Lisa Benson for January 17, 2011

Where’re them jobs they’re supposed to be focu–oh right, they criticized Dems for focusing on Healthcare and are now doing the same thing.

Wouldn’t take long at all. GOP would send them home to die without care.

My insurance paid $80,000 for a life saving operation that they don’t offer or put you on a long waiting list in places that have government health care. I’ll trust the evil corporations over government.

I trust both the government and the insurance companies to both behave in ways that promote their own interests.

Insurance companies are out to expand themselves via earning profits, and the government is out to expand itself via winning power. As a result, they both have different attitudes about money. For example, promoters of government-run medicine like to point out that Medicare is much more efficient than private insurance when it comes to administrative costs, but that’s because the government is much more eager to give away taxpayer money (which expands its power) than insurance companies are to give away shareholder money (which decreases profits). As a result, the amount of Medicare fraud lost by the government each year is more than the profits earned by the top 15 insurance companies… combined.

Do insurance company profits hurt the taxpayer more, or does government waste? Those who trust the government over businesses confuse me, because the US government is the largest business (insurance company, real estate owner, employer, and fill in the blank) of all businesses. The people who work there enjoy much more profits (in the form of pay and benefits) than people who work in the private sector. Like any business, it seeks to expand itself. Unlike any other business, it has no implicit mission to satisfy its customers, since it can enforce its regulations and collection practices at the end of a gun, and does. This allows the government to waste and give away as much as it likes, since the taxpayer is always there to make up for it.

Well stated, Nemesys…and, to boot, I will even add the caveat that governments will always show themselves to be altruistic in order to secure more of a reach, but the reach will always eventually reveal itself to be a mere power-grab, leading to greater poverty (defined as standard of living) for future generations.

I always come to Lisa’s cartoons in the hopes that I’ll be surprised someday. …I never am.

Narrow: the repubs ran on turning around the economy they origanally ruined. healthcare was an afterthought. latest polls say most people are mostly happy with the new healthcare laws but it needs tweeking

If the government runs out of money… they can print more!

I say repeal all of the government healthcare and Social Security while they are at it. Do away with food stamps, Veteran’s care and any other Social programs we now have in place.

Justice, it is not just to take away “social” benefits that people have already earned. If you are a veteran, or a taxpayer who has paid into SS and Medicare, then you have a right to collect those things.

However, it is also not just to force people to continue to contribute to ponzi-scheme programs that cannot possibly sustain themselves. The only funtion of these forced programs today is to enrich politicians by allowing them to steal money from these funds and buy votes with them. Individuals should have a choice about where their hard-earned “social” funds go.

Personally, I’d trust a reputable insurance company with my retirement and “social” funds before I’d trust the government with them. If an insurance executive stole them, we’d call him a “criminal”. If a politician wasted them, we just call him a “liberal”.

What Clark said. Dump the insurance-corporation bureaucracy!

edrush, you forgot the “Sieg Heil!” at the end of your comment.

“First they came for my car company, but I don’t make cars, so I didn’t say anything.

Then they came for my doctor and my hospital and my insurance company, but I’m not a doctor, so I didn’t say anything.

Then they came for my fast food place, but I don’t make fast food, so I didn’t say anything.

Then they came for my student loan company, but I don’t make student loans, so I didn’t say anything.

Eventually they came for me, but by then there was nobody left to help me.”

too many “band aids”? Yes. But the vast majority were “compromises” added to keep the insurance companies “happy”, period.

I’m waiting…(and waiting and waiting) to hear what type of health care system the Republicans are going to offer “we, the People” in the place of the “Job-Killing-Health-Care-Reform.” Any sane person (who isn’t living off dividends from the insurance industry) will attest that the current system is uanffordable and unmaintainable for the average worker. 50 million US citizens are uncovered by any health care plan except for enormously expensive visits to the the ER. Insurance companies are raising premiums four and five times the inflation rate and business (to maintain their record earnings) are blithly passing these rate increases on to their employees. Thus, more and more working poor are giving up their current coverage because they can’t afford to keep up the premiums.

So, Narrominded and Habannero and Howgozit and DTP, et al, what’s your plan? What do the Republicans propose to replace the 2010 Health Care Reform plan? If you say, “Don’t fix it; it ain’t broken.” you are fools. 60% of US citizens are one emergency hospital stay away from bancruptcy.

A quick search finds that the majority do not support repeal. http://www.gallup.com/poll/145496/favor-oppose-repealing-healthcare-law.aspx

As for government as business… the President of the U.S. has a cap on his pay at around $400,000. CEOs of private corporations tend to drain SIGNIFICANTLY more from the corporate profits than that.

Tort reform and real competition amongst insurers is a good start, Blue Jayz. There’s only one show in town in my state, because the government decided that it’s in the interest of the consumer that they be “protected” from non-state approved companies. The ability to get a cheaper plan that covers what you really want is another good start. There are plenty of ideas, all of which involve the free market to a great degree.

From the St. Pete Times: 30 The percentage of Americans strongly opposed to the health care overhaul approved last year in Congress, the lowest level registered in AP-GfK surveys dating to fall 2009. Ahead of a vote on repeal in the GOP-led House this week, the nation is still divided over the law, but the strength and intensity of the opposition appear diminished. As for repeal, only about one in four say they want to do away with the law com­pletely. — tbt* news services

Hopefully, when the Health Care Reform takes effect in the coming years, people will see it as a good thing.

Except Republicans who vote against their own interests because of snake oil salesmen selling their party.

Dream on, Lisa, dream on…

fennec, point taken, although to be fair I am re-reading William Shirer and could not come up with a simliar Stalinist reference at the time. I admit that I should avoid cliche’s, but if the jackboot fits…

Besides, Godwin’s law does not claim to articulate a logical fallacy, but according to Godwin himself is merely a meme. Citing Godwin’s law is only a counter-meme, per Godwin. The argument is not lost if the comparison is valid. Many of the tactics being employed today would have made Goebbels very proud.

Obama wasn’t even sworn in and republicans started complaining that he took too much time.

Are we complaining the GOP congress are taking too much time?