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| Checkmate, suckers. |
A follow-up to yesterday's post on the plummeting credulousness of the American public about Obama.
Do you really think that the government that runs the NSA which day and night gathers intimate data on 300 million Americans and eavesdrops on heads of state around the world, a government that commands the world's most powerful military, and rigged the last election by brilliantly suppressing the opposition with IRS and FEC witch-hunts really can't design a website?
Obamacare is not a failure. It is a remarkable success. It will be even more wildly successful in the years to come.
How so?
Obamacare was designed to blow the American healthcare system to smithereens. It was designed to bestow chaos and confusion and collapse. It was designed to demolish our current largely private system of healthcare and replace it with a single-payer federal system. Such has been the dream of statists for generations. Government control of healthcare-- complete control-- is a massive advance of government power, and an electoral elixir to the party of government.
The problem that Democrats faced in 2009 is that while they controlled the federal executive and legislature (and courts), they still couldn't get federal single-payer passed. So they chose the next-best alternative-- demolish the current mostly private system so that federal single payer is the only option.
It's Cloward-Piven, applied to healthcare. Obama is an old ACORN lawyer, and he took this in with his mother's milk. ACORN was created to implement Cloward-Piven (from former Leftist David Horowitz):
[T]he Cloward-Piven Strategy seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism [and implement socialism] by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.The Obamacare roll-out has been a rousing success. It will succeed finally when Americans, horrified and repulsed by a shattered healthcare system, demand decisive federal action. And the feds oh-so-reluctantly will comply, after much hand-wringing and regret, with federal single-payer.
The crisis is proceeding as planned, thank you. Only a crisis can bring about federal control of healthcare. And a crisis will bring it. Americans-- thrown off their existing plans by the tens of millions and bankrupted by exploding premiums-- will demand Healthcare Homeland Security.
Checkmate, suckers.
I'm always amused with people who say that the problem with Obamacare is that it doesn't go far enough. They want single-payer, or socialized medicine, whichever term you prefer.
ReplyDeleteBe patient. We're getting there. First the old system has to be destroyed.
JQ
Which the Republicans are eagerly helping to do by torpedoing ObamaCare at any cost. And now they complain about it!
DeleteWhat a bunch of suckers.
Hoo
The problem with Jeebuscare is that it is regressive, not progressive, and anti-choice instead of pro-choice.
ReplyDeleteIn the private sector, these are the days of "Have it your way".
The iPhone is just a platform. Thin phones with glass fronts and touch screens might have sold to early adopters, but the real genius is mass customization, via apps. Gone are the days when the wireless salesperson tells me what features I can get with different phones. Stock market news? There's an app for that. Heart rate monitor for your workout? There's an app for that. Amazon shopping? App. Recipes? App. Ham radio station? App.
Dell did the same thing, with its mass customization of the PC and laptop market. Pandora did it, with its mass customization of music channels. I have a Bach channel and a Beer Joint Country channel, and my wife has a Sarah Brightman channel. We have it our way.
Most people agree that's progress.
Progressives, on the other hand, have a different view of progress. I call it "regress". Progressives want to control - as Egnor notes, completely control - what health insurance you can buy. Bronze, Silver, and Gold. And even that is a bridge too far for the Progressive control freaks. They really want One Choice. They're more like Henry Ford: "Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black."
You see, if Americans were faced with the problem of selecting their own insurance at a price point they prefer, they might do things Progressives disapprove of. I mean, look at what they do now! Big Gulps! Salt! Suburban living! Central heating and air conditioning! Homeschooling! Commuting by automobile! Watching Fox News! Praying! Eating red meat! Wanting to keep their money!
The list is endless!
And that's my warning. The list is endless, and the technology to enforce compliance is advancing by leaps and bounds.
Hoots once tootled that "Conservatives don't want to govern." He's right....
Governor: a device for maintaining uniform speed regardless of changes of load
In other words, a control mechanism. People need to be controlled, governed. Left to themselves, they do crazy things. Freedom is dangerous.
By the way, the danger in Jeebuscare is not the Web interface. That's a sideshow. The danger is in...
DeleteThe Hub.
The Hub sounds innocuous, but it connects (at present) seven government agencies:
Names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, employment information, gender and ethnicity status of millions of American families will all be available through the hub. University of Minnesota finance professor Stephen Parente said it “could be the largest consolidation of personal data in the history of the republic.”
--- HuffPo
Seven government agencies is V 1.0.
You think the IRS suppression of dissent in the last election was bad? Wait for The Hub.
See a doc for depression? Homeland Security can find out. Behind on student loans? No surgery can be scheduled. Trisomy-21 test come back positive? Maybe you need an abortion, lady. Sorry, we're just governing.
And in the face of increasingly ominous warnings about cyberthreats, The Hub is one big sitting duck. It's not the midnight hacker after your credit card and SSN that you need worry about. It's state-sponsored hackers that are the threat to your health and well-being.
The Hub.
Remember that. Stalin would be having orgasms.
What's the point of building "The Hub," Grandpa? The IRS and Homeland Security are already part of the Federal government. What impedes the exchange of information between them? How would the implementation of ObamaCare break down those barriers?
DeleteEnquiring minds want to know.
Hoo
Hoots: "What impedes the exchange of information between them?"
DeleteLegacy system incompatibilities. If you don't know what legacy systems are or anything about the problems they cause, look it up.
Wrong! Guess again, Grandpa.
DeleteHoo
You, guys, deserve to have the government you think you have.
ReplyDeleteHoo
What you see as a vast left wing conspiracy is actually the result of destructive Republican politics. Remember that the insurance mandate Idea was the Republican plan up until the moment Obama adopted it as his own, and it has been Republicans doing everything they can to ensure it fails.
ReplyDeleteIf we end up with single payer (and I hope we do) you’ll only have yourselves to blame. Idiots.
-KW
True, true. And the problems with the website are much less severe in the states that set up their own exchanges. Republican governors refused to cooperate and now complain that the Feds aren't doing the job they refused to do.
DeleteHoo
Ahhhh. The "Republican mandate" canard...
DeleteEarlier this year, The New York Times called Jonathan Gruber “Mr. Mandate.” And with good reason: His in-depth modeling [simulation, actually] of health-insurance markets helped create the legislation for mandatory private insurance that is near the center of the U.S. presidential election.
--- MIT News (10/28/12)
Actually, Newt, we got the idea of an individual mandate from you.
DeleteMitt Romney
Heritage did put forward the idea of an individual mandate, though it predated HillaryCare by several years. We know this because we were employed at Heritage as a public relations associate (a junior writer and editor), and we wrote at least one press release for a publication touting Heritage's plan for comprehensive legislation to provide "quality, affordable health care."
DeleteJames Taranto
Some folks had great faith in you, Mitt. I just wasn't one of them. You said a lot of things during those debates, like all politicians do.
DeleteBetter you than Jeebus McLightworker, though. I'll bet if you had managed the rollout of Jeebuscare, it would have worked.
So the mandate was a Republican idea, after all?
DeleteHoo
Good point, James. Your dissections of the New York Times "reporting" are always excellent. No one should trust them. I guess they really are left-wing loons, trying to steal ideas from their intellectual superiors.
DeleteYo Grandpa,
DeleteCan't admit the obvious? LOL.
Hoo
Hoots: "So the mandate was a Republican idea, after all? "
DeleteLooks like the Republicans want to claim it, and the NYT is lying. Just goes to show how smart Republicans are. Or how stupid McLightworker is. You pick. Either way, or both, works for me.
Or maybe Grandpa's brain isn't working all that well. It has never occurred to him that one person or institution may be responsible for an idea and another for its implementation.
DeleteHoo
Hoots: "one person or institution may be responsible for an idea and another for its implementation."
DeleteThat's true, Hoots, but it still goes to show how smart Republicans are. Or how stupid McLightworker is. You pick. Either way, or both, works for me.
By the way, I think the empirical results of the "implementation" should factor into your choice. So far, we've had a series of... what shall I call them...
"emergency de-implementations".
Enjoying eating your own words, Grandpa.
DeleteHoo
Hoots: "Enjoying eating your own words..."
DeleteEating words? Not at all. My take-away from this is: never believe the NYT and assume anything published in the MIT News is cheap self-promotion. It's one of those reasons that, as you astutely noted, libertarians distrust academics and journalists. Thank you for reminding me why that is justified.
And by the way, I'm relishing the De-implementations. You, Hoots, might even call it... Schadenfreude. :-)
DeleteGrandpa, you are digging that hole even deeper. First you denied that the individual mandate was a Republican idea. Now you deny that Jonathan Gruber is responsible for its implementation in ObamaCare.
DeleteHow can you be so stupid?
Hoo
Schadenfreude.
Delete"Barack Obama has been hammered by the botched rollout of the Affordable Care Act, with disapproval of his job performance reaching a career high, opposition to the new healthcare law up sharply and evidence of potential fallout in the midterm elections a year off."
Delete---- ABC News
De-implementation.
Schadenfreude.
Life, Hoots, is good.
Come on, Grandpa, didn't you get the memo? ObamaCare is succeeding beyond our wildest dreams, the freedom is in peril, and you are having a fit of Shadenfreude? What are you, a leftist troll?
DeleteHoo
People should have the freedom to die from lack of access to health care. Tens of thousands enjoy this freedom every year in the US. Good on them.
ReplyDeletePeople should have the freedom to deny their children health care and pray to Jesus instead. Children are born sinners, so if they die they had it coming.
Bigot.
DeleteYou're a bigot, Troy.
DeleteYou've demonstrated it time and again.
A cowardly, sanctimonious, ignorant bigot.
A man child who fears what he does not understand.
Your points carry no weight at all. They rarely do.
These are typically libellous rants; most likely invented by other more creative bigots.
But you know what? My 'stupid religion' tells me to love you anyway. To tolerate you. To come to understand your motivations. So, I do. I watch and learn. Like a mirror, I reflect it to you. Perhaps that reflection will help you change. Perhaps it will not. That is up to you.
You can continue to be consumed by impotent rage, or you can grow.
I don't have a taste for the hatred you spew, that's true.
But, I would not harm you for excreting it.
You play a positive role despite yourself: You are an excellent example for the other readers to observe.
My sympathies lie with the other more intellectually capable and morally anchored atheists who are (unfairly) compared to you and your ilk. You've more in common with a religious fanatic or political zealot than any sort of person with a firm but reasonable metaphysical position.
I pity you and will pray for you and those you infect with your deceit.
You're a bigot, Troy.
DeleteYou've demonstrated it time and again.
A cowardly, sanctimonious, ignorant bigot.
A man child who fears what he does not understand.
I love it when you do this, Crusader. It demonstrates how you think, how you 'infer' information that isn't there. Typical of a true believer.
Maybe I am a "man child", as you say. I sometimes think that scientists are often people that didn't grow up beyond their youthful curiosity. But what's wrong with that? My children seem to enjoy having a crazy childish father. That counts for a lot!
Somehow we’re supposed to believe that the Obama administration is a pack of generally inept bumblers, except when the narrative requires them to have the amazing ability to pull-off giant fiendishly cleaver conspiracies. I guess you have to appeal to all flavors of haters even if your appeals are mutually exclusive. It doesn’t matter why you hate, just hate, hate, hate.
ReplyDelete-KW
Quiz. Which Bolshevik said this?
ReplyDeleteThe discoveries of healing science must be the inheritance of all. That is clear. Disease must be attacked, whether it occurs in the poorest or the richest man or woman simply on the ground that it is the enemy; and it must be attacked just in the same way as the fire brigade will give its full assistance to the humblest cottage as readily as to the most important mansion. Our policy is to create a national health service in order to ensure that everybody in the country, irrespective of means, age, sex, or occupation, shall have equal opportunities to benefit from the best and most up-to-date medical and allied services available.
Don't even think of googling it.
Hoo
Stalin? Castro? Mao?
Delete-KW
Imagine what kind of country we would inhabit if those who claim to represent conservatism in America possessed even a small measure of the human compassion and political decency of Churchill at his best. It is a standard that they do not even attempt to achieve these days.
DeleteOops
It looks like this tread is succeeding beyond Egnor's wildest dreams.
ReplyDeleteLOL
Hoo
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.
ReplyDelete-- JK Galbraith (aka boring man at embassy function)
I agree with about 90% of what you have posited, Dr Egnor.
ReplyDeleteHere's where I differ: I do not think the 'right/left' paradigm is anything but artificial. It is a holographic game used to divide, rule, and control the masses.
The idea of forced synthesis is, imho, 100% correct. The idea that the 'left' have been used as the hammer and the 'right' as the anvil is correct (on this issue).
But it is the hand that wields the tool that wins. Not the team players on either side. That hand cannot lose, no matter which of the tools yield.
It is the ULTIMATE hedge and is the direction history has been subject to since at least the 'enlightenment'.
Who are these hands? Follow the money.... Like smoke and fire, money is often the indicator and will lead you to the true power (the fire).
Crus;
DeleteI think you're right. The hammer and anvil metaphor is apt. If we understand left and right as meaning socialists and conservatives, I believe that the socialists are far more pernicious.
crus,
DeleteAnd I also think that this is a very old conflict, dating to the "Enlightenment' and first becoming manifest at the state level in the French Revolution. In fact, one could say that the politics of the past two centuries is that of the French Revolution, carried out in different countries and cultures.
Mike,
DeleteI would take it back a few centuries to men of 'high ideals' like Dee, Bacon and Raleigh. But, I would agree it first began to be brazenly practised on a state level during the revolutionary period. The 'clubs' (ie Hellfire and Jacobine, for just two examples) of that period were used to force the current syntheses we inhabit - whether that be modern constitutional monarchy or modern federal republic.
But it was only a step on the ladder....
Perhaps a pyramid would be a better metaphor.
I would agree also on the socialist assessment. They have been far more effective and malleable dupes. The French revolution (and indeed the Russian and later Bolshevik) is a prime example of the acceleration of the model.
So, what are you, guys, planning to do? Go back in time and prevent the French Revolution? Roll back the Enlightenment?
DeleteHoo
"So, what are you, guys, planning to do? Go back in time and prevent the French Revolution? Roll back the Enlightenment? "
DeleteLOL! No.
Not for my own part.
What I can 'do' is limited to my own field, friends, and family.
I intend to simply preserve the truth. I intend to avoid being forced into false choices and make the other options evident to those who will be capable of realizing them.
I intend to continue to counter the conditioning of those around me.
Anything more than that is either impossible professionally (ie beyond my scope) or simply not open for public discussion.
I can assure you, however, that not only the control freaks are in control of this game. Once the rules are understood, they can be quite easily undermined. There is no need to throw out the baby with the bathwater. No need to eliminate all the goodies, just to root out the rat poison.
The watch dogs will have their day, Hoo. When it comes, I intend to have been on of those who left them a history worth reading.
Typical false dichotomy: Conservatives champion the current private insurance mess (Big Business) and Liberals champion Single Payer (Big Government). Our Fearless Leaders give us an unholy combination of the two. (Big Business + Big Government) What we really need is a way for individuals to pay realistic prices on an as-needed basis for realistic health care needs, with a safety net for the disabled and grievously ill or injured, delivered on a local level. (Small Businesses + Small Government)
ReplyDeleteJH