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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Because if they didn't constantly kneecap it, the result is that insurance has to take on customers who present massive risk. The entire US health insurance industry is built around either charging exorbitant amounts, or getting healthy people to pay for squat in insurance and as soon as they need insurance force them to pay as much as possible directly, then kick them off insurance entirely if it's unprofitable.
Which is the exact opposite of how even a sane insurance system should work, because the idea is that you pay to be covered in the event of unforeseen circumstances, not that you pay to be price-gouged and denied any coverage as much as possible.
@Titan: Because it's associated with Obama. And apparently it's absolutely essential to tear down anything done by a member of a minority group, no matter the cost. Gotta keep 'em in their place...
Edit: ![]()
That too.
Edited by Kardavnil on Oct 24th 2020 at 1:01:54 AM
Roll a Constitution saving throw to make it through the year.As long as the insurance industry is for-profit, they will do everything possible to charge as much as possible while providing the least service possible, because that's what makes an insurance company profitable. An insurance company that does what it's supposed to is an unprofitable company.
But since the GOP's pie-in-the-sky ideal is to kill all the poor in order to line their pockets, obviously any kind of healthcare reform is poison to them.
Edit: For the record, I'm pretty sure that if they could make just as much money without killing the poor they would still choose to do so because that's just as much a core part of their ideology.
Edited by Clarste on Oct 24th 2020 at 2:03:34 AM
There's a couple of notations from the child of an insurance agent.
1. It is insane and stupid to make insurance the basis of your medical coverage. Whoever thinks this is a solution needs to be sent to the Phantom Zone with the other Kryptonian criminals. Insurance is dependent on people not getting sick as the whole idea is to pay for an eventually that MIGHT happen versus a certainty of happening.
2. Hospitals and pharmaceuticals charge have made insurance the defacto need for this despite the absurd charges. Say, $100,000 for a weekend hospital stay or $500 a pill that costs 2 bucks to make. However, they try not to charge the customer directly but their insurance which results in the costs being thrown on other customers or trying to force people off the policy. Because they charge absurd amounts to bilk sick people of money.
3. Medicine should be a public utility and service. People can pay more but a basic standard is the only sane way to operate as charging money for people's lives is a gang activity.
Mitch Mc Connell actively sabotages feeding poor people by churches, opiod protections, and medical coverage because he wants them to die. He is a monster.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on Oct 24th 2020 at 2:07:26 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.One useful thing about early voting is that it confirms polls, polls show that early voting should be overwhelmingly Democratic, early voting numbers (where they exist) are overwhelmingly Democratic, if polls are accurately capturing the early voting share for each candidate then they should be accurately capturing the overall vote share for each candidate.
As for the 5 point polling error in the Midwest for Hillary in 2016? Biden is up by at least 6 points in all of those key Midwestern states, so he can currently survive a 2016 style polling error against him, that’s before we factor in that pollsters have learnt from 2016 and that part of 2016 was late-change due to Comey as opposed to error.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranUltimately what the GOP of these days wants is "if you can't pay for it, you can't have it. And its your problem how to be able to pay for it"
If they had truly their way, this would be for *everything*
Firefighters? Pay a subscription.
Schooling? School at home if you can't pay tuition.
They basically want back to serfdom feudalism, just replace Noble with Rich.
Government should only be there to enforce the will of the Rich on the serfs.
Edited by 3of4 on Oct 24th 2020 at 12:40:14 PM
"You can reply to this Message!"
In that case, they (The GOP) have no right to complain or whine once the people gets fed up with their BS and decides to take matters into their own hands once betrayed one too many times by the corrupt system the GOP wants in place to only benefit themselves while screwing everyone else over.
Edited by TitanJump on Oct 24th 2020 at 12:54:07 PM
The basic premise of feudalism is that nobles are special. They deserve to rule over the peasants because of their intrinsic nature, not because of anything they've done. The same is true of modern Neo-Feudalism: the ruling class sees itself as inherently more deserving than the lower classes. If anything bad happens to someone poor they deserve it, but if anything bad happens to them it's the most unfair thing that's ever happened in the history of mankind. "Criminals" are the scum of the earth who deserve the worst possible punishments, but if a rich person breaks the law? Well, that's not a real crime. Rich people can't be criminals, because criminals are poor brown people.
To them, behavior is fundamentally meaningless. You're either born a good, deserving person or you're not.
Edited by Clarste on Oct 24th 2020 at 4:17:27 AM
They tend not to steal only one person’s wages due to that being small potatoes. Instead they tend to stiff a lot of workers at once. That’s when they get a class action suit up their ass.
The Snickers thing is simply because it is way easier to prove someone stole a candy bar. Just look at the CCTV footage.
Also, they rarely outright steal wages. Instead they do shit like lay off workers for flimsy reasons or make pay cuts for flimsy reasons. Then pat themselves on the back at shareholder meetings and suggest they deserve raises.
Edited by M84 on Oct 24th 2020 at 7:41:53 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedSometimes they just literally go "nah, I don't feel like sending you a check today" though.
Like "literally not paying someone for work they have done" is like 500 times more lost money than physical theft. It's just way too much cost/effort for most low-level employees to go to court and enforce a contract violation that would be trivial to prove. Even if a few of them do it, the company still profits from the practice because of all the others who don't.
Edited by Clarste on Oct 24th 2020 at 4:53:31 AM
Okay, 500 times was an exaggeration, but here's wikipedia on wage theft:
Wage theft is not even remotely rare or unusual.
Edited by Clarste on Oct 24th 2020 at 4:55:16 AM
The Republican mindset dovetails with the Prosperity Gospel (horseshit) and Ayn Rand's philosophies that the rich are also justified in doing whatever it takes to be rich. Which, ironically, underscores that their belief in free market capitalism is also nonsense.
In a market where the forces of the market regulates, workers will use their will to force the market to pay them a living wage. The Republicans smash down on this to keep the employer in power.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.There's another aspect to Republican behavior that Paul Krugman frequently points out. It's not just that they oppose the government forcing companies to play fair, it's that they oppose government doing anything at all.
To the Republican mindset, PPACA (Obamacare) cannot succeed because, if it did, it would prove that government can provide solutions to systemic problems: that it can make people's lives better. Their mantra is tearing down government in the name of individual and corporate freedom.
It's the same with COVID-19 relief. If the government effectively backstops the economy, keeps people out of poverty, and keeps businesses open, it makes a case for "big government", which they fundamentally oppose.
For decades, the GOP has taken a "starve the beast" mentality wherein they set out to prove that government can't help people by sabotaging every effort it makes to help people. This is a deliberate and calculated strategy that we have to understand to learn how to deal with it.
Well-intentioned Democrats often seek compromises with Republicans to "pay for" aid programs and things like that, not realizing that they're missing the real point of the opposition. "Fiscal responsibility" is a sham, discarded when it doesn't suit the moment. Obama failed to understand that... perhaps his greatest failing, as he tried to meet halfway someone who had no intention of ever negotiating in good faith.
Republicans do not believe in the legitimacy of government.
Edited by Fighteer on Oct 24th 2020 at 8:50:52 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Krugman falls for the same problem that he did when he was championing globalism (and has since come regret) in that he believes that the people involved are acting on a basis of what they claim. https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/22/economists-globalization-trade-paul-krugman-china/
The GOP has no problem with government despite their anti-government rhetoric. They are huge champions of bailouts, not just tax cuts, but active support of their chosen supporters. This applies to corporations, megachurches [which are corporations], law enforcement, and other groups.
"Small government" is a lie they sell because its all about the cash.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.

The answer is of course "all of them".
Disgusted, but not surprised