[quote name='mykevermin']
As for your father's pithy saying, that's what lazy people who are too unimportant for their own good say about statistics. It's what people who don't know shit about statistics say about statistics. It's a cute phrase for a bumper sticker, but one that won't wash in the real world. It's a naive, ignorant, defeatist, "I don't wanna know it, and I don't wanna like it" phrase.[/quote]
Oh so you must know my father then? You also must know every other person who said that too, since you know that everyone who says that is lazy, unimportant, doesn't know shit, is naive, ignorant and defeatist, right? You must know a lot of people.
I'm not any of those things, yet I know that stats and data can be and often are skewed in a myriad of ways. As a cynic, I'm always questioning "where is the information coming from?" "Who is telling me this and why?" I've seen that stats can be tortured and specifically selected to support pretty much any view; it may not be convincing but since most of America has to be saddled/chained with tens of thousands of dollars of debt to get a good education, a good deal of the populace will go along with what they're told. They don't think as critically. Hell sometimes they don't even have to be true at all, they can be bold face lies and the people will still chew them up like Coco-puffs (e.g. Iraq has WMD's).
Maybe I'm lazy or naive for being critical of what information I'll accept as fact, or perhaps just don't want to know the truth? Sorry teach, but your argument fails. As a matter of fact, quite the opposite is true: Those who are critical of stats and question their bias/credibility, are usually smarter and less naive than those who eat their coco-puffs with their minds and curtains closed.
And myke, sorry to break it to you, but as a third party (not Bmull or you) I can tell you that you have lost the nitpicky argument. Might want to think about starting to save face, though you don't seem to be concerned about your CAG "face" so please, continue on with your "smarter than thou" and "holier than thou" Ivory tower BS. If nothing else, it's entertaining to me.
To get back to the issue at hand, instead of this semantic bickering, my personal view is that in America, where we have sooooooo much wealth, and sooooo few people have soooooo much money, it is completely
ing atrocious that we let our poor and sick die in our streets. Hospitals will literally kick dieing people out into the street, (well cab drivers paid by the hospitals usually do the kicking). Pharmaceutical companies are racking in the dough, getting old white men's dicks up while the poor and middle class are getting kicked out of their homes b/c they're bankrupt with medical bills. Not everyone can afford to pay for their illnesses, so in a civilized society, where people actually give a shit about each other, it makes sense that we would want to band together to help those that can't help themselves. Here is the rub: I'm not even talking about the UNINSURED!!! I'm talking about the people who actually
ing have and pay for GOOD health insurance, but are getting denied b/c of one of fifty thousand reasons big HMO's can find so they can stamp that "DENIED" and save their company some money.
Adjusters, and physicians employed by health ins. companies get bonuses and commisions by having the HIGHEST DENIAL PERCENTAGE!! They make money by saving their employer money (by denying claims). It's is a
ing racket, it's atrocious, and it needs to stop.
Perhaps the most frustratign thing of it all, is that conservatives and people like Bmull (I'm not saying that you specifically beleive this bmull, but people like you/with your political views genearlly do) live under some false impression that universal health care would actually harm the quality of care in America. THis is completely and totally
ing false! Canda, France, Britain, and EVERY other western democracy (not exagerating or pulling shit out of my ass here, I mean EVERY SINGLE ONE except us) has universal healthcare and most of them have lower infant mortality rates, and higher/longer life expectancies!
This doesn't even start to take into account the increased stress/anxiety Americans have as compared to other countries.
So if the quality of care doesn't suffer, surely these nations must be giving like 50% of their income to the government right? Otherwise it wouldn't even be possible right? WRONG!! They pay roughly the same percentage of taxes that we do. Perhaps they use their tax dollars more wisely than we do (eg. starting wars in the middle east to RAISE gas prices for our people).
Which brings us to "Why?" Why do we tolerate it? Why don't americans give a shit about other Americans?" Simple answer: because the wealthy have the power in this country, and our masses are to afraid, and chained w/ debt and worry to
in do anything about it! You know why life is so cushy for people in France? It's because the government is afraid of its people (they have demonstrations and riots and shit to keep their gov in check). Here, the people are afraid of their government. I know I am.
Those of you thinking "then why don't you just leave if you hate the US so much?" go
yourselves, because I know there are some of you. Wanting and wishing to improve your country to make it better is the purest form of patriotism there is.
about universal healthcare, I'm all for that.
