Tom

You keep insisting they are "Popular"
...Not so!
Because you insist it must be doesn't make it so.

You are so right Tom. Thats why I've always offered evidence to support claims like this in the past. And in order to substantiate my claim this time I will again. (And apologize for the slight side track of the thread)

Indeed, the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll found 62 percent of Americans expressing support for "having the government create a new health insurance plan to compete with private health insurance plans." Other pollsters describing the public option as "government administered" and "similar to Medicare" gauged even more positive reactions: 67 percent in a Kaiser Family Foundation poll in April and 72 percent in the most recent CBS News/New York Times poll.

So if Americans live in fear of government intrusion into health care, why does likening the public option to Medicare make reform more popular?

Consider some results obtained by the same Kaiser tracking poll. When asked how much they trust various health care players "to put your interests above their own," respondents rank doctors (78 percent trust "a lot" or "some") and nurses (74 percent) at the top of the list.

Among those insured through Medicare, however, "the Medicare program" (68 percent) scores nearly as high. Among those with private insurance, "your health insurance company" earns much less trust (48 percent).
Perhaps that result is just about perceptions of corporate interests and not about patient experience?
We can test that question with data from a set of surveys known as the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems. CAHPS is an initiative of the Department of Health and Human Services that developed a standardized survey questionnaire used by virtually all health insurance plans -- public and private -- to assess patient satisfaction. Most private insurers use the CAHPS questionnaire and disclose the data to the National Committee for Quality Assurance in order to receive their accreditation. So thanks to CAHPS, we have a massive collection of data comparisons of how patients experience and rate Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance.

Those comparisons show the depth of Medicare's popularity. According to a national CAHPS survey conducted by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in 2007, 56 percent of enrollees in traditional fee-for-service Medicare give their "health " a rating of 9 or 10 on a 0-10 scale.

There's more here.
source: http://www.nationaljournal.com/njonline ... --20090629

So, I offered evidennce. What you got to support your "not so".
And see thats the kind of thing I'm talking about Willis... You have often demonstrated that you think an unsupported opinion of yours holds weight in an arguement against a claim made with authoratative evidence... and get all huffy because your opinions aren't respected.
Its where the debate has gone. We're supposed to not only support your right to an opinion but not care that its uninformed or misinformed or held up with nothing more than your belief.

Well lets start with the fact that I live here. You do not, not that this means you don't know anything but rather you do not know the full story. My wife works in the medical field and where she works, they do not accept it. My mother is on it and has plenty of problems with what can and can not be done, finding doctors that accept it is also sometimes difficult. I was talking to a man (very wealthy) who said the 9th doctor moved out of his neighborhood just last month, the reason? ...medicare. (It is different state to state and in Pennsylvania it is killing doctors).

Read all of these reasons and you find a common theme, Doctors keep getting less and less from Medicare. Patents like the something for nothing, when they can find a doctor who accepts it, they get fair (far from great) service. They want what they have been getting but doctors are not able to make due on what they are being paid for by Medicaid/care. These payments are not getting any better either, this system is also failing and falling apart fast.

Because people want something they feel is their right does not mean it's good, it does not mean it's doing well, and you can make an argument it's "popular" it isn't even what they want. You can point to all these polls of stupid people but the system stinks in almost every way. If this system were what we were suddenly given, look out, it's not what we want!

An interesting book which discusses ideological transformation is Michael Freeden’s Ideology: A Very Short Introduction.

The book outlines what may be a helpful approach to understanding ideologies but dividing an ideology into layers: core principles, secondary layers etc. The secondary, tertiary layers then have lines connecting them to the core principles. It can be a useful way of analysing an ideology (I had to use it to study Canadian conservatism shortly after the American Revolution.)

That being said, I think that before we discuss the American conservatism has changed we need to establish some sort of basis for what American conservatism actually is or was.

Freeden writes that a core element of conservatism is its reactionary nature. Indeed, he speaks of the “conservative technique...to assemble a counter-set of conceptual configurations directed against whatever is seen by conservatives as the most threatening to the social order.”

If what Freeden says has some truth to it, then I guess the change in American conservatism cannot be adequately assessed without a study of other ideological strains as well.

One of the main efforts of conservative philosophers is to advance the notion that conservatism operates in reality whereas the other strains of political thought are ideologically driven. I think this highlights, in a sense, a tension within the broad conservative ideology: how do we reconcile pragmatism with resistance to change? (That is, of course, if we even accept that conservatism is pragmatic and resistant to change in the first place.)

tom

You can point to all these polls of stupid people

Right.

2002 poll of Canadians, only 5% knew who the Canadian Head of State was
http://www.canadian-republic.ca/polls.html
...stupid people make stupid polls

But a poll, even of 'stupid' people, does indicate popularity. They may be wrong to support something, mistaken, mislead, ignorant or dumb as posts.

But it indicates popularity.

But it indicates popularity

Indeed it does. And if Tom had bothered to examine the polls in the article I linked he would have seen one was exclusively of US doctors, who were majority supportive of a single payer system. But by his reasoning the doctors polled would also have been the stupid ones...

Toms response is a clear demonstration of the typical reaction I was referring to however.

And so there is cognitive dissonance in dealing with that reality.

A religious people of fundamental beliefs, which American are in the majority, are used to the acceptance of things without evidence (faith) . Indeed if their assumptions about the world are challenged by evidence they dismiss the evidence.
We've seen that in the global warming debate for instance. And in other areas where science is disputed, not based on contradictory evidence but because of suspected "political views" or "collusions and conspiracies " or "because science is just faulty".
When people's core beliefs are challenged there is less acceptance of any evidence, and when people who hold those core beliefs are generally unused to the evidentiary process the response remarkably unsophisticated and reflexive.
For conservatism certain things became "self evident" over the 60's through the 80's. (In particular the 80s.) and one isn't allowed to challenge those notions even when the evidence is glaring. Socialism is always bad (despite Medicare), regulation is generally bad (despite the Cuyahoga river, the S&L failure, the recent collapse, etc and strategic government intervention in the economy is never good. (despite the development of transportation and communications, the invention of thecomputer industry, the Internet and the recent magnificent examples of the Asian tigers), and the markets always work to the country's benefit (despite the outsourcing of entire industries).
Conservatives now ignore all this evidence and base their view of the world only on their own narrow experience and what their parents taught them... Its easier that way. Doesn't challenge the core beliefs.

Socialism is always bad (despite Medicare), regulation is generally bad (despite the Cuyahoga river, the S&L failure, the recent collapse, etc and strategic government intervention in the economy is never good.

This may be an aspect of a new brand of conservatism but the tenets are not exclusive to the conservative tradition. The resurgence of deregulation politics has its roots in economic neoliberalism. So, while in recent times political figures who identify themselves as conservative have championed such a world-view, I’m not sure if we can place economic neoliberalism as a belief at the core of conservative values. Neoliberalism continues to have a considerable impact on our perception of the world and has affected more than just the conservative ideology. If the dominant strain of the modern conservative ideology has been subsumed into a neoliberalist mentality, it would be interesting to try and tract this transition. Essentially, what may be core to the conservative ideology may not be the outcome but the process.

GMTom wrote:Read all of these reasons and you find a common theme, Doctors keep getting less and less from Medicare. Patents like the something for nothing, when they can find a doctor who accepts it, they get fair (far from great) service. They want what they have been getting but doctors are not able to make due on what they are being paid for by Medicaid/care. These payments are not getting any better either, this system is also failing and falling apart fast.

Doctors have the highest median income of any profession.

In 2008, physicians practicing primary care had total median annual compensation of $186,044, and physicians practicing in medical specialties earned total median annual compensation of $339,738.

Self-employed physicians—those who own or are part owners of their medical practice—generally have higher median incomes than salaried physicians.

If you want to talk anecdotes, last year I had to switch physicians, so I randomly picked someone that was taking new patients. I was called 15 minutes later and the gal said that I didn't sound like I was a senior. I told her I wasn't, and she said they had made a mistake, that the doctor only accepts people on Medicare.

I'll go an anecdote further, I've got tons of doctors, dentists, and optometrists on my FB friends list. And guess who takes the most/best vacations every year of all my friends and family? I'm happy for them, they work hard, and have a lot of responsibility. But it's ridiculous to suggest that medical pros suffer from want of compensation.

Ricky:

Socialism is always bad (despite Medicare), regulation is generally bad (despite the Cuyahoga river, the S&L failure, the recent collapse, etc

However, medicare threatens to bankrupt the country. Isn't that a classic example of the dangers of socialism. To each according to his need is problematic if people have endless medical needs that the rest of us cannot afford.

Re regulation, I don't think you are making your case. There is and was tremendous regulations in the financial industry. We don't lack for regulation. There are hundreds of thousands of pages of Regulation in the US. In fact, there's more regulation today then there has ever been. There's barely an aspect of our lives that isn't regulated. In fact, most knowledgeable people attribute the recent financial collapse to over-regulation of our housing market. Aren't you just ignoring that evidence because of your own biases?

Ray Jay wrote:However, medicare threatens to bankrupt the country. Isn't that a classic example of the dangers of socialism. To each according to his need is problematic if people have endless medical needs that the rest of us cannot afford.

it's an example of how that system can fail. But it's not to everyone on the basis of need, it's to a subset. The need is not endless either. There will be a finite number of people eligible and they will live for a finite time and have finite medical needs in that time.

It's certainly an example of the 'dangers' (always with the emotional words when it comes to socialism?) of a socialist programme within the framework of a capitalist system. But there are other healthcare systems out there with socialist bases (and in many cases, far more socialist as they apply to all people throughout their lives, not just the elderly and disabled) don't face quite the same level of problems. And there are also many more non-socialist systems that are more efficient than the US medical market outwith medicare and medicaid. Anyone might think that the problem is not the ideology behind the system.

[qutoe]Re regulation, I don't think you are making your case. There is and was tremendous regulations in the financial industry. We don't lack for regulation. There are hundreds of thousands of pages of Regulation in the US. In fact, there's more regulation today then there has ever been. There's barely an aspect of our lives that isn't regulated.[/quote]Well, there's regulation and regulation. When a lot of the regulations have been written with an eye on the special interests (even written by the special interests), it may not have the same power. When the regulators are toothless, or can be avoided by some actors,

In fact, most knowledgeable people attribute the recent financial collapse to over-regulation of our housing market. Aren't you just ignoring that evidence because of your own biases?

define 'most knowledgeable people' and the basis on which they make that attribution. This opinion (no matter what level of authority or majority you wish to base your appeal-to-fallacy upon) ignores a more important aspect - it wasn't the mortgages that caused the problem, it was the bundling of them into opaque CDS instruments which were then sold on as assets that was the issue. Those CDS items were not rated properly, were traded between retail and investment portions of banks freely, and served to multiply rather than mitigate the risks should borrowers default.

It's falling apart fast, fewer and fewer are accepting it, it is faltering and will no longer work the way it is currently set up. Yes, it is "popular" just as was the free cheese program, doesn't make it something we actually prefer over something else, it's something we have paid into and want our share, yes, in that way it is popular. It still sucks and if this were the only plan we had, we would be hopping mad, yeah, that's real "popular"

A lot of people have cancer too, doesn't make it "popular" does it?

ray

However, medicare threatens to bankrupt the country. Isn't that a classic example of the dangers of socialism

We could compare the efficiency and effectiveness of different countries and see that 17% of US GDP is on health care but 9 to 12% every other western country....
And that would prove that socialism delivers better value .
Or you could actually compare US Medicare with other US insurance and health care delivery. And in that case medicare delivers dollar for dollar more efficiently than private care..
But thats been debated ad nauesum on this board, with all kind of links to the Kaiser Institute and all kinds of studies. And still its "Medicare is bankrupting the country".
Its not the problem. The problem is the basic cost of health care. When the same procedures often cost 4 times in the US as they do in other countries there's the problem. When the same prescriptions cost a quarter what they do in the states in Windsor....
And since you point to "regulation", there's a classic example in your medicare system. Where every other country allows the insurance administration in national systems to negotiate and bargain for lower prices and thereby keeps medical inflation in line somewhat, in the US 2/3 of the costs to medicare are essentially protected from this strategy by law.
What Medicare is in the US is socialism without the added benefit of allowing the administrators to act in the interests of the tax payers and users of medicare. They must behave as best benfits the service providers and big pharma.
But rather than examine the causes its easier to say "medicare is bankrupting the country". Rather than looking at why medicare as a socialized system fails to deliver the efficiencies that other socialized systems deliver its easier just to blame "Socialism".
See what I mean about abandoning evidence for labels? Ray, a US conservative of the 60's would have looked at how the levers of the market are manipulated and understood. And a US conservative of the 60s considered the objective of universal health care for their elders an imperative.

And you're just plain wrong on the financial regulations. Compare Canada' or Indias banking regulations, compare the years before Wall Street Investment Banks were allowed to create, buy and sell and bet on outcomes... Every time the regulations on financial institutions are loosened there has been a calamity.(S&L, 1929) For smart guys who for 3 years both sold their CSDs to unwitting investors, then bet against them, in a way that was previously illegal, the calamity was a gold mine. Guess who lobbied hardest for the rule changes Ray?

Ricky:

ray

However, medicare threatens to bankrupt the country. Isn't that a classic example of the dangers of socialism


We could compare the efficiency and effectiveness of different countries and see that 17% of US GDP is on health care but 9 to 12% every other western country....
And that would prove that socialism delivers better value .
Or you could actually compare US Medicare with other US insurance and health care delivery. And in that case medicare delivers dollar for dollar more efficiently than private care..
But thats been debated ad nauesum on this board, with all kind of links to the Kaiser Institute and all kinds of studies. And still its "Medicare is bankrupting the country".
Its not the problem. The problem is the basic cost of health care. When the same procedures often cost 4 times in the US as they do in other countries there's the problem. When the same prescriptions cost a quarter what they do in the states in Windsor....
And since you point to "regulation", there's a classic example in your medicare system. Where every other country allows the insurance administration in national systems to negotiate and bargain for lower prices and thereby keeps medical inflation in line somewhat, in the US 2/3 of the costs to medicare are essentially protected from this strategy by law.
What Medicare is in the US is socialism without the added benefit of allowing the administrators to act in the interests of the tax payers and users of medicare. They must behave as best benfits the service providers and big pharma.
But rather than examine the causes its easier to say "medicare is bankrupting the country". Rather than looking at why medicare as a socialized system fails to deliver the efficiencies that other socialized systems deliver its easier just to blame "Socialism".
See what I mean about abandoning evidence for labels?

Okay, but you are the one who said that medicare is an example of socialized medicine working. I just commented that it is not a good example. Now you are amending your original statement by saying that hypothetically if medicare was run well it would be a good example of socialized medicine working. If Hitler didn't kill 11 million people and try to take over the world, perhaps one could argue about the virtues of Fascism? (Okay, over the top, but fun nevertheless.)

Ricky:

And you're just plain wrong on the financial regulations. Compare Canada' or Indias banking regulations, compare the years before Wall Street Investment Banks were allowed to create, buy and sell and bet on outcomes...

Perhaps. Here are some other differences:

Only the US offers full tax deductibility of mortgage interest payments.
Only the US "maintains a government agency that insures mortgages (the Federal Housing Administration), a government agency that guarantees mortgages securities (Ginnie Mae), and government-chartered companies that buy and sell mortgages and...mortgage-backed securities (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Bank system).

In Canada, government-backed mortgages account for only 30 percent of the market. In the United States, the number is 85%.

Here's some reading for your free time. After you've read it you can assert that I am "just plain wrong". http://www.aei.org/docLib/Wallisondissent.pdf