The Health Care Debate

[im2kull]

It "doesn't matter" because brotha2kull obviously wasn't really aware of it when he went off and made is ill-informed commentary about how this is being rushed through.  

'What, Congress debated it for a month?  That's trivial.  I am defiantly going down with this loser of an argument like a rat on a sinking ship."

Like I said, the Senate debate is the only one that really matters.  If not, we wouldn't be having it...now would we?

Don't jump to conclusions about what I do and do not know, let alone am aware of when it comes to this health care bill and its debate.  I'm probably one of the few people on this forum that found more than just a few minutes worth of time to watch the (formal) house debate...which...for the record: Did NOT last an entire month.  

You should stop before you dig that hole any deeper.  Your "Facts" are just about as invalid as every other word spewed from your mouth.  What's worse, is that unlike AKP, you profusely refuse to change your view and standpoint on anything...even when its clearly wrong.

Then again, I shouldn't expect quite so much accuracy from someone who puts Lenexa & KCMO in the same sentence, let alone says them with the same breath.  Your like a dry Thanksgiving Day Turkey, that's been sliced and broiled for just a bit too long...yuck!

-Brotha2kull Out'

[anniewarbucks]

With the health care debate comes another issue, the countless number of employers that do not offer health insurance to their employees currently. With the non existence of this insurance comes employees that do not get paid vacation time, paid sick leave, breaks during their shift and other benefits that those with health care receive. These companies will be forced to offer these benefits to their employees after the legislation is enacted to stay in step with the contracts that the health insurance companies put forward. I work for such a company and will be happy when this is made into law.

[LenexatoKCMO]

You should stop before you dig that hole any deeper.  Your "Facts" are just about as invalid as every other word spewed from your mouth.  What's worse, is that unlike AKP, you profusely refuse to change your view and standpoint on anything...even when its clearly wrong.

Do you even know what my big-picture "view" is on this subject?  You seem awfully convinced that it is "wrong" and needs changing. 

[im2kull]

Do you even know what my big-picture "view" is on this subject?  You seem awfully convinced that it is "wrong" and needs changing. 

I'll admit, off the top of my head: No.  At this point I'm not even sure what were arguing about, since I am a social healthcare supporter.  Oh, that's right...we're arguing about Obama-Care (A Horrible misstep & about the furthest thing away from Social Healthcare that there is).

[LenexatoKCMO]

I'll admit, off the top of my head: No.  At this point I'm not even sure what were arguing about, since I am a social healthcare supporter.  Oh, that's right...we're arguing about Obama-Care (A Horrible misstep & about the furthest thing away from Social Healthcare that there is).

So just to clarify - you ran off at the mouth with some ~200 word diatribe about how I was "clearly wrong", innaccurate, and invalid - yet you have no idea what my position is on the issue?  Nice work!

Did it occurr to you that a person could be passionately opposed to nationalized health care yet at the same time be disgusted by the low brow tactics and intellectually dishonest arguments being offered by the GOP and the Teapartiers?

[im2kull]

So just to clarify - you ran off at the mouth with some ~200 word diatribe about how I was "clearly wrong", innaccurate, and invalid - yet you have no idea what my position is on the issue?  Nice work!

There's not exactly a "Position" to take when the argument is about when, and how long, the "Official" debate on Capitol Hill (In the House) took place.  That's a Fact:Fact debate, which is why I said you were so "Clearly Wrong" (On the basis that they had been "debating" for months...when the only debate that matters lasted barely a day)

Like I said, If you want to mix & match arguments...be my guest.  Just don't expect me, or anyone else on this forum to have a clue as to which part of your arse backwards philosophy you're debating.

[LenexatoKCMO]

Hey, brotha2kull - turn on CSPAN so you can watch the Senate debate health care. 

[DaveKCMO]

Hey, brotha2kull - turn on CSPAN so you can watch the Senate debate health care. 

no excuses! you can even watch it live online! this is really all that matters, right?

[aknowledgeableperson]

Is the legislation dead or not?  Looks like the public option out for now.

Will be interesting to see what the House has to say about the legislation now.

[DaveKCMO]

Is the legislation dead or not?  Looks like the public option out for now.

Will be interesting to see what the House has to say about the legislation now.

the senate will pass something, no one is betting against that. public option is definitely out, but most agree they never really had the votes to pull that off (and it wasn't an obama campaign promise, even though a robust version would have been a big money-saver).

lots of sausage-making left, however...

[Highlander]

the senate will pass something, no one is betting against that. public option is definitely out, but most agree they never really had the votes to pull that off (and it wasn't an obama campaign promise, even though a robust version would have been a big money-saver).

lots of sausage-making left, however...

Problem is, a lot of democratic senators are bailing on it because it does so little.  Will it pass?  I am not so sure. 

[zlohban]

Wed Dec 16, 5:57 pm ET
WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama has signed into law a $1.1 trillion bill that increases the budgets in many areas of the government by about 10 percent, including health, law enforcement and veterans' programs.

Obama signed the bill privately at the White House on Wednesday after receiving the bill from Congress on Sunday

Wow government gets more of our money to spend while we continue to debate a health care bill that we can't afford.  I haven't heard a single TV pundit mention this increase in spending.

[phuqueue]

Wed Dec 16, 5:57 pm ET
WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama has signed into law a $1.1 trillion bill that increases the budgets in many areas of the government by about 10 percent, including health, law enforcement and veterans' programs.

Obama signed the bill privately at the White House on Wednesday after receiving the bill from Congress on Sunday

Wow government gets more of our money to spend while we continue to debate a health care bill that we can't afford.  I haven't heard a single TV pundit mention this increase in spending.

Turn on your TV.

[zlohban]

We taxpayers need to put severe controls on congress and their excess spending before we can talk about real Health Care Reform.  Anything they pass now will only be to say they passed something, it will not result in any true reform.

EDINBURGH -- The expenses racked up by U.S. lawmakers traveling here for a conference last month included one for the "control room."

Besides rooms for sleeping, the 12 members of the House of Representatives rented their hotel's fireplace-equipped presidential suite and two adjacent rooms. The hotel cleared out the beds and in their place set up a bar, a snack room and office space. The three extra rooms -- stocked with liquor, Coors beer, chips and salsa, sandwiches, Mrs. Fields cookies and York Peppermint Patties -- cost a total of about $1,500 a night. They were rented for five nights.

While in Scotland, the House members toured historic buildings. Some shopped for Scotch whisky and visited the hotel spa. They capped the trip with a dinner at one of the region's finest restaurants, paid for by the legislators, who got $118 daily stipends for meals and incidentals.

Eleven of the 12 legislators then left the five-day conference two days early.

The tour provides a glimpse of the mixture of business and pleasure involved in legislators' overseas trips, which are growing in number and mostly financed by the taxpayer. Lawmakers travel with military liaisons who carry luggage, help them through customs, escort them on sightseeing trips and stock their hotel rooms with food and liquor. Typically, spouses come along, flying free on jets operated by the Air Force. Legislative aides come too. On the ground, all travel in chauffeured vehicles.

[LenexatoKCMO]

Wed Dec 16, 5:57 pm ET
Wow government gets more of our money to spend while we continue to debate a health care bill that we can't afford.  I haven't heard a single TV pundit mention this increase in spending.

Technically its the People's Republic Of China's money. 

[mudjack]

Besides rooms for sleeping, the 12 members of the House of Representatives rented their hotel's fireplace-equipped presidential suite and two adjacent rooms. The hotel cleared out the beds and in their place set up a bar, a snack room and office space. The three extra rooms -- stocked with liquor, Coors beer, chips and salsa, sandwiches, Mrs. Fields cookies and York Peppermint Patties -- cost a total of about $1,500 a night. They were rented for five nights.

For that kind of cash, one would think they could get some better beer.

[phuqueue]

We taxpayers need to put severe controls on congress and their excess spending before we can talk about real Health Care Reform.  Anything they pass now will only be to say they passed something, it will not result in any true reform.

EDINBURGH -- The expenses racked up by U.S. lawmakers traveling here for a conference last month included one for the "control room."

Besides rooms for sleeping, the 12 members of the House of Representatives rented their hotel's fireplace-equipped presidential suite and two adjacent rooms. The hotel cleared out the beds and in their place set up a bar, a snack room and office space. The three extra rooms -- stocked with liquor, Coors beer, chips and salsa, sandwiches, Mrs. Fields cookies and York Peppermint Patties -- cost a total of about $1,500 a night. They were rented for five nights.

While in Scotland, the House members toured historic buildings. Some shopped for Scotch whisky and visited the hotel spa. They capped the trip with a dinner at one of the region's finest restaurants, paid for by the legislators, who got $118 daily stipends for meals and incidentals.

Eleven of the 12 legislators then left the five-day conference two days early.

The tour provides a glimpse of the mixture of business and pleasure involved in legislators' overseas trips, which are growing in number and mostly financed by the taxpayer. Lawmakers travel with military liaisons who carry luggage, help them through customs, escort them on sightseeing trips and stock their hotel rooms with food and liquor. Typically, spouses come along, flying free on jets operated by the Air Force. Legislative aides come too. On the ground, all travel in chauffeured vehicles.

I had a longer rant here, but it's not worth it.  Suffice to say, $1500/night isn't even a drop in the sea of government spending.  We'd still be running huge deficits if they'd stayed at the Holiday Inn and eaten at Red Lobster, or if they hadn't gone at all.  This symbolic outrage does nothing but obscure real problems.  Let's try to keep our eye on the ball here.

[LenexatoKCMO]

I had a longer rant here, but it's not worth it.  Suffice to say, $1500/night isn't even a drop in the sea of government spending.  We'd still be running huge deficits if they'd stayed at the Holiday Inn and eaten at Red Lobster, or if they hadn't gone at all.  This symbolic outrage does nothing but obscure real problems.  Let's try to keep our eye on the ball here.

Symbolic outrage is right.  Any member of our federal legislative branch that claims to be "fiscally conservative" is flat out full of shit.  There are really only two paths towards fiscal solvency in this country 1) tax hikes, or 2) committing to massively slashing the defense budget, medicare/medicaid, and all of the various low income assistance programs.  No one on the mainstream political stage has the testicular fortitude to do either.  So all of this faux indignity and lip service about junkets needs to be recognized for what it is.  There isn't a member of the R or D party who's fiscal plan isn't based entirely on ever-increasing chinese debt and their claims to the contrary are a pile of BS. 

[FangKC]

Sixty years of fighting the Communist threat; however the US government doesn't have any problem borrowing trillions from the Chinese communists.

I have no problem providing health care to all US citizens.

However, if everyone is so upset about spending money on American health care, why doesn't anyone seem to be upset about the billions we spend providing security for other rich economies, namely Germany, Japan, South Korea, Great Britain, Belgium, Italy, Spain and Turkey?  The Cold War has ended.  Can't these countries afford to defend themselves?

At this point, the European Union should be able to defend themselves, and there is no need for US military to be there.

Because the US spends so much defending these countries, they don't have to do it themselves and can afford to spend money on their own people.

In essence, we are borrowing money from a Communist nation to finance our own spending, part of which is used to protect other countries that can afford to defend themselves.

[zlohban]

I had a longer rant here, but it's not worth it.  Suffice to say, $1500/night isn't even a drop in the sea of government spending.  We'd still be running huge deficits if they'd stayed at the Holiday Inn and eaten at Red Lobster, or if they hadn't gone at all.  This symbolic outrage does nothing but obscure real problems.  Let's try to keep our eye on the ball here.

Please do rant. The point is that we have a President, a Sec. of State and Ambassadors to oversee international affairs, congressman need not apply, they should stay close to home and take care of the issues concerning their own districts.