infringe your liberty except in limited circumstances. It does not grant you a laundry list of rights that derive from government such as health care, welfare or education, that depend on the compulsory service of another person.

It isn't fair though, yeah life isnt fair yeah yeah I know. My situation is different than people wanting a free handout. I literally can't get insured, aside from the high risk state pool which is very limited and awful coverage fwiw. That has been my issue for the health care issue. I agree this may not be the best plan but something had to be done rather than bicker about it for another year or so. I'm sure there will be amendments made to the plan down the road.

One thing I have done though is max out, for $100,000, my health coverage on my car insurance. This is primary to any health care insurance one may have. To specify the health coverage on your auto insurance doesn't cover regular health things, it only covers those related to auto accidents. Considering I am in good health, aside my secondary FSGS, I am most likely to get hurt while driving or riding in a car or walking down the street from the bars late at night. All three of those scenarios would be covered by my car insurance if I were to get hurt.

What about the roads and public schools that we all drop money into though??? It is not a persons right to drive or go to school either but we still publicly provide for those to take place. How or why should health care be any different? One could argue that we are making society better by providing kids and schools with certain amounts of money to help provide someone an education for the betterment of society. Why wouldn't the same logic work for health care. The caveat to health care being that both the providers and recipients could abuse the system which in turn drives up costs on both sides. I think if we all provide for public roads no matter how much or less we use them, the least we can do is provide on some basic level for health care for individuals. I do agree that if I were to get some really awful disease that I could still get care but it would bankrupt me. So in a sense you are saying that it is ok for my life to cost me my credit and the next ~7 years of any credit to be able to live, that is the actual price for ones individual life?? Just because I am not able to "qualify" for insurance even though I could pay for it.

I'm not trying to be a dick just a devils advocate and by all means if my comparisons are off base then correct me but they seem like logical arguments to me.

If your theory of constitutional law is that nothing should ever change from what the founders intended without an amendment then it has been game over since Wickard vs Filburn. Good luck trying to put that genie back in the bottle.

Assume for a moment you and I agree that Wickard is bogus and we can some how affect a change of our chosing, how do we reconcile this with the principle of stare decisis? It is not as if we are overturning a one decade old decision.

While I admire the founder's courage in fighting to try and create a better system of government and especially their run good (if it was not for various other irons in the fire, Britain would have squashed our rebellion with ease), I do not view their opinions with an unquestioning religious awe.

Is strict constructionism the best legal framework to use? I'm too ignorant to have a strong opinion but I certainly do not accept it a priori.

I think a big problem with a lot of socio-political arguments is that people argue about 7th order details without examining, discussing and contrasting the assumptions that these details originate from.

To a strict constructionalist (like mpethy) they are different. Article 1, Section 8 authorizes the construction of post roads. Therefore, roads are in the Constitution (allowed), while health care is not.

The reality is that the Constitution says whatever a majority of the Supreme Court says it says. One can argue whether that should be or not, but just as Al Gore had no more options in 2000, nobody else does either without changing the court.

And contrary to what the right believes, death panels (or rationing) occurred last week, too. It is only a matter of who decides who gets what. The pie of the total amount is approaching the maximum size and after that, various things will get dropped.

Yeah, rationing is one of the many meaningless memes we hear repeatedly. All systems have limits. If my daughter is dying but we can give her 20 more years of quality life at the cost of $30 billion (today's dollars) the answer from any sane decision maker is "sorry, your daughter gets to die".

There is no viable healthcare system that does not place a monetary value on life. The idea that you have more recourse to Aetna denying coverage for a procedure or that Aetna's CEO cares more about your well being than, say the head of medicare, is ridiculous.

Of course the great thing about the death panels meme is that it used up time that could have been spent rational, factual national debate.

P.S. I love this thread -- it is so civilized! I've looked at the politics forum on Obama-care and it is just a bunch of shouting.

I respectfully do not agree with your opinions in this thread but, first of all Im not american and Ive lived in a different political culture more governement-oriented. But hey, it is only political and philosophical opinions, so nothing wrong about having one's own.

Now I would like to ask you one question about the quoted opinion and genuinely would like to know your opinion.

Your political philosophy / and your constiution, aside from strictly positivist considerations (as roads) are still based upon the theory of the social contract and mainly on John Locke's works (correct me if Im wrong).
Now I may have an euro-jacobinist-centred view of it, but the main principle is that individuals give up a part of their liberty to ensure their physical and material security. I am aware that property is the most important component of those rights.
Nonetheless I think that the "philosophy of the text" at least in my interpretation should entail that since individuals give up a part of their liberty to the governement (aka the Leviathan) in exchange for their security and Tallion law avoidance, the "social contract" (not the text per se, rather its source) may as well include the fact that could have to give up tad of his property (money) or liberty (workforce) to ensure the well being of individuals challenged by life randomness and of the social body as a whole (productivity, reduction of risks of epidemies).
This is not SO different than the fact that in order not to get killed by physically stronger than you you give up the liberty of killing weaker than you to take his belongings.

I dont really know if that makes sense, and its really late here so Im headed to bed


edit : after thought : I dont know whether it is a viable comparaison, but the initial social contract (constitution) aims to avoid the physical violence and hence organises a monopolistic repartition of physical violence within the hands of governement in order to prevent people to kill each other and ensure the well-being of society. Now I dont see why the contract prevent the governement to make people give up a bit of financial ressources/workforce to protect the weakest/unluckiest from risks which are clearly randomized at least to some extent.

Co-opting the question directed at mpethy ...


After reading Justice: what is the right thing to do (corresponding video course) I am currently Rawlsian. IMO Rawls view aligns very closely with the christian "there but for the grace of God go I" view of the world, which is also consistent with Taleb's Fooled by Randomness. (I am a Bright but like the humility embodied by the "grace of god" phrase).

Coming back to Rawls and social contracts ... we are not born, grown to adulthood and then given the chance as to which social contract we might want to chose and abide by, we are born into a contract and the circumstances generated by that contract play a huge role in forming who we are before we are capable of making informed choices. This makes any theory on which society should be organized a difficult philosophical proposition.

On assumption Rawls makes when employing his veil of ignorance is that everyone would prefer a lower variance strategy. Perhaps he is aware of the durrrrs and Isildur1s of the world but figures they would be overruled by the far greater population of folks who prefer stability.

before i jump back into the mess that is politics...i just turned 21

Happy birthday!

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I have to say, I love the DeucesCracked video intros (e.g. DJ Sensei's Full Ring NL Dojo's riff on Lord of the Rings). I love their TV "seasons" approach. The production quality of their site is awesome! I think I'm going to subscribe with a 1/4 duty cycle. Given the volume of hands I put in subscribing every month makes little sense, especially when I get Stox and CardRunner's for free via FTP but DC is soo good I can't not come back in the future.

Vanguard: congrats on the 21! Enjoy the relatively mild hangover! It gets a lot worse as you get older. Of course you learn to regulate your intake of intoxicants/poisons better as you get older so it balances out ...