Two backgrounder pieces today offer a stark contrast between the health-care plans of Barack Obama and John McCain.

If you don’t want to read the links*, they boil down to this:

Obama = Mandates
McCain = Choice.

___________________
* Believe it or not, some people prefer to go into a firefight without ammunition. . . .

You know, you Americans are making your presidential election far more complicated than it needs to be.  To us over here in Denmark, it seems very simple and easy to decide:

On the Democrat side, you have a bitch who is a lawyer married to a lawyer, running against a lawyer who is married to a bitch who is a lawyer. 

On the Republican side, you have a genuine, decorated war hero who is married to a hot blonde who is fabulously wealthy and owns a giant beer brewery. 

What’s the question?

OK...this is the space where I would normally post 50,000 links to stories about people waiting months for treatment in the aforementioned enlightened utopias known as the “western world”, followed up by mountains of anecdotal stories about incompetence, people crossing borders to buy treatments and on and on.

BUT! Something tells me it will fall on deaf ears. No doubt deaf because of an ear infection that went untreated while the reader waited 8 months for a visit to a state doctor who got his degree in Uganda because all the competent doctors are in private practice where they cater to the wealthy and politically connected.

ONWARD to UTOPIA! (version 18.0)

http://www.counterpunch.org/nader05062008.html

The Story of Lisa Kelly

America’s Pay-or-Die Health Care System

By RALPH NADER

This is a tale of pay or die that recurs again and again all over our country and only in our country in the entire western world.

I think that agreeing with Obama will make me more popular with the young people who, as we know, are full of wisdom so, I’m gonna side with them.

Besides, I’m really tired of thinking for myself. I’m ready to lay back and just let them f**k me into a coma. History is an endless cycle of servile dupes being liberated by strong and courageous free willed heros...who them become dupes. Being a dupe sounds like less work. Less work means more time for video games.

Green Day Rocks!

McCain is right on two scores: that the Rep and Dem plans do offer voters a real difference, and that the real benefit of the plan will be in how well it improves healthcare delivery as much as raw coverage.

The Democrat plan promises to do this by providing single payer options like Medicaid does. Medicaid may only pay $500 for an ingrown toenail surgery with no complications. Many doctors will not want to hassle with a measly $500 so they won’t do it, but some will. Those who do will pressure those who don’t to lower their fees.

Does that work ? It already does.  Does it work well ?  Not the favorite solution of the medical lobby or the HMOs. Lot of pushback.

The Republican plan tries to do the same thing by letting folks pick the best coverage available in the marketplace, which will pressure HMOs to offer more competitive services because they must compete.

Does that work ?  It could work, but the recent prescription drug legislation for seniors highlights the problems. No reason why sophisticated HMOs can’t pull bait-n-switch on consumers. You buy one plan because it covers your favorite pill. Then they change coverage and suddenly your pill is expensive and you are locked in to a bad plan.

Basically, medical care is rather complicated for individual consumers to make more than minimal choices. Buyer beware. On the other hand, there is good reason to limit mandates (government).

The “slacker” thing is more scare talk, as is the small business talk. Right now, small business is at a disadvantage purchasing HMOs, which offer efficiency of scale to big companies, not so much to small business.

Right now things are screwed up. The real question will be in how well the future plans play out. Right now all plans are predictably vague because the only goal right now is to get elected. It will take a long and protracted and bloody struggle with Congress to get any reform of either side enacted.

“(Obama’s)mandates require coverage of infertility treatments, drug rehab, “personal injuries” incurred while intoxicated, and other forms of care.”

Well, Obama is right-on. Bart you yesterday wrote a tear-jerking piece about people languishing in prison. Well, you may also want to add to your list people who direly want to get into drug & alcohol detox, so they can get better, but have to go on a “waiting list” for some run-down state-owned joint—because insurance refuses to cover other places.

That’s a real-life scenario and isn’t very pretty for the person going through it. Or their family.

On this one issue Obama is right-on. Maybe his plan will pay for the mental hospitalization of Reverend Nutso Wright.

OBAMA: As a presidential candidate, Mr. Obama says people lack health insurance because “they can’t afford it.” He’s right. But he is also partly responsible for why health insurance is too expensive.

Council for Affordable Health Insurance (CAHI):  “...mandates increase the cost of basic health coverage by 20% to 50%.

OBAMA: SO WHAT THE RICH CAN PAY FOR THEM. THOSE EVIL PREDATORS MAKE TOO MUCH MONEY ANYWAY.

STATES: “...NEW categories of eligibility that force small businesses to cover additional dependents. One popular measure is the “slacker mandate,” which extends coverage to unmarried dependents under the age of 30.

OBAMA:  HAVE A HEART FOR THE POOR GUY STANDING BY THE FIRE BARREL OR IN THE MEDIAN AT A STOPLIGHT. BESIDES THE RICH CAN PAY FOR IT.

ME:  AW, UNFAIR CRITICISM OF THIS AGENT OF CHANGE. MORE HEALTH MANDATES, FULL SPEED AHEAD DAMN THE COSTS!

Post Your Comments: