palelizard: hubiestubert: Pretty much for the same reason that we all pay into systems for the general welfare. You may not need unemployment, but you pay in, just in case. And in the meantime, you help keep the system solvent for folks who do need it now. You may not use all the US Interstate system, but you certainly do rely on the services and goods that are transported along those routes. You may never need a fire department, but it's nice to keep it funded.

And if that common-sense rationale doesn't work, you can always remind the nay-sayers that even if they never use the system at all, they're better off if their neighbors have the safety-net. After all, people with very little left to lose tend to start looking at people who've got plenty and wondering how much force it will take to switch places.

Fear will keep them in line. All of them.

We have unemployment insurance for a reason. To keep utilities paid. To keep rents paid. To keep food being bought, and to keep folks from slipping off the radar entirely. Unemployment isn't just for the guy who loses his job, but to KEEP the businesses around him paid as well. Unemployment doesn't cover a lot, but it keeps the lights on and the rent paid until folks can find work. It's not just for the benefit if the guy who loses his job, but for all those around him as well.

qorkfiend: IlGreven: hubiestubert: IlGreven: Fear the Clam: There's nothing stopping companies from writing policies for private, supplemental, insurance for those too scared of gub'mint healthcare. There's nothing stopping doctors from having a practice that doesn't accept government insurance. Everyone wins.

No, everyone loses, because the bolded fact would make government insurance untenable. Give 'em the option to opt out, and they will, because it will always be more profitable to not accept government insurance that they believe won't pay full price than a private insurance that'll pay more for more things.

Good luck with that. No, really. Good luck with that. Keep blowing that particular horn, because you may just discover an odd thing about market forces, that they don't just flow one way...

Well, then, kiss government insurance good-bye, because no one will buy it.

Why not?

Because apparently all family practices are so rolling in money that they can just turn down getting paid by a ton of patients. Hospitals too. Not like they have bills to pay or that private insurance has any paperwork to fill out, or turn around times on submitting bills and getting paid...

Truly, it is the best of all possible worlds...

St_Francis_P: verbaltoxin: The GOP has done its damnedest to ensure my generation and below votes liberal or claims "libertarian" so nobody has to associate with the embarrasing "conservative" label.

Be assured they're doing a fine job on the rest of us, too. The GOP has gone from the party of William F. Buckley to the party of Rush Limbaugh. Can't explain that.

It's explainable. My hunch is in essence, the Republican Party's old Southern Strategy of making religion and social issues part of its planks resulted long term in a generational divide. Older Republicans have to toe this anti-intellectual line that eschews critical thinking and even the laws of physics themselves. I just don't think as many younger conservatives have problems with things like the age of the Earth, how humans became humans, abortion, gay marriage, and so on. They are still right wing when it comes to economics, defense, and energy, but they are starting to wonder if the current, elected leadership if the right is functionally retarded, or has spent too many years playing to the rubes.

Doing things the old way has resulted so far in two, notable electoral defeats in 2006 and 2008, a limp resurgence in 2010, and then a dragged-out affair over healthcare reform that saw a gasping defeat in 2012. All this and their Presidential candidate is a quantum robot. A super majority in the Senate is not likely in the cards either. "Repeal and replace" is empty consolation.

There just isn't much for them to cheer about these days. They are most powerful at the state level at the moment, but that won't last either if the states they control become more dependent on federal funds to keep the lights on, which is what's happening in the so-called red states.

Bloody William: hubiestubert: We have unemployment insurance for a reason. To keep utilities paid. To keep rents paid. To keep food being bought, and to keep folks from slipping off the radar entirely. Unemployment isn't just for the guy who loses his job, but to KEEP the businesses around him paid as well. Unemployment doesn't cover a lot, but it keeps the lights on and the rent paid until folks can find work. It's not just for the benefit if the guy who loses his job, but for all those around him as well.

Shut up! All business happens in a vacuum! We need job creators! The lower class doesn't have skin in the game! Every man is an island!

Sorry. My brand of Conservatism is perhaps outdated. I should have really gotten the Quaylebot 2.0 upgrade, but there were compatability issues with the Snowe-MC Smith-Maineiac firmware...

cchris_39: Yep. We now live in an a country where the government can tax our very behavior and half the poulation is elated about it.

Those who sacrifice liberty for security.......

because taxing cigarettes, single people, liquor and giving tax credits for buying SUV's never existed before

and you wonder why people don't take you seriously

MyRandomName:

And this is the bland partisan blindness I was talking about in my last post. There are lots of alternatives to the ACA bill, which was such a tangled mash of competing regulations and taxes that even many liberals don't like it. Pretending ACA is the only alternative is a laughable assertion. The fact is that coverage has to be leveraged against costs. Currently there are ballooning costs in Medicare and Medicaid due to items ranging from fraud, increased insurance for malpractice, over payments, unnecessary tests to cover liability, etc. The GOP focused on adding those items to the ACA bill and they were ALL REJECTED by the Democrats because of their connections to strong lawyer lobbies. The DNC will never except reform due to their intransigent connections to that lawyer lobby as well as various other lobbies. If you want a real healthcare package it has to be both reform as well as expansion. Expansion by itself will not work monetarily.

WTF are you talking about?

NateGrey: ohdoublereally: If the decision had gone the other way I'm sure the libs would take the opportunity to show what it means to be good sports.

wat?

Anyway, I think those stupid Libs were prepared for it to be ruled unconstutional. As mrshowrules screen capped in another thread, Cons were totally unprepared for this scenario and you can tell by all the: "America is destroyed", "I am moving to Canada to escape socialism" responses.

Pretty much...

Evacuate? In our moment of triumph? I think you overestimate their chances.

To all you calling this a tax, thank you for agreeing that it is Constitutional.

For all you calling it a fine, thank you for admitting that Obama has never raised your taxes.

Infernalist: Erix: Infernalist: Lovely. So, you were a die-hard GOPer until your sister came out of the closet and made the whole 'evil gayz' thing very personal to you.

I take comfort in the fact that if your sister hadn't come out of the closet, you'd still be a GOPer.

Thanks for outing yourself as a cock. I started out as a republican, then a libertarian, and now I usually vote for the democrats. I was raised in a very conservative, Christian household, and it took me a while to grow up enough to develop my own positions. Sometimes it takes something like your sister coming out of the closet to make you re-examine your ideals.
I didn't realize that if you aren't born with a particular ideology you'll never rid yourself of the stink of the other side. This is just as bad as the farking "RINO" screamers in the GOP.

Mad, bro?

Here's the deal, son: If it takes a personal investment for you to challenge your political ideals, THEN YOU'RE A HYPOCRITE. If it takes a sister coming out as gay for you to challenge your homophobia and close-minded hatred of a harmless bunch of people who just WANT TO BE LEFT THE FARK ALONE, then you're an intellectual and political coward.

DICK CHENEY came out in favor of gay rights only after his daughter came out of the closet. Cman has put himself into the same category as Dick farking Cheney.

By the way, congrats on claiming a hold on political sanity by abandoning the GOP and the lol-libertarians.

Seriously? So you need to be born and raised with a particular ideology or you're a hypocrite? That's BS. It's absurd to expect people to have examined every aspect of their political beliefs in complete detail by the time they're 20. My family was conservative and Christian, but extremely reasonable (yes, it's possible), and didn't give me much cause to rebel. It took time and independence to figure out where I actually stood on a number of issues, so I can't expect everyone else to have already gone through that difficult stage just because I have.

I used to think one of the great things about the left was the embracing of relativism and the rejection of absolutism, but I've been seeing almost as many puristic tendencies from the left lately.

/and you can keep your "son" shiat; it's pretty unoriginal.

"Many, many states are not going to be able to afford expansion of Medicaid and these exchanges that are going to try to be forced down states' throats through 'ObamaCare.' I would like to see governors be tough and opt out of this and exert our 10th Amendment rights and tell President Obama, who does not understand the Constitution -- he even being a constitutional lecturer and supposed scholar in our Constitution, not understanding and probably never reading or absorbing the 10th Amendment to understand that states have rights.

"We are sovereign states that can make up our own minds...Pew! Pew! Pew!"

NateGrey: cchris_39: Sell a basic a basic antiobiotic kit OTC

I know Republicans dont like science, but there is something about antibiotics and it being freely available for everyone at anytime.

Yeah, that's a terrible idea. People can fark with their own health if they want, but not with antibiotics.