A simple health care policy.

[riqster]

We should focus on this simple mission: get people health care, get them as much as they can have, and as soon as they can have it.

Too often we focus on party this, and messaging that, and next election stuff, and so on and on. Screw all that s***, people are dying and need health care.

The ACA is a very good first step in that direction, and we can not: we must not; we will not; move a single inch backwards.

[Wounded Bear]

1. Cover everybody for everything...

That's the cheapest way.

[riqster]

4. Damn straight. We need to get to single-payer

Right now, the ACA is a net positive for the people, but it's not enough.

[LWolf]

2. Okay.

Except that any for-profit insurance plan is not a step in the right direction if the goal is to get people as much health care as they can have, as soon as they can have it.

Any steps down the for-profit road are going the wrong way.

[riqster]

5. The ACA is not popular with the health insurance industry.

That's why they are spending millions upon millions to bribe Congress to kill it.

The ACA cuts their profits and requires them to drastically increase transparency.

Anything that pisses off corporate America is a good thing in my eyes.

No, it's not enough. But without it, we'd be much worse off.

[LWolf]

7. Without it,

we might be fighting for actual health care for people, instead of pretending that they can afford for-profit insurance, and that the insurance will provide actual care.

Corporate America is going to fight any kind of effort to cut into their profit to provide care, even when they are actually benefiting. It's what they do.

Just like Republicans will fight anything and everything Obama does, even when he's implementing policies that are Republican goals. It's what they do.

It's part of their identity.

As long as there is going to be a fight, I think we ought to be fighting for a universal non-profit national health plan that provides health care free at point of service, paid for by taxes. Fight for the best, not for a corporate compromise.

THAT would make actual health care accessible and affordable for all.

[riqster]

8. And if fighting for the best , with no compromises, had led to no gain at all?

The we would still be at status quo ante, and that was not a good place at all.

[LWolf]

9. It eventually leads somewhere.

Look at how well it works for Republicans. THEY know how to fight. If only they would fight for something worth having.

Giving up on the goal before the fight begins, though, means you are guaranteed to never reach it.

[riqster]

10. Eventually means a long time during which we would be in the old world

Which was far, far worse than the ACA.

[LWolf]

11. Short sightedness

leads to so many limits.

I disagree. I don't think mandating private, for-profit insurance is a step forward when it comes to getting everyone the care they need.

But then, I've had private, for-profit insurance for 3 decades now, and have never been able to afford all the care I needed.

[riqster]

12. You can call it short-sightedness.

I call it "solving problems in the here and now".

Insisting on doing nothing at all if it isn't 100% of what we want means dead people. I cannot support such a course of action.

[leftstreet]

3. ACA: Meet your deductibles, premiums, copays - and you'll live!

It's not healthCARE, it's healthINSURANCE

[riqster]

6. Quite true. That is how health insurance works.

But insurance is a first step towards health care access. Without access, people do without health care. And that is bad.

The end game is single-payer. And until we get more people into the insurance market, we can't get them into the debate.