Us nhs...?
 

okay... I dont know if this post is getting a bit borderline.... but here goes...

In the UK we are seeing LOADS of really nasty US adverts on our news portraying the UK NHS as a terrible thing... and something that the US should certainly not have...

Is that really the view in the US?..

As someone who's terminally ill, cancer ridden, American uncle was pretty much wheeled out into the parking lot when his health insurance wouldn't pay up... I struggle to see why anyone in the US would not want an NHS style system..

From my understanding the US president is only looking at having a NHS style benefit system to catch the very poor that have no insurance... Oooooo... wait... penny has just dropped... is it the rich folk not wanting to subsidize the poor?

what do people think?

No, that is not the view of the US. That is the view of only a small minority here (albeit a very vocal minority), who is attempting to scare the rest of us.

Trevor

That was pretty much exactly what they were doing in Sicko. Popping the uninsured in a taxi and dumping them on the street near a shelter.

Sicko, while good, is a movie made with an agenda. Michael Moore likes to bend the facts and distort things. I wouldn't take that film as 100% fact, but more with a grain of salt. Don't get me wrong, he makes a good point, but he also makes stuff up.

Here is my main beef with the health care plan. It is like 1,000 pages and our government is voting on it, yet probably less than half the officials voting on it have actually read the whole thing....WTH is wrong with people? How are you going to vote on something you don't understand?

I'm always mindful of the agenda behind anything I read or watch. Even with that in mind it was an eye opener.

Well a lot of what happened in Cuba was staged, and he has been known for editing interviews. Trey Parker and Matt Stone lashed out at Moore for editing their interviews and skewing what they said to fit his agenda, and they are both very liberal people.

I've read his books, seen him speak, met the man personally and shook his hand and watched his movies.

He is at least 50% bull crap.

Umm - are you referring to them being angry about their interview in Bowling For Columbine ?
Because that was (according to this interview with Matt Stone on the BBC web site) all about Michael Moore showing an animation in the movie that people thought (due to the juxtaposition) had been done by Parker/Stone. Not about editing the words of the interview.

Me too!

I would say it is more like 40% of people do not want this to go forward. There are a ton of ignorant people in the good old USA. I used to think it was a small minority but the more I look around the more narrow minded uninformed people I see. The other problem is Americans are entirely to lazy to actually look into an issue on there own (including our politicians). They just believe what ever spam was sent to them or what they see on TV. They also seem totally incapable of changing there minds once they have made a decision about something. I hope this does not offend anyone as it is just an observation of the folks in my area.

I for one would love a simple NHS but I am not sure our government could pull it off. The health insurance companies are dug in pretty good.

There appears to be a LOT of vested interests whispering into the ears not only of senators/congresspeople, but also into the ears of the "average person" in order to whip people into a state of fear and panic so that they will do the work of the vested interests for them. (Long sentance, bad grammar, but you get the idea).

Interesting breakdown of that process, at least as it relates to Fox news on The Daily Show the other day. Step 1. have a commentator make a spurious statement Step 2. Have a commentator read out "and unsolicited email/letter/tweet from an average person" pretty much repeating the same spurious statement. Step 3. Sit back and wait to report on other "average people" repeating the same idea. Self propagating media! Repeat something enough and people will believe the connection without proof.

Even worse is when they refuse to understand. Provisions for hospice and end-of-life counseling (living will, medical power of attorney, etc) have been dropped from the senate version of the bill because of all the contrived nonsense about "death panels".

Willful ignorance is the worst kind of ignorance.

An eccentric Conservative shooting off his mouth
 

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Interesting. Even David Cameron, leader of UK’s Conservative Party, finds due cause to criticise the Tory MEP who attacked the NHS on American TV. He succinctly calls his fellow party member Mr Daniel Hannan “eccentric” -- scoffing at the notion that Hannan presented the Tory view.

That sort of ostracism is a heartening contrast to American conservative politicians’ deafening silence at the far more extreme mutterings of their own right-wing fringe. Which is, frankly, rather scary.

-- ArcticStones
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Yeah the more I read about this the more it shows we have some lazy idiots in office. It just irks me how it is their job and duty to make it better for us, the citizens, yet they can't read a bill and understand it and also at the same time make it worth while.

Just wait until the abortion debate comes up, should the health care system support that? The anti-abortion people will be furious if they have to pay taxes into a system that supports it....

It is going to get worse. I think they just need more regulation in the private sector for now. Make insurance companies pay, do not allow dropped coverage for pre-existing conditions, and allow the doctor and patient make all the decisions instead of the insurance companies.

I totally agree. We do not have that great of a health care system in place at all. I mean there is a reason no other country on our planet has modeled their health care plan after ours...

I just wish they would drop the BS and make it so that it is all about the person and not about the money.

Here is what we might call "a confession of lost faith" from a former Libertarian; it has a fine analysis of the opposition to the single-payer model.

www.dwasifar.com

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Yeah, it’s far more comforting when the doctor’s first question is “Where does it hurt?” and not “What’s your insurance policy?”

And unfortunately that ain’t the way it is.
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I'm a british citizen and I can say with out any hesitation that the NHS does an amazing job, yes it has it's problems like all massive organizations but with the UK is so lucky to have free healthcare for all.

Sad thing is we have one of the best government run healthcare systems in the world, Medicare, Medicaid (by best run I mean that the cost ratio between healthcare and bureaucracy is higher than any private insurance).


All the bill would need to say is that it now covers anyone who needs it, done.

An anecdotal story. Some years ago my daughter was severely injured in an auto accident and required a couple years of in-home nursing. Two of the nurses who took care of her were from outside London and were working in the US on some kind of exchange program.

Neither of these ladies had anything good to say about the British system... all complaints with frequent comments about how lucky we were to have US health care. Then, over the following year, each had the opportunity to use the US system for a hospitalization covered only by their employer provided health insurance.

Both ended up strong supporters of the UK's national health care and have nothing good to say about the US system.

http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=102206
I thought this thread sounded a bit familiar. (link above)

The concept of "you get what you pay for" has become ingrained. So, free healthcare can't be any good, can it? Well, yes it can. God bless the NHS. It sure has been good to me.

I'm an American who moved to the UK in 1983. How you guys can say "no" to free healthcare is beyond me. (It must be some commie plot! Right?)

The British NHS is free at the point of entry. Yes my taxes are higher than yours, but not much. Yes, I might have to wait a bit longer for a non-urgent appointment, but when I had a stroke, I was in the best stroke unit in London 15 minutes after the phone call. An hour later, I had had two MRI scans, been assessed, treated and given a bed in the stoke unit for 30 hours of close observation and yet another scan. I was lucky. I recovered and walked home. I didn't have my wallet with me and I didn't have to sign any papers. I just had to wait for the hospital pharmacy to deliver my doggie bag of free meds.

As a 62-year-old, diabetic stroke victim with minor heart disease (five-stent, two-artery angioplasty – 2.5 hours on the operating table, 2 surgeons, 5 staff, state-of-the-art equipment) I will be on medication for the rest of my life. It's all free.

What can be wrong with that?

Oh! I know! Healthy people will have to pay for it. That's what I had to do in America, pay for health insurance, what the company didn't pick up. I suffered a compound tib-fib fracture and spent two days in hospital. After insurance, I was still $500 out of pocket.

I never got seriously ill in America, but my dad did. He had private insurance and medicare and the best medical care in the richest country in the world. Undiagnosed tumors killed him at 84. He didn't want to pay for a scan.

A free healthcare system is open to abuse, however. We have tourists coming on medical holidays. We have hypochondriacs wasting doctors' time. We have bureaucrats wasting millions on computer systems that don't work. But, when I get sick, I have good doctors who will take care of me regardless of the cost (it says here).

Oh, yeah. I watched Sicko and Michael Moore definitely cherry-picks his facts to build a case. (Who doesn't?) But he got this right: the NHS is absolutely, totally free to the patient.

Only thing wrong with this is that it is not on the table. All Obama is asking for is insurance reform and maybe an option for a public plan people can buy into. The public plan is looking kind of iffy because some fear it will lead to a socialist system (while others are hoping like heck that is exactly what will happen).

We'll see. The rhetoric is of course from those with a vested interest in the current system... the insurance companies.

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One independent mind?
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This would be freaking awesome. I would gladly pay a small increase in taxes for such a service. I mean heck me and my wife are currently paying $6000 a year now in medical insurance and we are both relatively healthy in our 40's. This is currently about 10% of our income. Yes, we are not rich. Oh yeah, that is only half of the insurance money. The government pays the other half. Talk about the insurance companies sticking to everybody. So by my calculations the total so far would be about $180000.

Like aehurst points out though I do not see a big change coming anytime soon. No use to complain anyhow.

Here's a really good article from the Guardian discussing the various claims made by the American vocal minority regarding NHS:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/20...lthcare-reform

While most claims are decidedly false, there are a couple (lower survival rates for breast cancer victims, for example) that are correct.

Trevor

Ah the nhs....i recently became a volunteer at the manchester hospital which as of last week is the biggest outside of america or something like that. Ah if you knew how the nhs was actually run youd be horrified...and i only see a tad more then the general public.

Anywho...the times ive had to deal with the nhs as far as injuries they have done well...i cant imagine the mass amounts of poor people or immigrants paying for insurance or expeses for each trip to the dr

A couple of comments about your link.

First, Ted Kennedy. In reality, he would not be refused by the NHS. He would pay a Harley Street doctor as a private patient for treatment. The treatment would then take place in a NHS hospital, but he would probably jump the queue.

The worry here is about a two-tier service. NHS patients and rich patients. You can buy private insurance if you like. It claims to provide quicker, better service.

Second, no heart surgery for over 59-year-olds. I had my angioplasty at the age of 61. There were 14 people on my ward that day and I was certainly not the youngest.

There are always debates about how much longer the UK can afford the NHS. Some doctors are asking that a nominal charge per visit be instituted, mainly to keep down the time wasting. Others are adamant that the service should always be free and new ways of funding it be found.

None of the political parties would suggest doing away with the NHS. The head of the Conservative Party says his son owed his life to the NHS.

Healthcare compared

Health spending as a share of GDP

US 16%

UK 8.4%

Public spending on healthcare (% of total spending on healthcare)

US 45%

UK 82%

Health spending per head

US $7,290

UK $2,992

Practising physicians (per 1,000 people)

US 2.4

UK 2.5

Nurses (per 1,000 people)

US 10.6

UK 10.0

Acute care hospital beds (per 1,000 people)

US 2.7

UK 2.6

Life expectancy:

US 78

UK 80

Infant mortality (per 1,000 live births)

US 6.7

UK 4.8

Source: WHO/OECD Health Data 2009

I'd just like to say that I find it admirable that someone your age is doing something voluntary. Well done. (I'm assuming it isn't court ordered :D)

well if the nhs discount which gives you 10% off at apple and 40% off at krispey kremes isnt enough incentive lol

Obama blinks.... public plan off the table. Health care reform is dead and it is now clearly insurance reform only.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_sebelius_health_care

My guess is they won't get much in the way of insurance reform either, except possibly more people covered but only if the government, not the insurance companies, foot the bill.

Big money wins again.

Obama's crowd did a poor job of selling health care reform to the American public. Almost nobody understands his plan, and the handful who do knows it wasn't nearly enough. Obama now just trying to save what he can of his proposal so he can claim victory where none exists.

Not-for-profit cooperative? That sounds like the old mutual insurance society. That is, insurance companies owned by their policyholders as members, retaining earnings. No dividend to non-members. But then along came the MBAs said they couldn't compete and had to be demutualised. Translation: we couldn't loot them.

"Obama's crowd did a poor job of selling health care reform to the American public."
- How could it have been done better, do you think -- how would you do it? Could it be done at all, in the light of the culture of ignorance and hysterical lying that we have been discussing?

To be sold, I think it has to be an up or down vote on adopting something similar to Norway, England, France or Canada.

It needs to be a simple message.... "Free health care. It works everywhere in the world but the USA. We CAN afford it because it costs less. We should do it."

Get the debate away from this or that technicality... vote on a whole new system and then let the Americans live with however they voted, bankruptcy and all.

Thoughts and questions
 

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It strikes me that Ms Sebelius has been strangely absent in this debate.

Given the influence of highly effective Washington DC lobbyists, the number of senators on both sides of the aisle beholden to the insurance companies, and the number of politicians willing to downright lie about what is being proposed, I think passing true Health Reform Bill is an almost impossible task.

I hope someone proves me wrong, but there are too many Democrats squirming away from their responsibility to the electorate. My optimism is fading.

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Edit: Is it true that you cannot purchase health insurance across state lines? i.e. that instead of having one national market, there are separate markets for each state, with far more limited competition?

Is it true that you can purchase car insurance across state lines?

If this is true, why the difference? And wouldn’t tearing down this barrier in itself improve things?
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There doesn't seem to have been any effort to prepare citizens for what was coming..... just kinda let the House and Senate come up with something and let the info leak out. Advocates have lost and there was never a firm plan even put before the public to debate.... just bits and pieces out of committees.

Still not too late to get something meaningful out of this, but I fear it is not going to be anything near universal coverage. The poor will still do without.

What has boggled my mind about the whole debate is the extent to which media networks have frankly taken sides; there is no attempt whatever to present an unbiased reporting of the news of the day and I suspect, to a large extent, opinions are shaped by the channels folks watch. American society really is driven by the big corporations who lobby Congress and Senate, and who promote their views on the news channels. What really blows my mind is the extent to which the media tell outright lies.

Three barriers...
 

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Perhaps the most succinct description of the state of things is this one:

"All that stands in the way of universal health care is greed, lies and gullibility."

Paul Krugman elaborates on that view in his column.
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Yes and No, you can purchase your insurance anywhere you like..... BUT you are going to pay the premium based on where you live. It's not just the state, it goes right down to your city. States do regulate insurance companies, so depending on how tight the regulation is not all insurance companies will offer policies in all states.

By and large, the big companies operate everywhere and simply charge a different rate with the rate presumably being based on the "cost" or "risk" of providing the service in your area. Yes they compete, but the level of competition may vary from state to state.

The state regulation may include things like a policy must include coverage for x, y or z. Some states require an insurance company post a bond to insure they can pay their claims or participate in some kind of insurance pool to, again, assure a company will be able to pay their claims.

Lots of insurance scams in our past.

Fareed Zakaria on Health Care and the lack of a crisis. Good point.

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This is perhaps one of the saddest cases of an ex-senator who sells himself.

His convoluted self-justification is truly amazing!


Edit:
Rachel Maddow has a rather scathing evaluation of the state of things:

"Why is the public option dying now? It's dying because of a lack of political ambition. The Democrats are too scared of their own shadow to use the majority the American people elected them to in November to actually pass something they said they favored."

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That piece and several New York Times editorials make it clearer and clearer that the Democrats have folded their tent on the only part of Obama's health care reform package that would actually help the constituency it's intended for. Watch the mid-term elections coming up next year if at the end of the day big Pharma and the health insurance providers win -- big conservative gains is my prediction. I think Rachel Maddow is right.

An interesting take in Newsweek: Health Care as a Civil Right

We have ourselves a ratchet here -- and I say "we" because I don't think this is confined to the US -- in that fierce right-wing opposition to a progressive reform is a political veto, while fierce progressive opposition to a right-wing project is a public-order problem. Like when a million Brits marched against the Iraq adventure, net effect zero.

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An ugly statistic:
Every year over 18,000 Americans die because they cannot afford life-saving medical procedures, or because their insurance company (should they have one) refuses to cover it.

Question:
Where is the "Right to Life" movement when we need it?
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[off thread]

Well, it took a while, but Blair is gone and our troops are out of Iraq. Afghanistan has much more to do with al-Qaeda, the Taliban and women's rights, and has been superceded by the banking crisis in this country. The daily troop death count causes barely a ripple here at the moment.

[/off thread]

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This Wall Street Journal article describes an interesting strategy, and seems in line with the earlier quoted New York Times report: New Rx for Health Plan: Split Bill.

And in a rather bizarre statement:

Seriously, given the influence of health industry lobbyists on the political process, how much reform can there be in a bill that has that garners that many votes?
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Question: Would full federal funding of all federal elections, or an absolute cap on campaign contributions of, say, $500, be sufficient to seriously decrease the power of lobbyists?

Just asking.
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Only the honest ones.

From an editorial in today's paper, it seems the "death panels" are not entirely fiction. The charge stems from the writings of Dr. Emanuel, special advisor to the Obama administration on health care.

Dr. Emanuel says consumption of health care in the US is similar to that everywhere else, except in two areas: end of life care and use of the most modern/most expensive treatments. These two areas account for differences in costs in the US when compared to other nations.

Understanding that not providing the best treatment regimen available is politically unacceptable, Dr. Emanuel says the alternative is an "independent body" who would make such decisions as to when the best available treatment would be cost effective and when it wouldn't be.

He didn't call them death panels, of course, but it seems obvious what function this independent body would perform --- hold down costs by rationing and/or denying care and by forcing the use of less effective alternatives because they are cheaper. At the same time, the independent body would provide plausible deniability to the politicians.

Is this not exactly what the opposition is charging... bureaucrats standing between the patient and the physician?

Doesn't the NHS have a panel that serves some similar function?

(Of course, private insurance companies have been doing the same thing for years.)

For non-approved treatments, each local council (or hospital body - I'm not sure which) gets to decide independently whether or not it is too expensive. An application for treatment is made on behalf of the patient by their GP. This has lead to the phrase "post code lottery" because the treatment you can get often depends upon where you live. It gets media traction because more affluent areas tend to place lower overall costs on the hospital budget and thus they can generally afford the more expensive treatments, hence the view that if you live in an affluent area you can get better treatment - basically a class-division issue.

Of course, the NHS is required by the government to provide certain treatments to everyone regardless, so this only applies to the 'edge case' treatments like the latest not-yet-approved cancer treatment drugs (for example).

EDIT: for a while, offering to help pay for your treatment meant that the NHS would withdraw your care (as you were then viewed as a private patient), but that has since changed. Now, the NHS-funded treatment you are entitled to can be "topped up" from your own savings/insurance policy/etc.

EDIT 2: in the UK, euthanasea is illegal, but I'm not sure what the stance on "willful witholding of life-saving care" is (which is still a conscious decision to end someone's life).

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A natural question, then, is whether or not the decision to withhold life-savingg medical treatment from someone who cannot afford to pay is to be considered euthanasia. I think it is.

And given over 18,000 cases of involuntary euthanasia in the USA every year, I am surprised hardly anyone is talking about it -- let alone calling this what it is.
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Yup, the whole question gets pretty dicey when you dig into it. Essentially, who should make these decisions if the individual cannot or is not allowed to? Is it better to leave it to the family, a body of cost conscious professionals, or the individual's medical team which is not at all divorced from the profit motive?

Profit motive being they are reimbursed for the care they provide or they may need that bed for another patient who needs even more expensive care... and on and on.

In my view, it comes down to who do we trust least for these decisions? Think that might well be insurance companies.

EatsWithFingers --- thanks for the honest assessment of NHS. Reality is our insurance companies do the same thing in our current system in that they require prior approval for most any treatment.... all the company need do is start asking for more justification that the care is necessary and/or will provide a better outcome. Once the question of reimbursement availability enters the equation, the health care providers start reconsidering what they really want to do in the way of care.... do they really want to take a loss on this patient?

When active euthanasia is discussed, as for instance in questions of whether to prosecute people who escort relatives to Switzerland to receive it, the antis always make a big do about the financial incentives to said relatives. That is, if you are chief heir of Auntie Mabel, who's old and sick and fed up, there may be a danger that you will influence her to sign up with Exit to get painlessly offed. But they don't seem to connect this with the financial incentives to hospitals and insurance companies. That is, they only seem to see individuals as the potential abusers.

It's a most difficult decision in the best of circumstances and there really are no disinterested 3rd parties who can make such decisions.

Which is why it pays to have a living will.

Won't help in all situations. There was a young Brit who got his neck broken in a rugby accident, became quadraplegic, and went the Swiss route. Now, he would not have been covered by any legal arrangement premised on a terminal situation, since he was not terminal, au contraire might have lived another 50 years, nor was he in a hospital, nor was he in pain. He just didn't want to live the 50 years like that; and his parents supported his decision. It was, of course, impossible for him to kill himself without aid, because he had no working limbs. A German (?) girl in a similar situation had unknown friends set her up with a video camera, a glass of cyanide-laced drink and a straw; she looked the future viewer in the eye and bent her head to the straw.

Those are extraordinary situations, however. I was talking about the end of a "normal" lifespan when physicians have a problem with interpreting the phrase "Above all, do no harm" (Hippocratic Oath). They too often consider that from a purely physical body perspective and will undertake heroic measures to preserve a life that the owner of that body wouldn't consider "life".

I know, I was going off on a tangent. One of my best friends is a Christian physician, and the only time I've ever been angry with him was when he was defending the refusal to countenance euthanasia -- even well-safeguarded euthanasia requested by the patient -- in terms of "the redemptive value of suffering". I considered that an unprofessional confusion of roles.

I once left a referral doctor's office very shortly after the interview began for that reason. I said to him that I wanted him to apply his full-blown medical expertise unfiltered by his religious beliefs. If that wasn't possible, I'd leave now and seek another opinion; and did.

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Here is a scathing article on the status quo. In short: today’s market is far from free. Nor are there serious proposals to make it so. Unfortunately.
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Here's a point of view from today's Wall Street Journal. Well said, in my view. Health Care and the Democratic Soul

Right on. The Democratic proposal has been so watered down that I don't even support it any more. Whole thing has been mismanaged coming out of the gate.

Obama says up front that half the funding will come from cuts to Medicare.... and you want senior citizens to support that? And those cuts won't affect what you have now? Fat chance. No wonder we hear senior citizen screaming "Leave my Medicare alone!"

The public option as outlined in the Senate bill must compete with private insurers on a level playing field.... that is, NO govt subsidy. How is a public plan going to be able to take all comers regardless of their health and pre-existing conditions for the same premiums the private insurers get who don't take all comers? Nor does the public plan address those who cannot afford insurance. THIS public plan does not solve the problems, so exactly what DO we need it for? Only one reason... once it's in place, we can throw out that level playing field nonsense and provide health care insurance to all comers using govt subsidy for those who cannot afford it (with tax increases of course).

Right now, the Canadian, British or French system looks pretty darn good to me.

For the record.... I support an overhaul of the system even though my and the family's insurance is great and extremely cheap!

That's my read as well. The President is trying to mediate instead of leading.

I'd add to that the Swiss, Swedish, Danish, and Norwegian systems. They all work too.

From afar, as it were, I support an overhaul as well. Even though two of my kids (and their families) and a nephew and his family all live in the USA and don't really need reform because they all have excellent health insurance and very stable employment (in addition to having done well in their careers).

I have a nephew in Canada though whose youngest son was born with a kidney problem and requires a lot of medical care. He's lucky to live in Canada (and that his dad is an officer in the Navy).

Something interesting, incorrect, and somewhat funny:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/0..._n_257343.html

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Just read a relatively unknown chapter of history -- new at least to me. Fascinating cooperation between Kennedy and Nixon!
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I think Arianna Huffington is right on the mark when she yearns for a return of “the National Conversation” -- not least of all about health care. Unfortunately, the unseemly and tactically manipulated noise that is going on at town hall meetings hardly qualifies.
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Somewhat of an aside.... my son's private school added an additional requirement for admission this year. Family must provide proof of health insurance to be eligible to enroll.

Not a problem for us, but we really need a fix for the massive number of uninsured in the US.

The GOP seems to be in meltdown mode and are now pandering to their lowest common denominator. Conversation isn't possible with a fanatic.

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_ro...rnc/index.html

Why the Christian silence?
 

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I am deeply disappointed that there aren’t howls of protest from Conservative Christians at the systematic and massive violations of the Ninth (Eighth) Commandment. How can anyone with eyes sit easily in their chair and not object to this "bearing of false witness" perpetrated by those who profess to be spiritual brethren?

Apologies if I offend anyone, but the repeated lies are so obvious -- and the silence so sickening.
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Conservative Christians are not alone in this regard, Stones. Clearly, fundamentalists of every stripe are willing to overlook the sins of their own kind in pursuing the "greater good" as they perceive it. It's an unfortunate human proclivity to protect your clan even when you know they're wrong. How else can you explain the world's massacres, or that Conservative Christians are more likely to divorce than the general population (contrary to the generally held belief that families that pray together stay together)?

Apologies if I offend you.

I hold no brief for conservative Christians, quite the contrary, but there is a problem with those statistics, in that atheists are far more likely to cohabit, and only to marry if they are very solid. When live-ins break up, they don't register on the divorce statistics; whereas many born-agains get married when what they really want (and can't admit to themselves) is just to get laid. I'd like to see figures for "people who have lived together > 3 years and have children and then part ways"; I guarantee that this will increase the atheist "score".

I did like the bit about how being born again doesn't necessarily offset your poor relationship skills. And that divorces are much more likely after people have been "saved" doesn't surprise me a bit: as well as quarreling over who takes out the garbage, they can now quarrel over one another's lack of faith -- and over wifely submission.

Just to keep this on task.... in the Southern US, you have to marry the girl to get health insurance for her! Also, everybody in the South is Christian if you ask them... whether they have been to church in the last 20 years or not. That's the way we were raised.

Personal view: The secret to a long marriage is, "Don't get a divorce." The secret to a happy marriage is, "There ain't no such thing as a happy marriage."

If you want to get a divorce there will always be plenty of reasons to do so. And if you're expecting the world to be nothing but bliss because you're married now, well that ain't gonna happen. It's about choosing carefully and facing the world and all its problems together. A little bliss along the way is just a bonus.

I've been married 44 years.

Woodsman makes very good points. Like him, I find the data a little suspect.

Who is out to get Grandma?
 

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Perhaps it really is appropriate to raise the question of "death panels" and "pulling the pulling on Grandma" -- but not in the way currengly being done. An honest investigation reveals very different answers than those insinuated by Grassley, Palin & Co. This Newsweek article explores the question further.

The insurance industry’s denial of life-saving medical services to many who are insured, and the denial of life-saving services to the millions of uninsured who cannot afford to pay, costs more than 18,000 American lives per year.

On the other hand, of course, I’m sure that makes the bottom line more attractive in many insurance companies -- which is the nature of their game. God help the CEO who has the guts to really prioritise Grandma over shareholders’ return; he won’t last long on his job!

It seems to me that the "death panels" in the private sector are currently working overtime. Dr Kerkovian has long since been outclassed by the competition...
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Ever see that Gary Larson cartoon about Death, complete with cloak and scythe, being discombobulated by finding his girlfriend at the movies with Jack Kevorkian?

IMH we can't fix this before we undo the demutualisation of all kinds of insurance. Insurance companies + external stockholders = denial of indemnity.

Meanwhile, I have an economist friend who suggests reconstructing the mutual society from the bottom up by getting together with friends, neighbours and colleagues to create new insurance pools. Like car-sharing, but in writing. This probably won't fly for the biggies like fire insurance, but it might work for home contents, defined small medical bills and so forth. That ought to frighten the scamsters. But alas, they'll only lobby to have it made illegal, if it isn't already.

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I am surprised that the American Medical Association hasn’t tried to establish their own mutual company for malpractice insurance. Surely there must be billions for their members to save on that.

Or perhaps they have, and I just haven’t heard about it? Or is this illegal?

Another question: Are there any major, truly mutual insurance companies remaining in the USA? I am really curious...
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Krugman has it right in the NYT this morning

Here's one of the attack ads targeting Obama's health care. Kinda cute.

http://aclu.org/pizza/images/screen.swf