Government Healthcare

[Sdiver]

Got this in an e-mail today.

What with "The One" speaking tonight, pushing HIS healthcare plan, this should be passed around, to let us know what he is REALLY pushing.


Activist Alert: Say "No" to Government Healthcare


Here are some highlights from the first 300 pages of the healthcare bill:



Page 50, Section 152 says that Healthcare will be provided to ALL non-US citizens, illegal or otherwise. Page 170, lines 1-3 say that any Nonresident Alien is exempt from individual taxes to cover the cost of their medical plans. (Tax-paying American citizens will pay for them.)



Other specific line items, which are easy to find in the proposed bill, include:



1. Private medical insurers are not allowed to enroll ANY new customers as of the first day that the government plan begins.

2. All citizens or businesses who refuse to enroll in the government plan will pay financial penalties.

3. Healthcare will be rationed, especially for senior citizens.

4. Doctors will be penalized if a patient, who has recently been in the hospital, returns in the near-term for a readmission.

5. Doctors' salaries/incomes will be decided upon by the government.

6. All citizens WILL pay for their healthcare via direct debit of their financial accounts.

7. The government WILL audit the books of all employers that self-insure.

8. The government will set the prices for ALL private health plans.

9. There will be a government committee which decides the treatments/benefits you get.

10. The government will have a database of your personal and financial information.

11. The government is creating a Healthcare Exchange to bring private Healthcare plans under government control. The government mandates ALL benefit packages for private Healthcare plans in the Exchange.

12. The government will raise taxes on all people to fund the healthcare plan, as they see fit. (Have you noticed that the pro-government healthcare advertising keeps referring to this plan as "free"?)

13. The Treasury Dept. is authorized to take money from Social Security to pay for healthcare.



As a retired Vice President of Morgan Stanley, I'd like to stress that investment markets are designed to function under capitalism (free markets), not under socialism. Therefore, in addition to saying goodbye to your current levels of taxation and healthcare, say goodbye to your asset values if this bill passes.



Read about the Healthcare bill: www.PatientsUnitedNow.com. (Many more articles at the end of this email.)



Take action! Call your Representatives and Senators in Washington D.C. Tell them to vote "no" on government healthcare. The healthcare vote is imminent!



Senator Michael Bennet (D-CO) 202-224-5852
Senator Mark Udall (D-CO) 202-224-5941



All Senators: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

All Representatives: http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml


Take action! Contact this vulnerable legislator and urge him to vote "no":


Grateful for your activism,

[Richard]

Just another good deal - or is that steal? :confused:

Richard's $.02 :munchin

[nmap]

This is one of those hard questions - I'm not sure about the best approach.

Take the inclusion of illegal aliens as an example. Sounds awful, of course. And yet...if they go to the emergency room, the hospital is forced to treat them at a high cost. I, as a property owner in Bexar County, participate in paying for this through my annual property taxes. So - is it more cost effective to cover them and relieve the pressure on the emergency room, or to not cover them, with the result that the emergency rooms continue to be so overwhelmed that they cannot do the work they were designed for? I don't know.

And health care is rationed now. Those who don't believe me are urged to read their policy, group or otherwise, carefully. There are generally limits - perhaps a million dollars, perhaps ten million, and maybe unlimited. In addition, there are procedures that aren't covered. There are, perhaps, penalties for going "out of network" or for not obtaining preapproval for some procedures. Regular insurance generally has limits on the frequency of tests or preventive medicine as well. So rationing may (or may not) change much under the so-called reform.

Taxes are going to go up; of that there is little doubt. I don't like it any more than anyone else. That said, we have a host of spending issues, including Medicare and Social Security that virtually guarantee such increases will occur.

On the one hand, I can't say I feel good about federal takeover of health care. But on the other hand, I don't trust insurance companies either. I have, from time to time, found it necessary to use aggressive (but, of course, entirely legal) tactics with them.

What I'd like to see is a dispassionate, careful, and thorough presentation of the various factors and costs. I had best not hold my breath. :D

[FMF DOC]

Curious as to how this will effect Military Retired patients and the families?

[JAGO]

I met some great Docs in "Gov health care" in the Army. But they were limited by the rules Uncle Sam imposed. Just like NFL doctors their task was to get us "back in the game" by treating the symptoms. I recall a couple comments at the TMC on smoke bomb hill when I was injured about the limitations these great warriors were under. I love 'em all and thank them for their working on me.

I have no regrets but now that I pay for my suppl ins and use Tricare Stnd I'm getting better long term care by chosing the best providers. I fear that this legislation is going to cause me to go back to the old ways.

My decision to buy my own insurance was because after retirement I met some really bad Docs in "govt health care" at the VA. They were much akin to the really bad "Govt health care" I saw on two Indian Reservations next to where I grew up in So Dak.

I don't have a problem with the government providing health insurance to those that can not afford it (provided they also can't afford CATV, large screen plasmas, cell phones or blackberrys, computers and wifi, and a godawful Escalade). Health insurance involves choices and those that want to spend their money on non=essentials can afford healthcare, IMHO.

That said, if they are going to ram this system down our throats, I only ask that the law include two provisions:

1. Whatever we endure, the congress and the president be under the same system. (Sen. Kennedy, I wish you well in your health, but under any system where I can't go to the expert of choice should I have brain cancer, then it is only fair that you can not chose to go to Mass. Gen or Duke Univ - you go where us common folk go)

2. An eye for an eye. If your program leads to the sensless death of one of my loved ones, there needs to be a mechanism to prosecute those of you who voted in a system that ends up killing us. A manslaughter conviction seems appropriate should your negligence in passing any plan kill an American.

v/r
phil

[JAGO]

I just got an e-mail that Congressman Fleming (LA-4) has introduced a Resolution (not an Amendment) that Congress go along w/ suggestion #1. It's not a law, but a step in the right direction.

Now, to get them to waive their immunity and go along w/ #2.....

v/r
phil

[Defender968]

Page 50, Section 152 says that Healthcare will be provided to ALL non-US citizens, illegal or otherwise. Page 170, lines 1-3 say that any Nonresident Alien is exempt from individual taxes to cover the cost of their medical plans. (Tax-paying American citizens will pay for them.)


Don't be fooled, we're paying for their healthcare as it is, this just socializes it, and it torques me off to no end.

The Dims are all saying how great this new health care is and how we need to get everyone health care. What kills me is that we're already paying for the health care of the nearly 12 million illegals in this country today. As an LEO I had to take clients to the hospital from time to time, and EVERY time I went into any of the ER's in my AO there were at least 25 Illegal’s in the waiting room, and I mean every time. I asked the Admin in the ER's several times about collection of fees, they said they (the illegals) rarely had insurance and the hospital rarely collected on their debts. So let’s do a little math.

Let’s say of those 12 million there are 3 million families (1 mom 1 dad 2 kids) total (a stretch but just work with me) let’s say they take each kid to the ER only once (again a stretch) per year, the average cost of each visit is $500, so that's 1K per family per year, or 3 Billion per year, I know in Government Spending these days that's not much, but really there's some savings we could take out of the system. Let's get a guest worker program where they are taxed, and have to pay for their own healthcare just for a start.

[Utah Bob]

he Dims are all saying how great this new health care is
Actually there is growing \Democratic opposition to it. An indicator of how flawed it is.

[ZonieDiver]

Healthcare from the government! Great! Our government's bureaucratic pooh-bahs in NASA managed to lose the videotape of one of the most amazing events in the history of the world. Imagine what'll happen to your medical records!

[HowardCohodas]

Imagine what'll happen to your medical records!

As leaky as Washington is, they will appear in the New York Times if your anti-liberal.

[nmap]

As leaky as Washington is, they will appear in the New York Times if your anti-liberal.

More problematic, perhaps, is the possibility that the records will be maintained by contractors who will, in turn, outsource them to any of a variety of locales.

Here's an example: LINK (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/10/22/MNGCO2FN8G1.DTL)

In the example above, a woman in Pakistan was not paid by a U.S. company that outsourced work, and she in turn threatened to release the records if she wasn't paid.

So...are there bad people in Pakistan (and elsewhere) who might make use of such information? Of course not. Silly me. :D

[Richard]

More problematic, perhaps, is the possibility that the records will be maintained by contractors who will, in turn, outsource them to any of a variety of locales.

Around a decade ago here in Texas, the Dept of Criminal Justice decided it would be good to entice state agencies to outsource a number of tasks to the prisons to save themselves labor costs. Eventually - when the non-prison population nearly revolted after they found out about it - the DOJC came to realize that allowing criminals to have access to computer files to process documents and records with personal (e.g., SSAN, DL, NOK, telephone, etc) and financial information was not such a good idea - and they stopped it. Stupidity knows no boundaries when a bureaucracy is allowed to flourish unchecked. :eek:

Richard's $.02 :munchin

[PR31C]

I just got an e-mail that Congressman Fleming (LA-4) has introduced a Resolution (not an Amendment) that Congress go along w/ suggestion #1. It's not a law, but a step in the right direction.

Now, to get them to waive their immunity and go along w/ #2.....

v/r
phil


Congressman Fleming is encouraging people to go on his Website and Sign his petition (http://fleming.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=55) (very simple - just email).


This is not one of those generic on-line petitions, it actually goes to Congressman Fleming's site

[Gypsy]

Congressman Fleming is encouraging people to go on his Website and Sign his petition (http://fleming.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=55) (very simple - just email).



I wish they'd show the results.