CTLawGuy
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:17 AM
Original message |
How to sell Universal Health Care to swing voters. |
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1. Under UHC, the government will buy health insurance from private companies for all people just like your employer does for you now, except at a lower cost.
2. Under UHC, your employer will not need to offer benefits and will instead give you more money.
3. Under UHC, if you are stuck in a job because of insurance concerns, you will become free to take that job you would be happier and more productive at. This will cause the economy to grow.
4. Under UHC, your business can save money due to insurance costs (this is especially good for small businesses)
5. Under UHC, poor people will be encouraged to deal with medical problems BEFORE they become catastrophic, thus saving YOU money.
6. Under UHC, the 8 zillion different federal programs with their own bureaucracies (including medicare and medicaid) that do a relatively poor job of insuring the uninsured (coverage, not quality of work), will be replaced by one efficient agency which will insure everybody.
7. Under UHC, the insurance companies themselves do not have to worry about adverse selection, whereby on average, insurance policy holders are sicker than the normal population. They will be able to use premiums from healthy people to hedge their losses. This will make insurance companies less motivated to fight having to pay claims.
Now, who says the democrats cannot win on universal health care? All it takes is a little convincing, and swing voters will understand.
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camero
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:22 AM
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Would be reduced as the medical portion of that system would fall under UHC.
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alexwcovington
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:23 AM
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BillZBubb
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:29 AM
Response to Original message |
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Those polled supported the individual points of the Clinton health proposal by about 65% pro - 35% against. When then asked if they supported the "Clinton health plan" the numbers reversed.
The same thing will happen to any Dem plan. The AMA, the insurance companies, the drug companies, and the Repug party will demonize it into "socialized medicine, where you can't pick your own doctor, you have to wait months for decent care, and you are paying for the insurance of those lazy welfare bums."
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Lydia Leftcoast
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:30 AM
Response to Reply #3 |
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Not offering a simpler plan and not going on TV to appeal directly to the American people to bug their Congresscritters.
Reagan used this technique repeatedly and with great success.
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CTLawGuy
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:33 AM
Response to Reply #3 |
8. i can pick apart your arguments with variants of mine |
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"socialized medicine"
This plan is modeled after what your employer does to buy health insurance for you, except the government can do it more cheaply. Are american corporations socialist?
"where you can't pick your own doctor"
we can require that you be allowed to pick your own doctor in law. And when theres only one insurance choice, either you can choose your doctor or your doctor is out of work.
"you have to wait months for decent care"
Does your employer's insurance make you wait months?
"you are paying for the insurance of those lazy welfare bums."
You are saving money because the poor will be more likely to show up in the doctors office rather than the emergency room. Which is more expensive?
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HFishbine
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:30 AM
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Your formula still leaves the insurance companies, and their need for profit, in the equation -- that's an unnecessary cost and one which would make your proposal prohibitively expensive.
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CTLawGuy
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:35 AM
Response to Reply #4 |
9. they wont have a choice |
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either buy from the govt, or go out of business. If profit is non-zero, they will choose to stay in business.
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HFishbine
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:50 AM
Response to Reply #9 |
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Who buys from the government?
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Nicholas D Wolfwood
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:32 AM
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Oh Yeah, and screw the Al-Qaeda Yankees. :toast:
(Note: Offense at the Al-Qaeda comment is completely intended.) :nuke:
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CTLawGuy
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:35 AM
Response to Reply #6 |
10. pay-Rod ! ... pay-Rod!... |
leesa
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:32 AM
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7. If our media would only report the truth about how well these single payer |
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systems work and how they actually cost less in both the short and the long run. Most Americans actually think we have the best medical care in the world when we are somewhere around 16th among industrialized nations and we pay the most by far.
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Nederland
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Fri Feb-27-04 11:40 AM
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Instead of having government buy health insurance from private insurers, why not let people buy it for themselves? Why do we need a middle man of any sort--corporate or governmental? Why not allow everyone to buy their own health care in whatever manner they chose, subsidizing the costs for poor people who can't afford it on their own? I don't understand why people believe that government needs to be involved in the act of purchasing health care at all.
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CTLawGuy
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Fri Feb-27-04 02:56 PM
Response to Reply #11 |
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bought his or her own health insurance, it would be more expensive per person than if the government did it for everyone. This is because the people who tend to buy insurance voluntariliy know they are going to be sick or more at risk to be sick. The insurance companies know this and overcharge each person.
If the govt buys it for a group, then everyone, whether sick or not, pays in. Because the insurance company can use the money from healthy people to pay for sick people, there is less incentive to overcharge.
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formernaderite
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Fri Feb-27-04 12:05 PM
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13. I only have one issue with government sponsored insurance... |
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...how will they deal with people who decide against things like immunizations? We chose not to immunize our children, and had to lie to the state and sign a religious objection form. This is hysterical considering we are non-religious people. I fear regulations that would coerce my family into health programs we don't care for.
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info being
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Fri Feb-27-04 12:23 PM
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14. Look how many words that takes |
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I'm sure Kucinich would lay this out if given more than 20 seconds at a time to talk.
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DU
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Tue May 07th 2024, 02:54 PM
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