How has Former President Trump pissed you off today?

[Norse]

@Starving_Artist

We’ve been speaking primarily of proudly socialistic Scandinavian countries (or so it’s been claimed in this thread by one or two of its residents), and if you live in a socialist country you by definition live a government controlled lifestlyle.

Dude, that’s so far out that it isn’t even in “not even wrong” territory.

I live in a Scandinavian country. And no, we aren’t “proudly socialistic”. We are social democratic. Or rather, our major left-of-center parties are social democrats, while our conservative parties are fairly well aligned with your Democratic party. We have a few approaching the moderate Repubs, but they’re generally regarded as right wing nuts. No major left/liberal party in Europe are “socialist”. They’re all some flavor of social democratic, which you can see even from their names (typically “labor party” or “social democratic party”). And since you apparently know nothing about current Western politics outside the US, you can start reading up on Wikipedia:

Social democracy is a political, social and economic ideology that supports economic and social interventions to promote social justice within the framework of a liberal-democratic polity and capitalist economy, as well as a policy regime involving a commitment to representative and participatory democracy, measures for income redistribution and regulation of the economy in the general interest and welfare state provisions. Social democracy thus aims to create the conditions for capitalism to lead to greater democratic, egalitarian and solidaristic outcomes; and is often associated with the set of socioeconomic policies that became prominent in Northern and Western Europe—particularly the Nordic model in the Nordic countries—during the latter half of the 20th century.

(emphasis mine)

Social democracy

Now, to my “government controlled lifestlyle (sic)”. When I was in middle school, I was given the option to either go to high school and further to college, or to take a vocational education. I have problems seeing how that was controlled by anyone but me. I could choose whichever college I wanted to enroll at, provided that my grades were good enough to admit me. And as a student, I took up public student loans with very reasonable rates and conditions, and I didn’t pay a dime in tuition fees. I don’t really understand how that was the government controlling me, unless the fact that neither I nor any of my student friends had to have rich parents to be able to study at one of the country’s best respected universities has anything to do with it. No-one told me which career to pursue, no-one told me which jobs to take, no-one told me where I should live, no-one told me how big a house or how many cars I should buy. I have to admit that I had to consider my own income level to make a responsible decision about house and car, and if I had opted for a gas guzzler big enough to land a plane on, I would have to pay more for my fills than if I opted for the mid-level crossover SUV I’m currently driving. Which, by the way, is a lot nicer to drive around in than any Detroit-made behemoth I’ve ever sat in.

Yes, I pay a bit of my income in taxes. But even with a family income comfortably above the national median, I’ve noticed that my total tax bill is smaller than what some Dopers have said that they pay in health insurance. Both in percentage of income, and in actual dollars. I can spend my disposable income exactly the way I want, particularly since I don’t have to put away a lot of money so my children can have a college education if they so choose. Because they, too, can benefit from affordable student loans and good public universities with zero tuition costs just like I did.

No, I’m not allowed to strut around town carrying a handgun. And frankly, that’s something I’m pretty happy with because I don’t have to worry about some idiot pulling a gun at me just because he thinks I cut him off in traffic. And I don’t have to worry about being shot by the police, because our social safety net makes even the criminals more mellow, so the police officers don’t have to pull a gun, safety off, for a simple traffic stop.

I regard my taxes as an insurance. An insurance against being denied medical treatment because I can’t afford it. An insurance against high crime rates caused by poverty and social differences. An insurance against being forced to live in the streets if my - or my wife’s - employer goes bankrupt and we lose our jobs. And as an investment for my retirement, because we have fairly decent pensions, so I don’t have to worry about whether my retirement savings are put in the right fund, or in the wrong one. If that means that I’m living a government controlled lifestyle, I’m all for it. Because I don’t experience more control than what’s dictated by the principle that “your freedom ends where my nose begins”.

@Starving_Artist

I found it primarily in every. single. communist country that ever existed.

So, I guess that since you bloviate with such authority, you’ve actually lived in “every. single. communist country that ever existed.”?

No I don’t, really.

[Martini_Enfield]

@Starving_Artist

I consider them evidence that there is a problem. If people weren’t complaining about wait times there wouldn’t be such a widespread effort to improve them. Or do you think up to 178 days to get a painful hip replacement is just peachy?

When it’s completely free and guaranteed to happen? Sounds good to me. Remember people with cash or health insurance can go still private and get it done in a couple of weeks at most - so everyone wins. Either way your dodgy hip gets fixed and you don’t have to remortgage your house to do it.

Look, I appreciate having The Best. Most of us do. But “Adequate” doesn’t mean eating food from plain cans labelled “FOOD” or wearing clothes which come from State Clothes Factory No. 1 or driving cars which have go-kart engines in them and run on kerosene.

I absolutely promise you all the fancy shit you enjoy in the US is available in any other first world country - even guns, in many of them. There is pretty much nothing consequential that I’m aware of that you have in the US that isn’t also available in Australia, or New Zealand, for example.

Basically, the rest of the world does not look like Soviet Russia c. 1986.

[OttoDaFe]

@Norse

<…>

No worry about copay (zero), or whether all of the health personnel I’d met were in my insurance company’s pool.

<…>

(Bolding added)

2square4u brings up an all-too-often overlooked “feature” of the US health care system when it comes to having any kind of procedure performed: that even when the surgeon is confirmed to be in the insurer’s pool, one or more of the ancillary personnel (e.g., anesthesiologist) may not be. And if that’s the case, an entirely different — and far more restricted — set of compensation rules come into play. Or perhaps no compensation at all, in which case the patient is left “twisting slowly, slowly in the wind.”

[MrDibble]

@Starving_Artist

I’d think

Like I said, ignorant. And seemingly proud of it, too.

[kaylasdad99]

@wolfpup

I’m in Canada, too, and I’m familiar with those socialist horrors. My health card was about to expire recently, meaning I would have no health insurance if I didn’t renew it, and the only way to get it renewed was to write my name on a form and submit to getting my picture taken. The harrowing experience has left me devastated. Communism has pretty much arrived, as Starving Artist will tell you.

And then there’s the story of my visit to the hospital ER in December of '16. I wanted them to check out a mild chest pain, and I left some snacks on the counter figuring I’d be back in about an hour. Turned out I was having a heart attack. The assumed hour turned into five days in hospital and a heart operation. In order to pay for this sudden unexpected medical emergency, I was forced to let them scan my health card so they could bill the government, another sign of rampant socialism and incipient communism. When it was all over, my final duty on the way out was to thank the doctors and nurses. They actually have a billing and accounts office in the hospital, but I don’t really know what it’s for. Maybe for Americans, so they can feel at home. Otherwise it’s a pretty lonely and unused place, another sign that communism has arrived.

It’s good to have Republican wingnuts like Starving Artist instruct us on all the horrors of socialized medicine, but I just thought I’d give folks a first-hand perspective of the horrors from someone who’s actually lived them.

WELL? Were the snacks still on the counter when you returned from the hospital?

If mean, c’mon, man; the Chekhov’s Snack principle is still in force, last time I looked.

Unless the snack was ketchup-flavored potato chips, in which case, never mind.

[Steve_MB]

This healthcare diversion from Trumpoltroon’s pissingoffituniousness is getting boring. Can somebody come up with the coup de grace that will make SA change the subject again? I did that for the economics subthread; do I have to do everything around here?

[El_Kabong]

@Steve_MB

This healthcare diversion from Trumpoltroon’s pissingoffituniousness is getting boring. Can somebody come up with the coup de grace that will make SA change the subject again?

Well, apparently not, because no matter what the actual subject, the only thing Starving Artist is willing or able to discuss is how liberals are personally responsible for everything he doesn’t like in the world. I’d say just ignore him, but people just can’t seem to stop themselves from futilely responding to those ever so tempting, rich, juicy walls of text.

[Evil_Economist]

@Starving_Artist

And no, I don’t define happiness by big cars, big houses, etc., as happiness must come from within. But having things that are more than ‘adequate’ are nice, and often fun. It’s nice to have a big, powerful car that will quickly get you out in traffic or up to highway speed to merge, that holds more people and carries more stuff. It’s nice to live in a big house where you have the room you need to move around, have extra rooms to fit certain purposes, can have more people over for dinner or to watch games on TV or enjoy a party. It’s simply nicer to have better things. That’s why when people can afford them, nicer things are what they buy.

Where a government controlled lifestyle that is just adequate comes into play is that it stifles people. It’s just that much harder to be happy when you’re scrunched up in a tiny house or apartment wth minimal and usually cheaply made furniture, and drive a tinny, underpowered little piece of crap that’s little better than a motorbike with a shell around it. Also people like to achieve things. it gives them a rewarding sense of accomplishment. It creates a great sense of satisfaction to look at the nice house your family is living in, and to look at the nice clothes they wear and the nice, big comfortable and powerful car they have to drive around in, and know that your accomplishments are what made it possible.

…

I’ve long noted the tendency of liberalism to take all the fun out of life. Drab and lifeless seems to be the order of the day and the more influence liberalism has over society the less nice things become. Look at the way people dress these days for example, or how nice things are criticized or mocked and portrayed as excess or the result of privilege.

Out of curiosity, which countries have you lived in? Which countries have you visited? Because you seem to be describing a caricature of a modern liberal democracy which shouldn’t have long survived exposure to reality.

[ThelmaLou]

@El_Kabong

Well, apparently not, because no matter what the actual subject, the only thing Starving Artist is willing or able to discuss is how liberals are personally responsible for everything he doesn’t like in the world. I’d say just ignore him, but people just can’t seem to stop themselves from futilely responding to those ever so tempting, rich, juicy walls of text.

YES, YES, YES. Please!! Put this line of discussion out of its misery. SA will never change his mind and never agree with any facts if they are presented by someone he considers to be “liberal,” including personal experience testimony from citizens of social democratic countries.

Cheeseless. Tunnel.

[CurtC]

@Starving_Artist

And yes, figuratively speaking there will be death panels. No government can afford to pay for every available treatment for every illness, so by definition some are going to be denied potentially life-saving treatment due to cost, as the Doper Maastricht admitted goes on in the Netherlands.

Is this any different from how it’s done in the US?

[JohnT]

Not in conservative States, which have set up laws allowing death panels:

Texas Advance Directives Act

Do note that SA decided to ignore a cited rebuttal in favor of ideological idiocy.

[septimus]

@Starving_Artist

Just so we’re on the same page, would you care to point out where I said that?

You wrote:
“Most insurance companies realize a profit of around 3% on the money they take in vs. pay out in benefits. Cite. So for every one hundred dollars paid into health care in America, only three of it gets kept by the insurance companies, and $97 of it is paid out in service of patient healthcare.”

This seemed pretty clear. Then you went on to say, in effect, that the salaries paid to 2+ million insurance employees shouldn’t count: at least those people have jobs! Well, then why not raise prices even more and hire another million if that’s your view?

This is why it’s frustrating to “debate” with someone like you. You’re caught in an error, and just slide to another faulty argument. That new error is pointed out, and you pretend you didn’t say it. You really do try to imitate your idol Trump, don’t you? — it must have made you very sad when you discovered his MBA was just a lie!

[Gyrate]

I’m just going to repeat this

@Gyrate

Or to sum up - compared to the US system, the UK system:

• Covers everyone;
• Costs less per person and in aggregate;
• Has better outcomes overall;
• Involves considerably less bureaucracy for patients (and, yes, even for practitioners);
• Is highly well-thought-of by the vast majority of the population; and
• Offers the option to pursue private care if desired.

[Mighty_Girl]

@MrDibble

You’ve never been to Scandinavia, nor met any real-life Scandinavians, have you? “Drab and lifeless”? You’re a profoundly ignorant idiot.

Oh lawd! Get that man a passport.

[Norse]

@Mighty_Girl

Oh lawd! Get that man a passport.

No, please don’t.

Sent from my E5823 using Tapatalk

[ElvisL1ves]

@CurtC

Is this any different from how it’s done in the US?

Yes. In the US, cost is *not *the only factor. Insuredness, aka ability to pay, is equally significant.

[bobot]

3.2 million fewer Americans had health insurance this year compared to last year. MAGA

Analysis | 3.2 million more people were uninsured at the end of 2017 than at...

[Knowed_Out]

@Starving_Artist

I’ve long noted the tendency of liberalism to take all the fun out of life. Drab and lifeless seems to be the order of the day and the more influence liberalism has over society the less nice things become. Look at the way people dress these days for example, or how nice things are criticized or mocked and portrayed as excess or the result of privilege. And of course life under communism, which is liberalism getting all it wants, is drabness, repression and lifeless personified. I used to think the deprivation communism was so famous for was the result of scarcity and poor central planning, but lately I’ve revised my thinking into believing that the communist ideology itself held the same view - “adequate is all you need, you would-be capitalist pig.”

Just where do you get the idea that liberalism takes the fun out of life? Whenever the left comes out with something fun, Conservatives usually squawk that it’s corrupting America’s youth, encouraging crime and eroding family values. I certainly don’t see any fashion trends towards drab and colorless apparel, and I don’t even have any fashion sense. Are you posting from a fallout shelter surrounded by Life magazine cutouts?

You seem to take for granted that communism and liberalism are the same thing, and you’re recalling Cold War-era communists dressed in green coveralls. Chinese communism wasn’t exactly following the Marx model. It was just lip service for Mao’s upheaval and ascension to power. Mao used it as a springboard to gather support of the common people and to accuse his enemies of capitalist ideas, much like the way conservatives use the “liberal” label to accuse political enemies of being unpatriotic. Just because you saw “liberalism” and “communism” close to each other on some political spectrum graph doesn’t mean they were using the Chinese as a model. You need to discard that kind of value system. It’s been obsolete for 50 years.

[JohnT]

These are people to whom the defining issue of the day is a 45 year-old Supreme Court decision. Getting them up to speed to, say, 1992 would be an improvement.

[Evil_Economist]

@Starving_Artist

It’s nice to have a big, powerful car that will quickly get you out in traffic or up to highway speed to merge

One wonders if the Germans or Italians will ever understand the appeal of a powerful car.