"The most deadly challenge ever faced by the medical profession"

[pnwmom]

According to the AMA back in the sixties, the most deadly challenge was Medicare, of course.

This account of the history of Medicare puts the Obamacare fight into perspective.

http://www.ssa.gov/history/corningchap4.html

[Warpy]

1. Exactly, which is why stories about the sky falling

under the ACA aren't getting any traction here, although the occasional troll has tried.

Too many of us here have very long memories.

[liberal_at_heart]

2. I am still waiting to see how ACA helps me. I am paying $925/month in premiums.

I loath insurance companies and I have to pay them $925 every month all for the privilege of not being able to actually go to the doctor because I'm too busy paying my premiums. We need to get insurance companies out of the health care system. We need single payer.

[Warpy]

3. Oh, absolutely right on all counts.

Insurance companies first priced me out and then refused to write insurance at all, so I've been without since 1987.

I figure I've saved somewhere in the low six figures by not paying those bloodsuckers and simply budgeting for disasters.

Unfortunately, it meant living in penury but at least legislators didn't have to put forth the effort to fix the system for decades, the poor babies.

Of course it won't work with insurance giants in the mix. They're going to want to get out of the health insurance business in fairly short order, especially in unprofitable markets, and that will leave the door open for state by state single payer.

[pnwmom]

4. I don't think you'll find many around here arguing against single payer.

But that wasn't one of the options this time around.

I'm hoping Vermont will make a success of it, and then more and more states will follow.

[liberal_at_heart]

6. I'm still angry that it wasn't one of the options this time around. It never even got brought to the

table because we were too busy sucking up to the insurance companies and letting them help write the law. I have serious doubts about how much good ACA will do. Will it have a couple of good points? Yes, but so far I am not impressed. We need leaders with enough courage to fight for single payer. Unfortunately we don't have very many leaders with courage these days.

[pnwmom]

7. It never got to the table because there were too many Rethugs who would have stopped it.

We just barely got the ACA passed. There's nothing we could have done to force single payer down all those Rethug throats.

[liberal_at_heart]

9. It never got brought to the table because we didn't have any politicians with enough courage to

bring it to the table. I don't care how many republicans there were. Our representatives should have been fighting for us.

[pnwmom]

10. Why waste time with something with zero chance of passing? We just barely got the ACA through. n/t

[liberal_at_heart]

11. fighting for your rights is never a lost cause.

[pnwmom]

12. It is if it means you don't get something passable through Congress because you ran out of time.

We wouldn't have been able to get anything through in the next Congress. We just barely made it as it is.

[pnwmom]

5. Does your state have an exchange up yet so you can see what the rates would be? n/t

[liberal_at_heart]

8. It's not even available to look at until September. That's when the call centers open.