How Confident Are You That Whatever HCR Bill is Passed Will Be a Net Gain?

[Beet]

     Option five. Still, regardless of what happens, hopefully this saga will succeed in instilling a sufficiently cynical world view into my generation.

Or, your generation could just read history. Then we wouldn't have to repeat a political nightmare every 25 years just to "instill a sufficiently cynical world view".

Anyway, I predict that if this passes, none of the apocalyptic tales of doom will come true, but by the time that is apparent, no one will be talking about it anymore.

[Beet]

Vepres, I really don't get your point. Your point #1 seems to describe precisely the problem that occurs without a mandate. And without a mandate, there is no justification for health insurance reforms that prevent companies from denying you for a preexisting conditions, because they would just be responding to people who deliberately wait until they get sick to get covered.

As for your point 2, there is no public option in the Senate bill, so I don't see why it's still relevant.

[Beet]

The problem with citing arguments from the Heritage foundation or its opposite is that such a large number of studies and statistics and findings about health care exist out there that you can easily cherry pick the ones you want and give them the spin on which you want. For example, I could cite:

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But I think it is instructive that Obama, who ultimately will be the one held responsible for reform, originally opposed the individual mandate and yet once he got into office and learned more, he changed his mind.

The individual mandate is no more a violation of civil liberties than single payer or a mandate plus public option would be. In each of those cases, you would either be forced to buy insurance the same as now (mandate plus public option) or you would be forced to buy insurance through tax. Either way, you are paying for the health care in the system, by force. Both of these alternatives have an "individual mandate", they are just not called the individual mandate because they have government operation on top of the individual mandate. But just because they have government operation on top of the individual mandate, does not mean they do not have the individual mandate. So people who supported this bill with public option, or who support single payer, have no case to make.

The individual mandate is nothing more than a tax. It says you will be taxed and these taxes will go towards health insurance. The only difference is operational: the health insurance will be provided through the private sector, and you will have the choice of which private sector company to use for your own insurance. The cost to the individual is no different.

[Beet]

Again, though, forcing somebody to buy a product, whether private or government, is unfair and needlessly authoritarian.

All government is essentially 'forcing you to buy' something, whether it's roads, schools, or defense. In these cases it's even more authoritarian, because the government is likely to run these things inefficiently and is accountable to no peers. So if you think that kind of thing is unfair, then you ought to be against roads, schools, and defense.