Who the hell knows. We humans are awful at making predictions, especially about the future. And /especially/ about futures affected by 'omnibus legislation'. Anyone who says they know what all this bill will do or whether it will still exist in a couple of years time is either way too self confident or has some kind of mental ability way beyond mine.
I mean, look at the supreme court decision. I know people who predicted it would be upheld, but offhand I don't know anyone who thought it would be upheld by Roberts, and not on interstate commerce grounds but on the government's inherent power to tax. Anyone who did gets a hat tip because that's some knowing-the-law super powers right there.
For the lower end of the middle class who can't buy insurance (that does them any good) and for the employed uninsurable it's probably a win. That's me, so I'm relatively pleased, so far. My personal health care dilemmas will get a lot easier in 2014. For a couple people I know it was literally life or death, so I'm pleased for them - had the underwriting rules been kicked to the curb they would likely have lost their insurance in the middle of life-extending medical treatments.
And insofar as it starts to peel apart keeping your job and keeping your health care, it's all to the good - that equation has been a massive source of social control for all but the most rich and/or portable. It promises to dramatically ease my parents' retirement, for one thing.
For the poor uninsured, I don't know - there's supposed to be a medicaid expansion for them, but with this state-by-state opt-out, I dunno. But this was a middle class bill from the get-go. Tax credits, mandates to buy - that stuff just isn't on the same planet as the poor, who neither buy health care nor pay income taxes. They'll be shoved into some kind of new program, but what it is exactly I can't say yet.
So, I dunno, we've got something like Switzerland has. Go us? I dunno. Hope so. When Doc comes Back from the Future, we'll know how it all shook out.
We can regret socialized medicine isn't here, but we can also protest the rain and curse against gravity for all the good it does. Opposing this bill because it's not socialized medicine would have been grotesque - the perfect there not as the enemy of the good but as its assassin. Critics of the democrats say that it's their fault for taking socialized medicine off the table, but the truth is that nobody wants it. You say the word 'socialize' and people run for the hills - the british are coming the british are coming. Even if people say they like their Medicare, they won't vote for socialized medicine. Clintoncare, Romneycare, and Obamacare are all ways of getting around that basic truth.
I personally predict we'll keep the bill, because it's going to take supermajorities to repeal and they won't get them. The repeal rhetoric is just a campaign thing they know they won't follow through on, like all the stuff the democrats say about labor. But as I say that prediction is worth the paper it's printed on.
no subject
I mean, look at the supreme court decision. I know people who predicted it would be upheld, but offhand I don't know anyone who thought it would be upheld by Roberts, and not on interstate commerce grounds but on the government's inherent power to tax. Anyone who did gets a hat tip because that's some knowing-the-law super powers right there.
For the lower end of the middle class who can't buy insurance (that does them any good) and for the employed uninsurable it's probably a win. That's me, so I'm relatively pleased, so far. My personal health care dilemmas will get a lot easier in 2014. For a couple people I know it was literally life or death, so I'm pleased for them - had the underwriting rules been kicked to the curb they would likely have lost their insurance in the middle of life-extending medical treatments.
And insofar as it starts to peel apart keeping your job and keeping your health care, it's all to the good - that equation has been a massive source of social control for all but the most rich and/or portable. It promises to dramatically ease my parents' retirement, for one thing.
For the poor uninsured, I don't know - there's supposed to be a medicaid expansion for them, but with this state-by-state opt-out, I dunno. But this was a middle class bill from the get-go. Tax credits, mandates to buy - that stuff just isn't on the same planet as the poor, who neither buy health care nor pay income taxes. They'll be shoved into some kind of new program, but what it is exactly I can't say yet.
So, I dunno, we've got something like Switzerland has. Go us? I dunno. Hope so. When Doc comes Back from the Future, we'll know how it all shook out.
We can regret socialized medicine isn't here, but we can also protest the rain and curse against gravity for all the good it does. Opposing this bill because it's not socialized medicine would have been grotesque - the perfect there not as the enemy of the good but as its assassin. Critics of the democrats say that it's their fault for taking socialized medicine off the table, but the truth is that nobody wants it. You say the word 'socialize' and people run for the hills - the british are coming the british are coming. Even if people say they like their Medicare, they won't vote for socialized medicine. Clintoncare, Romneycare, and Obamacare are all ways of getting around that basic truth.
I personally predict we'll keep the bill, because it's going to take supermajorities to repeal and they won't get them. The repeal rhetoric is just a campaign thing they know they won't follow through on, like all the stuff the democrats say about labor. But as I say that prediction is worth the paper it's printed on.