Is that the budget got a new form of calculation at that point in time that included social security taxes — since it was running a surplus.

So, technically, that “surplus” that Clinton ran was still a deficit if you add back in the additional debt that the government now owes to the social security program.

Dems and Repubs are both guilty for this. And I won’t dive into economics and how both parties mix and match economic theory to match what they want to accomplish.

While Trickman is correct that the social security taxes gave Clinton a “surplus”, they also make Bush’s deficit better than they are. Basically, the debt has been growing larger and larger since the 1960s for all presidents, but the points where they’ve shot up percentage-wise wrt GDP has been during Reagan/Bush I and again in Bush II.

During Clinton’s terms the % of debt to GDP decreased.

I think you might be cherry picking by highlighting only Clinton “exaggerations” without also highlighting Republican ones also.

While they “both do it,” the Republicans have been more egregious in the past 30 years in the amount they overspend.

R

To be in the opposition right now means being in opposition to people keeping their houses, keeping their jobs, being able to see a doctor, etc. It is, quite simply, going to be impossible for them to oppose these things without being demonized.

Just read the text of Obama’s first press conference – even the most innocuous question about the wisdom (or even the details) of one of his talking points got a response just to the left of “you must want the country to collapse if you don’t support this”

So, you think the money we borrowed was well spent?

Two-Nation-building on the other side of the world is your idea of a smart allocation of funds?

My response was to the implication that the “Democrats were the ones who caused this debt when THAT WAS NOT THE CASE.”

Unless you’d like to point out some inadequacy in my analysis of the deficit numbers. I’d be happy where you could show where I was wrong.

In addition, if I’m reading Wiki correctly, the deficit does NOT include Bush’s “non-budgeted spending” which INCLUDES the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

So, this is just DOMESTIC irresponsibleness. We’re not even talking yet about the “serious happenings in 2001.”

R

Sorry but I’m going to ramble, and probably not make that much sense due to my tired state. You see I’ve been studying for 14 straight hours, have a test tomorrow and this is what I’m doing to relax. Not really sure why I thought this would make me relax, but oh well.

Parkland is pretty much a textbook example proving that it’s just not effective to have a policy of it not mattering if you can pay the bill or not. Fortunately though despite there being extremely long waits you will get some of the best most skilled doctors in the country at Parkland.

While I never have seen inside the Fort Hood VA hospital, just judging from the results I’ve seen from people who’ve been to VA hospitals, the overall quality of VA hospitals as a whole is pathetic. (one guy went in for a hernia operation and lost a testicle, another had been diagnosed with COPD died while at the hospital and it was only then they realized he had asthma… I have a few other stories but I’ll stop there) From the few times I’ve been in the VA hospital in Bonham (taking my grandfather) you get a nice 10-12 hour wait and yet the doctor doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing when you finally get to have a conversation with him. That’s pretty much the perception of the quality of VA hospitals that most of the doctors I’ve spoken to have told me as well. I’ve had a lot of doctors who pretty much dismissed working at a VA Hospital because “the only doctors who work there are only there because they can’t find a job anywhere else.”

The main issue I have with this plan besides sadling the country with an even more enormous debt is how this is going to effect doctors as a whole. Personally I believe this will laden them with a much higher workload and deduct a pretty sum off there salaries. If this happens I gurantee that not only will you see a much lower quantity of physicians but a much poorer quality as well. Not a good combo.

Speaking as a med student I sure don’t desire to spend $200,000+ in med school loans and not actually start working to pay down the debt until I’m 30 years old, then take on probably the most stressful job known to man unless I get SOME type of compensation for it. If the government could afford to keep the salaries the same this just might work, but with the debt and the national perception that doctors make “too much money” makes me think that will never happen.

Again sorry for the rambling. I know a lot of what I wrote above is constructed poorly but I’m really too exhausted to give it a good look over.

getting into the debate one way or the other but, I never……ever……wait more than a day to see a doctor.

That’s why I voted for Obama in the first place. I think that as the most successful nation in the world, that we can find a better way to do health care. To me, that is something similar to the British system you describe. However, instead of having everyone get health care provided by the government that everyone pays for, and you pay for better coverage on top of that, I would like to see a more free market system. That’s what I thought Obama was proposing.

I would like to see the government offer a health insurance plan that competes with the other companies. It would be a more basic policy that wouldn’t cost very much, emphasizing catastrophic and preventive care, that individuals or corporations could buy into. It would not affect most people who work for large companies because they would want to stay competitive in hiring by offering the much nicer health care plans that they do now. With less overhead from CEO’s and corporate offices, as well as less of a need to make profit, I would hope the government plan would help drive down the cost of other plans, or at least make them more practical. On the other side of this interplay, corporations would still have incentive to compete to make better policies than the government to keep their market share.

This should be fully fundable by those who are actually going to use it, not charging everyone for such a big service that they manage through other means. This idea has been tried before, with Houston being the latest one I recall. They laid out the basics of two plans (a bare bones and average plan) that would be offered to all of its residents at two price points, but after all the research they did on what they needed and how much it would cost, they couldn’t find an insurance company to take them up on their proposal.

I agree with your first point though. From both public and private money that goes in, we don’t see enough out. And every country (as far as I know) is guilty of pouring lots of money into basic science research (cure cancer!) and not enough money into quickly getting these new therapies into doctor’s hands. That was another thing Obama wanted to address. I’m afraid he’s going to blow his ‘mandate’ on this and his good ideas are going to get swamped in the same old debate between the left and right wingers.

My original point in this subthread, though, was that I thought Obama was bringing a new plan to the table. This seems remarkably like the same old stuff. Hopefully it will prove to be more than that as more details come out…

In the 1920s, the American Medical Association changed to the model of US health care. Where before doctors had been trained in a much more anecdotal fashion, the AMA changed training of doctors to a system that was based off of the scientific method. That decision lead to more money being poured into basic science research that had health correlations and to US doctors getting much more scientific training. It lead to better health care, new cures, and a golden age of medicine (not my phrase) that ended sometime in the 1980s. Up until then, the idea was that if we kept pouring money into research, we could find a cure for anything. As the ‘easy’ cures were found, this seemed true. Then, people started realizing that how that care and new medicine was delivered mattered, not just that new therapies were developed. But the US still runs off this basic model; pour money into medicine, you will be rewarded with new cures and thus, better health. Unfortunately, there has been a disconnect in that last step. Obama has said he would like to address this, both through the government health care plan, but also with new institutes at the NIH dedicated to evaluating current treatments and to speeding the delivery of new treatments to the public.

While Europe does support research, it does not do it to the degree that we do. I personally attribute it to there being a much older society that is less likely to challenge certain norms. In other words, an American is much more likely to think that cancer can be cured than a European. Obviously, these are generalizations between a population of 300 million and 500 million, so there are exceptions to everything. Americans can be singly focused on a task, often to the exclusion of other things, that can be one of greatest strengths. We work more hours than any Western country, take less vacation, sleep less, eat worse, etc.

That was a lot of talking to say this: The difference between an American’s view on death (something to fight) and a European’s view on death (a part of life) is a reflection in the differences of how each looks at life, and the goals of it.

We are obviously not doing a good enough job in providing health care to the lower income groups in our society. This is why I voted for Obama, because I thought he had a better, more comprehensive, but feasible plan.

But the issues you are talking about are more complicated than that. Europeans have been living healthier lifestyles than us for a while (outside of smoking) and has consistently showed up in things like average life span. But we are making progress here. A recent report came out that showed a decrease in 9 of the top 10 causes of death in American over the past 5 years and increase the average lifespan. Most of the changes are attributed to more emphasis being placed on preventive medicine and better (implemented) screening measures.

My point wasn’t to say that Europeans are comfortable or happy with dying. My point was that they are more comfortable with not going to the extreme measures that we do here, that have resulted in us pushing the boundaries into new, better, and more expensive medicine. I think that given the choice between paying increased taxes for good health care access, increased premiums for good health care access, or worse health care access, Americans won’t choose the last choice. I could be wrong, though.

Also, don’t discount the advances that we have made in the US that have since gone out to the world to improve their health.

I did not intend to put it all on the “Mexicans”. I was broadly addressing the poster’s statement that this was some attempt to curb illegal immigration from Mexico.

There are far too many citizens and non-citizens that don’t pay their taxes, and the people who pay them under the table are avoiding the taxation.

For the state of Texas, property and sales tax make up the majority of revenues, and these taxes are far more difficult to avoid than income tax because the businesses are responsible for the payment of these taxes. We do have the federal income tax, which is what funds the policies we’re discussing – federal policies.

Even at the state level, a portion of the funding for infrastructure and services come from government grants. Look at Boston’s “Big Dig” — 80% paid for by federal taxation, 20% paid for by Massachusetts.

Anyone in the US that skimmed their taxes by not reporting tips, getting paid under the table, or claiming false deductions put a higher bill on everyone elses plate for this.

I sincerely apologize for seeming to target the Mexican immigrants as that post does come off as highly racist in hindsight.

They also don’t get any of the benefit of those taxes, since they are not eligible for SS.

but what exactly is so complex about the whole process?

For Congress to PASS any bills to appropriate OR spend money, they have to go through the President (or be overridden by the veto).

Because of this the President has a lot of power to influence what gets passed and what doesn’t.

I don’t understand what’s so confusing about that point.

R