The perfect is NOT the enemy of the good.

[rateyes]

The BAD is the enemy of the good.

Single-payer: PERFECT.

A ROBUST public option: GOOD.

Compromising with the Republicans and giving trillions more to the insurance industry through "mandates": BAD.


The goal should NOT be universal INSURANCE. The goal should be universal HEALTH CARE.

There is a BIG difference.

Better to do nothing than fuck the country with a half-assed bill that will spell the end of real reform and make the fat cats fatter and the sick sicker.

[Oregone]

1. Single-Payer = centrist compromise. VA type care for all is perfect

[rateyes]

5. I'll agree with that.

[Raven]

2. Sorry pal, while you are sticking to your ideology, I have a dear friend who is

thrilled that pre-existing condition exclusions are going to be banned. Maybe a little thing to you but she is a cancer survivor and scared to death that her hubby who carried the insurance will be laid off.

[rateyes]

4. Your friend may get to pay premiums for insurance,

but, who is going to make the insurance companies pay the fucking claims? I haven't heard a word about that. My mother just fell flat on her face and broke her jaw, and jammed a crown through her lower lip. And, guess what? Her insurance won't cover the extensive dental work she is going to need. Fat good that premium payment she makes is doing her.

[JTFrog]

7. And how exactly will doing nothing help your mother?

Just asking...

:shrug:

[rateyes]

9. Show me where doing this helps my mother.

[orpupilofnature57]

3. Existential philosophy is great for Voltaire and me , but these people need

an indepedent actuary to give us numbers that are actually substantiated.

[JTFrog]

6. Imagine if we had gotten that much after the first few months into Clinton's first term.

This wouldn't even be an issue today.

Instead we ended up with a big fat nothing. And yet we still have a ton of fuggin idiots around here saying we shouldn't even take this first step and should go with a big fat nothing again.

Unbelievable.

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

8. The funny thing is that I don't recall ever hearing any of the Big 5 of the Purity Patrol

ever give a personal account like Ravens. I'm starting to think that most of those whining the most have it the best. My guess is that they are on medicare or have very good insurance and can afford their all or nothing BS. All I ever hear from them is that insurance companies are evil. It's never about a personal need that only the public option or single payer can solve, unlike the pre-existing condition exclusion elimination and other benefits that we can get out of what's on the table.

I'd prefer single-payer or a strong public option, but I'm not willing to give up everything else for a longshot chance to get it.

[rateyes]

11. And, the question is:

Why, with 60 Democrats in the Senate, and a huge majority in the House is single-payer still a damned LONG SHOT??

[Raineyb]

13. What good does the small changes they're proposing do if you can't afford the insurance.

It makes no difference to me if they drop the preexisting condition clauses if I can't afford to pay for the insurance. I don't need another bill to pay I need access to health care without worrying about going broke!

[rateyes]

10. Who are you calling a "fuggin idiot?"

I'm with Kucinich on this one, and if that makes me a "fuggin idiot," then so be it.

[JTFrog]

12. The all or nothing crowd.

Big fat nothing is a HUGH step forward. :eyes:

[LWolf]

17. No that makes you smarter and more principled. nt

[SidneyCarton]

14. Better to do nothing than to achieve something?

Well, then I suppose we can write off both FDR and LBJ as failures, as neither managed to get us the full welfare state, and whatever benefits we got in the mean time were just "half-assed" stuff that we would have been better off without.

I suppose that electing Senator McCain would have been better last November, because no reform is better than a "half-assed" reform.

[rateyes]

19. Think a little deeper.

LBJ would not compromise on Medicare legislation like Obama is doing with health care. In fact, LBJ didn't want a huge majority to pass Medicare, because he knew that if he got such a majority, he would have left too much on the table--given too much away in negotiations.

The Democrats hold all the aces, and the Blue Dogs and DLCers want to give a couple of them to the Republicans in the name of "bipartisanship." And, Obama is going along with it.

Watch what happens. There will be, yet, ANOTHER unfunded mandate--telling poor people they HAVE to purchase health insurance (without a public option that will make it even close to affordable), and when they CAN'T purchase it, because even working 3 minimum wage jobs, they won't have enough to purchase it and buy food, pay the rent, etc.---THEY'LL GET FUCKING FINED.

Great for the economy!! RIIIIGGGGGHHHHHHHHTTTTTTTTTT. Great for the people! RIIIGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHTTTTTTTTT.

Great for the insurance industry, while the people get screwed---ABSOLUTELY!

[sohndrsmith]

15. "perfect" is a unique - and completely theoretical - concept. Expecting,

demanding perfection (which really translates into "this is what I think should happen", no?) is, I think, a truly lost battle before the first sword is drawn.

I'd lie to know, too, what the all-or-nothing proponents expect when they vote down, or vote against an imperfect bill (which I guarantee it will be - they all are)? I'm assuming that knocking down a proposal that doesn't have perfect components is done with the full and complete awareness that the result will be that things stay the way they are. A situation which seems destructive to just about everyone.

Perfection is immobilizing. Is that what we really want?

I don't know - perhaps I'm wrong. I believe in fighting for what one believes is right, but I think compromise in this case is a more powerful and useful position that we can all benefit from. Not with the Repubs, but with our own sense of what "should" happen - or should happen "now". Getting a bill passed that arguably still needs work would nonetheless - be historic and we need it. Refusing it and turning our backs guarantees a repeated failure. We've been there, we've done that.

[LWolf]

16. I would agree with this slight change:

No one ever gets sick or injured, so no need for health care: PERFECT

Universal, single-payer, not-for-profit health care: GOOD

A ROBUST public option: COMPROMISE

Pandering to insurance and pharmaceutical corporations: BAD

[Zynx]

18. I really fail to see how these reforms will make the system worse.

It will increase the size of the insured pool, but how do you get out of a mandate. Even if you have a totally open public option, if you don't make people buy insurance, what good is it?

[rateyes]

20. And, what are they going to buy insurance with?

Peanuts?

[Zynx]

22. Tax credits. You don't really believe they are mandating and then giving people nothing

to do it with?

[saltpoint]

21. Robert F. Kennedy felt that the perfect was indeed the enemy of the good.

In a family which has been the soul of public service over the last 60 years of our nation's history, I wonder why he might have been moved to express that opinion.