Me either, but here goes...

So the bottom line is that money is thrown away, and to make that more effective, MIHOP/LIHOP. Very nice position.

How have you not gone completely, clinically nuts with that belief system?

__________________
2010 528Xi
I demand justice.
Or, if there must be injustice, let it be in my favor.

Reynold's Wrap: it's not just for hats anymore.

Love your example...Big brother passes collective bargaining and works out exclusive contracts with certain drug companies who meet the lowest bid. Only the largest who can afford to take this loss bid ridiculously low bids to freeze out competitors. New upcoming pharmaceutical companies are unable to work with Medicare and go out of business leaving the larger pharmaceutical producers with a monopoly.

This leaves less competition and as an end result higher prices. Not to mention less innovation and competition.

Alas...The model is right in line with your BIG government mindset. Capitalism = Bad and Government = Good.

No, actually the insurance companies all use collective bargaining to get lower rates on drug purchases. Prior to the current bill, Medicaid used to do the same thing. Now they are prohibited from doing so by law, and must pay list price on everything.

Imagine for a moment if the board of directors of IBM (or any other major corporation) was to decide that their purchasing dept. that handles the leasing of vehicles was no longer allowed to bargain the price and must pay the car companies MSRP. Even mentioning this as an example is sure to make you laugh since we all know that no corporation in their right mind would do such a thing as it would be a huge waste of money and would not be in the interest of the corporation. Of course we can all agree that it WOULD be in the interest of the car companies who are leasing the vehicles. Yet when our government does the same thing (thus wasting our tax dollars), then you try to justify it in saying it is a good thing?

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my experience on X5world when I spend too much
time posting in political threads in the lounge...

LOL...That is fine until your insurance company tells you that you MUST use lab X because they have the exclusive contract. Or we won't pay for Drug Y because the drug company would not participate in the program. Drug company Y decided it would not bow down to the giant HMO which would have required layoffs and cutbacks in R&D had it caved to the pressure.

That is where you and I differ Eric. Let the free market decide...Not the Government or HMO. Go ahead and negotiate price...But don't allow large corporations to sell below cost so they can get exclusive contracts and freeze out the competition. Sure you get lower prices in the short run...In the long run you get low quality and few choices.

But then again, that is your ideal government. One GIANT bureaucracy that knows better.

Perhaps you did not know this about Congressman Billy Tauzin, who authored the Medicaid bill:

http://www.usatoday.com/money/indust...ugs-usat_x.htm
Tauzin switches sides from drug industry overseer to lobbyist

WASHINGTON — Retiring Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., who stepped down earlier this year as chairman of the House committee that regulates the pharmaceutical industry, will become the new president and CEO of the drug industry's top lobbying group.

Tauzin will begin work Jan. 3 heading the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a powerful trade group that marshaled an army of lobbyists last year to successfully support a bill overhauling Medicare and establishing the first prescription drug benefit for seniors. Tauzin was a co-sponsor, and President Bush signed the bill into law a year ago.




Before you say, let me guess.... You think it's a good thing that the person in charge of regulating an industry was loved so much by the industry he was supposed to be regulating, that they hired him to run their lobbying group? Did I guess right?

Actually, silly me for suggesting that Billy Tauzin wrote the bill. I doubt he did any such thing. He simply took credit for writing the bill. I think we can safely assume that the bill was written by the lobby he is now working for.

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my experience on X5world when I spend too much
time posting in political threads in the lounge...

Happens all the time...I'm not a fan of the lobbyist industry and the larger Government gets the more lobbyist storm Capital Hill.

Again...Let the free market decide...Not the Government. You can't have it both ways. Take Government out of the equation and you end the need for the lobby industry.

Eric's view of big government:


The results of our efforts to open his eyes:

__________________
2010 528Xi
I demand justice.
Or, if there must be injustice, let it be in my favor.

Reynold's Wrap: it's not just for hats anymore.

LOL...Can you imagine a lobby group approaching a large private company.



Groups Lobby the Government because they know how to work Politicians. Given enough votes most would sell their mothers into prostitution.

How do you take government out of the equation? Are you suggesting to end all regulation of private industry? No more FDA? No more oversight of anything? No more labor laws, no more product safety laws, etc.

That system worked fine 100 years ago. We had 9 year olds working 60 hour weeks for 2 cents a day. If you got hurt on the job, you were SOL as there were no workman comp laws. There were no ingrediants listed on any food products -- you just had to guess what you were buying. As for medicine? Most products that were advertised as "medicine" were simply alchohol products that made you "feel good" because you were getting drunk. Yeah...that system worked quite fine.

I'm sorry, but you will always need some sort of oversight of industry if you want to live in an advanced industrialized country, or you will end up with chaos and anarchy. There are some countries that have a system with no government oversight. Afghanistan and Somalia come to mind. I'm sure there are others.

But we do agree that the problem is indeed when you mix the "free market" and government together.

The solution is to outlaw lobbying and have publicly funded elections. If the drug companies could not give campaign contributions to your politicians and were not allowed to lobby on Capitol Hill, then you would have real honest regulation of industry, not this system of legalized bribary. Do you see my point?

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my experience on X5world when I spend too much
time posting in political threads in the lounge...