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August 10, 2009

Comments

I really hate those littles insects, they are so nosy and difficult to kill.

Great that you're doing this. Much needed with all the shouting. Should you need support about the the position of insurers, here's a Bill Moyers PBS interview with former CIGNA exec Wendell Potter

Hey the cartoons are good. Nice to see the post

I have lived in seven countries and as I see the USA was the last country where there was more freedom than anywhere else. This is coming to an end. First the right-wing used 9-11 as an excuse to decrease freedom, and now the left-wing led by Obama wants to take away any remaining advantage in the USA. The left-wing always wants to increase government intervention and the only business is healthcare where there was until lately more freedom in the USA than elsewhere. A great recession is coming in the next years caused by the “baby-boom demographic wave” and by the out of control federal debt. This will wipe out the healthcare program. The more the federal government is increasing spending, the deeper the recession will be. There is nothing to be gained from increased spending. Any tinkering with healthcare should be based on present (before the Obama bill) level of spending.

Had to drop by and leave a comment on the sketches you have up there, they are honestly hilarious!

Thanks for the review. I think a fundamental problem with insurers is that most of them are public companies, therefore responsible to their investors and motivated to constantly increase profits.

adasd

You have a very good blog that the main thing a lot of interesting and useful!

This is one that I will share to many, thank you for the great post

I like your napkin explainations of this healthcare equation. Maybe the healthcare (and other) bills in congress should be limited to a few napkins for all to see instead of hundreds and thousands of pages of hidden costs and agendas.

Tough times for now regarding our health care policy but what can we do? We don't have the power and all we have to do is to follow. We are just ordinary people and hoping for a better future for our children's health care system.I hope our president will realize what do we really need and not what their pockets want.

Fixing health care is important for everybody and I want to write an article about my opinion.

Very innovative idea indeed.

thank you for that
This is a very touching blog, If I only could have had an idea I wish I had read the You inspired me to be a bloggermaterial on here sooner. Thanks for sharing everything this is a very nice blog

Great job, keep it up. Of course this is an oversimplification, but we have to simplify the conversation so voices which are not usual heard can join in. The fact that only "100 people understand it" is why you have to keep doing what you are doing.

To all the people screaming "Oversimplification!" I have to say, STFU because people like me who understand NOTHING might actually start to understand a little bit from such simplification. Then, I can find out more later, at least I get some basics down this way! It's like explaining an atom to a high-school student. At first you tell them there are three parts... which isn't true, but it helps them grasp the concept before introducing them to orbitals and quarks and things. OK? Oversimplification is fine - and I'm not an idiot, I know it is a simplification, but this is absolutely VALUABLE for getting me started in my understanding. OK? Thankyou.

Doctors are not 'in it for the money'.

Too often they practice defensive medicine-- ordering tests of marginal value solely to prevent a lawsuit against them.

And the other thing lacking from this over-simplified fantasy is the Medicare/Medicaid debacle. These failed government programs pay 30 cents on the dollar of the actual incurred cost of care. Guess who pays the rest?

The problem with government-run anything is that it has a bottomless pit of money (when the money runs out they just print more!). The net result is that the (bad) government money drives out the (good) private money. In such an environment competition is impossible.

Look up Gresham's Law. Educate yourself.

And stop posting this propagandistic nonsense.

I agree with William and others - there are those whose goals/interests run deeper and broader than pure profit but who have been forced into squashing those interests. Many doctors DO want to provide actual care.

Also, you've left out other parts of the equation, in terms of why costs are the way they are. I appreciate the attempt but agree that the simplification is maybe a little too simplified.

What about primary care doctors who's mission is to keep us well?

I like the thought - but this concept might be better-suited to things upon which there is broad agreement (i.e. electric motors, photosynthesis, etc.) There are obviously many interpretations of this issue. It can be quite misleading to create a metaphor which there is an internal logic, but which misrepresents the truth. The viewer, after being forced to digest this logic, is then trapped by it's circularity.

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