Death Panels and the Politics of Death

No he would not have. kennedy would not have had the same health care as the plebes. he would have kept his enhanced health care and would have had any posiible treatment he so desired.

The point of the comment was that if Kennedy had to deal with the garbage being forced upon the country he would not have been worth treating. Palin/Huckabee 2012!

I agree with Joe Beck. Huckabee is correct. Rather than wonder which Democrat will toss it back first, why not refute Huckabee’s statement with evidence from the bill. Because it is not there. If I was a senior citizen right now, I’d be scared to death. Huh?….Oh…excuse me I’d be scared to “end of life”!!!

He sure didn’t rush off to Canada or the UK for superior treatment.

George, do you sit up all night making crap like this up from your White House office, or do you use the stall next to Obama and hold hands, and combine both your half-wit brain powers…how sweet!!!!
get a life and start reporting objectively…..

Without Obamacare, as a 62-year-old retired teacher and former breast cancer patient who is currently uninsurable, I will not have pain medication if my cancer returns. My current income puts me slightly above the current cut-off for public funding, but I cannot afford my state’s “high risk” insurance since the economic downturn. Frankly, pain meds and go home to die sounds good, compared to no pain meds and go home to die. I have had my life; the limited money for public healthcare should support children and young families. Many of my age cohorts are of the same mind. But please, some end-of-life compassion for pain. Death is not the enemy; fear of death should not drive public decisions. Relief of pain is an appropriate goal for end-of-life decisions.

Would Kennedy have access to the top brain surgeon in the country if he wasn’t wealthy and powerful? No. If was just your average 76 year old and there was only a public option I don’t think he’d cut in line in front of younger and healthier people.
Under a government plan there will be no incentive to keep hold people alive. Because they want to ration health care for the masses.

Not only does Mike Hucekberry look like Gomer Pyle, but he thinks like him.

Worst. Radical Leftist. President. Ever.
And if you disagree with him you get called a “racist”.
May our country survive these four long years…

George, you are not in the White House anymore, you are a journalist now. Stop talking like a Democratic pundit, it is embarrassing ABC News, and obviously killing their ratings.

“Under a government plan there will be no incentive to keep old people alive. Because they want to ration health care for the masses.”
James | Aug 28, 2009 6:58:39 PM
AMERICAN OLD PEOPLE CURRENTLY RECEIVE GOVERNMENT HEALTH CARE RIGHT VIA A PUBLIC INSURANCE OPTION RIGHT NOW. Read that again. Think!
The current public option proposal is to create a government run insurance option and make it open to the public at their option. It is not to open up the fully “socialist” Medicare program to the masses.

Oh no, Mr. Huckabee, Ted Kennedy would have the best his money could buy for his healthcare..Only the little folk would suffer under Obamacare..The elite would suffer not.

Don!!! Talk about lies!!! I have never read so many lies in so few words in my life!!!

Shame on Republicans for trying to use Kennedy’s death in their LIES on health care reform.

Agreed w/ MJ – Kennedy would still have recieved first rate care as a Senator, it is simply the rest of us who would be judged too old to be worth the treatment.

I see a couple of Obama’s staffers found the time to post a comment trying to insult Huckabee or suggest that everybody who opposes Obama is part of a Republican conspiracy- even a mild attempt to defend Obama’s policies just sounds silly these days. George’s blog entry is so wildly out of touch with reality that there is no point of reference to begin debating it- maybe he should lobby for government run career insurance…

wiletta thompson:
I wish you the best – you’re 62 and have alot of life ahead of you! your life is valuable until He decides to call you home. keep on truckin, honey!

Under Obamacare, America won’t even have good enough health care to meet the standards of the self-appointed “elite.” Currently, America is the place where OTHER foreign leaders come for world-class medical treatment; under Obamacare, OUR “leaders” will be going abroad for world-class medical treatment.

“Frankly, pain meds and go home to die sounds good”
What an apt and concise summary of government-run ObamaCare. Especially since that is Dr. Obama’s exact stated position for those who need pacemakers.
I expect he’ll be contacting you any day now for permission to use your “just go away and die, you over-50s and disabled” endorsement in an ad! Stay by your phone!!

If so many people want government health care, why don’t they emigrate to Canada or England?

…crickets chirping…

Sorry Mr.Huckabee,
I meant to give you the thumbs up, your right on the mark and thanks for telling the sheep all about it. Let’s hope they will stop following the scap goat before the slaughter history always warns us about,
Russia,
China,
S.Africa,
Cuba,
South of The Boarder,
death seems to be the way of the dictators, count the cost for those governments aboved mentioned, is this our new America? No not quit, no not yet and no not today ….right Americans? That is a very easy question.
Sincerly
TIMERUNNER

He is right George. No wonder FOX is number one. He is already dead under this BILL of Odummy care. If he was regular citizen not a politician. they have theres we have ours
NBC id doomed who would be next CBS then ABC

Well, that’s strange. He was going to die anyway. So….. Dying at home while being made as comfortable as possible is bad because? Why have we become such a nation of sensationalist imbeciles? When did things slide into such a sad state of affairs? Wake up people. Turn off the complacency box and think!!!

How do you know that Mr. Kennedy didn’t do exactly that? Take pain pills and go home to die?
Posted by: Linda | Aug 28, 2009 7:36:17 PM
Ahhh, because it was widely reported that Sen. Kennedy underwent surgery to remove lesions in his brain shortly after his diagnosis, then underwent chemotherapy…
Under the national health services such as in Canada or the UK, a 76-year old with that diagnosis would likely have been put on waiting lists and gotten treatments in 8 months to a year. Unless of course, they “knew somebody” or had “connections” that could get them bumped up on the list. Common people would have to go home and wait and see their conditions deteriorate. No, it’s not death panels you have to fear, but bureaucratic paper-pushers, mid-level flunkies and post office type unfireable government employees-for-life who will be running the “public option”.

Karen:
Do you even have a clue as to what you read? It is understood that Kennedy ins’t included in the health care debacle that is designed for “the rest of us” and not for the elitists. The author is merely pointing that difference out.

How is that any different than now? Ever hear of hospice? That is the gold standard for dying cancer patients. My father died from cancer, there isn’t anything else you can do with a terminal disease. Keep them alive longer to suffer longer? No one is exempt from death when it comes.

George,
It was President Obama who told a citizen that instead of the surgery to extend her life grandma could take pain pills instead. Facts are stubborn things!

Just one more reason Jake Tapper should take over This Week.

Isn’t that what it did anyway, with it’s SPECIAL government payed for PRIVATE heath care it had?

To those who believe Huckabee: what evidence do you have that the government would ever tell someone terminally ill to take pain pills and just die? There already is a government, public health plan that covers millions: it’s called Medicare and it’s existed for decades. How many of you have friends or relatives with Medicare calling you to say, “the government is trying to kill me?” The Obama administration is just proposing to extend public coverage to a larger segment of the population. Public coverage (i.e. Medicare) is neither radical nor new.

Can George be anymore of a political over-thinker? Democrats are trying to use the corpse before its even cold to advance their own cause. Huckabee says what many of us are already thinking and somehow it’s “too soon” and “bad taste”. You know what this is? This is Stephanopoulos the Zebra who is unable to change his stripes. He’s not reporting or editorializing, he’s still just spinning for the libs. Using another rule out of that Alinsky / Clinton playbook. Its okay for libs to exploit Kennedy’s death but if a Conservative responds then its the Conservative who is the villain. The rules are so one-sided in all of these games liberals play. George, you need to legitimize yourself and get some credibility.

Wiletta, I don’t know where you get your information. Go on Hospice website. “Hospices also care for people who don’t have insurance and can’t afford to pay for the services.” Hospice care includes pain meds and nurses. You will be taken care of if your cancer returns and you want to go home and die which will be part of Obamacare for everyone. Except politicians. They’re special.

When I turned 65, I had to take Medicare (part A) even though I told them I didn’t want it. They told me I had no choice and I have a Medicare card but thankfully my husband still works and we can keep his insurance as primary provider. There are many doctors in Atlanta who are opting out of Medicare for seniors because of the pitiful payments they receive right now for the elderly. When Obama robs Medcare of 560 billion dollars there probably won’t be any healthcare for seniors. Maybe some of you don’t have anything to live for but I have a 26 year old son who hasn’t married yet and five beautiful grandchildren who need a grandmother from my other three children.

I’m in the medical field and under obamacare I will f obama. How??? I will retire and just walk away and I will never serve one of his supporters ever again. And without any income, I will never pay federal income taxes again.

What is really sad about this is with all the “you are all racists if you are against Obama” talk from the governor of New York and now representative Watson, that Obama who was supposed to heal the racial divide, and probably wants to do so, will have presided over the worst racial schism since the l960′s. All this race baiting from African Americans is actually encouraging more antipathy to blacks. It is the classic example of making something a self fulfilling prophecy. I am sad to see it, but at least some good will come out of it. Republican rule for a couple of decades. Obama better hope a lot of supreme court justices die real soon. He won’t be relected. He has out Jimmied Jimmy Carter, and it took Carter almost 4 years to lose his second term. Obama has lost his second term in the first 100 days.

DAN IN LA
In 1965, the private sector wouldn’t insure anyone over 55. That’s the reason Congress enacted Medicare.

Medicare did that to my dad when he passed on… this is their only solution. Dollars and cents are what count, human life does not

A more accurate statement would be, “If Kennedy resided in Canada or the UK he would have been sent home with painkiller in his pocket and advice on how to tough it out till the end comes.”

Actually, I think Karen has it right. The political elite would not have to abide by any rules or policies established by Obamacare. Until they accept the same treatment as their constituents, this is not an American health plan.

Huckabee’s timing is a bit off, but truth is truth.

Americas finest is at it again! Clueless and paranoid!

Why is this man being laid to rest in Arlington Cemetary?? I know the Kennedy’s could afford that plot still for sale in the tidal channel in Chappaquiddick. Shouldn’t he be resting in hell there???? Sorry I was from Massachuesettes and I hated the Kennedy’s from the time my mother never thought about aborting me till I left to the military at the age of 18. (Under the best President ever to run this country. Ronald Reagan)

We should all read the bills, then discuss this issue intelligently with informed opinions. Especially the legislators and the media.
There is a man by the name of Peter Fleckstein who is reading HR3200 and has been posting on Twitter his findings. This is from his postings:
Pg 16: SEC. 102. PROTECTING THE CHOICE TO KEEP CURRENT COVERAGE. lines 3-26 of the HC Bill – OUTLAWS PRIVATE INSURANCE by forbidding enrollment after HR 3022 is passed into law.
Pg 21-22: SEC. 113. INSURANCE RATING RULES of the HC Bill MANDATES the Government will audit books of ALL EMPLOYERS that self insure!!
Pg 29: SEC. 122. ESSENTIAL BENEFITS PACKAGE DEFINED: lines 4-16 in the HC bill – YOUR HEALTHCARE IS RATIONED!!!
Pg 30: SEC. 123. HEALTH BENEFITS ADVISORY COMMITTEE of HC bill – THERE WILL BE A GOVERNMENT COMMITTEE that decides what treatments/benefits you get.
Pg 42: SEC. 142. DUTIES AND AUTHORITY OF COMMISSIONER of HC Bill – The Health Choices Commissioner will choose your HC Benefits for you. You have no choice!
PG 50-51: SEC. 152. PROHIBITING DISCRIMINATION IN HEALTH CARE in HC bill – HC will be provided to ALL non US citizens, ILLEGAL or otherwise.
Pg 58: SEC. 163. ADMINISTRATIVE SIMPLIFICATION HC Bill – Government will have real-time access to individual’s finances and a National ID Healthcard will be issued!
Pg 59: SEC. 163. ADMINISTRATIVE SIMPLIFICATIONHC Bill lines 21-24 Government will have DIRECT access to your BANK ACCOUNTS for electronic funds transfer. This means the government can go in and take your money right out of your bank account….

This posting goes out to Harry. Harry, do you believe we should re-write the system for less than .001 percent of the population. You are an exception to the general rule. We have an excellent heathcare system. I do believe that an insurance credit would help you my friend. It would be a Republican plan that includes that. VOTE REPUBLICAN in 2010, and maybe they can help you out.

Governor Huckabee’s statement is so true. Under Obamacare, Kennedy would not have been a priority. Obamacare will result in rationed health care for all American’s. Look at England and Canada, they have to wait for treatment. Socialized medicine does not work in other countries, why on earth would we think it would work here.
Huckabee for President 2012!

You go Mike! You are the only politician that ever speaks the truth. Please run for President in 2012. Our weary nation needs your common sense and values!

It is interesting that the Congress and Senate and White House will not sign up for the government run health care. That pretty much settles it for me.
Really though, my main concern is that we are 11.8 Trillion in debt and should be bankrupt. Adding another couple of trillion for government run health care is irresponsible.
In the short term I think we should provide assistance for those that need help and look for a longer term solution after we know how to reduce the deficit.

Can’t you people see that the America we love is being changed forever. Supreme leader Obama is slowly implementing elements of communism into the government. One day we are going to wake up and realize that the land of the free and the home of the brave – no longer exists.

I am overwhelmed by the childish and thoughtless comments that are left here. To comment in the negative, in an intelligent and well-formed way, is fine. But to use this as a forum to spout nonsense and lies is simply not productive.
Whether you agreed with the Senator’s politics or not, there were many who loved him and are mourning his loss – from both sides of the aisle. And anyone spouting a “good riddance” sentiment is not only a bad “Christian”, but a miserable human being.
If any of you received a student loan, meals on wheels, benefited from the civil rights bill, was a woman who played sports in school or receive and appreciate Medicaid, you have the Senator from the great state of Massachusetts to thank for it.
If you feel so negatively about Kennedy, perhaps you should return any benefits you reaped from him working tirelessly on your behalf.
As for American health care being the best, that’s laughable. We rate 37th in the world, after Costa Rica and before Slovenia. That’s definitely not something to be proud of.

No, Kennedy would not have been sent home to die with pain pills. He was a senator, he would and did get anything he wanted. The elected bumbles have made themselves exempt from this trash bill. Hmmmm…..Wonder why. Could it be that the masses will recieve inferior care and they know it? I think so. The republicans wanted a vote to include themselves and their congressional peers in the plan should it pass. The vote was no of course with only one republican voting no, adding that he wouldnt vote for his dog to have that kind of healthcare. Wake up people. You cannot get more for less especially when the government is running the show. They cant even run a CARS program correctly let alone your healthcare.

The difference in the Democrats politicizing Kennedy’s death and Huckabee is that Huckabee is not an elected official. He is only a citizen voicing his opinion. He is no different than you, George. His thoughts mean nothing in the real world. Teddy Care is Democratic elected officials politicizing.

Just how bad does it have to get before people wake up to the fact that we need health care reform. People can’t afford to retire because they can’t afford health insurance on their own. No one is going to let people die because we have a public health care option. Don’t believe such scare tactics. This issue is too important. We need to get it done for the good of the country. We can’t afford not to do it.

Leave Mr. Kennedy alone. He was a fine man, excellent swimmer and propped up the Irish Whiskey industry around the greater Boston area for decades. I remember him and Uncle Chuck,errr.. Mr. Todd doing the squeeze dance one night with Nancy doing shooters. Mikey is wrong, Teddy was taking pills way before he was eligible for Medicare, oh wait, that was his brother. Nevermind.

Ditto what Pat said:
“Huckabee merely pointed out that Kennedy gave us a perfect example of why seniors’ lives are not worth less than young people’s; that even at 77, he was fighting for something he believed in, so he considered every minute precious and was willing to take heroic measures to live every extra day rather than just take a pain pill and go home to die. He said any health care bill should recognize that and give all Americans the same choice that Senators enjoy. He was actually being respectful to the recently departed while promoting the idea that everyone deserves the best health care. What part of that do you disagree with, George?”
Of course, George took Huckabee’s comment out of context. If some of you posters would read the comments BEFORE you took what George said as the gospel and condemed Huckabee, you would already know this. And, if you read the comments, you might learn something – that most of the hype being put out by the Obama machine is just that – HYPE.
You will NOT be able to “keep your insurance”
You will NOT be able to “keep your doctor”
There WILL be rationing, just like in England.
Medicare funding WILL be cut to pay for this, at the expense of the elderly.
The public option IS still on the agenda. “Co-Ops” is just another way to get to the objective of the “public option”, so don’t fall for it.
Abortion IS going to be paid for, under all the various plans.
Instead of just accepting what the Dems tell you is in the plan, read the bills yourselves. There are copies of the bills on The Dems in the House and the Senate DO NOT know what is actually in the bills because they did NOT write them. The bills were written by people outside of Congress, just as were the Stimulus and the Cap & Trade (written by the Apollo Alliance)bills.

The right to fight for control of one’s life is God given. Not even Barack Obama or his leftist and fascist government should be able to take it away; not from Kennedy, not from you or me!!
Yes, under BHO’s plan, an older person like Kennedy would be asked to save THE COLLECTIVE a bunch of money by taking a pill, crawling away and dying quietly and quickly. Perhaps worse, the government would destroy the profit motive that fosters inovation and new discoveries. So all of the drug and medical technology companies, private universities, researchers and other providers who HAVE made our care the BEST IN THE WORLD, would have little funding to take financial risks to find the next amazing cure or diagnostic advancement or treatment. The cure for what ailed Kennedy will never be found under Obama/Kennedy care.

Tom, you said: “I am not an Obama supporter. I consider myself more Republican than Democrat. I’m a moderate.
OK that said…how many of us have said I don’t want to end up in a nursing home…with all the family’s money wasted instead of passing on to the kids.
As to TED, he did die at home. Life is finite. You are going to be faced with some end of life decisions. If you had to the pay the bill, and knowing you were going to die, would you pay for the extra care. So why is it that if someone else is paying the bill…Medicare or private insurance they should pay the extra bill, knowing full well you are on the last days.”
I think the point is this – we should be allowed to make that decision ourselves and not have it made by the government.
And as far as I know, none of us is God and so we don’t know “full well” when we are “on the last days”. My father-in-law was diagnosed with liver cancer and the doctors gave him 6 months to live. But he proved them wrong and lived on for 18 months after that prognosis was given. Just long enough to enjoy some quality time with his grandchildren before he died. By then he had been able to watch their first ball games, hear about their first day of school, and leave them with some wonderful memories of their grandfather that they would not have had otherwise.

The truth hurts doesn’t it?

Nancy, you said “Let’s start deliberating these important issues like intelligent, adult people.”
Tell that to your Congressmen and Senators. They don’t want debate. They fully expected us to sit back and let them ram this through without any debate at all.
And if you would just go out and look around on the internet (while you still can) you will find out that there ARE a lot of people “deliberating these important issues like intelligent, adult people.”
Just be glad that we still have access to the internet. That may not be true if Senate bill S.773 gets passed:
=== Bill would give president emergency control of Internet
Internet companies and civil liberties groups were alarmed this spring when a U.S. Senate bill proposed handing the White House the power to disconnect private-sector computers from the Internet.
They’re not much happier about a revised version that aides to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, a West Virginia Democrat, have spent months drafting behind closed doors. CNET News has obtained a copy of the 55-page draft of S.773 (excerpt), which still appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency.
The new version would allow the president to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” relating to “non-governmental” computer networks and do what’s necessary to respond to the threat. ===

IF Huckabee runs, please pick Sarah Palin or Anne Coulter. You are guaranteed to lose. Please, please run those folks. If folks like Huckabee had his way, we’d live in a Christian dictatorship. I don’t want people who believe in a made up book with some farcical guy in the sky… Christians are anti-science, anti-reason and anti-freedom. They want to control everyone and everything. I will fight you to the death, you fanatics. You stupid birthers, racists, die!

Don Williams does not know what he’s talking about if he thinks that Medicare would be acceptable government health care.
Try calling doctors. Tell them that you’re on Medicare and need a new doctor. See if the doc is accepting new patients. Keep calling until you find one.
You’ll be on the phone a very long time.
HR 3200 ends Medicare Advantage and cuts reimbursements to “save” the money to pay for everybody else – so it will only get WORSE. Fewer doctors and hositals will accept Medicare patients, who will have to pay more out of pocket for their health care.

Let me comment on this from a factual rather than a political perspective. What Huckabee said was partially correct. For the AVERAGE person under the Obamacare program, the treatment for a person diagnosed with a high grade glioblastoma would be – go home take a few pills and die. Of course we know that’s not the kind of care that Kennedy received. For the ELITISTS, they will receive nothing short of the best as did Senator Kennedy – multiple consultations with doctors around the country, the highest surgical care and cutting edge technology at Duke University, privileged access to nearly every institution across the country, etc. These leftist ideaologues are trying to dismantle this great nation of ours and turn it into a “bannana republic” with third world health care. The American people reject this socialist philosophy and are voicing their objections at town hall meetings across the country. It’s time that we take our country back from these “King George”, Harvard educated, Chicago gangsters. My message to all of these silver-spoon cry-babies is eat dirt. We’re mad as hell and aren’t gonna’ take it any more. Revolution if we must.

Of course, Kennedy would died much sooner. Otherwise why would Senators and House Representatives not want to be on this crappy Health Care Reform they are trying to ram down our throats. If its not as good as what they have then we shouldn’t be forced into it after all they work for us not the other way around.

I do agree that some form of rationing should take place with the elderly. That being said, I am 66.
I do not believe that organ transplants should be given to elderly unless they are in excellent health. I had an aunt at the age of 93 who was found to have had breast cancer and was operated on. I feel that this is wrong. I heard Chris Dodd speak of heart surgery on his father at the age of 90 something and how it gave him 18 more years of life. I think that is wrong.
I also feel that we have to set a threshhold for infant size. If an infant is born at 1 pound, they have no developed organs that function and they most likely will be burdens on the state because their parents might not have the resources to care for them. There is one set of quads on tv who are all both deaf and blind. That has got to use a lot of resources.
I have a Medicare Advantage policy. The premiums are $96 (Med. B) plus $40 for the advantage plan. I had an MRI and my insurance was billed $8,000. I paid a $100 copay. You can see that my premiums of $1632 for the year didn’t come close to this one test. We cannot continue on at this pace.
Medicare is to become insolvent in 8 years. It is not a good plan for the rest of the country. If people think the gov is going to pay all their premiums and charge no co-pays, they are drinking something funny. It just can’t work.

The indignation by the All Barack Channel to criticism of the messiah is quite predictable at this point. Hey Stefanopolis, are you still weeping with joy over Barry’s victory? Boo Hoo.

Anyone who says that the government option is “just an option” is either really deluded or flat out lying. It’s the back-door way to ending private insurance…even if it takes a decade or two.
George, you’re performing below your pay grade. Be a journalist, not a liberal operative.

Don Williams is a shill for the Left — he’ll say anything in his attempts to cover the truth. People are paying attention now Don — your same old lying schtick doesn’t fly anymore.

I think it’s awesome that Huckster, Palin and Glenn Beck are in a competition to out-crazy one another. And they know that this is APPEALING to the “base”! What kind of a Party do you have Republicans??

George. If you are a journalist, be one here and now. Cover both sides…Quit asking who will toss out what. Get the story. Quit being a liberal princess and go tell both sides of this story. Read the bill. George, be someone that generations of journalists will remember. Save journalism.

ObamaCare = TeddyCare = Chappiquidi-care.
I wonder how long it will take for this post to be removed. Don’t worry, the term is out there now, and it can’t be stopped.

Willeta, old at 62! Get up and get moving girl. Huck is so right! If you read and do the research it’s all laid out. Check out Dr. Zeke Emanual’s (Obama health czar)recent writings about the value of human life at different ages. We need to get serious and ask ourselves “do we really want the government to decide and tell us our value and when we should let go”. That doesn’twork for me, cause I belong to God not the government. Regarding money we will only be short on resources if we allow Obama to create a socialized state where too many people sit and hold out their hands for entitlements. Ronald Reagan had it right when Jimmy Carter was trying to convince us that the U.S.A. had seen it’s best days and he said “hell no”. Rise up America and fight back!

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Socialism is great,
Just don’t get the flu.

Let me guess George is now bringing lovers together on George’s bottom line :-D
I do love the poems :-D
Go Obama and Health care!

LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT…. Huckabee is making a declarative statement about a hypothetical situation based on legislation that hasn’t even been voted on, much less passed? And that passes for serious commentary amongst Republicans?
If Buckley were alive today, he’d die of embarrassment.

Mike Huckabee’s hand grenade or Democrat Love Poems LOL
I vote the Love Poems

notice how democrats copy others, while republicans write their own…

LET ME GET THIS STRAIGHT….Obama was upset that G.W. Bush spent billions.. so his solution is to spend trillions! In addition, Obama decides to take over industry and healthcare, apologize to every country while displaying his vast ignorance on foreign policy, emasculate the CIA, and subsidize a “green revolution” while China and India laugh all the way to the bank. Yup. That is pretty straight up socialism. Look it up. Socialism is when the government owns or controls the major means of production, transportation, and communication. (As opposed to all means of production in a communism system) Didn’t I just read today that Obama wants total control of the internet “in case of an emergency”? Jeez! This is too easy.

What is so wrong with your healthcare that you want to change it so badly. “Its bold face lies” not bald face lies. That just shows that education should be first. Anyways, why is it that the same americans complaining about this, probably all have cell phones, and cable, and 2 cars, and eat out every other night. Listen, my only point is, is that it YOUR responsibility to map out your own future. If healthcare isnt YOUR priority, then why should your healthcare be MY priority. If you didnt plan for it, then its noone elses fault but your own.Look, most of these people who want it, already get the government option. Its called Welfare, or medicaid. Im glad its there for people in need, but, its not for everyone. If I need help, the last place ill ever look is to the govt. When I grew up, people were ashamed to be givin things from the govt. Now its just a rite of passage.

WTB any democrat with a citation from House bill HR 3200 that will back up any of Obama’s claims. Anyone out there?
Bueler…Bueler?

America is great because people “plan”, “think”, “act”, for themselves. We’ve made it 224 years without a nanny state and community organizer in chief telling us what to do all the time. I know that the socialists in the Democrat party mean well, but so did Joe Stalin and Comrade Mao and their social welfare plans effectuated the death of millions of people.

I agree with Huckabee; which is strange because he is not a metrosexual and did not attend Harvard.

Obama is a liar and so are his hair dyed lap doggies.

When a man of Senator Kennedy’s advanced age combined with chronic alcohol and obesity issues was diagnosed with a form of cancer which normally takes even the healthy within a year, Senator Kennedy did not limit himself to the avenues of his congressionally provide care – abundant as it is. Instead, he assembled a team of more than a dozen doctors, neurosurgeons flown in from around the country, and proceeded with a tremendously expensive form of surgery to extend his precious life by less than 9 months.
There were no reflections on end of life planning – obviously the wealthy are not a burden to their families, or a push to simply forgo surgery at this late stage as Mr. Obama has stated “Maybe you’re better off not having the surgery, but taking painkillers.” No, instead the champion of mandated, government run health coverage used all his immense wealth and privilege to obtain the best health care he could possibly have. The only thing is, he and Mr. Obama want to take that away for the rest of us. If his superior government medical coverage was not enough to satiate his desire for the best medical care, do you think “Medicare for all” will be good enough for those of us who are not majestic and wealthy?

No he wouldn’t go home, take pain pills and die. The Kennedy’s have enough money to buy treatment wherever they want. THAT’S the point. It’s about access to the best care REGARDLESS of your situation.

Did anyone notice that a reporter named Cami Mc Cormick was seriously injured while reporting on our latest war. Kennedy went home to die, had the money to take care of it when he chose to do so (ironic that Obama was in town, and convenient as well since everyone is forgetting about the health care battle)and this poor woman is in a hospital somewhere in the middle east and no one gives her one minutes notice? Kennedy was a womanizer, drunk, liar, law evading rich kid who didn’t have a clue as to how the average human being lived! Anyone with money and power could accomplish what he accomplished which was evading truth! And Obama, the king, has fallen in step with the Kennedy clan! OUR country is in big trouble! Everyone knows it! Only the brave are willing to voice it!

Dear Willetta…Where is your family, your church, etc.? It is not the governments job to decide who gets anything or to provide anything!

If Huck was trying to make a point to clam irrational fears caused by lies about reforming healthcare – he screwed the pooch….if he was trying to compete with Palin for the wing-nut vote, he’s doin’ a heck of a job!
Republicans keep this up, Democrats will have a solid majority for the next 20 years!

Not very classy, Huck. You could have at least given Sen. Kennedy’s family time to grieve before you made it a political tool. Thought you were a Christian, dude?

The Last of The Kennedy Dynasty
As soon as his cancer was detected, I noticed the immediate attempt at the “canonization” of old Teddy Kennedy by the mainstream media. They are saying what a “great American” he is. I say, let’s get a couple things clear & not twist the facts to change the real history.
1. He was caught cheating at Harvard when he attended it. He was expelled twice, once for cheating on a test, and once for paying a classmate to cheat for him.
2. While expelled, Kennedy enlisted in the Army, but mistakenly signed up for four years instead of two. Oops! The man can’t count to four! His father, Joseph P. Kennedy, former U.S. Ambassador to England (a step up from bootlegging liquor into the US from Canada during prohibition), pulled the necessary strings to have his enlistment shortened to two years, and to ensure that he served in Europe, not Korea , where a war was raging. No preferential treatment for him! (like he charged that President Bush received).
3. Kennedy was assigned to Paris , never advanced beyond the rank of Private, and returned to Harvard upon being discharged. Imagine a person of his “education” NEVER advancing past the rank of Private!
4. While attending law school at the University of Virginia , he was cited for reckless driving four times, including once when he was clocked driving 90 miles per hour in a residential neighborhood with his headlights off after dark. Yet his Virginia driver’s license was never revoked. Coincidentally, he passed the bar exam in 1959. Amazing!
5. In 1964, he was seriously injured in a plane crash, and hospitalized for several months. Test results done by the hospital at the time he was admitted had shown he was legally intoxicated. The results of those tests remained a “state secret” until in the 1980′s when the report was unsealed.. Didn’t hear about that from the unbiased media, did we?
6. On July 19, 1969, Kennedy attended a party on Chappaquiddick Island in Massachusetts .. At about 11:00 PM, he borrowed his chauffeur’s keys to his Oldsmobile limousine, and offered to give a ride home to Mary Jo Kopechne, a campaign worker. Leaving the island via an unlit bridge with no guard rail, Kennedy steered the car off the bridge, flipped, and into Poucha Pond.
7. He swam to shore and walked back to the party, passing several houses and a fire station. Two friends then returned with him to the scene of the accident. According to their later testimony, they told him what he already knew – that he was required by law to immediately report the accident to the authorities. Instead Kennedy made his way to his hotel, called his lawyer, and went to sleep. Kennedy called the police the next morning and by then the wreck had already been discovered. Before dying, Kopechne had scratched at the upholstered floor above her head in the upside-down car.
The Kennedy family began “calling in favors”, ensuring that any inquiry would be contained. Her corpse was whisked out-of-state to her family before an autopsy could be conducted. Further details are uncertain, but after the accident Kennedy says he repeatedly dove under the water trying to rescue Kopechne and he didn’t call police because he was in a state of shock. It is widely assumed Kennedy was drunk, and he held off calling police in hopes that his family could fix the problem overnight. Since the accident, Kennedy’s “political enemies” have referred to him as the distinguished Senator from Chappaquiddick. He pled guilty to leaving the scene of an accident, and was given a SUSPENDED SENTENCE OF TWO MONTHS. Kopechne’s family received a small payout from the Kennedy’s insurance policy, and never sued. There was later an effort to have her body exhumed and autopsied, but her family successfully fought against this in court, and Kennedy’s family paid their attorney’s bills… a “token of friendship”?
8. Kennedy has held his Senate seat for more than forty years, but considering his longevity, his accomplishments seem scant. He authored or argued for legislation that ensured a variety of civil rights, increased the minimum wage in 1981, made access to health care easier for the indigent, and funded Meals on Wheels for fixed-income seniors and is widely held as the “standard-bearer for liberalism”. In his very first Senate roll, he was the floor manager for the bill that turned U.S. immigration policy upside down and opened the floodgate for immigrants from third world countries.
9. Since that time, he has been the prime instigator and author of every expansion of an increase in immigration, up to and including the latest attempt to grant amnesty to illegal aliens. Not to mention the pious grilling he gave the last two Supreme Court nominees, as if he was the standard bearer for the nation in matters of “what’s right”. What a pompous ____!
10. He is known around Washington as a public drunk, loud, boisterous and very disrespectful to ladies. JERK is a better description than “great American”. “A blonde in every pond” is his motto.
Let’s not allow the spin doctors make this jerk a hero — how quickly the American public forgets what his real legacy is. Let’s keep this going for truth, justice and the American way

Yep, Mike is right.
Prove his statement wrong.

“Obamam stated that for someone diagnosed with incurable cancer, they should not be treated but given a pain pill.”
I don’t know about “Obamam” but Obama didn’t say that. To see what he actually said, go to Politifact and search for Lungren. Republican Rep. Dan Lungren twisted that quote also.

With his lack of work ethic, lack of morals, and lack of intelligence, he would have been a 76 year old wino, living under an interstate.
The Kennedy name and Daddy’s money was all he had….and needed.

Do a search with the following tags: “Ezekiel Rahm McCaughey WSJ “. You will find that a certain MD who is one of the MAJOR consultants to the Pres on health care has been critical of US doctors who provide services to the patient based solely on the Hippocratic Oath-with no concern for the “broader society”. Yes, Virginia, Rahm has questioned whether a patient with dementia should receive dialysis! And brain cancer often leads to dementia so it is NO LONG STRETCH for Huckabee to take the position he did.

Did you see John Kerry with his cane? Do you think he would have hip surgery at his age under Obamacare? Well, YES he would b/c you and I the taxpayer have afforded him a Cadillac plan which he will keep, but you and I will have a “public option” where I will have the same treatment as a homeless bum.Also noticed how even Ted Kennedys family couldn’t help themselves with the cause during their speeches at the wake-what opportunists they are-pitiful.

George! Do you honestly think that he has to better Sara Palin? Cannot be outdone? Unless Huckabee said it directly, that is rhetoric. Substantiate that claim, please.

If you stop and think about it the American people paid for Kennedy’s health care. But yet under Obamacare we would not have the same privledge and we would still be paying for it.
It’s wonderful (sarcastic) being a second class citizen under the new administration.

JAMES (ref. bold face liars) where are the lies? show us where we have all gone wrong. maybe you’ve read legislation that says something different? maybe you have the inside track?
substance — that’s what this conversation needs, not name calling.

George, Obama told Jane Sturm at the ABC White House special that maybe her 100 year old mother would be better off with the pain pill rather than the surgery. He said we can’t bring “subjective decision” making in the process, so would Kennedy really have done much better?

“I wonder if anyone ABC reads these posts and realizes the majority of the people disagree with the direction that America’s headed.”
According to the latest ABC/Washington Post poll, 55% think the country is headed in the wrong direction. That figure has gotten worse since April, when it was 48%, but it is still much better than when Obama first took office. In January, 78% thought we were headed in the wrong direction.

“Obama told Jane Sturm at the ABC White House special that maybe her 100 year old mother would be better off with the pain pill rather than the surgery.”
He did not say that. Here is part of that exchange. Also note the words I have EMPHASIZED.
“And all we’re suggesting — and we’re not going to solve every difficult problem in terms of end-of-life care. A lot of that is going to have to be, we as a culture and as a society starting to make better decisions within our own families and for ourselves. But what we can do is make sure that at least SOME OF THE WASTE that exists in the system THAT’S NOT MAKING ANYBODY’S MOM BETTER, that is loading up on additional tests or additional drugs that the evidence shows is not necessarily going to improve care, that at least we can let doctors know and your mom know that, you know what? Maybe this isn’t going to help. Maybe you’re better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller. And those kinds of decisions between doctors and patients, and MAKING SURE THAT OUR INCENTIVES ARE NOT PREVENTING THOSE GOOD DECISIONS, and that — that doctors and hospitals all are aligned for patient care, that’s something we can achieve.”
For more of the exchange, go to Politifact and search for Lungren. Republican Rep. Dan Lungren twisted that quote also.

It is amazing to me that ‘focus-on-the-fetus’ GOP birthers like Mike Huckabee can continue to put out their completely outrageous fictions about supposed Democratic advocacy of “death panels.”
Republicans who are lackeys for big insurance corporations do their own version of death panels already, every day. Everyone who gets in the way of the corporate bottom line profits gets left to die by company bean counters pulling the plug on existing, good-standing insurance clients when problems arise.
Therefore, the GOP’s tender concern over seniors’ end of life freedom of choice is really touching in view of the very hypocrisy involved in the GOP’s fabrications. .
Never mind the specter of Democratic “Auschwitz-care”.GOPers have killed more people already than any death panel with their party having spent the last 50 years denying our whole nation a universal, accessible and adequate health care system.
Now, on top of that, we here in CA just pulled the budgetary plug on half of our state’s population ( the poor, elderly, sick, unemployed, etc) by eliminating the safety net completely, so that nobody here in CA will need even worry about living long enough to face some future death panel.
Those few of us who do survive this state-budget- holocaust will be accorded the privilege of demonstrating to the world what it means for California to “live within its means.”

Under “Obamacare” – or at least under any of the four bills currently under consideration in Congress – Senator Kennedy would be entitled to keep his coverage under the Federal employees health insurance program. Any one of the many available plans in this program would have paid for complete and comprehensive medical care; they really differ only in cost and deductibles.

All this hype about death panels is such an embarassment in that the entire world can see just how easily frightened many (not all) US citizens can become. This is the same motis operandi that landed us in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is the same FEAR TACTIC that the right-wing used to keep the most dismal president we have EVER had in office for a second term. America hangs its head in shame.

Our ” leaders” and I use the term loosly, should ALL be limited to two terms. That would stop the good ole boy system. All Public Servants elected should have what ever Health Insurance they can afford. And we all know most can afford the BEST.
No more private planes to fly back and forth to California Nancy, and no more paid for fun trips Mr. President. It is time for these people to realize they are SUPPOSED TO WORK FOR “US”.
When you go to the polls next time, look at hoew your representitives have spent your money, you may decide it is time for a change, but next time be sure what that change is. Obamanomics has not worked from the first week, and it progresses to fall down hill. He is offering you loss of freedoms, choices nad SOCIALISM………….that is not what America is about.
America offer OPPOR
TuN
ITY not a free lunch, not sit down and stick out your hand and the government will take care of you, if you want that go to a Socialist or Communitst Country. If you want Freedom of speech, which Nancy and Obama are certainly against if ANYTHING is said negitively about them, and they are now trying to reduce that freedom on all talk show host……wonder why ?
Be very atune to WHO you put into office….and be very careful what you allow the OBMA GROUP
to do.SPEAK UP AMERICANS.NOW BEFORE
IT IS TO LATE !

What a clown – May Ted Kennedy rest in peace…….What ordinary Americans should be afraid of is the insurance companies telling them they can’t get the treatment they need because it’s too expensive. There’s the true death panel!!!

Huckabee said, under Obamacare not by means of his own wealth or the senate healthplan. Mike meant if Teddy was a mere mortal instead of the ruling elite! Plus Mike wasn’t playing politics, just the facts! Remember George is really on the other side, he is just feeding the flames.

Politics can be a very reprehensible and demeaning art form. In my opinion, American politics has gotten itself mired in a very smelly, very stagnant, and very dangerous swamp. This government, we as American citizens, and the world deserve much better from our politicians and from ourselves than what we have been subject to over the past 8 years and this past presidential campaign. We deserved better than the pitiful and ridiculous attempt to link candidate Obama with terrorists or the “he’s really a Muslim” smear tactics. We deserved better than “I can see Russia from where I live” or Joe The Plumber becoming a national celebrity. We deserve better than what we’re being subjected to now in the “health care debate” and the hysteria generated over non-existant “Death Panels.” Anybody remember the one tv political ad that effectively killed Barry Goldwater’s chances of becoming president – the atom bomb spot that only ran once but had such an enormous impact upon the voting public? Both Barry Goldwater and we deserved better than that. The atom bomb spot and the “Death Panels” were brilliantly conceived to generate unthinking hysteria in people’s minds, and both worked very well. But we, as a nation, deserved better than that.
We deserve a truly partisian-free, completely factual, and respectful debate that brings us together instead of driving us apart. We deserve a government guided by politicians who truly wish the best for all of us, “the people,” instead of what power they can generate for themselves. We deserve to have the best health care in the world instead of being ranked #37. The nation of San Marino has the 3rd best health care ranking in the world. Look it up. San Marino is not a readily-recognized name; however, according to the internet, it is the oldest sovereign state in the world. And it ranks #3 in health care. We deserve to have a better health care ranking than San Marino.
We deserve better.

Huckabee–More pandering to the lies from the right wing extremists who are loud enough to convince people they actually constitute some kind of majority. (Hope someone saves a copy of that to use against him when he’s up for re-election.)
People are frightened and angry because they have been LIED TO by news outlets such as Fox and Rush, who exploit and encourage fears (racism, xenophobia, classism, etc.) for the sake of ratings and power. Time to bring back the Fairness Doctrine! (The Repubs got rid of that, and rt. wing hate radio surfaced soon thereafter…coincidence?)
Something like 75% or more of the people who believe the myths out there get their info from Fox. Shameful. Time to hold journalism accountable.

Kennedy would not have been needled under the proposed plan. The plan and the “advisers” contracted by the government would have stamped his health care needs as “necessary” so that he could continue his productive contribution to the political agenda. Anyone else that could not meet the litmus test of a “Return on Investment” would get denied care. Government involvement and the big cost associated with it is an echo from the past when health care became rationed to bring the cost under control. Are we really that euphoric with the panacea of universal health care where all people get quality equal treatment? There are way to many people that are short sighted to the fact that this plan sets the foundation to a return of an era where undesirables are denied care or even recommended for euthanasia. Anyone that knows their world history regarding nationalized health care either advocates atrocities of the past or are victims of the Pied-Pipers.

Are all Republicans just plane ignorant? In our existing healthcare system, you die if you don’t have the money. Today you die when insurance companies turn you down and ignore your doctor’s requested treatment. INSURANCE COMPANIES KILL EVERY SINGLE DAY TODAY.
Republicans continue to sponsor these insurance companies that prectice murder. We get rationed healthcare today. The public option is to get rid of this practice. Republicans need to stop being so incredibly gullible and naive. (By the way, the world is really not flat.)

The elderly will suffer beyond
anyone’s expectations if health
care passes. Perhaps you should
really read the bill, George.
It would be more than what Congress
has done. It will be disaster.

Ted Kennedy traveled the road paid with good intentions and has arrived gloriously at its destination. May he RIP.

Union payoff should get stripped from ObamaCare: Detroit News
$10B aimed at union retirees
Greg Mourad of the National Right to Work Committee called it “a shameless case of political payback,” saying Democrats and President Barack Obama are trying “to force the rest of us to pay billions to cover those unions’ health care.”

“If you ask about the end of life provision they completely deny any death panel, however, everybody seems
to know that it will be in the bill.”
Who is “everybody?”

Quote from President Obama’s Health Care Reform Advisor,
Dr. Ezekiel Emmanuel:
“[S]ervices provided to individuals who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens [in the body politic] are not basic and should not be guaranteed.”
Translation: if you can’t vote, you don’t deserve to live. Which, for advocates of the disabled, ought to give just a little pause. All those developmentally disabled adults dependent on charity and/or Uncle Sam for their bed and board? ‘Drop dead’. Anybody who’s had enough of a stroke that they can’t clearly articulate their wishes? ‘Drop Dead’ Dementia? Drop Dead. Mental illness? ‘Drop Dead’.
Which is especially cruel, because every one of those groups I just named really does need a little extra help from government(nothing special) and support for living, and we as a nation have supported them better than anyone else. But not any more, if the President and his ‘political utility’ squads have their way.
So when President Obama claims there will be no “death panels” in his health care reform plans, why then does he have Dr. Death as one of his health care reform advisers? Moreover, why is he reducing the Medicare budget by 500 billion when a 30% increase in enrollment is about to occur when the “baby boomer” generation turn 65? Where there is smoke there is fire. That is why so many people are rightly concerned about the government becoming a prime decision maker in how the health care dollar is spent.
At least in the private health care system health care providers are rewarded for keeping people alive and well as long as possible. Whereas in a government run system the incentive is to cut costs by denying care for your most costly clients (the elderly and disabled). Then all the money can go into the pockets of governments’ true clients, bigger and bigger bureaucracies and govt. union workers.

More GOP politics of fear…….
Every factcheck organization out there has decried the death panels as nonsense, a fabrication, smear and fear tactic. But the GOP still calling the sky red….lives in their own cuckoo reality.
Stop “ditto”ing and think for yourselves.

Most of you dont even have an idea what the public option is. medicare is a gov. program, is it killing the seniors right now? of course not. if you are against health care for all Americans, you must be an idiot.

My $500 deductible Blue Shield health plan went from $150/month 6 years ago, to $820(!) a month this year. You conservatives really are a bunch of idiots. You have no problem with private insurance companies ripping off the public for PROFIT, while 20-30 MILLION Americans are shut out of health insurance because they can’t afford it, and the rest of us pay through the roof to buy it because we are lucky enough to afford it?

George, Pelosi started this well before Huckabee weighed in. She started the let’s vote this for the gipper. Then Byrd said let’s name the bill after Kennedy. The fact is that he democrats are the ones that are trying to use kennedy’s death as the ploy. The fcat remains that the president consistantly claims things are not in the bill that are in the bill. And dems keep getting upset that average ameicans have the audacity not to listen to their lies, but actually ask questions. Don’t those simple minded folks know that obama is the wisest man in the land and you are suppose to sit and listen and not challenge him. The liberal media like George understand that. Yes, sir, you are absoluetly right, yes, we will distort the reasl image for you to prove you are right. And that black man who was beat up by your lackies, well, if he votes conservatives and complains, he can’t really be black, can he?

Eric, The reason health care premiums are so high is all due to government regulations and mandates on the private insurance industry. Take the government mandates out of the picture and Insurance costs would dramatically go down. The government now forbids private insurance from tailoring plans to the needs and pocket books of individuals. There are over 1000 government mandates now that most people don’t want or need but have to pay for because they are being mandated for by government.
Another reason for the high cost of health insurance is due to the fact government does not allow insurance companies to market their insurance across State lines. If this restriction was lifted health insurance costs would go down even further.
Not to mention TORT reform. Make sense?

AND IF KENNEDY HAD BEEN ONE OF US WE WOULD STILL BE IN JAIL FOR LEAVING THE SCENE OF A CRIME AND NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE FOR NOT HELPING MARY JO OUT OF OUR CAR…..

I have been a nurse for over 20 yrs without health insurance.The comment Mr Huckabee made I will first respond by the question”what do you think Hospice actually does?’Hospice is “pallative care.”This means patients are sent home or in a hospital setting and given pain patches ,Patient controlled morphine IV’s,as well as strong pain medication.The combination of these meds would drop a horse.These people are “no codes”.So what do you think we have now?I have severe sleep apnea and genetic lymphedema with no insurance.I have no breathing machine and have waited months for help.16,000 americans die every year waiting for disability approval alone.How dare anyone twist and turn helping into a “death squad”etc.

Of course Ted Kennedy had better health care than other people. He was fabulously wealthy, and the wealthy can always command more resources than others. But in other developed countries people under 65 are guaranteed at least a decent standard of health care. In America today, the only people who have that are seniors, and why they begrudge decent health care for others is hard for me to understand.

Dr Arthur Frederick Ide, The track record of government run health care is very bad so why would anyone in their right mind want to impose such a proven bad system on the whole US? At least in the private sector you can still sue if you get a bad deal. In a government run system you have no recourse no matter how bad the health care is.
The bottom line is that with out any profit (as in a private run system), corruption and fraud will dominate just like it is now in the government run programs like Medicare and Medicaid. At least with profit a motive, people will try and do a good job to please their patients and get their business. With government being the only game in town, people will try and game the system and political favoritism will rule the day. In a government run system the goal will not be to try and do a good job so people with be happy with your service, the goal will be to try and bribe the powers to be in government and commit as much fraud as possible. Third world America here we come if HR 3200 is approved as we have seen on the Indian Reservations where government runhealth care is a big failure.
Moreover, if a Public Option is approved, the private health care system (that the vast majority of people are very happy with) will eventually cease to exist. Once the people find out that Congress is more interested in promoting a government run system (with a proven track record of incompetence, fraud and waste) and intent on destroying the private system that meets the needs of the vast majority of its patients, THEY WILL BE VOTED OUT OF OFFICE.

hello

huck is a joke-rich folks are always gonna get better care-we the average joe have death panels right now-that would be the insurance companies the dug companies and the medical profession in general-its like no money no treatment-at least with the stuff obama is pushin we would have at least basic stuff-which we dont have now-

I’m 64, white and have no health care. I couldn’t afford to keep it when I had to quit work to care for an ailing father and a disabled father.My husband and I live on Social Security and I can’t wait till I can qualify for Medicare; a program we have because of Ted Kennedy and other Democrats.I know how it feels to live in fear that you will become ill and loose every thing because of medical bills. My daughter works to pay the thousand dollars a month to keep her family’s insurance and still has over $100,000 in medical bills for her daughters recent illness and that is after insurance paid what they would. We need health care reform, like Obama and Ted Kennedy envisioned.

j p romansic, You are pretty naive to think government will provide you with the “basic” stuff. Remember what President Obama said about that needed surgery for Grand ma? Quote: “Maybe she would be better off just taken a pill instead of getting that surgery.” that would make her life better. Than there is the Indian Reservations where basic services are not being provided by government run health care.
Keep in mind, once the government has control over the health care dollar the bulk of the money will go into the pockets of governments main clients, government union workers, the politicians and the bureaucrats. Whatever crumbs are left over will go to the people and it won’t include any “basic care” you can count on it.

wow, if half of this is true, we elderly should be very concerned, for me it smells of genocide aginst the old folks. an any body else with disabilities. think of the money to be saved. sounds a lot like nazi germany. everything for the state. wow. im 62 an im worried

sandra french, You must live in dream land if you think government will answer all your prayers when it comes to health care or anything else for that matter. Medicare and Medicaid are going bankrupt. Health Care on the Indian Reservations is a failure. The deficit has risen to over 9 TRILLION dollars under President Obama, more than all the other Presidents combined.
The bottom line is when government gets control over the health care dollar, like rats on a sinking ship, they will save themselves first, and let everyone else drown. As the ship sinks, more and more cuts will be made in health care and other critical services in order to save as many union worker jobs as possible.
That is what is happening right now in California. Instead of laying off CA union workers, the Democratic controlled legislature is making cuts in critical services that would never happen in the private sector. In the private sector, the critical services are maintained and administrative staff and non essential personal are cut so critical services can still be maintained. The opposite occurs in government.
Think about it. The government is already broke so they will use the people’s money to save themselves first. The people, us, will be last in line. Bottom line, don’t tie your hopes to a sinking ship that is already bankrupt.

And ray, you also said this:
“Currently the doctors aren’t encouraged (paid) to bring up the subject and patients are too scared to bring it up”.
So, ray, are you saying that you routinely accompany people when they visit their doctors?
NO?
Then how would YOU know what they do or say? You don’t.
You are just regurgitating the Dem talking points. I imagine you go about and talk about how doctors run tests and don’t bother to send the results on to the next doctor. (are you psychic?)
And also how pediatricians refer to the reimbursement tables to see how much they will make from prescribing antibiotics as opposed to removing a child’s tonsils. BTW – Obama said that, but he forgot about the fact that pediatricians don’t remove tonsils, SURGEONS DO. Was he saying that doctors are in cahoots with surgeons and get kickbacks?
And this is to that earlier poster who referred to the WHO study that said the U.S. ranked 37th in health care among industrialized nations. You forgot to mention WHY we were ranked so low:
=== The WHO judged a country’s quality of health on life expectancy.
But that’s a lousy measure of a health-care system. Many things that cause premature death have nothing do with medical care. We have far more fatal transportation accidents than other countries. That’s not a health-care problem.
Similarly, our homicide rate is 10 times higher than in the U.K., eight times higher than in France, and five times greater than in Canada.
When you adjust for these “fatal injury” rates, U.S. life expectancy is actually higher than in nearly every other industrialized nation.
=== Diet and lack of exercise also bring down average life expectancy.
=== Another reason the U.S. didn’t score high in the WHO rankings is that we are less socialistic than other nations.
What has that got to do with the quality of health care? For the authors of the study, it’s crucial. The WHO judged countries not on the absolute quality of health care, but on how “fairly” health care of any quality is “distributed.” The problem here is obvious. By that criterion, a country with high-quality care overall but “unequal distribution” would rank below a country with lower quality care but equal distribution.

Will the media please do a documentary series on the truth of what is and will be proposed for the health care bill? The criticism of the bill is inappropriately lambasted as political fear mongering or the tirade of morons. Many people fear the repeat of Germany’s history regarding the cost of over extended health care and the resulting deaths of people no longer considered life worthy. Rather than demeaning people who have real concerns why not present the facts and how this health care agenda could never lead us to government sponsored brutality and feared persecution. The current health care system abandons people to die by not covering the cost of care they need. We don’t need a system that leads to the government doing the same and sanctioning who is worthy to live or die.

glen, What leadership?
9 TRILLION dollar deficit, more than all other Presidents combined.
9.8 % unemployment (some say 16%)
StimulusmMoney being wasted on pork barrel projects and into the pockets of corrupt organizations like ACORN. Where’s the stimulus money going into? Not job creation that’s for sure.
Iran and North Korea thumbing their nose at us and going ahead with their nukes.
Scotland and the UK releasing the Lockerbie bomber against our protests.
American troops still in Iraq and Afghanistan turning into a possible defeat for the US.
etc etc etc
Bottom line is blaming Bush won’t work any more.

Fred, I’m afraid you’re comparing apples and oranges. Kennedy’s opinion on Bork was just that, an opinion and it couldn’t be checked one way or the other. He ‘felt’ that Bork should not be on the court and he acted accordingly. In the case of health insurance reform and Kennedy, there is nothing in either of the bills that is being floated around that would have caused Kennedy even if he had been covered under any of them to be told to go home take a pill and die. There is nothing in either of the bills that would place seniors in any more jeopardy of having a procedure rejected than they are in under the current system. I’d wager tht NONE of you agreeing with Huckabee have read any of the bills circulating through congress. Like all mentally lazy people (and yes, Americans have generally become mentally lazy) you are relying on someone else having read them and to tell you the truth. They are not telling you the truth. They are lying to you for their own purposes. If you look at all of the health insurance reform efforts in our history, you will find the same patter. But, you’d have to not be mentally lazy to know that.

The only reason Obama is pushing this health care is because the Democrats control everything. You want to make health care affordable? Make the illegals pay taxes and stop treating them in the emergency rooms for free. And DON’T give them social security like you plan. They didn’t pay for it. WE DID.

Greg asked “Who in the heck is paying for Ted Kennedy’s funeral and all the traffic cops. I hope its not me.”
Well, you (and me and everybody else) ARE probably footing the bill for some of it – the police, the military flight to carry his body from Boston to D.C., etc.
BTW (and speaking of C&T), has anyone come up with the “carbon footprint” from driving and flying Kennedy’s body, his huge family and all those “dignitaries” all over the East Coast these last two days?
Bet its astronomical!
And I saw that they used SUV’s, too!
For shame
(Or maybe it was that my DAUGHTER went to school with a Greg McWhorter, or was it that my son played bball w him? All of this within the last 10 years. LOL. I forget.)

Healthcare for the masses? Yes, lets drop the seniors who fought for and built the country and use the money to buy the votes of the masses who are to stupid to understand what’s being done
to our country.

I see that fear of death makes people irrational. Kennedy had a death sentence with his brain cancer, and no medical technology anywhere would have helped him. If you’re going to compare to his situation under “Obamacare” then exactly what is the *alternative* that you think Obamacare eliminates? A few extra months on a heart-and-lung machine while you’re in a coma? Or how about a few extra surgeries that won’t affect the outcome at all? If you’re afraid of death, go deal with the fear instead of spending the rest of society’s money to have another week of life in a coma. I’ve never understood Christians’ fear of death when they should be delighted to go meet Jesus in person once they are done on this earth.
Fear clearly lowers IQ by 50%.

“Specter: Town Hall Meetings Are ‘Not Really Representative Of America’ ”
I say, What could be more representitive of America, sitting down and giving in to something you do not beleive in?
America was born on citizen disapproval of government, where is Specter comming from? Another planet? Or, is he just following the socialist party line!

Someday, someone will have the ##### to say that we should NOT be spending a trillion dollars on futile care for seniors in the their last few months of life. No one says they are worth less but heroic measures to keep people alive who the Lord is calling home is stupid and helping to bankrupt this country.

For all you folks who like to say that the Republicans “just say no” and haven’t offered any positive ideas of their own, have you heard about HR3218?
This is probably the first time you’ve ever heard of it because the msm (ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, etc) won’t report on it.
== HR 3218 would greatly expand the availability of insurance, create market incentives like refundable tax credits to help lower and middle-income workers afford coverage if their employers don’t provide it, and create a high-risk pool so that people with pre-existing conditions could get affordable coverage. ==
Why don’t you check into it and if you like it, ask your Congressman to co-sponsor it?

While I am not a Democrat nor a supporter of President Obama, the reports of “Death Squads” directed at the nation’s Senior Citizens are no more true that our President’s statement that surgeons such as myself amputate people’s legs to earn $50,000.
People don’t sign a medical consent to amputate their leg unless life threatening gangrene is present. A doc’s payment from Medicare for such an operation is about $800.
Both the polictical left and right are playing loose with the facts.
God bless us all.
Mark Sanders MD

Everytime the republicans MENTION a death panel I get angry!
I get angry every day when I PAY for “REPUBLICAN” politican health care!!
Every politican today is getting health care from the taxes of the American taxpayer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That’s what my mom was basically told–and that’s under the care we currently have.

I am amazed at the conservative fortune tellers who can see into the future how legislation will turn out without even reading the facts about specific legislation. It seems to be easier on the mental facilities to just listen to the lies of the Right and not have to evaluate information. For almost all those posting negative comments they are likely to have been affected by at least one of Ted’s 550 bills he authored. Those of you against the health care bills should read them first and understand there is no final bill. Try to be a responsible American and THINK. Read. get facts. Use logical thinking concepts
(that may be difficult for most of you.).

I think all you folks who are so hot to get Obamacare enacted need to answer ONE question….
If its so great, then why do ALL versions of the bill in the House and in the Senate exempt the members of Congress, Federal Employees and members of certain unions (SEIU) from the plan?
Why?
Its a simple question. Ask your Congressman and Senators that question. See if they will give you a straight answer.
I’ll bet they won’t.

Huckabee surely knows we already have death panels . They are called private insurance companies . They decide to let people die every day all across this country by denying care for a variety of excuses but ultimately to avoid paying claims .

and this is any different than the for-profit “death panels” that exist in the form of insurance companies? New York State forbids insurers from excluding individuals for pre-existing conditions. Oh, forgive me; New York is a LIBERAL state. Wake up, people……any proposal is better than the system we have now.

It is shocking how much the “age of information” has turned into the “age of disinformation”. The “power brokers” on both sides are so afraid of an honest debate on the issues that no-one knows what is true anymore. Everybody seems so intent on stating that their opponents are evil incarnate that it has become impossible to have a discussion between two people who disagree. Democracy isn’t about the imposition of the will of the majority its about people who disagree being able to reach compromise.

Becareful what you ask for. I DO NOT want the government involved in my healthcare decisions PERIOD! Obamacare is nothing more than socialized medicine and I DO NOT WANT IT!!!!!!!!!

i have never seen more know-it-all drama queens and kings as have come out during this health care debate. but i wonder- do any of you people really believe that your current health care insurance carriers have an unlimited amount of money that they are willing to pay for all the people they cover?? if so,who do you have insurance with? i find it amazing that people are so ready to accuse “obamacare” of all these misdeeds that they assume it will be guilty of, when their current insurance providers are in fact, already doing these things. can anyone genuinely and factually show that the for-profit insurance industry is not ,nor has it ever, been guilty of denying necessary care, capping payout, dropping coverage after large payouts or denying coverage after somehow tying an illness to some pre-existing condition that they claim they were not made aware of? can anyone deny that premiums have increased many times faster than inflatiton, while out-of-pocket expenses have increased every year? no matter how you feel about the govt proposals, has everyone developed amnesia concerning the the practices of the existing health ins. companies? im just saying..

And the lies continue.

Obviously many people posting here have not even taken the time to read HR 3200 or to listen to the comments made by Obama, Reid, Pelosi, Hoyer and many more including the late Ted Kennedy. HR 3200 does not specifically call for nationalized health care however, it calls for a government option to compete with private insurance, mandates that employers offer the public option, raises the income requirement to 133 and one third percent of the poverty level and calls for congressional approval of all non public option plans. If your current plan doesn’t meet government specs it will be disallowed and you will have to go on the public plan. That is the first step towards socialized medicine in America for all and I don’t care what you claim socialized medicine means rationed care. Obama supports single payer health care, so does Pelosi, Reid, Hoyer, Frank, Dodd and just about every other liberal you can name in Washington. Frank openly admitted that a public (read government) option was necessary because it was the first step towards nationalized health care. If the government wants real health care reform it needs to start with Tort Reform and the removal of state boundaries for purchasing health care insurance, removal of pre-existing conditions and life time limits and the ability of insurance companies to cancel clients for health related issues, after all that is why they collect premiums. What we don’t need is another poorly managed social program that provides too little in the way of services and too much in the way of tax obligations. The government is not the answer they are the problem.

Democrats MUST know that Obamacare will ruin this country.

I have a friend whose former boyfriend’s father was sent home from the hospital with terminal prostate cancer. And that’s not under Obama-care, that’s as things stand now.

So why should the rest of us pay for treatment which likely costs greater than $150,000 for an incurable disease only to buy an additional 6 months?
Part of the reason were breaking the bank with healthcare is the unreasonable expectations people have and their refusal to realize that sometimes, spending a lot of money (particularly money that nobody really has) garners only a minimal benefit and really isn’t worth doing. All these folk complaining about rationing are free to pay for their expensive unproven or experimental therapies out of pocket.

I cannot believe the uninformed comment on this page. If you wish to comment on Health care in the US you should at least take the time to try understand it! Currently for any but the super rich over 65 health care is paid for by the US government via a single payer GOVERNMENT insurance system called MEDICARE. So if TK hadn’t been a senator he would have been getting Medicare. Why was MEDICARE set up? Because in the 60′s!! people could not afford the rates medical insurers charged – why is this? Because they don’t want to insure old people they make no money. So if you don’t want the system for the over 65′s to change because the US system is so great it is MEDICARE the US Government system you are fighting for.

Secondly. If it is wrong for the government to deny you care and condemn you to die because of your age to have ‘DeathPanels’ as the right wing put it. Then surely it is also wrong for an INSURANCE COMPANY to condemn an insured person to die because a treatment is ‘experimental’ despite the fact that the treatment (such as a transplant) has been routine for 30 years – these are also ‘Death Panels’. Many doctors who have worked processing claims in the insurance industry have testified that they denied claims as ‘experimental’ purely to save money for the insurance company because that is what was required to meet the companies quota of money saved. WHERE IS THE OUTRAGE ABOUT INSURANCE COMPANIES DEATH PANELS??? IT IS WRONG PERIOD BUT THAT IS THE CURRENT SYSTEM SO SURELY THE OUTRAGE SHOULD BE DIRECTED AT THOSE FORMING THEM NOW!!

The Right-Wing Radical Republican Party of Sarah Palin and now Mike Huckabee are the political party with an agenda of stupidity, fear, hate and an obsession with death. They are cowards and bullies. They have no decency and no honor. If they are truly the party of faith and family values, maybe they should read the Ten Commandments and The Golden Rule before they ever open their mouth or appear on Twitter and Facebook again.

Here is another reality check. Most companies that provide health care pay for only part of the cost. For the employee, that means they can go with the company plan and pay for part of the cost or go with another health care provider and pay for the entire cost. That means most people don’t really have a choice in what plan they want. Second, the money that companies pay for health insurance is really the cost of hiring an employee. But you won’t see these companies dropping health insurance and putting that money into the employee paycheck. The employee will be lucky to get 50% of that money coming back to them. The company will keep the rest.

Under the Obama plan you have the right to chose your current health care provider. The elitist republicans are trying to keep the billionaire insurance CEOs fat and rich. These companies PROFIT from denying coverage, that’s who the republicans are going to bat for.

I’m getting sick of people believing the lies that Republicans and the Health Care Industry feed them. THERE IS NO DEATH PANEL. Republicans just keep spreading lies cause they have no positive ideas. Kennedy was in support of Obama and the health care reform so Huckabee using his name to support the Republicans is just disgusting. That’s pretty low.

The Obama health care bill will pull the plug on grand ma and withold health care for republicians. Are people really that stupid ? And the most frighting thing is, these people vote. These are really happy people, but then you have to consider that ignorance is bliss.

With all the years the Republicans controlled Washington recently, and noting the current state of the Union, I am having trouble buying into their born-again fudicial stewardship persona.
The Republicans may have some very valid
points concerning health care, but I am not sure when to believe them. There’s a
creditability issue. And this is not about Ted Kennedy, it’s about healthcare
reform people.

kennedy had better insurance mutch better than medicare. when the doctor say’s that’s all that they can do you will either die in the hospital or on the way home when they take the tube’s from your arm. a friend died waiting for a ride home after he had been informed of all they can do.guess the insurance wasn’t there the doctor’s are the death panal allready and always will be because of money.

This is to that earlier poster who referred to the WHO study that said the U.S. ranked 37th in health care among industrialized nations. You forgot to mention WHY we were ranked so low:
=== The WHO judged a country’s quality of health on life expectancy.
But that’s a lousy measure of a health-care system. Many things that cause premature death have nothing do with medical care. We have far more fatal transportation accidents than other countries. That’s not a health-care problem.
Similarly, our homicide rate is 10 times higher than in the U.K., eight times higher than in France, and five times greater than in Canada.
When you adjust for these “fatal injury” rates, U.S. life expectancy is actually higher than in nearly every other industrialized nation.
=== Diet and lack of exercise also bring down average life expectancy.
=== Another reason the U.S. didn’t score high in the WHO rankings is that we are less socialistic than other nations.
What has that got to do with the quality of health care? For the authors of the study, it’s crucial. The WHO judged countries not on the absolute quality of health care, but on how “fairly” health care of any quality is “distributed.” The problem here is obvious. By that criterion, a country with high-quality care overall but “unequal distribution” would rank below a country with lower quality care but equal distribution.

Wow!,the marching morons wasted no time in regurgitating their spoon-fed non-facts!
Huck and Ted Kennedy work for the federal gov’t,their state-run health program is excellent,…if only there was a way for the rest of us to share in that?
“Read the bill w an open mind”? as in “disregard what it says,because everyone from the AARP to the Society to Preserve Medicare,to fact-check .org,and anybody else not being paid by the poor insurance companies and Big Pharma has read it and verified there’s nothing in it to ration medicine”.
Wake up,the reason there are few if any private health care options for seniors is not that Medicare “drove them out”,those are the first people to be excluded or rescinded coverage from private policies,they’d rather insure the least likely to file claims..gee that’s an awful lot like rationing

Everyone who is for this health care I challenge you to open it and read it for yourself and stop listening to the news. You can find it on US congress website( HR3200). It is a very scary bill and you can cleary see where the power and control will lie. I urge you to know what your fighting for and against. This one we can do without. There are answers to reform but this IS NOT IT.

Could someone please show me where in one of the FOUR bills currently under consideration that it says or implies that someone suffering from terminal brain cancer would be given pain meds and told to go home and die?
Could it possibly be that Huckabee’s comment is another right wing lie, comparable to Palin’s Death Panels lie?
What’s truly astonishing is the number of people who STILL believe the garbage that issues from her mouth and from the mouths of other right wing whackazoids. Polls indicate that there a lot of intentionally ignorant people in our nation.
Huckabee-Palin in 2012? God help us!

Oh for…*argh* I’m not a proponent of Obama’s plan and I’m not against it. Yet. You know why? Because he doesn’t have a plan yet. There IS no Obamacare. The President has put together a wish list for health care modification, which via the democratic process (yes, there is still democracy in this hideous socialist state!) is being vetted by Republicans and Democrats alike. A final version has not been released yet. They’re not even close. So to make any statement about who Obama is going to ‘kill with his death panels’ is ridiculously premature. I have to wonder…has anyone here actually been following the White House website for updates on the health care program as different issues are being addressed and wording is being altered? And for those of you who have objections to the way things seem to be going (objections based on legitimate info, not on some late-night pundit or gossip with your neighbor), how often do you call your senators and representatives? How many letters do you write? How many rallies have you attended? How many editorials have you submitted to newspapers? Or do you just whine to your neighbors about how that commie pinko loser is ruining your country? Also, it’s pretty easy to point at some imagined straw-man horror when you yourself have not dealt with ruin under our *current* health care system. Have not had to declare bankruptcy after one surgery, or choose between meds for you and meds for your kids. Have not delayed treatment because of money issues and then found out you had terminal cancer. Sure an ER has to take you…but try to buy a car or house after when your credit is ruined. If you have a better idea for health care, if you really know how to fix the stuff that’s ruined my life and the lives of my family members and friends, let’s hear it. Seriously, us crazy libs are all ears.

I cannot believe that there are so many ignorant people taking time out of their stupid lives to post such junk online.
At least READ the Health Care Program being offered. Try that instead of just running around yelling, showing guns, aimlessly showing the rest of us that you have fallen by the wayside as a result of the poor education given to the masses in America. Thanks to the GOP.
It’s time for real Americans to show (as they did when we voted Obama in) that we believe in what is being offered and Kennedy agreed with it also.
God Bless Teddy’s soul.

Keith, I’m glad you read the bill in its current form! I’m glad people are taking time to get educated on the details. I hope that if you have objections based on reason, as it seems you do, that you’re contacting your representatives and expressing your views. That’s the power we have in a democracy. If enough of us stand up and say, “I feel strongly about X”, our representatives (employed by our votes) will see the wind changing and vote accordingly in order to keep their jobs. I’m a social liberal and fiscal conservative, and I’d love to see health care reformed in a way that would benefit all Americans, right, left, and in the middle without impoverishing us in the process. The only way to do that is to be informed and communicate with those in power about what we need and what is waste.

Death Panel? Bunch of right wing nuts, next thing you know Palin with fight to have DNR removed.

well, if the object is to save gov’t money and make it stretch, then the higher the income of seniors, the more they should pay, but not just for the premiums. also for copays. the ones who learn good healthy living and avoid/ prevent diseases, should not have to pay the same as those who ignore health issues and use the system too much after practicing an unhealthy lifestyle. People who take good care of themselves, don’t need medical half as much as those who don’t bother.

I’m 62, my husband 61 and I can tell you what healthcare we have had to date: zilch…….Due to pre-existing conditions and premiums that are too high. The Republicans don’t give a damn about us. I have already experienced health care rationing the American free market way. I’ll take my chances with the Democrats anyday.

It’s true. The Older you are, the harder it is to get good quality care. Older Patients are neglected. Family advocates are made to feel like stupid jerks. It’s totally imoral to refuse an 89 year old lady IV antibiotics. But folks, it’s happenning now. Fact is, it just happened last week. They just wanted to send her to a nursing home – no meds. Didn’t care they were sentencing her to die with out even trying to help her. It was all $$$$$. The excuse to the family? Well she’s lived a long life.

How much is a life worth???
Americans are fighting a war to protect us; but we have a war here which is killing more people then the war in A. It is a war between the Insurances companies, Republicans and the rich. It is killing hard working, average Americans, who aren’t even able to defend themselves. The solder has a gun and ammunition . We have elected representatives who are owned by the insurances GIANTS and want more. GREEDY! What is a good name worth??? Life here is so short. Make a difference HELP US, WE ARE WORTH MORE THEN MONEY

REALLY EVERYONE,
WHO IS THIS HUCKOBEEEE. He is a lie personified. He acts like a snake sweet and always slithering. He dosn’t Care about anyone, but himself and MONEY. He judges people and has a tree in his own eye. Who really cares what he thinks. He is just a man when it is all said and done. Whenever you find people who have nothing good to say about a person better start looking at that person. I am scared of you!
Huckebee is just a fat man living off the emotions which his lies express.

All you right wing confessing Christians shame on you I wonder how many people who are astounded by your LIES have turned away from becoming Christians because of what you represent Shame on you God will have a GREAT REWARD FOR YOU WHEN YOUR TIME COMES. AND YOU KNOW IT IS COMING LOOK AT YOUR AGES THERE IS NOT ENOUGH MONEY IN THE WORLD TO GIVE UP YOUR SOUL FOR, BUT I BEYA DON’T EVEN CARE!

Well, at least with ObamaCare Old Huckabee will get the psychological help he so desperately needs.

Someone give Obama a pill please. He is such a pain in the arse.

Last time I checked, the Federal government already pays for nearly 60% of health care in this country NOW. And you know what, the insurance companies are the ones telling old people to go home and die NOW because they can get more money from someone else with those beds. But we don’t want to talk about that because big insurance LOVES the GOP.

Hay people,The healthcare system we have know is a joke.It’s all about money.Not healing,Both my parents dsied from cancer.My mother Had ciemo tharipy,
And sergeury,The cost blew my mind.And this was 30 years ago.I couldnt nor wouldnt want to have to pay what it would cost today.My father got lung cancer,and it spread every to his leanex and pancreus.If he would have had adiquit,health care,Physicals ect.He could have cought his earlly and mabbie.fought it.But as it is know.insurance companies and hospitals.Manage our care,Insurance companies love taking your premiums,And tthen,when you get sick limmit your care,Because they want to make a proffit.And cost its rediculuse.The system we need is a government system.Most people in this country work for minimum wage.And you can not depend on your employer either,I can tell you your employers insurance costs go up when you use your insurance,And they will get ridd of you.People in health care aspecially insurance companies want everyone insured,sure but they want to be able to get you out of the system when you need to use the insurance you payed for,Pre-existing conditions = get sick stay sick.at
least,Oboma is trying to make them give you what you payed for.And for lower payed workers or the ones to sick to work would have health care.We need a government option,Us millitary,Has government bassed health care.And i can tell you.She got excelent care.And she servived a long time.she got what she needed without the wast.and it was free.A lot of illnesses can be cured if cout earlly,CHECKUPS an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

The fact that Americas health care system is broken is a no brainer, but you know what? I didn’t see anyone else besides Hillary Clinton back when her husband was in office, do anything about it, says allot about our “caring” “committed” public servants. It’s the “don’t fix what’s broken” mentality that’s led us to the current situation we’re in, and I don’t mean just the health care system. Every time someone comes up with a fix that might jeopardize someone elses special interest pocketbook, they scream foul and throw everything but the kitchen sink to derail it, at least until they can come up with something that on the surface looks different, but is essentially the same thing. What the hell does Kennedy have to do with this? Despite his money and clout, in the end, he was just as mortal as the rest of us, broken health care system or not.
Quit clouding the issue and FIX SOMETHING instead of trying to tear it down.

Please the rules don’t apply to people in power. If ignorant average joes can’t see behind Obama’s purposed health care plan. They deserve the the health care plan. I can understand going after these insurance companies. But, lets not forget these Dr.s who beef up there bill for them.
Had a physical last yr if I paid out of pocket it was $100.00. Once they realized the insurance covered it 100% the bill was $270.00. How does that happen. And let the goverment decide if your life is worth the all mighty dollar.
I’d prefer to play russian roulette. The odds would be better that I could walk away breathing.
What do you call a democrat witha brain? You call him a republican.

Would someone tell me where to look up what Huck is talking about being told to take some pills and die. I can’t find it.
Where? I am on medicare disability because my private long term insurance I bought requires you to use it as the primary. I was very well paid and got 2/3 of my base salary because i paid for an optional coverage. So my insurance was secondary. Then after two years my pension and insurance was canceled as there was a loop hole and many types of injury and illnesses are limited (very fine print).
We have tort reform here in Texas and though my disability was caused by MRSA infection and was clearly malpractice no one will sue as there is a cap of $125,000 lifetime and it can cost that much to sue. FYI malpractice insurance rates did not go down either.
I thought I had everything covered…
Lookout for yourself. This is happening to more and more people.
I paid 20% of my bills and a million goes fast. I make $1000 a month but the SS medical is not too bad at all. Part of it is privatized and no one gives a damn about the patients. I have even been asked to lie about the services I never got but medicare paid for. Crooked.
Be well and don’t vote politics, vote for yourself.

Never have I seen such right wing bull. Talking wihtout facts is a right wing devotion. The US is 37th in the world in health care. We are only number 1 in cost of heath care. Not one Republican member of congress want’s to do away with our present single payer government programs like Medicare or the VA.

Death panels? Right now, folks are dying and not receiving proper treatment, because of the lack of coverage. Prescriptions aren’t affordable for our medicare recipients that are barely makind it. If they need to go back to the hospital they have to pay again, these are the medical advangtages plans, these plans are full of restrictions already. My daughter was under my group ins. at the age of nineteen she was drop, reason??? she wasn’t a full time student, reason??? she has a condition. No individual coverage will touch her, reason??? she has a pre-existing condition. My group ins. or any other works the same way, the funny part of the story???? I work directly for one medical ins. one of the major ones, we are the workers taking the calls, we are the ones listening to our members or prospects, , guess what Huckabee, we want change!!!! and we want it now. The true is we wouldn’t be having theses debates is our greatest institutions will provide coverages at affordable prices and will cover pre-existing conditions.

as the bubonic plague surfaced the renaissance was marked by the 1st public hospital in florence. The renaissance, its art created by children like leonardo and michaelangelo gave impetus to our prosperous world as we know it without it we would be in the dark ages, no wonder we are reverting to the dark ages now with the fantastic and arcane views of backward christians and muslims. Public option is on the right track to spur a renaissance with a mix of art and design. Now refute that backward persons who think healthcare is socialism. Public healthcare is a renaissance option not socialist. And what the conservative dumbells are opposed to is good they are the ones that are backward and live a life of make believe and hypothecise things that sound good to their brainwashed and shallow ears yet they have no deapth of humanistic, poetic or itelligent thought.

last thing if you make healthcare availabe for everyone you will have a nicer society with less murders and crime eventually. It will be a nicer world for the rich as well. Dont you want to live in a utopia. Voltaire and the age of enlightement paved the way with their utopian ideas for the revolutions of democracy and nicer societies and we are reaping the benefits of that. Univeral healthcare belongs to these visionaries and whoever attacks these principles is a backward boor who must take halucinagenic drugs to believe the vapid republican theories of what will happen if this or that. These theories are stupid and unrealistic. These people are going against their own good, Because a nicer world will benefit them realistically , while their own contradictory mind bending thinking is to their own detriment. Go to canada and see how peaceful, clean, and nice it is there. It is a example of the lies perpetrated by republicans on the american public. There are no slums in canada but US is full of them.
After enslaving the blacks and destroying the indians the US should be obliged to help these underprivelaged, it is the least they can do as well as help themselves. It is that simple. And what the repuplicans propose is so complicatedand convoluted that it just boggles the mind the arcane thinking. Can you imagine Picasso opposed to public healthcare. And artists like him create out prsperity not so much scientists, or bankers and you must realise that. Artists are the poorest group yet they are responsible for the wealt created culturally and systematically in society. without artists we are living in the dark ages with no light at the end of the tunnel. Roosevelt employed artists to success to draw the republic out of the dark age, charlamagne did the same in europe institutin g the Goeblin tapestry shops, italy did the same with industrial design after world war 2 to make its post war economy one of the richest. This is the right path not the religious and conservative vapid mindless uninspired nothing of a philosopy. And I challenge anyone to refute that please.

With the revelation of the Veteran Administration’s “Death Book”, is there any doubt that the elderly and chronicaly ill would be told to “take a pill”? Those were the words of President Obama, responding to the story of a Great Grandmother who recieved a Pacemaker at the age of 100. She is now 105 and doing well, fortunately ObamaCare was not in effect at the time.

I’ve never heard such bald faced lies as Republicans are making about health reform, including distortions and lies here. There is nothing in health reform about denying care to anyone, this is solely a Republican scare tactic.
I lived and worked in the US for seven years and I’d take the Canadian system anytime over the low quality, barbaric system I found in my time in the US. Not only does the US need a public option, it would be far preferable to have a single payer system as Anthony Weiner has proposed.
Americans should not let Republican distortions, lies, and baseless fear mongring prevent the American people have an improvement in the low quality health care system, heavily rationed by insurance companies, that they have now.
The United Nations rates the US health care system 50th in the world, just behind Cuba. This is in line with what I was forced to endure during my time in the US. Give me the higher quality Canadian Health Care system anytime.

Mike Huckabee and the rest of the Fox “wanabees” will do anything and say anything to get in the running. “Death Panel” is another of the coined phrases that simply has no meaning in reality. Palin used the term and they are perpetuating the lie. For all you Foxheads – wake up – it is time to start using your own head and stop being brainwashed by these extreme nutcases whose goal is to make MONEY. They are NOT true conservatives – they are extremists. They are kin to the neo-nazi’s who want to strip people of their rights by teaching them to hate. That is exactly what they are doing. Does anyone in their audience actually think or reason or do you all just mindlessly goose step to furer Limbaugh, Huckabee, Hanity and the rest? It is pathetic. You have been taught to HATE without reason – to assume that any other news source is misleading you and to label other Americans with a different viewpoint the dreaded “liberal”. Isn’t that exactly how the Nazi’s got in power – by teaching hate, convincing people that, like liberal Americans and illegal alliens, that Jews and Gays and others were the source of all their problems? The Nazi’s also had control over the press (On Fox they have convinced many that their “press” is the only “real news source”. Also have you noticed that in many markets – they are the ONLY commentating station on the radio. That is true over most of the south. You don’t hear any opposing opinions on a daily basis. FOX is it. Wake up…change chanels…read things besides books by Mike Levin and learn to reason on your own. Reason would take you into an entirly new realm.

Sorry George,
It’s sad to see you riding the OBAMA bandwagon. Are you willing to do the public option or co-op? Incidently ,no matter what they call it from here on out is not going to stick.I hope they do call it Ted Kennedy Health Bill,now that’s under the bridge.

Actually, if Kennedy had been an ordinary citizen, and not from the wealthy and powerful, that would be a true statement.
Kennedy would have been given pain relief, and told to prepare for death.
Under Obama’s plan, it would likely have been worse. He would have not even been told what was wrong with him, he wouldn’t have been given pain pills, and he would not have been given another appointment.

I ask all to get a copy of the September AARP Bulletin. In it, it debunks all the mis-information on the health care reform. No death panels, no taking money out of medicate to pay for the health bill, no socialized medicine, private insurance will not be outlawed and it places the blame on just who is lying to whom. They are not in anyone’s pocket and are having to do this because of the fear that has been perpetrated on the public and the fear that the elderly are now experiencing. People need to get their facts from other sources than talk show hosts and guests on shows. FactCheck.Org is a good source and now this. Unfortunately, much damage has been done but we need to get things straight. Read this article it is very helpful for all.

Mr. Huckerbee…read the AARP Bulletin and get things straight.

Did Pat just say the little people suffer under Obama’s plan? Really??? The little people are the ones who will get the help they don’t have. It’d be nice if some of you people would realize you’re just not that bright and maybe you have no idea what you’re talking about.
We are the only advanced country that is set up where profit can be made from people’s healthcare. These companies are making boatloads of cash, sometimes by screwing people over. They aren’t in competition, they are in bed together because non-related companies make more money by keeping all prices high than driving costs down, an unfortunate truth based on greed that defies the intended good nature of our free market. This, by the way, wouldn’t happen if there was a non-profit government option because the big boys would then have a reason to drive costs down instead of keeping them artificially inflated for the sake of profits. That means lower costs for your business which is more money in your pocket.
700,000 Americans are bankrupted by medical costs each year, that doesn’t happen in other countries, but Obama is screwing the little guy right? I don’t care if you like him or not but at least know what the heck you are talking about before spouting off.
Forget healthcare, spend the money on education so all you mindless parrots can actually grasp what you’re parroting.