Top Conservative Activist Enthusiastically Endorses Government-Run Health Care

[eridani]

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/07/14/2297111/top-conservative-activist-enthusiastically-endorses-government-run-health-care/

A top conservative leader endorsed a government-run health care program similar to single-payer during an appearance on CSPAN’s Washington Journal on Sunday morning, telling a caller that TRICARE — the Department of Defense’s health care program for more than 9 million active duty uniformed personnel and their dependents — works even better than the Affordable Care Act.

Dean Clancy, the Vice President of Public Policy at Freedom Works, an organization that vehemently opposes President Obama’s health care law and advocates for eliminating most government regulations in the health care system, admitted that the government program is “fairly popular” with military members:

CALLER: Good morning. I have looked at all the insurance companies all over the world and the governmental plans all over the world and it comes back to one item that sticks out that would work for everybody, employers, retired people, people who have a small business, people who have low insurance and high insurance. That is TRICARE. TRICARE is what would lower everything and increase everything as far as services and there is not a doctor who doesn’t know about TRICARE. [...]

CLANCY: TRICARE is an employer provided insurance for Pentagon employees and their families. I think it is fairly popular with them. It may have some problems, but in general it works better than Obamacare is likely to do. Employer provided insurance works pretty well, in fact Congress has the best employer provided insurance in the country, it’s the gold standard.

[geckosfeet]

1. Yes but...

"Congress has the best employer provided insurance in the country, it’s the gold standard."

Screw all you little people... go die.

[tclambert]

2. Poor people are such a burden for rich people.

Poor, sick people? Even worse! They won't work, yet they expect rich people to pay for their living expenses and medicine. If poor people had any consideration for the rich, or any sense of "fairness," they would just die quickly whenever they get too sick to serve and not try to make the rich feel guilty about enjoying the hard-earned luxuries they were born to.




(just in case, 'cause you never know)

[maindawg]

3. here is the point

we already have single payer govt run health care . we have had it for about 80 years,it works very well. But regular working people are shut out. In other words, the people who fund it, cant have it.

[Demeter]

4. ANYTHING ELSE would be betterthan Obamacare

It's pork for insurance companies, with a few token "people who are helped" while everyone else is fleeced and screwed.

[Politicub]

5. Insurance serfdom is ending

And there is a lot of good that will come from that important element of the ACA.

We all want single payer one day, and Obamacare moves us closer to the goal.

I'm one of the lucky ones who has insurance through work, but I also recognize that it may not always be the case. And I also am happy that people who want or need insurance and can't get it today for whatever reason will have equal opportunity to access the system.

Outright opposition to the ACA means you don't see or care that more people will be insured than not.

Advocating for fixes to the law and making it better is a progressive approach.

[Bluenorthwest]

7. No, the ACA mandates that serfdom. It requires contributions to the profits of private insurance

companies, which are still free to deny services and charge huge premiums. Touting the help some might find in that rubble is basically admitting that you do not care about the millions it leaves uninsured, nor about the financial burden placed on millions more. In actual thinking nations, there is full and universal coverage. Those who do do support that don't care that so many will suffer and die to feed profits to the Big Corps. Obama of course said those Corps 'deserve large profits' and we must give them what they deserve while apparently the uninsured don't deserve health care.
The ACA is a barrier to actual progress, it is not a step to single payer and it enshrines profit as the first and only objective of the 'health industry'.
ACA makes some improvements, but your post is a huge oversell of a very mediocre plan we will all suffer under for years until we get REAL reform of the US health care system.

[Puzzledtraveller]

8. ^^this^^

[Politicub]

9. Look up the definition of serfdom

The ACA isn't serfdom.

I get that you are throw the baby out with the bath water type, and I hope you never find yourself in the uncomfortable position of telling someone who has a chronic condition that you want them to suck it up and wait.

I see that as an absurd, cruel position, but we all have our POV.

My position is more along the lines of let's make the law work to the best of our ability, get democrats elected to office, and make tweaks to the law that strengthen it.

[kenny blankenship]

10. WINNER.

[geek tragedy]

12. So, you favor repeal of the ACA then?

Because that's obviously what prevented single payer from being enacted . . .

[area51]

20. +1

Worth repeating:

"the ACA mandates that serfdom."

It won't lead to single-payer.

How many more people must die due to lack of health care before we get a chance at becoming a civilized nation?

[smartalek]

23. this is a great oversimplification -- and reasonable people can disagree

....on the long-term impacts until we get there.
Is ACA the best we could.have gotten?
Probably not. If nothing else, giving away the "public option".may have been.unnecessary.
But we must blame Publicans and conservadems -- especially the vile and unlamented LIEberman, named at the time.as the dealbreaker -- at least as.much as Obama for that one.
And you're ignoring the most.important advances ACA provides, including requiring 80% of premium revenue to go.to.service delivery. Though nowhere near the 95%+ that Medicare and the VA demonstrate to be attainable, it's still a huge improvement over the 65%+/- that has been common among private insurers.
That and the guaranteed-issue, including pre-existing conditions, are radical -- not minor, not incremental -- advances.
Most important, though.we can.argue ceaselessly over what "the best".that.could have been attained.at the time might.have been, there is one certainty.
Single-payer would not have been*.
That being the case, bringing it up as if it had been seems pretty pointless to me.
YMMV, of.course
Cheers.

*That is not to.say it shouldn't have been taken.as a bargaining position. Again, we'll never know.how.things.might have gone had that happened.

[A Simple Game]

6. I think how poor Obamacare really is for the people and how good it is for the

insurance companies and hospitals is starting to sink in even with President Obama's do nothing wrong brigade on DU. It's defense is getting weaker and less frequent on DU.

Obamacare is going to push many people to high deductible coverage that does nothing but fill the insurance companies pockets and guarantee hospitals the bulk of what is owed to them. The individuals will still face bankruptcy. After all, it is the ideal Republican plan.

[babylonsister]

14. So explain this...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023279392

[antigop]

15. It's explained on the thread....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023279392#post14

Do people really not get it?

Premiums don't tell the whole picture.

You have to look at your co-pays/deductibles.

It doesn't do you any good to have coverage you can't afford to use.

Also,
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023279392#post13

Do people NOT understand how an average is computed?

[ctsnowman]

24. Bingo

It doesn't do you any good to have coverage you can't afford to use.

[B Calm]

11. K&R

[Rozlee]

13. We have Tricare.

We always used to go to the military bases for our care, but lately, they've been farming us out to private care providers in the civilian community. Not a bad thing. My husband's hip replacement costs us $20.00 in 1999 for his meals while hospitalized and currently, we have no monthly premiums. Our prescriptions are $3 and up to $12 for the really expensive ones. What bothers me is that they don't provide for long-term care health benefits. Well, for that matter, neither does Medicare. Our insurance seemed adequate when we purchased it at $70.00 a day for care and unwisely, we never updated it or kept up with market trends as the costs of care skyrocketed. My husband was diagnosed with dementia a year ago and it's been accelerating alarmingly to the point where he now needs to be fed. With daily nursing home care costs at two hundred dollars a day and our income too high for Medicaid, our insurance policy won't cover much of his long term care if he finally requires it. He'll almost certainly require it at the pace his condition is advancing. The ACA doesn't cover long-term health either.

[antigop]

16. sorry about your situation, Rozlee, but you are correct...we need long-term care coverage. nt

[muntrv]

17. That's because it is taxpayer funded.

[DissidentVoice]

18. The ACA is not the solution

It's kind of a case where it's worlds better than anything we've got (meaning: nothing) from the Republicans.

I believe the ACA to be better than the status quo - but only just.

I am very disappointed that President Obama did not push for single-payer.

[ProSense]

19. He loves it

Dean Clancy, the Vice President of Public Policy at Freedom Works, an organization that vehemently opposes President Obama’s health care law and advocates for eliminating most government regulations in the health care system, admitted that the government program is “fairly popular” with military members:

...because it serves the military, and military members love it.

The DoD initiative, which like Medicaid, contracts with private insurers, offers health care services “through both military and nonmilitary hospitals, clinics, and other providers.

Yet he hates Medicaid.

Dean Clancy: Why State's Should reject Medicaid Expansion
http://heartland.org/podcasts/2012/07/25/dean-clancy-why-states-should-reject-medicaid-expansion

Krugman: Obamacare Is the Right’s Worst Nightmare
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023284000

[rpannier]

21. Who ever said logic was their strong suit

He probably saw it's for the military and decided it's a good thing. He also probably wears a flag pin

[Grins]

22. But...but...but...Soshilism!

'Cuz that's what it is.

[burnodo]

25. Affordable Care Act

Affordable! Trying to put a kinder, gentler face on the capitalistic excesses of the health-care industry.

[eridani]

26. It has a provision for state single payer in 2017

As long as conservatives keep electing jackasses like McConnell, that's the best we'll be able to do.