From: mccall@mksol.dseg.ti.com (fred j mccall 575-3539)
Subject: Re: Clinton's Economic Plan
Organization: Texas Instruments Inc
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 17:42:54 GMT

In <fjQBr*+V0@caleb.UUCP> jdp@caleb.UUCP (Jim Pritchett) writes:

>In article <1992Aug31.091852.19872@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca>, Gerald Olchowy writes:

>You have some really strange ideas here.  I agree that there ought to be health
>care reform.  The quickest and best way to reduce health care costs is to do these
>things:

>  1.  Eliminate insurance.  No one cares what anything costs (on either side)
>      because "someone else is paying for it."

Gee, either you have relatives who are doctors or you're independently
wealthy.  If neither of those things, do YOU have health insurance?
If not, one almost hopes for a catastrophic illness so you can see how
well "without insurance" coupled with "without funds" and "sick" works
for you.

>  2.  Severely restrict extravagant malpractice awards.  I think that malpractice
>      should require compensation, but not the wildly extravagant jury awards of
>      recent memory.  These awards drive up costs which must be passed on to the
>      patients.

If you follow through on your first one, this won't be a problem.  One
malpractice suit will wipe out the doctor, and we won't have very many
people willing to practice medicine.

>  3.  Eliminate "no-fault" malpractice suits.  (e.g.  x percent of babies are
>      born with yyzzy syndrome.  Even though the doctor did nothing wrong, he
>      is sued for megabucks because there is a "bad baby."  In these cases, the
>      doctor has about a 50-50 chance of losing the suit even though he was not
>      at fault.)

Neat trick.  How do you propose to do this, since at no point is it
ever assumed that the doctor is not at fault in these suits?  It is
assumed that it IS his fault, which is why money gets paid.


>> 
>> >  What about your other programs?
>> >
>> >[SW]
>> >  I'm going the make the rich pay for them.
>> >
>> >[Press]
>> >  What was that again?  If you take all the assets of the "rich" it won't be
>> >  enough money (and there won't be many jobs left, either.)
>> >
>> 
>> Marginally better than Bush's plan which is "I'm going to borrow the
>> money to pay for them".

>How, is it better?  "Taxing the rich" is equivalent to "let's get more people
>laid off."

Lay 'em off now or lay 'em off later.  Rather like the decision on
whether to change the oil in your car or not.  "Pay me now, or pay me
later . . ."

>> >[SW]
>> >  Oh, we'll take it out of the 'peace dividend' and spend it on...
>> >
>> >[Press]
>> >  What about the defense workers who will be unemployed?
>> >
>> >[SW]
>> >  Oh, we'll spend it on retraining.
>> >
>> 
>> Defense is going to be downsized...if you were a soon to be unemployed
>> defense worker, whom exactly would you trust to deliver a training
>> program.  The concerned of the worker isn't exactly how the program

>I am already a laid off defense worker.  I choose President Bush.  You ask
>me to trust a man like Slick Willie who lies almost continuously?  One of the
>few things that he is telling the truth about is the fact that he WANTS to raise
>taxes.  That is supposed to make me trust him?  He has already disavowed his
>promise to cut middle class taxes.

If you're already a laid off defense worker, then how in the world do
you expect Clinton to do WORSE by you than George Bush did?

>Look at this guy.  He was AGAINST Operation Desert Storm.  Now he claims that he
>was somehow neutral, but he understands why some were against it.  Then he has
>the GALL to say that if he was President, he would have given General Schwarzkopf
>another day to "get Saddam."  How stupid does he think the public is?!?!?!?

Judging by your knee-jerk adherence to the Republicans?  Pretty stupid.

>> is going to be paid for (Bush lies on the issue, at least Clinton is

>You have no evidence that Bush lied.  He did break his promise, but that is after
>the fact, and under coercion from the House.  For Bush to have lied, he would have
>had to intend to raise taxes when he said it.

Gee, another new definition for a word.  It's not a lie to make a
promise and break it.

>By the way, what about Slick Willies promise to his wife when they got married?
>Why should I trust a man that can't even be trusted to be faithful to his own wife?

Why shouldn't you?  I mean, you're not talking about moving in with
him as his spouse, are you?  Personally, I don't care if he has group
sex with sheep; I don't see how that's germane to whether he can be
trusted in other areas.  Perhaps you should make up a list of
Presidents who have had extramarital affairs or who are rumoured to
have had them, and then see how you come out.

Let me help you get started:  George Bush, Lyndon Johnson, John
Kennedy, Franklin Roosevelt.  You can add from there.

Besides which, if his wife doesn't have a problem with it, why should
you?  SHE, not you, is the one affected, after all.  

>Tsongas was as bad as Slick Willie.

Jim, you have GOT to be on some really heavy drugs.  It's the only
explanation for this kind of reasoning (or lack of it).

-- 
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred.McCall@dseg.ti.com - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton