John Green

[Imoutgoodbye]

I use this guys history videos in my tutoring of kids from the local schools...seems to get them really interested in world history.

I also watch some of his other videos, such as this one on health care:

https://www.upworthy.com/his-first-4-sentences-are-interesting-the-5th-blew-my-mind-and-made-me-a-little-sick-2?c=bl3

[inscribed]

I saw this earlier. While I don't really disagree with his facts, I do disagree with his single proposed solution to the problem. I agree with this well-written comment from his webpage:

The facts may be correct; his interpretation is loudly stated but twisted by an unconsidered and concerning ideology. He suggests that we (who is WE?–the US government? America? Americans as a big smushy group??) anyhow, WE could save money if (for example) the government picked out the cheapest (while also best?) hip replacement for everyone: a one size fits all cheap solution.. Do you want Obama (or McCain or Romney) picking out what hip is best for YOU? What if what is best for you is not the same as best for the average person in America on which Obama bases his decision. Or worse, what if the hip that is best for you is not the one manufactured by the company owned by a big political donor to Obama’s campaign (which gets the contract from the government)?

John Green is absolutely correct that “We” don’t negotiate for better deals, and we don’t because we all have third party payers in between us and the source of the health care. This is known as MORAL HAZARD, and it is the overwhelming reason why the prices we pay are so high. The third party payers are stuck between us (who want them to pay more), the doctors (who want them to pay more) and their own survival and profitability (which compels them to pay less) and the government (which compels them to cover everything). It is a total mess.

The reason health care costs are so high is only one thing: 1) we as individuals (not the government!!) but WE as individuals don’t get off our butts (in advance preferably) to seek out the best deals. We should not be paying $124 for a month of pills, instead paying $7 for a month of pills, but it doesn’t bother us if AETNA pays it for us, does it? So we don’t care!! That is it. That is the reason… There need be no other.

We don’t have a free market here and the government does not yet have full control (price controls, supply controls, regulatory limits, etc). Other countries don’t have a free market, but they have full centralized control of that market and therefore have lower costs (and of course collectivization of outcomes). We have the a horribly dysfunctional hybrid system here in the US. No free market; incomplete government control.

Outcomes elsewhere in the world are better ON AVERAGE than our outcomes, perhaps.. But this is not a race of America vs Australia. This is not a race at all. This is: how can I get the best care for the money, as ME, the individual? Our system has removed the individual from the financial decision, but left him making the medical decisions. Other countries remove the individual from the financial decisions AND remove him from his medical decisions. and that is why their health care costs less.

The answer to save money is either to go socialist and give the political class control of your health care, or go free market and give yourself control of your health care. The hybrid we have now is totally stupid and ridiculously expensive.

Obviously, I have ZERO interest in giving the political class control of my health care, because I don’t think they really care enough about me to get to know me well enough to decide what is best for me. Even if they did get to know me well, they are so stuck in their collectivist GROUPTHING, that I don’t think the political class is capable of thinking that people are indeed individuals, need individual consideration and that the individuals themselves are in the best place to make their own decisions for themselves. So I want free market. I want the unfettered free market. No subsidization of the moral hazard of health insurance. No price controls by Medicare. No restrictions that only MD’s can provide health care (I am an MD). Get the couterproductive government the heck out of our way. That is the American Way, and what made us great as a nation. Sadly, what we are doing now is the “United States Government” way, a.k.a. the “fascist way” of government collusion with corporations and groups at the sacrifice of the individual.

John Green recognizes the problem of why costs are high, but his one proposed example of a solution is to let the government negotiate for the best cheapest deal and obtain all hip replacement widgets from one company is a method of cost control would certainly be approved by fascists. But it is an absolutely horrendous concept to the people of a nation that respects liberty and individuality.

John Green, there are great ways to save money and lower our ridiculously high costs. But giving more power to government sociopaths (the same ones who set up the NSA and want to bomb Syria) is the way of force and fraud and fascism. I suggest we try the other way: the way of freedom, liberty, respect for the individual, and optimization of individual health, based on the individual’s prioritizations and the individuals moralities.

Please read “Assume the Physician”. It is full of laughs and satire and fun and it will provide so much help to the people who want to solve health care cost problems, but also like to make their own choices. LAUGH AND LEARN at the same time!!

edit: source

[Imoutgoodbye]

OMG! Liberty and individualism, because if you don't you're a FASCIST.

Let me know when you find something that isn't so ridiculous.

Deconstruction of the word "we" as if this isn't a national problem (because it is, therefore an individual cannot solve this issue, it is one that is being addressed globally, as in health care will also eventually become a globalization issue) is false.

Honestly, I don't need to read the whole thing as I know it's coming from someone biased. John Green, however, is as close to non-partisan as it can get, promoting critical thinking and OFFERING an EXAMPLE of a solution.

Also, the idea that John Hunt, M.D. puts forth, that it will hurt individual choice is false. What John Green proposes merely puts forth a market damper that will give one company the ability to mass produce a specific brand. Doesn't mean the others have to stop. Individual choice will not go away. Plus, if it increases, it will be minimal. A monopoly will not happen as people often think it will. Because in Amerika, we want to be individual.

I bite my thumb at John Hunt, M.D., and his biased rant, sir, but I do not bite my thumb at you. I simply bite my thumb.