Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Exactly who are the people who support this HC bill?

We all know conservatives and Republicans hate this bill. But many think it's because we're listening to Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck, and we really don't know what's in the bill.
So I found an article that breaks down the bill pretty well. And for the record, it's the very liberal Jane Hamsher from the very liberal Huffington Post. I hope that's enough of a qualifier for people to listen. Here are some points from her article (click title to link to Huffington and read for yourself):

"Real health care reform is the thing we've fought for from the start. It is desperately needed. But this bill falls short on many levels, and hurts many people more than it helps them."

Myth 1: This is a universal health care bill.
Fact: The bill is neither universal health care nor universal health insurance. According to the Congressional Budget Office:

Total uninsured in 2019 with no bill: 54 million

Total uninsured in 2019 with Senate bill: 24 million

Myth 2: Insurance companies hate this bill.
Fact: This bill is almost identical to the plan written by AHIP, the insurance company trade association, in 2009.
The original Senate Finance Committee bill was authored by a former Wellpoint vice president. Since Congress released the first of its health care bills on October 30, 2009, health care stocks have risen 28.35%.

Myth 3: The bill will significantly bring down insurance premiums for most Americans.

Fact: The bill will not bring down premiums significantly, and certainly not the $2,500/year that President Obama promised during his campaign.

Myth 4: The bill will make health care affordable for middle class Americans.

Fact: The bill will impose a financial hardship on middle class Americans who will be forced to buy a product that they can't afford to use.

Myth 5: This plan is similar to the Massachusetts plan, which makes health care affordable.

Fact: Many Massachusetts residents forgo health care because they can't afford it. A 2009 study by the state of Massachusetts found that:

21% of residents forgo medical treatment because they can't afford it, including 12% of children

18% have health insurance but can't afford to use it

Myth 6: This bill provides health care to 31 million people who are currently uninsured.

Fact: This bill will mandate that millions of people who are currently uninsured purchase insurance from private companies, or the IRS will collect up to 2% of their annual income in penalties. Some will be assisted with government subsidies.

Feel free to click and read the article. Plenty more.

Intelligent conservatives hate this bill because they know what's in it. And intelligent liberals hate this bill because they know what's NOT in it. We of course don't agree on these things, but it's clear that we agree that this health care bill just signed into law is garbage.

So, who likes this bill? There are only two possible explanations:

1) The politically ignorant sheep who believe what Obama, Pelosi, and the rest of the politicians are telling them.

or

2) Democrats who are more interested in "winning" and pushing something Republicans don't want. This is a sad example of partisan politics that anyone would support something this bad just because you view your opponent as the enemy and since they hate it, you like it.

Both of these are examples of how sad U.S. politics are these days...

Friday, January 29, 2010

MORE handouts necessary?

In the State of the Union earlier this week, Obama said he wants "...debt forgiveness for people who have been repaying their college loans for at least 20 years."

“In the 21st century, the best anti-poverty program around is a world-class education,” Obama said in yesterday’s speech. “No one should go broke because they chose to go to college.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=2…

Okay, let's THINK and find everything wrong with this.

1) We can't get kids to finish high school. Funding college is not the problem. Let's identify the problem and fix it. Obama's plan will help a very small percentage of kids in poverty.

2) Why is it a good message to say we should take a loan out and it will be forgiven in 20 years? What is my incentive to pay it off sooner? Why should others pay for my education?

3) Even if we were able to create this wonderful land of gum drops and candy canes, and every single person were able to then go on and get a 4-year degree, do you know what would happen? Do you understand supply and demand? If everyone has one, it's useless. Then you'd need at least a Master's Degree to deliver pizzas.

So why do the Democrats continue to push programs that sound nice to the politically ignorant public, yet will cause more problems than they will solve?

Some more health care info...more Democrat scare tactics

I keep hearing people throw things out like "Our life expectancy is way lower than those with nationalized health care." That must mean it's better, right? Well, unlike many sheep, I like to actually think critically and look at data. Here's some that I found:

Life expectancy @ birth
#8 Canada (81.16)
#10 Sweden (80.74)
#37 United Kingdom (78.85)
# 47 U.S. (78.14)

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/hea_li…

Murder rates per capita:
#24 United States (4.2 per 100,000)
#44 Canada (1.5 per 100,000)
#46 United Kingdom (1.4)

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mu…

Also, Lowest annual motor vehicle death rate (per 100,000, so it has nothing to do with the U.S. having more people):
#1 Sweden (5.7)
#3 United Kingdom (6.2)
#8 Canada (10.4)

U.S. (15.4)
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml…

Lowest annual accidental death rates:
#2 United Kingdom (20.5 per 100,000)

http://www.benbest.com/lifeext/causes.ht…

"Investigators from the Department of Family Medicine, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston compared the results of two large-scale studies of the US population in 1988-1994 and in 2001-2006. In the intervening 18 years, the percentage of adults aged 40-74 years with a body mass index greater than 30 has increased from 28% to 36%; physical activity 12 times a month or more has decreased from 53% to 43%; smoking rates have not changed (26.9% to 26.1%); eating 5 or more fruits and vegetables a day has decreased from 42% to 26%; and moderate alcohol use has increased from 40% to 51%. The number of people adhering to all 5 healthy habits has decreased from 15% to 8%."

http://www.prisonplanet.com/following-a-…

So in the U.K., they live months longer on average. In Sweden and Canada, a couple years. But our murder rate is roughly 3 times higher, our auto accident rate is at least 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 times higher.
Add in our overall unhealthy lifestyle, where we are exercising less, eating less fruits and vegetables, and drinking more...

Isn't it a testament to our great health care system that we are where we are?

Can we stop spreading ignorance and have a real discussion about what we can do to help bring down costs?

Democrats' "scare tactics" debunked

Is it global warming? Is it global cooling, like the scientists predicted in the 1970s? Is it climate change? Yeah, climate change. That way, whether it goes up or down, we can blame it on CO2, in order to push an agenda.
Well, here are 4 of the most recognized scare tactics, and why each one is wrong.

1) Sea levels will rise and flood the coasts.

Quick multiple choice. If the entire Arctic Ice Pack melted, how much would sea levels around the world rise?
A) 4 inches
B) A foot
C) 2 feet+
D) Exactly zero because I’m not an idiot and I understand Archimedes Principal

Hope you picked D.
http://www.seed.slb.com/v2/FAQView.cfm?I…

2) Himalayan Glaciers are melting.

“The UN’s top climate change body has issued an unprecedented apology over its flawed prediction that Himalayan glaciers were likely to disappear by 2035.”
“The 2007 report, which won the panel the Nobel Peace Prize, said that the probability of Himalayan glaciers “disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high”. It caused shock in Asia, where about two billion people depend on meltwater from Himalayan glaciers for their fresh water supplies during the dry seasons.”
“It emerged last week that the prediction was based not on a consensus among climate change experts but on a media interview with a single Indian glaciologist in 1999. That scientist, Syed Hasnain, has now told The Times that he never made such a specific forecast in his interview with the New Scientist magazine.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/en…

3) Polar sea ice levels are decreasing

Although the website claims these numbers are below normal, we only have to look at the recent numbers.
Arctic sea ice extent averaged over December 2009 was 12.48 million square kilometers (4.82 million square miles), 210,000 square kilometers (81,000 square miles) above the record low for the month, which occurred in December 2006.

I don’t know guys, looks like they’re now INCREASING.

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

4) The Polar bear population is decreasing due to loss of Arctic Ice.

"In the 1950s the polar bear population up north was estimated at 5,000. Today it's 20- to 25,000, a number that has either held steady over the last 20 years or has risen slightly. In Canada, the manager of wildlife resources for the Nunavut territory of Canada has found that the population there has increased by 25 percent."

http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/a…

“Not so fast. According to a U.S. Senate and Public Works Committee report, the “alarm about the future of polar bear decline is based on speculative computer model predictions many decades in the future. Those predictions are being “challenged by scientists and forecasting experts,” said the report.”
“Harry Flaherty, chair of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board in the capital of Iqaluit, says the polar bear population in the region, along the Davis Strait, has doubled during the past 10 years. He questions the official figures, which are based to a large extent on helicopter surveys.
“Scientists do a quick study one to two weeks in a helicopter, and don’t see all the polar bears. We’re getting totally different stories [about the bear numbers] on a daily basis from hunters and harvesters on the ground,” he says.”

http://www.examiner.com/x-32936-Seminole…