If you aren't careful you will trip over your semantics one of these days.

Going to lp.org is the best way to find out what the Libertarian party is about. It's about limited Constitutional government and resistance to all-powerful states, whether they be communist, socialist, fascist, or whatever.

http://www.lp.org/

An anarchist is an extreme libertarian, like a socialist is an extreme democrat, and a fascist is an extreme republican.

and the best answer

Libertarians believe in free markets, private property, and capitalism. Anarchists who believe in these things usually call themselves libertarians.

I can't believe I'm actually discussing this

For the record, Libertarians are not anarchists, which is what your comments seem to imply. Voluntary cooperative efforts are just peachy, but if an individual wants to go live alone, that's fine too.

I sympathize with the plight of persons who are bankrupted by medical expenses. That portion of ObamaCare I agree with. Mandates to insurance companies to not exclude pre-existing conditions, to not be able to cancel insurance when people get sick, those are the right things to do, but they DO drives insurance costs up. I also understand the moral imperative to get everyone insured. No problems with that from this hard-hearted Libertarian/Conservative.

The problem with the ObamaCare bills so far is, they don't bend down the health care cost curve. The number one problem with our health care system, as you pointed out yourself, is that it costs too much. The growing uninsured problem is a result of that. Businesses increasingly cannot afford to insure their employees. Individuals cannot afford to insure themselves. Most of the unemployed sure cannot afford the high cost of COBRA. Yet, as the CBO has pointed out repeatedly, the various Democratic health care reform bills drive the costs up instead of down. Medicare premiums will increase. Prescription drug prices will increase. This is not the reform we need. In addition to getting no concessions from insurers, the Dems are ignoring ideas that WILL drive the cost curve down. In the end, we are left with little more than a government mandate that everyone purchase health insurance. To paraphrase Obama from last year's presidential debate, "the problem with health care is not that we aren't forcing people to buy health care insurance." Now he's changed 180 degrees.

Back to the drawing board on health care reform, and this time, it should be a bipartisan effort including the best ideas from both sides, and it should engage health care practitioners and insurance companies for their ideas too, in order to find a real solution.

Ya I forgot the "be" after may too. When I get to typing fast I typo sometimes and I misread your 10K. Are you happy now? I do have a foundation, actually a trust, for a small group of people with a specific problem. I supply 4 rent free homes to 4 people and they are not relatives. What do you do? Who said patriotism = willingness to pay more taxes? I didn't.
Patriotism is loving one's country and participating in it to make it as good a country as it can be in my book and if that means paying more taxes then so be it. I have paid huge amounts of taxes in my lifetime and the chance that I will ever get back as much as I have paid in is close to nil. I would like those taxes to benefit my country as a whole not just a select few. Would consider signing up to go to Mars?

I'll try to go slowly here. The $10k mentioned is the maximum amount the person would have to pay out of pocket before insurance covers the remainder of the treatment. It's NOT a cap on the total amount of care or benefits.

Again, individuals do not have to liquidate all of their assets in order to receive Medicaid family coverage. It sounds like you are confusing this with nursing home requirements for extended care.

As far as your random "fact" spewing, it isn't very persuasive. The high cost of care here can be attributed to defensive medical practices because of our litigious society, along with poor planning by people to manage their end of life care.

Are you seriously arguing that if you needed a heart transplant you would be more comfortable in Sweden than the Cleveland Clinic?

On a personal note, the notion that patriotism = willingness to pay more taxes is ridiculous. If you are "rich" (whatever that means) nothing is stopping you from creating a foundation to help people who are less fortunate. The fact that you claim to be successful and don't know the difference between "loose" and "lose" undermines your credibility. Invest in a dictionary!

Problem is….EVERYONE is one medical disaster away from financial disaster. EVERYONE.
To think otherwise is just denial.

King, here's what Bush proposed….

"the administration is seeking an even more far-reaching change to Medicare — capping the amount the government spends on the program.

Under current law, if the portion of Medicare spending that comes from the general treasury (as opposed to payroll taxes or beneficiary premiums) rises above 45 percent, the president is required to make savings recommendations to Congress, which is free to ignore them. HHS Secretary Leavitt says the administration wants to put some teeth in that requirement: "If it goes above 45 percent, that it will trigger a series of actions that would keep it at 45 percent," he said.

And if Congress does not act, an across-the-board cut of 0.4 percent would be imposed on all Medicare payments, instead."

Bush was going to cut medicare fees to doctors and hospitals, arbitrarily and across the board. Obama is planning on eliminating the windfall to private insurers in the Medicare Advantage program.

And you're also wrong on the Humana story. Any private group working hand in hand with the government in the Medicare and Medicaid programs are forbidden from scaring seniors and lying about those programs. Humana did what they did to protect their beloved profits…..and you defend the indefensible actions of Humana in allegiance to your own private industry=good, government=bad , ideology.

between 44,000 and 98,000 patients die every year in American hospitals of iatrogenic infections or as the consequence of a mistaken diagnosis or a bungled operation. American hospitals and doctors are paid for the amount of care they produce, not for its effectiveness or its quality. Medical error ranks as the country's eighth leading cause of death, more deadly than breast cancer or highway accidents.

Americans in 2007 paid $7,421 per capita for health care as opposed to $2,840 paid by the Finns and $3,328 by the Swedes, but life expectancy in the United States is not as long as it is in 30 other countries, among them Finland and Sweden; the first year infant mortality rate in the United States is higher than it is in some forty other countries, among them Slovenia and Singapore. A newborn child stands a better chance of survival in Minsk and Havana than it does in New York or Washington.

The money allocated to health care in most other developed countries (in Canada and France as well as in Germany and Japan) provides medical insurance for the entire citizenry. Not in America; 46 million citizens (15% of the population) are uninsured. Patients with sufficient funds can buy a brain implant or a bionic eye, but an estimated 22,000 people died in 2006 for lack of insurance; 59 million other people reported their inability to receive needed medical attention.

..American healthcare shopping mall now offers expensive diagnostic tests that allow upwards of 6 million Americans to enjoy the benefit of high-priced bodily home improvements — Titanium knees, Peruvian kidneys, two hour erections and a sunny disposition. Of the 1.5 million Americans expected to declare personal bankruptcy this year, 60% will be forced to do so to pay their medical bills.

You call this a system. Even if you have prepared for your accident or cancer or hangnail do you really want to use this system? Oh may you are rich . I am and I have enough sense to know this is not a system I want to trust my life to.

Cobra is expensive as it reflects the employer portion of costs, obviously. Ohio Medicaid eligibility is largely based upon income. A family of 4 can have income of up to $1654/mo and still be eligible:

http://jfs.ohio.gov/Ohp/consumers/HSHFIncomeGuidelines.pdf

Alternately, there are many low cost / high deductible plans that provide umbrella protection in the event of catastrophic illness. Looking at the numbers, a family of 3 can essentially limit their risk to $10k per person or $20k per family for under $200 a month. You can run the numbers on the Summa website to verify this.

Just because death and illness are certain, that does not excuse a person from failing to plan for that eventuality. Its just as likely that at some point I will be involved in an auto accident, through no fault of my own. Does that entitle me to have you pay for part of my car insurance?

from a previous thread…..Insurers' Anti-Trust Exemption
By dday Friday Sep 18, 2009 10:00am John Conyers and some allies on the House Judiciary Committee have come up with a fabulous way to get the insurance industry in line – by threatening to remove their anti-trust exemption. Conyers is a dem

in 2007 Patrick Leahy sponsered S.618 wich delt with the McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945. Leahy is a dem

"…….the GOP has proposed healthcare reform that provides coverage for all, at a lower cost, and doesn't increase the deficit." Give us a link

If the relative who lost their job has no income, they would be eligible for government assistance via medicaid in most cases. If they have income and simply declined COBRA coverage,

Your kidding right? Medicaid kicks in when everything is gone – as in gone. Something like $3200 in assets minus the home if a spouse is living in the home – it does allow them to keep something like $37 a month for expenses. And COBRA often costs more than twice what the person was paying for health insurance while employed. I have helped 4 relatives negotiate the US Health Care Messs. Yes there is a social net out there but why should someone have to worry about finding that those social services when they should be concentrating on surviving the illness. Why should someone out there who has managed to accumulate some things in life like a home etc. have to loose it all before they can get help from Medicaid? The US needs a better system and I personally think Insurance should not be a part of it because Insurance is for things that may not happen – things for which you can calculate the risk of it occurring. Death and illness are certain.

The GOP have proposed tort reform. The dems wouldn't have anything to do with it. The GOP proposed allowing all insurance companies to offer their services in every state, creating the competition the dems say their plan would encourage…which just happens to be a stinking pile of horseshit. The government doen't have to show a profit to continue operating…they can just print more money. Think about that for a while, you idiot.
The fact that morons like you don't want to hear is that the GOP has proposed healthcare reform that provides coverage for all, at a lower cost, and doesn't increase the deficit. Do some research and educate yourself so that you don't come across as such an ignorant and un-informed A-hole, OK?