Comments Posted By Marge Gunderson
Displaying 1 To 10 Of 13 Comments
'THE COST OF DYING:' FALSE CHOICES OR THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN HEALTHCARE?
busboy33: well said.
I'm stealing "government healthcare instead of NO healthcare." That's a great line and puts the whole thing in perspective.
It's what I've been trying to tell my RW relatives for some time now - why can't I sign up for SOMETHING that doesn't cost $1000 a month, (or more) in case I lose my job? Why couldn't I have Medicare for $96.40 a month, temporarily, while I look for a job? I would gladly pay that rather than worry that I might lose everything I own because I'm "not covered" and something happens.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 18:55
Michael Reynolds:
or, c) as it exists now with Medicare: a governmental paper pusher with a mandate to provide care and no regard to costs whatsoever.Wish I could get that kind of coverage. Guess I'll have to wait until I'l 65.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 17:21
John Burke - you hit the nail on the head.
Situation one should not be difficult to discuss. I'm afraid it will be, because too often it morphs into situation two - witness the guy on the 60 Minutes show, who, at 68 and already quite ill, wanted a double transplant. A DOUBLE TRANSPLANT. I'm 41 and pretty healthy, and I'm not sure I would be up to that. As it happens, the show said he didn't get it, and died a few months later, of the original problems that led him there. He was never well enough to even get the transplants.Personally, I think doctors need to be more realistic with people and their chances. And I totally get the 500 reasons why they aren't, but perhaps if individuals and their families insisted on some more candid talk, it would happen.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 14:46
Roberta - "we as society" means each of us, individually, talking with our families, our church, our communities.
Certainly we can all have THOSE conversations.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 14:23
And I applaud Dr. Byock's guts in his answer about what is scurrilous. Would that even one person inside the beltway had said the same thing about six months ago.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 14:21
It was my sincerest hope that somewhere in the Healthcare reform "debate" we might, as a nation, at least start to have the discussion about end of life care and options beyond staying (and dying) in a hospital: hospice and palliative care, for example. I have no real hope that will happen anytime soon, since so many people seem to be intellectually and emotionally 12 years old. (Sex is just as natural a part of life, yet we cannot even have a discussion about it without about 60% of the population having an apoplectic fit....)
The only thing that gives me pause is that the realities of our aging population will intrude and we will HAVE to have this conversation. And, as others have noted here, the financial aspects will be unavoidable as well.I would hope that during this shift in thinking that the contributions of counselors and hospice workers might get more support than they currently receive. Those folks are truly doing the work of the Lord. It's just too bad they don't get paid for it.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 23.11.2009 @ 14:17
MORE THAN POLITICAL CORRECTNESS OR VICTIMHOOD AT WORK IN FORT HOOD ATTACK
manning: Substitute "Christianity" for "Islam" and "the Bible" for "the Koran" and "God" for "Muhammed" in your paragraphs and see how that sounds.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 12.11.2009 @ 16:54
Here's my overly simplistic take on every gun tragedy in America:
There is a Culture of Violence in this country and Too Many Guns.
Does this apply to Ft. Hood? Not entirely. But until we as a country start to seriously address both those issues, these things will keep happening.
Will this be easy? Nope. Social change never is. (But nobody in 1940 thought smoking would become socially unacceptable, either.)
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 12.11.2009 @ 14:20
Jackson 1234: "I don’t know where to draw the line, but when someone spouts off jihadist slogans and contacts radical clerics, that doesn’t require rocket science."
Here's where we draw the line in America: between the First Amendment and criminal action.
Otherwise, we have to profile, arrest and detain every nutbag racist Klansman and all their offshoots. We have to profile, arrest, and detain everyone with an unpleasant idea who hasn't done anything yet.
Why when this standard is applied to Muslims does it seem to become impenetrable to so many people? Muslim ideology towards "jihad" or any other separatist, murderous ideology is NO different than Nazi ideology, white separatism, black separatism, or whacked out religiousity that calls for the extermination of the Other. Is it because "the Muslims" attacked the WTC that somehow that makes them different? I don't recall all this soul searching after Timothy McVeigh blew up OKC. Nobody called out to profile readers of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" or whatever other crap those folks believe. Nobody started profiling or calling to profile white ex-military men of a certain age running around the Midwest. Yet when "they" are "easy to spot" (whatever that means,) so many Americans are totally willing to throw out the Constitution and the Rule of Law due to FEAR. Well, freedom isn't the same thing as security.
Rick, I wish there were a lot more writers of your caliber from your side of the fence.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 12.11.2009 @ 14:16
DOES THE GOVERNMENT THINK YOU'RE STUPID? OR A CHILD?
Yeah, I really hate it when the government tells me what plants I can grow in my garden for my own personal use. Or what should or shouldn't show up in my bodily fluids.
Danged libruls are always infriging on my personal space and freedoms as an American.
Comment Posted By Marge Gunderson On 29.10.2009 @ 09:42
