NOBby, thanks for proving the old saw about blind squirels...

I agree- rationing of health care is always an issue. Either everybody gets everything and costs spiral up to infinity, or somebody HAS to gget told "no" at some point. I just wonder- why is it "wronger" (your term) when a government does it, versus when the decisions are made by a for-profit company to maximize their profit? What else would you call lifetime maximum caps, exclusions for pre-existing conditions, disallowal of treatmen as experimental, etc., etc. if not "rationing"? Governments are far from perfect, but presumably their decisons should/could have some input from the governed, and some kind of accountability.

If you and I fight, I would prefer having a neutral referee to one that is on your payroll...

NOBby, thanks for proving the old saw about blind squirels...

I agree- rationing of health care is always an issue. Either everybody gets everything and costs spiral up to infinity, or somebody HAS to get told "no" at some point. I just wonder- why is it "wronger" (your term) when a government does it, versus when the decisions are made by a for-profit company to maximize their profit? What else would you call, lifetime maximum caps, exclusions for pre-existing conditions, disallowal of treatmen as experimental, etc., etc. if not "rationing"? Governments are far from perfect, but presumable their decisons should/could have some input from the governed, and some kind of accountability.

If you and I fight, I would prefer having a neutral referee to one that is on your payroll...

Glenn-

I read Huc’s “response” and had exactly the same reaction. You nailed it- 30-40% of the US population live in an alternate reality, simply rejecting facts out of hand if the facts either conflict with their belief system and/or they are told to so by an acceptable authority figure. You keep flashing me back to my training days in the state psychiatric hospital…

The corporatists, right wing, and establishment media know this is true and shamelessly pander to it. Lanny Davis is the predictable evolutionary outcome of such a system. One aspect of this mindset that is crucial is that they respond to certainty and low anxiety, rather than reasoning and logical argument. Thus, if you come across as absolutely sure of yourself, you “must” be right to s sheeple. The Force is powerful on the weak of mind…

Thanks for ruining my day so early. Keep up the good work!

“This is really funny. McCain was right there, the most honest politician in a generation, one who has repeatedly taken positions that have hurt him politically just because he thought it was right.”

Right. Until he abandoned every one of those positions to have a chance at the presidency. Whether he believed them or not is immaterial- he loudly and publicly dumped every position you would cite as his past “honesty” when it was politically expedient to do so.

The only “honesty” difference I would note is that at least his hypocrisy was on public display prior to the elections- we needed to elect Obama in order to see what a sell-out he would become.

We are so screwed.

must go puke now.

Totally right. Our medical care in the USA is driven by maximum profit, not optimal outcome. New drugs are pushed because they are new and exclusively patented, even though both (the few) true comparative studies and real-world experience shows that frequently they are little if any more effective than older and MUCH cheaper drugs. I was very active in biomedical research 25 years ago, when our studies were funded by the NIH, not Big Pharma. Even then there were biomedical manufacturers wanting us to do studies BECAUSE we were well-respected, and you could feel the “pull” to represent their products in the best possible light. What is sickening today is how many “respected medical researchers” are nothing but paid whores for the pharmaceutical and medical products industry, and how slow the AMA has been to deal with these flamingly blatant conflicts of interest.

As an aside, you may be an anarchist, but you are a well-informed one :-)

Actually, y’all, NOBby has done a decent job of the old “bait and switch” here. He’s trying to sidestep the rather important issue that TORTURE IS ILLEGAL AS HELL, and instead try to make the argument about whether we can torture angels into dancing on the head of a pin- or some such… Then, tying the argument to the utterly unrelated issue of drone bombings (which I am against as well, FWIW..) Seriously, NOBby, you get points for misdirection. I’ll bet you’re a stud at card tricks…

NOBby- if a police officer “solves” a brutal crime by torturing information out of a suspect, guess what- it’s ILLEGAL! He WILL, and SHOULD go to jail and the criminal WILL and SHOULD go free. Read the f-ing constitution (besides the 2nd amendment part you have tattooed on your ass, that is…)

stupidest comment of the thread. And the competition was intense!

Hint- to pour the piss out of the boot, read the instructions printed on the sole...

PLEASE, I pray, shove farragut up Glock45's ass. Or vica versa woold be acceptable. If He is busy, I'll be happy to subcontract the job for him...

Joan-

I agree with some other posters about banning these worthless pimples on the butt of humanity. I am a democrat and I didn't agree with Senator Kennedy's positions all of the time by any means, but these two are way off the deep end of the cesspool.