Actually, in a certain manner, they already have; a long time ago via various forms of welfare. This too, is part of the problem with spending.
OK, I apologize for my rather snarky post. I detest all these political rants on ET and long for a more rational discussion. For people who are opposed to "Obamacare", you might take a look at some of David Frum's opinion pieces. For those not familiar with David Frum, he was an economic speech writer for George W. Bush and is widely regarded as having sterling conservative credentials. Here are a couple of his articles: http://www.frumforum.com/what-if-we-win-the-healthcare-fight http://network.nationalpost.com/np/...lthcare-costs-destroyed-the-bush-economy.aspx
It is funny that the only thing that bothers Republicans is the Public option. If that is removed they will go along with it.
Understand that this proposal is to allow people to *buy in* to medicare, with the goal to keep it revenue neutral. That means that people under 65 would have to pay the full premiums, unlike those signing up at 65 (for parts A and B that's over $700 per month).
This guy brings up some good points, but the problem is there is no good answer for solving these issues. The fact is, if you want to get more and more medical innovation along with longer life spans, it will continue to cost more. If you want to insure more people, someone is going to have to spend more money to cover the added people. AND/OR you're going to have to ration. Maybe you can argue that you can squeeze a little out of waste/fraud, but the government involvement only adds to those types of abuses and rarely results in a decrease. What they are doing is partisan and dishonest. If they were serious about bringing down costs, they would include some tort reform for medical claims. That is one of the ONLY proven ways to bring costs down in a significant way. Obama and the congressional Dems are trying to make the claim that they are going to: *cover more people *not ration care *not raise cost or taxes These three things do not compute. That is what I find appalling. The least any politician can do is try to maintain some semblance of honesty in their intentions.
HEh. People are starting to realize that the only thing politicians care about is winning re-election. And next year is an election year. So guess what? It's time to buy votes. Spend, Spend, Spend!!!
That's not how most folks would define our $12 Trillion national debt + running annual deficits of $1.5Trillion per year.
Uh, you wouldn't "soundbite" a quote and add commentary out of context would you? THE GOVERNMENT SPENDS TOO MUCH. GET IT?