I was all over this "Kill Grandma" canard last week.

"BREAKING: Foreign born Radical Communist Obama wants to kill Grandma and Grandpa"

Link in my name.

Nice stuff. I'd love for you to comment at my place (link in name).

My own doctor agrees with much of what you say, but also says that the current reality is that Medicare is his preferred payer (and he's an internal med doc). Has to do with quickest net cash flow reimbursement among the hundred of 3rd party intermediaries that clog his back office.

I agree that an actuarial "insurance" model does not fit well with respect to health care.

My state extended benefits ran out last week, so I'm no longer officially "unemployed."

to my Sarah Palin fund. Link in my name.

So, this guy by the name of William Kostric shows up today at an Obama health care town hall meeting with [1] a loaded pistol strapped to his thigh, and is [2] brandishing a large sign declaring "It Is Time to Water the Tree of Liberty." (the rest of Jefferson's quote pertains to "with the blood of tyrants..."). Were I a Secret Service agent, I would interpret that as a direct threat against the life of the President.

Fuck the gun. The sign "It Is Time To Water The Tree of Liberty" can mean only one thing, particularly in the context of the loaded 9mm. I don't care that this asshat thought he was being oh-so cute.

See my blog. Link in my name.

The macroeconomic FACT, all ideology aside, is that we spend roughly 2x per capita relative to comparable industrial nations, and virtually all of our public health outcomes measures remain far down the rank scales.

A lot of people are doing just fine with that arrangement, thank you. But, let's not call it "health care."

"Does the addition of 45 million people who will come into the pool - who by and large do not pay taxes give you any pause about why people are dubious that prices will go down?"

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Assumes that these people currently use no health care resources. Perhaps their net drain on the system would go down (particularly under a single payer paradigm).

I'm not asserting that, just pointing out that it is not at all clear. Most lay people who are vocally "dubious" these days have not done the first bit of research. They prefer angry bumper sticker slogans.

and the FBI take up a continuing interest in this moron.

Take a fucking valium, dude. Yeah, I've seen your stuff, and will get around to citing some of your observations, in which I find much merit. I am no lover of the shit I see in HR3200. Yese, you are right, your analogy was apt, e.g., you don't buy car insurance and use it to buy gas, tires, wipers, etc.

What am I doing "other than blogging"? LOL. I go to neighborhood policy reform meetings and try to contribute constructuvely and in logical detail (usually to get told 'STFU, you're not even a Democrat'), I am in my congresscritters faces all the time by phone, fax, and emails. I write to the papers. I READ the fucking legislative drafts -- all of them, from HR3200, HR 676, and the as-yet unnumbered Senate bill. What else, exactly, should I be doing?

In fact, I have a job app pending with SEIU as a health care analyst. Gimme a fuckin' break, Joe.

William, my brother-in-law Jerry is retired military intelligence and subsequently Secret Service, from which he has also retired. But. I'm sure his hooks back in and up remain just fine, and I will be passing along everything I can glean about your dipshit ass. (Not that they're not already on your case.)

Just to give you something rational be worry about. Sleep tight.

"Is this basically it? If so, then I ask our resident conservatives: what is wrong with this scenario?"

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One word. "Profit."

The U.S. spends ~ 2x per capita on "health care" relative to comparable industrial nations, with persistent and increasing across the board inferior aggregate public health outcomes.

That excess money goes into private profit, obviously not into clinically necessary and worthy actual health care. Some things should be readily obvious.

Kostric spewed that lame line to Chris Matthews about how "an armed society is a polite society."

Right. Shit, examples abound: Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan tribal regions, Somalia, ( Oakland CA, and increasingly Mexico)...

The evidence is dispositive, 'eh?

That asshat poseur wouldn't last one day in a FOB outside of Kabul.

LOL!

Troll.

"Little education, no understanding of the concept of consentual democracy..."

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Recall the documentaries of 20 years ago bemoaning the comatose state of American education? Kids who couldn't locate a nation or foreign capitol on a map, and didn't care? Kids who couldn't do basic arithmetic, and didn't care? Kids who couldn't construct a coherent, grammatically correct sentence, and didn't care? The aliterate and civically apithetic hordes?

They are now in their 30's and 40's: the Birthers, Deathers, Tea Baggers, William Kostrics...

in which the ethical difficulties and quandaries are duly noted and addressed. Elhauge correctly notes that potentially beneficial health care "needs" approach the infinite relative to available resources. This debate is nothing new. See my post "The U.S. health care policy morass" (contains excerpts and a link to the Elhauge paper). Blog link in my name