It appears that you think one has something to do with the other, and if so you will need to be clearer. If not, my answer to doing away with credit card companies and all that is no, but I am beginning to think that if we have to have a nanny state, we should do it in ways that actually create a better society, so why not have laws that cap the amount of credit people should be allowed to carry? And/or how much mortgage they can have. And put education on how to intelligently deal with credit in the high schools. Maybe even require people pass a test in order to get credit.
All forms of birth control, including abortion, should always be legal and easily accessible. Simple forms should be cheap. No one should be forced to have (women) or pay for (men) a baby they never wanted to have. Access to sterilization should not be so difficult.
Jesus didNOT say I must stay silent when proplr discuss whether we should raise taxes. If this thing passes, I’ll pay my increased taxes for it.
And I’ll accept that my fellow citizens, misguided as they will be if they approve this, are acting in good faith, and that we can add another expected entitlement to the list of things that Americans support. Like the Monopoly Free Parking, I can argue that the idea is poor, but if we as a society disagree, I as a member of society accept it.
I have no idea if it’s a fair representation of progressive ideology, but it’s what Blaron said.
And it’snot my civic responsibility to donate the money I earn in excess f $90,000 to make you happy.
In other words, you want people to be exploited, and to suffer. Because that’s what happens in the real world with nonsense like “personal responsibility”; it translates to “you’re on your own, sucker!” “Personal responsibility” it just a noble sounding way of saying “screw you” to the rest of humanity; it’s a way of saying that you have no responsibility.
People wouldn’t stop behaving in the ways you condemn as irresponsible; they’d just suffer and die when they did. Just like they always have throughout history. The golden age of “personal responsibility” you want to return to never existed. Instead, we had a smug society where if, say, a girl got pregnant young and unmarried, she was coerced into marriage, into an abortion, or locked away somewhere while everyone studiously ignored the whole thing, pretending such problems didn’t exist.
I love it when people like Der Trihs and Dio talk tough to rich people (i.e, talking about how rich people are parasites that need to be drained, and all that). It’s like hearing a serial killer in the world’s most secure jail cell bragging about the murders he would perform if he got out–it would be creepy to hear the bragging if he weren’t locked up, but when he is locked up, there is something sort of satisfying about it. It’s nice to know that someone who wants to do evil things really really wants to do those things and has absolutely no power to do them.
Although HIPAA adds protections and makes it easier to switch jobs without fear of losing health coverage for a preexisting condition, the law has limitations. For instance, HIPAA:
Does not require that employers offer health coverage;
Does not guarantee that any conditions you now have (or have had in the past) are covered by your new employer’s health plan; and
Does not prohibit an employer from imposing a preexisting condition exclusion period if you have been treated for a condition during the past 6 months.
Well, I know what you think is funny and ironic about it. But I don’t have adolescent fantasies about what I would do to a class of people if I got my way. I just have ideas about the best way to govern a society. That’s the critical difference.
I don’t know what’s “typical.” I admit this freely. I do know that, in the past, I have been denied coverrage for a pre-existing condition upon taking a new job. It wasn’t Parkinson’s – this was quite a few years ago, before I had Parkinson’s, or at least before I knew I had it. I was denied coverage for needed knee surgery (a knee replacement). It took a long time, but ultimately I did get coverage (under a different insurance plan). It was a rough year between needing the surgery and getting it. For all I know, the law, or the plan that denied me coverage, may have changed since then.
Now, putting up with knee pain and the inability to walk very far, or ride a bicycle, is an inconvenience. It can be dealt with. Putting up with untreated Parkinson’s in the future, as the condition progresses, would be more than an inconvenience.
And, in any event, let us say that legislation is passed that prohibits group plans from excluding pre-existing conditions. Good. This would be a good thing. I would still not be able to go out on my own as a consultant (something I’ve thought of doing – I believe there’s a market for what I do) and purchasing my own insurance. And covering me (if I could) *and *my wife would be prohibitively expensive, especially in the initial stages of running my own business.
Since I take medication every day, and have to renew my prescriptions monthly, seems to me that I could be excluded, at least for coverage for this condition. My last treatment (depending on how that word is defined) is either the last pill I took, or the last time my doctor called in or wrote a prescription for me. These things obviously happen more frequently than every six months.
It is true that I might find a job with insurance that doesn’t exclude pre-existing conditions, or at least my pre-existing condition. It may be that my state insurance regulation rules provide stronger protections. Right now, I don’t know. But I’m sure you can imagine that it’s all pretty worrying.
SL, there are ways to get group insurance even if you are an independent consultant. One way is to become a “group” of one. Look, the main point here is you shouldn’t let scare tactics from the left (or the right, for that matter) keep you up at night. You could also use a health savings account to save money on regular health expenses.
Those are other words, but they are not mine. OTOH, yes, I don’t have any responsibility to you or anyone else who demands that I go without to pay for whatever it is that you are currently thinking you are entitled to. Since you apparently like those words, your demands on our income is the same thing as saying “screw you sucker, I want you to pay for this”.
Really? If we no longer allowed people to go bankrupt while keeping some or most of their possessions, you don’t think they might be more careful about running up credit card debt? If our society quit treating teenage pregnancy and children born in poverty as natural and something to be celebrated, you don’t think people might quit choosing to have children they cannot afford? If we as a society placed more reward on personal responsibility instead of punishing it, you don’t think more people might decide to be responsible?
And how is that worse than what we currently have? Do you think that is worse than 14 year olds raising babies, women who cannot afford the children having more, restrictions on birth control but none on birth? You prefer to condemn all these babies to a poor upbringing, instead of putting the punishment on the ones who put them in that situation?
Now I want pony socks. I can’t decide if they’d be more awesome as socks with ponies on them or socks for a pony, but either way, I want.
Well, that blows. Thanks for sharing–hopefully if you ever have to switch insurance, we’ll have modified our system enough that your concerns will be a moot point.
Yes–let’s not forget the vast economic wasteland that is every country with UHC. The last time I transferred through Heathrow, it was pretty much a tent city.
… Oh wait.
Until we require everyone to have health insurance at all times, pre-existing condition clauses will never go away. Ever. Otherwise, people would only pick up health insurance when they had a problem and then drop it as soon as they were healthy. Premiums would go through the fucking roof.
We keep the areas close to the international airports full of Potemkin villages to fool the toursits. Get more that 20 miles away and the streets are full of the bodies of those killed by the Death Panels.
If that’s the case, why hasn’t the stock market reacted? If the doomsayers were correct, shareholders should be bolting to sell their shares before they become worthless. That doesn’t look like it’s happening.
I can’t decide if they’d be more awesome as socks with ponies on them or socks for a pony, but either way, I want.