Cynical Nation

Barry, the "joys of divided government" amount to treading water and no question, that's better than one alternative.

The Gingrich Congress was responsible for the Cap gains reduction and the spending caps that brought about te surplus toward the end of Clinton's presidency.

Clinton was a Supply-Sider who supported Free Trade and bought into most, if not all, of Gingrich's "Contract With America."

The WoT both abroad and domestically has been the primary culprit in the "excessive spending" done by the GOP over the past six years.

The saving grace for Conservatives has been the rise of the "New Democrats," mostly Conservative Dems from out West and down South, now over 20% of the Democrats in Congress (thanks to 2006) and hopefully in the future there will be even more Conservative Dems from the Mid-West and even the northeast.

There is no great "ideological battle" between far-Left Liberals (the Moore-Gore-Soros-Kucinich Axis) and Conservatism.

The ONLY real ideological battle today is between Conservatism and Libertarianism.

The only way that battle supplants the one between the idiotic ideology of far-Left Liberalsm and Conservatism is if enough of these New Democrats are elected to swamp the repugnant anti-American left of the current Democratic Party.

As far as divided government goes, if we have to have it, I'd much prefer a Republican Congress with a Democratic President than the reverse.

Hillary is by far the most conservative Dem running, so don't forget to vote for her, JMK.

Guiliani is running an ad lying about his cancer survival chances had he been treated in the UK. Why did he need to lie about universal healthcare? He's already bought and paid for by the insurance industry.

Hillary is clearly a much better choice.

Romney is far and away the brightest and best qualified candidate out there right now, in my view.

He's the only candidate about whom I can honestly say I "respect and admire his intelligence."

That just can't be said of any of the others, in my view.

Giuliani and Clinton both have dramatic flaws and high negatives. I LIKE that Clinton was a board member on Walmart. I have stock in that company and love the way it's run ("Save money. Live better") and I like her ties to the HOM lobby.

The UK is considering just scrapping its system of "socialized medicine." I've collected data on all of the various state-run health care programs and have found that ALL state-run healthcare programs suffer from severe rationing, age cut-offs for many procedures and long waits for many procedures.

There isn't a single candidate from either Party who'd deny those facts.

But Universal healthcare, in some form, is in our futures. Business desperately wants out from under the ponderous burden of insuring over 85% of all Americans.

And they shouldn't be paying for our healthcare.

OK, just between me and you, they really aren't, as they take the premiums they pay for each employee out of the salary structure...we just think we're getting it "free," because we don't see the money we "would've earned."

So long as we get a basic, bare-bones Universal healthcare system (with rationing and various restrictions to avoid the inevitable "tragedy of the commons" associated with all such "freebies") along with a separate pay as you go private insurance path that allows those, willing and able to pay, to avoid the rationing and restrictions of the general government-run plan, I think we'll all be just fine and our businesses will become even more competitive in the global market.

I'd take Giulaini for his anti-terror cred, as that's going to be the biggest problem facing the U.S. over the foreseeable future, but at this point, I'd much prefer Romney.

Compared to Rudy or Hillary, he has actual business experience, he also ran a state and was elected, as a Republican, in the "Bluest" state (MA) and he has none of the negatives that either Hillary or Rudy carry and few of their all too apparent character flaws either.

Eeeek!

"HOM lobby" SHOULD BE HMO lobby

Eeeek!

"HOM lobby" SHOULD BE HMO lobby

"The UK is considering just scrapping its system of "socialized medicine." I've collected data on all of the various state-run health care programs and have found that ALL state-run healthcare programs suffer from severe rationing, age cut-offs for many procedures and long waits for many procedures."

Really, did Rush tell you this? Funny, but I put in 'UK medicine' in Google news and didn't get one hit about this dramatic change in their SIXTY YEAR OLD system of healthcare.

I did get a lot of hits about how Guiliani is lying his ass off about UK medical care though. Every factual source agrees that he is just another Repug liar.

That’s what people who’ve studied and compared the two systems (people like James Bartholomew; http://www.spectator.co.uk/search/13221/die-in-britain-survive-in-the-us.thtml) tell all of us Barely.

The primary argument of those who favor government-run health care is that American health care is “too expensive.” That Americans are worse off because they spend more and that’s true, Americans spend more because they purchase more. The average American receives more health care than the average European.

Thatcher expanded the availability of private insurance in England and made a number of “too little, too late” reforms.

As an example:

Use of High-Tech Medical Procedures (per 100,000 people per year)

Dialysis Patients

87 – US
46 – Canada
26 – UK

Coronary Bypass

203 - US
65 - Canada
41 – UK

Coronary Angioplasty

388 - US
81 - Canada
51 – UK

No government healthcare system in the world runs without health care rationing and restricting access to various procedures.

The “Tragedy of the Commons” makes that an absolute necessity. In fact, the "Tragedy of the Commons" is why any time ANY commodity is delivered "free" by the government, the only way that rampant overuse can be controlled is through restricting access via rationing, "queing," etc.

Not to mention the fact that since the government produces nothing, it can deliver nothing "free." It must charge the recipient indirectly via a slew of taxes.

JMK, I couldn't help but notice that instead of providing proof of your rather retarded statement (a lie), you instead went off on a tangent.

Was this intentional? Or did you look and find out that you had mindlessly repeated yet another Rush lie.

OK, let's just let it go, and focus on what you did post. Wouldn't life expectancy be a better indicator of proper health care than sheer number of medical procedures?

Tsk, tsk ... stupid is as stupid does.

There is ONLY ONE fact that is important in the discussion of private insurance versus government run healthcare.

Are Americans paying more for less medical care, or are they paying more for more medical care.

The answer is that Americans are paying more for far more healthcare, better healthcare and more innovative healthcare.

Virtually all of the most recent medical innovations have come from America.

There IS however, a very good reason to support some form of government-run bare bones program - to get our beloved businesses OUT of the healthcare morass they're now in and to make them more competitive.

So long as a system of loosley regulated private insurers is available, those who put a premium on better quality healthcare (without rationing and vist-restrictions, etc) can and WILL pay for it...and everyone else will have a basic, cost-effective free alternative.

As a healthy 25 y/o I'd take the free-o and the risks, because I doubt medical rationing and other restrictions would impact me all that much, but if I were a sickly 25 y/o with, say, early onset diabetes, that person would have to pay for more care to avoid the rationing and restrictions that would and SHOULD impact that unhealthier person.

In fact, if I were a healthy 25 y/o with kids, I doubt I'd be able to accept the rationing and restrictions of a free government-run plan.

I'd hope and I fully believe that the private health insurance industry would offer some affordable full coverage plans.

No JMK, as I proved, we are paying for MORE FAKE PROCEDURES and MORE FAKE TREATMENTS ... but alas, not more survival.

We are over medicated, over diagnosed (often just falsely diagnosed), and overtreated (causing antibiotic resistant strains of say, staph) ... BUT WE DON'T LIVE LONGER!!!

Sorry chump, you lose again.

Prove it.

We need studies, proof of these "fake procedures," and "phoney tests."

Americans get MORE MRIs, MORE CAT Scans, and wider aray of tests that result in far earlier detection of cancers and other serious diseases.

Those are the facts.

We Americans PAY MORE because we GET MORE HEALTHCARE procedures.

Thanks for making you true position clear. YOU clearly favor "Healthcare via the bean counter."

Barely supports a system that denies patients tests that result in early detection to reduce the costs of healthcare.

Yeah, that's why American males have a 99% five year survival rate for prostate cancer compared to a 78% five year survival rate among European males.

When did you begin hating sick people so much?

Hyuk, time to post hump!

Now, I may be dumb, in fact I am dumb, but even I can see that for the United States, the incidence was 136 per 100,000 and deaths were ***26 per 100,000 males***. For the UK, the incidence was much lower, 49 per 100,000, but the deaths were roughly the same, ***28 per 100,000***.

Durrr, now if WAY MORE people in the good ol' conservative USA are diagnosed, but pretty much the same number DIE as in communist, socialist, dirty England, what does that say???

According to Barely Hanging, this would somehow indicate that in the USA we are DIAGNOSED AND TREATED more but don't actually SURVIVE more!

Hyuk, what a dumbass! He'll never prove that any more than he can prove that GRAVITY EXISTS. One time I released a balloon and it went UP!

Good thing I'm here to protect this board from LIES!

Again, Your quoted stats fully agree with what I've quoted by those esteeemed researchers above;

"Economist John Goodman, in "Lives at Risk," arrives at precisely the same conclusion: "In the United States, slightly less than one in five people diagnosed with prostate cancer dies of the disease. In the United Kingdom, 57 percent die...

"...The American five-year survival rate for prostate cancer is 99 percent, the European average is 78 percent, and the Scottish and Welsh rates are close to 71 percent. (British data were incomplete.)"


YES, indeed more Americans are diagnosed with prostate cancer and more survive due to that early detection (as proven by our 99% survival rate over the first five years) compared to the 78% five year survival rate for European males.

As John Goodman noted, while 57% of those diagnosed with prostate cancer, die from prostate cancer, less than 20% of American males diagnosed with that disease, die from it.

Hyuk, lemme see. If good ol' red-blooded American doctahs diagnose 2,000,000 guys with cancer, but really only 1 guy had it, and some stinkin commmie Euro socialist no-good doctur diagnoses 2 stinkin lyin Euro guys wide cancer, and really only 1 stinkin Euro guy has it, DAT MEANS DAT AMERIKUN DOCTURS SAVED 999,998 MORE LIVES! ONLY .0001% of AMERIKUNS DIED, but 50% of STUPED EUROS DIED!!!

Hyuk, I wants a 99.9999% chance of livin! I don't want justa 50% chance of livin!

Ha, you is STUPUD!

Actually virtually EVERYONE diagnosed with prostate cancer is confiremd as having prostate cancer.

The U.S. diagnoses MORE cancer victims and diagnoses them earlier than is done in Europe and that is WHY, as we agree (we do agree with the documented FACTS, right?) that the five year survival rate for American males with prostate cancer is 99%, while the five year survival rate for European men diagnosed with that disease is 78%.

I know facts and numbers seem to frustrate you, whether it's the truth about RICO (it doesn't allow gov to CONFISCATE assets prior to CONVICTION), H-1B Visas (they went from under 50,000 to over 1 million btw 1993 and 2001), salary vs "other compensation," or "cancer survival rates in the U.S. vs Europe," you seem to insisit on arguing AGAINST the documented facts.

Save yourself the frustration Barely, DON'T argue against the facts!