Okay, wtf is going on?Follow

Can someone, not overly biased, explain exactly what is going on with the health care crap? I hear several things and nothing even remotely the same from either side. My gram is pissed as hell but I have friends that are excited.

If they're reporting something about themselves, sure. But in this case, they're reporting something about a service that affects them. Period.

A statement about how something affects you directly is *always* going to be more accurate than a statement about how you think something affects others. Think about it. The "80% believe we need health care reform now" is in the latter category. They are responding to an assumption about how others are doing, not about how they are doing.

Let me give you a simple example:

Let's say you run a cafeteria, and you serve a specific meal (lets call it "roast beef"). You want to know whether the people eating at the cafeteria like that meal. You run a survey and ask two questions:

1. Do you like the roast beef dinner?

2. Should we replace the roast beef dinner with something else?


You should expect to get similar numbers when you run the poll, right? If 80% of the people like the roast beef dinner, you should expect that somewhere near to 80% of the people will answer "no" to the second question.

If you got 80% of the people answering "yes" to the first question, and 80% answering "yes" to the second question, you'd likely think something screwy was going on, right? Clearly, a large majority of the people like the roast beef dinner. You should obviously keep it on the menu. Yet, for some reason, 80% of the people want you to chuck it and serve something else. That's kinda strange isn't it? Yet that's exactly the kind of response we're seeing from polling on health care.


That would *never* happen. It should never happen, I should say. And it doesn't, until politics gets involved. Those kinds of numbers pretty much only happen if someone makes a concerted effort to make it happen. If a group of people who don't like roast beef want it taken off the menu, they could run a campaign to convince people that the roast beef dinner is bad. Of course, they can't convince someone that they don't like it. But they can convince those people that most people don't like it. See. The 80% who like it don't necessarily know that 80% like it. If you can convince them that most people don't like it, then they'll likely agree to allow it to be taken off the menu for the good of the whole. Each of the 80% thinks they're in the minority and is willing to sacrifice the meal they like for what they think will be a meal more people will like.


That's how you get poll results like that. As I said, it pretty much can only happen if there's some concerted effort to convince people that the reality of the situation isn't real. Everyone knows their own reality, but they have to be told the reality of others. If you work hard to tell them that everyone else hates the roast beef, they'll respond "yes" when asked if roast beef should be replaced with something else.


It's not rocket science, and it certainly does not require a degree in psychology to understand this. It's one of those incredibly obvious things to see, if you bother to open your eyes and look at the world around you...

Gbaji will twist himself in knots trying to convince himself that the GOP party line is correct and all those people who want to see health care reform or who think that getting universal coverage is a pressing issue are deluded fools, tricked by politics and the media.

Circumstances had it that I had to take Flea to the doctor today for some stuff. Now, Flea works in a hospital and so we have pretty good insurance but it was still ridiculous the amount of bureaucracy we had to go through for even trivial tasks. Need blood work? Well, you need to see this guy and he's in this town at this center but before that you need to see this guy and talk to this person for a referral which will take 24-48 hours before you can set up an appointment which will be another however many days after that and... Anyway, it was a joke. It reinforced how fucking stupid the whole "the government will get between you and your health care!" is where there's already a massive looming wall between my doctor and myself.

Be that as it may, was I "satisfied" with our insurance? Sure, in that we at least have insurance and can get this stuff done. Do I think my satisfaction means the system is fine as is? Fuck no. Ignoring everyone else in the country and their problems, I'm fully aware that I've basically lucked into a better plan than what I get through my own work. And that our being insured relies 100% on us keeping our jobs. And that if she lost her job, the stuff she saw a doctor about today (which was nothing drastic) could result in my job's insurance refusing to cover her or charging us a shit-ton of cash for it. I'm aware that her carrier could decide tomorrow to change coverages or shift networks or otherwise fuck with our coverage and there's jack all we could do about it. As a matter of fact, they're doing just that to some extent, forcing us to travel much further now if we want to continue seeing the doctors we've established a relationship with because they're dropping one medical plaza from their coverage while keeping a different one, despite the same doctors being in both groups. Once again, "Oh no! The government might get between me and my doctor!"

So, yeah, it's entirely possible to say you're currently "satisfied" while realizing that the system needs an overhaul. Or, hey, maybe stick your fingers in your ears and chant "Lalalalalalala!!!" really loud until the scary poll numbers go away.

Edit: Also, the numbers are: 41% "Very Satisified", 37% "Somewhat Satisfied". I would guess that most, if not all of the 37% feels the same as I do and that a fair number of the 41% does as well -- happy with their current condition but cognizant of the fact that it could easily change for the worse.

Edited, Nov 2nd 2009 10:54pm by Jophiel

Like I said...

OMFG! Gbaji hates babies!! Especially fat ones!!!


Anyway, I'm just recovering from the flu'. Not a heavy cold, oh no. The Flu'! Real full on Influenza! Don't know if it was H1N1 or the regular type 'cos i didn't bother getting tested. Why? 'Cos I wasn't going to take Tamiflu either way, thats why.

I've only had it once before, and I'd forgotten how all-over sick it makes you. I've been in bed for 2 days alternating sweating, cold shivering, joint pains, stabbing pains in the gut and the most disgusting volume of sticky green mucous...

But you'll all be happy to know that my immune system has pulled me thru with no need for vaccines and all that palaver, and my place of work has been happy for me to stay away for the last week and don't want to see me again till next week!

Cool eh?

at the Roast beef dinner analogy. It encapsulates the healthcare debate so perfectly and accurately! Remind me why you're not running for office with insights such as these?

Anyway, thanks gbaji, I needed a laugh today.

Geez Pensive. Switch to decaf. Seriously...


Does anyone honestly believe that the bills the Dems are pushing right now will make health care "better"? In what way? Will it be less expensive? No. Will it have less bureaucracy? No. Will the medicines and shots you get become more potent? No.

We can go back and forth about the reasons for the polling numbers, but I don't think it's a stretch to assume that everyone polling in favor of reform assumes that said reform should result in something "better" than what we have now. What we're getting though, isn't better for the consumer in any way. It's better for the politicians. It's better for the health care industry. It's better for the health care insurers. It's *not* better for you though.


It's not that we conservatives blindly oppose any and all change or reform. It's that we don't blindly support any and all change or reform. Which appears to be a common ailment among liberals. It's better to not pass a bill than to pass a bad one. It's staggering to me that so many of you seem to get that completely backwards.

Mmm hmm. Sure.

And the modifications are thus even more likely to not represent the interests of the people. You're just kinda setting yourself up for failure there. It's really not that hard to come up with health care legislation that a large majority of the population would support. Not hard at all. However, the legislation would not be beneficial to the political powers that are at work here, so that's not what they're doing.


You get that right? If it was just about doing what was "right", they'd be doing it and everyone would be happy. What's making things tricky is that they want to do things that benefit themselves politically and which aren't what people want. So they have to play games to try to get this done. Letting them pass a crappy bill and then hoping they'll "fix it" later is really really foolish IMO.

I had a sudden flash to people who post on MMORPG sites saying "It would be SO easy for the developers to add flying motorcycles that shoot laser axes which transform into a phoenix!"

Umm...... REPUBLICANS! You were going to say "Republicans", right? That was the answer? You were going to blame it all on the Republicans?

Ok, that was my guess. What do I win?