How to best create change

[mdmc]

The one thing that this health care bill did is show the powers that be that they are not above the law.
Sure they got to write the law, but we all know, they would have preferred to kill this bill. Writing the bill was the concession.
Yet write it they did.
Now we all know corporations will make a profit if one is to be had. Well denying expensive treatments has always been profitable.
We don't need a public option, the corporations will not change - they will pursue profit until it becomes unprofitable to do so (via regulation, court fines, criminal charges).

We have shown that the corporations are not above regulation (sure, it was regulation written by them, for them, but still).
Next, logic suggests that the corporations will not provide better health care at the expense of profits. Ain't gonna happen.
So we will need to be ready to take them on again, and regulate them, or shut them down, depending on what we are able to do what we can get done.

The eventual change we will be able to create will depend on how well this bill works. If, for instance, my co-payments go down (if the cost of my medical treatment goes down), I will be happy with the bill and will not seek to alter it. However, if I continue to be unable to afford treatment due to my excessive copayments, if formerly uninsured people are now insured and still can't access treatment, if health care quality dives instead of increases, then we will have a chance to fix this bill.

Obama is a smart man and I suggest that we all continue to fight for what we believe, and try our hardest to support Obama when our interests our mutual. I think Obama knows this bill is a first step, that this bills benefits will need to be improved upon, and that we will have to revisit this bill sometime in the next 8 years.

[Laelth]

1. I do not believe that the powers that be wanted to kill this bill.

Quite the contrary. I think the health insurance industry, at least, very much wanted this bill. And they got what they wanted.

Kill the bill.

Forcing people to buy insurance is no more the answer to a failed health care system than forcing people to buy houses is the solution to homelessness.

:dem:

-Laelth

[mdmc]

2. The Ins. industry WROTE the bill, so obviously it had a lot for them

This bill will give the ins. industry pretty much everything they wanted, but will enforce some restrictions on the "sicko" type practices that the industry currently embraces.

The bill will fail to create access to affordable health care.
In fact, the bill will basically take the uninsured, and make them effectively insured - but without access to medical TREATMENT (I currently have health insurance that is too expensive to utilize). Lots of people will be insured without access to health care.

So the bill will not succeed, because the ins. industry will not give up profit.

People will not see health care costs go down.

And there will be a call for change.

28 other countries do a better job then us in regards to health care.

Having the ins. company write our health care laws didn't work. Something else will have to be done.

Stay the course. This bill is the first step to the fulfillment of Teddy's dream of universal health care.