Scrambling for Votes, Democrats Face Uphill Climb to Pass Healthcare Reform

I doubt that test is anywhere close to enough to drop someone off of a policy.

 

You bet your azz they can under the previous system (or even the new one). If you claim you are a non-smoker, pay a lower rate and they find out. It's fraud.

 

I think they actually do.

If you make the analogy to car insurance, which I've done, then you say this: opt out of healthcare, but pay back-debts to the system on your 1st year of life, and never, ever be allowed to use the system again, whether you you a heart attack, a broken spine, or allergies. Just suffer. You sign a form, and I'll support that.

Then it's just like car insurance. No insurance? You can never, ever drive on American roadways. Simple.

 

I know where you're going, but it's obviously not that simple. You can't tell paramedics and doctors not to treat you if you've been hit by a bus or are flopping around on the pavement. I don't know of anyone in those positions that would look at a card and say, "OK, this one dies."

 

So, I take it by your lack of response, basso, you really have no answer to these questions?

It's cool. You're just like the majority of the GOP: "I don't like it, but I don't have a better idea!"

 

Which is exactly why everyone should have insurance.

 

Maybe you take a pool of people who mark a certain box on their tax returns that says "conscientious objector to health care" or whatever.

Then, at the end of the year, you tally the emergency expenses for this group and distribute the costs over this entire group.

A few triple-by-passes, a few pre-mature births, and all of these losers would end paying double what they would to join the health insurance world.

 

We could call it the "Space Ghost Clause"

 

I like this idea but it's too plain vanilla.

These folks are gamblers by nature, so let them gamble.

We can make this thing into some sort of survivor-esque reality show.

The conscientious objectors will be randomly assigned numbers 0-9, divided up into deciles. Each group will then elect a representative through some democratic process. The groups can then be marooned on an island (or a studio lot) and be put through a series of competitions, which will be in the cheekily sadistic, yet comedically ingenius, tradition of Japanese game shows.

The order of finish will determine each decile's share of the uninsured's emergent care costs:

1 - 0% (grand prize) + free trip to unregulated health care paradise, like Somalia
2 - 2% + ceramic dalmation
3 - 3% + conscientious HC objector home game
4 - 7%
5 - 9%
6 - 11%
7 - 13%
8 - 15%
9 - 18%
10 - 22%

The ad sales & marketing tie-ins will go to pay down the nat'l debt.

I dare somebody to constitutionally challenge this.

 

as long as we're using the car insurance analogy, what's to prevent congress using the same logic to compel everyone in the country to purchase a Prius, whether or not one has a license to drive, or is even old enough to?

 

I've seen this Prius line pop up quite a bit in the comments sections of stories. I'm guessing this is something that wingnuts think is cool.

 

odd, i thought i made it up.

interestingly, you don't seem to have a response.

 

What kind of a response can you give to something so nonsensical?

 

only because it does not deserve a response

 

explain how it's nonsensical. congress just passed a law compelling all individuals to purchase a product from a particular group of private companies. how is the prius example materially different?

 

does one need a license to get sick or be a certain age to be sick?

 

Allow the IRS/State agencies to levy tax refunds, and bank accounts to cover when such uninsured person goes to the hospital and doesn't pay. I think it would be fair. Though we still have the problem that many of the uninsured actually qualify for assistance already, and don't realize it, or don't bother.

 

I think the car insurance analogy makes the idea of required insurance analogous to required insurance.

Since a car uses the highway system, the appropriate analogy to mandating the purchase of a prius (which yes, I've read all over the interwebs already) would actually be to government mandating the use of the healthcare system -- colonoscopies and prozac for all! Weird idea, but they can keep trying. I know they will.

 

You are only required to carry insurance on your vehicle to cover the person in another car. You don't need car insurance to cover your car. And of course you are legal to drive someone else's car while having no car insurance of your own. Car Insurance to Health Insurance is Apples to Oranges, though Prius to health insurance is probably Apples to Televisions.

 

assume for a moment i indulge in known dangerous behavior, say, having sex w/ Tiger's mistress w/o a condom. if i were to contract HIV from such an encounter (assuming again that it was entirely voluntary), is it reasonable to expect you to pay for my care?