[QUOTE=rogue;140648] The article also stated that 30% of the spending is on unnecessary tests and procedures.

[/QUOTE]

Driven by a CYA attitude that is caused by malpractice suits.

[QUOTE]
Are you saying that people who want malpractice insurance should buy it is a type of "umbrella" policy? That's an intriguing thought, but how could you hold the doctors/hospitals responsible for their mistakes?

[/QUOTE]

You [b]DON'T[/b]. We buy auto insurance to protect against the mistakes
of other drivers. . We would buy medical insurance for
the same reason: Protect against medical error.

Now, a doctor might still get his/her license revoked because of error.
But that is not a monetary issue.

[QUOTE=S485122;140653] Try getting health insurance if you have a history of diabetes for instance...

Jacob[/QUOTE]


:smile::smile: I have both........ :smile::smile:

[QUOTE=masser;140654]McCain must have a thing for beauty queens...[/QUOTE]
Even I must grudgingly admit that in the Great Campaign 2008 Arm-Candy Debate, McCain would appear to have an insurmountable lead. A tall, totally hot conservative babe on each of those abnormally short li'l arms of his ... must be the whole renegade/flyboy thing at work there ... as the one girl said in [i]An Officer and Gentleman[/i], "I wanna marry me a [B]naval avee-a-tor...[/B]"

[QUOTE=R.D. Silverman;140655]Driven by a CYA attitude that is caused by malpractice suits.[/QUOTE]

Maybe, but I don't know how much of the CYA attitude is strictly to reduce malpractice. I suspect a lot of it is due to doctors who are inexperienced, lazy, or have too much pride to send a patient to another doctor.

[QUOTE=R.D. Silverman;140655]You [b]DON'T[/b]. We buy auto insurance to protect against the mistakes of other drivers. We would buy medical insurance for the same reason: Protect against medical error.[/QUOTE]

I don't agree with you analogy. I buy auto insurance not just to protect against the mistakes of others, but to protect others from my mistakes. If the doctor/hospital doesn't have to pay for the mistakes, what incentive is there to address them?

Instead of bogging down this thread with this side discussion, maybe this topic should be continued in a new thread.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;140659]Even I must grudgingly admit that in the Great Campaign 2008 Arm-Candy Debate, McCain would appear to have an insurmountable lead. A tall, totally hot conservative babe on each of those abnormally short li'l arms of his ... must be the whole renegade/flyboy thing at work there ... as the one girl said in [i]An Officer and Gentleman[/i], "I wanna marry me a [B]naval avee-a-tor...[/B]"[/QUOTE]


Palin's daughter is [b]also[/b] a hot looking piece. With [i][Ed. - crass term for "large, well-rounded mammalian protuberances"][/i].
No wonder the bimbo got knocked up.

I don't want to put too much of the blame on the daughter - 17-year-olds getting pregnant is a quite common occurrence. And as you say, she's certainly the type who will attract notice from the male of the species.

Again, this speaks more to Ma Palin's hypocrisy. Hah, I'll bet by way of not-educating-about-that-dirty-but-necessary-deed-of-which-we-do-not-speak, the Palin parents came up with a fake name for "having sex". So when one of their kids walks in on them having sex and asks, "Mommy, what are you and Daddy doing?", they just answer, "We're doing Bible Study, sweetie - now go back to bed." Alas, this ruse ended up backfiring when in an unguarded moment, Ms. Palin, wanting to get her eldest daughter and her boyfriend out of the house so she could have some peace and quiet, told them, "Why don't y'all just run along and do some Bible Study or something..."


BTW, this snip from the ADN article I linked is just so deliciously telling:
[quote]The Alaska governor campaigned in 2006 on a build-the-bridge platform, telling Ketchikan residents she felt their pain when politicians called them "nowhere." They're still feeling pain today in Ketchikan, [b]over Palin's subsequent decision to use the bridge funds for other projects[/b] -- and over the timing of her announcement, which they say came in a pre-dawn press release that seemed aimed at national news deadlines.

"I think that's when the campaign for national office began," said Ketchikan Mayor Bob Weinstein on Saturday.
[b]
Meanwhile, Weinstein noted, the state is continuing to build a road on Gravina Island to an empty beach where the bridge would have gone -- because federal money for the access road, unlike the bridge money, would have otherwise been returned to the federal government.
[/b]
It's a more complicated picture than the one drawn by McCain, a persistent critic of special-interest spending and congressional earmarks. He described Palin as "someone who's stopped government from wasting taxpayers' money on things they don't want or need."[/quote]
That's right, mustn't have that taxpayer money actually being returned - better to put it to use "providing good-paying construction jobs", even if those jobs are used on a completely useless road-to-meet-the-never-to-be-built-bridge-to-nowhere.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;140675]


<snip>
That's right, mustn't have that taxpayer money actually being returned - better to put it to use "providing good-paying construction jobs", even if those jobs are used on a completely useless road-to-meet-the-never-to-be-built-bridge-to-nowhere.[/QUOTE]


Yep. Better to waste the money than to (say) <gasp!> use it to pay
down the debt..........

[QUOTE=ewmayer;140675]I don't want to put too much of the blame on the daughter - 17-year-olds getting pregnant is a quite common occurrence. And as you say, she's certainly the type who will attract notice from the male of the species.

.[/QUOTE]

An Interesting Question....

By becoming a VP candidate, Palin has [b]forced[/b] her entire family into
the public eye.

Suppose you were a teenager who didn't [b]WANT[/b] public exposure;
especially exposure of something like a pregnancy. Sure, sure, it is
already known to a number of people. But is has not been dragged
into the national spotlight.

Could you sue your parent to prevent it??? What if it were your spouse
who didn't want it? I could easily see a kid getting mad at her parent
for outting her like that. If *I* were that kid, I'd get revenge by revealing
every dirty rotten secret that I could about the parent who betrayed
my private life..........And I do view it as a betrayal by Palin of her
daughter's privacy.....

[QUOTE=R.D. Silverman;140678]An Interesting Question....

By becoming a VP candidate, Palin has [b]forced[/b] her entire family into
the public eye.

Suppose you were a teenager who didn't [b]WANT[/b] public exposure;
especially exposure of something like a pregnancy. Sure, sure, it is
already known to a number of people. But is has not been dragged
into the national spotlight.

Could you sue your parent to prevent it??? What if it were your spouse
who didn't want it? I could easily see a kid getting mad at her parent
for outting her like that. If *I* were that kid, I'd get revenge by revealing
every dirty rotten secret that I could about the parent who betrayed
my private life..........And I do view it as a betrayal by Palin of her
daughter's privacy.....[/QUOTE]

A follow-on. What could a teenager do who didn't want to be first daughter?
Didn't want the scrutiny? Didn't want the secret service following her?
Didn't want the secret service knowing when she was shacked up with
her boyfriend? Or attending a college frat party? Or doing any number of
things that college kids hide from their parents? Look what happened
to Bushie's daughters when they did something every college kid does:
drinking etc. etc.

[QUOTE=Zeta-Flux;140647]Bigotry and hypocrisy. Hypocrisy and bigotry.[/QUOTE]

I have to agree with you here. I didn't respond to the original post because of the source. Bob has a history of hateful posts.

Now Ernst has joined the chorus. Neither has any idea what or how the Palin's tried to teach their daughter at home. Yet one disobedient 17-year old somehow proves the parents are hypocrites, incompetent parents, irresponsible in their procreation choices, and unfit for office.

Apparently, Bob and Ernst think that anyone on the right who has a teenager that isn't an angel is immoral and unqualified for office. Zeta, you are right, that is nearly as bad as saying Obama should be disqualified because he is black.

In the same vein, bloggers on the left are accusing Sarah Palin of faking her last pregnancy to cover up her daughter's pregnancy. Their evidence - none. Apparently their motto has changed from "innocent until proven guilty" to "guilty of whatever slander we make up simply because we don't like your politics".

Fortunately, Obama has repudiated this loathsome behavior.

[QUOTE=Prime95;140690]I have to agree with you here. I didn't respond to the original post because of the source. Bob has a history of hateful posts.

Now Ernst has joined the chorus. Neither has any idea what or how the Palin's tried to teach their daughter at home. Yet one disobedient 17-year old somehow proves the parents are hypocrites, incompetent parents, irresponsible in their procreation choices, and unfit for office.[/QUOTE]

I merely assumed that they practice at home what they preach in public - if that is not in fact so, that makes them even bigger hypocrites.