Warren Buffet And I Have The Same Advice

From Politico:

Billionaire investor Warren Buffett advised President Barack Obama on Monday to scrap the health care bill and start over.

In an interview with CNBC, Buffett said the current bill does not focus on controlling costs, which he sees as the central problem that must be addressed to reform the system. He added that while he does not like the Senate bill, he’d vote for it in preference to doing nothing.

I don't know why "doing nothing" must be the inevitable default; surely the Dems can do something if they want to work with some receptive Republicans on less grandiose bill.

That said, the Times offered an amusing article on the perils of doing nothing:

“People think if we do nothing, we will have what we have now,” said Karen Davis, the president of the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit health care research group in New York. “In fact, what we will have is a substantial deterioration in what we have.”

Nearly every mainstream analysis calls for medical costs to continue to climb over the next decade, outpacing the growth in the overall economy and certainly increasing faster than the average paycheck. Those higher costs will translate into higher premiums, which will mean fewer individuals and businesses will be able to afford insurance coverage. More of everyone’s dollar will go to health care, and government programs like Medicare and Medicaid will struggle to find the money to operate.

Have they read the CBO report?  Premiums aren't going down notably with ObamaCare, although some people will benefit from government subsidies.  Ad the CBO ignored the impact of more insured people availing themselves of medical services.

If cost control is the problem, ObamaCare is not the answer.

Comments

[Clarice]

If Obamacare is not the answer, what WAS the question ? I think we have all forgotten by now.

[daddy]

They've also overlooked that never again will John Edward's win a Million Dollar BS medical claims settlement, thereby personally causing Doctors and Hospitals Insurance rates to rise astronomically. He's permanently out to pasture, so even if nothing gets done and we're back to where we started, that's a big plus.

[Rob Crawford]

If cost control is the problem, ObamaCare is not the answer.

Except that Obamacare is about spending control, aka rationing. It's about denying care for the person who spent their lives working hard, playing by the rules, so you can provide it for the high-school drop-out, drug-addled dole addict.

It's about punishing those John Edwards described as "winning life's lottery" and rewarding the "downtrodden".

It's about, as Al Gore said, "the redemption of humanity".

[LouP]

Cost IS the problem, not who is going to pay for it. The whole "debate" has been side-tracked by this transfer of objectives.

I know why Obama & Company want to make it a who-pays issue; I can't figure out why the Republicans don't change the conversation to the real culprit: cost. Except that might involve killing a lot of sacred cows (that need killing) - like the lack of competition in the whole health care industry.

[bunkberbuster]

Health care will always be somewhat unresponsive to price signals. If you need a kidney transplant to live, you're going to spend your very last dime to get it.

If we can't even get free markets to work setting prices for something as simple as wheat or rice, how can we expect it to effectively control prices for health care?

[Danube of Thought]

"If we can't even get free markets to work setting prices for something as simple as wheat or rice..."

Who says we can't? I suspect that you feel the market has "worked" only when it produces a price you think is "fair," but I'd be happy to hear an alternative definition.

[Danube of Thought]

"If you need a kidney transplant to live, you're going to spend your very last dime to get it."

Why should it be otherwise?

[Old Lurker]

"If you need a kidney transplant to live, you're going to spend your very last dime to get it."

The problem being, of course, that you want me to spend my last dime on your kidney.

[James]

We had better address the cost problem for the long term. Social Security, Medicare, Medicade, and a host of other programs many people depend on face future solvency problems. Now, we add a new health insurance program to compete for more resources.

In another century, these programs will take all of the national budget and we still won't be able to pay the bills. Everyone eventually may have to save for health care as we now do for a house or a car.

[Danube of Thought]

There are three principal factors behind the high costs of health insurance. The most important is the third-party payer effect, whereby the consumer is entirely divorced from the purchasing process, and neither the consumer nor the provider has any incentive to be prudent. Next is the tax code's treatment of employer-provided insurance, and finally there is the practice of defensive medicine in response to the absurd tort system.

One fact that never seems to get attention is that costs are rising because new products and processes are constantly becoming available, and they are, in a word, costly.

Fifty years ago you didn't have to worry about the costs of an organ transplant or an MRI because they didn't exist. Today they do, but they aren't cheap. Nothing can make them cheap.

[squaredance]

Except it is a power and destruction.

It is not about "cost control". It is not about "spending control". All that is just hokum. If Buffet think that they actually mean anything else than he is a fool.

It was government sticking its nose into markets in the first place that caused all these problems in the first place. If one wanted to control either costs or spending, the answer is a simple one: Do away with all entitlements. Demand that people take responsibility for their own lives. Stop demanding that their neighbors are responsible for their lives. It is a simple as could be.

ObamaCare is about reforging the relationship of the citizen to the state into one of a serf dependent on the will of his master. It is about nothing less than destroying the social, moral, political and economic order of this nation.

It is about socking producers for all they are worth so that the Leftist Nomenklatura of the Democrat Party does not have to earn an honest living.

They want to sit around in their dream world in Academia, government jobs, foundations and NGO's and never have to engage in the real, gritty, tedious and unpredictable world productive labor. They want lives which they have not earned and do not merit, and they want those who have earned it to pay for it.

Hard, productive work is for the rest of us.

That is all it is about. That is all it was ever about.

[squaredance]

Correction: Except is is ABOUT power and destruction.

[MikeS]

The only thing surprising about the success of Mitch Daniel's health care option for Indiana employees, is that anyone is surprised. It is a common sense solution that reduces both government, and insurance company involvement in health care solutions. What a concept!

[Porchlight]

There are three principal factors behind the high costs of health insurance.

I would add a fourth which is the insane state mandate structure whereby in some states coverage of relatively obscure procedures are required to be covered by all plans, regardless of consumer need. All the people in those states are simply stuck paying for these things whether they want them or not, which in turn feeds into the first three factors you listed.

[bunkberbuster]

How about children? Should a child that breaks his leg be left to die if his parents can't afford to pay to have it fixed?

There has to be a line somewhere, and I have a hard time believing even the hardest conservative believes health care is no different from cable TV -- only available to those who can afford it...

[Hooch McCord]

FWIW:
"Kent Conrad Rips Media: Yes, We Can Do Reform Via Reconciliation
...
But Conrad patiently explained that the media interpretation of his comments is wrong. He was merely saying reconciliation would not be used to pass a comprehensive bill, and would only be used to pass the sidecar fix, which he said is workable, depending on what’s in it.

“Reporters don’t seem to be able to get this straight,” Conrad said, hitting the “misreporting” he said is widespread. “Comprehensive health care reform will not work through reconciliation. But if the House passes the Senate bill, and wants certain things improved on, like affordability, the Medicaid provisions, how much of Medicaid expenses are paid for by the Federal government, that is something that could be done through reconciliation.”"

LUN

[Extraneus]

Social Security, Medicare, Medicade, and a host of other programs many people depend on face future solvency problems.

Interestingly, these are all socialist programs.

[Jane]

How about children? Should a child that breaks his leg be left to die if his parents can't afford to pay to have it fixed?

Get a grip Bunky. You can be an illegal child murderer and no one would deny your children coverage. Deal with facts for a change will you?

Based on your contributions thus far I have no problem believing that all liberals are completely unhinged from reality.

[MarkJ]

"In another century, these programs will take all of the national budget and we still won't be able to pay the bills. Everyone eventually may have to save for health care as we now do for a house or a car."

At the current rate of insane congressional spending, who says we'll have another century? We'll be lucky to have another 20 years.

Besides, we now have a president who thinks money grows on trees and is an infinitely renewable resource. Why does he think this? Because the Tooth Fairy told him so.

[matt]

"Hello, I must be going". A health care update. LUN.

[Old Lurker]

"Should a child that breaks his leg be left to die if his parents can't afford to pay to have it fixed?"

Oh come on. Existing law already requires hospitals to fix that for free if they can't pay for it.

[Extraneus]

Should a child that breaks his leg be left to die if his parents can't afford to pay to have it fixed?

Well let's just say the idea really was to motivate people to get insurance, rather than a pretext for a socialist takeover. Wouldn't refusing that one broken leg do more for the cause than all the machinations of the Democrats?

I don't say we shouldn't cover poor people who really can't afford a catastrophic insurance policy. But the rest of us should be forced to be responsible for our own families.

It's the fact that we have this automatic care for everyone and anyone system that causes the problem. If people were turned away unless they're truly poor, and therefore eligible for help, the need for socialist solutions would disappear, and able people would have to take responsibility for their own health care.

[centralcal]

Bravo, Jane! at 7:36 pm.

[Clarice]

Very good,matt. I especially like this:
A number of leading Democratic senators have come out against using the reconciliation process to pass the health care bill, and with the opposition of various factions in the House to each others nonnegotiable demands, the whole thing is turning into a Marx Brothers movie with guns. "

[bolitha]

I don't believe that a child can die from a broken leg!!

[Rob Crawford]

I don't believe that a child can die from a broken leg!!

Without socialized medicine, we'll be forced to shoot kids with broken legs, like horses.

[narciso]

BTW, the AP is doing that ridiculous analysis
of Republican filibusters that has long been
debunked

[Jane]

Nice job Matt!

[pagar]

" Existing law already requires hospitals to fix that for free if they can't pay for it."

OL, Surely leftists aren't expected to know anything about existing laws. That's probably why they are trying to add another 2000+ pages of garbage to existing law books.

Jane, your 7:36 PM has identified the problem
perfectly.

Over at the "Show me the Coattails" post Sara at 3:18PM has identified another problem. Nothing the liberals teach to other liberals anymore has any basis in fact whatsoever.

[Clarice]

The Hill says on Wed the President will discuss policy and process, hinting he's going to defend reconciliation. Now I am really confused. Is it because this has not officially entered the absurd? Or should I start seeking a guardian for my affairs?
(This report seems as odds with the earlier reports in Fox and the NRO which could DOT and I agreed only be referring to a new bill altogether.

Stay tuned...will TM crack before I do?
Will the entire Congress enter into a battle royals?
Will people threaten to shoot themselves en masse if this health care carp doesn't end now?

[Clarice]

*battle royale**(forget the other typos--they're self evident.)

[MarkO]

Just exactly when did this healthcare crisis raise its ugly head? I know insurance companies exist to collect premiums not pay claims, but that's a long-standing structure. Is it because we of a certain age are entering a rather uncertain age? Too many of us? Was that the marker?

I have a neighbor who runs an insurance company that was touted by Obama. He makes about $2 million a year. All the doctors who were once his friends (he's a doctor himself) now hate him. But, that was true for many years before this emergency crisis.

There are certain costs to medical care and not many solutions to reducing them other than mandatory reductions in care and payment to doctors and others.

It is hard to get a fix on the extent and nature of the problem because it appears that there are too many agendas attached to the data. That makes the problem difficult of resolution.

I feel certain that the Obama solution is really just an excuse for the exercise of power, much like many believed to be true of the Iraq invasion. What to do?

[Clarice]

OT:
Harold Ford drops out of the NY Senatorial race with a hard smack at the party establishment:http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/opinion/02ford2.html

[Tollhouse]

Now that's some Friendly Fire clarice.

[Clarice]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/02/opinion/02ford2.html

heres a better link.

[Danube of Thought]

You're right about the state mandates, Porch. My error of omission.

I am listening to O'Reilly now (TiVo) talking about the legislative possibilities, and it's remarkable how uninformed he is.

[Janet]

LUN More info on Obama and his credentials. His "teaching career" at Chicago.

[Clarice]

DOT I'm afraid your worst fears about the Wed announcement are true..It appears Nancy overstated things. Obama will apparently urge the Senate bill be adopted with the addition of some tort reform and interstate insurance sales and throw in an endorsement of the reconciliation process which JMH has so ably tracked down.

URGH.

Dumb and dumber.

[Pofarmer]

I am listening to O'Reilly now (TiVo) talking about the legislative possibilities, and it's remarkable how uninformed he is.

That's pretty much his standard position, AFAICT. Sad thing is, he's not even pretty.

[narciso]

SAdly, I''m not DOT, and remember he was a private school teacher down here, before he hit the big time. Janet, that picture from the July 30, 2008, Cantor piece ostensibly
about his teaching law, where he was drawing
Alinsky power relationships, speaks a thousand
word

[Pofarmer]

I don't know why "doing nothing" must be the inevitable default

Works for me.

“People think if we do nothing, we will have what we have now,” said Karen Davis, the president of the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit health care research group in New York. “In fact, what we will have is a substantial deterioration in what we have.”

Which is just baloney. Graduate or import more docs, setup more clinics, address competition in the Medical field, as LouP suggests. Nothing in any of what's being proposed helps ANYBODY.

In another century, these programs will take all of the national budget and we still won't be able to pay the bills. Everyone eventually may have to save for health care as we now do for a house or a car.

James, Hertage Foundation has it at 2050 at the outside. Probably closer to 2035 right now. That's without the current insane spending.

If we can't even get free markets to work setting prices for something as simple as wheat or rice, how can we expect it to effectively control prices for health care?

Gee Bunky, maybe you'd like to explain how wheat and rice are priced? I swear, when I think you've said the dumbest thing possible, you double down.

[Olympia Snowe]

Senate bill be adopted with the addition of some tort reform and interstate insurance sale

Good. Now we have a lean, conservative bill that I can really get behind.

[Ignatz]

--Should a child that breaks his leg be left to die if his parents can't afford to pay to have it fixed?--

Bunky has been here for days and made dozens of posts, each one, improbably, even more dull witted than the last.
I'll give him a point or two for keeping a civil tongue in his head, but otherwise it's easy to see how he became one of the 52% of the chumps of the world last November.

[Danube of Thought]

JMH, I went over and read your response re reconciliation, for which I thank you. I'm still confused, because (among other things) I don't know the meaning of the term "reconciliation bill" as used in the rules.

[Clarice]

LAWeekly, says Mickey Kaus has taken out papers to run against barbara Boxer.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

[i]I don't believe that a child can die from a broken leg!![/i]

I worked with a gal who nearly died from a broken ankle. It wouldn't heal and it turned out that the bone became infected, there is a name for it, but I forget. She was in and out of the hospital for months and 3 years later she had a tube inserted into her heart that pumped medicine directly into it and she had to drag an IV pole and bag around everywhere and she was still in a cast. This went on for another couple of years and finally they amputated her foot about 6 inches above her ankle bone. Each hospitalization was touch or go for her as to whether she would live and she spent weeks in the ICU trying to save her life.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

If anyone sees bunker around, give him the following link:

Racism and Civil Rights: A History Lesson (Videos)

There are three videos at the beginning, all worth watching, but #2 deals with Civil Rights and Voting Rights, which he thinks were democrats' doing. Not so.

[Danube of Thought]

Rove just pointed out that if the house passes the senate bill the prez must sign it or veto it within ten days.

I guess one way to proceed would be for the prez to introduce the changes that he proposes to accomplish through reconciliation, the house to pass the existing senate bill, the prez signs it, then they either do or do not succeed with reconciliation. Either way we are screwed.

Will the house pass the senate bill knowing that it might not be changed?

[Melinda Romanoff]

Sara-

bb probably heard in some version of what stands for today's history classes and heard that it was done democratically. Using his massive powers of assumption, in between head bobs, bb came up with "by Democrats".

[Clarice]

stupak says that he opposes the Senate bill even without the abortion thingy..One more Republican congressman retired so Nancy only needs 216 votes. Pray she doesn't get them.

[Melinda Romanoff]

DoT-

Stupak still on record as a no to the Senate bill as written.

I haven't seen any changes in that.

[Frau Gesundheit]

During the late Dark Ages around the time of clarice's birth, I had two broken wrists in first grade (first one with jump rope and the second on monkey bars). Each was set *in* the doctor's office. Our income was very limited, and I have no idea how long it took my mother to pay the bill. The main thing was that the bill was not so large that it couldn't be paid. There was also the "county ward" at the local hospital, so no child would have been left to die. As a result, we all had a lasting incentive to be and stay healthy!

[Ann]

Sarah:

Your link doesn't work.

[bunkerbuster]

Jane admits: ``Based on your contributions thus far I have no problem believing that all liberals are completely unhinged from reality.''

Thanks Jane!
I had a feeling your belief system required only the thinnest of evidence. It's an edifying surprise to have you confirm that.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

Remember when I wrote about my nephew's 4 year old who was rushed to the hospital and tests showed he had childhood diabetes. He nearly died that day with a sugar count of over 700. His Dad was out of work and they had no insurance, yet Christian spent three weeks in the hospital, all his diabetic supply needs were supplied to him gratis, and they sent his dad to several classes to learn to parent a child with diabetes. All of that was covered under Medicaid and the Diabetes Foundation. No child or adult for that matter ever has to go with out treatment, but I've seen people in the emergency room for normal scrapes and bruises, everyday head colds, even bad menstrual cramps. They treat the ER like a walk-in clinic.

Frau, my doctor in childhood made housecalls. When I had to see him a couple of times as a teen, I went into his office, he took care of me and would say, don't worry about the bill, I'll catch up with your Mom the next time she comes in and off I'd go.

[Jim Ryan]

What percentage of those who say that wealth ought to be transferred from rich to poor even more than it already is are people who don't know anything about how to create wealth?

What percentage of them will never make anyone wealthy by employing him?

What percentage of them don't give as much to charity as conservatives do?

What percentage of them have no grasp at all of the manifold arguments in favor of capitalism, liberty, and the preservation of private property rights?

What percentage of them are aware that the best argument in favor of their economic leveling was given by a Harvard prof named Rawls and that his argument went down in flames decades ago?

[Clarice]

I don't even know if there were private hospitals when I was a kid. I was hospitalized when I was about 3 and I remember there were no private rooms..just one huge ward with lots of kids in it. Parental visits were limited to 1/2 hour a day. We were allowed one toy, but no pillows'. Crying at night was strictly forbidden. Imagine! (I got out of that hell hole by refusing to eat.)

But it was wartime and it was far less labor intensive and cheaper to operate that way, and I suppose when we open our borders to health care for anyone who shows up here and put our crack public unions in charge, we can return to those glory days.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

Civil Rights History Lesson

Thanks Ann, try it again.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

While I was out today, I finally went in and had my hair all cut off. I hadn't had it cut since 2004 and it was almost to my waist. Everyone said the new style takes 10 years off, which is nice to hear, and I was anxious for my son to see it. He has been grousing about how I was starting to look like an old hippie. I though he'd love the new style, but he hates it. He says what possessed you to get a Nancy Pelosi haircut. Talk about feeling deflated. :(

[bunkerbuster]

Here's the relevant data on the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Kind of hard to see how you can call it a Republican initiative. Looks like Democrats controlled House, Senate and White House. JFK introduced the bill and LBJ kept it alive.

The voting record:
The original House version:

Southern Democrats: 7-87 (7%-93%)
Southern Republicans: 0-10 (0%-100%)

Northern Democrats: 145-9 (94%-6%)
Northern Republicans: 138-24 (85%-15%)

The Senate version:

Southern Democrats: 1-20 (5%-95%) (only Senator Ralph Yarborough of Texas voted in favor)
Southern Republicans: 0-1 (0%-100%) (this was Senator John Tower of Texas)
Northern Democrats: 45-1 (98%-2%) (only Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia opposed the measure)
Northern Republicans: 27-5 (84%-16%) (Senators Barry Goldwater of Arizona, Bourke Hickenlooper of Iowa, Edwin L. Mechem of New Mexico, Milward L. Simpson of Wyoming, and Norris H. Cotton of New Hampshire opposed the measure)

source: wikipedia.org

[Dave (in MA)]

A link on Drudge has Ø's economic advisor Larry "women can't do science" Summers warning that the upcoming unemployment stats are "distorted" by the wintry weather we've had in the winter.

Like that old joke, Mom's on the roof.

[BR]

Amen to all above, especially Squaredancer!

Let's see, I ate peanutbutter and Teddy croaked.
Now let's imagine the most noxious potion of Ouzo mixed with green tea ice cream and anyone in Congress who even thinks about passing any health care interference in our lives will be dry heaving till they beg for Deliverance.

Hmm, sometimes it feels like I'm in the Land of Lilliput. We should be evolving, growing our own new teeth, healing ourselves, new things, things done with thought and intention. Come! Play with me!

[bgates]

House Republicans: 138-34 (80.2%)
House Democrats: 152-96 (61.3%)

Senate Republicans: 27- 6 (81.8%)
Senate Democrats: 46-21 (68.7%)

-besides which guys like Goldwater opposed the bill out of a principled belief in federalism, whereas guys like Byrd opposed it so he wouldn't get his Klan membership revoked.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

I did not call it a "Republican initiative," I said it was the Republicans who got it passed. Do you see the democrat votes there to pass either house? I don't. Go watch the #2 clip at the link.

[And the next day. And the next.]

Sara, he'll like it better tomorrow.
===============

[Clarice]

Gee bgates, I don't see why you didn't divide the parties into sectors on the map like bb did--You know reps from Ne sector 32 vs. Dems from that sector..LOL

[You'll learn. I'd give it twenty, maybe thirty years. Not likely much more.]

Thin evidence, bunkerbuster? You've been ladling it on the canvas. What surprises me is that you are obviously smart; why are you so brainwashed?
=====================

[Bone marrow is a different story. Lot's of blood there.]

It's osteomyelitis, Sara. I once knew someone who'd had it since 1926. This was thirty years ago, mind you.

Infections are tough to cure where the blood supply doesn't much go, like bone.
==================

[Ann]

Thanks, Sara:

Sorry I added the h on the end of your name!
Can't be anything but a compliment, coming from me though. :)

I love Col. Allen West too. Thanks for adding him on your blog post. A real hero!

[BR]

Ah, I just remembered the worst tasting cocktail I had at 16 -- it was a Grasshopper. But my impromptu recipe up there will do just as well.

Now for some levity -- look at these cocktail names and imagine asking a bartender for one!

[Carol Herman]

And, kids died of polio back then. There was also a pediatrics ward at Kings County Hospital, in Brooklyn, with the Iron Lungs all lined up.

The future won't look anything like it was, back in the days, a single wage earner, if you were lucky, brought home $50 to $65 a week.

This Wreck/conciliation won't fly, any more than Nancy Pelosi does pole vaulting tricks. But I think there's hope some republicans (as dumb as LaHood) will abandon the GOP ship. Their safety net, as they go leaping about the high flying trapeze, is probably a judgeship. Or other 'goody.' None of them 'ever go home.' Just ask Tom Daschle.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

My friend and I looked alot alike, same general build, close in height, similar hair color and style and we were sometimes thought to be sisters. One night we were assigned by our Congresswoman boss as surrogates for a fundraiser and we decided to have dinner together first. When we both hobbled in on crutches with full leg casts, hers from a slip on the ice, me from falling 8 ft. off a landing, we drew lots of attention and several customers stopped by our table to comment. Of course, everyone asked what happened. We got so sick and tired of telling our rather boring stories over and over, we decided that from then on we were going to make up fantastic tales of daring do to explain our injuries. We came up with everything from being former paratroopers to being ski racers, then we'd laugh at how easy it was to convince people that a couple of 42 year olds got their injuries in these adventurous tales.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

BR: I love a Slippery Nipple but I quit ordering them when out because for sure some immature jerk would make some off color crack. I still like them though.

[Danube of Thought]

Face it: Bunky's view (and Obama's) is that in the field of medicine, whatever can be done should be done, and at public expense. And above all, no amount of hard work, thrift, sacrifice and foresight should enable anyone to spend money to acquire health care insurance that is better than anyone else's.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

In addition to Christian, there is my cousin, who last year went through a mastectomy and 6 mo. later another operation to remove her thyroid and then a few mo. after that full reconstruction surgery.

When she was first diagnosed, flat broke and no insurance, she sat and cried thinking that her only fate was to become a breast cancer statistic and die. Her doctor said no way, that his hospital had a charity fund for just such as her. Breast cancer survivors in combination with the Breast Cancer Society and they stepped in and took care of everything, including the reconstruction. They even provided her with specially fitted padded bras to get her through the period after the mastectomy and before the reconstruction. They only asked that she give back by becoming a BC counselor to other patients and if her circumstances improved to make a donation that could go into the fund to help others. She is now entirely cancer free and back to work instead of dead in her grave.

[Ann]

Jane:

You can't find a better poster child for your Youtoocongress.com than Charlie Rangle.

No National Significance...Charlie Rangle

Does anyone know what the legal requirements of the use of this picture would be? Cause I think it would make great You Too Gear!

[BR]

That's wonderful, Sara at 12:07! I love it! Spirit of play!

And yrs at 12:11 -- hee, imagine asking for "Sex on the Beach" or 4 Orgasms - I blush even typing those words.

I hope you grow your hair long again. I'm keeping my long hair forever :)

[JM Hanes]

DoT:

"I don't know the meaning of the term "reconciliation bill" as used in the rules."

I'm still sorting out info on the fly, but think of it as a Pay/Go accounting bill intended as a vehicle for balancing (i.e."reconciling") revenue and expenditures. It's why using that special purpose, formulaic, procedure to cram down an omnibus healthcare reform bill is as bizarre as it is unprecedented. I suspect Pelosi is having serious trouble just trying to figure out how to force the Dems' square peg into that round hole.

[bunkerbuster]

``I said it was the Republicans who got it passed.''

That's impossible. They didn't control either house, nor the presidency. They helped get it passed, but the initiative and most supporters were Democrats.

Kind of amazing you'd try and skirt that fact. Sad, really...

[bgates]

Most opponents were Democrats, too. A higher percentage of Congressional Republicans supported the measure than Congressional Democrats in both houses.

How are wheat and rice priced?

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

bunker: you do understand that from 1865 on it was Republicans who passed ALL the civil rights legislation, right? You did go watch the videos, right? You understand that all the blacks were Republicans and it was Republicans the Klan was organized to destroy, right? And you did go watch the videos, right? Right?

It doesn't matter who controls, if the majority party can't get the votes. Democrats have never wanted blacks off the plantations, they never wanted to abolish slavery or give blacks the vote. They fought hard to prevent any kind of civil rights including citizenship for blacks and voted nearly in total against these measures. When the lynchings began, it was Republicans who were lynched, both black and white. If you promised to become a Democrat they'd let you go. And to this day, that is the same tactic. Stay on the plantation, vote for us because we'll take care of you, keep you poor and needy and in the slums where you belong is their game plan or else pay the consequences.

And for your enlightenment, the Civil Rights Act of 1957 was introduced in Eisenhower’s presidency and was the act that kick-started the civil rights legislative program that was to include the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Last time I looked, Dwight Eisenhower was a Republican president.

[Danube of Thought]

"They didn't control either house, nor the presidency."ouTou seem determined to avoid the essential point: the Democrats, despite their large majorities, could not pass that legislation without very substantial GOP support the bitterly entenched opposition came from the Democratic party.

And you're right, it is sad. Sad that the Dems kept sending Klansmen and arch-segregationists to the US Senate.

[Danube of Thought]

Excuse the typos. Trying to post from I-phone.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

Here is alittle more and which shows that LBJ had his own motives:

Eisenhower, perhaps shocked by the news broadcasts of Little Rock, publicly supported the bill (it was, after all, his Attorney-General who had produced the bill). However, [b]the final act became a much watered done affair due to the lack of support among the Democrats[/b]. The Senate leader, Lyndon Baines Johnson, was a Democrat, and he realized that the bill and its journey through Congress, could tear apart his party as it had right wing Southern senators in it and liberal west coast ones.

In keeping with Congressional procedure, Johnson sent the bill to a judiciary committee which would examine it for flaws, controversial and unconstitutional points etc. This committee was led by Senator James Eastland - senator for Mississippi. Committee heads have great powers in changing bills and altering them almost beyond recognition. Eastland did just this especially after the very public outburst by Senator Richard Russell from Georgia who claimed that it was an example of the Federal government wanting to impose its laws on states, thus weakening highly protected states rights of self-government as stated in the Constitution. He was most critical of the new division which would be created within the Justice Department

Johnson had other reasons for taking his stance. No civil rights act had been introduced into America for 82 years. If this one went through successfully and had support from both parties, it would do his position within the Democrats a great deal of good as he had plans in 1957 to be the party’s future presidential candidate. If he could get the credit for maintaining party unity and get the support of the South’s Democrats for ‘killing the bill’, then his position would be greatly advanced. If he was seen to be pushing through the first civil rights act in 82 years he hoped to get the support of the more liberal west and east coast Democrat senators.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

I'm sorry for the wrong tags with this [ instead of < surrounding commands. I lost the wonderful HTML toolbar when I upgraded FF and downloaded BBcode as a replacement and then forgot to set it to HTML. Fixed now.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

Actually it is BBcodeXtra in case anyone else is looking to replace when they upgrade. It doesn't install as a toolbar, but in the context menu. You have to right click and then select whatever command you want. It requires an extra step over the old toolbar but is just as easy.

[bunkberbuster]

Does the name Strom Thurmond ring a bell? He was a Democrat who switched to the Republican party, which welcomed him, precisely because he was opposed to the Civil Rights act.

And how about George Wallace? If the mainstream Democratic party opposed Civil Rights (how did it pass??) why did Wallace have to leave the party to run for president on a segregationist ticket?

A little history lesson is in order, but I do have to wonder what's worse, that you don't know this history, or that you know it and just don't like it, so try to deny it??

In the 1960s, the courting of white Southern Democratic voters was the basis of the "southern strategy" of the Republican Party's Presidential Campaigns. Republican Presidential Candidate Barry Goldwater carried the Deep South in 1964, despite losing in a landslide in the rest of the nation to President Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas. Johnson surmised that his advocacy behind passing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 would lose the South for the Democratic party and it did. The only Democratic presidential candidate after 1956 to solidly carry the Deep South was President Jimmy Carter in the 1976 election.[7]

Senator Strom Thurmond switched parties and became a Republican as a result of his support for the Barry Goldwater campaign in 1964. Jesse Helms also switched his party registration to Republican in 1970 and won a Senate seat in North Carolina in 1972. However the most powerful committee chairmen, including Richard Russell, Jr. of Georgia and James Eastland and John Stennis of Mississippi remained in the Democratic Party.

Thus far the change was at the presidential level. In the 1990s the South changed from a Democratic monolith to a majority Republican sector of the country with GOP gains in state legislatures and local elections. This change began with the elections of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and George H. W. Bush in 1988. It was consolidated in 1994 when Republicans gained a majority in the House of Representatives under the leadership of Newt Gingrich.

[bunkberbuster]

As for healthcare, I have to agree partly, at least, with Tom's conclusion "If cost-control is the problem, Obamacare is not the solution."

I am very disappointed that Obama either misjudged the political situation or simply sold out by cutting a deal with big pharma to protect drug prices by ruling out policies that could help control costs.

I am far from alone among liberals, from Paul Krugman to Robert Scheer to Thom Hartmann, who are all very disappointed with the president on that issue.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

bunker dear, I not only know the history, I lived through it and remember it well. Are you getting anything at all? Democrats had to be dragged kicking and screaming along and civil rights legislation didn't begin in '64-65. Just in case you didn't know that either. Wallace called the bill a Fraud, Sham, and Hoax. Watch all the videos because you are very badly brainwashed or something.

Who passed the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments, the real civil rights legislation? Who passed 24 civil rights bills before the Dems took over Congress and nothing more got passed for 82 years and the Dems went on violent rampages thruout the South trying to eradicate Republicans and blacks who were all Republican at the time. Which party elected the first black Senators and Congressmen? Which party lynched 4800 of which 1300 were whites because they were Republicans, not because they were black? Go learn some history yourself.

Which party still has a Klan recruiter in their ranks?

And as an aside, my Mother marched in the Selma to Montgomery march and was a lifelong friend of Coretta Scott King. She had her arm broken during the last day of the march.

[bgates]

In the 1990s the South changed from a Democratic monolith to a majority Republican sector of the country

Wikipedia is correct. As the South became less racist, it became more Republican.

[bunkerbuster]

‘‘Democrats had to be dragged kicking and screaming along.’’

That's just not the case. JFK wrote the Civil Rights bill of 1964 and LBJ made sure it passed. Neither are Republicans and both took their actions purely by choice -- no one held a gun to their head.

It is certainly true that the Democratic party included a lot of southern racists. But most left the party and the few that remained turned their views around 180 degrees or didn't last long.

But, to be honest, I'm not interested in defending the Democratic party. It is no different from any other political movement in that it has attracted its share of scoundrels, thieves and, even, racists. I have no stake in any political parties, so there I'm not compelled to attack or defend any political party reflexively.

But I do think, Sara, you're whitewashing the history of that era in a rather extremely partisan way out of some weird devotion to defending the honor of the Republican party.

More generally, my view is that all humans are racist to one degree or another and in one way or another. Neither political party has anything near a monopoly on racism.

Still, the right side of the political spectrum draws most racists and certainly not just in the U.S., but all over the world. The rightwing worldview is more amenable to racism than is the leftwing worldview, and that holds true on every continent on the planet -- whether it's Germany's neo-Nazis, Britain's National Front, Japan's Uyoku or Russia's Nativists, the right side is more comfortable for racists.

That by no means demonstrates that all conservatives, or even a majority of conservatives, are racist in a bad way. Quite to the contrary, my experience has been that most conservatives I know are no more racist than average. Though I would say every openly racist person I've known considers themselves to be on the right side of the political spectrum, and I have yet to meet a single open racist who considers themselves a liberal.

[Rob Crawford]

Which party still has a Klan recruiter in their ranks?

Which party prosecuted people standing outside a polling place, shouting racist slogans and brandishing weapons? Which party dropped the prosecution -- after it had been won?

The Bush administration pursued cases of minorities being denied fair access to the ballot box, and the Obama administration has made it clear they will not pursue similar cases, because the minorities in question were whites in black-majority areas.

The Democrats have always been the party of racial division, hatred, and anger. All that's happened is that the race riots they churn up and support are blacks attacking whites (LA, Cincinnati, New York) instead of the other way around.

[stace]

Bunker, except Jews, black conservatives are subject to more public racism than any other group. Your buddy Scheer featured on his website a cartoon of Condi Rice as CondiMima.

Read any thread HuffPo thread on someone like Michael Steele or Angela McGlowan and you'll see the following terms used in the comments: house negro, ho, Aunt Jemima, and Uncle Tom. The lefties there are extremely racist, and very open about it. They have no shame at all when anyone calls them on it, as I've done in the comments there. Not the least bit embarrassed.

Don't even get me started on their anti-Semitism. Before HuffPo started moderating comments, the comments on any article about any Jewish person read like a neo-Nazi site. A lot of anti-Semitism still gets through even with the moderation.

[Rick Ballard]

My Sylvan Bozon emission detector indicates that we're dealing with performance art. The Narcisolator or killfile provides the appropriate countermeasure.

There's just a tad much (tad much = avalanche of) stupidity involved for New Sylvia to be real.

[MayBee]

Sarah- you are lovely and I'm sure your hair is lovely. Tell your son it isn't a Nancy Pelosi, it's a Marsha Blackburn. She has the best hair in elected office.

[bunkerbuster]

Stace, calling someone Uncle Tom or Aunt Jemima isn't racist. It's a characterization of their attitude toward race. Not surprised you don't register the difference.
I think you're confused about what's racist and what simply refers to a person's race or racial politics. You're applying an especially irrational version of political correctness...

[Clarice]

"It's a characterization of their attitude toward race. "

It's a characterization based on what the speaker thinks a person of a given race should support or oppose and since it assumes all persons of that race should hold a specified singular view, it most certainly is racist.

[laura]

"Not surprised you don't reg8sterthe difference."

In other words, you haven't been steeped in post-modern thought where the charge of racism is only leveled at those you disagree with especially if they have an R after their name.
The truly unfortunate thing is that BB is what passes for the educated college sophomore these days.

[boris]

A white person may inadvertantly benefit from historical white privilege yet be opposed to white privilege in principle. Such a person is considered noble.

A black person may inadvertantly benefit from quotas and minority preferences yet be opposed to minority preferences in principle. According to acceptable liberal conventions (eg bb) such a person is considered a race traitor hypocrite and should be called names.

[James B]

If "cost control" is the goal, then single-payer is the answer. Nothing lets you control costs better than dictating what you pay for a service, even if what you decide to pay is less than what it costs to provide the service (although in that case, get used to not getting that service).

Now please don't get me wrong here, I'm as conservative/libertarian as they come. Would quality of service for people with decent insurance plans go down? Absolutely, Canada and the UK demonstrate that. Would health care workers unionize to limit the government's ability to dictate costs? Absolutely, Canada and the UK demonstrate that.

Maybe "cost control" isn't your main goal, certainly as a consumer it isn't my main goal. This is why you see politicians from Canada come to the US for medical procedures: as a politician "cost control" is their main goal, as a consumer "quality" is their main goal.

So let's be clear here: the best way to control costs is to dictate them, which Medicare does now for age 65+, and single-payer would do for everybody. Whether or not that effort to control costs gets you the LEVEL/QUALITY of care you want is a whole other question.