My optimism in America, of which there is plenty, is being chipped away by these debates.

God, these fucking people make me sick.

Actually, the "yeah's" in the background were more likely people against him cheering the tough question. Nice filtering though, it does make him look like a jerk, but a smart one. The problem with hypothetical questions, they are always corners. Like polls or statistics they are designed to get a specific answer.

I love these extremes, on one hand we have "let's give everyone the over inflated medical bills to pay for everyone else" on the other it's "let's not do anything but just require insurance" .... wait, I think only one of those is now in the works .... either way, whatever happened to the middle of the road, or in more medical terms, fixing the problem instead of the symptom?

Disgusting.

canada is so goddamn appealing right now.

Change the way money works or you change nothing.

Republicans are dreadful people. Sociopaths, mostly.

And michaelp, for what it's worth, just remember - the Tea Party is an invention of corporate marketing departments. There's no one who really believes in it, and poll after poll shows it to be less popular among Americans than either Atheists or Muslims.

And I don't think this debate is going to win them any friends, either.

What are you talking about, KK? The crowd starts cheering when he gets about three sentences into his answer.

@5- But oh, the COLD! Were it not for the cold, I'd've been there in 2001, after W was appointed.
"Party of Life", indeed.

@8 PART of the crowd ... sheesh, you'd think that the only people that go to these things are all just blind supporters ... wait ... they are all blind supporters, just not all of the same "side".

Depends -- if the hypothetical man is a libertarian/teabagger, then hell yes, pull the plug.

@11 ... hmm, choose the side being honest about pulling your own, or choose people like you who pretend to care by giving everyone something but post such comments .... that's a no brainer, you are not helping your "side".

@12: Hey, I'm just concerned not to violate his moral integrity, is all.

Last republican debate the crowd erupted in cheers for Rick Perry's death penalty record. This one they cheered the prospect of a poor person dying because they didn't have health-care. Next debate, they should just reenact the scene from Batman Begins where Liam Neeson orders Bruce Wayne to kill a thief. Wolf Blitzer should lead someone on stage and be like, this man is an illegal immigrant, he just got a DUI in an area where many innocent twelve year old girls live. What will you do to him?

@13 Well, I'm not surprised at the callousness of opposition in any debate anymore, it's all Us Versus Them now, it's just realize that comments like that make you look the fool just as much because hypocrisy is one of the things many swing voters can't stand. ;) I tally them up, and vote which side has the fewest lies and hypocritical moments. So far, the Reps are winning this time. The idea is that since I have to vote for an extremist, may as well pick the one that's most honest about it.

Yeah, you know what? In Somalia, the Tea-twats vision of heaven, doctors either work for cash or for charity and guess what? They get kidnapped by militias of poor people because there isn't enough medical care to go around.

It's funny, one of my tea party relatives was just explaining that the reason he can't support Ron Paul, in spite of agreeing with him on so many things, is due to Paul's isolationism. This means that it's not enough that he's just willing to let people die from neglect; to be manly enough for Republicans to vote for him, he needs to be actively seeking new people to bomb.

@16 So you are all for letting the doctors control how much you have to spend on medical care, gotcha. As I say, I would rather they go after the problem instead of a bandage or pretending all is okay, but since I have to choose one failed ideal or the other, may as well be the more honest of the two. You do realize that Obama lies to, right? So does every Democrat, there is no real difference other than the masks they wear. If you want change, you will vote for Joe Plumber himself, not one of the princes who pander to him.

To be a Republican you have to be a liar--it's a prerequisite and virtue for them. I have yet to meet one that I haven't found to be despicable. Now add ignorant, old, racist, antigay, misogynist, and white to the mix and you get a teabagger AKA rebranded rightwing social conservative POS.
Take their medicaid, medicare, and social security away from them--I'm sure they won't mind.

Republicans: party of pig fuckers.

fucking mother fuckers.

KittenKoder@3 Are you saying that the situation described in this "hypothetical" question is unlikely?

@20

Poor pigs. I can only imagine the horrible diseases Republicans would transmit.

Remember when Andrew Sullivan pitched a hissy fit attempting to burnish his "conservative" credentials when Alan Grayson said that the Republican healthcare plan was "don't get sick" and if you do get sick "die quickly"? That literally is their plan, but saying so is mean mean mean and wrong wrong wrong and a disgrace to civil discourse etc.

@22 Where did I say that? I assert, as always, it would be better to make medical affordable without requiring a third party like insurance. Originally that's what Dems made it sound like they wanted, then they twisted, and eventually became "everyone has to now pay for insurance" .... That's far from making it affordable, that's just shifting the cost.

@15:

If being opposed to people who cheer on people dying because they're uninsured makes me an "us against them" kinda person, then you know what? I am proud to be against those nihilistic fucking assholes. I am totally against them, and I will fight them with whatever it takes.

As for the rest of your argument: That anyone is capable and serious of that reasoning scares the fuck out of me.

@25 I'm assuming you are making an argument in favor of single payer healthcare/socialized medicine. I agree with you but the rest of your point about Obama lying and whatever the thing about Joe the Plumber is supposed to mean is just incoherent nonsense. Establishing a mandate to purchase health insurance in order to increase the pools of insured people and lower prices is not "less honest" than "letting people die". You have no idea if it is a "failed ideal [sic]" or not because it has never been attempted on the scale of the Affordable Care Act before.

@26 So it's better to make insurance affordable instead of making medical affordable ..... you do realize that's the same reasoning that go the housing loan problem started, right? Making the loans affordable but not the houses. It's trying to cure a symptom instead of fixing the problem. We don't need to allow Obama to make the medical industry worse just so he can make a profit off it.

@27 Medicaid is a failure, and that was it's purpose, to insure the uninsurable, it failed because it could not do it, the rising costs of medicine has ruined it.

Seriously, what logic has lead people to believe that insurance companies are setting the prices?

i'd like to hear the rest of ron paul's answer. because most of that was dodging the question. the likely result: if the 30 year old lives, he gets a bill for 100K, and either pays for it the rest of his life, or declares bankruptcy and the hospital eats it.

@28:

I have no fucking clue what you're going on about.

I am talking about the fact that people cheered when Paul said "too bad" when presented with someone without health insurance. That is sick. That is totally and utterly inhuman.

@31:

Gawker has the rest of Paul's response, which was that churches should and would pay for it.

I was in a social justice youth program a few years ago, and we spent a day figuring out a budget for a family of three whose parents worked minimum wage jobs. We found that the only way to have enough to eat, based on an admittedly pessimistic scenario, would be to not buy health insurance.
Fuck this screw-you-I've-got-mine bullshit.

SO, as kain has pointed out:

Debate 1: all candidates raise their hands when asked if they would torture someone.

Debate 2: audience cheers Perry's 200+ criminal executions

Debate 3: Audience cheers death of poor young man who can't afford insurance

What the hell level of depravity and inhumanity is left?

The best part of this is that statistically, most of these people consider themselves Christians. Remember the part of the Bible where Jesus told the sick people to fuck off unless they could pay him?

@35: the hypothetical 30 year-old had a good job but was too cheap and immortal to pay for insurance. just the sort of thing that churches have spare cash to cover.

I think a lot of you missed the point, the question was not "What happened if a poor person without health insurance get sick ?" but "A wealthy young men decided not to take an insurance, instead buying a new TV, and then get sick, whout are we going to do ?".

And of course, it's way less controversial, after all why would you pay the health cost of someone who had the money but decided to get other things while at the same time, you worked hard to paid your own insurance ?

I think the question was dishonest and misleading, because everyone wanted to ear the real question (poor man who can't afford an insurance) and so interpreted wrongly the answers.

Ps : Bear in mind that a number of person are actually opting out of medicair and medicaid like the Amish for example, if they get sick, they are on their own.

@38 what an idiotic hypothetical question. Buying a "new TV" makes you wealthy? You can buy a 46" 1080p TV for about $750, which would not even buy you one month of family health insurance on your own, at least in New York. Maybe they should have made it "bought a Ferrari" which would of course never happen since the number of Ferrari owners without health insurance is almost definitely zero.

@39 : I think you should watch the video and not just the headlines (shame on you Dan !), the questions clearly mention that the guy is "making a good living".

And I know you didn't watch the video, the TV part is mine ;-).

@39 Bullshit:
http://www.ehealthinsurance.com/
http://www.ehealthinsurance.com/washingt…

A $750 TV (more than I earn in a month) is enough for 10 months of health insurance in Washington state.

@38 I think has the right idea.

Make healthcare affordable, don't just blindly attack health insurance. All the people who are attacking insurance companies must need mental hospitalization or some such. I thought "trickle down" tactics were already proven to fail, and that's exactly what going after insurance companies is, it's a trickle down theory, the worst kind. Again I ask, why is everyone so against affordable healthCARE?

The theoretical 30-year-old in question has lived his life according to the same principles the teabaggers espouse -- he made a CHOICE not to get health care. No mandates, etc.

And yet when the "should society let him die" question gets asked, they scream YEAH! with a kind of righteous anger, like the poor bastard had it coming somehow. What did he do to make them so angry? What inspired the bloodlust? I'll tell you what: The idea of somebody being left to die stirs up their primitive Randian juices and they can't suppress a yalp of approval. They're barbarians who simply don't believe in society...they'd rather we all go back to feudalism where our plutocratic masters reign supreme and everyone else lives in a hovel with dirt floors and slaughters chickens for food (if they're lucky), because at least then we'll be free, Free, FREE!!!

Gross. Really. Fucking. Gross.

FWIW, at the very end of the clip, paul answers with a "no" despite the few cheers of "yeah" that can be heard.

I was expecting to hear Perry offer to sign the execution order for the hypothetical 30 yr. old without health insurance. The audience would have whipped themselves into a frenzy of orgasmic & epic proportions.

This is why I can no longer speak to my relatives in Arizona.

@45 I think the cheers were for the question being asked, the timing and sound of them seem more likely to be those opposing him proud to see such a question asked then .... well ... shock at his "no" ensues. ;) But shh ... let the blind supporters of the opposition continue to spew their own hatred, at least they're finally getting it in the open.

@43,

I work for Blue Cross/Blue Shield and certainly don't condone the blind attacks on insurance companies. And I think most (or at least quite a few) would agree with you in theory that the best way to resolve the problem would be to make care affordable. But to do so you're going to need to also address the entire secondary education system, among countless other things.

A huge chunk of the rising cost of care is directly attributable to those providers paying off several hundred thousand dollars worth of student loans. "Obamacare" (ugh) actually has several cost control measures built directly into it as a central tenet of it's foundation (in addition to the mandate, no doubt.)

Yeah, I think you may just be a tiny bit naive or ignorant as to what "affordable healthCARE" which again, I'm fully in support of, would actually entail in attaining.

It is not one bit more appallingly, disgustingly inhumane to believe that an uninsured person should die than it is to believe that peasants in Afghanistan should die in order for us to feel safe.

Obama and the Democrats believe that innocent peasants in Afghanistan (and Pakistan and Yemen and Somalia) need to die in order for Americans to feel safe from terrorism.

People who support Obama and complain about the inhumanity of Republicans need to take the planks out of their eyes.

Oh look, a real; plan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFYaRp-ql… Sorry, I'm siding with the T-Party now on this issue, period. FYI, Tea party isn't a real party, it's a group of people who are swing voters, yep, the swing voter population has gotten that big, large enough to organize. But the blinders on everyone have not allowed you to accept this. After a bit of research I now understand why they are supporting mostly Republicans, yep, I watched the debate, that little clip is disingenuous, though the Reps use such tactics as well, I thought you'd be above that Dan, I really did.
Note, most of the audience is Republican, not Tea Party, again, nice try to spin. So threatened by swing voters organizing that the Democrats are stooping to this level? Not to mention, Paul saying he wants to legalize alternative healthcare, what's wrong with that? One thing I hate, is people telling me what I can or cannot spend money on, period, they are not but Democrats are, and it's an expense that I should have complete control over. "Single payer" is "here's your insurance, deal with it" ... with alternative plans you can pick and choose, but most importantly, you need to cut the actual cost of medicine, single payer does NOT address the cost of healthcare, it's a bandaid, bandaids only cover the wound, they don't heal it.

Abortions for some.....miniature American flags for others!

There was also a huge cheer when Rick Perry talked about being for capital punishment, when there's pretty good evidence that some innocent people have been put to death under him. I'm agnostic and pro choice, but I've read the new testament, and I can't understand how anyone could possibly cheer on death in this way and call themselves either Christian or pro life

@49 That is a good point, and one issue I really wish someone would pick up. The education system is completely fucked, and not going to be an easy fix, mostly because the requirements for jobs are really skewed. New doctors, fresh out of school, no matter how much study, don't do nearly as good as doctors who have been through less school but have more time practicing. I have had to deal with both, and strangely it was a med student doctor (intern?) who was at the emergency room that actually saved my life, indirectly, he diagnosed my problem correctly, I went to a different hospital to get a truly experienced surgeon to do the procedure, and he did his best (though now I have a huge scar thanks to the failed doctors delaying treatment before the med student). Honestly, until this happened to me, I didn't care, I was able to pay for my medications that I take and it was all "they'll figure it out for me" ... but after this I saw the bill ... which shows what was covered by Medicaid, I wasn't angry with my out of pocket expenses, I was pissed at what Medicaid had to pay for. Many of the costs were not even because of the doctors, they are regulated by the hospital's administration, and were really inflated beyond anything I had seen. All the products I buy at home already, they were charging up to ten times the amount I pay (I'm picky about brands and products), food was over charged, glad I ate light. I know it's not all the doctors directly, but I'm lazy and typing medical administration all the time is just too much effort. ;) The other problem is the frivolous lawsuits, "oh, a doctor had to chop off my dick to save my life? I'm ruined, let's sue!" Seriously, stupid, or the people that go in for elective surgeries and sue because they change their minds afterward. My whole point is that it's not as simple as blaming health insurance, they are the middle men, that's like blaming the sale's person for the shipping costs. It's not going to solve anything.

@15 I assume you're talking about the presidential race... you have to vote for an extremist? Obama is an extremist?

He's so extreme that he passed a health care bill essentially like the first proposed by the GOP during the 90s health care debate. He's so extreme that he's continuing the wars we were already in. He's so extreme he wanted to, but ultimately did not,, raise the top marginal tax rate a couple percent.

If you think that both sides are extremists then you're a perfect demonstration of how ridiculously skewed the perspectives of many Americans are. If you think Obama's an extremist, you reveal yourself as not a swing voter just trying to innocently decide between two parties, but as a conservative partisan who views anything left of center-right to be leftist extremism.

I guess the Tea Party's changed their minds about death panels.

@45

Paul is full of shit. He answers no but then listen to his response. He basically says that charities and his family should cover his medical costs. First, that does not relate in any way to his mantra of personal responsibility. Second, his answer is a pipe dream. When will these magical charities materialize? And what if the hypothetical patient is not the spawn of millionaires? We're talking about a hypothetical patient that required 6 months of intensive care, that's hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical costs.

Blitzer's question was terribly phrased and exactly what I'd expect from that moronic empty suit, but even within the confines of his ridiculous hypothetical, Paul's response was despicable.

Private-run, insurance-based health care is a disaster. Insurance companies get a percentage of the cost of the health care they provide. So not only do they have no incentive to control costs, they actually have an incentive to see cost of medical care increase. It's not like they pay for the increase. They just raise premiums.

And to you Kitten Kooder or whatever the fuck your name is, to say that Republicans and Democrats are all just liars and pretty much the same means you are either stupid, dishonest or both. I'm all for single-payer, government-run healthcare, and the reason Obama and the Democrats did not propose that idea is that they know the Republicans would not only prevent them from passing such a plan but also paint them as evil, baby-killing, pinko, commie, homo-fascist, pedophile horse fuckers for even suggesting it.

BTW, KK, saying that $750 would buy an individual 10 months of health insurance in Washington suggests that you do not understand how the health insurance works. Not everyone pays the same premium . It varies based on age, medical history and health-risk factors. A healthy 30 year old with no history of illness might pay $75 (though I doubt it), but one with a chronic condition or a history of illness would pay a great deal more.

@54 the links I posted, the first one shows a quoted price depending on the auto-detection of your region. While quoted prices are not usually what you pay, it's the bare minimum price, and it's $71 a month here in Washington. Because of the healthcare costs many insurance companies will add based on current problems, to cover the most probable costs of care for things like chronic illness and such so others who are healthy do not have to pay more. This is only one of the many links I saw though, with a Google search: http://www.ehealthinsurance.com/ .... but the $71 would be likely based on such a scenario as they are touting, thus why I said it, again, the actual cost for someone not in perfect health is likely to be more, and it's logical as to why. Here's a nice "guide" like website: http://www.healthinsurance.org/washingto… That may help better.

@51 And here we go, I see that I was correct in assessing you as a conservative partisan posing as a swing voter. It's just Republican rebranding, nothing more. The Tea Party is not swing voters, it is not previously apolitical people, it is not bipartisan.

A survey, done both in 2006 and 2011 finds that despite the Tea Party's origin story of being a grassroots organization of non-partisan, previously apolitical people who are just angered by what they were seeing, the most important predictor of being a Tea Partier or viewing the Tea Party favorably is BEING A POLITICALLY ACTIVE, PARTISAN REPUBLICAN.

(Not only that, but they also are more likely to dislike blacks and immigrants, imagine that!)

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/opinio…

The Tea Party is not the middle, and the fact that you would even think it was just shows you for the conservative partisan you are, not the wide-eyed, undecided swing voter you portray yourself as.

@56 Many people supported Obama because he claimed he wouldn't, I knew different so I didn't support him myself. Now I get to gloat and say "told you so" ... I hate saying that because it's getting old, I've said it so much so often lately I'm just going to say this: He wasn't what you thought because no one paid enough attention.

Also, just because he's not hanging people, doesn't mean he's not an extremist.

@41

'Dan' did watch the video, and conciously chose to lie about it and post an out of context version of the question and answer per usual Stanger 'journalistic' standards.

This is the modus operandi. Read only leftist propanda. Twist even the facts presented by those propandandists farther left. Finally, post a headline which lies even about the misleading 'facts' in the blog posting.

And all of you went into full progressive reaction. That is, believe the obvious lie about the issue despite even the wording of the source of your deviant messiah. Then get all weepy about the consequences of the lie, which never happen in real life. Then blame Republicans for the lie you told in the first place. For reference, see Alan Grayson lying about 40,000 deaths through no health insurance. Or lying about what an opponent for the legislative seat he lost said about the role of women in a marriage. Maybe Grayson is as pathological as Savage, but I don't think that quite clinically possible.

Why anyone should believe anything any progressive says or writes, ever, is simply bewildering to me.

@60 But you are ignoring their questions, did you not watch the debate at all? I base my judgments on actions, not words. I know, that's a little old fashioned but meh. As for polls, I have said this a million times, polls don't show shit, they are bias ... and to quote Penn "Fuck you Luntz" .... seriously, don't show me a poll, show me what they do and say. Also, I didn't say middle, I said swing voters, there are new swing voters every day, the large influx of Republicans disappointed because of the Bush era have joined the swing voter population, swing voter doesn't mean moderate or middle of the road, it means someone who is not committed to a party, someone who is not blindly following a politician, someone who chooses issues not faces.

Actually, it's almost comical really, how very bad at lying progressives are.

It's kind of like when my daughter was small and would take chocolate chip cookies without asking. 'Did you take a cookie?' we'd ask. No (fingers smeared with melted chocolate, mouth lined with cookie crumbs) she'd say with an innocent expression.

Only, when a little girl does it, it's cute even when you have to make them aware of the consequences of dishonesty.

Maybe that's whats wrong with progressives. Your parents never told you that 'truth' and 'falsehood' are actually a bit different.

@62 While I do not like this "reporting" on the debate myself, the "rightwing" folks have done the same thing on many occasions, do not be fooled by my pointing out the flaws in their approach, I do not agree with much of what Republicans do or say, just in the healthcare issue they have much better answers. Though this doesn't mean much until after they are in office, healthcare is a big thing to me now. So careful not to get all high and mighty there, the rightists have not acted much better, nor have they been much help either.

@63 And here comes the rejection of science.

If you can show me that you understand the statistics behind random sampling and that you understand what a confidence interval and a margin of error are and how they can be calculated and how they relate to the size of the population you're sampling, I'll take your opinion seriously. Your rejection of the study because it is a study is noted and ignored as kneejerk defensiveness.

You're not a swing voter if there's no realistic chance of you voting for the Democrats. People who are disillusioned with the GOP establishment but who are still very strong GOP partisans (they show their displeasure by voting in primaries, not by voting for Democrats) are not swing voters by any normal definition.

@66 That should read "your rejection of the study because it is a survey"

If you have a substantive objection to the study rather than "polls and surveys are meaningless dur dur dur", such as a critique of methodology (you know, something based in science), please make it.

@67 Seriously? You really believe that interpreting answers to a survey can tell you what people think? I suppose you support other forms of profiling as well, perhaps skin color can determine the chances of committing crime to? Same logic, same science. I do not denounce science, I prefer it, but real science, and psychology is NOT a science, it's a guess, nothing more. Polls and surveys are also not science for one reason, a rather scientific reason really, the outcomes are altered by the presence of the viewer, even if the viewer (as unlikely as it is) does not interject their own bias.

Wait! I get it, keep attacking the messenger to try to break them down to your level and say something stupid like "I wish they would die just so they'd shut up" .... nice tactic there, won't work with me, I'll keep spreading the word that the medical industry, not the insurance industry, is the problem, and since it's catching on, I'll keep doing it until even the stupid ignorant people who wish the other "side" dead will finally get it, of course that means you'd have to need hospitalization and see the whole bill, but I don't want you to have to go through the suffering I did, I want you to use your heads, think about it, follow the money, as someone once said. Make some real change that will stick and work instead of a quick fix or bandaid that will fall apart in a few years. Stop feeling happy about bullshit politicians hand you and start thinking for yourselves, all of you on both "sides", for once in your life, do some digging because it would suck if you all had to go through the shit I did just to learn your lesson.

@59 That insurance quote ($75) must be for someone exactly like the scenario presented (30 yrs old, male). I went to your links and the cheapest quote I got was $175. It only asks age, gender, and zip code, not state of health (aside from a smoking question). So I'm guessing there are very few people who could actually find insurance for $75

@36 Thank you for making my night!

@68 Yes, I do think so. Because I understand math (specifically statistics) and science.

You clearly do not understand how statistical sampling works or the theoretical underpinnings. Yet you feel that you are qualified to dismiss it as not "real science".

Bias introduced by the interviewer is an important issue and one that pollsters and social scientists think about deeply. It is, however, not one that you have thought about deeply and the fact that you dismiss all polls based on your shoddy reasoning shows this. It would be something you could bring up, if you looked into the methodology and could identify some substantive problem with how the researchers conducted their interviews. Instead you embrace ignorance. The fact that you refer to this as "psychology" just reveals how deep your ignorance is.

Get an education and return when you know something. In the meantime, you'd do better to refrain from commenting on polls unless you want every statistically literate person to think you're a twit.

Actually, Forky, I do understand math quite well, I also understand that the wording of a question can alter the answer much more than you seem to want to admit. Look more into Frank Luntz's story, it sort of explains it all pretty clearly. Profiling is considered a psychological science, so stop being such a card, okay. Polls and surveys are nothing more than lies fabricated by the pollsters, period, anyone who thinks otherwise is really naive. Here's the perfect example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If9EWDB_z…

Kitten, I think you should examine the memes that reside in your brain and maybe flush a few of them. Please ask yourself why you're towing the line on this thread, and if you have in fact been infected by the Ron Paul Apologist Meme.

Actually no, I was deluded by the Democrats before. ;) sorely mislead, and that opened my eyes on a lot of things. I'm not "towing the line" here, I'm explaining the details, I know you don't like details, you just want to go vote for your "side" and feel good about it, but here's the problem, medical care costs too much ... what's the solution? You can't really expect to solve this by throwing more money at it, here's what the doctors will think "oh, now they'll give us money, let's raise the prices and see if we can get more of it." ... that's what they did, they'll do it again. But tell me, would you pay $10 for one adult diaper? I sure hope not, because if you will, I'll sell you my used coffee maker for $20 ....

The irony here is that I had no clue, no idea what Republicans were saying on this until today, of course you all probably don't believe that since you are so use to lying you can't trust anyone else either. But yeah, thanks for showing me who is really smarter on healthCARE.

According to ehealthinsurance I (45, female, non-smoker) can get insurance for $146 a month - with a $10,000 deductible and 50% coverage.

Now, on the subject of what kind of irresponsible employed people might run around without health insurance...

Let's say I'm a day care teacher, I make $10 an hour and do not have employer-based health coverage. So, for catastrophic coverage I'm shelling out $1752, or 8.5% of my gross pay.
Scenario 1 - no use. I've been pretty healthy and I hate the doctor anyway. $0 on medical care. The $1752 is not looking like a good deal.
Scenario 2 - minimal use. I see the doctor once for routine care and once for the flu, bronchitis, a UTI - something mundane. Total doctor bills - about $400, labs $100, plus 2 prescriptions, maybe $50. Total doctor visits about $600, insurance pays $0, total health insurance $1752. Still not looking so good.
Scenario 3 - I take a regular medication which keeps me healthy, happy and capable of being employed. The $150/month for my meds leave me pretty poor, but it works for the depression, keeping the breast cancer from coming back, minimizing my MS symptoms or managing my diabetes, whatever the case may be. No way am I spending all that money on insurance which won't cover prescriptions anyway.
Scenario 4 - I break my leg. Damn, that is expensive, but not over the $10,000 deductible. Now I'm out $5000 for the leg and $1752 for the insurance.
Scenario 5 - catastrophe strikes. Brain cancer treatment $50k - $750k or breast cancer $50k - $100k, hit by a car - $0 (instant death) to more than I will make in a lifetime, heart attack with bypass surgery - $60k...Basically no matter how you slice it bankruptcy or charity care are looking like the only options. From my point of view being buried under a debt of 5 years salary or 100 years salary is about the same to me. But at least I wasn't irresponsibly running around without health insurance!

Found it, proof that I was the first to say it, and was attacked for even suggesting it by not only Democrat followers, but also Republicans .... thus why I wasn't supporting them until now. ;) http://www.usmessageboard.com/1525226-po…

@77 Thanks for doing the math to prove my point.

@56 - The moment KittenKoder said the tea party is a group of "swing voters" (#51) he gave himself away. (Pretty sure it's a he.)

Of course he's not a swing voter either. He, like Joe the Plumber, is a poseur.

Silvio Levy

Let's do a little poll, do you believe that medical costs are too high?

@80 Nice assumption, but you are wrong on all of it. ;)

@58, Kitten Koder is indeed an idiot.

One of these new-breed libertardarian computer programmer types that watches too many reason.tv clips, and assumes that because there are some stupid laws enforced by society (war on drugs, etc.), that being an Ayn Rand sociopath is acceptable.

Sure the Tea Party Volk are swing voters... they swing all the way from to far right to the extreme right.

@83 .... more assumptions, this is just too awesome. Actually, I don't like the war on drugs only because it costs too much money. Don't know this Rand person but if you hate them so much they can't be that bad. Libertarian ... I agree with some of their views, but I don't know many of them anyway so can't deny or acknowledge. I really don't pay much attention to politics anymore because, well, none of the politicians have kept their promise. But here's the thing, why are you so against making doctors do what's "right"? Why do you like handing them money for shit they don't even do half the time? Why do you support the medical CORPORATIONS ... thought corporations were the evil to many people on here, well, doctors are businesses. Health care should not be a business, it should be a public service, but no, you want insurance to be a public service and healthcare to remain a greedy business. Seriously, I;m not even twisting logic here, that's what you are saying. If I am an idiot, that makes people who don't understand who's really ripping them off complete morons ... or is it Mormons ... I can't tell the difference anymore.

@84 They are the swing voters who fell from the Republican supporters, so of course many still hold Republican views but you see, they are smart enough to see their politicians lying to them, yet ironically the Democrat supporters don't want to see it.

You know, the Koch brothers AstroTurf leaves a mighty painful rugburn...

@87 ... again, I have said it before anyone else, doctors have been ripping us off.

@90 They address the actual cost of healthcare in their debate, it's oddly the only reason I would consider voting for them at all really, most of the other issues I disagree with completely and wholeheartedly. But they're looking at it from an angle that would yield better results for everyone. If the Democrats would at least consider looking at the this angle I would just abstain from voting until they made at least a promise to fix it. but so far all the Democrats and their supporters are still looking at insurance, which changing that will fix nothing. But here's the biggest flaw, comparing other countries to us, it simply doesn't work like that, all countries have unique economies and even more unique people. As I said, it's that they are taking my side now, a complaint I made almost 10 years ago (though I only found a two year old post that wasn't the first time I mentioned it). I have no real plan, that's what politicians are suppose to be paid to do (instead of standing around bickering or partying). We can't know what any politician will do until they get into office, because too many people lie these days, something that really pisses me off and why I generally despise all politicians, but one can hope they do. All of the Republican candidates have said that "the problem is the cost of health care, not health insurance" ... we know this is true. What I don't get is why Democrat supporters are being so snotty about that.

For me though, the cost isn't even something that actually impacts me directly, I get Medicaid (what little it covers now) and everyone else pays most of my bills, I'd rather just pay in cash but no one can afford to do that right now. But my biggest problem is the doctors are getting away with not treating people, this bothers and worries me. The major medical need I had was ignored by doctors for a long time, I honestly bought their whole "it's in your head" diagnosis at first because I didn't want to deal with surgery. Turns out it wasn't in my head and the delay almost killed me. Now I have another medical issue that's not even being looked at again, getting the "it's all in your head" response and this time with no tests at all (I mean at least doing the wrong tests gave the illusion they were trying). So yeah, what I really want is for them to start doing their jobs, one way is to hit them where it hurts, their pocket books. But since we can't do a "you only pay if they actually do something" just lower the costs so we can see more of them until one of them does do something, or at least let them realize we aren't taking their bullshit anymore as patients. Also, stopping the stupid lawsuits, I already mentioned those, recently a few have been stopped by the courts, a good trend but barely a beginning.

I don't suggest emulating anyone, I suggest doing something new, trying something that hasn't been tried. Every country has problems with their medical care, and each problem is different, but one commonality is that many other countries tell doctors what they can charge, instead of just giving them more money. It's also the only avenue that hasn't been looked at until recently, and I'm saddened that it was the Republicans who are saying it now, I really am. I had hopes for the Democrats at one time, but shit like this is making me lose all hope for them.

@90 Also, that kind of insurance idea of Bernie Sanders', that actually sounds good to, but we would still need to find some way to curb the costs for it to work. Medicaid is falling apart only because there isn't enough money to cover anything (thanks to politicians for part of it but also rising costs).

Ladies and Gentleman: the Tea Party has just turned into the Soylent-Green Party...

Blitzer was also well out of touch thinking that health insurance is "$200-300 per month".

@94 For some people it is.

The way I see it, and this is strictly from my point of view, the question was posed incorrectly for us progressives. The question was presented as a person, with a good income that 'willfully' rejects the purchasing of healthcare insurance. The question should have been presented as 'a working poor family/person who could not afford healthcare insurance." It would have been interesting to see the results of the crowd and/or the candidate. It's the working poor that I believe we progressives are concerned about.

On a side note, I realize it's a 'free' country and all, but Jesus, this 'KittenKode' dude prattles on incessantly on every thread he/she posts. Practically dominating the whole conversation. And, upon reviewing the time frame of posts, I want whatever drugs 'kittenkoder' is on that could keep me posting from 8pm to 4:30am.

Okay, I'm done.

Oh, dear KK. You not only fail to understand how statistics work, but you seem to fail to understand how insurance pooling works, either. You are falling into the trap of "it's cheap for me, so ergo it's cheap for everyone," aka over generalizing.

I get your convoluted points, I really do. Education is undervalued and has been for a long time, hence it's expensive to get a specialized advanced education, like a medical degree. And there's no easy way to get someone staring down a $250K debt to take a job that pays $50K or less (which is why there's so few GPs in rural areas). I get that you're pissed that healthcare is expensive--it is so for a multitude of reasons, most of which are not as simple as you would like them to be. And you're far from the first person to look at a poll, see your group represented in the responses, and say "but that's not what I think! poling bias! statistics are lies!"

But.

Not everyone is an 18 year old non-smoker. And yes, under a traditional insurance market, such a person would have very low premiums, mostly due to a lack of utilization of healthcare. But, those premiums (and the actuarial tables showing the low risk for insuring these pool members) are to offset the multitude of people like my parents (late 50s), and that low introductory rate will rise as you get older. That's the pool effect. Unless you plan to join the Forever 27 club or have perhaps found a source of immortal youth, you will get older, probably sicker, and ergo riskier and more expensive to insure. Run your parents' numbers through your online calculator and see what a good deal they'll get. And no, health insurance isn't identical to car insurance, in that you can't choose not to age but you can choose not to ride Motocross.

And yes, one can create misleading polling questions, but that's not the case in the poll that you're complaining about. Statistical sampling isn't the problem here. It seems to be that you're surprised researchers saw hoofprints and found horses, not zebras.

"Today's GOP: Not as clever as the Nazi's but they're trying!"

@96 No drugs, I have insomnia ... oddly a symptom of depression .... I don't like sleep meds so I just weather through it. While it does make me slightly ranty, it also makes me highly productive and ideal for monitoring web servers, not my chosen profession but it's what my skills and disability allow me to do. ;)

Is it widely known in the United States that your healthcare system is very unusual in the First World, and that 'socialized medicine' is more the norm?