Dealers Still Waiting For Clunker Cash.

When the government buys auto parts from my store it usually takes them 90 days before we get a payment.

And some want these clowns running healthcare?

You're a kook if you think total control of healthcare (as opposed to the half or so they control now and their interference that has damaged the other half) won't turn out different (and better) than everything else the US federal government has ever done.

Clunker Legislation.

It's the Economy,,, going down the drain. cuhulin

snipped-for-privacy@webtv.net wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3172.bay.webtv.net:

Gone. Past tense. And like any russian would, scrub took the bathplug with him when he moved.

snipped-for-privacy@webtv.net wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3172.bay.webtv.net:

Yeah, yeah. Whine whine. I suppose they've got all their new car loans paid up in full too?

Sorry, but the Govt. is being diligent to make sure they aren't being fleeced. If however they don't have the money by next tax day, there might be a problem - *if* they did the forms properly - *if* they handled the car properly. Etc. Etc. Somethimes I think the press spends most of their day looking for people who don't do things right on purpose just so they have a list of who to ask next time.

Hachiroku $B%O%A%m%/(B wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@e86.GTS:

Why not? you work for some corrupt insurance company do you?

'health care reform' if it works like other 'reform' will remove what free market aspects are still left in healthcare and turn it over to a cartel of players who purchased influence in DC. That is, there is no reason for the big insurance companies to oppose it.

Sure they tell us it's bad for them. It's not. If it was bad for them it would never get anywhere. It's the same way they sell other reform, they just lie about it to play to what people already think when its exactly the opposite. That's why they name the bills the way they do.

Brent wrote in news:h7muk0$5aj$ snipped-for-privacy@news.eternal-september.org:

Well, the word reform is completely meaningless. What is *done* to improve the costs of health care is what's actually has meaning here. None of that has been mentioned of what I've seen of US news. Not living there, I have both a different perspective on how health care should be run along with what *can* happen when government gets involved. Nothing minor, Doctors threatening to emigrate to other countries, strikes in hospitals. This all was the result of one man - not even in what you in the US would call a political party. More in line with Nader if there is a parallel. The end result is that costs of hospital and doctor procedures are dictated by the government and the cost of medication is regulated along with allowing generic copies after a short period of time to prevent monopoly pricing. Apparently this didn't work so well as too many of you US citizens were buying our sifnificantly cheaper medication untill we plugged the pipe.

That is, there is no

It would be bad for them if none of the medical plans were sold by insurance companies. Up here (and in the rest of the western world BTW) everything *but* dental is covered by a cheap quarterly fee - around $30. Medication you pay half the set price you people were buying it at. And the government *doesn't* lose money on it.

Time to stop watching FOX and Glen Beck. They'll rot your brain for sure.

If however you want to learn more than what goes on in the US, his name was

And he was at one point the leader of the #3 party in Canada. You'll probably have heard of his son in law, or at least his grandson.

Not at all.

These people can't even give money away efficiently.

Um, you're preaching to the chior here. Did you mean this for someone else?

I don't want the Govt running ANYTHING!

What is on the news in the US is generally the government's version of things.

That's because the federal government enforces a cartel here. It's about ensuring high prices. (remember, lots of the drugs are made in the US and shipped to canada, purchased and brought back to the US and still cheaper) The government is about ending the competition of the free market for the advantage of insiders. That was the core of the 'New Deal' and more recent reforms try to emulate it.

A free market would result in cheap insurance and care in the US, but that's not what any of the players want. They want a highly regulated cartel that keeps prices high, manditory purchase, etc and so on. The government wants control, the connected businesses want the market locked up for them.

I don't watch FOX or any other TV news because it's generally BS.

What do I care of some politician, especially one who thinks health care can be "free"? It can't be free. You can use the government monopoly of legal violence to get someone else to pay for it, but it's never free.

I agree with you... just saying it's considered 'kooky' to disagree with our 'leaders'.

Brent wrote:

Well facts are facts and the media and government can only do so much to hide the real facts. The facts are that health care in the US is not very good quality and it is expensive. If current trends continue in a few year there may be dozens of third world countries that have better life expectancies than the US. And when that happens it is going to be hard to continue to disguise the fact that health care in America is expensive and not very good quality. The major problem with a free market system is there is no real incentive to keep the population healthy. The purpose of running an industry like movies is to create a product that gets as many people into the theaters as possible. The idea behind health care is supposed to be just the opposite. The simple economics of it is that there is no economic incentive to keep the customer healthy. If the health of Americans suddenly improved dramatically there would be a major recession in the health care industry which would have negative economic impact on every segment of that industry - even the insurers. A major contraction in the need for medical care would be economically devastating to the entire industry. So where is this free market incentive? The actual market incentive is to create the illusion of providing advanced care without actually giving much health benefit to the recipients. That market incentive makes a modern hospital full of whiz bang technology with lots of flashing lights and sounds, but also the one place in the world where you are the most likely to contract a serious illness.

That's right we already have government run health care in the US. It is run by the government for the benefit of the big campaign contributors and media advertisers.

The "competition of the free market". Man are you brainwashed. Why don't you try to participate in this so called "free market"? If you do attempt that, you will end up in jail.

A highly regulated cartel that keeps prices high, mandatory purchase, etc is what we have now.

And making sure that a sufficiently large portion of the population is convinced there is no possibility for improvement is the secret to keeping it like it is. The current hoopla in this area is only because it is getting harder and harder to keep the myth going that Americans are getting quality affordable health care. The current system is driving many businesses to bankruptcy or to move overseas. Americans who have serious health problems and need surgery are beginning to discover that they can get on a plane and fly to India or Guatemala or Mexico and get significantly cheaper surgical procedures from facilities that have a better success rate than what is available to them in the US.

You don't have to watch TV for very long to see that a huge amount of money is being funneled from pharmaceutical companies to the media. That isn't about free market economics. With all that income, it isn't hard to guess what stance those networks are going to take.

So What do want? they should borrow the billions from China so they can pay the dealers as fast as possible? Remember most of those cars sold would be still rusting away on the dealers lots if there had been no program.

-jim

While that is a matter of comparative opinion, the present conditions are the result of government interference. Government controls about half of health care in the US already and severely regulates the rest.

The US does not have free market health care. What gives you the idea it does? crappy TV news? Free market health care in the US hasn't existed in decades. The cartel and government type systems in the US are about keeping people sick for maximum profit. But that only can be because there isn't a free market. If there were a free market, if there were no FDA, there wouldn't be the barriers and illusions that keep people in that system.

The free market incentive is when there is a free market, that is people have a choice that isn't dictated to them by a government or fascist (government-private) system.

I think you mis-read. Government _ends_ competition. One of the ways it does that is through putting people in jail. The FDA is there not to protect people, it is there to protect the profits of the insiders.

The idea that the same government who brought the present system into being will 'fix' it is simply absurd. The media forms the debate between the 'present system' and the 'new government system'. People don't think beyond the choices presented to them, so that is the debate. Those of us who see the choices are rigged, are left out and called 'kooks'.

Much of the third world still has free-market health care or at least something closer to it. That is, where people pay for services rendered. That's why it's cheaper.

Media, licensed by the FCC and/or subject to other forms of government regulation, news departments requiring access to government office holders to stay in business, will favor the state. Sure there is the phoney left-right nonsense, but in the end, it all favors the government which can stomp them out instantly.

Oh sure ignore what i wrote and desperately pretend i said something different. You are the one advocating a free market system. But you can't make a reasonable case for it. Where is the evidence that moving towards a free market system would make things better and not worse? There is no incentive in a free market to make it work any better. All you apparently can do is whine about what is.

If pigs had wings they would fly.

If pigs had wings they would fly.

If pigs had wings they would fly. The FDA isn't going away. Try to pay attention - that isn't even a remote possibility at this point.

Oh sure and the idea that were going to get rid of the AMA and FDA isn't absurd?

Well there are more than 2 choices currently on the table. Somebody is going to make some choices. The kooks take themselves out of the process

- that is the choice they make.

Not really the quality health care in third world nations is not at all free of govt. regulation and is also not affordable to the vast majority of the citizens, but that is neither here nor there since it is pretty much completely out of the question that the US is going to go back to some seventeenth century system without the FDA and the AMA etc. There are plenty of western countries with very government regulated systems that provide better and cheaper care also. The life expectancy of the Cuban population is the same as the US population and their life expectancy rate is increasing much much faster than the US. As I said it is going to get harder and harder to disguise the fact that the current system is not very good.

The public can influence what the government does to some extent. But making it sound like the only thing one can think of is to request the government to just stop doing everything seems a little ridiculous.

-jim

I wasn't aware you wanted one. You realize that the mess that exists now is not a free market but one of government control, but you insist on the choice be between total government control and the present system. It's a false choice.

Oh, you want a case for free market health care? You've already made it yourself by pointing to nations that already have it.

I'll let those better at it than me make the case:

I could find more if you'd like.

So, take the false choice ?

I guess that's what you mean then, choose a form of government control.

If the FDA doesn't go away, costs, cartels, political favorites, and so on won't go away. There will be no reform, only more wealth sucked from the people by these special interests using the government monopoly on legal violence. If it's not a possibility then any 'reform' will just be to strengthen the market protections of the connected.

I didn't say anything about the AMA nor did I say the FDA was going away. It would help if you read what I wrote. I stated that the FDA protects the politically connected interests. There will be no improvement, no real 'reform', only higher prices and a stronger cartel.

What are the choices besides 'present system' and 'new government system' ? There's more than one of the former because of differences in the details... maybe that's what you meant?

I stated more free market. The FDA was a 20th century creation. If you don't even understand where the FDA came from, well, there's no point in continuing.

Much of what we are told of Cuba isn't exactly true.

Like the bailouts... congress heard 'no' and 'hell no' so what does it do? Pass it. 'by the people for the people' isn't what really goes on.

Then why the hell did they start the program in the first place? The real reason was to get rid of SUVs. Liberals don't like them very much, and blame the world's ills on them, but they sure drive a lot of 'em.

Either that or old Hondas that blow blue smoke out of the tailpipe sporting a bumper sticker that says, "Save the Planet".

And if they need to borrow 'billions' to pay off the CfC money, what the hell are they going to do for the 'public option' healthcare?!?!?