the Patriot Act was only going to be in force until we rescinded or amended it to make it perfect

[Lerkfish]

how did that work out?

[Orrex]

1. My wife sent me to the grocery store for apples, and I brought home oranges

How do you suppose that worked out?

[ixion]

2. the same way this will: poorly

thanks for confirming.

[Lerkfish]

3. we sent Obama and congress to the store to bring back health care reform

and they brought back private insurance expansion.

[Orrex]

8. So, in other words, it's nothing at all like the passage or function of the Patriot act

Now I understand.

[girl gone mad]

17. wooosh..

that one went way over your head.

[Orrex]

20. Uh. If you say so.

:eyes:

[hootinholler]

9. Depends

Were they for eating or making pie?

For eating might not be so bad, making pie, well I've never seen an orange pie.

-Hoot

[juno jones]

21. But you can make orange cheesecake! :)

but then you gotta hope the wife will bring home creamcheese and not a block of swiss.

I wish we could have been at the table to make the grocery list in the first place.

[Blue State Blues]

13. Dude, word to the wise

Don't try telling your wife that you never said you'd bring home apples or that she told you to get oranges.

Just sayin.

[Orrex]

14. As a matter of fact, I think I tried that.

There's this blank patch in my memory immediately afterward, though...

[Motown_Johnny]

4. nothing is ever perfect, and 122 people a day die from lack of access to health care

do you really want to hold out for something perfect?

If this bill can cut that number in half it will save over 20,000 live a year, every year.

[Blue State Blues]

15. But is putting an insurance card in someone's wallet going to change that number

if that card has a high deductible, a high co-pay, and only reimburses 60% of the "covered expenses"?

122 people die from lack of access to health care every day. But junk insurance doesn't provide access to health care.

The most common cause of bankruptcy is medical bills. Most medical bankruptcies are people who had insurance when their illness started.

As best I can tell, the only difference from this legislation is that people will go bankrupt a little more slowly ... perhaps. Though more people will have their finances strained by being forced to purchase a product they cannot afford to use.

Our country deeply needs real reform. This is not real reform. It's not even a good start.

Yes, I want a single payer system, but I acknowledge that there are several systems that CAN work, the system created by this legislation is not one of them.

Several immediate steps that can be taken to improve the "system" we have ... virtually none of them are in this legislation.

[Toots]

5. Has there EVER been any thing amended at a later date?

Just doesn't happen does it? :sarcasm:

[Lerkfish]

6. name a bill that has been amended to be more leftward.

[Cetacea]

7. K&R

[ProSense]

11. Civil Rights Act, Medicare, Social Security. n/t

[Lerkfish]

19. IIRC, wasn't there a donut installed in the medicare most recently?

how is that an improvement? didn't the recipients have a higher deductible and a higher premium, as well as a higher age to qualify?

are those improvements?

[Selatius]

12. Does it count if the bill in question is over 70 years old? They amended Social Security back then.

In 1935, after much hand-wringing and arm-twisting, FDR managed to ram through Social Security in 1935, and four years later, amendments to the bill expanded the program further.

Of course, I think I'm comparing apples to oranges here. Democratic congressmen of 70 years ago were of sterner stuff than Democratic congressmen of today. Only a small few Democrats in office have that kind of fortitude left, and the Democrats in Congress today are being poorly led by something that isn't as capable as FDR.

[eridani]

22. Social security did not start with a mandate to invest in a stock market retirement account n/t

[Selatius]

23. You got a point there. They succeeded where the Senate leadership collapsed.

At least with a limited Public Option, the door could have been left opened for expansion. Here, we'd have to essentially invent the wheel on the spot instead of building on a pre-existing structure.

[eridani]

26. IMO, only a public option saves the bill from being fascism

Even if only for a few, a way out of being required to be customers of parasites who give their employees bonuses for denying claims, at least leaves a door open.

[Bluebear]

28. +1

[Echo In Light]

10. "There's a sucker born every minute"- P.T. Barnum

[Bluebear]

24. mmhmm

[girl gone mad]

16. k & r

[WeDidIt]

18. The Patriot Act couldn't be taken care of via the budget every year

Adding a Public Option or Medicare for all, or any other good idea for health care will be able to be added to the budget every year after HCR is signed.

Oh, and since it goes into the budget, you don't have that 60 vote requirement in the Senate any longer. The standard is now 51.

[scentopine]

25. A very appropriate analogy. -nt

[MisterP]

27. these were the same guys who, after the IWR, said 1) it was the right thing to do,

because it would let us win the election (and prevent the warmongers from keeping power...)

2) the Senators have a "secret plan" to undo it, or to escalate our way out of the war

either way, the moderates "knew what they were doing" (and, in a way, they did)

in '04, they also kept repeating that Kerry didn't vote for the IWR, so Obama's lie about his '08 campaign isn't that new: they know that the word "lie" is thrown around so much it can just be dismissed