money.cnn.com — The pricetag to influence the health care debate in the halls of Congress has surpassed $600 million and is fast becoming a legislative record breaker. The total spent on lobbyists, television ads and political donations is enough to pay the insurance tab for about 45,000 families a year.
Nov 18, 2009 View in Crawl 4
rick888Nov 19, 2009
"There are people out there (conservatives) that will argue government health care will be terrible - it will bankrupt companies, kill grannies, discourage pharmaceutical doctors, wasteful, and basically a terrible thing that will make America like Sudan."I need to see facts and statistics. It seems that many people that support a Universal health care only talk about how it's going to help people. There is no mention or thought into the amount of money it's going to cost the American people, the fact that nearly all governments on the planet are wasteful and inefficient (including the US), and that a single payer system means that choice is gone and that we will have a monopoly running health care (I suppose that monopolies are okay now, right?)"But then you look at HMOs, for example, who take in your premiums, from which they have to reward their shareholders, pay their CEOs handsomely, pay lobbyists and contribute politicians, pay fines (Scrushy ordered to pay $2.9 billion dollars in fines, his legal bill alone is $23 million, Pfizer also ordered to pay $2.3 billion in fine), pay marketing campaigns, etc. After it has finished paying all that from your premium, it then chooses to pay for your health care."Why is making money now considered evil? If the health care industry has the cash to pay for my care..I don't care what they do with the rest because it's not my money. Health care does need to be reformed, but a single payer system is not the answer."You really think that is better than a government/single payer/hybrid private/public health care system that every other industrialized nation is using? As far as I can see, people in UK, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, and Japan are all happier with their health care system than ours."Sorry, but I will not be happy with the majority of my paycheck going toward a health care system that I feel will be inferior. Not only that, If I want private care, I will have to pay twice (once for public..once for private..and once public is available, private will be 10X the cost). It's the same with our public school systems.
insightfulNov 19, 2009
Who says making money is evil? I did not.But you'd be a fool to believe that your health premium is utilized well inside a HMO. "If the health care industry has the cash to pay for my care..I don't care what they do with the rest because it's not my money."See the thing is, they do not have the cash to pay for your care - which is why they have a claims department where they deny claims or a table where they decide what is "usual and customary" that has no basis in reality - which the court agreed.So, it is your money at stake. Health care premiums went up 75% between 2000-2007 - are you getting better care?Third, you are an even bigger fool to think that a majority of paycheck will go toward health care system. Without reform, that is exactly the trend it is going. The fact that you you are getting superior care at an affordable price today and there can be no better is what is so laughable about your misunderstanding of how a health care system is supposed to work instead of the rotten collapsing entity you are seeing today.
markusfarkusNov 19, 2009
No, they only want you to hurry up and die if you get sick.
starryann2000Nov 20, 2009
Watch C- span it is very informative since you go right into the congress and senate and listen to them first hand. Here is what I have noticed the democrats only give rosy glowing accounts of how it will help, they only read letters that are for the new program but never any that are against why is that one has to wonder. and by the way I am democrat. watching and listening is very eye opening.also check out open secrets.org which is a government watchdog, Bacchus received 200,000 dollars you guessed it from blue cross blue shield Etna and others and so have some of the others in gov. now one should ask yourselves why would they be biting the cash cow so to speak, could there be an ulterior motive here? What if they know insurance companies will make more because everyone has to buy insurance just think of that a gauranteed captive pool of people paying them.
starryann2000Nov 20, 2009
apparently Landrieu will get 100 million for her state if she votes for health care reid apparently including this in bill as inducement to get her to vote positively. wonder how many others will come to light. there may be a cost cutting provision whereby an independent medicare advisory board could be formed which could be required to recommend steps limiting growth of medicare which would apply unless congress blocked them. the creation of insurance exchanges would be delayed until Jan 2014 to reduce costs. Senate CBO figures 19 million people would receive a subsidy of 5,500 in 2019. half of the bill would be financed by curbs in projected medicare spending with biggest blow falling on private medicare plans and on home health care agencies.A doctor in the congress who is now a representative said that doc fix is good for only one year and then contrary to what was promised to docs a new formula would be used, instead of what they have now it would be based on GDP. He also said that Health and human services office or a branch of it was behind this new ruling that women did not need to get mammogram until age 50 which would put many women at risk and has angered many recently. If gov is going to say what is needed and what isn't the consequences could be that you would lose coverage and have to pay for it out of pocket because powers that be, not docs mind you determined you didn't need it. seems they are using smoke and mirrors and they really do bare watching. One thing to be aware of gov can not even pay for what they owe now. they have said that right now medicare and social security are running with negative balances and within 7 years medicare at least will be insolvent followed by social security shortly there after. that does not count the trillions owed foreign governments plus interest that is over budget. they plain do not have the money. dollar has dropped 16% and unemployment stands at 10.2 % according to both congress and senate. If they keep going they will bankrupt this country
ineversleepNov 21, 2009
Do you have a better source for me?
ShovelbabyNov 23, 2009
Really? Who said that? I only remember a Robert Reich, a democrat saying it. <a class="user" href="http://www.humblelibertarian.com/2009/10/obama-advisor-to-elderly-were-going-to.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.humblelibertarian.com/2009/10/obama-adv ...</a>