Sarah Palin (R) to resign as governer

[Silent Hunter]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8133964.stm

Former Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin has anounced she will resign as governor of Alaska on 26 July and not run for re-election.

Mrs Palin's term of office was due to end in 2010.

There has been speculation that Mrs Palin, who is very popular with the Republican Party base, might make a bid for the White House in 2012.

Commentators have also suggested Mrs Palin could be considering a run for one of Alaska's Senate seats.

Polls indicated she was very popular in Alaska during the first few years of her governorship, and although her approval ratings have dipped somewhat since her vice-presidential run, she still enjoys widespread popularity in her home state.

In a statement announcing her intention to step down, Mrs Palin said she had asked her family for their opinion before making her decision.

Mrs Palin did not reveal what she intended to do after leaving office.

Her resignation means Alaska's Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell will take over as state governor.
Story from BBC NEWS:

I wonder how this will effect wolf hunting in Alaska and the GOP as a whole.

[RedEye]

Wolf hunting in Alaska is a Tourist money maker, although I would challenge any person who claimed to be a hunter because they ran a wolf to exhaustion with a helicopter before shooting him.
That is NOT hunting, in my book.

As for the GOP, if they don't change markedly, they will die. Period.

Even lifelong conservatives* (like me) have departed their ranks because of their policies and practices. They have ceased to be conservative and have become reactionary.

Perhaps there will be a more centerist party to replace them, if they won't change.

*Don't judge Conservatism by the Republicans of today. They aren't.

[vrikasatma]

Yep, I just caught this on Digg. Another article says she wasn't going to run for re-election, didn't say anything about resigning.

I'm hoping it bodes well for the wolves too, but there's a lot of wildlife officials up there that feel the same way she does and I'm not holding out a lot of hope. I can't imagine the rangers and wardens that are shooting up wolf packs from helicopters are doing it against their better judgment and under protest.

Or worse, she may be succeeded by an even more whacked-out fundie who'll expand the quota and give the shooters and bounty-hunters MORE money.

It just rips me. "Stop killing MY caribou!" Yeah right. Like you're going to eat a skinny, old or diseased caribou. How's that Sin Of Greed working out for ya?

ETA: Sarah Palin is considered a Conservative, but let's face it. She's a whackjob, like the mooks who spent $1.7 million to build the Creation Museum in Kentucky (I can definitely think of better, more Christian ways to spend that kind of bargeld, and I'm a Pagan). The only reason she gathered any steam in the election was because she made the NASCAR Dads and fratboys go, "Errrrr heerrrrrrrrr! MILF MILF MILF." Women didn't buy an ounce of it, on either side of the campaign.

[RedEye]

You can bet that the so-called "Guides" will lead the tourists to the ones that are sick, too. It's easier and faster than tracking a healthy animal. Those will be kept for the "good old boys" to track and eat.

And if the sucke..Customer isn't happy, remember: No Refunds on Tags.

[Silent Hunter]

There is a lot of talk of her using this as a time out. Think about it like this, she has left for "family reasons" which is a nice innocent reason and can hit with certain family values people (though not all, so as not to generalize), she is out of the public spotlight and can basically make a name for herself in a sense. This will let her start fresh almost for 2012. Could be wrong but that makes sense.

Wolf hunting..hmmn it could get worse or better, it depends on if the guy who is going to take over her job is for more of the hunting or for less. It could just stay at its current level so its hard to say.

Finally the GOP is really a reactionary force now, or the clown car party, take your pick. I wish there was a more modest, serious party to take their place as they are really nothing but jokes now.

[vrikasatma]

[Terastas]

As for the GOP, if they don't change markedly, they will die. Period.

You can already see it happening now. A lot of former Republicans are either switching sides or running as independents. George W. Bush effectively let the highest bidders decide his party's agendas and weeded out of the party anyone opposed to it. Now all that's left of the Republican party are a bunch of elitist businessmen upset because the party is over with nothing better to do than screw with the Democrats.

I honestly think this is the end of the Republican party as we know it. . . But not the end of conservatism, of course. The U.S. has always had a two-party system, but not always the same two parties. Just like the Federalists and the Whigs before them, the Republicans have betrayed their ideals and exhausted their welcome. Eventually the Democratic party will either split into the next two primary parties, or the third parties and independents will reform into the new opposition party.

ETA: Sarah Palin is considered a Conservative, but let's face it. She's a whackjob, like the mooks who spent $1.7 million to build the Creation Museum in Kentucky (I can definitely think of better, more Christian ways to spend that kind of bargeld, and I'm a Pagan). The only reason she gathered any steam in the election was because she made the NASCAR Dads and fratboys go, "Errrrr heerrrrrrrrr! MILF MILF MILF." Women didn't buy an ounce of it, on either side of the campaign.

Actually, there were plenty of women who did buy an ounce of it. Well. . . Sort of. I don't think they actually believed she was qualified, but they really wanted a woman president enough that they were willing to fake it. That was Palin's first sales pitch after all: she tried to piggyback off of Hillary Clinton's success in the primaries.

As for her resignation, I think it means Palin is planning one of two things (or perhaps both):

1) Running for president in 2012.
2) Getting her own "conservative" talk show.

Sarah Palin was the laughing stock of the entire country. Even Alaska -- hell, even Wasilla is ashamed to have her representing them now. But because there were millions of people out there that were willing to play along and pretend she was qualified (people that would have sooner voted for a Hilton/Federline candidacy than a Democrat), Palin is now delusional and believes she absolutely is qualified to lead the Republican party.

At the very least, she's got dreams of stardom and is looking forward to leaving Alaska behind. She's become like Anne Coulter -- she won't care what she's doing, or even what she's saying, just as long as there are a bunch of Republican scumbags writing her a check at the end of every month.

My predictions are that she'll parade around the talk circuit "guest hosting" every now and then, try to run in 2012 and fail (unless the Democrats decide to give the "Operation Chaos" voters a taste of their own medicine), then she'll get some crappy talk show on FOX where she'll basically become a petty female version of Rush Limbaugh.

Either that or she and Patti Blagojevich will duke it out on the next installment of Celebrity Boxing. She's never going to amount to anything, but she's never going to go away either.

[Gevaudan]

I honestly think this is the end of the Republican party as we know it. . . But not the end of conservatism, of course. The U.S. has always had a two-party system, but not always the same two parties. Just like the Federalists and the Whigs before them, the Republicans have betrayed their ideals and exhausted their welcome. Eventually the Democratic party will either split into the next two primary parties, or the third parties and independents will reform into the new opposition party.

Well, if this is not the end of conservatism, I think that rather than a Democratic party split, our country's party system will go the way of your second proposal (third parties and independents merging to form another party). We're not going to have "Conservative Democratic" and "Liberal Democratic" parties; there's too many conservatives in America to let that happen (not to mention the leftover members of the Republican party that actually care about conservatism, the Libertarians, and the Constitutionalists). Either the Republican party will have an extensive makeover, or it will be replaced by less extreme conservatives and Libertarians, or maybe both at once. Or who knows, it might dissolve and reconfigure itself into this same exact "party" all over again (God forbid).

As for her resignation, I think it means Palin is planning one of two things (or perhaps both):

1) Running for president in 2012.
2) Getting her own "conservative" talk show.

Pleeeease let it be #2. At least that way I can turn her off if I really wanted to.

[vrikasatma]

It's been a long, hot day here and I'm tired, so I'll keep this short —

Let's keep in mind that McCain's first choice for a running mate was Joe Lieberman. The Theocratic branch of the Republican Party, Karl Rove, and Rush Limbaugh, pressured him out of it and fronted Sarah Palin. I don't know what the hell Rove had on McCain to make him, a torture survivor, back down like that and pick up a blithering redneck from the boonies to be a heartbeat away from the Oval Office (I still get a shudder when I think about that).

Sarah Palin was a trifecta of the Theocratic Right: she didn't believe in separation of church and state (pastor praying over her and commanding God to give her political power — ack!!! ), she's a forced-birther (no birth control, no abortion for any reason), and she's a Creationist. Even her own church disavowed connections with the church she attended. She made the "Reverend" Dobson look mainstream.

1) Running for president in 2012.
2) Getting her own "conservative" talk show.

According to MSNBC, she's getting out of politics for keeps and concentrating on book deals. [breathing a sigh]
Books are fine. You can ignore a book.
Okay, it's late, it's still hot in here, I'm to bed. Night all, Happy Independence Day.

[Terastas]

My best guess is that McCain wasn't pressured so much as he was convinced it would be a good idea. His entire campaign was filled with nothing but petty jabs and low blows; he probably picked Palin for no other reason than because she was a woman and he wanted to think everyone that had voted for Clinton voted for her for no other reason. Had Clinton won, no doubt in my mind he would have selected a black man as his running mate.

McCain had received his party's nomination months ahead of Obama; he had plenty of time to look for a qualified running mate, but he still waited until after Obama had selected Biden, and then out came Palin, along with the ads lecturing Obama for not choosing Clinton as his running mate.

It only came out that McCain wanted Lieberman after it became perfectly clear just how big of an idiot Palin was. He didn't want Lieberman -- he just said he did for the sake of damage control.

As for conservatism in general. . . Well, I don't think it's going to go away completely, but I do think the reinvention of conservatism is going to be more liberal in nature. Right now they're going through a phase where they think they can attract voters just by insisting that conservatism is cool, trendy and minority-friendly, but it isn't working. If anything, the fact that they were discussing 2012 before Obama was even sworn in just made them look like a bunch of petty juveniles, and no matter how far-right you are, you've got to admit that there was something mildly amusing about seeing Rush Limbaugh go from staunch patriot to raving anarchist in a matter of days.

What they should be doing instead to save the party is rethinking their ideals and trimming off all the obsolete and/or egocentric policies that made them so loathed in the first place. Gay marriage, abortion and the separation of church and state, for example, were Dubya's three great callings, but now that it's become clear that he screwed the entire country just for the sake of those pigheaded and morally ambiguous ideals, its reached a point where anyone in the opposition is antagonized for even daring to bring it up. America is done with politicians who force their morals.

They need to be more than just anti-Democrats, in other words, and to do that, they'll need to concede on some issues and become more central with their platform.

Only problem with that is that Bush already weeded out most, if not all of the moderates that would have ever considered, and what few of them are left in politics are now independents more closely aligned with the Democrats.

At the very least, it won't be called conservatism anymore. The only thing they're interested in conserving nowadays is the status quo.

[Gevaudan]

I'm fairly certain that the conservatives are never going to concede their economic policy. They'll probably become even more steadfast capitalists (which is fine, but they'll get a lot of corporate lobbyists, which is never a good combination with politics). However, I agree, the conservatives need to rethink their morals on these key issues, and not just because their opinions are unpopular. They and some independents might just become Libertarians, if they were pushed a bit closer morally.

[RedEye]

There is nothing inherently wrong with Capitalism, other than the human tendency to Greed. Our current situation ably demonstates that.

It is the oldest economic philosophy, after all. Therein lies the rub: it's an Economic philosophy, not a Governmental Philosophy. When we try to make it a way of governing people, we inevitably mess up; as the Russians finally discovered with their version of Communism (actually Leninism).

The current Republican philosophy is less Capitalism than Iconoclasty on a governmental level. In no way is it truly Conservatism.

Conservatives are the people who think we need to try out the new and see how it compares with what we already have; ie: Cautious Advancement and Change. It isn't economic, other than in keeping a close eye on your investments and never investing anything you aren't prepared to lose outright. What happened recently, while tragic, was simply the result of Greed. If some stocks or investments are growing at more than 5% faster than the rest of the market, something's happening... and the recent situation promised a growth of nearly 120% above everything else.

"If it seems too good to be true, you can bet that it is." That's a Conservative's viewpoint.
Most Conservatives are devout Murphyites...

[vrikasatma]

From what I've seen, it's the Libertarians who are taking up the $$$ torch and pulling corporatism into their Big Tent. Their rallying cry right now is "Let the Free Market take care of it!" and are always going on about not wanting to pay taxes. There's a lot of anarcho-capitalists in that group.

And of course, we all saw where that got us last September, if Enron and Blackwater weren't enough of a wake-up call.

The thing is, they're pulling it out and dusting it off again now, with the healthcare debate. "Don't waste my taxes on some fat-a**'s insulin! I got mine, screw you!" No joke, a few days ago some mook from Ron Paul's district came out and said in so many words that health care isn't a right, it's a privilege to be earned.

I believe in free trade. Free trade allowed me to buy the two nice alpaca ponchos straight from the weavers in Peru. Free trade allowed my Burning Man campmate to travel to Varanasi, India, and come home with real Indian batik bedspreads. Free trade is allowing me to rent a certified kitchen so I can bake bread and sell it at the Farmers' Market. The Free Market means no-one breathes free, water isn't free, slavery comes back and everything down to the salt in your blood is for sale to the highest bidder.

[Gevaudan]

[Terastas]

Thank you Vrikasatma. I don't know if it was your actual intention to say this, but it pretty much sums up for me that when libertarians say "keep the government out of business," what they're really saying is "keep the government out of my business."

Obama summed it up pretty nicely in a press conference when he hypothetically asked: If the private sector thinks the government can't do diddly squat, why are they so afraid of having to compete with the government? The answer is that the government could hold the private sector to standard: any company that could not compete with the government would go under in the blink of an eye.

To answer Gevaudan's question, the interests of human beings when it comes to the economy are antagonistic. It's not a difference of honest or dishonest business. More accurately, the difference is between being safe or being risky; of cutting ones own profits to ensure economic stability or gambling with risky / unethical practices to increase one's own profits.

Haliburton, Enron, WorldCom, A.I.G., etc. were all companies that chose to gamble with dishonesty and instability. But while other company CEOs may say they avoided such practices based on moral grounds, the more accurate truth is that they chose to play it safe and guard their profits instead of increase them.

In a way, that was a gamble too, because once the unethical companies go under, the ones that played it safe are the ones that will profit during the recovery.

I mention this because this is why I think the Libertarians won't be the new Conservatives either. It was very much a libertarian economic policy that got us in this mess, and it's only because government intervention is seen as socialism (a dirty word) that so many people are opposed to it.

So I'm going to predict for the record that the next two parties will be the Progressives and the Constitutionalists. Conservatives originally derived their namesake, after all, from a desire to preserve the Constitution, but ever since Nixon, the Republicans have done nothing but try to work around it (with the exception of the right to bare arms; that's the only one they're still literally conservative about). That needs to change if they don't want the Green Party to emerge as the new opposition party (in which case the Democrats will become the Constitutionalists).

[Gevaudan]

I mention this because this is why I think the Libertarians won't be the new Conservatives either. It was very much a libertarian economic policy that got us in this mess, and it's only because government intervention is seen as socialism (a dirty word) that so many people are opposed to it.

The housing bubble was definitely caused by reckless investments on part of the consumers and banks, but it wasn't entirely a capitalistic failure. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bought risky mortgage products. The AMPTA allowed banks to make adjustable-rate mortgages (which were praised by Alan Greenspan, accounted for 80% of recent housing mortgages, and were a large contributor to the crisis). The Community Reinvestment Act encouraged banks to make predatory loans. You've got to admit that government regulation had something to do with this crisis. I personally think that it was a mix between capitalism and government failure. Both are to blame.

[Terastas]

Well. . . Yeah. But the failure wasn't a result of the government's involvement so much as its lack thereof. Like I said, it was a libertarian economic approach that caused everything to hit the fan the way it did.

The problem with the Republican party is that they think of all these platforms just as titles; they think wearing a red tie makes them truly conservative automatically and have lost all sight of what "conservatism" actually means (which was, as I said, "conserving" the Constitution as written). Hell, there are millions of people out there even that talk about being Republican the same way they talk about being Caucasian; like its something they were born with and are incapable of changing (which I think is what the Republicans wanted: for people to associate the party with their identity and keep them stubbornly loyal). For them its all just about making money and wielding power, and having a figurehead like Michael Steele or Sarah Palin won't change that. They're a dying party because they took everything political out of politics and reduced themselves to nothing more than smarmy businessmen.

So if they're nothing but businessmen, Sarah Palin resigning as governor would be equivalent to the Enron execs selling all of their stock before the company went under. She's going out to write a book while there are still some devout Republican morons willing to buy it.

[vrikasatma]

[Gevaudan]

[Silent Hunter]

@Gev

The funny thing is that if you do not think healthcare is a right. Why should police protection or a fire service be? I mean they are both a service, not a right. You could apply those two arguments to those other two services, even going as far to say the free market could do a better job. The thing is though that generally people don't want those two services to be totally private while they shriek at the the prospect of healthcare going national.

On top of that why should healthcare not be a right? If you don't think its some kind of privilege to earn than what is it? Healthcare is the well being of a countries citizen and which would include things like some basic shelter and enough food on the table. The idea that healthcare is not such a right is a bit disturbing to be honest.

Now you could bring up that its peoples personal responsibility yet you could also use this argument for the other two services; fire and police. Its Mr Joe the Plumbers personal responsibility to make sure he does not his stove on or to make sure no criminals get in. Yet you can't argue that you need both of these services at times to for your own well being. This also applies to healthcare. Sure its good not to trash your body but there is often times you really need healthcare.


Also I must seriously question your faith in the free market. The free market has failed horribly with over 10% unable to afford healthcare. In the free market the companies are only out for one thing: Profit. They don't care if someone can't afford to pay for their leg operation or if their coverage only goes for minor illnesses. The companies DON'T innovate much. Research from other areas including other non insurance parts of healthcare does. The idea that they compete to the point they are always innovating or getting cheaper is a very clear logical fallacy. If you’re a company, you want to make profit, profit, profit and will not want to invest in something that is not worth it. On top of that health insurance companies are very keen to dump people who have certain things they want to insure.

You may say that the US spends the most in the world per person which is true:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_s ... per-person

and yet, you have 10% of people who cannot get healthcare. Therefore its only reaching a limited base of people compared to European countries like the UK and places like Canada which are spending less but treating more. In fact, Medical Bills prompt more than 60% of US bankruptsies:

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/0 ... index.html

On top of that more people die of Cancer a year than most government run systems:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_d ... rom-cancer

The US is also behind when it comes to Life Expectancy:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_l ... population

Again, hardly the best system in the world eh?

Now a government ran system would not actually impose on anyone done right. All it would mean is that you'd pay towards it in your tax and it would always mean you have a healthcare saftey net. If you are rich enough to afford it, you can get insurance. No one says to get rid of private insurance, just that it should not be the primary method of healthcare in the US. In fact it would make companies cheaper, insurance wise as they now have to compete with a government system. You could say you would not want to pay for the government healthcare and woud rather have it opt in. The problem with that is that pretty much everyone will pass on the responcibility for someone else and the system will be heavily underfunded. You can't say that no one would use it for sure given how many are not insured or may not want to use insurance.

You could say that the system would be awful and it would have long waiting lines. This is another fallacy as in many countries with national healthcare. Waiting times are for MINOR things, not all major at all. You may have to wait a little while for a doctor but your leg operation will be far faster. You may say it will costs lot. Well Europe had many of of its national healthcare systems started after WW2. We were not full of cash back then.

I'd also like to attack the idea that its bailing people out. That idea is slightly sickening to be honest, no one can predict when they are ill or what might happen to them and you can only be so careful before your pretty much living in a bubble. As well as that, the amount of people it actually helps over the people who brought it on itself would be pretty much 10:1 imo.

Finally to bring up the whole right thing again..well why should it not be? Even from an economic standpoint it means that your workers are working more and you’re not paying their leave, you’re not paying for insane insurance costs and your workers can also live longer therefore can work more. This is a net gain in the end and this is just looking it through an economic perspective. Are people really going to say that if you’re poor, you should not be allowed healthcare easily? Sorry, its just what some people are implying.

PS: If people want to continue this and it remains civil, can it be moved to its own thread?

[Terastas]

Didn't want to derail this too much from Palin, but I just thought I'd chime in and say that this goes right back to what Obama originally said about health care. His plan, if you didn't know, isn't to completely take over health care, but rather to allow the government to offer its services alongside the private market; to let people decide for themselves if they should let the government handle their health care, or if they should shop around on the free market for a better deal.

So here's the hypothetical question once again: If the private sector believes they can provide better, more quality health care than the government could ever dream of, why are they so adamantly opposed to the government's intervention?

The answer is because they don't want the government holding them to standard; they could provide better coverage, but there's no money in that. Not when they can keep charging you through-the-roof premiums for policies that provide them several loopholes they can use to avoid having to pay for your expenses.

Regardless of whether you believe health care to be a right or a privilege, it is absolutely a necessity. And when the private sector has 100% control of a market necessity, it isn't business -- it's blackmail.

[Gevaudan]

@Gev

The funny thing is that if you do not thing healthcare is a right. Why should police protection or a fire service be? I mean they are both a service, not a right. You could apply those two arguments to those other two services, even going as far to say the free market could do a better job. The thing is though that generally people don't want those two services to be totally private while they shriek at the the prospect of healthcare going national.

Because whenever the government runs a service, it always does so through its use of force or coercion. The only reasonable way to apply government power is against corruption and crime, which is the wrongful use of force on others. Using government power for any other purpose is unjustifiable, especially in the healthcare system. This is because there are not just patients involved in the system; doctors, nurses, insurers, employers, and hospital staff are all inexplicably tied up in this problem, and giving more rights to patients will constitute a sacrifice on the part of the doctors, and it is simply my opinion that this imbalance of power will be detrimental to the industry. Force should only be used to stop wrongful force, thus government's only role should be the courts, the police, the fire department, and the military.

On top of that why should healthcare not be a right? If you don't think its some kind of privilege to earn than what is it? Healthcare is the well being of a countries citizen and which would include things like some basic shelter and enough food on the table. The idea that healthcare is not such a right is a bit disturbing to be honest.

Just as you need a baker to bake bread, you need several people to run a healthcare system, including doctors. If one man says that he has the right to a loaf of bread every day, and uses the government to ensure that he gets one free loaf of bread from a baker every day, then how is that any different from stealing that same loaf of bread himself? The goods and means of production in a service require money to work, like it or not. We pay for the police force through taxes, because anytime a crime is committed we want them to be there using force to stop a wrongful use of force. Healthcare requires money too, but it shouldn't come from taxpayers, but from the people who wish to purchase it (i.e. the patients), and the only way that prices will go down and quality will go up for all individuals (so I'm arguing) is in a free-market healthcare system.

Now you could bring up that its peoples personal responsibility yet you could also use this argument for the other two services; fire and police. Its Mr Joe the Plumbers personal responsibility to make sure he does not his stove on or to make sure no criminals get in. Yet you can't argue that you need both of these services at times to for your own well being. This also applies to healthcare. Sure its good not to trash your body but there is often times you really need healthcare.

It is Mr. Joe's responsibility to defend himself, yes, but crimes do happen. The whole point of the government is to uphold the rights of its people, and we grant them a certain amount of power so that they might do that. You could say that all individuals have the responsibility to defend ourselves, and we do this by acceding some power to the government in exchange for the use of that power against criminals and all wrongful perpetrators of force. I'd say it's been one of very few government programs that has helped us.

Also I must seriously question your faith in the free market. The free market has failed horribly with over 10% unable to afford healthcare.

As I've said before, the current US healthcare system is not a free-market system. For example, over 50% of the money spent on Medicare and Medicaid comes from the government, which necessarily gets its money from taxpayers. Because it's not a free-market system, I'm making an important distinction here between the system that I want, the system that is, and the system that you want.

In the free market the companies are only out for one thing: Profit. They don't care if someone can't afford to pay for their leg operation or if their coverage only goes for minor illnesses. The companies DON'T innovate much. Research from other areas including other non insurance parts of healthcare does. The idea that they compete to the point they are always innovating or getting cheaper is a very clear logical fallacy. If you’re a company, you want to make profit, profit, profit and will not want to invest in something that is not worth it. On top of that health insurance companies are very keen to dump people who have certain things they want to insure.

I'm not arguing only for companies here. I'm arguing for several individuals that have to earn a living, such as doctors, nurses, hospital staff, etc. Now, one could argue that insurance companies are big enough already, and I agree. But their loss is nothing compared to the lowered income of the people working at clinics and hospitals. Without any sort of profit, there would be less money to invest in higher-quality care. And what about charity hospitals? They don't work for any sort of profit, and yet they get enough money from voluntary donation to help people who can't afford healthcare.

You may say that the US spends the most in the world per person which is true:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_s ... per-person

and yet, you have 10% of people who cannot get healthcare.

Then shouldn't we be spending less if it's not working? By the way, where does this "10%" number come from? I keep seeing it lately, but with very little sources to prove it.

Therefore its only reaching a limited base of people compared to European countries like the UK and places like Canada which are spending less but treating more. In fact, Medical Bills prompt more than 60% of US bankruptsies:

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/0 ... index.html

On top of that more people die of Cancer a year than most government run systems:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_d ... rom-cancer

The US is also behind when it comes to Life Expectancy:
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_l ... population

Again, hardly the best system in the world eh?

Yes, because it's not a free-market system.

Now a government ran system would not actually impose on anyone done right. All it would mean is that you'd pay towards it in your tax and it would always mean you have a healthcare saftey net.

Would I be paying for my own healthcare or my neighbor's? This sounds suspiciously like Social Security.

If you are rich enough to afford it, you can get insurance. No one says to get rid of private insurance, just that it should not be the primary method of healthcare in the US. In fact it would make companies cheaper, insurance wise as they now have to compete with a government system.

Companies may be profit-hungry, but at least they aren't given the power to write laws to improve their odds and weaken their competitors.

You could say you would not want to pay for the government healthcare and woud rather have it opt in. The problem with that is that pretty much everyone will pass on the responcibility for someone else and the system will be heavily underfunded. You can't say that no one would use it for sure given how many are not insured or may not want to use insurance.

With taxes, everybody's paying for everybody else. Or rather, everybody's paying the government hoping that it will go towards someone else. I'm not saying that no one would use it, but whatever happened to charity hospitals, private accounts, and door-to-door doctors?

You could say that the system would be awful and it would have long waiting lines. This is another fallacy as in many countries with national healthcare. Waiting times are for MINOR things, not all major at all. You may have to wait a little while for a doctor but your leg operation will be far faster.

I'm not concerned with waiting times (as long as I don't bleed to death ). If I need to wait an hour and a half for my interim permit at the DMV, and then wait a week and a half for my real learner's permit, that's fine. I'm still going to get it, but a driver's license and snail-mail are very different from a leg operation.

You may say it will costs lot. Well Europe had many of of its national healthcare systems started after WW2. We were not full of cash back then.

We gave them billions through the Marshall plan.

I'd also like to attack the idea that its bailing people out. That idea is slightly sickening to be honest, no one can predict when they are ill or what might happen to them and you can only be so careful before your pretty much living in a bubble. As well as that, the amount of people it actually helps over the people who brought it on itself would be pretty much 10:1 imo.

I hope that this isn't what I'm arguing for.

Finally to bring up the whole right thing again..well why should it not be? Even from an economic standpoint it means that your workers are working more and you’re not paying their leave, you’re not paying for insane insurance costs and your workers can also live longer therefore can work more. This is a net gain in the end and this is just looking it through an economic perspective. Are people really going to say that if you’re poor, you should not be allowed healthcare easily? Sorry, its just what some people are implying.

Yes, I probably am paying for it, if I pay taxes. If I'm already paying 12.4% of my income for Social Security, why would I be comfortable giving even more of my earned money to others? My taxes go to the government, and the government could give it to my own workers. Then again, they could give it to some workers who need it more then my workers. How is it economically better for me to be forced to give away money to a system than might not benefit me or my workers?

And no, I'm not saying that if you're poor, you should not be allowed healthcare easily. I'm saying that the free-market has consistently shown to lower costs for everyone, including the poor. If healthcare were universal, the government would probably start by taxing the rich and the middle class, but when has the government not taxed the poor? Honestly?

PS: If people want to continue this and it remains civil, can it be moved to its own thread?

If you want. I don't mind. It's been pretty civil so far, but I can see some tensions mounting behind all of this politeness, so I'm fine if the argument remains in this thread or is moved.

If the private sector believes they can provide better, more quality health care than the government could ever dream of, why are they so adamantly opposed to the government's intervention?

Because the government isn't just "another competitor." It's a competitor that decides the rules. If the government holds the system to a "standard," then what is this standard? And why is the government bestowed the honor of making this standard? Why are they so special? Why are the individuals in government any better than the individuals in the health insurance system? "Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."

Regardless of whether you believe health care to be a right or a privilege, it is absolutely a necessity. And when the private sector has 100% control of a market necessity, it isn't business -- it's blackmail.

Who's to say that a government can't run a racket just like a corporate monopoly? Any sort of monopoly is bad, especially a forced governmental one.

I think that I've sufficiently de-railed this thread.

[Berserker]

I think she's a toad, but most people are toads (particularly politicians,) so my expectations are about on-par. But, money isn't the root of our problems, and neither is government; those are symptoms, alongside shooting wolves from helicopters and banning books.

The problem is a worldview with inversely oriented goals.

We currently function in a society whose goals are short-term: a person's status is based on surface-level vanities, like "moral worth," or monetary wealth. This stims mostly from egalitarianism, a paradox where the individual goal reflects the mass goal, which is to satisfy immediate personal happiness. Thus making money becomes a goal, and avoiding offending individuals becomes its companion. The end result is a misguided infatuation with artificial, individual-preserving things like "rights," until the decay of said society becomes so prevalent that reversal is impossible (we see signs of this near the last days of the Roman Empire, for example.)

This materialistic worldview contrasts with a more cosmic ideal, which assumes a holistic understanding of a person's place within society, with the human species being a creation of the natural world, subject to instinct and of equal but not artificially greater importance than the environment around us. With this understanding (unfortunately usually only achieved through the collapse of civilization,) we can safely tuck away the deification of the individual, and focus on long term goals with more vigor: the preservation and happiness of future generations, not only ourselves; to both fulfill survival and transcend it. Build 3000-year-old monuments from stone, not garbage, as a previous poster pointed out. I'm not sure if something like the "free market" would fit into such a worldview (although to be fair, modern government--especially democracy as we understand it--might not fit either.)

[Silent Hunter]

Because whenever the government runs a service, it always does so through its use of force or coercion. The only reasonable way to apply government power is against corruption and crime, which is the wrongful use of force on others. Using government power for any other purpose is unjustifiable,

So are you saying that government schemes to help people economically, policies to help the enviroment, changes on laws to stop discrimination, changing things to aid people etc are wrong? That the government can only work as a police force is what you can say, nevermind the whole defence aspect of it. The government is meant to serve the people and the idea of limiting it to do that is a very grave one. On top of that even basic stuff like rubbish collecting and fire services should not be done with that view.

Also how will giving a system that will want more doctors, nurses etc, INCREASE jobs, etc. There wont be a sudden massive job loss as a fair view will want to keep their insurance which is fine, its just now that it has a choice. The healthcare is to a high standard and yet is not meant to compete like a company. Again its a service.

Just as you need a baker to bake bread, you need several people to run a healthcare system, including doctors. If one man says that he has the right to a loaf of bread every day, and uses the government to ensure that he gets one free loaf of bread from a baker every day, then how is that any different from stealing that same loaf of bread himself?

Your blurring the issue. The idea of the system is that the person will also pay into the pot to get to so others can also have a loaf of bread. He is being given the bread as a benefit and when he can get back on his feet, he can pay into the same system. Thats what national healthcare is meant to be. A system for everyone and everyone contributes.

We pay for the police force through taxes, because anytime a crime is committed we want them to be there using force to stop a wrongful use of force. Healthcare requires money too, but it shouldn't come from taxpayers, but from the people who wish to purchase it (i.e. the patients), and the only way that prices will go down and quality will go up for all individuals (so I'm arguing) is in a free-market healthcare system.

As said, the idea that the government should but nothing but a police force is silly at best. On top of that healthcare is a basic need like food. If a man gets sick he will need treatment and then you bump into this: What if he can't pay for it? You could say there should be a benefit but guess where thats coming out of? The taxpayer! You want good healthcare to stop people from dying, to fight infection and keep people happy. Another basic need like the police service which you seem fine with surporting (no fire service?)

It is Mr. Joe's responsibility to defend himself, yes, but crimes do happen. The whole point of the government is to uphold the rights of its people, and we grant them a certain amount of power so that they might do that.

The rights of its people and what the people want. Its evident that people want more then just basic things otherwise government would not be so complex. Again goverments are meant to do more than hold up the basic rights of its people, they are meant to help the country and its people propser and deal with its issues. Not just hold by certain rules. Besides if Joe did not defend himself or did not beleive in guns, would you say that he should not be entitled to protection via the police?

As I've said before, the current US healthcare system is not a free-market system. For example, over 50% of the money spent on Medicare and Medicaid comes from the government, which necessarily gets its money from taxpayers. Because it's not a free-market system, I'm making an important distinction here between the system that I want, the system that is, and the system that you want.

M&M is a lifeline for a lot of people. Are you saying that it should be taken away? What if people cannot afford it? You could tout charities and what not but they can only do so much for so many peope. They wont cover everything and medical bills can be quite high. So again, what will they do if they cannot afford it?

Also why would the free market system be any better? I have already said on how 10% of people cannot afford health insurance and the lack of innovation. Again they will compete by cutting corners and screwing people over for profit, not service improvment. So please explain how it wouuld be any better?

I'm not arguing only for companies here. I'm arguing for several individuals that have to earn a living, such as doctors, nurses, hospital staff, etc. Now, one could argue that insurance companies are big enough already, and I agree. But their loss is nothing compared to the lowered income of the people working at clinics and hospitals.

For a start why would their income suddenly dropped. Again, the private companies would be allow to run and compete. If the companies you tout to be big and able for a free market solution are so good then why would they not be able to afford to pay their staff?

Without any sort of profit, there would be less money to invest in higher-quality care. And what about charity hospitals? They don't work for any sort of profit, and yet they get enough money from voluntary donation to help people who can't afford healthcare.

Tax payers money from 300 million people that can then get pooled into researche or buying stuff off of private companies if it needs to, you know. I already said a lot of healthcare innovation comes from universities and otther areas of healthcare. That would never stop in a government system, on top of that, if insurance companies are makinf profit as it is, why innovate fast?

Also voluntary donation will only go so far. What if its a high cost regular treatment? What if its something that stops someone from working. I would like evidence that charties could cover the at least, current 30 million people uninsured. Think about how much it costs for work with x rays, operations, holding someone in for a night and this for just for one person, potentially on their own. So again, what if the donations don't cover it?

Then shouldn't we be spending less if it's not working? By the way, where does this "10%" number come from? I keep seeing it lately, but with very little sources to prove it.

Thats how much a person spends on healthcare in the US by the way, not government spending.

Oh and here is proof, its actually higher: http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www ... 05647.html

The percentage of the nation’s population without health insurance coverage remained unchanged, at 15.7 percent in 2004.

15.7%, and this will rise as the economic situation really bites in. I concede I got this figure too low. *nods*

Yes, because it's not a free-market system.

Again many countries that have a government system have better results and don't spend as much. On top of that the US system is already quite free market and over 15% cannot pay for it. How would making it even more free market make it better?

Would I be paying for my own healthcare or my neighbor's? This sounds suspiciously like Social Security.

You'd be paying into a pool. So your paying for everyones healthcare and they are paying for all of your healthcare back.

Companies may be profit-hungry, but at least they aren't given the power to write laws to improve their odds and weaken their competitors.

Governments don't compete like companies do, they have money to keep a high standard and to move with the times. Again its a service, not a company. The police don't try and compete with private security constantly. I know some government agencies do but this is not a one size fits all thing. Some do some don'tand who do and don't can be controlled.

Besides people have more control over goverment and what it does. Thats the idea of a government.

With taxes, everybody's paying for everybody else. Or rather, everybody's paying the government hoping that it will go towards someone else. I'm not saying that no one would use it, but whatever happened to charity hospitals, private accounts, and door-to-door doctors?

Yeah, again you have more control over gorvernment and what it does over a company. On top of that, charities can cover only so much, private accounts only go so far and don't door to door doctors cost money? Again, what if you can't afford it?

If I need to wait an hour and a half for my interim permit at the DMV, and then wait a week and a half for my real learner's permit, that's fine. I'm still going to get it, but a driver's license and snail-mail are very different from a leg operation.

Its not common for national healthcare systems to have people die waiting and for high case stuff, the responce is very fast so I don't think you'd have to worry. ;)

We gave them billions through the Marshall plan.

Which we paid back and who says all that went to healthcare?

hope that this isn't what I'm arguing for

You have good intensions but you are kind of not seeing reality, In reality charities etc wont have cash to cover people and there will be more and more poor people who cannot afford health insurance. Basically you are proposing a situation where more and more end up in bad health because they cannot pay for care.

Yes, I probably am paying for it, if I pay taxes. If I'm already paying 12.4% of my income for Social Security, why would I be comfortable giving even more of my earned money to others?

Because you wont have to buy insurance which can cost more than tax can?

My taxes go to the government, and the government could give it to my own workers. Then again, they could give it to some workers who need it more then my workers. How is it economically better for me to be forced to give away money to a system than might not benefit me or my workers?

Because everyone pays for everyone else, your workers would get treatment so you would not have to pay for sick days and you'd not have to insure them which by the 2004 US Census, 59.8% of people go by an employer based health insurance plan. This means you don't have to pay for them and you can use that money elsewhere. The tax rate would be lower than for paying for someones insurance.

And no, I'm not saying that if you're poor, you should not be allowed healthcare easily. I'm saying that the free-market has consistently shown to lower costs for everyone, including the poor.

First, simple but blunt: Prove it.

Secondly, if over 15% of people cannot afford these "low costs" then they are either not low enough or something is wrong. I'd also like you to show how cheap these costs are. Also I would like to add this:

http://www.ahiphiwire.org/News/Default. ... TRACK_USER

[Gevaudan]

@Berserker: I agree that we should stop putting humankind and individuals above all else (after all, that's what we do with celebrities), but I'm not so willing to completely renounce my individuality. I'll admit I'm interested, but what does happen to the individual?

@Silent Hunter: As much as I like political discussions, it's too hard to do it on a forum, where you have to argue in blocks of text disproving other blocks of text. Silent Hunter, can we agree to disagree? I doubt that we're going to convince each other, nor are we going to come to any sort of mutual conclusion or peaceful resolution.