I have been paying into stoopit Social Security for nearly 40 years and haven't ever once needed it. Same for that dumb old Medicare.

rather than get health insurance.

I know on my part I am ready to do substantial rearranging to be able to afford it for my family.

because if they get hit by a car jaywalking can lead to an expensive 911 call/hospital visit and if they can't pay the bill, we all pay.

the idea that one with some means can opt themselves out of a system that may end up caring for them anyway, it seems reasonable to charge them something to place some of that risk on the taxpayers at large.

Health Insurance Corps. Wendell Potter explained it way back, how the Big Ins Corporations viewed those without coverage, NOT as a failure of a horrible system, that so many had to go to third world type free clinics for treatment, but as a whole new market.

It was genius. How they figured out how to get money from those too poor to be able to afford to pay for HC.

Now, instead of Medicaid going directly to pay for the indigent with a 3% overhead, the money will be funneled through the Ins. Corps first and before it gets to the sick, about 20% will be pocketed.

Let's start with the fact that people on Medicaid are not necessarily "indigent," a word which implies homeless and/or shiftless, they're just poor. Usually working poor, at that. To make out that Medicaid only covers people who are at the fringes of society insults both Medicaid and the people who need and depend on it.

Secondly, the expanded eligibility for Medicaid has nothing to do with insurance companies. That's 100% government healthcare, with absolutely no profit margin, just like "regular" Medicaid.

Third, even with the subsidies for people not eligible for Medicaid, 20% will not be "pocketed." 20% is allowed as the maximum for a company to pay all of its employees, case workers, accountants, every single person who works for that company assuring that care is paid for for the people who need it.

Fourth, if this was such a supposed gift to the insurance companies, I'm sure that you'll enlighten us as to why they spent $100,000,000 trying to fight it tooth and nail to prevent it from being passed in the first place.

decade or so:

You have no clue. You may not be indigent but if you are working at a low income rate, you may not be eligible for Medicaid at all. So you have to make yourself indigent in order to qualify. The rates have been lowered so much over the years, that yes, to qualify, at least on paper, you do need to be what is termed indigent. People have to hide income in order to qualify. States differ on rates, and some will provide for only certain illnesses.

In NYS 'working poor' are turned down. I've had experience trying to get Medicaid for people and last time I was there, Medicaid would not even cover someone making over $200 a month. I don't know what you call that, but I call it 'indigent'.



Are you serious? They spent a fortune WRITING the bill and lobbying Congress to get the kill the PO and get the Mandate passed. They may not have been happy with a few things, such as the 'pre-condition' clause, but over-all this bill saved the industry.

That's just for starters.

this whole thing is about not changing the system for most people --which was the political calculation that led us to this.

but the rest of ACA is all about allowing the disabled, those with preexisting conditions, and those who can't buy insurance on the individual market (or afford it) giving them some options and changing the insurance program to cover and provide care, rather than deny it.

that's where ACA actually did change things in a substantial way.

i want single payer as much as you do. but i feel like i've done the harder work of understanding the health care legislation and you've given me a few quotes and bumper stickers.

it aint that simple.

But it serves no purpose not to acknowledge the flaws, not just in the bill itself, in who got to have a say in it. Progressives were shut out of the process. If we are going to move forward and improve on this bill, we have to make sure that this does not happen again.

I don't like being placed in the position we have found ourselves in where we had to support something against Republicans that many of us never supported. I always opposed the Mandate, so did President Obama, one of the reasons I supported him. I will not allow political operatives or anyone else to tell me to forget what I supported. I have not changed my mind, I think the mandate is wrong, for the same reasons President Obama SAID it was wrong. Something that is wrong doesn't become right just because it's been accomplished.

But what is done is done. Now it's on to the next phase and this time we will have to be much, much less trusting than we were before. And no more listening to those who try to shut people up. That didn't work very well. What works is demanding to be heard, to use whatever tools we have to get heard. But the last thing we should ever do or have done, is to be bullied into silence.

at least, that's how i read your initial post and that's why i took issue.

but acknowledging the law's flaws? many of us supporters have posted extensively on those flaws, yet still maintained support of the law.

i have health insurance. in theory, i could just ignore this and oppose things until i see a perfect bill --my health care is okay, why not?

but there are people there that have to deal with an insurance industry almost unregulated by any sensible rules and this changes that.

and that's a good thing.

first to kill the PO and then to provide a whole new market for the Insurance Corps. have been placed in a very bad position having predicted the bill would be challenged and having no choice but to hope the Republicans would be defeated.

However, I did not believe it would be struck down, and said so several times last week, because this was the part of the bill the Insurance Corps wanted most. I thought Kennedy would be the defector. I have no idea why the Chief Justice was the one to save it, but to be honest I was never worried that it would not survive.

I just hope that we can now move towards getting at least a PO, even if it's state by state.

Sad but true. The 7 out of 10 (based on a poll here recently) who have no clue will wise up...eventually. Based on the rhetoric they use, it's highly doubtful they've even cracked open the law to look at or have any idea what people mean when they're talking about Bronze coverage.

They know to chest thump, though. I'll give them that.

PB

that would be dishonest of you.

are trying to repeal the law: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=881801

I value Wendell Potter's opinion:

Wendell Potter Agrees: Big-Profit Health Insurance Almost Dead
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002390746

what the Dem Party used to stand for. And we have more knowledge now than ever before on the corrupt Corporate influences on our government, and still people are willing to go along. I guess it really is true, we do get the government we deserve.

chart: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002881604