Here's a sample of what will eventually happen in this country if obamacare becomes law. The following was written in a psoriasis forum that Granny is a registered member of by an English lady who lives in Manchester, England:

Quote:

I go to the doctors like every week and you know what the doctor said to me the other day... I quote: 'You have too many problems and I am only allocated 10 mins with each patient, I am sorry but I can only give out one prescription per problem each week.' (I had problems with my last doctors, and everyone on here told me to change doctors so this is a new doctor) I have looked into all the doctors in my area. I have asked neighbours, the few friends I had, etc... all doctors on the NHS (National Health service....yes becuase am poor) Are ALL the same.. they have rules and regulations and they all just tell you that it is caused by STRESS and nothing they can do about it basically. As my doctor as told me my skin is caused by STRESS. He WILL NOT send me to a derm, and instead I am seeing a counsiller. The counsiller I am seeing is a student in University.... She has had 1 year expierence.... :/ GREAT! She is also on holiday at the moment and we're only allocated 20 mins to talk every couple of weeks and during them 20 mins all she has me doing is filling out bloody questionaires!!!!

Why did this happen in England? Because under all socialized countries, there is much more demand for resources and services than the government can confiscate from the people in taxes to pay for these resources and services. Doctor's payment for services are capped by the government, so there is no incentive to become a doctor, hence a huge shortage of doctors and very long waiting periods to even see a doctor, much less get tests and treatment. Since there is a shortage of money for healthcare (most socialized HCS in the world are bankrupt), service and medicines are rationed, and life-enhancing/life-saving procedures and medicines are often denied to the very poor, the very young and the elderly. If you are very poor, or not a productive (working) member of society (very young or past working age), you go to the end of the line (but the government leaders and administrators of HCS go to the front of the line with no restrictions on treatment and medicines received), and in most cases are denied expensive life-enhancing or life-saving procedures and medicines. England and Canada are so bankrupt that even people who are still productive members of society flock to the United States to receive life-enhancing or life-saving treatment that they would have to wait months or years for, or perhaps never receive in their home country.

Some of the countries under socialized healthcare are now trying to change to a system more like what we currently have in America (Canada being one of them) because the countries are bankrupt - there just isn't enough in taxes that can be confiscated from the people to pay for the system and bring down the mounting debt caused by healthcare and welfare. Every country that has tried this has failed or is in the process of failing and becoming bankrupt. And here we are, on the freight train bound for socialism that only we, the people, can stop. What makes you think our corrupt goverment will succeed in doing anything that will benefit the country or pay for itself? Social Security is broke, Medicare and Medicaid are broke, the Post Office is broke, Amtrack is broke. Katrina was a failure. Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac broke the back of the housing market. Everything the government touches is broke, corrupt and a failure with the exception of the Military. When will the American people realize that this is not about concern for you or your health, it has nothing to do with healthcare - it is about power and control over every aspect of our lives? What these people we have elected are trying to do is exactly what and how Hitler gained control over Germany in the 1930's. Don't you know your history or are you in denial about what is happening in this country - or do you just choose to ignore what has happened to other countries that have been down this road, thinking that it can't happen here? Think again!

Both political parties and their special interest groups are complicit in doing this to America - it's both sides that want to control everything - one party more than the other, but still both parties. Our choice in voting for our leaders has been reduced to a choice between the lesser of 2 evils! And do you think the politicians and bureaucrats and their cronies will be subject to what they impose on the rest of the American people? No, they exempt themselves from such laws and restrictions, and have already done so in the provisions of the bills that will be brought before Congress. Don't you realize that your elected officials are much better and more educated than you and not subject to the same laws and restrictions that they impose on the rest of us? Don't you realize that they know better what we need, what's good for us, how to spend our money and take care of us than we ourselves do?

While not perfect, we have the best healthcare system in the world. The statistic being quoted by proponents of this bill that we rank 37th in the world in lowest mortality rate under our present healthcare system, pay twice as much per capita as other countries and therefore must do something to control cost and provide "better" healthcare is a ball-faced lie - it's just rhetoric to make you think they are concerned you, to win you over by deception. We are the richest country in the world per capita, and therefore can afford the best healthcare in the world, and we currently have it! The statistic given erroneously includes all deaths by automobile and other accidents, and by murder (granted, we do lead the world in deaths by accidents and murder, but we also have the one of the largest populations in the world with the exceptions of Russia and China). Accidents and murder have nothing to do with mortality rate due to disease! Take those numbers out of the equation, and we are NUMBER ONE in the world with the lowest mortality rate due to disease because we have the best and most advanced medicine and medical services in the world and have it available to more of our population than any other country, including those who don't have insurance! Check it out! Our standard of living, even down to the poorest citizens is superior to any other country in the world! You've also heard that there are 47 million Americans that cannot get healthcare because they can't afford it. That too, is a ball-faced lie! All but about 5 -15 million of these people are either illegal aliens, or under 25 years of age and choose not to purchase healthcare because they feel they don't need it. So, the obama administration and Congress want to destroy the entire system and bankrupt the country for 5% of the population when we can address just this problem separately at very little cost to the taxpayers? Isn't it startling that 85% of Americans are satisfied with their health insurance and don't want the government interferring in their healthcare, and yet there is this urgent push by government to trash what we now have in favor of a system that other countries have had for decades and are now running as fast as they can away from?

Is this what you want for America? If so, encourage your representatives in Congress to vote for obamacare and you will likely get what you ask for.

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Repa

I keep hearing them say if the can't get the health cared bill pushed thru the normal way, that they may use reconciliation. Sounds like it would require fewer votes - what are they talking about?

Fay

Reconciliation is a powerful, 25-year-old procedural maneuver that allows for the passage of a budget by a simple majority vote rather than the usual 60 votes needed to prevent a filibuster, and limits debate to 20 hours.
Right now, democrats have enough people to pass the bill without a single republican vote. The problem is the Blue Dog democrats, who are more moderate in their thinking and see how this bill would bankrupt the nation, among other bad things that would happen. They will not vote for the Senate bill pass as written. So, Harry Reid will cut enough stuff out of the bill with the exception of the public option to reduce the amount of debt it will add to the national budget, thus allowing them to use reconciliation to pass the bill on a 51-50 vote majority. Apparently, Reid thinks he can get 51 votes, counting the vice president, who would break a tie. After they get that part through, then there would be another bill to get the rest of what they want. By dividing the bill up into 2 parts, they would come under the cost threshold that would otherwise force a 60-40 majority. And they don't care what the American people want, so they will do it, regardless. It isn't about healthcare at all, they could care less about the people - it's about power and the government controlling every aspect of our lives. Universal healthcare is one step in that direction, but it is a big step. Hitler used the same tactics that obama and the dems are doing now to gain totalitarian control of Germany in the 1930s, and the German people were willing pawns until they discovered his real agenda, and by then it was too late.

Repa,

What I don't get is when do they have to have 60 votes and when 51 votes. It sounds like from what I read above, it depends on the cost of what they are trying to pass. Is that true? I had heard something about they might split up the bill but did not really know why.

At one point I thought I had heard that they were going to eliminate the public option but then it sounded like they were saying it is still in. This all makes my head swim. One side says one thing the other says something else. But a lot of time neither side gives the specifics to back up what they are saying. You sure get a different view point based on whether use listen to FOX or some of the other channels.

One thing I fear is the incremental approach - which I think you mentioned. Little by little and people will accept it with out realizing that they are being gradually boiled alive.

You and I agree to a point - I don't like what the democrats are trying to do or at least what I fear they are trying to do. But we have already been thru a discussion on the insurance thing before so I know we don't completely agree. I do think there needs to be some changes to how insurance is handled. I don't know what the solution is - but it is far to expensive for people who can't get it thru their job, if they can get it at all. A friend of mine and her husband -(about my age) are paying 1000.00 a month for the 2 of the and that is Halliburton retiree insurance. They both have pre-existing so can't really change. Maybe there is not solution.

Seems like we have already lost a lot of our privacy now we may lose a lot more.

Repa, thanks for you input

Fay

Fay, budget items require a 60 vote majority unless they don't impact the deficit ceiling. The current budget deficit ceiling was set at $12.104 trillion, by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (H.R.1). Why do you think the obama administration, through the Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Gitner, has gone back to Congress this year asking them to raise the ceiling again? Because the healthcare bill in its present form would add enough to the deficit to exceed the established ceiling, requiring the 60 vote majority to pass and become law. That is why they are thinking of splitting the bill, so they can use reconciliation to get the public option rammed through against the expressed wishes of the majority of the people!

I think we do agreee on most points. Yes, something should be done to make healthcare more affordable. But the government option isn't the way, because even though it may reduce cost to those that don't have it, it will be at the expense of many others, and overall costs will increase when you include all citizens and have a big shortage of doctors, which will happen. We are already short some 400,000+ doctors in this country now. The government doesn't go by the rules of the private sector and so doesn't have to compete. They can easily drive all private insurance for healthcare out of business by making the cost of insurance premiums under the government option so low that private companies cannot make a profit. Many doctors will leave their practice because they won't be able to afford to keep them open at the government paid option, which will necessarily have to be low to cover everyone. There will be no incentive for young people to become doctors because the government effectively will put a cap on their livelihood. Thus, there will be an even bigger shortage of doctors and much longer waiting lines like every other socialized country experiences - up to months for even the most serious conditions. Currently, Medicare and Medicaid pay doctors about 26% less than private insurances. Under the public option, they will cut funds now going to Medicare by $500 billion, and reimbursement fees to doctors and hospitals will go down even more than they are now. Currently many doctors will not take new patients that are on Medicare or Medicaid, because if they did, they couldn't afford to keep their practices open. Some practices will not take any Medicare/Medicaid patients under any circumstances, period! To afford their facilities, equipment and staff today, hospitals and doctors rely on what they get from private insurance and private citizens to keep their practices open and cover their operating costs and provide services. If they do accept Medicare/Medicaid patients, it is only because they have enough patients under private healthcare to cover the difference in what the government doesn't pay for their services. Medicare and Medicaid cut deeply into their operating costs, and if all the people in the USA were only on these 2 options, many hospitals and private practices would not be able to survive because their cost of operation would be more than what they would receive in payment from the government.

One-half of all individual medical costs come in the last couple of years of a person's life. It is the sick who will suffer most under the government program, because the system is being designed to care for the well, not the sick. The costs being considered are mostly preventive costs and treatment for things like the flu and bronchitis, not costs for caring for the seriously ill - cancer, heart failure, kidney failure, advanced diabetes, hip and knee replacements, and the like. Life enhancing and life saving medicines and procedures for the very young and very old will not be available to them because of the cost and because neither group is considered as productive citizens by those who will be drafting the details of the new healthcare system, a couple of them being self-professed communists! It is only logical that you cannot increase services to a large populace like ours without increasing cost. So, where is the only logical place to cut cost? Where the most cost occurs - in the sick and in the last year or 2 of a person's life.

But they even lie about the costs. For example, obama said the other day that doctors profit greatly from serious diseases by treating chronic diseases like diabetes for years, and then make $50,000 to cut off a foot or a leg in the advanced stages, instead of practicing preventive medicine to save costs. That is a ball-faced lie and he knows it! Doctors do advise patients early on about what preventive measures they can take, but most people ignore the advice. People addicted to smoking will continue smoking; people addicted to eating the wrong kinds of food will continue to eat the wrong kinds of food; and people who don't like to exercise aren't going to start exercising. The doctor cannot be responsible for a person's lifestyle and behavior, that is up to the individual, not the doctor or the government! You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink! Surgey is the last option doctors take, when nothing else can be done and the patient's life is in danger. A surgeon is paid between $700 and $1000 by private insurances and Medicare/Medicaid for removing a foot or leg. And that figure includes all the hospital and office visits the patient has after surgery! Hospital costs are much higher for the recovery period that the patient remains in the hospital. Even in heart bypass surgery, the majority of the cost goes to the hospital facility and recovery services, not to the doctor. Many serious diseases cannot be prevented, no matter what precautionary steps are taken. They also lie about the savings. Separate non-partisan organizations like the CBO and others like the Heritage foundation and the CATO institute have estimated that the current proposal will add $1 trillion or more to the deficit over the next 10 years. There are no savings there! And CBO always underestimates the cost of new government programs. For example, Medicare costs are 10 times the original estimate, and Medicare is currently going bankrupt!

The problem is really fairly simple to solve if the real concern was to cover everyone who wants healthcare, and to improve the healthcare system. But that is not the real concern - politicians don't care about us! They don't care about anyone but themselves and the people who finance them! It is all about power and control over every aspect of our lives! It is about lining their own pockets and the pockets of their rich supporters - the labor unions and companies and individuals like George Soros that support them and profit from them at the expense of the American people. If they really wanted to solve this problem, they would provide tax and other credits to those who cannot otherwise afford healthcare but want it. They would reform the tort laws to stop ambulance chasers like John Edwards from frivilous lawsuits that cost the healthcare industry $200 Billion per year. They would open healthcare to interstate commerce so people could go out of state to purchase insurance that is cheaper than in their own state. They would make insurance portable from job to job, and would make it possible to continue carrying the insurance you have when you lose your job with subsidies until you could find another job. They would make it possible for people with pre-existing conditions to be able to obtain some kind of coverage that would at least reduce the burden of the cost they incur. Some companies have implemented incentives such that, when employees take some of the preventative steps that do work to reduce the risk of getting some the more serious illnesses, they will reduce their healthcare premiums. These steps alone would stimulate competition and lower insurance costs significantly, and would cost the taxpayers very little. But, they will never do that because this isn't about healthcare!

Repa,

It sounds like they are going to ram this thing thru regardless of what "we the people" think. I really don't know exactly how it will work if it does, and I expect that it will be a while before all the really bad stuff starts to surface. Once we accept this, what next? I remember way back many years ago - I heard it said that if the US fell it would be from within instead of from foreign countries. Maybe they were right.

If for some reason this doesn't go thru we probably will not get any thing done about heathcare/insurance reform and that is not good either.

If it does go thru, it would not surprise me if a lot of people are in a state of euphoria for a while , till the bad stuff starts to surface more and more - not sure how long it will take.

I think if the republican side had gone to the minsters asking them to speak up for their polices they would have been raked over the coals.

I just get tired thinking about it all.

Fay