Ghost Guns

[ImBillT]

The private sector has had over 70 years to make their case that they should remain in control of your healthcare, and they've failed miserably to do so.

The VA has worked very well for a small group of people who should be a particular priority for the government. If the government can’t handle health care for vets, they can’t handle it for the whole nation.

“Faithful with little. Faithful with much”

 

[ImBillT]

Knock that down by 50-60%. Only 49% of Americans have employer sponsored healthcare, and a lot of that sucks.

Why does your employer have to sponsor healthcare for you get it?

I’m self employed, and prior to Obama Care, I had very good coverage for $110/mo. My agent royally screwed up and didn’t take the required action to lock in my pre-Obama care coverage. I now have vastly inferior coverage under my wife’s employer at almost triple the price....actually my sex change will be a lot cheaper under my new coverage.

 

[rwc101]

Why does your employer have to sponsor healthcare for you get it?

I’m self employed, and prior to Obama Care, I had very good coverage for $110/mo. My agent royally screwed up and didn’t take the required action to lock in my pre-Obama care coverage. I know have vastly inferior coverage at almost triple the price....actually my sex change will be a lot cheaper under my new coverage.

You just told a story of private healthcare failing you.

 

[noharleyyet]

Why does your employer have to sponsor healthcare for you get it?

I’m self employed, and prior to Obama Care, I had very good coverage for $110/mo. My agent royally screwed up and didn’t take the required action to lock in my pre-Obama care coverage. I now have vastly inferior coverage under my wife’s employer at almost triple the price....actually my sex change will be a lot cheaper under my new coverage.

Let me guess....cabinet position?

 

[Ben Lamb]

Physical health care in US is world-class for 80% of us. We still haven't solved for the 20%, but destroying what works for the 80% in the process is not progress.

Mental health not so much.

I have a lot of exposure to global medical systems and none come close to the US system (for the 80%) in quality, and mental health care sucks in all of them.

We can do better and we have to do better, but govt. medical systems reduce the quality of care for most.

I'm not seeing any nation rush to eliminate their NHS. Every Gov't program can be bad, but it requires leaders who make those investments in citizens over corporate profit. It's a cop out to say that a NHS would suck without actually crafting a NHS that would work.

That 20% is where the gun violence lives. If private healthcare was the great equalizer, it would have figured this out, but they'd rather focus on profit instead of people.

 

[VikingsGuy]

Knock that down by 50-60%. Only 49% of Americans have employer sponsored healthcare, and a lot of that sucks.

First, math . . . the difference between 80% and 50% is not 50-60%. It also ignores the 20% that get medicare coverage for "free" (most with supplemental private gap coverage). Both of my elderly parents have gotten world-class medical treatment via Medicare.

Way better than what either got in their 30's when our family lived in Canada - rationing is a thing, not a political lie. It was shocking.

It probably has a lot more to do with where you live than who pays. I would guess that the suburbs will get better care regardless of who pays, vs small rural areas or inner city.

There are simply no examples where large scale government monopolies provide higher quality and less expensive service. It is a utopian fantasy that pursues equity by destroying the good. Churchill summed it up, "‘The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."

But back to the OPs topic.

So, long as the SCOTUS makeup remains and Manchin is a required vote to remove the filibuster, very little will happen at the federal level. It is the "blue" states where the action is.

 

[Ben Lamb]

The VA has worked very well for a small group of people who should be a particular priority for the government. If the government can’t handle health care for vets, they can’t handle it for the whole nation.

“Faithful with little. Faithful with much”

I don't disagree, but you have to look at why the VA was left to suffer for so long, and who was writing those budgets (i.e. the lobbyists for private healthcare). We have a crisis of veteran suicide, and a VA that follows a model of shuffling around docs and nurses, rather than building teams that have the trust of their patients. I know a lot of VA folks who work across the spectrum, and they are dedicated professionals who dearly want to help veterans. We can listen to them if we want to actually reform and help veterans.

But we're straying far from the topic, and that's my fault.

Apologies to the OP.

 

[rwc101]

First, math . . . the difference between 80% and 50% is not 50-60%. It also ignores the 20% that get medicare coverage for "free" (most with supplemental private gap coverage). Both of my elderly parents have gotten world-class medical treatment via Medicare.

Way better than what either got in their 30's when our family lived in Canada - rationing is a thing, not a political lie. It was shocking.

It probably has a lot more to do with where you live than who pays. I would guess that the suburbs will get better care regardless of who pays, vs small rural areas or inner city.

There are simply no examples where large scale government monopolies provide higher quality and less expensive service. It is a utopian fantasy that pursues equity by destroying the good. Churchill summed it up, "‘The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries."

But back to the OPs topic.

So, long as the SCOTUS makeup remains and Manchin is a required vote to remove the filibuster, very little will happen at the federal level. It is the "blue" states where the action is.

With all due respect, cut the condescending "math" crap. Not everyone in the 49% has good healthcare. Luckily, my mom and her side of the family is Canadian so I know for myself how their system works and how sometimes you have to wait for elective surgery but nobody goes bankrupt for the audacity of having cancer.

 

[4ohSick]

Both of my elderly parents have gotten world-class medical treatment via Medicare.

There are simply no examples where large scale government monopolies provide higher quality and less expensive service.

I acknowledge I'm taking out some context, but these statements are in direct conflict.

 

[morley.tyler]

The main reason we couldn’t get together on keeping guns away from people on the No-Fly list is that there was zero due process involved in gettin put on or off that list. If I’m not mistaken, there was even a law maker accidentally placed on that list. For the general public, if you end up there somehow, you don’t know until you try to fly, and it’s pretty much impossible to get off that list, even if you’re there entirely by mistake.

The main reason we couldn’t get together on keeping guns away from people on the No-Fly list is that there was zero due process involved in getting put on or off that list. If I’m not mistaken, there was even a law maker accidentally placed on that list. For the general public, if you end up there somehow, you don’t know until you try to fly, and it’s pretty much impossible to get off that list, even if you’re there entirely by mistake.

No one said Democracy or living in a Constitutional Republic was easy, it just beats the alternative(s).

 

[longbow51]

In regards to corporate immunity, I don't see much value in gun/hunting magazines these days, as they are mostly advertisements for the latest and greatest. Nevertheless, I have looked through a few from time to time, and don't recall any ads that would classify as marketing to criminals or the mentally unstable. Mostly geared at hunters, and lately, a lot at self-defense, particularly for women, given the social unrest. On another thread here, someone's wife saw an armed carjacking a few cars in front of her in Chicago. Pretty scary.

Maybe Biden watched Jackie Brown, where Samuel L. Jackson claimed TEC 9 advertised itself as "the most popular gun in American crime", which I doubt. Moot point as that gun was declared illegal in 1994. (Was going to post the clip, but, as usual for SLJ, not exactly PG.)

Anyway, seems like it would be pretty hard to show that advertising was "wrongly directed".

 

[rwc101]

But occasionally someone dies waiting for cancer treatment or surgery because it's not their turn for whatever reason. Or maybe that's just in the UK where it happened to my family.

That doesn't happen here? Nobody in America finds out they have cancer too late because they can't afford regular doctor visits?

In the cases I know with my family your case gets priority if it is remotely life threatening. Frustrating to wait two months for cataract surgery, but you're alive, have received care, and not financially ruined. Can always buy additional insurance if they so desire.

 

[Ben Lamb]

Seems kind of aggressive.

 

[Nick87]

Seems kind of aggressive.

View attachment 180079

I remember that ad iirc it was the back page of American hunter when I was a kid.

 

[Ben Lamb]

I remember that ad iirc it was the back page of American hunter when I was a kid.

Here's one from two years ago:


The imagery in the Bravo Company ad is familiar. The whole "Patriot" theme is militia-speak 101 as is the tactical cos-play. There's a lot of money to be made off of this kind of stuff, and it's worth looking at how companies can advertise.

We didn't allow cigarettes or alcohol to be advertised on television for decades because of the imagery & message that it sends to young people. I don't think it's that much of a stretch to see the same kind of emotional advertising in the gun world.

 

[MTGomer]

If I am to believe that I am in a social contract to pay for someone else’s healthcare, then I’m going to need some buy-in from the 70% of Americans that are overweight, the whatever percent that use drugs and tobacco and abuse alcohol, that they need to make some changes, before they can get in the system.

 

[MTGomer]

Seems kind of aggressive.

View attachment 180079

The legendary 700
“Guaranteed to fire when you need it most, and sometimes when you don’t.”

 

[Hydrophilic]

That doesn't happen here? Nobody in America finds out they have cancer too late because they can't afford regular doctor visits?

In the cases I know with my family your case gets priority if it is remotely life threatening. Frustrating to wait two months for cataract surgery, but you're alive, have received care, and not financially ruined. Can always buy additional insurance if they so desire.

I’m in healthcare and it is 100% broken in the United States.

 

[rwc101]

If I am to believe that I am in a social contract to pay for someone else’s healthcare, then I’m going to need some buy-in from the 70% of Americans that are overweight, the whatever percent that use drugs and tobacco and abuse alcohol, that they need to make some changes, before they can get in the system.

You already live in this scenario.

 

[AvidIndoorsman]

@VikingsGuy

So leading cause of death in the US is heart disease...

Dr. Example MD

Student
-------------------------
4 years - BS or BA
4 years - Medical School
-------------------------
Training
3 years - Residency Internal Medicine
4 years - Fellowship Cardiovascular Disease
2 years - Fellowship Structural Heart Disease
2 years - Interventional Cardiology

19 years of training/study Average Salary US $430,000

CEO of United Healthcare
BS Accounting -4 years
Compensation in 2019 $18,900,000

So C-suite at an insurance company is 44x more valuable a doctor, 250x more valuable than a nurse.

$18,900,000 is equivalent to 1,750 peoples premiums if they are paying $900 a month

And the government wastes tax payers money? I dk $200 for a hammer and $500 for a toilet seat doesn't seem all that bad when the alternative is a G-5 and a Mclaren for Mr. Wichmann.