US politics 2

[awesome possum]

I disagree completely with this. Romney has a good shot at taking the White House with the discontent of the American people at how things are going right now economically. I am not saying that it would be a good thing, only that it is very plausible.

I'm not so sure. Romney is like the posterchild for the type of people and business practices that are at the heart of what's wrong with our economy. He's taking this much heat now from his own party, just wait until the Obama election machine takes full aim at him. Remember, they've been working for months under the assumption that Romney will be the nominee. They're going to come out with all guns blazing.

If you don't believe that then just realize that this country elected George W Bush.... twice

Then again, there is that. Romney is missing a few key elements that Dubya had: he comes across as rich and elitist, whereas Dubya was able to hide that behind his good-old boy facade. And he doesn't love Jesus as much.

Can we just have a separate thread for people to wank over the virtues of the Free Market and argue against Obamacare?

Hallelujah! Yes, please!

[Guest Raidne]

Most attorneys that don't actually have their own practice don't have the luxury of billing hourly - all the attorneys at the company I work for are salaried, as are most junior attorney's at law firms. Typically, the only attorneys who get that deal are the ones that have rich idiots or large companies for clients.

Well, I was going to say that this guy is the reason I think people would benefit from doing some work for the government before they decide they know how the government works, but fuck if this kid doesn't get how the place he currently works at works either.

It's like this - all non-partner attorneys are salaried. Partners also get their partnership share (although now I think they're all LLCs). In-house legal counsel, of the sort you mention, are salaried, but in sophisticated companies, they bill their time to the department that uses it. You send a contract for review, and your department gets the bill. In hours billed. (This leads to a travesty of ineffeciency in private contracts as whole departments actively avoid trying to use in-house legal, but that's a subject for another time.) As a government attorney,I also record my time. It's a little different, but there's a number out there showing how many hours I worked on every case. However, I have an incentive system set up in my office that rewards us for the number of cases we complete, balanced against the quality of the cases we complete, and moderated by the complexity of the cases we complete.

If only any private practice worked so well. I'd like to see it.

But it's not as bad as people think - most law firms will adjust the billables of their junior associates downward to account for the time that should be billed for the task assigned, so you really just don't have to actually get a lot of work done to really earn those 2400+ hours bonuses. On the other hand, I think we've all heard the stories of junior associates photocopying at their billable rate on a case for a client with deep pockets, and "hitting them for .5" is hardly unheard of.

Overall, in my experience, the government is crazy efficient, with the one huge exception that people cannot be fired. There are literally reams of people who are too stupid and lazy to be trusted to do anything, such that it's less damaging to pay them to sit around and do nothing than it is to pay other people to fix whatever they screwed up. The other thing is the funding - once budget is allocated, there is no changing it. This is also stupid. We replaced carpet in an entire building less than two years before the building was gutted. But otherwise? It's efficient. I would like to see a law firm handle the volume of correspondence that our administrative staff deals with here.

With regard to health care, it's too late. We don't have an informed consumer base. We are pathetic idiot consumers of health care. Nobody has any idea what anything costs. And then, what things cost don't in any way reflect what their market value would be were health care totally private. Not even close. Last, private industry survives of making money. Making money is not synonymous with increasing life spans, or being easy on the pocketbooks of your patients. When's the last time a doctor prescribed aspirin? Let's take the time I went to the Doctor for recurrent sore throats and laryngitis. The doctor could have wondered if it was from a bacterial infection and prescribed antibiotics. They could be generic, or they could be some newfangled z-pack (so much better because people won't forget to take the whole cycle! charge all your patients triple!). She could refer me to an otolaryngologist.

Or she could tell me to shut up once in awhile and try salt water gargles. Thank god for salt water gargles. I don't get laryngitis anymore. Naturally, that was at the student health clinic. I've found another doctor who thinks more this way and is conservative about treatment, but they are hard to find. Pretty much everything that's screwed up about health care is screwed up because there is money involved in it. Doctors should get salaries. They shouldn't get paid by the number of services provided, which is how most of them get paid now. Everytime you conservatively treat a patient, it comes out of your pocket. And you can always tell yourself that it's just so they won't sue you.

The last health-plan I had was "emergency only", and it did indeed cover long-term care. It just didn't cover predictable expenses. And this is where published prices and markets would help the most, because those predictable expenses would also be the easiest things for people to comparison shop, which would mean market forces would be very effective.

Do you ever purchase health insurance? My ex undergoes thousands of dollars in predictable dental expenses in a year. I found a godsend of a receptionist to actually sit down with me and figure out what procedures he has fall under which A, B, C, D schedule of dental coverage, which separate copays, coinsurance, limits, apply to each, and then, in the end, what should go into the tax-deductible health care savings plan to cover that.

I sat down with about 12 different health care options a couple of months ago, and in the end, I stuck with Blue Cross because it looks pretty good and it's just impossible to really get a handle on this stuff. And I'm a lawyer who reads medical records for a living. I can manage thinking about my prescription coverage and office visits. After that, how the hell will I know what labs or x-rays I'll be getting?

I'll have to do a little more reading on the Swiss system when I have more time - my concern with government setting prices for certain treatments is that it will wind up with a system where, for example, NY clinics can't afford the rent while Georgia sees prices rise - it's preventable, but that would require sense and good faith on the part of regulators, and that's not common enough for me to be confident in it.

The government has a locality pay table for employees. It is amazing how those same percentages could be applied to health care costs. They are all listed here:

http://www.opm.gov/oca/12tables/pdf/saltbl.pdf

There is a base rate, and then areas with increased rates. Atlanta is about 16% over the base rate, and New York is about 22% over the base rate.

[Maithanet]

To me, this primary election really comes across the same way as the 04 primary for the Democrats. Plenty of people are really pissed off at the president, and there's a lot of fire about getting him out of office. But that's easier said than done, and in both cases the challenging party is left wondering what they need to take back power. In both cases, once voting starts a front-runner emerges who is rich, seasoned, and most of all "electable".

The problem with Kerry and the problem with Romney is that while on paper they were "electable", they are stiff and unexciting to the base. There's a word for that. It's Unelectable.

I'm not ready to dismiss Romney chances just yet, but my feeling is that it is almost impossible to win an election with the slogan of "less of a turd than the other guy!" That dog won't hunt, or more accurately, that dog won't devote hours and hours to operating phone centers and knocking on people's doors.

[Jon Sprunk]

I was away most of the weekend, so I've fallen behind a bit.

To Commodore: I saw your (well, Cantor's) list of "jobs" bills passed by the house. Sorry, but that's a joke, right? I saw nothing that would boost the nation's economy in there. That dog won't hunt come election time. Now if the house repubs joined Obama with a bill to build up more infrastructure (bridges, roads, levies), then they might start to dig themselves out of this massive hole they're sitting in and people might take them seriously.

At large: Clinton rode into the White House with populist sentiment (feeling our pain). Bush Jr. got in with the message that he would return (sexual) dignity to the oval office (and he seemed more fun than Mr. Stiff). Obama rode the anti-Bush/anti-war/anti-govt wave. What do the current gop candidates have? Romney is Richie Rich, and that isn't playing well even within his own party. Santorum is best known for his anti-gay views, and that's a loser in the general. Paul says some very interesting things, but then he keeps taking and reveals himself as a pure message candidate (not withstanding the problems in his past). Perry is a dumber version of Bush II. And Gingrich, though an excellent debater, is one of the most reviled public office holders in recent history (he actually makes Nixon look warm and fuzzy). Huntsman doesn't have enough base support to make a serious run this cycle.

It's as if the GOP just tossed out a few token candidates as place holders until 2016.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFXXAuDK1Ao

Looks like I'll be voting this year after all.

[TerraPrime]

It's as if the GOP just tossed out a few token candidates as place holders until 2016.

Token place holders or the best the GOP can come up with? You be the judge.

[Ser Greguh]

Overall, in my experience, the government is crazy efficient, with the one huge exception that people cannot be fired. There are literally reams of people who are too stupid and lazy to be trusted to do anything, such that it's less damaging to pay them to sit around and do nothing than it is to pay other people to fix whatever they screwed up.

Trust me when I say that this is an enormous problem in private industry as well. Probably not to the degree that it is in government, but the principle is universal; there is a long and storied history of taking employees that should in all reality be fired and instead simply shifting them to the areas where they can do the least damage. Often, horrifyingly (as per the Dilbert Principle), that shift involves promoting them to management.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

The problem with Kerry and the problem with Romney is that while on paper they were "electable", they are stiff and unexciting to the base. There's a word for that. It's Unelectable.

I'm not ready to dismiss Romney chances just yet, but my feeling is that it is almost impossible to win an election with the slogan of "less of a turd than the other guy!" That dog won't hunt, or more accurately, that dog won't devote hours and hours to operating phone centers and knocking on people's doors.

I think that's a very fair analysis. But Kerry was still competitive -- he didn't get clobbered. Had the election been in 2006, I think he might have won. So assuming Romney is the nominee, the question is whether Obama 2012 is Bush 2004, Bush 2006.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Congratulations, you've just invented practically every "socialized" health care system in existence.

If 80% of the people pay for it on their own, and 20% get "government" care, I don't think that's a "socialist" system to most folks. If the percentages are the other way around, then yes.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

So your solution for health care in the US is the same as third world Africa's... Why is the US a first world country again?

I'd say it is because we have the highest GDP in the world, as well as one of the highest GDP's per capita, a level of technology and scientific advancement second to none, and the most powerful military in the world. What African nation do you think is comparable in those respects?

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

This is what is going to kill Romney:

Bain’s modus operandi was to invest in companies, leverage them up with debt, and then sell them off for scrap, allowing Bain’s investors to walk away with huge profits while the companies in which Bain invested wound up in bankruptcy, laying off workers and reneging on benefits.

Last week, Reuters profiled one company, Worldwide Grinding Systems, that went belly up after Bain invested in it. The company not only lost 750 jobs, but the federal government had to come in to bail out its pension fund, while Bain walked away with millions in profits.

And according to an analysis by the Wall Street Journal, this was far from an isolated incident. In fact, 22 percent of the companies in which Bain invested wound up either in bankruptcy or shutting their doors entirely, while Bain itself has made billions of dollars for its investors...

Adding insult to injury, Bain would hide its profits in tax havens, not even paying the rate it was supposed to on the profits it made laying off workers.

Romney has tried to spin his firm’s record of destruction as simply the way “free enterprise” works, claiming that Bain, overall, created 100,000 jobs. However, the campaign recently admitted that the 100,000 statistic is bogus, cherry-picked from a few successful ventures. One of Romney’s former partners at Bain has even said, “I never thought of what I do for a living as job creation…The primary goal of private equity is to create wealth for your investors.

MoveOn.Org, and Newt Gingrich, have both been running adds illustrating this. And they are effective.

Well, they'd certainly be effective in a general election. In terms of the GOP race, while some of those ads may hurt Romney, they're also doing damage to the Republicans supporting them. For me personally, they make me more likely to vote for Romney even though I was previously leaning to Gingrich.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Stuff about the uninsured

Just to clear the decks, I do not think government has a moral responsibility to guarantee health care to citizens. We didn't do that prior to the 60's, and the country actually managed to survive, as did most of its people. Sometimes, they got sick and died, and those with less money tended to die sooner.

However, I think the government's involvement in the health care market via Medicare and Medicaid has (along with mandates) dramatically increased the cost of medical care, making it much less affordable. So, I would not simply end those programs overnight because that would place people in a much worse situation than they'd have been in a free market. We'd have far more uninsured than we should have.

I think that if the health care system was reformed properly by reducing the impact of government, health care would be significantly more affordable. I'd convert both Medicare and Medicaid to a defined contribution rather than defined benefit model. I'd then eliminate every direct and indirect government mandate of coverage, including (for example) the requirement that pregnancy be covered, or that mental illness be covered to the same extent as physical ailments if offered ( a truly ridiculous rule, btw.).

What all this means is that some people would no longer get coverage for some things that are now covered. Health care for those on government assistance would not be nearly as cutting edge as it is now, with most folks likely being limited to drugs that are out of patent, etc.

Now, would that mean that some people would die who might be saved if we spent more on health care for the indigent/elderly? Yup. But at least, I suspect that most would die in their homes rather than "on the street", so we'd have that going for us. I also think such reforms would have a significant effect on health care costs, which may make it possible to eventually phase out government insurance entirely, leaving a much smaller number of people who truly cannot get any health care at all. And at that level, I'd expect that charity would be sufficient to provide even them with some level of basic care.

[Fez]

The problem with Kerry and the problem with Romney is that while on paper they were "electable", they are stiff and unexciting to the base. There's a word for that. It's Unelectable.

I'm not ready to dismiss Romney chances just yet, but my feeling is that it is almost impossible to win an election with the slogan of "less of a turd than the other guy!" That dog won't hunt, or more accurately, that dog won't devote hours and hours to operating phone centers and knocking on people's doors.

The difference is that Kerry had only one real path to victory and that was to win the states he did win and to win Ohio to win the electoral college in a squeaker. He wasn't that competitive in any of the states that Obama ended up winning in 2008, like the NV/CO/NM trio, Florida, or VA & NC. Due to census changes in the electoral map, as well the fact that New Hampshire is almost certainly going to go Republican this time, Romney has several paths to victory. Of course Obama has even more paths, but its definitely going to be a more open election then '04 where the challenger had one shot and one shot only.

If you don't already know about it, http://www.270towin.com/ has a great little interactive map where you can mess around with the electoral college.

[Maithanet]

Yeah - I'm leaning more and more this way. I think that anything's possible due to the economy, but if it keeps inching upwards, it's going to be hard to unseat Obama. He would be looking awesome if not for the economy; that's Romney's whole angle. And Romney is going to be very easy to paint as an out-of-touch elitist. He's like Kerry but Mormon. That's not good electorally.

I can't really speculate on how important the mormonism is, because I'm not a values voter. But I think that Romney comes across as a "rich" even more so than Kerry. Overall, I think he's a better speaker than Kerry, but this isn't a good election to be making jokes about $10,000 bets. That kind of thing really doesn't sit well for the voting public, who can't imagine throwing 10k around on a whim.

I think that's a very fair analysis. But Kerry was still competitive -- he didn't get clobbered. Had the election been in 2006, I think he might have won. So assuming Romney is the nominee, the question is whether Obama 2012 is Bush 2004, Bush 2006.

Oh sure, any reelection is more about the incumbent than the challenger. But a weak challenger can't catch the winds of political fortune nearly as well. The "big issues" everyone was talking about in the '04 election were almost entirely irrelevant to Americans in the 05-08 years. Those issues (social security privatization, Iraq and the economy) were mostly ignored in favor of the war on terror and gay marriage. And a big part of the reason we were talking about these distractions was because Kerry was such a weak candidate.

The difference is that Kerry had only one real path to victory and that was to win the states he did win and to win Ohio to win the electoral college in a squeaker. He wasn't that competitive in any of the states that Obama ended up winning in 2008, like the NV/CO/NM trio, Florida, or VA & NC. Due to census changes in the electoral map, as well the fact that New Hampshire is almost certainly going to go Republican this time, Romney has several paths to victory. Of course Obama has even more paths, but its definitely going to be a more open election then '04 where the challenger had one shot and one shot only.

It's a little early to be talking about geographic strategies for the 2012 election, but overall I think that big states in the coming election are going to be the usual suspects of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida plus the new swing states, namely Virginia, Colorado, New Mexico and Iowa. Obama won all of those states in 2008, and if he wins at least half this time, he's still got it in the bag.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Here's a fun story -- oil manufacturers are being penalized for not blending in a specific biofuel that doesn't exist.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/10/business/energy-environment/companies-face-fines-for-not-using-unavailable-biofuel.html

[Fez]

It's a little early to be talking about geographic strategies for the 2012 election, but overall I think that big states in the coming election are going to be the usual suspects of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida plus the new swing states, namely Virginia, Colorado, New Mexico and Iowa. Obama won all of those states in 2008, and if he wins at least half this time, he's still got it in the bag.

Agreed. Although Obama needs to make sure he locks down Michigan and Wisconsin.

My point is just that the electoral map is much more fluid then in 2004, when it was clear from far out that it was going to come down to Ohio since at the time it seemed like the parties were going in a very geographically entrenched direction. Look at how similar the 2000 and 2004 electoral maps turned out; there's a reason Rove was going on about that "permanent Republican majority" back in 2005. Both parties have ceded some ground since then.

Btw, I think there's an awfully good chance Obama losing the popular vote but wins the electoral college for precisely this reason. Romney's not in a great spot, but it is better then the situation Kerry faced.

[Shryke]

I think you are kidding yourself about Romney's potential popularity. None of the polling so far has shown he's anything but unexciting to the GOP base.

[Fez]

I think you are kidding yourself about Romney's potential popularity. None of the polling so far has shown he's anything but unexciting to the GOP base.

But the polling overall does show him close to Obama, and Obama is usually under that 50% mark that conventional wisdom suggests is so important to incumbents. Obama is the favorite to win an election against any of the potential Republican nominees, but against Romney its a close one.

[Brienne the Beauty]

Just to clear the decks, I do not think government has a moral responsibility to guarantee health care to citizens. We didn't do that prior to the 60's, and the country actually managed to survive, as did most of its people. Sometimes, they got sick and died, and those with less money tended to die sooner.

Philosophically, government doesn't have any obligation to its citizens whatsoever. But we have made up a few obligations over the centuries, such as the US Constitution. Our rights are what we agree with the government that they are. If we agree healthcare is a right (as in most First World Countries), it's a right. If we don't, it isn't. If the Constitution is repealed, all those rights evaporate, too. It's a mind-bender, right?

However, I think the government's involvement in the health care market via Medicare and Medicaid has (along with mandates) dramatically increased the cost of medical care, making it much less affordable. So, I would not simply end those programs overnight because that would place people in a much worse situation than they'd have been in a free market. We'd have far more uninsured than we should have.

I think you are looking in the wrong direction. Healthcare is currently very expensive because it is so much better than it was. Many conditions that in the past were a death sentence are now an inconvenience (e.g. diabetes.) Conditions that doctors would have previously dealt with by calling a priest and telling the family to prepare for the worst can now be treated, usually with a lot of expensive medicine and pricy medical skills. This is why not providing health care at all worked for most governments before the '60s, because there was little to provide. Time marches on.

Costs have gone up all over the world, not just the USA. The NHS, for instance, deals with it by not just blindly buying all the latest drugs, but only the ones that are most effective for the cost. There is an occasional kerfuffle over the NHS not providing some miracle cancer drug, but it usually turns out that the drug barely worked and was ludicrously expensive. This is what the Republicans refer to as "death panels." :rolleyes:

In the USA, drugs are marketed directly to consumers, so there is higher demand for pricey "miracle drugs" of dubious efficacy. The free market driving up costs? Shock!

Now, would that mean that some people would die who might be saved if we spent more on health care for the indigent/elderly? Yup. But at least, I suspect that most would die in their homes rather than "on the street", so we'd have that going for us. I also think such reforms would have a significant effect on health care costs, which may make it possible to eventually phase out government insurance entirely, leaving a much smaller number of people who truly cannot get any health care at all. And at that level, I'd expect that charity would be sufficient to provide even them with some level of basic care.

16% of the USA truly cannot get any health care at all. Sure, they might be able to swing some free antibiotics from a friendly doctor, or queue for 7 hours at a charity clinic to have a tooth extracted. But if they got something serious, they'd be truly screwed without government support. I have pointed out to you before that for charity to cover the 16% already uninsured, Americans would have to switch all their charitable giving to health care, and increase it a little too. If medicare and medicaid were cancelled, they'd have to triple their charitable contributions. You don't seem interested in that. I can only assume you think the magic of the market would cover almost everyone instantly if all government controls were removed, which is fairy tale land.

[Fez]

Check out the New Hampshire primary ballot. That... is a lot of options.

ETA: Found another fun thing. PPP just did a poll of the South Carolina primary with Stephen Colbert on the ballot. He's currently at 5%, ahead of Huntsman and just behind Ron Paul and Rick Perry.

They also asked about Colbert's ballot question. Only 33% (and remember this is a poll of likely GOP primary voters, basically as far right as it goes) agree with the statement "corporations are people".