But he wants the Nanny State to have total control of our bodies. Men, turn your head and cough. Women, put your feet in the stirrups and relax. Because if Edwards has his way, you will no longer get to choose whether or not you get some guy with a rubber glove prodding around your body.
This just goes to show that for at least this one guy, being "prochoice" isn't about resepecting women's bodily integrity, because he clearly doens't recognize anybody's right to bodily integrity. Edwards wants to turn this country into a prison where strip-searches for illicit illness are routine for everybody.
Let's run his cojones through a mammogram machine and see how he likes having his tender parts squished on somebody else's command.
I'm not a big Edwards fan -- to say the least -- but I think your post is a bit misleading. He says, "If you are going to be in the system, you can't choose not to go to the doctor for 20 years."
ReplyDeleteThis implies that no one would be forced to undergo preventive exams under penalty of law -- presumably, they would be able to opt out of "the system," with the understanding that doing so might compromise their future coverage. If that's the case, and not legally mandated exams, then I have to say it doesn't sound all that unreasonable.
He seemed pretty firm about insisting on 100% coverage -- nobody being outside the system.
ReplyDeleteWhich I do NOT like one little bit. I'd rather scramble to fend for myself than deal with a bad system that siezes control of you and then acts as if you should kiss their asses in gratitude because it's "Free." I got enough of that as an Army wife. I'd have my baby delivered by a cab driver sooner than have another baby in a military hospital.
I. -- you omit that he's not going to let you out of the system.
ReplyDelete"It requires that everybody be covered. It requires that everybody get preventive care,"
To tie it back to abortion -- doctors are pretty insistent on abortion for babies who will have problems. Call it preventive care, and then. . . .
It's not just the moms of kids with problems who are at risk. Warren Hern and other movers and shakers in the abortion lobby think that all pregnancies should be aborted unless the mother can convince the doctor that she got pregnant on purpose, her health is optimal, her social and financial situation is optimal, and it's just the "right time" to have a baby. And of course I think it'd go without saying that Hern and friends would want mandatory abortions for women with any sort of health problem or any less-than-perfect baby, or with more than one fetus.
ReplyDeleteBut aside from that, why isn't anybody calling Edwards on the hipocracy of being "prochoice" while proposing to deprive people of all medical choices entirely?
Even if a person were able to "opt out" of Edwards' universal health care plan, just how many private practice doctors and insurance companies do you expect to survive having the vast majority of their patients / customers move over to free government health care?? Do you expect doctors to remain in private practice just so you can opt out when all of their other patients are moving to universal health care?
ReplyDeleteAnd, if there are private practice doctors, or if doctors are allowed to take both government and private patients, how do you expect to pay for it without private insurance? Again, how many private insurance companies do you expect to survive losing the majority of their customers?
ReplyDeleteThere needs to be competition, a motivation for providers to come up with better ways of offering services.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in Pennsylvania in the early to mid 1990's, I had the most wonderful HMO. I was able to get whatever I needed, when I needed it -- and it was often a lot more convenient than the health care I'd gotten under more traditional insurance coverage.
For example, they dealt with emergencies by having doctors rotate being on call. If you had an emergency that wasn't a clear-cut "Call an ambulance!" emergency, you'd page the doc. She'd call and attend to you. Here are some examples of how that worked out:
1. Hot bacon grease splashed in eye. She had me describe how I felt, then had my husband describe how my eye looked. She told me to put an ice pack on it for fifteen minutes and if there was still any pain, page her again and she'd meet me at the emergency room. The ice pack did the job. Their cost: Nothing. She was on call anyway. Convenience factor for me: Fantastic! No trip to the ER, no wasting my evening being processed through triage only to end up with a $400 ice bag.
2. Husband managed to slice his hand open. She met us at their clinic, where she unlocked the door, turned on the lights, got out a sterile kit, and stitched him up. Their cost: Dirt cheap. She probably got a fee for having had to actually go meet a patient, and there was the cost of turning on the lights and for the steirle suture pack. Convenience factor for us: Fantastic. No wait in line, no triage. In and out in less than half an hour.
3. Car fell off jack and landed on husband's foot. She had us meet her at the emergency room, where they leased an exam room. No signing in, no going through triage. We met her, she unlocked the room and examined his foot. She sent him for an x-ray. His foot was okay. Their cost: Low. The lease on the room, the stipend to the doc, the x-ray. Convenience factor for us: Fantastic. Again, no triage, no wait. In and out in no time.
This HMO was no doubt significantly cheaper to operate than a traditional insurance company, but there was no reduction in the quality of care. They just eliminated a lot of waste and in doing so made it MORE convenient for us, and they reduced the overcrowding in the ER.
Take away competition, and you end up with people like Hillary cutting costs by taking away care from the sick and the disabled.
Even if a person were able to "opt out" of Edwards' universal health care plan, just how many private practice doctors and insurance companies do you expect to survive having the vast majority of their patients / customers move over to free government health care??
ReplyDeleteCanada just got sued by a doctor who wanted to open a private practice. He won.
Yes, it is possible for private medicine to survive government medicine. Canada tried to ban it. I suspect that, owing to "Pierce vs. the Society of Sisters", in the US such a ban would certain not survive a lawsuit.
Government-supplied health care is SUCH a bad idea. It sounds good at first, but it just doesn't stand up to scrutiny.
ReplyDeleteTwo thoughts:
1) Do you really want the same clowns who run the DMV to make decisions about your health care?
2) Remember the scandalous conditions at Walter Reed? That's what government health care offers!
But back to the main topic: I'm actually grateful to John-Boy for making the connection as clearly as he did. Of course government-run health care will be massively intrusive. Of course it will take away many of your rights to make your own decisions about your body. How could it work any other way? Once the government takes over something that should be left to the private sector -- health care, education, "art" -- that service will become highly-politicized, and personal freedom will suffer.
Do you really want politicians to keep their laws off of your body? Then you have to oppose government-run health care.
ReplyDelete1) Do you really want the same clowns who run the DMV to make decisions about your health care?
This argument is tired. Do you want health care being run by Enron-type corporations? How come it's okay for the government to build roads and offer public education, but not for it to offer public healthcare? Moreover, why do you need to have it entirely one way or entirely the other? We have public and private lawyers, public and private schools, etc. We accept that education, legal defense, etc are in the best interest of the nation as a whole, so we ensure that regardless of financial situation, all citizens have access to these services. Surely, giving the better-off the means to choose to pay for private service if they so desire is preferable to making private service the only option available, and you're just screwed if you can't afford it.
2) Remember the scandalous conditions at Walter Reed? That's what government health care offers!
This is also an incomplete argument. Walter Reed is what happens when government health care is allowed to mess up. Any one of hundreds of stories of people dying in waiting rooms, people going broke when they get sick, people not being able to get life-saving treatments covered because their insurance doesn't feel like shelling out for it -- those are all what private healthcare offers, to take your tone. Just because our current government has done a remarkable job demonstrating that it is inefficient and incompetent does not mean that all government-run programs are inefficient or incompetent. I have family living in countries where their healthcare is paid for by their taxes, and they have NEVER had any of the problems patients at Walter Reed or even the ER in my neighborhood have had.
I don't think that government-run healthcare is necessarily the solution for the US, but the old jokes about "Hey, don't you hate the DMV?" are tired one-liners that don't address the complexities of the subject.
Of course it will take away many of your rights to make your own decisions about your body. How could it work any other way?
It seems to work quite well in just about every other industrialized country. I know my sister has never been forced to go to the doctor or do anything she hasn't wanted to do.