why don't the anti-aca folks just form and join the church of i-don't-believe-in-health-insurance?

[unblock]

you don't have to buy health insurance *or* pay any penalty/tax if you have religious objections.

so go form a religion that doesn't believe in health insurance, or insurance, or health, or whatever.

register a domain name so other antis can join online.

register it with the government as a qualifying religion and fill out whatever paperwork needs to get filled out to qualify for the religious exemption.

in fact you can form many such churches, or have your own church adopt some anti-aca belief into its doctrine.


so many ways to avoid paying the tax. or you could just fill out your 1040 and pay your taxes like the rest of us.

[joshcryer]

1. There are so many loopholes that honestly I think if they're credible...

...they're going to use one of them.

They're more pissed that most people will be socially responsible and pay their dues.

[harun]

52. None of them are going to have to pay anything, yet they still squeal like pigs

[Fumesucker]

2. The presidential candidate I supported was against the private mandate..

Although I figured I was going to get stabbed in the back on it right from the beginning.

http://election.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4494168#4494251

[joshcryer]

3. LOL, I just realized I'd responded to this before. Twilight zone!

Here's a link where I went over this before with you: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002502828#post133

Rather than hash it out again.

[Fumesucker]

6. Yes, I remember..

And I haven't changed my opinion, the private mandate with no public option was where we were going all along, Obama lied about his intentions I think.

[joshcryer]

7. I thought mandates were a no-brainer at the time, but I never...

...in a million years expected the public option to be sacrificed.

[Fumesucker]

12. Did you also think Obama lacked a brain?

Because Obama was anti-mandate at the time..

[joshcryer]

14. I thought it was a glorious messaging approach.

I think he may have been naive that he could get it passed without mandates, but overall I think that the message of being against mandates was the full reason that it was being pushed.

I mean it sold freakishly well. "Would you make the homeless buy a house?" It made me respect Hillary for sticking to the mandates even when they were a really really really bad sell. I mean fuck we've been debating them for 4 years off and on for crying out loud!

[Fumesucker]

19. One man's "glorious messaging approach" is another man's "baldfaced lie"..

I have my reasons for detesting private insurers, I'm not changing my mind on the wastes of carbon that run them.

[joshcryer]

26. I'm open to accepting it was a baldfaced lie.

Krugman at least called him a liar on that subject, as well as Politifact (Obama always had a mandate for children, so his messaging was really two faced at the minimum).

I just don't want to be too hard on him because given his first two years it really seems like he wanted to reach across the isle.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

55. I think that Obama was convinced by somebody at some point

that such a massive overhaul couldn't be done without a mandate. Also, don't forget that he had nothing to do with scrapping a PO. I think that he had to learn to live without that as well. Just because legislation doesn't wind up looking the same as when it started doesn't necessarily mean that the "fix was in" the whole time and that it was all just a bunch of lies used to get us on board so that we'll vote for somebody. Do you think that he would have signed a bill that didn't have a mandate (if he believed it could work without one)? If he was handed a bill that contained a public option, do you believe he would've vetoed it? If he was even somehow handed a bill that was single payer and/or Medicare-for-all, do you believe that he would have vetoed that?

[joshcryer]

57. As I originally said, I think it was messaging.

I can't rule out that he was lying, I'm not convinced he was. I think he did believe a mandate-free solution would be workable.

I think if he had a public option he wouldn't have vetoed it, of course. I think he would've signed a bill without a mandate.

[Hoyt]

74. I think he was naive and thought most people would participate in the system if premiums were

affordable (with subsidies).

Once he got in office, he found out that even a substantial number of good Democrats would game the system and choose to pay the penalty/tax to save a few bucks since they could just go without until they got sick at the expense of the rest of us. I too have been surprised by that.

[Zalatix]

13. The presidential candidate I supported was against the private mandate..

And I don't care how many times you "go over this" with me, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE OBAMA opposed the individual mandate and that is a historical fact.

You can't refute that.

Have a nice day!

[joshcryer]

16. He was also for closing Gitmo.

We see how that turned out, didn't we?

Some things are beyond a President's control.

[Zalatix]

20. I'm STILL voting for Obama in 2012. I'm still contributing to his campaign.

99.99% of the ACA is a glorious fucking revolution against the Plutocracy. I'm not going to abandon the ACA or Obama over these things.

But I will look for a LEFTIST candidate in 2016, someone on the level of Bernie Sanders. Yes, I know, he's not perfect either. I'm not looking for perfection. And since there's so much rumors here about people supposedly wanting to ditch the whole ACA, I want to be counted as not in THAT camp.

Thanks for reading, and have a nice day... and I mean that not in a snide way.

[joshcryer]

23. It's nighttime here.

WARREN 2016!

[Chan790]

46. I'm pushing O'Malley in 2016.

He's a friend, I've known him since he was running for mayor of Baltimore and I was in college. He's not as liberal as I'd like but at-least he's a trench-fighter, I don't have to worry about him ever opting for bipartisanship. Also, he's got a history of making Koch-backed candidates look stupid. (Actually, it's the same Koch-backed fool repeatedly but the point stands.)

I'm more concerned with Elizabeth Warren winning in 2012 before we start running her for 2016.

[joshcryer]

47. I like her ideology, but frankly, I'll take a partisan over a bipartisan any day.

If Warren is showing bipartisan overtures I'm jumping ship.

[Zalatix]

75. LOL thinking the same damned thing. Warren 2016. Who for Veep?

Pity Sanders won't actually run in 2016. Elizabeth Warren will fill his shoes perfectly.

[Fumesucker]

24. Is Obama now going around telling us how not closing Gitmo is the greatest thing ever?

[joshcryer]

27. Heh! Touche.

Strawman, but it was nicely worded.

[Fumesucker]

30. You were the one who brought up Gitmo..

And now you cry strawman?

[joshcryer]

33. Gitmo was an example of something outside of his control.

Just like mandates were out of his control. He couldn't say no to mandates because it would've looked bad, the numbers would've been worse.

Not closing Gitmo is not something to cheer about, but 99% of ACA is something to champion. If it had a public option I bet most of the mandate bashers would just STFU for the most part.

[Fumesucker]

36. If it had a public option..

But it doesn't and won't..

Which is kind of my point..

[joshcryer]

43. The mandate will assure it will.

I guarantee you. Two states already are going that route. It's inevitable.

[Fumesucker]

48. The insurance companies now have their fangs in our jugulars..

They're not going to give up that feast other than over our dead bodies..

And that's leaving aside big medicine and big pharma, neither of which are warm fuzzies either.

We really desperately need an NHS but we'll never get it.

[DJ13]

28. Yes, he was strongly against it

And that was one of the deciding factors in my decision to support him over Hillary, who was for mandates.

I think I was a sucker for believing his lie now, and had I known it was a lie I would have supported Hillary.

[unblock]

4. had it been called a tax all along would there even be such objections? stabbed in the back, really?

what if obama had simply raised income taxes by $695 for everyone who files, or 2.5% of agi, whichever is greater?
no exemption for any reason?

would that be a betrayal of anything?

so what's the betrayal?

that you don't have to pay the tax increase for any of several reasons, one of which is if you have qualifying health insurance?


as you may recall, obama's position shifted a few times as he learned what would fly and what wouldn't in washington.
so i'm not sure clear on what the betrayal is.

[Fumesucker]

9. Did you think in 2008 that Obama was going to call for the private mandate?

And dismiss the public option?

[unblock]

25. did i have a crystal ball, no. but i knew the way sausage is made in washington, so i knew

there would be changes, and i had a pretty good sense that obama would go with whatever he could get passed.

frankly, though, i think it was the republicans and the conservadems in congress who forced his hand.

and with the benefit of hindsight, i think it's pretty clear that had he stuck with the public option, the whole thing would have gone down like clinton's plan.

[joshcryer]

10. OMB, liberal economists, Paul Krugman all saw a no-mandate approach was more expensive.

They had to do it.

[Fumesucker]

15. Of course no mandate would be more expensive..

You would have to make medical insurance look like a good deal instead of a ripoff.

With the mandate and no public option you have no alternative to ripoff insurance, exactly as intended from the beginning.

[joshcryer]

17. No, the reason it was deemed more expensive...

...is because that 38% of uninsured above the median income would be freeloading in such a system.

[Fumesucker]

29. So you're telling me there *is* an alternative to ripoff private insurance?

I thought the public option failed?

[joshcryer]

31. The OP has explained it to you, clearly.

[Fumesucker]

38. The OP was a rant, not an explanation..

[joshcryer]

44. Pfft, I'm tempted to start the No Health Insurance Church.

Tithes will be $12 a year.

[girl gone mad]

66. Then Krugman is incorrect.

Uninsured "freeloaders" with money are almost always stuck with the bills and must pay up or declare bankruptcy, just like many of the 33% of "freeloaders" who are "freeloading" because their insurance claims were denied (a problem which will still exist and likely grow since denials are expected to rise).

"Freeloaders" who can't afford to purchase health insurance probably can't afford the fines, either. Our sovereign currency issuing government, however, can without question afford to provide payment for the basic health care costs of every man, woman and child in the USA.

A regressive fiscal policy which takes money away from the struggling middle class and working poor and hands it to the health insurance cartel (a racket if ever their was one) or simply destroys the money ("deficit reduction&quot is one of the more idiotic approaches available.

[joshcryer]

69. I'll take Krugman over anonymous message board posters.

Krugman's article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/04/opinion/04krugman.html

[girl gone mad]

72. Does not address my points.

It appears you are incapable of engaging in coherent discussion. Krugman is a human, not a demigod.

[joshcryer]

73. You've redfined "freeloaders" outside the scope of the models.

It is effectively impossible to respond to you in a way that you will accept.

Krugman can make an acceptable analysis. Anonymous posters on the internet who have bizarre justifications for right wing positions, not so much.

[DJ13]

34. what if obama had simply raised income taxes ....

It would have been far cheaper to insure everyone with a slight increase in income taxes than the $695 the penalty will be because of the progressive nature of income taxes.

A tax wouldnt hurt the working poor who make just above the income limit for government provided coverage.

No penalties, everyone gets covered.

Thats precisely how it should have been paid for.

[unblock]

41. yeah, well, sigh, unfortunately, we didn't get president kucinich and the 75th congress....

[longship]

5. Don't give em any ideas.

We already have to deal with booger-picking Jenny McCarthy and her anti-vaccine idiots.

[unblock]

11. knowing the way they think, if the idea originated on du, they'll never go near it!

[EFerrari]

8. So now objecting to buying for profit health insurance

froma predatory industry makes one a tax evader? Come on.

[unblock]

18. no, failing to pay the tax makes one a tax evader.

if you object to buying insurance, then don't buy it.

or form a church that objects to it.

or just pay the tax instead.

or don't. there's no enforcement for failure to pay. so you're a tax evader in name only, there's no consequence to it.

what's the problem?

stuck on the pundits' silly WORDS and the politicians' RHETORIC rather than understanding the actual LAW.

there IS NO REQUIREMENT TO BUY INSURANCE. there never was.

the requirement is to pay a tax. buying insurance is merely one of several exemptions.
in fact, paying the tax isn't really required, either, as again, there's no enforcement.

[joshcryer]

21. Boom. That's a brilliance bit of logic.

Simple, to the point, and totally destroys the argument that you're "required" to buy insurance.

[EFerrari]

32. Two things.

One, it's a little silly to pretend this isn't about for profit health insurance because it clearly is, but, never mind about that.

The kicker is, the wingnuts don't have the guts to come out and say, they don't want to pay the tax. No, they say that this health insurance that we are all going to pay for will increase THE DEFICIT! The DEFICIT, which they were FINE with when Reagan ran one up, that they IGNORED when it was the Chimp's and only now care about it because Obama is in office, even though ACA has squat to do with the deficit.



lol

[unblock]

37. well, you're certainly right that the right-wing will always find some cause to get riled up about

whether or not that cause has any reason or logic behind it.

[EFerrari]

40. I have insomnia so I watch late night teevee.

There are channels running fundraising ads (from scammers like Ralph Reed who bilk the nutcase right) about ACA blowing up the DEFICIT and SHREDDING THE CONSTITUTION. It would be laughable but it works.

This is their cash cow right now. It's hotter than immigration.

[Ruby the Liberal]

22. Easier than that.

Just declare yourself Amish or a Jehovah's Witness or something and then you don't have to bother with the IRS or GoDaddy and all of that website and 800 number stuff.

[EFerrari]

35. It's probably a bad idea to marginalize wholesale

folks who have rational objections to enshrining the vulture insurance industry in our health care system.

[unblock]

39. is it any different than the way the banking industry is enshrined in our housing system?

income taxes paid by people who do not take advantage of deductions and credits fund many private industries, including banks and car makers and appliance makers and so on.

[Fumesucker]

45. Is the banking industry really the best counter-example you could come up with?

You might want to take note of the less than stellar recent history of the housing market and the banking system.

[unblock]

50. i'm not a cheerleader here. i'm just pointing out that there's nothing different about this

than has been done with many other industries and tax provisions.

the only real difference is that they CALLED it a penalty instead of a tax and they CALLED it a mandate instead of a credit or exemption.

[EFerrari]

53. Yes, it really is different. The many countries that do it differently

with good results show that. Although you make a good point about housing. -

[unblock]

77. i agree that american policy has become truly messed up in many respects.

using tax policy to encourage people to buy hybrids is one thing; using tax policy to encourage people to buy health insurance is another.

from a policy perspective, relying on financial incentives to support preferred private industry and to adjust the economy and to further social or strategic goals (such as going green) is fine (if done fairly and properly).

however, relying on financial incentives is very bad public policy in matters such as health, where costs go up when people avoid early preventive care and checkups and such, and many people suffer when others don't take stay in good health (think contagious diseases), and the social implications of health care being affordable to the rich but not the poor is very different from the social implications of nice cars being affordable to the rich but not the poor, etc.

nevertheless, it's all the same constitutionally. call it a "uniquely american solution".

[Fumesucker]

42. Heritage Foundation policy has now become Democratic orthodoxy...

Really all you have to do is follow the damn money, the Niagara of money flowing from the insurance industry to DC is now going to become an Amazon of money, a river so wide you can't see across it..

Cubic megabucks per second..

[ProSense]

49. Do you

"Heritage Foundation policy has now become Democratic orthodoxy..."

...seriously believe the Heritage Foundation is happy with this ruling? Really?

The Court Affirms Our Social Contract
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1002885363

[Fumesucker]

51. I have my perspective and you have yours..

As I remarked earlier in the thread I supported the candidate that was on record as being against the individual private mandate but figured it was futile anyway.

Like it or not the mandate is the key to the ACA and the mandate combined with an utter lack of a public option is what the shouting is mostly about.

[ProSense]

58. Yeah,

"Like it or not the mandate is the key to the ACA and the mandate combined with an utter lack of a public option is what the shouting is mostly about."

...if it only had a "public option," you could take advantage of all the great provisions in the bill via a government-run plan administered by a private insurer.

Gee, do you thing it would be easier to add a public option to the existing comprehensive bill than to add one to a non-existing one? I mean, people talk about the public option as if it's the coverage or the provisions. Yeah, it would be great to have the government administering the plan, but it's still the plan. The benefits of that are in the administering, which would lead to cost saving, but first comes the plan. A public option to administer the status quo doesn't do jack. There is a reason that members of Congress are now required to use the exchanges.

It's also easier to add a Medicare buy in to an existing plan. Note that the health care law also made improvements to and strengthened Medicare. There is a lot more room for improvement in all these plans to make them the ideal that everyone envisions.

[rhett o rick]

59. I am confused. Do you agree with Fumesucker that the mandate is

the "key" to the ACA? It will only affect about 2% of Americans. Most likely very few will choose to buy health insurance and will choose the very small penalty. How can this be the "key"?

[ProSense]

60. It was a

I am confused. Do you agree with Fumesucker that the mandate is the "key" to the ACA? It will only affect about 2% of Americans. Most likely very few will choose to buy health insurance and will choose the very small penalty. How can this be the "key"?

...sarcastic "yeah." Still, the mandate is a mechanism to encourage more people to join the pool of insured. I really believe that mandated insurance isn't appealing to the RW/insurance companies because of the other provisions.

[Fumesucker]

63. The mandate is highly divisive, that's made perfectly clear just by this thread.

And yet you tell me it's not important to the ACA..

If it's highly divisive yet unimportant why is it even in the legislation in the first place?

[ProSense]

67. Well,

"The mandate is highly divisive, that's made perfectly clear just by this thread."

...it doesn't have to be, and now that it has been upheld, it's not going anywhere.

Isn't it time to work on improving the bill? I mean, what's the point of continually saying that the mandate would have been OK if the bill included a public option? When the public option is added, the mandate becomes moot.

[Fumesucker]

70. The meme is that health care reform is done, finis, fait accompli..

You are asking me to believe that the state we have arrived at with respect to health insurance is not the one that the powers that be wanted going into this..

Even though I expected the outcome we got I nevertheless feel used by the person I supported for president because I think that person knowingly lied about his intentions and I supported him anyway even though I thought he was probably lying at the time.

It's hard to get overly enthused when your cynical predictions becomes reality.

[rhett o rick]

78. It is divisive because the effect has been blown out of proportion.

People are acting like it is an assault on the liberties of Americans. It will affect a very small number of people that will most likely ignore it and choose the fine.
Why is it in the bill? Great question. It wouldnt have been if it had been up to me. I would have handled it like Medicare Part B. If you dont sign up when offered, then you will pay a stiff fine to sign up later.

[Fumesucker]

62. I'm commenting on what *is*, not what might be..

A lot of us got played with the mandate/public option shell game, just because I realized ahead of time that I was being played doesn't really make me all that much happier about it.

[ProSense]

64. Here's

"I'm commenting on what *is*, not what might be.."

..."what *is*": Comprehensive health care reform passed and was upheld by the SCOTUS. Adding a public option "*is*" possible.

In fact, the former makes the latter that much more likely. Also, no one still talking about the failed attempt to pass a public option ever talks about the path to single payer that is built into the legislation.

[Fumesucker]

65. Nope, health insurance reform perhaps, health care reform not so much..

There's going to be an increase in people with low quality insurance they can't afford to actually take advantage of thanks to copays and deductibles.

Romneycare didn't lower the medical bankruptcy rate in MA by a significant amount and Obamacare won't change the medical bankruptcy rate in the USA by a significant percentage either.

http://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(10)00991-5/abstract

Conclusion
Massachusetts' health reform has not decreased the number of medical bankruptcies, although the medical bankruptcy rate in the state was lower than the national rate both before and after the reform.

[ProSense]

68. This makes

Nope, health insurance reform perhaps, health care reform not so much..

There's going to be an increase in people with low quality insurance they can't afford to actually take advantage of thanks to copays and deductibles.

...no sense, especially since you've already stated that the public option is the missing component.

[EFerrari]

54. Yep.

[ashling]

56. You mean the Church of Tea?

[freshwest]

61. Because they'd have to give up their Medicare, VA and other socialist goodies. Those are exempt from

Being evil because...

Well, just because.

[Initech]

71. There actually is a church like that: Christian Scientist

[unblock]

76. my point is that they don't have to abandon anything they already believe.

they don't have to believe in whatever else christian scientists also believe in.
southern baptists can form the church of southern baptist anti-health insurancists, and so on.
or the church they're already in can just add anti-health insurancism to their official religious beliefs.