I live in the UK and the NHS is a strange thing..

Sometimes they will spend a great deal of money on things that seem quite minor..

I once had a pain in my shoulder and was impressed at the speed that I was shoved in a big expensive scanning machine so they could have a look at my.. Perfectly healthy shoulder joint...

I took my own advice and eased off bench pressing 300 pounds plus for many reps twice a week.. The pain went away, as it always does when I stop punishing my joints..

Because I am a headcase, the NHS has decided that I need to be pumped with drugs to stupefy my mind..

I reject these drugs, even though I could have access to the most expensive ones for free.. Because they are shite..

I take my own advice and avoid stress whenever I can..

That way I less likely to go round with my axe and start chopping people up or whatever..

Looking at how the US treats mentally ill folk..

It is clear that they operate in a manner that is entirely motivated by money..

They effectively diagnose folk as needing loads of pointless "therapy", for precisely as long as it takes to drain all resources from their insurance companies..

Its fraudulent.

If the state does not provide universal health care in certain areas, it will have lots of folk full of disease, and they will not only affect themselves and their own families, but also, others they come into contact with..

So state provided health care is essential..

But there are many good arguments as to just what this should be about..

Is it really essential that the NHS provide fertility treatment?

It is really essential that the state provide free abortions?

Is it really essential that the state boost some titless woman's chest size up to what she wants?

When I go to see a doctor, I dont want a similar experience to what I get when I take my car for new brakes..

I dont want to also be told I need new tyres, a penis reduction operation, or anything else that is more in the interest of those who want to make a profit than what I see as being important..

Privately run insurance is always a "for profit" business and is open to abuse in many ways..

The health of the nation should not be a "for profit" business..

Health care should not be more about the petty "cosmetic" concerns of the rich than the "needs" of the lesser financially gifted..

It is the nature of folk to be selfish and try and work for the most money..

I would prefer to see a health service that does not reward practitioners trained by the public purse the poached by private practice to serve the rich only..

But, the problem with the free market system is that it does have the tendancy to always put the whims of the rich above the needs of the poor..

There are many examples that can be given of industries where free market economics simply do not provide the best universal outcome..

Transport based industries, health care, law and order, national defence..

Quote from zuismanm

Ok Guys and Girls... I got your point - purpose of Health care system is not providing national health , but actually something different - that have to be measured by some artificial statistical (and economical) factors... Such a way - there is no really any contradiction between bad medical statistics and fact - that you have "best health care system" in the world(since national health at all is not a target of such system). And you really can have worst health statistics in the world and best health system in the world... No problemo... Hi Tera , Garak - you can be quiet! Fact that you (and millions of people like you ) can not afford basic decent health care does not indicate some failure, or problem in US health system... It is just - your health is not an issue for those system - it is busy with other - more important things...

The rate of mortality is not a medical statistic. Even the morbidity of the general population is not a medical statistic. If you want to evaluate the health care system, then you use quality and availability of care. Stop the bullshit!

Quote from zuismanm

You know there is old joke about two programmers - that participated tender for development of software project...
First present his prototype and say :
My program is able to process X data in Y time and was tested on 100 test datasets and passed all properly...
Second says but my program is much better - it works 10 times faster ... But - in 40 datasets give wrong results...
First programmer answer - if program does not have to give right results - I can easily make it even 1000 time faster...

And dear Meadester ! I am glad for your deep education in field of scientific communism, but I still do not understand - where did I said that I am communist , and how did you (and our darling - RV) decided that any Marxist is communist , and what do you mean by those terms??? I am just curious...

WTF? Is that what this is about? You're claiming that Marxists aren't communists? There are communists that aren't Marxists, but Marxism definitely is a subspecies of communism.

Quote from Adrian

The rate of mortality is not a medical statistic. Even the morbidity of the general population is not a medical statistic. If you want to evaluate the health care system, then you use quality and availability of care. Stop the bullshit!

That is great!!! So - once more - using "appropriate criterions" we can easily prove - that Health care system, that creates worst life span / early diagnosis / child mortality ..... Is actually - best in the world... Ok ... I see...

Quote from Adrian

WTF? Is that what this is about? You're claiming that Marxists aren't communists? There are communists that aren't Marxists, but Marxism definitely is a subspecies of communism.

I am just saying - that those are quite vague terms (at least - Marxist...). If communist is more or less clear - what it can mean , Marxist - can mean many different things

Quote from zuismanm

That is great!!! So - once more - using "appropriate criterions" we can easily prove - that Health care system, that creates worst life span / early diagnosis / child mortality ..... Is actually - best in the world... Ok ... I see...

Once again, it is not the health care system that creates life span or even morbidity. You really don't even have to know much about the issue to understand why that is. For one thing, at any given point in time, most people aren't even in the health care system at all....

Quote from zuismanm

I am just saying - that those are quite vague terms (at least - Marxist...). If communist is more or less clear - what it can mean , Marxist - can mean many different things

"Marxist" is more clear than "communist". And, neither is terribly vague. Communists and Marxists just say stuff like that to try to engage in some ridiculous double talk to trick people out of identifying them as what they are. It is about the only lame tactic left for them in this day and age.

WTF? Is that what this is about? You're claiming that Marxists aren't communists? There are communists that aren't Marxists, but Marxism definitely is a subspecies of communism.

Absolute twaddle of the highest order. Marxism predates communism, it is communism which is a 'sub-species' of Marxism, to use your own crude terminology. The fact is Marxism can be defined in many fashions; a Marxist being someone who supports a Marxist theory; this does not necessarily mean they are in any way a socialist, as Marx' works cover a great breadth of subjects and he wrote much beyond 'the communist manifesto'; this deals primarily, I may add, with economic factors and what Marx saw as the inevitability of communist revolution. It is not, per-say, a proposed political system, that aspect of communism draws more from Platonic Idealism.

Also, someone really needs to advance an argument to make this a logical fallacy ‘Reductio ad Communism’ it’s no less asinine than Reductio ad Hitlerum. “Look, that guy is advancing a leftist objective, quick, let’s call him a communist!” so should I refer to all right-leaning thinkers as ‘little Franco’s’ or would you prefer I compared you with Pinochet? Yes, that’s right you moron, any kind of political leaning can lead to oppression and totalitarianism if taken to extremes; so please stop acting like any kind of attitude whereby one agrees with the slightest impulse toward leftist ideals is somehow a romp down the well-beaten path to a communist dictatorship; it’s not, as I think can be demonstrated by the fact that outside America most of the educated, civilized world embraces some leftist ideals, and yet most of these first world countries are not oppressive dictatorships.

Finally, a note on Healthcare.

We pay something like 3% more tax than the US (A small amount you will no doubt agree) yet we have free public health care; I won't lie, our public system leaves much to be desired, but one can at least be treated regardless of their financial situation. Also available in this country is private health care, and it provides a superb service, though it's cost is prohibitive (I am privately insured myself) however the insurance companies do not by and large attempt to wriggle out of payment.

This is not the only social service we offer that the US does not; yet as I have said, we pay only a small amount more tax.

Make of that what you will. If it encourages you in your desire to see public health care come about in the US, fair enough, if the concept frightens you, fair enough once again. I personally think our system is relatively good; the WHO rates it higher than the US' system, and as I have said, it simply does not cost us that much in additional tax.

Why fear it?

Also, the first person who calls me a scrounger or bludger or anything else, insinuating in any way that I don't contribute to society: go fuck yourself. I guarantee I pay more tax than everyone in this thread combined; and when I see my tax dollars being used for something which I believe is a good cause and to the benefit of society as a whole, it is something I am proud to be supporting.

Quote from dad_savage

Absolute twaddle of the highest order. Marxism predates communism, it is communism which is a 'sub-species' of Marxism, to use your own crude terminology. The fact is Marxism can be defined in many fashions; a Marxist being someone who supports a Marxist theory; this does not necessarily mean they are in any way a socialist, as Marx' works cover a great breadth of subjects and he wrote much beyond 'the communist manifesto'; this deals primarily, I may add, with economic factors and what Marx saw as the inevitability of communist revolution. It is not, per-say, a proposed political system, that aspect of communism draws more from Platonic Idealism.

Also, someone really needs to advance an argument to make this a logical fallacy ‘Reductio ad Communism’ it’s no less asinine than Reductio ad Hitlerum. “Look, that guy is advancing a leftist objective, quick, let’s call him a communist!” so should I refer to all right-leaning thinkers as ‘little Franco’s’ or would you prefer I compared you with Pinochet? Yes, that’s right you moron, any kind of political leaning can lead to oppression and totalitarianism if taken to extremes; so please stop acting like any kind of attitude whereby one agrees with the slightest impulse toward leftist ideals is somehow a romp down the well-beaten path to a communist dictatorship; it’s not, as I think can be demonstrated by the fact that outside America most of the educated, civilized world embraces some leftist ideals, and yet most of these first world countries are not oppressive dictatorships.

If your political philosophy is Marxist, then you are a communist, and supposedly zuisman is saying that he is a Marxist. In this context, he certainly doesn't mean that he is "not communist at all but, on a completely unrelated note, he does happen to agree with dialectical materialism" or something like that. What any blankism is is quite precise if blank is an actual philosopher. You only have to read blank and self identify with their writings more than anything else.

Communism is not a subspecies of Marxism since people commonly refer to, for instance, Babeuf as a communist, and he predates Marx. Marx didn't even create the neologism -- it was popularized for the purpose of talking about Babeuf. Engles refers to a variety of early socialist theories as types of communism and considered one of the utopians, Owen, to be a communist. And, of course, Marx was more than a hundred years ago. By now, we are well beyond even simply "Neomarxist," which is, itself, supposed to be distinct from "Marxist," to all variety of off-shoots of those 19th century ideas that would hardly be called "Marxist" even if they are communist (of which there are plenty).

When we say "Marx invented communism" as I did a few posts back, we don't mean that he invented the word and created the first communist theory. It is, admittedly, a bit of hyperbole -- kind of like saying that "Euclid invented geometry" or "Kant invented deontology."

But, hey, thanks for playin...

Quote from dad_savage

Finally, a note on Healthcare.

We pay something like 3% more tax than the US (A small amount you will no doubt agree) yet we have free public health care; I won't lie, our public system leaves much to be desired, but one can at least be treated regardless of their financial situation. Also available in this country is private health care, and it provides a superb service, though it's cost is prohibitive (I am privately insured myself) however the insurance companies do not by and large attempt to wriggle out of payment.

This is not the only social service we offer that the US does not; yet as I have said, we pay only a small amount more tax.

Make of that what you will. If it encourages you in your desire to see public health care come about in the US, fair enough, if the concept frightens you, fair enough once again. I personally think our system is relatively good; the WHO rates it higher than the US' system, and as I have said, it simply does not cost us that much in additional tax.

Why fear it?

Have you been following this thread? Or, are you just jumping in at random? Did you watch any of the videos, perhaps...? And, you have private insurance -- do you even use the public system? Are you even sick at all? I am not a rich man, myself. I am squarely middle class. My wife has Crohn's. Believe it or not, I manage to pay thousands of dollars a year in insurance premiums and medical bills, including $2700 crowns for my step son this last year. And, I have not taken out a second mortgage on my house (as if I even could in the current economic climate). Public health care is not a good cause -- it is a brazen money and power grab by politicians.

Quote from Adrian

Once again, it is not the health care system that creates life span or even morbidity. You really don't even have to know much about the issue to understand why that is.

I understand it in very simple, primitive way... National health care system exists to provide national health... And (at least in my primitive understanding) main marks of national health are life span, child mortality, early cancer discovery and so on... If system in bottom line provide good national health - it is good system, if not - it is bad... As simple as it... And if let us say Japan or France after overall analises decide - that (for example - I do not know - if that is what they really did) spending some part of money in propaganda of healthy life style and mass sporting - will give more effect tehn spending it directly in medicine, and finally gain good results - from my point of view - thier health system is better then one that have more expancieve equipment , but in bottom line - provide less national health...

Quote from Adrian

most people aren't even in the health care system at all....

Hmmm... that is what about we are speaking all that time... Soviet health care in last 20 years of USSR has almot collapsed... But - if we will judge it by service - it provided for some limited group of powerful functionarys - it was not bad at all...

Quote from Adrian

Public health care is not a good cause -- it is a brazen money and power grab by politicians.

That is strong say! Just - WTF - what on is it based??? We see - that there are plenty of countries with public health care (which by the way - costs much less then US private one) - that have better national health, than US...
O I forgot - if I France, Japan and so on people leave more - it has nothing to do with their health care system... And if in US they leave less (while health care is really - most expancive in wold I saw ins ome new spaper- that per citisen US health care costs twice than in most European contries... Inluding citizens - that have no health insurence at all) it once more has nothing to do with health care... I will say you something... If purpose of health system is not to create national health - you can proove with no problem whatever you want... Hope - you at least enjoy those caca game

zuismanm, you really have reading comprehension problems, from what I can see. I said before on this thread that the US healthcare has COST problems and showed WHY they are there because of GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. Obviously, not you or anyone debated that, you just started to bring unrelated things up. The quality of a system is described by the outcomes of that system - as an engineer you should know this, unless you are being intellectually dishonest or the quality of your education is so deplorable you should be digging ditches, not be an engineer.

Life expectancy isn't a healthcare indicator. If the US healthcar system would be worse than Canada's, for example, there wouldn't be Canadians travelling to the US for care and pretty much no Americans travelling to Canada for care. The US wouldn't rank first in satisfaction and speediness, in the state of technology and a bunch of other things. As I said before, the problem is the COST and I admit it. I also showed simple solutions to deal with it that don't involve the government coercing and stealing from some to give to others - only a moron could find this moral.

And the Marxist economic theory is communism. Obviously, I doubt anyone on this board agrees with Marx on social issues, like his idea that children should be raised by the state after they don't need their mother's care anymore, right?

And the WHO ratings are biased by their agenda. If you do away with the "fairness" claptrap, the US would probably rank first. This is why only fools don't interpret the statistics data themselves and take what others give them. Look at the numbers and read the study, not just the results. I could make a study, with my criteria, showing that Zimbabwe's healthcare is the best. I will just find something that Zimbabwe is great at and give it 99.99% importance. Again, don't expect a political organization's statistics interpretations to not reflect their agenda. It is similar as taking the feminists statistics for granted.

Also, I'm really tired of countries who leech on the US military to cry about how their taxes are only a bit higher and so on. Obviously, look at Europe. Besides the UK, we barely have any military forces because the US is defending us and they are spending for it.

And dad_savage, your income tax is 12% higher for the top rate, not just 3%. Not to talk about the other taxes.


fair = free from favoritism or self-interest or bias or deception
So, please explain to me, how is a system in which the top 50% pay 98% of the tax and the bottom 50% use most of the services, fair? It's full of favoritism, bias and deception. And by the way, the people who want the income of someone else, are GREEDY too. Fair would be to pay what you get. So the WHO should rank that 25% on how unfair a system is since that is the proper word for it.

EDIT:Also, people in the US were polled and 80% are content with their healthcare. Even by your morally flawed point of view, that the majority can coerce the minority into paying their part, you fail. Oh, and over half of the scientific breakthroughs in medicine are done in the US. Anyway, early cancer discovery is unrelated to the quality of care. If you take 1000 people and make them go through the system in Canada - for example - and in the US, those in the US will be discovered faster, provided they actually use the system. The problem isn't the quality, it is the cost. Quality wise, the US has the best healthcare system in the world. Cost wise, the government regulations, as I proved before, caused prices to spiral out of control.

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

Life expectancy isn't a healthcare indicator.

So - what is???

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

If the US healthcar system would be worse than Canada's, for example, there wouldn't be Canadians travelling to the US for care and pretty much no Americans travelling to Canada for care.

I suppose - it is just because - they can not... To use state health care - you have to be citizen... So - I suppose - most Americans have no Canadian citizenship and just can not use Canadian health care system... I suppose - all those people - that have no access to any health care would gladly use less advanced Canadian hospitals if they could...

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

The US wouldn't rank first in satisfaction and speediness, in the state of technology and a bunch of other things. As I said before, the problem is the COST and I admit it. I also showed simple solutions to deal with it that don't involve the government coercing and stealing from some to give to others - only a moron could find this moral.

Darling - you just once more explain me that US system is great in producing fucking bunch of interesting things... It just is much less effective in producing national health... I agree with you... And darling once more - you mix comparison of real, existing systems with some abstract ideas... In theory everything looks simple...

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

And the Marxist economic theory is communism. Obviously, I doubt anyone on this board agrees with Marx on social issues, like his idea that children should be raised by the state after they don't need their mother's care anymore, right?

Marx theory is broad specter of things... I would say - it s first of all system approach to analysis of history - based on assumption, that economical interests of different population groups is key to understanding of this history... By the way - I am not sure - that idea of state raising children was of Marx...

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

Also, I'm really tired of countries who leech on the US military to cry about how their taxes are only a bit higher and so on. Obviously, look at Europe. Besides the UK, we barely have any military forces because the US is defending us and they are spending for it.

And who threaten you???

Quote from RebelliousVanilla

EDIT:Also, people in the US were polled and 80% are content with their healthcare.

Where from can they get info for real compare??? If they are told each day - that America is best in world and actually have no idea how other systems works - sure - that is what they will answer... I saw actually 3 different system : Soviet, old Israel - state health care , new Israel half private system... So - I can compare basing on real experience

Remembering the Grayson incident here.....maybe this helps the discussion as well

The “holocaust” Grayson was referring to was the 44,000 Americans that a recent study says die each year because of inadequate access to health care. The representative cited the Harvard study (PDF) in what appeared at first to be an apology, but quickly turned into a retort.

*adds fuel to the fire and runs away laughing*

Quote from zuismanm

So - what is???

You've been given the answer to this question. And it has been explained to you several times now why life expectancy does not and cannot measure the efficacy of health care. Acting like life expectancy is a measure of health care is stupid and asinine at this point.

For the record, many more things influence life expectancy than health care do. Ethnicity, other genetic factors, and life style have far greater influence over both mortality and morbidity than the quality and availability of health care. Even if life expectancy was a measure of health care, there is no statistically significant difference between the US and other countries that have nationalized health care (e.g. the life expectancy of Canada is 80, of the UK is 79 and of the US 78). And besides that, there are plenty of countries that do have universal health care but are below the US which despite its "horrible health care system" manages to rank above most of the countries all the same. Furthermore, it isn't even clear that countries that have higher life expectancy didn't always have higher life expectancy.

Quote from zuismanm

Where from can they get info for real compare??? If they are told each day - that America is best in world and actually have no idea how other systems works - sure - that is what they will answer... I saw actually 3 different system : Soviet, old Israel - state health care , new Israel half private system... So - I can compare basing on real experience

What the fuck are you talking about?? Americans are inundated with the notion that their system is broken and needs to be "fixed" with a single payer nationalized health care system. This is a giant load of horse shit.

Quote from Adrian

You've been given the answer to this question. And it has been explained to you several times now why life expectancy does not and cannot measure the efficacy of health care. Acting like life expectancy is a measure of health care is stupid and asinine at this point.

I explained you several times - that (at least - as I see it) national health system has one main purpose - to produce produce national health... And for that simple reason have to be measured by medical criteria(like life span , early diagnosis and so on... if you have better one - you are welcome to add to list) ,and not by commercial one (like customer satisfaction and bla-bla-bla)... I will give you small example... If you will measure it by customer satisfaction - you will take for example 20 customers with cancer - that are unsatisfied - since they were not diagnosed in time and died after 0.5-2 years ,and 60 customers - that got some trendy plastic surgery - which they did no actually need , but it give good profit to medical companies , and they convince people - that they need it... those 60 are quite happy You take an average and conclude that your system is great - very high level of "customer satisfaction"

Quote from Adrian

What the fuck are you talking about?? Americans are inundated with the notion that their system is broken and needs to be "fixed" with a single payer nationalized health care system. This is a giant load of horse shit.

I will not argue with you - you leave there ... May be you are right (except of cause "horse shit")

I love the way you both just completely ignored my reducio point, instead quibbling over a bunch of barely relevant information (i.e notes on communism/marxism itself, not your rebuffs to the health care issue) as for what I noted about health care, it was simply food for thought, not meant to proove or disproove anything.

Also, I'm really tired of countries who leech on the US military to cry about how their taxes are only a bit higher and so on. Obviously, look at Europe. Besides the UK, we barely have any military forces because the US is defending us and they are spending for it.

The US' runaway military budget does us no favors, but please - point to the US bases in my country, show me precicely how they're defending us, and who they're defending us against.

We faught in the Korean War, Vietnam, both Iraq wars and we're in Afghanistan right now; none of these events effected our interests, in fact our involvement (at least in those most recent wars) has made our situation worse.

But yes, the US are 'defending us' - of course.

And dad_savage, your income tax is 12% higher for the top rate, not just 3%. Not to talk about the other taxes.

Since only around 1% of the country earn enough to qualify for this rate, it's hardly relevant. Of course naturally, you think you're going to be very rich (does any kid not?) so this is of the utmost concern to you. Apparently.

I don't think I will be very rich, but unlike leftists, I have morality and I don't view as normal to coerce someone into paying what I use. For the same reason, I didn't marry someone rich, even though I had the opportunity and still do and for the same reason, I wouldn't use a man for his money, even though I could. That's the only reason I'm using mass transit instead of driving a BMW to school. The only difference is that voting for someone to steal money from some and give to others is that's impersonal, while the latter is personal. And it's amusing that I'd screw the guy out of less money than the government does.

zuismanm, they are Canadian citizens. And the satisfaction and speediness of a system are parts of it, unlike what happens outside of it. Is this so hard for you to comprehend, toots? Do you want me to make a drawing for your little head to understand? Having the lowest death rates on most major surgeries, for example, is a medical indicator too. The fact that you deny that the US healthcare system is the best quality wise, in the world, is deeply amusing to me. The fact that you judge it's quality of care, by the results of people that don't use it, is amusing. It's like me complaining that soap is crap because I still have dirty hands, even though I didn't wash them.

What's more amusing is someone who supports an idea, without reading about it. Karl Marx thought that the family structure was expoitative and that it accumulates assets that are passed to their children - and you probably know how horrible inheritance is. The solution he came up with was to have the children raised by the state and have the family and inheritance eliminated. Well, he could just about be a feminist if he lived now.

And their opinions(80% of them being happy with it) are actually congruent with the facts showed by other statistics gathered from the system and people who used it, not those who didn't - which is what you are doing. And you probably don't read or watch American stuff - as Adrian said, Americans are given propaganda about how crappy their system is - funny enough, a lot of times paid by the White House lately. This is the ultimate proof of the government being just another corporation, with the difference that it can force you to buy their services. Obviously, you are wrong about the quality of care. If you'd make a point that a lot of people don't afford it, I agree with you that the system is flawed there, but I showed on this thread who is to blame for it.

And Adrian failed to mention that in order for the WHO ranking to reflect quality, you'd have to discount the 25% of it which reflects immorality ala governmental slavery - being forced to work for the government, since this is pretty much what direct taxation is, to pay other's way through life.

There's no such thing as NATIONAL HEALTH. But when you are losing a debate, you're making shit up - I guess it's understandable because you can't really expect an immoral and intellectually dishonest person to admit they're both utterly clueless and wrong. Also, I suggest you buy a 101 Statistics book(an 101 English book would come in handy too) and learn how data is gathered and interpretated because your abysmal lack of knowledge about it is laughable.

EDIT:As a side note, I make a stocks, commodity and currency portfolio just for fun and see how I'd do if I'd have money. Since October 2008, until now, I made around 45-55%, just through appreciation, ignoring yields and so on. But again, unlike all the tools who still have their money in USD and American or European stocks, I have my virtual money in commodities and Asian stocks. Actually, any person who measures their wealth based on the increase in DOW, if you adjust the 2000 DOW with inflation, it would need to be in the 14000 just to keep it's buying power. For each 1 point in the Dollar Index going down, you need an extra 100DOW points.