Trade abortion for natonal health care?

[Onlooker]

The Democratic leadership should offer to outlaw abortion in exchange for tax increases to allow a comprehensive national health care program. The program could give women 24 weeks of of time off (like in Scandinavia) to be with her newborn. Of course, such an offer would expose the anti-abortion frauds, many of whom see the life as an unborn as less valuable than money.

I am prochoice, but believe national health care could address many, but not all, of the same issues.

[havocmom]

1. Can't have any real healthcare if important care options are illegal

No way in hell US Corporations would give liberal benifits to workers.

[rocktivity]

46. DING DING DING! Havocmom, you're our grand prize winner!

Without reproductive rights, there can be no real national healthcare!

:headbang:
rocknation

[GCP]

2. Well, accessibility to contraception and pre=natal care

would be a good thing, but you still have to have accessibility to abortion when contraception fails, as it will.

[JanMichael]

3. What about Rape, Incest, and health of the Mother?

Would all of these things be mitigated by Universal Healthcare?

Wow.

[Nobody]

6. Nope. It just means that the state will decide for you

whether or not you will give birth or abort. If someone else decides it's rape or that the risk of dying is too great, then you can abort.

These exceptions are OK as long as your life and sorrows are pried into, looked upon and judged, and the final decision lies with someone else.

This would be a good opening move in a bluff to see where the extreme right wing really is in regards to valuing the health of already born persons. But I couldn't advocate making Row v Wade illegal. And I'm one of those myriad working Americans with no health care coverage.

[Truman01]

4. If you have ever lived in Canada, you don't want National

health care, it sucks.

TC

[SmokingJacket]

5. RIght now I'd prefer national healthcare to no healthcare

which is what I have now, with my high deductible policy.

= no going to the doctor unless you're gonna die.

[GCP]

7. I think most Canadians would still choose their system over ours

If you get sick, you get the care. Why would anybody choose a system where your health insurance (along with your entire family's) can disappear along with your job - Medicare is a government-run system and all the old people I know are very happy with it - apart from drug coverage and high deductibles.

[Truman01]

23. I think you are very wrong about that.

I lived in Montreal for 3 years, Canadians HATE their health care. The waiting lists to get to a specialist are much worse that HMO's. Just a fact, don't flame me.

TC

[Orangepeel]

9. sucks worse than my HMO? (n/t)

[RC]

10. And you know because...?

I live up against their border and what they have seems to be far superior to what we have. Blue Cross which pays pennies on the dollar.

[Truman01]

24. How about I lived in Canada for 3 years and saw the

really poor health care up close. Believe me Canadians hate it so badly there is a private health insurance for the wealthy that is often up to be made illegal.

TC

[JanMichael]

17. Bullshit.

Bullshit.

Bullshit.

[Cheswick2.0]

19. if it sucked they would get rid of it

Canadians could get rid of the system if they wanted to.
DOn't buy the right wing talking points on universal healthcare.

[Truman01]

25. I don't buy anything, I've lived there. Canadians hate it. nt

[ghostsofgiants]

34. I"ve lived here for much longer than 3 years

I don't see this hatred for our healthcare system that you speak of.

Our system is by no means perfect, but outside of the Ralph Klein torries you'll be hard pressed to find people who truly hate it.

[Truman01]

42. You know that isn't so.

There are thousands, even millions in Canada that would love to have private health insurance. The rich have private health insurance and they have the private "non-medical" clinics that have MRI machines that don't require a year wait. I didn't say everyone hates it, but you know as well as I do that the Canadian health care system is not popular at all. Except to those who cant afford anything else.

TC

[bunkerbuster1]

22. I'll trade you my healthcare coverage

which is paid for entirely by yours truly, and is subject to double-digit annual increases in monthly premium payments.

And mind you, I'm healthy as a horse, as are my family members.

[sonicx]

26. Polls says Canadians like it...

and Polls here in America say most Americans hate our system and want Universal.

[Truman01]

28. The polls are full of shit. I was in Montreal for three months

just last year and the biggest controversy they were having was the advent of private insurance for the wealthy. The wealthy were getting private insurance that would give them US HEALTH CARE instead of Canadian Health care. The Parliament in Quebec was debating whether to make it a crime to carry such insurance.

I've Never met a Canadian who enjoyed the health care there.


TC

[sonicx]

29. Then why haven't you guys voted the Leftists out of office?

I'm sure the Conservatives will be happy to privatize it.

btw, what's your theory on why the polls say Canadians like it?

[Name removed]

35. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

41. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[WillowTree]

30. The day my Mother's

cancer was first found via an ultrasound and CT scan, the radiologist who read the films sat us down and told us to be sure to thank God before sleeping that night and every night going forward that she would be receiving her treatment in the US and not Canada. She was a Canadian citizen who will not practice in Canada any longer, nor will her father, a surgeon, because they found accessibility to specialized treatment so difficult to procure there that their patients were too often dying needlessly. She told us that her own mother had died of a cancer that would have been operable had treatment begun when the malignancy was first diagnosed but she, the wife of one physician and the mother of another, had to wait so long for approval of a referral and further diagnostics and treatment that the cancer had metastasized and was no longer treatable. After that, they both closed their practices and moved here.

What I thought of later, but never had an opportunity to ask her, was why they hadn't packed her mother up and brought her here for treatment when there was still time. Would have been interesting to hear the answer.

From what I've heard from people I know in Canada, accessibility varies considerably by where one lives but that, to a large degree, routine treatment is generally easily accessible there. It's when one is seriously ill and in dire need of immediate treatment that they have the worst delays. The difference is that here your HMO or whatever may balk at payment, but if you can find a way around that, the treatment is still available. There, everything's all paid for, but only IF you can get the specialized treatment that you need, and that's often tied up by a government bureaucracy that can make our HMOs look like child's play, even if you had the resources and willingness to pay for the tx that you need yourself.

Our healthcare system has serious problems and is in urgent need of major revisions, no question. But from those I've talked to who have experienced both systems first-hand (an admittedly limited number), to a person they've said that they'd prefer to be here rather than in Canada if they ever developed a life-threatening-but-treatable illness. I'll take their evaluation because I have no first-person experience with it of my own.

[SharonAnn]

36. Reallt? My Canadian relatives say it is far superior to the care

they get here through their work related, HMO "insurance" coverage.

[Ilsa]

39. I don't think I want Canadian healthcare, either, but

we are certainly running into unintentional or intentional rationing here in the US as well. We can't get enough healthcare providers in rural areas. It already takes months to see a specialist in some areas, even in the large cities, even with insurance. My family has seen this over the last four years. It is worse if you don't have insurance.

[area51]

8. No.

You want to kill women in exchange for national health care? Because women will continue to get abortions -- illegal ones -- and die in agony in the ER. And there's no need to raise taxes to pay for national health care; we already pay enough in taxes to afford it; but the money is being siphoned off to the military.

[DELUSIONAL]

11. STUPID idea or suggestion

Better idea -- kick the democratic "leadership" out on their asses.

The "leadership" refused to listen to the grassroots about vote manipulation in the 2002 election and were completely unprepared. Plus the "leadership" continues to ignore the grassroots.

The democratic leadership has LEFT me -- a feminist -- by their election of the male chauvinist PIG Reid as Senate Minority leader.

The democratic party does NOT need to become GOPig light.

Pro-Choice -- control of our own bodies is NOT negotiable -- got that? No negotiation -- ever.

The asshole who are against choice won't embrace the democratic party -- they are demanding the complete subjugation of women -- complete control over our bodies -- the supremacy of the sperm and fetus -- to hell with any right that individual women might have.

Obviously anyone who tries to negotiate with the religious right wing fanatics has never bothered to understand that these folks are CRAZY -- and nothing is going to satisfy their lust for the end times.

[renaissanceguy]

37. AMEN!

Only a chauvinist would suggest such a thing. Do you people not realize that without control of one's own body, one has no rights! Take a feminist theory class sometime.

THERE IS NO DEBATING A WOMAN'S RIGHT TO HER OWN BODY. PERIOD.

I'm appalled that anyone would even SUGGEST depriving a woman of this right, just for monetary gain. That reaks Repug-ism.

--------------------------------------------------------------------


Outspoken political bumper stickers and buttons at www.cafepress.com/liberalissues

[tavalon]

12. Um, no

Absolutely not. You aren't trading my control over my body for health care. I want universal health care but not at that cost.

How do you see that national health care could address abortion?

[Deja Q]

13. Given the last 10+ years of Dem capitulation, that will never happen.

:-(

[amazona]

14. women's rights are not for sale or trade

There is no amount of money or care that could compensate for forcing me to carry my rapist's child.

[w13rd0]

15. Predict Result of Your Proposal...

...GOP sees willingness to "move" on part of DNC. Abortion is outlawed. Then when the universal health bill crosses the table, the "tax increase" you mentioned is made much mention of. DNC loses more seats. Dem reps cross the aisle to vote against for fear of being painted a "taxer". Universal health does not pass. GOP laughs at DNC for being so damn gullible.

[AndyTiedye]

16. Bad Idea

We'd get an ironclad ban on abortion (even to save the mother)
and they wouldn't fund the healthcare.

[Onlooker]

18. Well, I see the issue differently

Again, I'm prochoice ...

But, I'm against the death penalty. Now, I can respect someone who is against the death penalty and against abortion on the grounds of taking an innocent life. If I truly believed a 3 month old fetus was a living human, I would be against abortion. I don't believe that, in part because I'm an atheist, and I trust science to make the determination when life begins.

So, what about those people who truly believe life begins at conception? They might be otherwise very progressive people. They could be as liberal as any of us and favor equal rights, social welfare, and progressive taxes. But, if they truly believe that abortion is murder, then they must feel the same sort of sorrow and pain that progressives feel when reading about war crimes in Iraq, for instance.

I think there are anti-choice people who are our brethren, but the issue of abortion is very powerful for them.

Further, from a more pragmatic point of view, even floating the idea of the Dems opposing abortion in exchange for the religious right supporting increased taxes for national health care, could expose the hypocrisy of the religious right. They would either have to embrace such a proposal or say that tax rights are more important than the rights of the unborn.

[Karenina]

21. "Pro-choice" of undeclared gender

and willing to offer up women's control of their own bodies. Hmmm...

[Eileen]

20. Women's rights are not political footballs!

NO! NAY!! NEVER!!!

- NEVER AGAIN!!!! -

---

A woman's right to personal bodily integrity IS NOT a subject for debate.

It IS NOT a subject for negotiation.

It IS NOT open to a referendum and the possible tyranny of a misogynist majority.

Like all her other rights, and your rights too, her right to personal bodily integrity is hers by virtue of her belonging to our society and our agreement through constitutional guarantees that the right is hers.

If a woman's right to personal bodily integrity, and to not be a slave to biology, must be the subject of the next civil war then so be it. There can be no appeasement on this issue.

If the leadership of the DNC cannot recognize the first step on the road to theocratic fascism then it is time to replace the scoundrels with people of courage who will defend the rights and freedoms that so loudly are boasted about in the world.

- Eileen`s always in process page -


Eileen

[Xipe Totec]

27. Our National Health Care IS an Abortion

What's there to trade?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

31. Knowing the way the Republicanites work

they'd say, "Okay, let's outlaw abortion, and then maybe we'll think about nationa health care."

And a lot of Democratic legislators would be dumb enough to believe them.

[Bridget Burke]

32. No. Where, precisely, has this exchange occurred previously?

Nowhere.

Women's lives are not gamepieces.

[AliciaKeyedUp]

33. You have to be kidding?

You're going to take away my rights and try to give me something else I should have anyhow? Go ahead, you will seem a women's rebellion in this country where we all walk away from jobs, family responsibilities, etc.

[Ilsa]

38. If that's the best Dems can do, I'll go find another party.

Abortion was the first reason of many I turned away from an increasingly conservative and falsely religious GOP. Dems can expect to see their party lose a huge part of their membership if they keep moving to the right on issues of civil rights, care of the sick and poor, ecology, etc.

[LeftPeopleFinishFirst]

48. ding ding ding

we have a winner!

[proudbluestater]

40. Horrible Suggestion. We will NEVER see national health care

because there is too much money to be had for the politicians from the drug companies and insurance companies.

So in essence, you'd be allowing somebody to make abortion illegal, and we STILL would not get healthcare. Horrible idea. Can't believe you're really pro-choice.

[HEyHEY]

43. Go for both - it's the way it should be

[La Lioness Priyanka]

44. while i can see where you are coming from...your proposal

is frankly both stupid and naive

[JerseygirlCT]

45. Uh, no

What is it with some and their wacky notion that giving up a basic human right -- women's reproductive choice -- is either morally correct or strategically smart?

We need healthcare. We need to stop talking about outlawing abortion. We need to start vigorously framing the conversation and taking it away from the rw freaks who've very successfully twisted the debate to their own ends for years.

Yeesh.

[LeftPeopleFinishFirst]

47. This is a ridiculous suggestion.

Since when has it been OK for my reproductive rights to become political playing pieces? You can just trade off one for the other? Giving a woman time to spend with a baby she doesn't want is not a substitute for abortion. That, like adoption, still requires the woman to go through the childbearing process - and some women are physically or mentally unable to handle that. So forgive me for turning my nose up to your suggestion, but it makes absolutely no sense.

[jdj]

49. no, let's trade Viagra and hair replacement for national health care.

what say you?

[Catholic Sensation]

50. How about this

on top of getting rid of reproductive rights of women, we give up the civil rights act as well, somehow reverse Brown vs. Board of Education, and the 14th Amendment just to bring aboard the Zell Miller types too?