patrick.net

Dude this is anything BUT Socialized medicine.

If it were Socialized Medicine healthcare plan, then I would be a stanch Obama supporter right now, and the health plan would have a 85% approval rating. And not one of those CNN Polls that suggests it does, even though it has hardly no support at all.

If it were a Socialized Medicine plan, the biggest backlash Washington would be having from the voting public would be not implementing it immediately.

If it were a Socialized Medicine plan, the only people that would be apposing it, would be ilk of the Rich Elite in our Congress and Senate losing money in the bio Medical sector, they are heavily invested in.

If it were a Socialized medicine Plan, the GOP would have gotten their shit together and scrounged up the biggest, meanest, baddest, hairiest, ugliest Right wing son of a Bitch to run against Obama in 2012.

But as it stands now, the only problem the right really has with the plan, is they didn't pass it, and they don't care for the pre-existing condition clause.
They made a ton of fucking money off Obama care so they phoned in Mitt Romney, and set up a fake do nothing Super Pac to oppose Obama, because they can't really be bothered with campaigning against him. Not while they've got these super massive piles of cash to count.

Nope. It's corporatism. While that ends in "ism" like socialism or capitalism the three are rather different.

With socialist health care like the UK's NHS the government provides your insurance, builds the hospitals, hires the doctors, and pays for their pensions. To repeat myself the government provides your insurance which is paid for directly with tax revenues. With finite tax revenues to spend the government tries to limit the costs.

Under Obamacare you'll buy your insurance from a for-profit insurer (although it might be marketed through a not-for-profit exchange), pay a penalty to the government for not buying private companies' products, and have your payments to such companies supplemented if you don't make enough money. The government has placed no bounds on how much that insurance will cost (although the insurance companies can only keep 20% of what they collect in premiums) and actually took measures to increase the price tag like no longer allowing those of us over 30 to buy inexpensive catastrophic plans.

That's corporatism.

To quote wikipedia on the subject

Corporatism, also known as corporativism, is a system of economic, political, or social organization that involves association of the people of society into corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labor, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common interests

where the corporate group being served is the health insurance industry.

With capitalist health care companies provide insurance, build hospitals, hire doctors, and manage 401ks. They compete amongst themselves and against market alternatives. In such a system the least expensive professional solution for sniffles would be a visit to a nurse. He'd charge you $50 for a half hour of his time like any other professional with a few years' training (mechanic, hair stylist, accountant), give you antibiotics if needed, or refer you to a more expensive doctor if he couldn't handle your situation like when your $100/hour accountant sends you to a $250/hour lawyer.

The astute reader will note that the last time they had minor problems they were seen (briefly) by an actual doctor instead of a nurse, that they paid $20 out of pocket at the doctor's office, gave the pharmacist another $20, and that their health insurance on which some one spent $1200 - $6000 a year took care of the rest of it.

That's because we didn't have capitalist health care - it was already corporatist. The recent changes just make things more favorable for the insurance companies via the expanded customer base and tax dollars directed their way.

Nice long explanation, but the musings on the "capitalist healthcare system" is all hypothetical. The waxing poetic sounds all very nice and dreamy but can you provide any real world examples of this system in action? Where does this dreamland capitalist utopia currently exist where healthcare corporations do not collude with each other to set prices, do not treat people like cattle, do not try to avoid treating people in order to 'maximize profits'...