We can regulate health care. We can help them do better on records and practices. We can even help people have more access to more plans via an exchange. But, who is going to insure those who aren’t? What’s the incentive to the insurance companies to take them on? They don’t want them now at rates those people can afford.

So, without a gov’t option you’re leaving about 45M people uninsured.

There may be more people insured if an exchange helps more small businesses and individuals to find plans they can use. I’ll bet there are some, but not all.

That brings us to a gov’t option.

What should be the goals of a gov’t option? Certainly it would help to know what interferes with the uninsured finding and getting insurance. Logically there would be some who aren’t employed and can’t afford private insurance for one or a family. There are also the young who are, well young and don’t think they need insurance. Who will insure them?

Private insurers would like a Massachussetts mandate REQUIRING them to get insurance. But, ask the same people how they feel about requiring doctors to accept Medicare payments and they flinch. No no no, don’t force doctors to do anything. Seems hypocritical.

So, private insurers would like government to get them new customers, but they don’t offer much in return and the doctors oppose the idea (already in terms of Medicare).

That takes us to a gov’t option which OFFERS insurance it either runs itself or farms out to plans. If they’re just offering to connect a person to an existing plan that might help a few, as I said above, but there are some who would prefer to die before using a private insurance company’s products and there are some who can’t afford it. What can the government offer to those folks?

It seems to get everyone covered you either force everyone which I think is repugnant or you entice them — and private insurers aren’t that interested in enticing or they would already have done it.

Government has to offer something people want and they could offer the handling of it to private insurers, if they would like, or handle it through gov’t. I’d suggest maximum flexibility here and continually let private insurers make offers to get in on the deal, but always have the gov’t plans for when private isn’t willing.

If a gov’t plan only takes customers who don’t want private insurance or customers the private insurers don’t want then there’s no competition and no need for a “level playing field”.

What should be the idea behind a gov’t plan?

It clearly has to be based on something a little different than private plans or it won’t achieve anything.

Different kinds of plans? Different options than private insurers do or could offer? Different terms? Greater (complete) portability?

What do private insurers NOT offer that people clearly want and need? That’s what a gov’t option should offer.

As for financing, I’d suggest that a percentage of income basis would be a lot more acceptable to these folks. Whether you offer any gov’t subsidy or not there are going to be a lot of people who simply can’t afford private insurance and a percentage basis, not unlike in some other countries, could fit the bill for them. I don’t know how many of the 45M people that would handle, but it would help them tremendously.

How much percentage of income? Let people have options: many plans, many rates of cost.

If government is going to be a competitive force it should be more on plan choices than on forced pricing levels.

in my livin’ in the big city early twenties, i used to get these anonymous cards in the mail, sporadically, that said a contribution had been made in my name and that a candle had been lit for me in a shrine here, a shrine there…i got them for a long period, from all over the world..couldn’t figure out what catholic friend was doing it, my family is methodist…ends up it was dad…he has a wicked sense of humor. his way of letting me know he was thinking about me.

anytime i get something anonymous in the mail, he is my first guess. this is the same man who kept taping so many articles about smoking on my sister and my bathroom mirrors that we had to peek at the mirror strips left inbetween to put on our makeup..never said a word.

he found pot that was my sister’s, he dumped it into her toilet and didn’t flush it…you’re busted. same thing with cigarettes, would break them up and leave them in her toilet..he didn’t really need to say anything else.
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wow. thanks suz…

man i wish i was in a late late night time zone…..or still a night owl…

i missed the first round of eric burdon–born in ‘59, but rediscovered him thanks to youtube and pbs…

love his spirit. he is on my dream dinner party ’short list’. somethin’ abouth im shines through.

and transister radios? my ‘pop’, grandpa, gave me my first one, used to lay sideways on my bed and look out the window on rainy days…i still remember hearing wichita lineman…

that’s’ as good a description as any.

I’m still listening to stuff:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMBr–Ou_Xg

Makes me miss my son – and regret the things that never get properly said:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMBr–Ou_Xg

I don’t necessarily understand the French – but then again – I do.

Cbl and I speak of you often and wish for you all the best the universe has to offer.

Johnette (Concrete Blonde) on Letterman:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…..re=related

Love the way you can see her soul by watching her dance……