USA Politics (redux)

[71 dB]

+1

+1

Thank you both! Support appreciated! 0:)

[Fëanor]

Thank you both! Support appreciated! 0:)

+1

[Fëanor]

While I don't disagree in principle, I do question whether this can be done without significant sacrifice by US health professionals, and I daresay, significant pain to consumers of health care in other countries who currently pay much less than we do for prescription drugs. Health professionals, because as I understand it, at least in Europe, physicians do not earn the enormous salaries (much of which ends up going towards malpractice insurance) that physicians here in the US do. And consumers in other countries because, though I have never seen this discussed, it seems self-evident that we in the US, through the high costs we pay for prescription drugs, are in a sense subsidizing the lower costs that European countries pay, i.e. are at least partly making up the difference in the profits of the big pharma companies. So it seems very likely that resistance from big pharma would be another brick wall in the way of anything like this becoming reality in the US, and that there would be huge pressure from big pharma on countries with universal health care to renegotiate drug prices upward. I could be wrong about this, but given the enormous power and profitability of the pharma industry, it seems like another inevitable hurdle that would somehow need to be overcome.

Well seems to me you are scrapping the bottom of the barrel for excuses to do nothing about the US health care calamity.

Of course Big Pharma is fighting tooth & claw against changes to the current situation, such as allowing states to negotiate drug prices..  That situation is huge profits.  The business about Americans subsidizing foreign drug research and prices is BS;  drugs, (such as Covid-19 vaccines), are being developed world-wide.  Furthermore an excessive amount drug development in the USA is targeting chronic conditions, rather that acute conditions such as infections and cancer, because they promise decades of patent-protected profits.  The advertising I see on US media for prescription drugs, (most of them targeting the aforementioned chronic conditions), is quite disgusting and ought to be banned.

[Karl Henning]

Well seems to me you are scrapping the bottom of the barrel for excuses to do nothing about the US health care calamity.

That seems to me an unnecessarily personal remark. what do you suppose krummholz can do about it? Why your accusation of excuses? Go take a cold shower, buddy.

[krummholz]

Well seems to me you are scrapping the bottom of the barrel for excuses to do nothing about the US health care calamity.

Now you're stooping to ad hominems too? Well in that case I'll bow out of this discussion. First, though, to reply to your points...

Of course Big Pharma is fighting tooth & claw against changes to the current situation, such as allowing states to negotiate drug prices..  That situation is huge profits.  The business about Americans subsidizing foreign drug research and prices is BS;  drugs, (such as Covid-19 vaccines), are being developed world-wide.  Furthermore an excessive amount drug development in the USA is targeting chronic conditions, rather that acute conditions such as infections and cancer, because they promise decades of patent-protected profits.  The advertising I see on US media for prescription drugs, (most of them targeting the aforementioned chronic conditions), is quite disgusting and ought to be banned.

FTR, I said absolutely nothing about the US subsidizing foreign research. I was not talking about research at all. I was simply pointing out that drug companies (the biggest of which are international conglomerates) may have been willing to negotiate fairly low prices with other OECD countries' healthcare systems as long as they had a major customer (the US market) willing to pay premium prices for their products. What leverage does the US have at this point? Seems this (meaningful caps on drug prices) is something that will have to be legislated, something not likely to happen in the US Congress as long as the Dems' majority is as razor thin as it is.

That is not to say we shouldn't try to fix it - in fact, I think reducing the cost of pharmaceuticals is the single step that will make the biggest dent in the US healthcare problem. Given that universal health care seems to be a non-starter here, looking for other ways to reduce the costs of healthcare seems to be the way to go. My big lament is that the political will to actually do something about it seems to be sorely lacking today.

[SimonNZ]

People are never supportive of what I do, so of course I feel I am bad at everything! US politics is just another example. According to you I suck at it. Why am I not allowed to be a communicator/influencer? Wrong political views? Wrong nationality? Wrong personality type? What?

See, this has been explained, and the fact that you have to ask it again is part of the problem. You hear people disagreeing but don't take in their reasons, just that there is pushback,.

You think things are black and white and solutions easy, when every topic you address is in fact massively complicated and understand and knowing all the moving parts and theories and the nature of past attempts at solutions any one of the - to say nothing of navigating a way through them - requires a full library's worth of reading to have the certainty and knowledge you believe it is your right to be recognised as having.

If I acted like I knew any political topic completely (let alone based only on just a smattering of punditry) I'd deserve whatever "condescension" came my way. I've deserved ot for even less than that.

Nobody is saying you cant communicate , but the answer to this "Why?" is that you need a better sense of just how much you still have to learn.

Will you take this on board this time, or yet again deflect to suggest its about something other than what I'm trying to tell you as directly as possible?

Why do I keep scratching at this? Because it worries me that this is the way many now get their so-called ?news": via amateur Youtube bobbleheads with their uncomplicated faith in their own certainty and easily acquired absolute truths, and I'm looking for some sign of hope - and I'm not seeing it, here or elsewhere.

[71 dB]

That seems to me an unnecessarily personal remark. what do you suppose krummholz can do about it? Why your accusation of excuses? Go take a cold shower, buddy.

I think Fëanor is on point. Does krummholz even want to do something? The root problem is corruption due to legalised bribery. What the left talks about is an Amendment to take money out of politics. That would allow the politicians to serve their voters rather than millionaires, billionaires and corporations. Once that obstacle to real democracy is removed, the excuses against universal healthcare (and many other progressive things) magically go away.

[Karl Henning]

I think Fëanor is on point. Does krummholz even want to do something?

Well, congratulations for compounding an unnecessary personal remark with unnecessary personal speculation. You made a category error earlier. Yes, you are a human being, and your being such is not a problem. Perhaps the problem is that you should do something better or otherwise.

[Fëanor]

Now you're stooping to ad hominems too? Well in that case I'll bow out of this discussion. First, though, to reply to your points...

Not at all really, and apologies if it struck you that way.  I was only saying that the particular argument was not much of an excuse for American's inaction.

[Fëanor]

That seems to me an unnecessarily personal remark. what do you suppose krummholz can do about it? Why your accusation of excuses? Go take a cold shower, buddy.

Sorry if it seemed a personal attack.  Americans in general tend to not see the forest for the trees when it comes the shortcomings of their own system and devise apologetics accordingly;  at worse krummhotz is just another example.

[krummholz]

Not at all really, and apologies if it struck you that way.  I was only saying that the particular argument was not much of an excuse for American's inaction.

It was not intended as an "excuse" for anything. I was simply pointing out what I think is going to be a major hurdle to overcome, even once the political will is mustered to do something, if it ever is. I agree that something needs to be done, but our political parties are embroiled in a constant partisan struggle to undercut and undermine each other, to the detriment of the country's future.

What I do believe would be a major mistake though (and said as much) is to attempt to implement a solution like universal health care without the authority to actually raise the revenue needed. That is not an excuse for inaction, it's just recognizing that the cure could be worse than the disease if we can't overcome the US public's desire to have government give them what they want without being willing to pay for it. That applies to many things, including the "Build Back Better" plan - and yes, I know that it is touted as an "investment", but it remains to be seen whether it will truly pay for itself in the long run. We must be willing to pay for it without passing the debt onto future generations, if the return on the investment proves to be less than expected.

[Karl Henning]

I think most Americans agree that the health care system needs improvement. Probably does need to be razed to the ground and designed intelligently. This would be difficult in normal times. In today's climate, it's impossible. Nota bene: this is a description not an excuse.

American policy-making is a succession of kludges

By Henry Farrell

October 9, 2013

The American public likes to complain about how difficult it is to understand U.S. public policy measures like Obamacare. Johns Hopkins political scientist Steve Teles argues in a recent article for National Affairs that instead of well-designed policies, we get kludgeocracy, a succession of semicoherent fixes to the policies that we already have. Kludgeocracy is worse in the U.S. than in many other electoral democracies because of underlying problems in our political system.

The most obvious reason why American institutions generate policy complexity is our system's numerous veto points. The separation of powers means that any proposal must generate agreement at three different stages — each house of Congress and the president. ... Most legislation has to pass through separate subcommittee and committee stages, each of which presents opportunities for legislators to stymie action. Many ambitious proposals are considered by Congress under "multiple referrals," in which more than one single committee is given jurisdiction. ... Finally, the super-majority requirement for breaking a filibuster in the Senate, combined with the intense partisanship that accompanies most major policy reforms, means that any single member can stall the progress of a piece of legislation, and a cohesive minority can kill it.

A superficial analysis would predict that this proliferation of veto points would lead to inaction, generating a systematic libertarian bias. In practice, however, every veto point functions more like a toll booth, with the toll-taker able to extract a price in exchange for his willingness to allow legislation to keep moving. ... many of our legislative toll-takers have a vested interest in the status quo. In exchange for their willingness to allow a bill to proceed, therefore, they often require that legislation leave their favored programs safe from substantive changes. Consequently, new ideas have to be layered over old programs rather than replace them — the textbook definition of a policy kludge. Second, the need to gain consent from so many actors makes attaining any degree of policy coherence difficult at best ... kludgeocracy is now self-generating, as its growth has created a "kludge industry" that feeds off the system's appetite for complexity.

Teles's analysis of the politics of kludge-piling has lessons for both left and right (his ideas have much in common with those of Hoover Institution political scientist Terry Moe, who writes eloquently about how most American legislative measures are in part designed by their enemies). Both argue about the size of the state, rather than whether the state is transparent and accountable. Kludges used to be part of the cost of doing politics, but they are now threatening to overwhelm the system that generates them. It's also worth reading Wonkblog's interview with Teles for further information.

[milk]

Gosh, I've had my motivations questioned in a much MUCH worse fashion (and others too). Much worse. Let's keep cool. I don't see vitriol but it's appropriate to point out when you feel someone is attacking your motives unnecessarily. I doubt it was meant to be insulting.
As I pointed out before, here in Japan, we have a system that covers everybody for everything. It's not that expensive for the customer and taxes are not even that high. It isn't perfect but it might even be a better model for the U.S. 

[71 dB]

If someone here has an impression that I think changing the US healthcare system is easy they are mistaken. I am well aware of how hard it is. The US has tried to implement universal healthcare system for 100 years and it hasn't happened. That tells how hard it is. However, going to the Moon was hard too, but it was done.

SimonNZ keeps defending corporate media, but the truth is they haven't been the best advocates for universal healthcare, have they? Instead they do fearmongering: Who is going pay for it? How about the waiting times? How about the doctors you can see? Does it make the country Venezuela? They know the answers to those questions, but they keep asking anyway to uphold the narrative. MSM is one key factor in this. It is one lock that keeps change from happening. That's when the "amateur Youtube bobbleheads" come in providing alternate view.

When regular people (of which a large portion are poorly informed politically) have access to news coverage beyond MSM they can understand better the underlying narratives and the real tension in the society. Regular people on the right and left have many things in common: Both want higher taxes for the rich, both hate corruption, both want to end wars and both want better access to healthcare. The current political narrative keeps these people apart fighting each other over nonsensical cultural topics such as critical race theory in schools or whether mask mandates infringe someones freedom. The rich to whom the system is rigged for benefit from this status quo.

Americans need to learn more about the right-left axis. Americans are so mislead with this topic. Republicans call Biden a communist, which is hilariously comical. Even AOC isn't near of being a communist and Biden is several steps to the right of AOC. The most left label to Biden that makes any sense is "centrist", but even that is far fetched: Any politician who doesn't fight for universal healthcare or at least public option are radicals. The idea that it isn't a human right to have access to healthcare is radical, at least outside the US it is. The progressives are actually the centrists. Why? People their platform is very popular among regular people. They represent the real "center" of the population. It is only the misleading narrative of the MSM that mislabels them the radical left to fearmonger. They real radicals are the corporate Dems and Republicans. It is very radical to serve only big money doners. This is what Americans should understand and when they do, changing the country to a better one become easier. How about Nina Turner for president 2024? Hello somebody! At the moment Manchin and Sinema are the real president and VP. They run the show. The only question is which is which? 

[milk]

Have you watched Breaking Points on YouTube? They used to do The Hill Rising. Also Matt Taibbi's "Useful Idiots." Taibbi and his cohost review the Sunday political shows every Monday.

[SimonNZ]

SimonNZ keeps defending corporate media,

Another artless an dishonest dodge. Please address the actual criticisms I've made in my actual posts.

If you want to know why you're treated as unserious this dodge is another reason why.

[milk]

Not stopping 'Stop the Steal:' Facebook Papers paint damning picture of company's role in insurrection
https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/22/business/january-6-insurrection-facebook-papers/index.html

"When Facebook executives posted messages publicly and internally condemning the riot, some employees pushed back, even suggesting Facebook might have had some culpability."

There are so many articles along this line now. I just wonder. People/news organizations are clamoring for more censorship and I don't see that other side of the coin expressed. Sure, we're in awful times. People in my family too went off the rails into trump-land, anti-mask/vax, q-anon. I hate it. But I worry when a blizzard of media seems to be asking for speech curbs. I'm not saying there isn't a problem but I also wonder if it's not a case of "too late to close the barn door." Or "the medium is the message." Social media is not much of a place for nuanced polite dialogue. I've even been called bad things on GMG. But the remedy might even be worse than the problem. Facebook is more than just a private publishing company in my view and I don't really wanting it telling people what they can say. Or maybe it should be broken up.

[SimonNZ]

Have you watched Breaking Points on YouTube? They used to do The Hill Rising. Also Matt Taibbi's "Useful Idiots." Taibbi and his cohost review the Sunday political shows every Monday.

Dude...this guy doesn't need more quick-hit punditry. He needs actual long form investigative journalism.

Or am I being "condescending"?

[milk]

Dude...this guy doesn't need more quick-hit punditry. He needs actual long form investigative journalism.

Or am I being "condescending"?

Taibbi does long form journalism if you read his substack. Glenn Greenwald does also (to add another "crank"). I agree that it's good to read widely and in-depth.

[71 dB]

Have you watched Breaking Points on YouTube? They used to do The Hill Rising. Also Matt Taibbi's "Useful Idiots." Taibbi and his cohost review the Sunday political shows every Monday.

Not really. There are so many to choose from. This year I have followed US politics less because I want to think about it less, but when I watch something it is mostly Secular Talk (Kyle Kulinski), David Pakman and TYT, althou I am more careful with TYT after their ridiculous feud with Jimmy Dore. I stopped watching Jimmy Dore who has become a total ivermectin grifter. In my opinion TYT has been good lately. Maybe the feud with Jimmy Dore made to put their act up while Jimmy Dore wants to get more right wing audience.

Another artless an dishonest dodge. Please address the actual criticisms I've made in my actual posts.

If you want to know why you're treated as unserious this dodge is another reason why.

Sorry if I have misunderstood your posts here, but for me it has been quite clear you don't value independent commentators and think corporate mainstream media are the real professionals. Your criticism seems to be that the like of Kyle Kulinski are amateurish morons. Well, these people work from morning to the evening earning their living doing it. That makes it professional, doesn't it? Also, these guys get things right unlike corporate media.