jay pettitt on 22/8/2009 at 16:57

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Muzman - I think you alluded to it earlier also, but I can't help thinking that, if making a constructive contribution to writing legislation is what you're after achieving then there are probably ways and means of doing that. I'm not following this or anything, but I ain't seeing that here.

I'm very sorry CCCtoad, but public servants (bin men and women included) make decisions every day. That's the silliest argument I've heard in ages. For fucks sake.

I'm really not sure how tort law is relevant to forming legislation, setting budgets or clinical standards or whatever it is you're trying to argue.


--edit--
I'm not a US citizen, or expert on any of this - but I imagine if you're setting standards of clinical care and provision available through national insurance then it's going to get batted between departments and the Office of Management and Budget several times. Then it's likely to end up getting reviewed in a court - rinse and repeat until shiny. The idea that the janitor or some other low-level public sector employee might be making decisions about the availability of care to seniors is just ridiculous.
--edit--
You most have noted that it was ridiculous as you edited your post. Good good.

heywood on 22/8/2009 at 18:20

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Jay -

The point about torts is that when something bad happens because you were denied care, it's a lot easier to sue a private insurer than the government. Congress has given the federal government immunity from many different types of claims, including this blanket one:

(a) any claim based upon an act or omission of an employee of the government, exercising due care, in the execution of a statute or regulation, whether or not such statute or regulation be valid, or based upon the exercise of performance or the failure to exercise or perform a discretionary function or duty on the part of a federal agency or an employee of the government, whether or not the discretion involved be abused;

So I think accountability is a reasonable issue for CCCToad to bring up. I have not read the bills, so I don't know if there is any provision in the public option that provides recourse for people who are harmed when a government administrator makes a bad decision to deny coverage.

Regardless, I watched the Daily Show clips and it was obvious to me that Stewart inherently trusts the government to make the right choices and McCaughey inherently distrusts the government to make the right choices. If the language in the bill is the least bit unclear, they're going to read their own biases into it.

One of the problems that Obama is facing right now is that confidence in government (especially Congress) is running low and mistrust is running high. I'm not saying it's his fault, it's just the way it is. And the way they tried to rush this legislation through before opposition could mount just fuels the mistrust.

Starrfall on 22/8/2009 at 19:21

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CCCToad doesn't really know what he's talking about when it comes to the accountability and suing of government agencies despite his link to the FTA but that should be par for the course by now.

(Actually the fact that he's linking to the FTCA but not the APA shows how little he knows about this area)

heywood on 23/8/2009 at 00:52

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I can't see that it's less transparent than private insurance. Was that one of CCC's points? I'm ashamed to say I haven't really been following this thread until now.

I do think it's reasonable to say that people have less recourse when dissatisfied with a government service, compared to a service provided by a private entity. But as long as the public option is just one option out of many, then I don't think this argument applies. It only becomes an issue if the public option drives private insurers out of the market.



I suggest being philosophical about it.

This stupid "death panel" argument is just one salvo in one battle in a long war. Our federal government has been slowly expanding social services ever since the 1930s and the real fight is between the neo-cons and libertarians who would like to roll it all back and the progressives who would like to keep expanding until the federal government provides all essential social services. The thing is, the vast majority of Americans don't want to move very far in either direction, so it's common for the parties to manipulate public opinion with wedge issues. So far, I have to give Obama HUGE credit for being straightforward and fair and not trying to bite off more than he can chew. The way he's handled things has made it obvious that the Republicans are the ones "playing the game" this time.

My personal views on this are mixed. Intellectually, I lean toward the libertarian side. However, my political views are pragmatic more than ideological. So if the government can provide health care more efficiently than the private sector, I'm OK with that. And we clearly have to do something. Leaving 15% of the population without any health care aside from emergency rooms is not acceptable.

My biggest reservations are about cost control. We know that Medicare alone will bankrupt us, even without any further expansion. Also, Massachusetts enacted health care reform 3 years ago with some of the same provisions as the likely federal program, and now it has the highest health care costs in the nation. I would feel a lot better about a reform plan based on a smaller scale example that had already demonstrated cost containment. Ironically, from the cost point of view, the military and VA health care systems are probably our best examples, but the proposed health care reform bills don't look anything like that.



I'm curious to hear your take considering most of us know little about this area. I had thought the APA was more about rulemaking. Does it further limit sovereign immunity?

Rug Burn Junky on 23/8/2009 at 14:58

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For everybody that's sorta saying to themselves: "Well, that sorta SEEMS reasonable. Maybe the wackjobs really have a point that there's an interpretation they just want made clearer," let me just take a step outside the discussion itself with an example to illustrate what's going on.

Suppose you and your buddies go to an ice cream shop. In the shop there's a menu, and on that menu it says:

[CENTER]ICE CREAM CONES
Chocolate, Vanilla, Strawberry, Chocolate Chip, Mint Chocolate Chip, Rocky Road, Dulce de Leche, Ginger Snap, Butter Brickle, Cookies & Cream, Pralines & Cream, Cookie Dough, HEath Bar Crunch
ALL FLAVORS $1[/CENTER]

Now, one of your friends is a giant douchebag. He reads the sign and says to the kid working behind the counter that he wants a cone with all of the flavors. The kid tries to explain to him that that's not what the sign means, but your friend won't stop, because the sign plainly says "ALL." He throws a tantrum, makes a scene and repeats his complaints to the manager, before calling the police.

Would you be utterly mortified? Of course you would. Do you think that he's ever going to get that magical ice cream cone filled with all 32 flavors? Of course not.

Why? Because even though that's what the sign literally says, anybody who's ever eaten at Baskin Robbins knows that that's not what the sign actually means.

Legal interpretation is often like that. And that's why it's so problematic when someone like McCaughey gets her hands on a bill and starts cherrypicking shit out of it. There are standard ways things are interpreted, and even if it's written ambiguously in one particular section, oftentimes, when applied in conjunction with other sections one can logically deduce that that ambiguity falls away. But that takes A) time, B) insight and C) an audience who has the logical skill necessary to follow along.

The problem is, there are people who have to be utter Desmonds about the whole thing, and oftentimes, they aren't even trained in statutory interpretation. When one of these people get their hands on a little bit of code, it's dangerous, because they don't know what to do with it, and explaining to them why they're wrong is more trouble than its worth because they're not operating on the same wavelength as everyone else.

This is why it's so frustrating dealing with these people, and to some extent, it's really better to just throw rocks at them or ignore them.