# Dancing on the grave of health care "reform" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 3, 2010, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487 "2010-02-03T04:17:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/201 "2010-02-05T18:30:41Z")
It’s not just other people, you Randian douche. It’s also _you_. The problem with private health insurance is not just that everyone doesn’t have it and can’t get it - it’s also that lots of people who _do_ have it find that it doesn’t or won’t cover them when they actually need it. Sure, you can take them to court, but even if you’re going to win you’re still being forced to make a financial choice without knowing if you can actually pay for it or not. Surely even you can see that this is an untenable position. Hell, by the time litigation concludes, you might _already_ have lost your car, home and job. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/202 "2010-02-05T18:35:59Z")
In an article on [Barry Commoner’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Commoner) third-party run for president in 1976, [Robert Anton Wilson](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Anton_Wilson) commented, “Politically I suppose I should have supported Ed Clark, but I’m not that kind of Libertarian; I don’t hate poor people.” (The Libertarian nominee that year was Roger MacBride; but Wilson was writing early in the year.) I’ll give Wilson the benefit of the doubt there because he was so awesome, but from what I’ve seen, there are very few self-ID’d Libertarians who can honestly say that. And **Rand Rover** definitely is not one of them. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/203 "2010-02-05T18:38:59Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Right, but that is just coercion to stop people from hurting others, so ita the same as the police essentially. I’m fine with that coercion. I don’t like coercion that stops me from owning property just because the government decides that other people are in more need of it. Yeah, but owning something doesn’t mean that the state doesn’t interfere in how you can use it and derive in income from it. The state interferes with our economic property rights all the time. So why is ownership actually so important? It might be better to have fewer things you can own but have greater rights to them. Being able to own anything and do anything with it might be nice, but I agree with you that this has to be limited to keep people from hurting others. But if the fact that you own something might be a symptom of a greater problem that does hurt others, what then? I just don’t think that in these cases, maximizing ownership is a very good guide to either the utility of the owners or the utility of the people who might benefit from some redistribution. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/204 "2010-02-05T18:39:02Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > The thing about many libertarians is that they rarely think past the superficial “taxes are theft, government should not be involved, charities could handle healthcare for the poor” > > There are implications if we were to go down a road like this. The systems in society are complex and interconnected, however Libertarians like **RR** either ignore or minimize the complexity involved. They go for the simple sound bite answer, and fail to recognize the vast implications of implementation. > > For example (not an exhaustive list!) > > - How would charities manage to raise the enormous amounts needed? Who would administer this? > - Would healthcare charities for the poor be vetted somehow? Who would make sure that corrupt people did not start a “charity” and fleece people? > - Given a finite amount of resources, how do these charities ration healthcare? > - What to do about “free riders” who give nothing to charity, but reap the benefits of a healthy, functioning society that provides them with customers, clients, and service people? > - What happens to private insurance companies when they are competing with tax-exempt charities? Is this fair? > -Is it OK if healthcare is vastly different in quality in different geographic areas due to economics? Would it be acceptable for average life expectancy in a poor state or city to be 45 years? > It is reasonable to expect everyone to “pay their own way” for healthcare, when a health crisis can occur at a young age, before you have been able to gather resources? For example, a 20 year old cancer patient - are they irresponsible for not having saved a nest egg of $100,000 for treatment? > - Can everyone accept that begging a charity for your life is something that is reasonable or OK for our fellow citizens to have to go through? They’re not begging for a jet plane. They’re begging for their life. Does this fit with everyone’s moral code? > > It’s complex. It’s interconnected, as we live in a thing called a society. Healthcare is not amenable to sound bite answers or simplistic mantras. [**Rand Rover** doesn’t usually give to charity.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=10972559&postcount=101) ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/205 "2010-02-05T18:42:34Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > I haven’t been to a single teaparty event, or watched one on TV, or really know a great deal about them. I had my views long before the teaparty stuff started. So how are they working me and making me their pawn? Since you’ve had these views for awhile, they may not be influencing you. However, they are, by popularizing those notions for small, angry people, making you seem like less of a fringe whackjob. So in this case I suppose they’re helping _you_. Most people have to be massaged into your special brand of stupidity, but I guess you’re a natural. 😃 To reiterate. The teapartiers who talk about taxes being violence are being used by anti-regulation, pro business cock-suckers like Dick Armey. It’s a simplistic chant to get people angry and ready to vote. You’re just helping because you aren’t smart enough to know the difference. I stand corrected. ---
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/206 "2010-02-05T18:42:40Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I know this won’t sway you. But seriously – mental disorder?? C’mon. **Bricker** , I know you are a sharp guy, but let me point out the exceedingly obvious: **Rand Rover** doesn’t insult and name-call because it backs up his argument, he does it because that _is_ his argument. **Rand** really thinks calling someone “mentally disordered” or “liberal douchebag” are the debating equivalent of a slam-dunk, an “I win” button for playing on the internet. And he’s going to keep hitting Plan A because there is no Plan B. As **Maeglin** rightly pointed out, he’s got nothin’. In fact, it’s precisely because he knows next to nothing that he thinks he knows everything–the smartest people on earth are the ones that are the first to say they’ve still got a lot to learn. That is, of course, unless one has learned everything they already can in life, which suggests that **RR** ’s last years on earth will be rather dull. It amuses me that **RR** couldn’t stay away from this place. You’d think if he hated us all so much, thought we were mentally disordered or liberal douchebags, that he’d just stay away. It takes a certain kind of obsessive monomania to hang out with those you hate for…well, what, really? “After work, I’m going to sit around in this old, dirty bar with $9 beers and greasy, belching cigar-smokers. The place sucks, but I can’t stay away!” ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/207 "2010-02-05T18:57:14Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > In an article on [Barry Commoner’s](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Commoner) third-party run for president in 1976, [Robert Anton Wilson](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Anton_Wilson) commented, “Politically I suppose I should have supported Ed Clark, but I’m not that kind of Libertarian; I don’t hate poor people.” (The Libertarian nominee that year was Roger MacBride; but Wilson was writing early in the year.) I’ll give Wilson the benefit of the doubt there because he was so awesome, but from what I’ve seen, there are very few self-ID’d Libertarians who can honestly say that. And **Rand Rover** definitely is not one of them. Why do you think I hate poor people? Please be specific. ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/208 "2010-02-05T19:01:06Z")
The opposite of love is not hate, it is apathy. I don’t think you hate poor people, I just think you don’t give two shits about them. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/209 "2010-02-05T19:13:14Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > The opposite of love is not hate, it is apathy. > > I don’t think you hate poor people, I just think you don’t give two shits about them. I disagree. I care enough about poor people that I want them to be treated as humans and not as pets. The liberal position of absolving poor people from responsibility for themselves treats them as inhuman. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/210 "2010-02-05T19:26:29Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > I disagree. I care enough about poor people that I want them to be treated as humans and not as pets. The liberal position of absolving poor people from responsibility for themselves treats them as inhuman. You’ve used that line before. Come up with a new one. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/211 "2010-02-05T19:33:32Z")
Tough love. Cut every program to the poor and those who survive will be so much better. Who absolves the poor for their own responsibility? There you go again, making shit up. The poor have kids. They are not responsible for being poor. Many poor are sick. Sorry but lumping the poor into a group that wants Rover money and will not work is so easy to do. It is wrong though. It is revitalizing the anti black arguments of the past. You should be ashamed. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/212 "2010-02-05T19:41:42Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > [**Rand Rover** doesn’t usually give to charity.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=10972559&postcount=101) Ah, gotcha. So Rand Rover is admittedly looking for a “free ride”; He can say that charity should replace taxation, then give nothing to charity. This way he can reap the benefits of living in a healthy, safe, functional society without having to pay a nickle to maintain that society. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/213 "2010-02-05T19:44:13Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > I disagree. I care enough about poor people that I want them to be treated as humans and not as pets. This has to be the most hateful, condescending notion I’ve seen on these forums. It’s breathtaking in its absolute indifference. Making sure that everyone has access to the healthcare you enjoy is \*nothing \*like treating others as “pets”. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/214 "2010-02-05T19:52:35Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > This has to be the most hateful, condescending notion I’ve seen on these forums. It’s breathtaking in its absolute indifference. > > Making sure that everyone has access to the healthcare you enjoy is \*nothing \*like treating others as “pets”. If we just could breed RR and Curlcoat. That would be some dry, unpleasant sex. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/215 "2010-02-05T19:53:33Z")
> [@Euphonious\_Polemic](#): > > Ah, gotcha. > > So Rand Rover is admittedly looking for a “free ride”; He can say that charity should replace taxation, then give nothing to charity. > > This way he can reap the benefits of living in a healthy, safe, functional society without having to pay a nickle to maintain that society. Wrong again, bub. I am willing to pay whatever it costs, including 100% of my income, in tax if that is what it takes to pay for those things that I believe are a legitimate function of government (assuming the tax burden is distributed fairly). ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/216 "2010-02-05T20:00:10Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > Wrong again, bub. I am willing to pay whatever it costs, including 100% of my income, in tax if that is what it takes to pay for those things that I believe are a legitimate function of government (assuming the tax burden is distributed fairly). What happens if someone else has a set of legitimate functions of government that doesn’t overlap perfectly with yours? Rock-paper-scissors? Edit: I would say the choice should be made based on the public good. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/217 "2010-02-05T20:16:01Z")
> [@Lightnin](#): > > This has to be the most hateful, condescending notion I’ve seen on these forums. It’s breathtaking in its absolute indifference. > > Making sure that everyone has access to the healthcare you enjoy is \*nothing \*like treating others as “pets”. On the first part, you sure about that? I’ve said some pretty hateful stuff about liberal douches around here. You may want to do a search before deciding that that is the most hateful. On the second part, sorry the truth bothers you. Liberal douches like to pat poor people on the head and say “there there dear, let me make it all better.” That’s not how one adult treats another. ---
**Author:** ![tacoloco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tacoloco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tacoloco)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/218 "2010-02-05T20:18:34Z")
> [@Jack\_Batty](#): > > I don’t think you hate poor people, I just think you don’t give two shits about them. I call this the **curlcoat** syndrome. Also know as _fuck you, I’ve got mine_. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/219 "2010-02-05T20:26:23Z")
> [@Rand\_Rover](#): > > On the second part, sorry the truth bothers you. Liberal douches like to pat poor people on the head and say “there there dear, let me make it all better.” That’s not how one adult treats another. So how exactly is this different from what a charity does? Does the charity you claim should help people who make $20k per year not treat the poor like adults? Are people who support these charities just eleemosynary douches? I love that word, eleemosynary. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 5, 2010, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487/220 "2010-02-05T21:11:48Z")
Aww, hell, **Rand** , don’t back down now! At least your stance as a spiritual vacuum has a certain panache, a certain…oh, I don’t know…_je ne sais quoi_? But if you start pretending to give a rat’s, then you have to pretend that ruthless indifference is some form of tough love, and, jeez, we can get that from any other dollar store Republican! Only thing makes you remotely interesting is your reptilian emptiness, don’t start diluting the cyanide in your Kool-aid! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dancing-on-the-grave-of-health-care-reform/527487.md?page=12)