Anything else you motherfuckers need?

Crafter_Man · July 17, 2009, 2:41am

Yes. To protect my individual freedoms & individual liberties.

Federally-subsidized/mandated health care is the antithesis of individual liberty.

Fear_Itself · July 17, 2009, 2:43am

I want to purchase my insurance from the governement.

If I allowed to choose how I am to be victimized, I choose indifferent incompetence over deliberate avarice any day. At least slow-witted civil servants are not motivated by the pursuit of profit to find ways to deny service when I need it most, and powerless to fight back.

DianaG · July 17, 2009, 2:44am

But you’re *already *free and at liberty to not use any government services. Rejoice!

Crafter_Man · July 17, 2009, 2:44am

If you choose not to make the sacrifices to purchase LE services, then you are taking a big risk. Me? I would definitely purchase it. But I should not have the moral authority to force someone else to purchase it (via taxes).

Sitnam · July 17, 2009, 2:44am

I wouldn’t say they’re inefficient, i’d say it’s a closed economic system. You pay before you go then get stuck with what you get. I have a shelf full of horse shit computer games that can attest to the efficiency of this system.

Crafter_Man · July 17, 2009, 2:45am

I am forced at gunpoint to pay for federal “services” that the federal government has no authority providing.

DianaG · July 17, 2009, 2:46am

You know, they always say that, but I’ve never seen a single armed IRS agent.

Crafter_Man · July 17, 2009, 2:47am

Fine. But why are you forcing me at gunpoint to do the same? And I thought liberals were pro-choice…

Rand_Rover · July 17, 2009, 2:47am

I agree.

I disagree.

The_Understander · July 17, 2009, 2:48am

To play devil’s* advocate, I imagine that there could be a system whereby concerned citizens could donate into neighborhood pools to pay for security forces.

Those who can’t afford to contribute to the pool would, of course, be excluded from security services. But, hey, guns are cheap.

Vigilantes, blood-feuds, armed gangs as powerful as most metropolitan police forces… it’d be a Malthusian Utopia!

*no offense to Lucifer for equating him with this ridiculous system

JRDelirious · July 17, 2009, 2:48am

News Flash: The society has decided that it will be. Deal with it or try to secede from society.

Rand_Rover · July 17, 2009, 2:49am

I agree that one of the things the government should do is to secure property rights. We are therefore in agreement. Glad to have you on my side.

Sitnam · July 17, 2009, 2:49am

I love the ‘at gunpoint’ it really brings out the whole martyr aspect.

Crafter_Man · July 17, 2009, 2:50am

I thinking helping poor people is very noble and admirable. And I send money to charities every year. But no one should be forced at gunpoint to help poor people. And that’s exactly what you’re saying; you believe people should be forced to give. I believe that’s morally wrong.

Rand_Rover · July 17, 2009, 2:50am

Leaper:

There’s this blog I read sometimes written by a pretty staunch libertarian. In one of his comments sections, someone asserted that “the market” would eventually pay for health care for the poor; since the demand would be there, someone would fill it with supply. Even in that libertarian blog, there were people commenting that it was a naive and probably untrue point of view, AND getting modded up for it.

It makes me wonder: who exactly would find it profitable to fill that demand for health care for people who can’t afford it? How would it be filled, and why? To what extent? Why has it not happened already? If it’s because of “government regulation,” which ones, in particular?

Of course, if you think that the current system just needs some changes to run infinitely better, I’d like to hear what they are. Some libertarians just turn to “the market” so they won’t have to offer better solutions; those solutions will “just happen.” So I’d be interested in hearing thoughts NOT along those lines.

Maybe there’s not a problem in the first place. Poor people don’t drive Bugati Veyrons, should the government buy one for each poor person?

MsWhatsit · July 17, 2009, 2:52am

Nobody IS being forced at gunpoint to help poor people. As stated earlier, the IRS doesn’t pack heat. And I know “at gunpoint” is a rhetorical flourish, but it is a rhetorical flourish that makes you look like an idiot.

Fear_Itself · July 17, 2009, 2:53am

So why in the world do you choose stay in such an unjust system? Surely the free market has brought forth a libertarian paradise somewhere; you are free to choose from hundreds of countries, and you choose this one that so unfairly oppresses you? How is your situation different from the individual who is free to choose any insurance company, or none at all?

Really_Not_All_That_Bright · July 17, 2009, 2:53am

Am I the only one visualizing Crafter_Man’s ideal society as the post-apocalyptic wasteland in The Road Warrior/Mad Max 2?

Rand_Rover · July 17, 2009, 2:53am

gaffa:

If my experience with a wealthy right-wing opponent to “socialized medicine” is any indicator, I don’t think any amount of reasoned argument will change Rand Rovers mind.

One of my skills is computer support. I’ve had one particular client for nearly 30 years. A doctor, great guy and I consider him a good friend as well as a client. But he is a very conservative Republican Catholic and believes the polar opposite of pretty much everything I believe in. But we like debating the issues.

When I first met him he was just out of residency, and rose in his profession to the point where he was the editor of the journal of his specialty and he built a business employing other doctors and staffing the departments of local hospitals. A solid, respectable small business employing roughly 25 people.

Eventually those hospitals were bought by the huge health conglomerates and they destroyed his business that he had been building as a legacy for his family. So he shifted to teaching and lecturing on his specialty.

In the meantime, he has had medical problems. Prostate cancer. But he found the best treatment centers with the best outcomes and it looks like he is doing OK. Enough to go back to doing something else he loves - on-field doctor for a professional sports team. And during a game he was injured by two of the players, breaking both legs.

What did the sports team do? Why they fired him, of course. Only logical, as it was the only way to avoid paying for his treatment to repair his legs - the healing complicated by the radiation and chemo he was still undergoing for the prostate cancer. And his insurance company? They dropped him. He can’t get any more insurance, as he has this “pre-existing condition”. The cost of his medical treatments are now coming out of his kid’s college fund…

And you know what? I asked him a couple of weeks ago if he liked the proposed health care bill?

“I just don’t like socialized medicine.”

Right. Not everyone is all “I want it, you have it, give it to me” like some people are. This guy apparently isn’t like that.

Sitnam · July 17, 2009, 2:53am

As much as I might agree, the debate here seems to be what SHOULD be.

On that, Rand Rover is getting pummeled.

But as he says, he’s here to rant not to practice rhetorical logic.

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Anything else you motherfuckers need?

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