Just an update on the politics. I would say it's now a near-certainty that comprehensive HCR will pass and go into law. There's some more political song-and-dance to do, but the hard part is already done. The Senate can use reconciliation to modify their bill, and then all that's necessary is for the House to pass it and the president to sign it. Naturally the Republicans will howl that the Democrats are "using procedural tricks to ram it through against the rules," but the bill already passed using the normal rules and all they need to do now is modify it; even if the requirement of getting 60 votes were reasonable to begin with (which IMO it's not), it makes absolutely no sense to make the same bill pass that same hurdle TWICE.

We may or may not see a public option as part of the package yet (I wouldn't bet on it), but we will see the bill pass.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Just an update on the politics. I would say it's now a near-certainty that comprehensive HCR will pass and go into law. There's some more political song-and-dance to do, but the hard part is already done. The Senate can use reconciliation to modify their bill, and then all that's necessary is for the House to pass it and the president to sign it. Naturally the Republicans will howl that the Democrats are "using procedural tricks to ram it through against the rules," but the bill already passed using the normal rules and all they need to do now is modify it; even if the requirement of getting 60 votes were reasonable to begin with (which IMO it's not), it makes absolutely no sense to make the same bill pass that same hurdle TWICE.

We may or may not see a public option as part of the package yet (I wouldn't bet on it), but we will see the bill pass.

We'll see. I have seen several House members say they do not have the vote as of yet to pass the final bill.

Originally Posted by princeofcats67

KIA: Can't we all just get along?(LOL) FWIW, I do respect BR's opinions(eventhough I disagree) and am trying to learn how to state my opinions as coherently as he does. It sucks, but it's true IMO. PoC67

I have issue with communicating things that are viewed, taken in as or apply as being second nature stuff to me to others as well. Writing his views is a second nature thing for Brian.

Interesting video posted on Drudge. Its the Dems whining about how breaking the filibuster by the "nuclear option" is an abuse of power....

http://www.breitbart.tv/obama-dems-i...unders-intent/

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Just an update on the politics. I would say it's now a near-certainty that comprehensive HCR will pass and go into law. There's some more political song-and-dance to do, but the hard part is already done. The Senate can use reconciliation to modify their bill, and then all that's necessary is for the House to pass it and the president to sign it. Naturally the Republicans will howl that the Democrats are "using procedural tricks to ram it through against the rules," but the bill already passed using the normal rules and all they need to do now is modify it; even if the requirement of getting 60 votes were reasonable to begin with (which IMO it's not), it makes absolutely no sense to make the same bill pass that same hurdle TWICE.

We may or may not see a public option as part of the package yet (I wouldn't bet on it), but we will see the bill pass.

I wonder how many Democratic Party politicians view their party membership as a suicide pact. I guess we'll find out. Trying to ram this bill through, which is overwhelmingly, vehemently opposed by the American people, is sort of the political equivalent of suicide bombing. "We may be going out, but we're going out in a blaze of glory!"

When that bill has been explicitly repudiated by MASSACHUSETTS, and they're still thinking of trying to pass it...they are literally insane.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Just an update on the politics. I would say it's now a near-certainty that comprehensive HCR will pass and go into law. There's some more political song-and-dance to do, but the hard part is already done. The Senate can use reconciliation to modify their bill, and then all that's necessary is for the House to pass it and the president to sign it. Naturally the Republicans will howl that the Democrats are "using procedural tricks to ram it through against the rules," but the bill already passed using the normal rules and all they need to do now is modify it; even if the requirement of getting 60 votes were reasonable to begin with (which IMO it's not), it makes absolutely no sense to make the same bill pass that same hurdle TWICE.

We may or may not see a public option as part of the package yet (I wouldn't bet on it), but we will see the bill pass.

Fine by me, all your doing is opening the door to be politically and systematically destroyed by a new 51 Republican Tea Party majority. Liberally speaking, I'm a bad guy because I FIRE IDIOTS or KILL THE IDIOTS JOB.

Originally Posted by princeofcats67

The US Electorate has a short attention span IMO. That said, the TPP has legs, but the average American will most likely Vote with the Economy. I study Economic Indicators on a daily basis and there's arguments to be made for improvement and deterioration. Govt Intervention has really screwed-up the normal Data-Points.
Once they can get the Structure in place, it's very difficult to reverse. Rep Ryan(Wisc-R) was saying that they believe the Dems don't have the votes, but Pelosi has been able to get them everytime so far. I wouldn't bet against her.
It's the Mandate that sickens me the most. PoC67

I think the American people are going to kill Obama's Health Care Reform the same way it killed Bush's Immigration Reform.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

I wonder how many Democratic Party politicians view their party membership as a suicide pact. I guess we'll find out. Trying to ram this bill through, which is overwhelmingly, vehemently opposed by the American people, is sort of the political equivalent of suicide bombing. "We may be going out, but we're going out in a blaze of glory!"

When that bill has been explicitly repudiated by MASSACHUSETTS, and they're still thinking of trying to pass it...they are literally insane.

As I recall, an American recently opted to go out in a blaze of glory as well. Do you think Peloci has the rational wisdom and common sense to put two and two together? Do you think Peloci and her liberal pals have the fundamental courage to accept the consequences that come afterwards or during? SHE IS A TWIT! Do you think I'm going to extend her any sympathy or support for her position or any of her liberal ilk? Nope, as far as I'm concerned, she/they brought it on and she/they deserves to live with the consequences of their actions.

Originally Posted by princeofcats67

KIA: Can't we all just get along?(LOL) FWIW, I do respect BR's opinions(eventhough I disagree) and am trying to learn how to state my opinions as coherently as he does. It sucks, but it's true IMO. PoC67

Honestly, I think we'd get along just fine without them.

Amazing how many people don't look at the details of the polls when the surface of them says things one wants to hear.

The Democrats would be committing suicide NOT to pass this bill. The reason it's not popular is because it doesn't go far enough (given that 70% of the people support the idea of the public option), and also because people don't understand it (given that when the provisions of it are broken out and presented separately, almost all of them have high levels of support).

To suggest that low support for the bill itself, when presented without explanation of details, means that people don't want comprehensive health-care reform, is sheer twisting of the available facts. It's not true. Comprehensive health-care reform in general is VERY popular, and as people understand this bill and see it in action, it will be, too. If the Democrats fail to pass it, they will be perceived as a party that can't get anything done even when they have big majorities in Congress.

That, not passing the bill, would be electoral disaster for them.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Amazing how many people don't look at the details of the polls when the surface of them says things one wants to hear.

The Democrats would be committing suicide NOT to pass this bill. The reason it's not popular is because it doesn't go far enough (given that 70% of the people support the idea of the public option), and also because people don't understand it (given that when the provisions of it are broken out and presented separately, almost all of them have high levels of support).

To suggest that low support for the bill itself, when presented without explanation of details, means that people don't want comprehensive health-care reform, is sheer twisting of the available facts. It's not true. Comprehensive health-care reform in general is VERY popular, and as people understand this bill and see it in action, it will be, too. If the Democrats fail to pass it, they will be perceived as a party that can't get anything done even when they have big majorities in Congress.

That, not passing the bill, would be electoral disaster for them.

Dude, if 70% supported it or wanted it, the liberals wouldn't be in the position that they're currently in and trying to change the rules to get it passed.

Originally Posted by K-I-A 67

Dude, if 70% supported it or wanted it, the liberals wouldn't be in the position that they're currently in and trying to change the rules to get it passed.

They're not changing the rules.

The Republicans are filibustering it because if we ever DID move towards government health care it could destroy the Republican Party. Imagine if people received affordable health care from the government. The balance would produce a long-term realignment. Show me a Republican alternative that isn't produced by, or in the interests of, the health insurance lobby.

I think KIA means the same rules that the Republicans used repeatedly to cut taxes on the richest Americans..... reconciliation I believe is the dirty word. The GOP embraced reconciliation like drunks embracing Jim Beam but now want nothing to do with it.

Gimme an H...... Y ..... P .... O .... C .....

you know the rest.

Using reconciliation to pass tax cuts was within the rules. Stupid, but legitimate by Senate rules. So is using it to pass amendments to the Senate health care bill that have primarily budget effects. The parts of the bill that can't be passed by reconciliation have been passed already and don't need to be passed again.

The changes to be made to the bill involve how it is to be financed, mostly. Using reconciliation for that is perfectly legitimate.

The Democrats are not changing the rules.

Originally Posted by aadams1980

The Republicans are filibustering it because if we ever DID move towards government health care it could destroy the Republican Party. Imagine if people received affordable health care from the government. The balance would produce a long-term realignment. Show me a Republican alternative that isn't produced by, or in the interests of, the health insurance lobby.

I actually favor selling policies across state lines. But there must be federal regulations that accompany it. You can't just wipe out all state regulation and turn the industry into a more pernicious version of the credit card industry, where everybody is based out of North Dakota because North Dakota was able to write the most industry-friendly laws.

The problem with both the liberal and conservative conception of health care today, IMO, is that neither side is willing to take the steps needed to restructure the market in a way that will promote open and fair competition.

Republicans seem to favor just opening it up and doing nothing to back it up from the federal side. This would be a disaster.

Democrats seem to favor repealing the antitrust exemption or putting a public option in place to help mitigate the worst effects of a national exchange. The antitrust exemption is IMO much less effective than advertised- insurance companies are already subject to merger law today, so it wouldn't stop the consolidation of the industry by itself. Additionally, the McCarran-Ferguson Act also says insurance companies are subject to antitrust scrutiny for boycotts and other specified abuses of competition. Yes, it would put insurance on the hook for price fixing and market allocation schemes, as well as overt abuses of monopoly, but it's unclear that this a) occurs at a rate high enough to actually produce a substantial effect on the market, or b) would be enforced by the FTC/DOJ, or c) would make it through the courts if it was. This antitrust exemption deal is a nice little distraction IMO, an excuse to pretend to restructure the market without actually messing around with the market. Nibbling at the edges. Were they serious about competition, they'd have been stopping health insurance mergers for 20 years now.

Similarly, the public option is no substitute for real insurance regulation. It's theorized that insurance companies would have to alter their practices to compete with the public option, but why is this necessary? Why can't they just enact a regulatory scheme that accomplishes similar things as the public option would? They have 50 ready-made templates for how to regulate insurance already in the states. Take what the states have done right and pre-empt the things that don't work.

All of these half-measures, and the histrionics that accompany them from both sides, get tiring sometimes. If you want a competitive market, just put rules in place that will ensure there is competition in most markets, instead of repealing an antitrust exemption that wouldn't address most people's complaints about the insurance market (concentration of market power in a few firms), or putting a public option in place as a way of regulating insurance practices without actually regulating them (and in the process look like government is busting into healthcare as a competitor in an open market, to the terror of many tea partiers).

The only problem with relying on market competition is that what determines success is not whether or not you can deliver the highest quality of care, but whether or not you are the cheapest.

Looks like Bart Stupak and many other Dems have a problem with the current bill.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...se-health-plan

I worked in the health care industry before (I was in sales for a home medical equipment company and owned 50% of one for several years). On an RFP for a regional health insurance company they told us that quality of patient care was only 10% of what they considered for their rubric. The customer for the insurance companies is the business that has a contract with them. In these times their chief concern is cutting costs. It's only if it gets to the point where people are threatening to quit en masse that they reconsider providers based on quality. The trend has continued in that direction for some time.

But, these are two cases where the market didn't act as it was supposed to.

Before Reagan did away with regulations we used to have regulations for teh sake of protection not punishment (or so I've read).

1. You are correct about the free market not applying to health care, which is why I think the government should play an activist role. Insurance competition didn't result in better choices. The free market works when the profit motive is a net positive for the people.

2. Can we agree that the financial crisis was at least 90% the free market's fault?

Now that we're talking about free markets, let me posit an axiom: a "free market" is possible only when all participants to exchanges are able to regard the exchange as optional. If either or both parties are, for whatever reason, unable to walk away and NOT make the trade, the exchange is not free.

A party is able to walk away and not make the trade when:

1) Failure to acquire (or sell) the product/service in question will not produce unacceptable consequences; OR

2) Sufficient alternative sources (or markets) for the product/service in question exist offering substantially different terms for the transaction that the person is able to regard the particular deal as meaningfully optional.

Examples:

I am trying to buy a car. My current vehicle is good enough, but I want to upgrade to something fancier. I go into a Mercedes dealership and look at a 2010 model. I don't like the price, though, and the dealer won't come down to a point I find acceptable. Both 1) and 2) above apply. I already have a perfectly good car, so if I don't buy this Mercedes the worst that will happen is I will go on driving my old car, and that's acceptable. Also, there are other Mercedes dealerships, or I can go look at BMWs instead, so if I walk away from this deal I can still find another source for what I want. From my perspective, this is a free transaction.

I am trying to buy an anniversary present for my wife. I go into a jewelry store and look at a diamond necklace. Again, I don't like the price. 1) above does NOT apply (if I don't get my wife a present she will run away with my boss), but 2) above does; I don't have to get this specific necklace, and there are other sources of presents that would keep my marriage intact. This, too, is a free transaction.

Given this concept, the purchase of health-care services is at times not a free transaction, because it is necessary for survival and the options are often limited. For this reason, health care is intrinsically not a free market.

Where a market is intrinsically unfree, failure to regulate by government action results in exploitation of either buyers or sellers, whichever is in the powerless position.

Brian,

I think what Brian's trying to tell us is:

1. Even though he's not a Republican, he can afford to be one

2. His wife needs to reexamine her values.
We're here if u need to talk

jk

Originally Posted by aadams1980

Brian,

I think what Brian's trying to tell us is:

1. Even though he's not a Republican, he can afford to be one

2. His wife needs to reexamine her values.
We're here if u need to talk

jk

Those were hypothetical examples, not personal ones.

My EX-wife was an atrocious person for completely different reasons. I never worried about her running off with my boss.

princeofcats67 - Hold on, I now know you are too well-informed about this issue to believe that the government's home-ownership policy caused the housing crisis. The mortgages that the government encouraged the creation of were not a significant % of the defaults. It was mostly lower-income buyers when the real damage was done by defaults of middle-class and upper-middle class homes. Unless you can show me data that says otherwise, I do believe that it was the greed of the mortgage companies in trying to fit as many people into a mortgage that would be sold to another financial institution (and not be their problem) that caused it.

Crony Capitalism allowed the market to get its way (thus the "crony" aspect). If your point is that the government was asleep at the switch I agree. However, government failed by letting the market do what it wanted. If you and I go to a bar, and you get too drunk to drive, I do not stop you from driving your car, and you hit a tree on the way home, am I at fault? Sure! But you're mostly at fault. So again, will you not agree that the free market did 90% of this?

Originally Posted by aadams1980

So again, will you not agree that the free market did 90% of this?

There is no free market in banking and debt. We're 100 years in to an "independent" (but government-sponsored) cartel.

While the dominant members of the cartel are certainly at fault, they also knew that the government would be there to keep them alive - regardless of how foolish their financial decisions were.

Basically, in any sort of philosophically or practically justified private ownership society, JPM, GS, BoA, AIG, and Citi should all be completely out of business. Debts owed to insolvent institutions would be shredded as illegitimate. If we treated the insolvent banks the same way we treated those delinquent on mortgages, the CEOs would be sleeping under bridges and having wages garnished until they paid back every penny they owe.

Anyway, subprime might have hit low-income housing first, but the next wave is going to break on the $500,000+ mortgage market. Get ready to bail out the bankers a second time when its their own houses & neighborhoods on the line...