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    Joe Scarborough Dumbfounded by Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY)

    By DF on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 7:58pm | Politics

    I'm loving Rep. Weiner on this issue.  Straight and to the point, he asks a subsequently stunned Joe Scarborough what value health insurance companies are adding to the equation.  Watch (awesomeness occurs at the 5:00 mark, culminating in a lovely pregnant pause at around 5:30):

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    Punch-drunk Scarborough is finally able to surmise that there is a "fundamental ideological difference" afoot.  You're right, Joe.  The dominant ideology places private profits above all else, even when those profits are made via a corrupt system that is absolutely bereft of the competition that makes capitalism work.  The proponents of reform, on the other hand, place a higher value on human life.

    That's really what this fight is all about.

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    I love the word "bereft." I also love Rep. Weiner's take-no-prisoners approach to the debate.

    What I don't love so much: that Mika's contribution to the conversation was to note that Rep. Weiner didn't call the insurance companies evil. What a twit. They should rename the show "Ernest Goes to Camp and Barbie Do the News."


    by Orlando on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 9:39pm

    Rep Wiener should be the spokesmodel for the entire healthcare  movement.

    Indeed - What do insurance companies bring to the table?  Profit grabbing?


    by David (not verified) on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 11:15pm

    What do insurance companies bring to the debate: capital - they pay your medical bills for you. Consumers should be able to buy their medical insurance like they do term life insurance. The younger you are when you buy it, the cheaper the premium and you lock in that premium for life. No pre-existing conditions. The employer base system is ludicrous. It worked in the 1950s when people worked for a company for life, but those days are over. But giving the government full control of health care has made matters worse everywhere it's been tried.


    by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 08/18/2009 - 11:42pm

    Hey, Anonymous. The capital the insurance companies bring to the table is money their customers have already paid up front for coverage -- minus bureaucratic waste, shareholder profits, management jets and CEO excess.

    I prefer a system where I pay a little bit more taxes, and in return I get a health insurance card I carry in my wallet. I present it every time I visit a hospital, clinic or health professional, and they bill the government. End of hassle. End of story.

    If the public option you eventually get is even remotely as cost-efficient, everyone will want to switch. The health-care vultures add nothing.


    by acanuck on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 3:23am

    I really wanted to see the next part of that particular video because i wanted to hear weiner's thoughts on how we pay for his plan because is clearly my concern about a govt takeover of health insurance - paying for it. joe makes a fair point - financing medicare is a big problem already - and if you expand that program by fivefold to include all Americans, where does the money come from? we just don't have the room to increase the deficits - the money has to come from somewhere - there's no way efficiencies gained from scale will do the trick and i dont think even the rich have enough money to subsidize such a plan with taxes.

    the whole thing is silly on a political basis of course since the health insurance lobby is way too powerful to let something like that ever happen.

     


    by Deadman on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 2:25pm

    I actually think that increasing the pool to include younger, healthier insureds would go a long way toward paying for Medicare for everyone, especially with lower overhead than the private companies have. That's why larger risk pools get better rates and why small businesses can't afford insurance. I'm not an economist and I've never looked at the number, but I think if we had single payer, suplemented by a tax on the wealthiest to subsidize the poorest, shored up by some sort of public education campaign to make sure people are practicing preventive care, we'd have a country where everyone had access to affordable healthcare with a bonus of a healthier population in general. It's win-win, which is why the Republicans hate it.


    by Orlando on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 3:58pm

    Not only that, but we pay twice what the rest of the world pays per capita.  This is simple arithmetic.  If you bring everyone in and everyone is paying, we're only talking about expanding coverage to one sixth, or ~16%, of the population, whereas we're looking at potentially being able to normalize per capita cost with the rest of the world, a savings of up to 50% compared to what we're paying now.  I think Deadman's aversion to numbers-based analysis is letting his gut do a little too much thinking on this one.

    The money is there.  The issue is redirecting it from private coffers into a productive system that actually has the goal of providing healthcare.  The political question is whether anyone has the guts to tell the folks on the gravy train that the party is over.


    by DF on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 4:32pm

    Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure the political answer is no.


    by Orlando on Wed, 08/19/2009 - 4:35pm

    i dont know enough of the numbers to comment intelligently but that has never stopped me before. but clearly you have to admit that most large government programs end up being huge sprawling beasts that must constantly find new sources of financing. social security, medicare and medicaid, the usps, all in danger of going bankrupt. yes, part of that is demographics or exogneous events, but a lot of it is also because government doesn't often do things efficiently. to think otherwise is just being ridiculous

    Now that all said, given all that's happened over the past couple of years with the broader economy, I think we can also say that private industry doesn't always get things right either, and I obviously still think government should take a much larger role with health care because I view health care as a right, and a vital one at that. Just like I wouldn't want private industry in charge of our military, I feel similarly about health care.

    i just want the administration and Congress to be upfront about the costs of the program and the sources of funding. I think Obama has been for the most part, though the CBO disagrees with most of his numbers. The Weiner plan sounds great, and certainly if we shifted resources and priorities, we could make it work. But something would have to give - if the profits of the health care insurance industry is enough, then that's great, but i doubt it.


    by Deadman on Thu, 08/20/2009 - 2:25am

    As far as I understand it, most mainstream economists don't think there's any real problems with Social Security.  Sure, it requires some demographic re-adjustments once or twice a decade.  Of course, that doesn't stop the MSM from dragging out the screeching "SOCIAL SECURITY IS DOOMED OMGZ!!!!" headlines.  From what I understand, Medicare/Medicaid are in a similar boat.  It's basically a product of the fact that these systems are run at cost.  So, some years the demographics drive cost go up.  Sometimes they go down, but then that might end up being spent elsewhere, though if you look at the demographic trends, we're fat around retirement age right now as I'm sure you know.  However, as far as the total costs go, especially when compared to the alternatives, they are easily manageable over the long run.

    Well, easily if it doesn't mean that you need to seek the approval of opportunist buttholes.  I'm lookin' at you, Grassley.

    I'm a big proponent of transparency, so I'm with you on the government being up front about costs.  But the fact is that the private system isn't sustainable.  Costs in the current system have outpaced inflaction by nearly five times over the last decade.  The healthcare sector is nearly one sixth of our total economic output at this pont.  Surely, your fiscally minded self understands that our long-term economic prospects are far more threatened by the albatross around our neck than by the spectre of potential inefficiencies in a new system.


    by DF on Thu, 08/20/2009 - 3:19am

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