Would Universal Healthcare Kill Our Freedom?

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**Mannahnin**

This article is a bit old. It's from 2009, during the ACA debate.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/19/opinion/19kristof.html?_r=0

The Wrong Side of History
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: November 18, 2009

Critics storm that health care reform is “a cruel hoax and a delusion.” Ads in 100 newspapers thunder that reform would mean “the beginning of socialized medicine.”

The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page predicts that the legislation will lead to “deteriorating service.” Business groups warn that Washington bureaucrats will invade “the privacy of the examination room,” that we are on the road to rationed care and that patients will lose the “freedom to choose their own doctor.”

All dire — but also wrong. Those forecasts date not from this year, but from the battle over Medicare in the early 1960s. I pulled them from newspaper archives and other accounts.

Yet this year those same accusations are being recycled in an attempt to discredit the health reform proposals now before Congress. The heirs of those who opposed Medicare are conjuring the same bogymen — only this time they claim to be protecting Medicare.

Indeed, these same arguments we hear today against health reform were used even earlier, to attack President Franklin Roosevelt’s call for Social Security. It was denounced as a socialist program that would compete with private insurers and add to Americans’ tax burden so as to kill jobs.

Daniel Reed, a Republican representative from New York, predicted that with Social Security, Americans would come to feel “the lash of the dictator.” Senator Daniel Hastings, a Delaware Republican, declared that Social Security would “end the progress of a great country.”

John Taber, a Republican representative from New York, went further and said of Social Security: “Never in the history of the world has any measure been brought here so insidiously designed as to prevent business recovery, to enslave workers.”

In hindsight, it seems a bit ridiculous, doesn’t it? Social Security passed, and the republic survived.

Similar, ferocious hyperbole was unleashed on the proposal for Medicare. President John Kennedy and later President Lyndon Johnson pushed for a government health program for the elderly, but conservatives bitterly denounced the proposal as socialism, as a plan for bureaucrats to make medical decisions, as a means to ration health care.

The American Medical Association was vehement, with Dr. Donovan Ward, the head of the A.M.A. in 1965, declaring that “a deterioration in the quality of care is inescapable.” The president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons went further and suggested that for doctors to cooperate with Medicare would be “complicity in evil.”

The Wall Street Journal warned darkly in editorials in 1965 that Medicare amounted to “politicking with a nation’s health.” It quoted a British surgeon as saying that in Britain, government health care was “crumbling to utter ruin” and suggested that the United States might be heading in the same direction.

“The basic concerns and arguments were the same” in 1935 against Social Security, in 1965 against Medicare, and today against universal coverage, said Nancy J. Altman, author of “The Battle for Social Security,” a history of the program. (The quotes against Social Security above were taken from that book.)

These days, the critics of Medicare have come around because it manifestly works. Life expectancy for people who have reached the age of 65 has risen significantly. America is no longer shamed by elderly Americans suffering for lack of medical care.

Yet although America’s elderly are now cared for, our children are not. A Johns Hopkins study found that hospitalized children who are uninsured are 60 percent more likely to die than those with insurance, presumably because they are less likely to get preventive care and to be taken to the doctor when sick. The study suggested that every year some 1,000 children may die as a consequence of lacking health insurance.

Why is it broadly accepted that the elderly should have universal health care, while it’s immensely controversial to seek universal coverage for children? What’s the difference — except that health care for children is far cheaper?

Granted, there are problems in the House and Senate bills — in particular, they falter on cost-containment. In the same way, there were many specific flaws in the Social Security and Medicare legislation, but, in retrospect, it’s also clear that they were major advances for our nation.

It’s now broadly apparent that those who opposed Social Security in 1935 and Medicare in 1965 were wrong in their fears and tried to obstruct a historical tide. This year, the fate of health care will come down to a handful of members of Congress, including Senators Joe Lieberman, Blanche Lincoln, Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu. If they flinch and health reform fails, they’ll be letting down their country at a crucial juncture. They’ll be on the wrong side of history.

**AustonT**

There are two answers to be given one is to the question you posed in the thread title, the other is in response to the article.

Universal healthcare, and by which I mean real universal healthcare not the ACA, will absolutely not kill our freedom unless it is somehow co-opted like the patriot act was.

The article is ridiculous. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking either social security or Medicare are resounding successes. These are the real problems in government spending, but Medicare is especially responsible for the current climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry. In short Medicare is the reason healthcare reform is necessary. Social Security is unrelated to the topic of the thread but as it was in the article I would argue it has either failed or run its useful course and now or back in 2009 is hardly something Id use as an example of the success of government programs.

**Peregrine**

The answer is yes, of course. I haven't felt free since the last time I watched a poor man die of cancer without health insurance. Since then I've felt the icy prison of anti-freedom closing in, crushing my heart and draining my will to live. If we don't have the freedom to watch the less fortunate suffer and die, can we really be considered free at all?

Suicide is the only escape from this bleak anti-free world, but I know that the traitor doctors of socialism would spend society's money on trying to revive. Until then, I will cling to my memories of a free world and pray that Saint Reagan will return and restore American freedom to our once-great nation.

**AlmightyWalrus**

Have an exalt Peregrine. Brilliant.

**Wolfstan**

How much do you guys pay for your medical cover? Knowing how much it is over here it can't be cheap? So if you introduced universal healthcare wouldn't it cost each person less? More money in your pocket and everybody is covered, result?!

**d-usa**

Wolfstan wrote:
How much do you guys pay for your medical cover? Knowing how much it is over here it can't be cheap? So if you introduced universal healthcare wouldn't it cost each person less? More money in your pocket and everybody is covered, result?!

It's better to be broke, sick and free than it is to be healthy, rich and oppressed by a tyrant.

Or something like that...

**Wolfstan**

Fair enough, you don't want the government doing something crazy & oppressive... like look after it's citizens

**sebster**

AustonT wrote:
The article is ridiculous. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking either social security or Medicare are resounding successes. These are the real problems in government spending, but Medicare is especially responsible for the current climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry.

'climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry'

What I love is that those words have some kind of meaning inside your head.

**Shadowseer_Kim**

Wolfstan wrote:
How much do you guys pay for your medical cover? Knowing how much it is over here it can't be cheap? So if you introduced universal healthcare wouldn't it cost each person less? More money in your pocket and everybody is covered, result?!

An annual checkup or doctors visit is somewhere in the $100 - $200 range. for a once a year health expense that is not bad. Catastrophic coverage with a few thousand dollar annual deductible will cover all your big stuff, heart attack, stroke, cancer, broken leg. Runs about $200 a month.

Generic prescriptions for $4 a month.

Various medical services can be found at an affordable price, though most people do not think to look. An MRI was obtained for around $80 for cash sometime in the last year I heard in a report.

All in all it is no where near as expensive as the insurance industry would lead you to believe. Most people of course have been suckered in.

**Kilkrazy**

You're looking at about £150 to £450 for ultrasound and MRI scans on BUPA in the UK, if not insured. A full health check is about £650.

**azazel the cat**

I just show up and the government pays for everything.

It's fething awesome.

Also, I still seem to have freedom.

Hooray for socialized medicine!

**Shadowseer_Kim**

azazel the cat - civics 101 question for you. Where does the Government get the money to pay for all your stuff?

Spoiler:

**PhantomViper**

azazel the cat wrote:
I just show up and the government pays for everything.

It's fething awesome.

Also, I still seem to have freedom.

Hooray for socialized medicine!

That may be true, but you should feel ashamed for yourself for being a self entitled communist hippie!

Also, you can't have as many guns as the Americans, so you clearly don't have freedom.

**Peregrine**

Shadowseer_Kim wrote:
azazel the cat - civics 101 question for you. Where does the Government get the money to pay for all your stuff?

Spoiler:

A: by declaring that it now has more money and spending it

Fixed that for you. Actually collecting taxes to pay for government spending is so last century.

**d-usa**

Just cut out the middleman and print your own money!

**djones520**

azazel the cat wrote:
I just show up and the government pays for everything.

It's fething awesome.

Also, I still seem to have freedom.

Hooray for socialized medicine!

Really? My dad works in Canada, has about a 40% tax rate, comes to around $36,000 a year he pays in taxes. Ends up being roughly $8,000 more a year then what he'd pay back home, and about $3,000 more a year then what he'd pay for insurance for himself (actually, about $7800, since he's retired military). Then on top of that the 12% sales tax he has to pay for anything he purchases, then gas taxes of about $1.30 per gallon... It's not a wonder he's sick and tired of living there. Doesn't even make $100k a year, and ends up bringing home less then half of his pay after taxes.

If "socialized medicine" means I have to pay so much more in taxes for a system that his fiance still wanted private insurance for, then you can keep it.

**Shadowseer_Kim**

d-usa a discussion of the FED should be had in another thread.

**Wolfstan**

I'm not sure if it's a fixed amount or depends on you earnings for national health contributions, but it works out cheaper than paying for the same thing privately. There also isn't any restrictions on how many times I get treated or if I've had the same problem before. Had a heart attack 3 years ago? With NHS if it happened again, no problem, it will be dealt with. private health cover... no go, you are too much of a risk, or you have to pay a crazy premium.

If paying a health tax works out cheaper per person and covers everybody, no matter what the medical problem. what is the issue? I have some ideas but I will hold back for now, just to see what pops up.

**d-usa**

Shadowseer_Kim wrote:
d-usa a discussion of the FED should be had in another thread.

The same can be said for a discussion of cutting out the middle-man that is the government or health insurance.

The question was if it would kill our freedom, so both our posts were equally non-constructive

**Shadowseer_Kim**

yay go us.

The point I was trying to make is that just like with Insurance companies running health, Government running all health will also equate to the prices constantly going up, becoming more and more of a burden on citizens.

Does this equal a loss of freedom? Yes and no. The bigger part of that is a yes, because the average citizen will have even less money in their pocket to pay the bills, buy minis, eat dinner. As the prices consistently increase, and they will, the Government will then look for more money. The main way they do this is taking it from the citizens.

Even if they have the FED "prints it" it causes even more economic problems, which again ends up with the citizens having less buying power. Sure you might end up with wheelbarrows full of cash and coin, but you will need at least that to buy a loaf of bread.

No. because people have the power to take back control of the governments, their lives, etc, at any time. It is just a matter of exercising it. When things ever get bad enough, people tend to start rising up to change it.

**d-usa**

Shadowseer_Kim wrote:
yay go us.

The point I was trying to make is that just like with Insurance companies running health, Government running all health will also equate to the prices constantly going up, becoming more and more of a burden on citizens.

Does this equal a loss of freedom? Yes and no. The bigger part of that is a yes, because the average citizen will have even less money in their pocket to pay the bills, buy minis, eat dinner. As the prices consistently increase, and they will, the Government will then look for more money. The main way they do this is taking it from the citizens.

Except that you are ignoring the part where every other system that utilizes some sort of "socialist" health care system pays less per capita than the United States and gets better results. It is hard to argue that socialist healthcare will make our prices go up when we are spending more money per capita than countries with socialized health care.

Also "taking my money makes me loose freedoms" is not exactly a valid point.

**Frazzled**

AustonT wrote:
There are two answers to be given one is to the question you posed in the thread title, the other is in response to the article.

Universal healthcare, and by which I mean real universal healthcare not the ACA, will absolutely not kill our freedom unless it is somehow co-opted like the patriot act was.

The article is ridiculous. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking either social security or Medicare are resounding successes. These are the real problems in government spending, but Medicare is especially responsible for the current climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry. In short Medicare is the reason healthcare reform is necessary. Social Security is unrelated to the topic of the thread but as it was in the article I would argue it has either failed or run its useful course and now or back in 2009 is hardly something Id use as an example of the success of government programs.

No a universal system would not IF
It didn’t give the nanny state the excuse to start telling me what to do. Although I am a supporter of a Canadian/Swiss style I fear this will inevitably happen. And by inevitably I mean almost immediately.

Would there be “death panels?” You betcha. The horror show that is the ACA has them, and Medicare has it now. However, it’s a tradeoff. As technology expands the cost expands as well.

**Mannahnin**

AustonT wrote:
There are two answers to be given one is to the question you posed in the thread title, the other is in response to the article.

Universal healthcare, and by which I mean real universal healthcare not the ACA, will absolutely not kill our freedom unless it is somehow co-opted like the patriot act was.

Even the Patriot Act hasn't killed our freedom, though it's certainly impinged on a lot of our liberties and is a lot scarier than the ACA.

The question isn't exactly the same, but I'm echoing the claims of these laws's most strident critics, in the past (like Reagan, Taber, and Reed), using language like "when men were free", and "lash of the tyrant".

AustonT wrote:
The article is ridiculous. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking either social security or Medicare are resounding successes.

If you look at the before and after for each of them, they certainly are. Far fewer old people die destitute, or from lack of care. Medicare covers far more people effectively, for a much lower percentage of overhead, than any private insurer. They're both amazing efficient when you look at their scale and compare them to private programs.

Would there be “death panels?” You betcha. The horror show that is the ACA has them, and Medicare has it now. However, it’s a tradeoff. As technology expands the cost expands as well.

In the sense that you're using the absurd inflammatory troll term "death panels", every private insurance provider has death panels too. Only they deny a lot higher percentage of people care, because they need to save money for profit.

**Frazzled**

Mannahnin wrote:
[

Would there be “death panels?” You betcha. The horror show that is the ACA has them, and Medicare has it now. However, it’s a tradeoff. As technology expands the cost expands as well.

In the sense that you're using the absurd inflammatory troll term "death panels", every private insurance provider has death panels too. Only they deny a lot higher percentage of people care, because they need to save money for profit.

Its not absurd when you're on the bad end of one of these decisions. I know people on Medicare who already are.
I call it what it is, but also said as technology/cost expands these sorts of decisions come into play. They have here, in Canada, and the UK. Its the fundamental law of economics.

If you're going to respond harshly to everyone who wants to discuss it, even those I'm sure you essentially agree with, you should probably step back and not, er respond. You're too ready for a fight.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

azazel the cat wrote:
I just show up and the government pays for everything.

It's fething awesome.

Also, I still seem to have freedom.

Hooray for socialized medicine!

yea but look what happened to your head. You're bald and grey!
(Frazzled likes the Canadian system fyi).

**Polonius**

As a rule, ideologues are often very willing to fight for "rights" they have no intention of exercising.

How many liberals actually want crazy japanese bondage porn? How many fight to preserve the right to have it?

Likewise, how many people actually dont' want health coverage?

I"m not saying everybody wants governemnt insurance, but that's not what this is about. I hear people arguing for the "right to not be insured." Which sounds good, in a theoretical sort of way... but what the hell?

**Frazzled**

Shadowseer_Kim wrote:
Wolfstan wrote:
How much do you guys pay for your medical cover? Knowing how much it is over here it can't be cheap? So if you introduced universal healthcare wouldn't it cost each person less? More money in your pocket and everybody is covered, result?!

An annual checkup or doctors visit is somewhere in the $100 - $200 range. for a once a year health expense that is not bad. Catastrophic coverage with a few thousand dollar annual deductible will cover all your big stuff, heart attack, stroke, cancer, broken leg. Runs about $200 a month.

Generic prescriptions for $4 a month.

Various medical services can be found at an affordable price, though most people do not think to look. An MRI was obtained for around $80 for cash sometime in the last year I heard in a report.

All in all it is no where near as expensive as the insurance industry would lead you to believe. Most people of course have been suckered in.

I pay $10 for a regular checkup. My prescriptions run about $10 a month.

**Ouze**

djones520 wrote:
Really? My dad works in Canada, has about a 40% tax rate

Canada does not have a 40% tax bracket. Are you combining state/province taxes into this as well?

djones520 wrote:
Ends up being roughly $8,000 more a year then what he'd pay back home, and about $3,000 more a year then what he'd pay for insurance for himself (actually, about $7800, since he's retired military).

Do you even see what you did here?

**d-usa**

Ouze wrote:
djones520 wrote:
Really? My dad works in Canada, has about a 40% tax rate

Canada does not have a 40% tax bracket. Are you combining state/province taxes into this as well?

djones520 wrote:
Ends up being roughly $8,000 more a year then what he'd pay back home, and about $3,000 more a year then what he'd pay for insurance for himself (actually, about $7800, since he's retired military).

Do you even see what you did here?

You mean to tell me that in Canada I would pay 1% more in taxes than I do now, and get fancy health care? That 1% is still less than I pay for my premiums...

**Frazzled**

You would also pay a 20% VAT tax on everything you buy.

**AustonT**

sebster wrote:
AustonT wrote:
The article is ridiculous. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking either social security or Medicare are resounding successes. These are the real problems in government spending, but Medicare is especially responsible for the current climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry.

'climate of entitlement on the part of the healthcare industry'

What I love is that those words have some kind of meaning inside your head.

What I love is you have no idea what I'm talking about and post anyways. Twice in one night.

It makes you look like a fool.