Jezebel 
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New York, 1:57 PM
Sat Dec 19
73 posts in the last 24 hours
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12/18/09
Silly me for thinking the insurance companies could get away with less after a bill passed. I guess my gullibility is a pre-existing condition.
I love America, but I hate how reactive some people get to "socialism" and other words when they don't even know what those words mean. I hate that this is all about an old white man's ability to further control my uterus and not getting better health care for my uninsured friends and family, including a brother who has worked full-time at one job for over a year but is still considered "temporary' and therefore gets no insurance.
Because of people like my worthless senator who can still call herself a Democrat with a straight face, this is getting watered down and watered down and watered down to where it isn't even soup anymore. It's just water that someone probably peed in.
12/18/09
I find this has a fairly interesting explanation with some number crunching on the (semi)current version of the bill. It also has excellent links to other analysis and the bill itself, if people are interested.
12/18/09
12/18/09
The Democrats: Even when we win, we lose!
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12/18/09
Oddly enough, I did know about the farm labor exemption, but that's only because I wasn't able to find my grandfather in the SS Death Index (he passed away 16 years before I was born). My dad explained his absence from the index as, "He was a farmer. You think he was going to pay any taxes if he could possibly help it?"
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12/18/09
Now I really feel that all hope is lost. If this bill passes as-is it's going to bankrupt hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of hard working Americans who are just scraping by hoping they don't get sick. I can't even afford the $1,000/year fine for not having health insurance much less health insurance. Moreover, unless we're going to start mandating that all institutions of higher learning provide health coverage for their students, we're going to permanently put college out of the reach of millions of students whose families can't afford to provide them health coverage, which means more and more students are going to have to forgo college and opportunities in order to get a job and health insurance. That's just WRONG.
I'm one of the lucky ones, in that I have the option of scraping together a few thousand dollars up-front and immigrating to Australia since my fiance is an Australian citizen and even if he wasn't, I have a friend in Canada who would be willing to marry me. Most people don't have that option and more importantly, you shouldn't NEED that option.
12/18/09
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12/18/09
@bluebears: Seconded on the shittiness of the coverage. The University of Idaho's undergrad coverage, the first year it was required, did not cover BROKEN BONES unless they were the result of a varsity university sporting event. Really.
12/18/09
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12/18/09
Mr. Pietra broke his leg two years later; thank goodness the school had switched to a different policy that actually covered routine medical care.
12/18/09
However, even if the minimum that goes through is the revocation of the "pre-existing condition" and tighter regulation of the insane and fraudulent current business model of the insurance industry, much good will still have been done for millions of chronically and fatally ill people. But it is not going to be enough to ensure, much less mandate, that the poorest of the poor get coverage. Which as I understand it, is kind of the point of having reform in the first place.
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12/18/09
The flaws are so big that millions of people just like you may again have to suffer while waiting decades for any chance of change. So if we have to work to change this bill, even if it goes past the deadline Obama wants- his State Of The Union speech (just so that he can claim a win, no matter how shitty, in his column). Working it out a few days,weeks or months longer is worth the fight for a better, truly public friendly bill.
12/18/09
12/18/09
More importantly, sympathies to your family and your mother in particular. Hopefully something not shit can be done in time to help :(
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12/18/09
8% is actually ridiculously low... For a $50000 a year income, that's a cap of $4000 a year on insurance. I'm pretty sure that most family insurance plans are going to be at least that much, and $50000 is well above the poverty line for a single family household.
12/18/09
12/18/09
The mandate 'fine' also starts at under $100 and takes over 5 years to reach the maximum penalty. Also, you are exempt if you've been uninsured for less than three months at the time of filing. If your insurance company booms your premium by 300% in retaliation for eliminating pre-existing conditions, you are probably going to shoot right out to the exempt pocket while you look for a better deal. If EVERY insurance company in the exchange program followed one-another lockstep the only thing they'll do is open the door for a government plan to swoop in and do the mop work. This has worked successfully in other states and with work it can work nationwide. Not perfectly, but it can work.
12/18/09
12/18/09
And for the firedoglake crew: spare us the sanctimoniousness. There's something awkward about opposing a mandate because it will inflict pain on the poor, and then turning around and banking on increased suffering by these same people to expand your grassroots support.
12/17/09
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12/17/09
Plastic surgery and botox has become relatively affordable. Doctor's have payment plans, so you can pay off your procedures over the course of years. The American public is not generally freaked out about the idea of carrying a credit card balance- why wouldn't you just throw down your card for this? Millions of people do. Even if you were going to pay out of pocket. 500 dollars X 2times a year= 1000 dollars/12 months= 83 dollars a month. A good number of middle class people have 83 dollars a month to spend on this if it is a priority.
12/17/09
You need to recalibrate your understanding of middle class. No middle class people I know are getting a toxin injected into themselves for cosmetic purposes. File this tax under "rich people problems."
12/17/09
No amount of argument could convince me that it's a medical, life-saving necessity.
12/17/09
Although someone mentioned downthread that it's a tax on the procedure, and not the poison itself, so it wouldn't be taxed for someone who needs it for a geniune medical reason. Which, if that's the case, maked the whole medical arguement moot.
12/17/09
I just with people would be upfront about their vanity. There's nothing wrong with wanting to feel better about your appearance.
But you can't bullshit a bullshitter, as it were.
12/17/09
But everybody is different, some people will respond well to the first medicine they try, some have to try a few to find the right fit, and for some people the usual methods just won't work, so they have to try something a bit more extreme. I don't doubt that there are people out there who don't get relief from traditional migraine meds. I also don't doubt that there are more people using it for that reason than genuinely need it.
But for the ones using it purely for vanity, I say tax the shit out of it.
PS - Jeez, the end of my last reply is atrocious, I was heading out the door to grab lunch when I wrote that last bit, I swear.
12/17/09
12/17/09
As opposed to, say, a kidney transplant?
Isn't it still cosmetic? Or is the understanding that this type of situation yields psychological issues that therefore make it life-saving?
12/18/09
Yes, I am referring to the psychological issues here, and obviously not being able to access sex reassignment surgery won't kill anyone directly. So, yes, technically it's cosmetic, and also elective in the same way some heart surgeries are - these surgeries markedly improve the quality of life of the patient but are not still elective.
These may not be emergency surgery like an appendectomy but they're still as life-saving as other technically non-life-saving, elective procedures such as angioplasties or hysterectomies.