Maria Bartiromo tells 44 year old Anthony Weiner if Medicare is so good why isn't he on it?
And the dumb keeps coming. CNBC's Maria, I just met a girl named Maria Bartiromo is so intent on sticking up for her Wall Street fat cat pals that she makes an idiot out of herself when she asks Rep. Weiner how come he doesn't use Medicare if it's all that!
Well, Weiner is half way to fifty so he's not eligible, but as we know facts are useless things when conservatives want to destroy something. Actually I wonder of she got confused with the other conservative talking point that says if the public option is so great, why doesn't the Democratic Congress sign up for it. Can you tell? I know it's hard to pin down the crazy.
Earlier today, MSNBC's Carlos Watson hosted Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) and CNBC anchor Maria Bartiromo for a discussion on health care.
At one point, Bartiromo was critical of the government-managed health care system in the United Kingdom. "How do I know the quality [of health care in the United States] is not going to suffer" with a public option? she asked.
Rep. Weiner reminded her that there already is government-managed health care in the United States -- namely, Medicare, the system created for Americans 65 years and older -- and that patients with Medicare report very high satisfaction rates.
Bartiromo's response to this argument was a true head-scratcher. In a mocking tone, she pressed the congressman: "How come you don't use it [Medicare]? You don't have it. How come you don't have it?"
Rep. Weiner, who turns 45 this week, tried to walk Bartiromo through it. "Because I'm not 65." But she was insistent. "Yeah... c'mon!" she exclaimed, laughing incredulously.
The "Money-Honey" apparently doesn't understand complex numbers like 45 & 65.
I can see why CNBC loves her analysis of Wall Street. If numbers like that baffle her, she doesn't have a prayer of understanding stocks and will just say what she's told.
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
Does anybody have this bimbo's email address? We certainly need to flood her with information about Medicare. Maybe she's got it mixed up with Medicaid and needs a lesson or two.
I have only seen this dimwit live a couple of times (some colleague has CNBC on all the time, really annoying). And she seems to have a real hard time reading off the big font in the TelePrompTer, an e-mail would be too much for her to handle. And would imply she takes off some time from her hectic NY socialite schedule.
Although one has got to love the conservative circular logic: they do not want to pay taxes, and they cite a program which depends on tax revenue to operate (and thus is woefully underfunded because they refuse to pay their fair share) as the reason not to pay taxes.
bartiromo wingnut koolaide in the morning
noon and night. you can not educate gop stupid.
when she was having her affair..she had someone to correct her papers and feed her info...Now she is an just another unedited mouthpiece---Foolish woman!
And to think I believe they can't top themselves with anything dumber ... and they prove me wrong every time.
now?
There is NO justification for something that ignorant.
I could imagine that being a career ender if it gets enough attention. I wouldn't be surprised if she gets a pass on it though.
But hardly a career ender when you think about Jim Cramer. There is a guy that should have been fired but he is still plugging away with his worthless advice.
... I still can't explain Kramer though. He's not particularly attractive to "work it" on any homosexual or female high ranking GeneralElectrite... He must have the goods on someone one, that is the only way I can explain it.
At least I hope it's ignorance.
Maria just set women in the work place back 50 years with that comment.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
She is now to be known as "Maria Dumas-Moran."
"Typoid Maria" seems also quite fitting.... maybe
I had thought Musolini had died, but apparently, he is living in drag.
Yes she is an idiot, but I still am bewildered at those who think either medicaid or medicare are going to be around in the future when they are insolvent, filled with IOU's. We're going to pay for these programs how?
I know many C&L's hate hearing me rattle the cage with questions like "with what money?" but the fact is we don't have any money, we are $12 trillion in the hole and adding debt at a massive rate. Bush drove us to the cliff and Obama has stepped on the gas.
Economic recovery to what end? We got our money fix, wait until the feel good wears off and they reach for yet another stimulus package. You know if you borrow too much on the CC's, one day you find can't make even make the minimum payments.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
was U.S.S.C. decision George W Bush.
If you allow Medicare and Medicaid to negotiate with drug companies to lower prices or to import drugs from other companies, you will realize massive savings.
Election 2012: Be Educated! Be Active! Vote!
www.PhoenixJustice.com
... Medicare is not.
I say that with sadness since the company I work at has government contracts with both Medicaid and Medicare. It helps pay my salary and the company principles know we need to increase our commercial market, we save the programs money so our company is a plus to these programs and commercial markets. Yet the fact is both are loaded with IOU's, all you have to do is read the US financial statements put out by the GAO to see that.
I'm not saying the private sector is'nt broken, oh it is! But I think a lot of people are making assumptions on where the money is going to come from for the public programs. Some one need to clearly explain how these programs can be solvant and remain solvent. It's long been known both of these programs are unsustainable. We are going to need to take a hard long look at both the public and private systems, neither work.
Negotiating with drug companies will help but it's not the biggest chunk of expense. Medical services are way over-priced, even medical tests are insane. My wife recently went for a bunch on our POS $7,800 per/yr HRA commercial plan with BCBS. I paid an additional $5,000 out of pocket for just the tests before my HRA kicked in, so she could be told needed a highly intrusive $20,000 procedure for a condition that will come back.
So trust me, I know the private system does not work. But I also know our nation is insolvent and deeply in debt, it does not help us to ignore the elephant in the room. Eventually it will step on us.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
I guess we should do "Nothing?"
... most people do not seem to get that we are already paying for health care. Single payer for example, would allow us to pay less for it.
Less money to pay for health care = more money to pay for debt.
I'm saying that we need to first understand we as a nation are in serious fiscal trouble and likely default on obligations to countries like China. There is a very good chance of that. If we are to pay down our national debt, then we will need to cut on domestic programs here.
So I think if we are to come up with a real plan then we need to do more than just a public option because is far it doesn't seem to take into consideration our national financial status. We are going to have to address costs in the entire medical system itself. This will likely piss off the entire medical industry, and likely tax payers as well.
I'll say Obama's going paperless initiative will help a little. I know because our claims department takes in an insane amount of paper every day, images them to PDF format and pays for a service to come shred the paper on site twice a week. But the reality is the entire industry price structure is out of control. Twenty years ago my health coverage was free, ten years ago I spent $100 a month for better coverage than I get today for $660 a month. That's more than my car payment.
But Medicaid and medicare are in trouble, especially medicare for several simple reasons:
1) people live longer than before
2) the baby boomers are 1/3 larger than Gen-x, so a smaller population of tax payers is going to have to pay for a larger retiring generation. that alone is going to put a massive amount of pressure on our deeply in debt nation. The problem is deeper than just just cost, the paying generation isn't large enough to handle the burden.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
The answer is simple: Raise taxes on the rich and eliminate the social security cap.
Problem solved.
I always chuckle when people complain about medicaid being in trouble, but completely neglect to mention that it is in trouble because it is seriously underfunded.
Again, we're already paying for health care, single payer and universal proposals allow us to have significant savings on overall health care costs.
You can not pay your debt if you are too sick to work. But being able to cut all sorts of social programs is like a wet dream for the common libertarian.
we are out of money, why do so few get this? Every dollar we spend right now on national programs is derived from borrowed money. The credit cards are getting cut up now by debt buying countries, the party is over, it may take 5 to 10 years to see that but I assure you it is over.
There are two options, expand the real income circle, or tighten the belt.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
How about stopping corporate welfare?
from people who do not understand the difference between the MO of a credit card, and public funding.
Right now there are 2 options: continue the same private system which is 2x as expensive as the next competitor (Switzerland), and which makes business woefully uncompetitive (labor costs among other things). Or move to a public system, which reduces healthcare costs by 50% (again, we're already paying for those costs), covers everyone, and makes American businesses more competitive. Ergo freeing more money to pay debt, and increases the tax revenue.
What you keep on proposing, it is the typical libertarian approach to winning a marathon: shoot yourself in the foot, because all those holes are bound to make our feet more aerodynamic. Brilliant!
I do understand. While taxes pay for many things our government has engaged in spending for more than it takes in for about 30 years now. There is good debt and bad debt, good debt feeds you and bad debt eats you. our government is engaged in a whole lot of bad debt. It's really that simple.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
... but that will not stop you from using the same crack pot libertarian economic talking points, over and over and over and over again.
Health care reform, if done properly, lowers medical costs, which in turn lowers the amount of debt, which in turn generates higher revenues, which in turn allows to pay more of our debt.
It all involves basic investment principles really, which is something that libertarians don't know anything about. Since their economic playbook basically has 2 plays: gold standard, and cut social services. Somehow, that magically leads to "profit." The past 8 years of Bush, and 3+ decades of unfettered Friendmanomics have proven otherwise. I'll pass thank you...
for a crack pot libertarian as you say I am. It's actually gone up while most other investments have been tanking. But if it makes you feel better to say that kind of stuff, have at it.
So if credit used does not become debt, then what does it become? I wait in baited anticipation for your answer.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
So? The Dow is back to 9000. Most people's portfolios have been doing great lately. I really don't think you know what you are talking about, at all...
"credit used" LOL, nice red herring... nothing to do with the thread at hand. So you can wait all you want, because I am done with your perennial tangential questioning.
I said early "credit is credit, and all credit is debt" and you said "No it is not..." so I am now asking "So if credit used does not become debt, then what does it become?"
I ask because it is clear you have no idea what you are talking about. So please answer away.
...and the Dow, wait until after October, my only position on the Dow is to short it.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
WE as a country have PLENTY of money to pay for any damn program we want. The GOVERNMENTS, local state and federal, are strapped for money because of the fundamentalists on the right always whine, piss and moan about high taxes and "big government". California, for example, has more than enough money to fund their social services, the GOVERNMENT is strapped because of crappy neoliberal economic ideas and, contrary to what those on the right predict, private interests have not stepped in to improve people’s lives. There is plenty of wealth, excess wealth that is far beyond what anyone in their right mind needs, to fund these programs. Wages in this country have stagnated for decades, thanks to that same philosophy that both parties are tied to, but GDP has grown, productivity has grown, the financial markets have exploded in size (along with debt). Have any idea how much financial wealth exists now, money that people have in their accounts by playing around with numbers on a computer screen without adding a damn thing to the world? More than the world wide GDP is traded EVERY DAY in the financial markets.
If we taxed a small fraction of that, if we did something about tax shelters, if we did something about the Euro Dollar and Euro Bond markets (which have no reserve ratios at all), if we had a small financial transactions tax (a "Tobin" tax, especially on short term, and usually destructive, financial transfers), we'd fund any program we want without a problem. You have to realize, the financial wealth has been created, it has just been monopolized by the economic elites and they control government so the government doesn't tax them on the wealth they never earned in the first damn place. This is not a matter of resources, this is a matter of numbers and the numbers are there. We just have to be willing to go and get them, and to ignore the idiot right and their nonsense and failed metaphysical arguments.
Just admit it, we don't have the money to pay for these programs only if you ASSUME we won't increase taxes to pay for these programs. Admit that you are assuming more of the failed same.
OK, this is my last comment on this thread but Wilber1, you might want to book mark this web page.
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
You're talking nothing but nonsense. I will say this one more time, slowly so you can understand, GOVERNMENTS are in debt and strapped for money because of people like YOU. There is enough fictitious wealth out there, owned by your “friends”, to pay for any social service we need. Have anything to say about private debt? Of course not, because the ballooning private debt is a result of your nonsense, crap, economic ideas, which hold down wages and the right to organize because of simplistic notions of “individual liberty” and all that nonsense. What has happened over the last 30 or so years? Wages for the majority of the country have either stagnated or declined while debt has gone up, along with the size of the financial markets.
Again, you're preaching nonsense failed ideas to the victims of the policies, don't cry and moan when you get angry repsonses. You aren't a free thinker, you're doing a mindless defense of the status quo.
It's "We the people", I'm stunned you don't know this. Who do think pay's for all government debt? We do. We'll for the last 40 years we have been borrowing more and more, but in the end the tax payers. That would be you and me, are paying for all those numbers and it's taken from you either by direct taxation or stealth tax, a.k.a. inflation.
And since most on this board are John Maynard Keynes fans let's look at what he said about that.
"By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
we are the government? people's opinions on the issues differ from government policy, and the difference in opinion has been growing fastest in the countries listening to nonsense right wing economics. it is, according to "libertarians" one dollar one vote, not one person one vote, and the market is where democracy happens, right? the simply fact is that marginal tax rates have been reduced, as have corporate tax rates (the CBO did a study which showed that about 2/3's of US corporations paid no or less than 5% in taxes in recent years). governments are strapped for cash and rich, parasitic financial investors have money (that they don't need and didn't earn) that is ours, and it could more than cover any program we need. they have ruined the us currency, along with their palls in government.
It sounds good, but the rich are the ones who create jobs and bring opportunity, piss them off too much and they will simply go off shores more than they already have. The US is teetering on a high wire act now and the net below is gone.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
laws, we let people die?
like the rich have done one hell of a job creating jobs, "Overseas."
the problems we face are complicated now and the so will be the solutions. If it was affordable to set up businesses here in the US they would, but I have said it many times here our nations problem at the core is a dollar crisis. We have debased our currency terribly and are doing it even more now.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Not the rich ones, though.
If businesses didn't have to be involved in providing health insurance, they would be able to compete with the rest of the world in manufacturing.
and higher taxes further burden our pocket books. I have a friend in Canada who pays about $5,000 for national health care. He isn't exactly thrilled with the expense, it's less than what I pay for my private HRA plan, but not by much. So either way we are going to pay, the real issue is the cost of goods.
I've said this before, the only way to distinguish between price and value with our fiat dollar is by comparing asset classes to other asset classes. A dollar is not worth a real dollar anymore. As long as we keep printing money and expanding the pool, then costs will keep going through the roof.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Can't argue with stupid.
is the solution, then you haven't thought very far ahead. There is more to it than that.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
is "sticking it to them" you are more disingenuous than I thought.
pay their fair share, they should. It just seems like the only plan that is being touted here is to tax the rich and all will suddenly be well. That is a pipe dream.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
No, that is not a pipe dream... that is your straw man.
I have better things to do than suck off the rich. I choose to make my own wealth, thanks. And your wife is a surgeon with her own practice and she holds this view? Interesting.
[From the C&L commenting policy:
So if you've got better things to do, please go ahead and do them. This is your 26th comment on this thread, and you haven't said anything new in the last 20. Consider this a warning. You are very close to the end. Site Monitor.]
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Which is it? You or your friend?
I live in Canada. I've lived all across Canada. I'm Canadian.
There's no province where health care will cost you $5k/year. None. I am living in probably the most expensive province as far as health care goes, and I pay $54/month. That's the top of the income scale, no one pays more.
So back that up, or put it back in your ass where it belongs.
.
What is your conceptual, continuity?
He said in all it cost about $5,000 annually. I don't the specifics of how he arrived at his numbers.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
$5k/year is a lie, Vegas Rage.
I anxiously await VR's clarification from his friend ....
The below news story is where he got his numbers from, so if it's wrong take it up with The Canadian Press and who they are citing.
The Canadian Press
OTTAWA -- Canada's health-care spending will continue to outpace inflation this year, reaching $171.9 billion or $5,170 per person, a new study predicts.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/C...
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
You wrote:
I have a friend in Canada who pays about $5,000 for national health care.
You said he PAYS $5K/year, that isn't what that story says.
Don't try to confuse the issue with half-truths and gorilla dust.
Your friend isn't very smart.
You're spreading misinformation about my country and our much beloved health care system. You don't know what you're talking about.
Please stop it.
... where are these benevolent rich people going to go?
Will anyone think of the billionaires!
On second thought, that would be pretty much all of them, wouldn't it?
but I am going to get a laugh to see these billionaires warning us they're going to pack up their toys and leave.
Don't want to pay the fair share associated with living in this country? Then leave. Jeez, I am tired of the house negro telling me how awful is going to be if I piss the massah and I don't get my crumbs tonight.
I know a few people who are very well off. Their money doesn't just sit still, they re-invest it in new ventures and in so doing create jobs like the one I am grateful to have today. If you are going to invest in something, in order for it to make fiscal sense you need a positive ROI, otherwise you are losing money. No investor rich or poor wants to lose money. They are not all greedy bastards, the ones I know prefer to keep things domestic but if the numbers don't add up then it's hard to justify the investment.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
... I don't care if they are the nicest people, not wanting to pay their fair share seems to me many things... but not a trait that I associated with being nice.
If they don't want to pay their fair share, by all means... don't let the door hit them on their way out to whichever fiscal paradise they intend to build their fortunes in doing... what exactly?
What does ROI, and other unrelated business mumbo jumbo have to do with a proposal that would lower healthcare expenses by at east 50%? From a pure business value proposition, single payer or universal health care is a no brainer... unless, you make money off ripping people off by managing health care. I can see how that would be a non-starter for someone providing no value added, and expecting a huge return for the "privilege."
I must have missed the news where that number came up. If we are talking about negotiating with drug companies and reducing paper, I don't see a 50% reduction there, the other services still cost a huge sum of money.
With respect to drugs, the issue is more complicated than just negotiating with drug companies. I have worked in both nutrition and on the side of allopathic medicine. Part of the cost issue with drugs is how we approve drugs here in the US. The FDA won't consider international clinical studies on anything for drug approval. The AMA and FDA are in bed with each other, they treat all alternative medicine like it is some shaman flute blowing mysticism despite the fact that 20% of all synthetic allopathic medicine have a plant source.
Yet in Europe they have an approved pharmacopia of botanical extracts with mountains of clinical backing. Drug companies which spend years and millions in drug testing to get an approved drug to market suppress alternative medicine even if it proven to be more effective than their drug. The drug company cost problem requires looking at bad processes in drug approval in this nation as well that are biased to drug company favor as well. The whole drug approval process needs to be fixed.
Another issue is MD's are not required to have expertise in nutrition. Often they don't understand good nutrition and can't identify when poor nutrition is the problem. The US is very good at trauma based medicine, it sucks at preventive medicine and resolving chronic conditions.
BTW I diverged off on the ROI because of your post above which also didn't seem entirely related to health care, my bad if I miss understood.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
We need health care reformed
than on a per capita expense, that is what the closest country pays for their health care. And that is the most expensive example after us. Further savings can be realized.
Eliminating HMOs interference shaves off an automatic 30% to 40% of costs right there.
Again, it is a no brainer. Furthermore, I don't care if that pisses off a few billionaires. They had everything they wanted for 8 long years, and it only lead to a massive clusterf*ck. So as I said, whoever doesn't want to pay their fair share, they are free to leave... they don't seem to be the defining factor for our prosperity.
is a strong national push for better nutrition. The largest expense in healthcare hands down is a result of poor nutrition. You will see a 50% or better reduction in healthcare costs. If we are to force a national option on this country I would recommend an educational program that teaches people better nutrition in our schools. Public or private I don't care, but I would even give tax or premium advantages to people who stay healthy. However I would not penalize people who had preexisting conditions beyond their control. They should be taken care of.
But otherwise healthy people who choose to smoke or take drugs for example without good cause would have to pay higher taxes or insurance premiums.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
... actually, none of those initiatives even comes close to generate the 50% reduction in costs that a universal healthcare proposal would generate.
Anyhow, it is becoming increasingly hard to take you seriously. It seems the libertarian economic playbook is written by the same editor that did the equine surgery manual.
in medical claims processing, I know what the numbers are.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
you work in health management/insurance, not health care.
It explains your constant red herrings trying to deviate the debate though.
I suppose now you are going to tell me you know more about the industry I work in than I do? We process medical claims looking for billing discrepancies. We run statistical analysis on the the claims and know exactly what procedures the claims are for and return these to CMS medicaid and medicare, we do this as well for a number of commercial large insurance providers.
We employ a large number RN's, LN's and MD's for detailed reviews. I know the industry I work in, the majority of conditions treated could be prevented with proper nutrition and exercise.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Everything is so simple to you, apparently. If you think that it is easy for people to improve their health just by eating properly, you do not have an inkling how bad corporate food has become. Monsanto, and its Frankenfood, Wal-Mart, "green washing" with its phony "organic" food imported from China, Tyson trying to import filthy chicken from China, Smithfield with its cruel and disgustingly filthy factory farms, all offering people food that will make them unhealthy and ultimately kill them. Just try to feed yourself properly, especially if you are poor. Toxic food additives, melamine, anti-freeze in bay scallops from China, feces run-off from factory farms into the Gulf of Mexico, contaminating sea food. Your simple-minded "solutions" are offensive. Back to your cubicle. Try to expand your horizons while you're there.
I do, organic is mildly more expensive, it's not hard to avoid bad things. If everyone got on a good diet and proper exercise health care costs would be reduced by more than double. That has long been known.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Not hard to avoid bad things? You do not know what you are talking about. If everybody got on a good diet, it would be a fucking miracle. Stick your head back up your ass, and leave the truth to those who respect it. Bye now.
and what I get back here is nothing but drivel about tax the rich and our problems are over. And you think I'm being naive and simplistic? Even if we get the rich to pay their fair share our problems are nowhere near being over.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Yeah, the rich are SO important. You can tell how bankrupt the country was without all of them when the tax rate in the US on the top earners was almost 60 -90% in the early 40' to early '70's.
How did our ecomony improve, build highways, how did we reach the moon, when apparently all of the rich abandoned the country due to the high taxes?
It must be for greater minds than mine.
was in 1929. It turned out great, didn't it?
If not do a little google research on Paul Volcker. Things were pretty tight back then, what we have done so far to fix our economy is going to make that look like a walk through the park when the rubber band snaps us in ass.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
VR, the stated policy of the Fed is to "control inflation" by keeping unemployment at a minimum level. That's actually the measure they use to know when to tighten or loosen credit. Every Fed chairman since Hamlin has been a corporate tool, feeding the boom-bust cycle your kind so love.
sambolina, they are losing control of inflation right now and that is the point. Learn the history of money and you will understand.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
come you're a number cruncher working on a cubicle farm?
and the strategy is when my passive income exceeds my current income plus my expenses I'll retire. I'm about 3 years away from that now.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
and no thumb. Good point. Although I suppose for guys like Vegas it will NEVER sink in.
EAT the HMOs I say.
Go into ANY doctors office and there are 1 to 2 people doing the paperwqork for each practicioner. My PCP is a single shop and he gets by on one receptionist/secretary. My Dermo has himself and a PA. He has five, yes, five women JUST processing insurance paperwork.
... you can't imagine how much paper work each procedure entails. There are some insurance plans that put some clerical overheads that are ridiculous for certain procedures.
Our quality time would benefit immensely... never mind the quality of care she can provide.
I manage over 30 TB of PHI, I set up our companies imaging application for scanning in the huge mountain of paper we get each week. I see more PHI in a day than she views all year.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Your friends, if they are like most every other person with wealth (most it gained by the work of others, the benefits of which they monopolized) have invested in the financial markets. What ARE the financial markets in the end, what is the fractional reserve banking system, but DEBT? Your friends haven't invested in building factories, we are becoming an de-industrialized country because of your "friends". Your friends are trying to make money by playing around with numbers, doing some arbitrage with currencies and by suppressing labor and increasing the debt of working people. At best they're creating businesses where people will provide services, where pay is low and workers are rarely if ever unionized.
By the way, people here aren't mad at people like you for not "towing the party line". Not at all, it's towing the party line that got us to this point and the party line in both parties has been your crappy ideas. You're talking to working people being raped and pillaged by your "friends" and you are preaching about having more of the policies that is the means to that end. They aren't mad and you because you THINK you're such a brilliant free thinker, (which are not revolutionary in any way, you are offering nothing but a senseless defense of the status quo), they're mad at the horrible effects of your policies and they're tired of hearing the nonsense justifications you're offering.
"Atlas Shrugged" was horrible book by the way.
Obviously, the healthcare system will be funded with tax increased. Obama has already said he will increase taxes on those at the top, during the election.
The idea that the rich will 'go offshore even more than they have now' is a classic straw man argument. The Clinton tax plan did the same thing-OMG! No mass exodus!? How can this be?
You are going to have to show your hand here with some facts on a mass exodus. And in case you haven't read the news lately, Swiss bank accounts and offshore tax loopholes are being rapidly targeted and closed.
Ban this troll already will ya. Please.
early on here and because I didn't hug the party line I got a load of crap for it because I dared to have independent thought. An independent thought by someone who actually works in health care and knows something about it. And for the record I voted for Obama.
I recall a lot of people on C&L bitching about Bush suppressing dissenting opinion and how closed minded he was for years on this site. Funny now here I am getting the same suppressing dissenting opinion bull shit from C&L people. Where did your progressiveness go?
[It's not a question of quality but quantity, although you've also strayed off topic. Bandwidth is expensive. Give it a rest, please. Site Monitor]
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Most people earn money by getting paid for work they do, a service or good they create, something tangible. YOU, well the rich at least, invest and make money by someone else working and you and the rest of the investors monopolizing what they produced. You use that capital, which you didn't earn, to invest in businesses and then lobby for things like the removal of minimum wage laws, environmental protections and the like. Sure, societies will be destroyed buy you’re only doing what is in your best interest. How long do you think you'll be able to get away with this, especially given how horribly the rich have f*cked the rest of the world? You can't "escape" to Latin America, because they're kicking the ass of the rich and are seeing their lives improve while doing it. Poverty, wealth concentration, environmental destruction, lowered access to basic services increased when you crappy ideas were put in place and have been reversed by ignoring parasites like you. Are you going to escape to some casino island, whose days are numbered thanks to the graves you capitalists are digging for yourself?
"It sounds good, but the rich are the ones who create jobs and bring opportunity"
Nonsense. The rich monopolize the work of others. If they were rich in proportion to what they tangibly added to the world they wouldn't be rich, or would at least be far less so. You invest in the stock market and increase your wealth. Did YOU earn that increased wealth? Do you work, or add anything to the world? No, you once again monopolize what someone else did and increase your wealth. If you do that enough, if variable costs like labor are low enough, you'll increase your wealth. Then you'll use that money (in libertarian land there'd be no minimum wage laws, right?) to maybe create poverty level jobs for most people. We should kiss your boots for monopolizing our work and paying us just enough to stay alive. We couldn't possibly think of a better system or ideas to run our lives now could we? Sure we could, but we’d love our “individual freedom”.
People divide wealth amongst themselves thanks to the social relations of the countries they live in. The rich have been ruthless and have pushed for antisocial policies that have not benefited people. Even if you think as you do you’d be wise not to cheerlead for policies that have clearly harmed far more than they’ve helped. Here and elsewhere. Your smugness would only be justified if your ideas actually worked to benefit the majority of people, which they haven’t and won’t.
What some are overlooking is that recipients of Medicare pay for it every month. It isn't free to anyone. There are also some co-pays. It isn't a matter of seniors freeloading off working people. The seniors have either worked and contributed to Medicare while working or have spouses who did the same. The Medicare propaganda is just that. Don't fall for it. The reason it is targeted is because it works.
The biggest drain on Medicare is that they are being overcharged by the durable medical equipment companies. At least one of the wheel chair companies is charging Medicare $1,200 for a chair that, in reality, only costs $400.
If millions have a public option they will be paying lower premiuns than what they pay now and many that have no coverage now will also be paying premiums. Those that are younger and healthier will not be needing as much care therefore the system will be accumulating a large pool that will pay for healthcare that others end up needing. Every other industrialized countrry in the world makes it work and there is no reason we shouldn't be able to also. It is basically what the insurance companies do now but becaause they cater to Wall Street, they drive up costs to satisfy investors.
Stop indulging in ruinously expensive wars that squander the nation's money. The money we threw into That Trog's stupid adventure in Iraq would have paid for universal health care for the next ten years.
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
and we still don't we are so deep into deficit spending now it's boggles the mind.
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
Instead of ranting about the economic evils of reforming health care why not speak out against corporate welfare, defense spending and other items that are draining the nation of any wealth it may still have. Going off on health care reform seems about as sensible as railing against foreign aid or public education spending.
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
she's just a rabid moron. I've rarely seen such vehemence directed at those who favor reform from other pundits, and I watch some ridiculous shows. She is frequently disagreeable just to stand opposed to the notion that life extends beyond crooked books and golden parachutes. A disgusting human being.
... think about this twit, next time you work over time and have to pick a second job to make ends meet. Because your hard work is used to make persons like this twit even richer.
She was on morning joe recently and Matt Taibbi was on talking about a piece he had written for Rolling Stone about health care. He said we do not have the best health care system in the world and when he said that, Maria went fu*king bananas. She said she would not stand by and allow anyone to say something like that about our health care system. She made a total ass of herself and Matt looked at her like he was watching a woman losing her mind.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
is qualified to do with her mouth, and it isn't to interview anyone...
MY GOD SHE'S DUMBER THAN A USED TAMPON!
be rich it's just anyone can make money being an idiot on TeeVee these days.
In case you haven't noticed this type of TeeVee is the exclusive domain of the well off.
Boy is she going to be pissed, now that her value proposition has been exposed, and she does not have enough protection on her IP to leverage the revelation of her trade secrets.
She HAS to be fucking somebody in the NBC hierarchy. There is no other excuse for letting that kind of adamant stupidity on the air...
The idiot, drooling, dripping bint's IQ isn't 45...
... she just has a minor in economics. So yeah, her position as an economic commentator is based mostly on her bedding skills it seems.
She is also born on 9/11, I found that interesting somehow.
As for her birthday, sometimes catastrophes are clustered together.
It worked for Judy Miller at the Times
I became stupider just watching her speak on that video.
me-oww!
have money?!? Let's see, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and Maria Bartiromo. Money!
Damn I should lower my IQ if it pays that well :-(
NOBODY 2012
... one was born into money, one was married into money, and the other acts like she's got money.
Their common trait is that none of them made their money the old fashion way: by earning it by produced something of value to others. In that sense, they are the poster children for the American business class of today.
who don't have money, you just don't see them on TV.
I wonder if some people actually take financial advice from this woman. And if they do, it's no wonder that Wall street collapsed with this ignorance out front.
and it's GREAT. It would be even better if EVERYONE got the same care I do now. Of course, not being able to access medical care in the first place is the REASON I am disabled, but hey, what's a few details among friends?
Gobshite.
me-oww!
"Keep your government hands off my Medicare!"
When did she become a health care expert? Judging by her comments, she hasn't yet.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
I'm shocked she has enough brain matter to get out the front door every morning. I can't even think of a way to describe someone so stupefyingly shallow and moronic. My rating, I think I have to give it an 11. Most everyone else stops at ten, but my scale goes one higher. Because her stupid is louder than 10.
me-oww!
it rewards the stupefyingly shallow and moronic.
Be it's Doritos or stock options.
woody, that's how she got the job. no pun intended.
Can we fund our own BBC please?
now they got their own problems.
any time, any where.
But what would you have to bitch about then? ;-)
all this stuff?
... how we're going to pay for a system that costs less than the one we have now?
Huh?
That is just a whole new level of stupid. I could not imagine asking a question that moronic and not feeling completely embarrassed and ashamed when told the answer.
What can you do when people are so abysmally, PROUDLY stupid?
There's always free cheddar in the mousetrap, baby. - Tom Waits
I think you're right, she mixed up her health care bashing talking points.
And when people bring up the idiotic "why don't you go on it" TP about the public option, they should tell the truth: "Because we are prohibiting people who already have insurance through their employers to take the public option. It's only for people who have no coverage."
It's a stupid rule, specifically designed for the corporate crazies who think people will flock to the public option and away from the one their employers provide, thus making the insurance left for the executives way too expensive.
But then when "experts" in the news business don't even understand the most basic point of medicare -- like how old you have to be to get it -- then real details will never get through, ever.
when it comes to the ecomony. But, I've regularly watched MSNBC for years - it being the least offensive of news channels.
And there, years ago, they were hawking the sheer brilliance of this young woman on CNBC and her economic genious. Well, I checked in and listened. She was about as dumb as a cat-sctratching post. They were selling her "look". She had NO idea what the Hell she was talking about. Even I knew that!
And now, you see her years later. Maria, if you don't know wtf Medicare is, the wtf are you doing on TV talking about economics?
Jesus, if being attractive is some sort of prerequisite for male and female pundit blow-hards to be on TV, at least show them to us butt-fucking naked.
Don't keep feeding me well-dressed Barbie and Ken blowhards when the actual dolls kids play with have more brains than the anchors.
If they were naked, maybe I wouldn't notice how fucking stupid and vapid they all are.
LOL!
"Jesus, if being attractive is some sort of prerequisite for male and female pundit blow-hards to be on TV, at least show them to us butt-fucking naked."
At least the female part.
is intended to be a factual statement
ahahahahaha naked just thinking about how they would look with clothes and NO makeup.
I never said anything about no makeup. Now THAT would be scary! :-)
regarding the UK and erbitux:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/1523...
Maria should learn to use The Google rather than blindly accept everything someone with a vested interest tells her.
She intentionally memorized Erbitux and pitched a bullshit lie about the UK letting you die without it. Total bullshit. For her to be stupid enough to not know 65 was the minimum Medicare age, but spit out the brand name Erbitux like an expert means she's fucking a Merck rep.
maria is a cheerleader on cnbc for wall street and the investment darling china. OUTsourcing and profit in/to china is more important than the health in this country.
Keep the government out of my Medicare!
I work for federal honey it ain't that great and we are working with a large pool, everytime I get a cost of living increase they take it and the co-payments go up, you find out when a family member develops a chronic illness. I would take medicare or medicaid at this point
I look forward to her explanation of why she "misspoke." It'll be something along the lines of "In the heat of the conversation I briefly confused X with Y, and of COURSE everybody knows a 45-year-old person can't get Medicare, duh." Of course, the video doesn't bear this out -- it's obvious she thought she caught Weiner with a real gotcha.
Why doesen't she go hang out with the elderly town hall dipshit who wants government to keep its hands off of his Medicare? They can have a moronfest together.
I don't believe in God. Teach a man to be a good citizen and you have solved the problem of life.
-Andrew Carnegie
She has made so many dumb (not even outrageous, just plain dumb) comments that we have to wonder if she has her job because of her "skills", entertaining comments or comedic relief.
This for real? Are you sure this isn't a take-off on an old SNL Lisa Loopner sketch? "if you love Medicare so much, why don't you MARRY it?"
are broke and working on a shoestring budget.
the networks should get a clue and outsource these tasks to a third world country that can provide objective reporting for a fair market price, maybe then we will finally be offered a product worth viewing.
Shouldna the her question be to anti-health-reform republicans why don't they drop out of the FEHB plan, and take the insurance coverage that we have to take?
And if they're considered self-employed, they'd have to pay the full amount that employers and employees together pay in paycheque withholdings.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
OMFG. Where's my baseball bat? Someone needs some sense knocked into them.
"Someday somebody related to some of these sufferers, these victims, these collaterally damaged souls, may try to kill you. And I have to tell you, I think you’ll have it coming." - Christopher Cooper
This woman is stupid enough to be on fox!
republicanism is a mental illness!
Wondered if Keith would have her as one of his "worst" persons....Nope. Guess the memo went out from headquarters about not targeting NBC family members.....
Olbermann is a phony and anyone with brain can see that he is a master at false outrage, just liked the douches on Fox News.
He had it on Bests. Olberman sounded shamed at all that she did. I came on here hopeing you people would give him probs since many of you Equate Olberman to being the same as BillO.
Honestly Next time AT least watch the whole show before you make such a large judgement.
"If you don't know how old you have to be to get medicade then what are you doing debating it on national TV"- Olberman to Maria Bartiromo
Worlds best number 3 Sep, 01 2009
Epic Fail for the money dummy. She was equally rabid and uninformed with Howard Dean on Morning Joe a couple of weeks back conflating the insurance companies with the pharmaceutical companies. Why do these ignoramuses continue to get air time? She should be ashamed of herself.
"....She was equally rabid and uninformed with Howard Dean on Morning Joe a couple of weeks back conflating the insurance companies with the pharmaceutical companies...."
I honestly was tryin to give home girl the benefit of the doubt but she doesn't live on the planet most of America lives on...wow...these people........wow
This well-groomed Wall-Street darling was lovingly dubbed Money's Honey in the decadent 1990s, when Lou Dobbs and the rest of the potentially white supremacist gang at CNBC (as revealed now) were treated as financial titans (as were those vicious crooks at Enron, WorldCom, the Ken Lays, the Jeff Skillings and more recently, just about all the vile investment and insurance crooks). It is no surprise to me that this million-dollar doll proves herself to be the complete airhead I would suspect her to be.
Some day, I wish all the phony large-scale crooks at Wall Street, its manipulative journal and the financial exploiters would simply go away, and the world be left with gentle, ethical human beings that care about knowledge, inquiry, humanity and broad-mindedness.
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