Comments

1
Romney's lying??? Clutch the pearls!
2
You see, there are no differences between a state government and the federal government so it must be hypocrisy!!!!
3
Romney's distancing obviously is politicking, no argument there. But Gruber's rant is also politicking, and has a few questionable assertions of its own.

(1) Whether someone else is going to pay for your plan or not is a pretty damn significant detail. Certainly enough to make someone who cares about such things legimitately switch sides. Gruber clearly outs himself as somone who doesn't care about such things with his "no big deal, just raise some taxes" statement. (By the way, it isn't actually true that the feds covered all the costs of Romneycare for Massachusetts; but they did cover a significant part.)

(2) There are plenty of alternatives to Obamacare besides single-payer and doing nothing. One possible direction that would make a lot of conservatives happier is to extend coverage, but make that subsidized coverage much cheaper and less attractive than what people paying their own way get. Allow plans without mental health coverage or reproductive coverage, for example. Allow plans that only cover generic drugs or older, cheaper treatments. Allowing cross-state competition was one easy way to facilitate this rush to the bottom. Another possible direction is an NHS-style, publicly administered system. Mostly this makes progressives feel happier, but I would be perfectly happy with such a system as long as at was incredibly stingy (e.g. a $20K QUALY price), so that it ensured access to cheap, effective treatments (e.g. setting a broken leg) for all, but restricted access to expensive, risky treatments (e.g. newer cancer treatments) to those who pay their own way or buy supplementary, private insurance.
4
@3: What your proposed alternative would lead to is hordes of working-class Americans being uninsured for mental or reproductive health. If there is a cheaper alternative, people will flock to it because the small risk is often worth being able to spend less and save more.
5
Why can't we just get World Government to pay for it?
6
I absolutely love how Ms. Vel-DuRay's "Clutch them pearls!" idiom is gaining traction to describe how the bedwetters and crybabies will react to hearing news that doesn't jibe with their opinions.

I will be using it as often as I can in everyday conversation. My tip-o-the-hat to you, Catalina!
7
@5, because at the moment, we as a species can't even agree on what "Human Rights" means. A stronger layer of world government is pretty much inevitable though; we have global scale problems that need solving.
8
"What your proposed alternative would lead to is hordes of working-class Americans being uninsured for mental or reproductive health."

beats the hell out of not being insured for anything whatsoever
9
@8: Yup. But it's inferior to Obamacare as it stands, or the even better option of universal health care.
10
Hey, let's bold things to add emphasis where there was none. That'll make it easier to read and not annoying at all.

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