Pretty damn pathetic. Swallow your pride, admit you went cherry picking, misunderstood and/or misrepresented his argument and let it go.

Michael and Bithead, why not just make a bet, for, say, $50? If in Jan '09, Obama is proposing to draft all doctors into forced work and cap their salaries at $125K, then Bithead wins. Otherwise, Michael wins.

Sounds like a pretty safe bet to me. How about it Bit?

This is not "America can't get it done" hihs is "Government can't get it done.

Thats what he said. The meaning is pretty plain. End of discussion.

So you set up a straw man and when you got caught you referred me to a post where you had been caught setting up the same straw man a few days ago. And that's your defense?

I don't feel quite the same sense of indebtedness to everyone else just because they are fortunate enough to live in America.

Tell me Charles, what happens if, God forbid, a catastrophic illness or accident befalls you or someone you love? Hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical bills. Insurance won't cover it all. Perhaps 24 hour nursing is required, maybe a retrofit of your home for a wheelchair. Travel to see specialists.

Perhaps you have the means to cover all that despite lost income if you can't work. But I doubt if more that 4 or 5 percent of the people in this country do. And if you think it can't happen in your family, think again.

Who do you think ends up footing the bill when this happens, if it happens to you? Why all of us do. And I for one, am ok with paying a few extra buck to ensure that you, or your next door neighbor, or the guy across the street from we would get what they need if struck by tragedy.

I put out 25k a year in after tax dollars to help care for relatives that are seriously ill. It is nowhere near enough to cover the total costs. Without government assistance they probably both would have died for lack of sufficient medical care. Is that the kind of country you really want America to be?

What, after all is the point of having a common society? We are stronger together than we are apart. We provide for the common defense, which protects the very basic need to stay alive. Well we need medical care to stay alive as well. Is this so different?

Once again, Anjin, you seem confised. This is not "America can't get it done" hihs is "Government can't get it done.

As I said, complete straw man.

I don't feel quite the same sense of indebtedness to everyone else just because they are fortunate enough to live in America.

You are going to pay for them one way or another, why not try it in a more intelligent manner than forcing them into ERs for non-emergent care?

No one ever said the government can't do anything right

Go back a few posts, that is pretty much exactly what Bithead was saying.

I thought it was about government mismanaging privatization. But that can't be right because the government does things better just because they are the government.

Complete straw man. No one ever said the government can't do anything right. What the government can't do is coddle increasing numbers of mindless users while continuously squeezing a decreasing numbers of producers.

Anyway, ever read those stories about neglect at Walter Reed last year in the Washington Post?

From the Army Times

The committee wants to learn more about a letter written in September by Garrison Commander Peter Garibaldi to Weightman.

The memorandum “describes how the Army’s decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was causing an exodus of ‘highly skilled and experienced personnel,’” the committee’s letter states. “According to multiple sources, the decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed led to a precipitous drop in support personnel at Walter Reed.”...

The letter said the Defense Department “systemically” tried to replace federal workers at Walter Reed with private companies for facilities management, patient care and guard duty – a process that began in 2000.

“But the push to privatize support services there accelerated under President Bush’s ‘competitive sourcing’ initiative, which was launched in 2002,” the letter states.

During the year between awarding the contract to IAP and when the company started, “skilled government workers apparently began leaving Walter Reed in droves,” the letter states. “The memorandum also indicates that officials at the highest levels of Walter Reed and the U.S. Army Medical Command were informed about the dangers of privatization, but appeared to do little to prevent them.”

Walter Reed is a story about the effects of privatizing government responsibilities.

Anyway, ever read those stories about neglect at Walter Reed last year in the Washington Post? Or was that just hack journalism? Did you catch the congressional hearings recently highlighting the inadequacy of medical care for returning soldiers? Or was that just Democratic hack politics?

Front line medical care in the military for trauma is top notch and unsurpassed by any other military or civilian practice in the world. I'm not sure that is true universally for all medical care in the military, though I think it is generally pretty good, grandstanding media shows and political circuses notwithstanding. Battlefield deaths are way down, but there is a concomitant increase in serious long term care needs that I'm not sure we have fully stepped up to yet. The sooner the better for those who voluntarily put themselves in harm's way.

And yet, that's still a very different animal than, say, Hillarycare. Or is it Obamacare now? I do feel I owe a debt to those who served and have no problem being taxed to pay it. I don't feel quite the same sense of indebtedness to everyone else just because they are fortunate enough to live in America. And I suppose it would be xenophobic to say that those here illegally generate an even lower sense of entitlement when it comes to raising my taxes.