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Drunken Irishman

(34,857 posts)
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:01 AM Mar 2014

FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush...

...they all had their chance to fix the broken healthcare system. Only a handful tried - and every single one of 'em failed.

Before you tell the President to fuck off and call him a piece of shit, maybe you should look to those leaders, who served well before Pres. Obama, and blame them too for a system that, even when it's reformed, is far from perfect. It's easy to blame Obama - but it wasn't his mess. It was the mess of a dozen-plus presidents who kicked the can down the road, or entirely gave up on the fight after initial backlash.

If you're going to suggest Obama is culpable, then so is every U.S. senator, representative and president who served before him. That includes Ted Kennedy, who crippled healthcare reform twice - back under Nixon, and then again under Carter (who deserves blame too for proposing a conservative plan liberal Democrats could not get behind - and failed to even budge one inch).

Obama was served up a heaping pile of shit and frankly, got out of it the best thing possible.

Our old system just about screwed everyone. This system will screw a few, hell, it'll screw a lot, but it's also going to help far more than the old system ever could have done.

Think about it this way - had any of those presidents I listed even passed marginal healthcare reform, we probably would have universal coverage today. But because that step wasn't taken, Obama was forced to make the first steps ... and it's always the first steps that prove the hardest.

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FDR, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush... (Original Post) Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 OP
Interesting that FDR should not have been told "FU" treestar Mar 2014 #1
excellent point steve2470 Mar 2014 #2
and even with single payer there will be times the government doesn't cover something we want treestar Mar 2014 #3
yes single payer won't pay for everything ! steve2470 Mar 2014 #4
Medicare itself wouldn't pay for a surgery my father had treestar Mar 2014 #6
In our system, it boils down to, if you don't support Dems, you end up supporting the Repugs steve2470 Mar 2014 #7
And there it is. So the agenda is plainly laid out. Thanks. n/t freshwest Mar 2014 #30
my pleasure ! GOTV 2014 ! nt steve2470 Mar 2014 #31
Here is Truman expressing ProSense Mar 2014 #5
You should actually Cha Mar 2014 #8
Obamacare. Romneycare. Nixoncare. Three peas in a pod. progressoid Mar 2014 #9
Do you ProSense Mar 2014 #10
Do you progressoid Mar 2014 #12
Yes, ProSense Mar 2014 #13
OK progressoid Mar 2014 #14
"Romneycare" was mostly written by Mass Democrats. Romney just signed it. phleshdef Mar 2014 #32
You say LBJ failed but he got Medicare through! Jim Lane Mar 2014 #11
Have you heard of Medicare? nadinbrzezinski Mar 2014 #15
I didn't know Medicare covered most Americans... Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 #16
You said no reforms nadinbrzezinski Mar 2014 #17
Obviously, when discussing the ACA, I meant major reform to the entire system... Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 #18
It **was** a major reform of the system nadinbrzezinski Mar 2014 #19
Medicare was in no way a door to any type of universal healthcare reform... Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 #20
I am sorry if in this one I will defer nadinbrzezinski Mar 2014 #21
Let 'em agree... Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 #22
And without it we would not be having this discussion nadinbrzezinski Mar 2014 #23
We probably would... Drunken Irishman Mar 2014 #24
Why is pointing out WHY someone is "misguided" considered kicking them? VanillaRhapsody Mar 2014 #28
I don't believe DI was trying to slight Medicare or Medicaid in anyway. phleshdef Mar 2014 #33
Third time's a charm! WhaTHellsgoingonhere Mar 2014 #25
Thank you. elleng Mar 2014 #26
LBJ did *his* part MannyGoldstein Mar 2014 #27
Well said, DI! Tarheel_Dem Mar 2014 #29
It's fucked up, but we got Nixon's proposal. joshcryer Mar 2014 #34

treestar

(82,383 posts)
1. Interesting that FDR should not have been told "FU"
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:05 AM
Mar 2014

Had he and Truman "really fought" they could have gotten a national health plan here at about the same time the British got theirs. Fuck them very much for any of us having the slightest problem with coverage over anything since that.

Before ACA I had to pay $1500 out of pocket for a procedure that confirmed I didn't have cancer. Fuck FDR.

steve2470

(37,457 posts)
2. excellent point
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:08 AM
Mar 2014

The ACA was the very best that could be squeaked through Congress in 2009, with Blue Dogs and one (?) Republican maybe ? I forget the exact vote counts.

Onward to single payer ! We'll keep tweaking ACA and finally get single payer one day.

eta: I meant this for DI, also. Oops.

treestar

(82,383 posts)
3. and even with single payer there will be times the government doesn't cover something we want
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:20 AM
Mar 2014

so fuck Bernie or whatever saint finally forces the Republicans to vote for it!

steve2470

(37,457 posts)
4. yes single payer won't pay for everything !
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:22 AM
Mar 2014

The whole fuck you POS line was wayyyyyyyyyyyy over the line IMHO. Call up Anthem and get the CEO and tell HIM or HER that !

treestar

(82,383 posts)
6. Medicare itself wouldn't pay for a surgery my father had
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:26 AM
Mar 2014

they didn't put it on him, but on the doctors. They said that it was not indicated. (A knee replacement). Fuck LBJ!!!

That WAS way over the line, especially when someone pointed out on another thread, he's a best selling author! So no financial worries anyway! That was purely political agenda.

steve2470

(37,457 posts)
7. In our system, it boils down to, if you don't support Dems, you end up supporting the Repugs
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:30 AM
Mar 2014

It sucks but it's the way it is. Yes, we can drag the party leftward, but we have to win elections too.

I don't think calling POTUS a POS helps us win elections now or in 2016.

ProSense

(116,464 posts)
5. Here is Truman expressing
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:26 AM
Mar 2014

his regret for having failed at health care reform:

<...>

By mid-1951 the AMA was openly claiming victory, and President Truman acknowledged as much when he omitted the proposal from his 1952 state of the Union message. Instead, he announced the establishment of a Commission on the Health Needs of the Nation to study the problem. In the presidential election that year, the Democratic candidate, Adlai E. Stevenson (who replaced the retiring President as the party's standard bearer, skirted the issue of Government health insurance. On the other hand, the winner, Dwight D. Eisenhower, voiced strong opposition to the proposal, ensuring that the new administration would not soon revive it.

In sum, the Wagner-Murray-Dingell bill was the victim of a cautious Congress, massive resistance by a prestigious and vitally affected interest group, sympathy for the AMA's position from an imposing array of nonmedical groups, a lack of wholehearted support from some of the key proponents, considerable antipathy from the press, the rapid growth of private insurance, and, finally, of a hostile political climate. (12)

Years later, President Truman wrote: "I have had some bitter disappointments as President, but the one that has troubled me most, in a personal way, has been the failure to defeat the organized opposition to a National compulsory health insurance program. But this opposition has only delayed and cannot stop the adoption of an indispensable Federal health insurance plan."

http://www.ssa.gov/history/corningchap3.html

President Obama ensured that significant legislation passed, and the opposition "cannot stop the adoption of an indispensable Federal health insurance plan."

Obamacare: It's Obama's signature achievement
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024695694

progressoid

(49,827 posts)
9. Obamacare. Romneycare. Nixoncare. Three peas in a pod.
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 03:03 AM
Mar 2014

All three built their system on private, employer-sponsored insurance in which all but the smallest employers had to provide insurance to their workers or pay a penalty. All utilized Medicare to insure the elderly and an expanded Medicaid-type program to insure the poor. All provided subsidies to low-income individuals and small employers. The Romney and Obama plans created state-based private insurance exchanges to make insurance more accessible and affordable to small business and individuals.

President Obama has been heavily criticized by conservatives because his plan includes a mandate for all individuals to have insurance or pay a penalty. Romney, too, has joined those criticizing the president, yet his plan in Massachusetts included just such a mandate. This idea was originally proposed by conservative groups as a measure of personal responsibility and an alternative to a single-payer system advocated by many progressive organizations. Romney believes it is alright to have a state require all to have coverage but that it cannot be mandated by the federal government.

...

As with the Nixon proposal, neither Romney nor Obama decided to include significant measures to reduce health care costs...

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/25/opinion/altman-romney-obama-health-care/


Nixon's plan:

President Richard Nixon's Special Message to the Congress Proposing a Comprehensive Health Insurance Plan
February 6, 1974

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=3757



ProSense

(116,464 posts)
10. Do you
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 10:20 AM
Mar 2014

"Obamacare. Romneycare. Nixoncare. Three peas in a pod."

...you see a problem with comparing Obamacare to the MA health care law, which was a product of the MA Democratic legislature? Democrats made significant changes to Mitt Romney's proposal. In fact, Romney opposed those changes, and upon signing the bill into law, vetoed them. Romney's vetoes were overturned by the legislature.

In Fall 2005, the House and Senate each passed health care insurance reform bills. The legislature made a number of changes to Governor Romney's original proposal, including expanding MassHealth (Medicaid and SCHIP) coverage to low-income children and restoring funding for public health programs. The most controversial change was the addition of a provision which requires firms with 11 or more workers that do not provide "fair and reasonable" health coverage to their workers to pay an annual penalty. This contribution, initially $295 annually per worker, is intended to equalize the free care pool charges imposed on employers who do and do not cover their workers.

On April 12, 2006, Governor Mitt Romney signed the health legislation. Romney vetoed eight sections of the health care legislation, including the controversial employer assessment. Romney also vetoed provisions providing dental benefits to poor residents on the Medicaid program, and providing health coverage to senior and disabled legal immigrants not eligible for federal Medicaid. The legislature promptly overrode six of the eight gubernatorial section vetoes, on May 4, 2006, and by mid-June 2006 had overridden the remaining two.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massachusetts_health_care_reform#Legislation

Obamacare: It's Obama's signature achievement
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024695694

ProSense

(116,464 posts)
13. Yes,
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 01:01 PM
Mar 2014

"Do you see a problem comparing Obamacare to Nixoncare? "

..."Nixoncare" was rejected, but it gave us HMOs. Obamacare is the law, and it provides a path to single payer.

How to strengthen Obamacare, courtesy of the Progessive Caucus.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024702695

 

phleshdef

(11,936 posts)
32. "Romneycare" was mostly written by Mass Democrats. Romney just signed it.
Sun Mar 23, 2014, 02:39 AM
Mar 2014

Nixoncare actually should've been passed back then. Nixon wasn't really a conservative -- a crooked, paranoid, obliviously racist guy -- but not a conservative at all from an economic/government regulation sense. Nixon believed in using the power of government to fix domestic problems and expand economic security, at least to a certain degree. Nixon had some serious character issues, but he signed a lot of liberal/progressive stuff into law and his healthcare plan would've been way more progressive in terms of the system of the time, especially considering how much worse the system became in the decades that would follow.

 

Jim Lane

(11,175 posts)
11. You say LBJ failed but he got Medicare through!
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 12:18 PM
Mar 2014

That wasn't the whole ball of wax, but it was single-payer for a significant percentage of the population (those generally most in need of it), and it didn't involve strengthening and further entrenching the big for-profit health-insurance corporations.

Medicare was a bigger step forward than the ACA.

At this point, one likely avenue toward single-payer is a gradual lowering of the Medicare eligibility age. Phasing in single-payer in that fashion would minimize the disruption. The ACA will presumably expand the scope of the private insurers and thus mean that the employees who might see their jobs threatened by single-payer will become more numerous, thus exacerbating the disruption caused by the transition.

 

nadinbrzezinski

(154,021 posts)
15. Have you heard of Medicare?
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 01:36 PM
Mar 2014

No.

I guess you never heard of Medicare.



We must protect dear leader from all possible criticism, because dear leader's feelings might get hurt.

Two clues:

1.- Free Republic read like this throughout the eight years of shrub, and boy we made fun of them for it.

2.- This is unseemly and UN-American. Trust me, the President will not hear of the critics, or the rants protecting his fragile ego, take my word on this.

I know staff in a Congress read both sites actually, but they are mostly interns.

 

Drunken Irishman

(34,857 posts)
16. I didn't know Medicare covered most Americans...
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 01:47 PM
Mar 2014

From what I can tell, Medicare is mostly reserved for the elderly. That's like calling Social Security a universal living wage.

 

nadinbrzezinski

(154,021 posts)
17. You said no reforms
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 01:58 PM
Mar 2014

Medicare is considered health reform.

I am sorry you did not know that. But actually Medicare was the first attempt at health reform in this country. It covered one sector, but Romney care if we are to be fair, is far more universal than Obamacare.

And I am sorry you feel the need to attack one poster who found a serious hole in that signature bill, one that those of us who read all versions of the bill even predicted, and one removed from the table actually faster than single payor. Big pharma is truly protected in their profit margins.

Hint: Single formulary negotiated by the Feds for the program, ain't gonna happen

So be an adult, and deal with the signature policy item with the good (plenty of it) the bad (also plenty of it) and the very ugly warts. This is one of the really ugly watts.

 

Drunken Irishman

(34,857 posts)
18. Obviously, when discussing the ACA, I meant major reform to the entire system...
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:05 PM
Mar 2014

Not just for a select group of Americans. Of course, if you want to get picky, other presidents have 'reformed' healthcare bit by bit - but never has one adopted a plan to try to literally insure EVERY citizen.

I mean, that's like saying Bill Clinton did his part because he created CHIP or that Nixon is just as successful in that regard as Obama because of HMOs - or, I guess, Bush too because of Medicare Part D.

 

nadinbrzezinski

(154,021 posts)
19. It **was** a major reform of the system
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 02:14 PM
Mar 2014

Without it, no ACA. Even congressional staff and critters referred to Medicare as the shoulders the ACA was standing upon during discussion. You saying they did not know better?

And anyway until the first longitudinal studies come in, they take at least ten years, we really will not know how earth shattering it will be. Sadly it will take a generation for definite results to show. I know that reality sucks but public health is not instant.

If infant mortality rates do not improve, for example, them we will not be able to consider it a success. I know, epidemiology is like that. If those same rates turn, and we climb from number 37 in outcomes to even 30, not asking much actually then definitely it did what it was designed to do. Neither of those happen, or changes are minor, then success not so much.

So yes, the jury is still out.

And there is a very good potential that we will go the other way. And that has to do with national and state politics.

Sorry if some of us are not team players. in the way some of you are.

I find the attacks by the way wholly disgusting, but i guess kicking people while they are down (metaphorically speaking) is all kinds of fun.

 

Drunken Irishman

(34,857 posts)
20. Medicare was in no way a door to any type of universal healthcare reform...
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 09:27 PM
Mar 2014

It only would have been had we done a Medicare for all plan. That didn't happen. Moreover, the scope of Medicare reform remains limited to a certain segment of the population. Our healthcare system continued to flounder because Medicare didn't intend to cover every American. That's the point, had any president taken the initiative to cover a majority of the country, we'd have a system that rivals a great deal of other nations

 

nadinbrzezinski

(154,021 posts)
21. I am sorry if in this one I will defer
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 09:37 PM
Mar 2014

To HHS and the US Congress on this.

One is political, the other is policy, they both agree.

 

Drunken Irishman

(34,857 posts)
22. Let 'em agree...
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 09:49 PM
Mar 2014

I don't. Medicare didn't attempt to cover even a majority of Americans. Less than 2% of Americans are currently covered by Medicare. The ACA, ideally, will lead to almost the entire U.S. population being insured over the long haul.

 

nadinbrzezinski

(154,021 posts)
23. And without it we would not be having this discussion
Fri Mar 21, 2014, 09:59 PM
Mar 2014

Sorry if I prefer my world to not include...and I will leave it at that.

Have a good day

 

VanillaRhapsody

(21,115 posts)
28. Why is pointing out WHY someone is "misguided" considered kicking them?
Sat Mar 22, 2014, 12:27 AM
Mar 2014

Especially someone who is making a vile and disgusting rant ..about legislation that has ALREADY helped MANY....as there are no pre-existing conditions NOR Lifetime Caps....NOR charging women twice as much as men...

But you cannot even count those as successful....unbelievable!

 

phleshdef

(11,936 posts)
33. I don't believe DI was trying to slight Medicare or Medicaid in anyway.
Sun Mar 23, 2014, 02:58 AM
Mar 2014

But lets also not forget that the ACA expands Medicaid and granted 8 years more solvency to Medicare and fixes the loophole in Medicare drug coverage. On top of that, it regulates the private insurance industry to many degrees higher than it has ever been regulated. It creates thousands of free clinics. It provides subsidies for insurance premiums based on a progressive income scale. It also makes many changes to Medicare in regard to cracking down on fraud. And it makes it a whole lot easier for states to enact their own single payer system. At some point it requires employers to cover employees or pay fines that is ultimately used to shore up the subsidization funds.

So yea, Medicare/Medicaid, those are some very great things, things we should celebrate and be proud of. But the vast majority of the Americans aren't poor or old. The ACA bridges that gap a lot, not entirely, but a LOT.

So his initial point is probably correct. The ACA sets a standard that everyone should be able to get covered. It codified that idea into law by using individual and employer mandates and expansions of healthcare for the poor and expanding the solvency of healthcare for the elderly. It will be looked back up on as the beginning of true universal healthcare for America.

 

WhaTHellsgoingonhere

(5,252 posts)
25. Third time's a charm!
Sat Mar 22, 2014, 12:18 AM
Mar 2014

much better approach than trying to give him all the credit, which the previous two threads have tried to do.

 

MannyGoldstein

(34,589 posts)
27. LBJ did *his* part
Sat Mar 22, 2014, 12:21 AM
Mar 2014

Universal health care for everyone 65 and over. You can probably read up on it at Wikipedia.

One thing that's different now is that two-thirds of Americans are now in favor of Medicare for all. If a political party can't pass something that two-thirds of Americans want, they either don't want it themselves or are staggeringly incompetent.

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