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[sluissa]

In which state do you live sluissa?

Florida

[smjjames]

Yeah, the republicans have been trying to completely repeal (and then some) Obamacare ever since it got implemented :/

[mainiac]

and if I had to pay a hefty premium, plus a $3000 deductible for every hospital visit, I'd seriously consider not taking the damn insurance and paying the doctor out of pocket. At the present prices, it would probably be cheaper in most instances.

1) You are conflating deductibles and copays
2) Copays are one of the things that the ACA regulated
3) It would not in fact be cheaper because the payment structure has been FUBAR for so long.  The problems with healthcare in the US aren't just that it's a private system which is non ideal. It's a private system and there are a bunch of problems on top of that.

and certain liberals on both sides of the Atlantic (not you, but some) are still refusing to admit the essential faults of your system.

Certain liberals in the US realize the nature of american politics:

In contrast to the way Americans describe their views on social issues, they still by a wide margin, 39% to 19%, describe their views on economic issues as conservative rather than liberal. However, as on social ideology, the gap between conservatives and liberals has been shrinking and is lower today than at any point since 1999, with the 39% saying they are economically conservative the lowest to date.

When only 19% of the country calls themselves economically liberal, you need to be politically realistic about what you can achieve.  It's all well and good to discuss what the perfect system would look like.  But in terms of policy you need to look at realistic steps.

The affordable care act is not just something that could be achieved but something that gets the ball rolling for something more.  Look at student loans for a comparison.  First there were student loans which were private and sucked.  Then the government reguated them to fix the disincentives.  Then the government started underwriting them to remove the uncertainty in the system.  And then Obama came along and pointed out that the government was doing all the work and taking all the risks and all the banks were doing was cashing the checks.  So then the government started cashing the checks.  And voila, the system was fixed.

[sluissa]

Student loans are still one of the most unfair and horribly managed systems out there though. It's hardly fixed and it still incentivizes universities to jack up their prices because the students (who honestly are mostly still kids and shouldn't be making the sorts of lifelong commitments that student loans require) can manage to get the loan for them.

Horrible example maniac...

[RedKing]

Yeah, at the state level, the GOP has done a lot to fuck up the implementation of ACA. Though IMHO, the ACA fucked up from the outset by not aggressively capping rate changes by providers. The whole thing with people's premiums going up is just the industry being greedy as fuck and offsetting their losses on ACA plans by gouging the non-ACA plan members. It's not as if the insurance industry is going broke. In fact, their profits are booming since the ACA came along.

[mainiac]

Student loans are still one of the most unfair and horribly managed systems out there though.

Well blame the socialism if you dont like it.  I still say it's a lot better.

it still incentivizes universities to jack up their prices

Maybe loans shouldn't exist.  But if we are going to accept that loans exist I'd much rather they be underwritten by the government which has motivation to keep them affordable then by banks.

Again, this is blaming the bird in the hand for not being two in the bush.  It would be great if we completely overhauled the university system and made something better.  But you are talking about a massive change that would take years or decades to work out the problems and get buy in for.  The incremental approach got us to the point where Elizabeth Warren can say that students should be paying interest no higher then the banks and it's a simple, concrete idea.  If we wanted to implement the Warren rule it would be very simple, congress would pass one law setting a number and it would be able to go into action overnight.

[smjjames]

Anyway, couple new polls out this morning, two from California (other than Sanders encroaching (GO SANDERS!) on Clinton, not really analyzing that) and two from Pennsylvania.

The republican one is a bit interesting though: http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/polls/franklin-and-marshall-college-24143 with Kasich within the margin of error from Trump, so, he could very well win that state. I looked at 538's pollster rankings and it has a respectable (B+) rating and Pennsylvania is some kind of hybrid winner-take-all because I looked at that Times page and it says wta statewide and then the remaining are allocated or something. However, the delegate tracker targets on 538 show it like it's some sort of hybrid, so, I'm not sure what's up with that.

In any case, it's certainly incentive for Kasich to stay in and he very well could grab a few states in the New England area. This years convention is getting more complicated by the day and with each primary.

[scriver]

Just got visited by some Easter witches.

[smjjames]

Just got visited by some Easter witches.

?

Why are people paying a whole lot of attention to the national one-on-one polls: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/poll-john-kasich-vs-hillary-clinton-221192 ? Such polls really aren't worth much this far out and to me, it seems like the only reason Kasich is winning against Clinton is because he hasn't been vetted or attacked as heavily as Cruz and Trump have. The whole 'taking the high road' can have an effect, but still, theres many factors.

[scriver]

That was supposed to go in the happy thread. Excuse me :v

[RedKing]

Just got visited by some Easter witches.

?

Why are people paying a whole lot of attention to the national one-on-one polls: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/03/poll-john-kasich-vs-hillary-clinton-221192 ? Such polls really aren't worth much this far out and to me, it seems like the only reason Kasich is winning against Clinton is because he hasn't been vetted or attacked as heavily as Cruz and Trump have. The whole 'taking the high road' can have an effect, but still, theres many factors.

Well, if you're John Kasich, you're paying attention to them because you can rightly point out that you're the only Republican who's beating Clinton and Sanders.
If you're Bernie Sanders, you're paying attention to them because they regularly show you beating Republicans (other than Kasich) by a bigger margin than Hillary Clinton.

I wouldn't say they're set in stone, but it's a general "likeability" poll. Kasich is seen as the most likeable Republican candidate, Sanders is the most likeable Democratic candidate.

[mainiac]

The Kasich Clinton poll is probably the closest to a general election poll you can get in the primary.  Clinton and Kasich are both running pretty close to a "generic" candidate for their parties.  Most Cruz/Trump supporters that are going to vote a republican party line ticket when push comes to shove are probably already willing to say they would support Kasich against Clinton right now.  Most Sanders supporters that are going to vote a democratic party line ticket when push comes to shove are probably already willing to say they would support Clinton against Kasich right now.  Kasich has a few unpriced negatives for Clinton to exploit on abortion (his labor positions probably aren't good political hay) but that isn't going to make that not be a race about anything but the fundementals.  I suppose that it is still possible that Trump would drag Kasich down into the pile of shite that is the republican primary.  Clinton will probably have a little rebound when the primary finishes.  Overall the basic story is that a normal election comes down to who swing voters trust on the economy.  Kasich and Clinton are both normal.  Right now the economy is weak but not completely weak so Kasich has the edge but not an overwhelming one.

[RedKing]

Some interesting op-eds starting to sprout up that the primary system is skewed in some ways because it frontloads the Southern states, backloads the West Coast, and sort of scatters the Northeastern and Midwestern states throughout the schedule. This has had a real impact this season because Trump and Clinton both dominated the South, but have had mixed results elsewhere.


I know there have been proposals before to rotate the primary schedule so that each region of the country would get primacy once every few election cycles, but they've been dead-on-arrival so far.

[mainiac]

It's not exactly by design but both parties knew exactly what they were doing when they settled on these primary schedule templates twenty years ago.  For the democrats frontloading the south made sure they would give visibility to politicians that did well with more centrist democrats and democrats who could appeal to black voters.  But it's purely cosmetic, the south doesn't get votes so it's just an optics thing to elevate centrist democrats while still requiring them to run strong in the northeast and west coast where the majority of the delegates are.  The republicans on the other hand gave more visibility to the most ideologically pure wing of their party.  That ensured that the republican candidates would be people who did well with republican base voters.  And it turns out that republican base voters want Trump.

[BFEL]

Yeah, the republicans have been trying to completely repeal (and then some) Obamacare ever since it got implemented :/

Good riddance.
My mom lost the health insurance she had because of Obamacare and all the ones she was offered had stupid 1000 dollar deductibles.