Audley Strange wrote:Seth wrote:Audley Strange wrote:
Wiki disagrees.
So?
So there exists a larger more consensual perception of HMO's in this causality's historical narrative than the one you describe. Thus I assume you cannot prove that wrong. Since I worked in the Health Service (yes I too was a Marxistdronebot of doom

) I learned a small bit about Health Insurance, since I also have A Chartered Insurance Certification, I learned a larger bit about Health Insurance. Since I worked in Corporate Insurance and specifically claims, I can vouch that their version of HMO's in the narrative along with the obvious statements and behaviours of those companies matches mine and yours does not. This is private businesses using influence in government to make insurance mandatory in order to consolidate profit, it is fraud with force. They do it here.
I actually fully agree with you here. As I said, the industry was happy to both be complicit in setting up the system and getting protected by government for their own profit. That's why I deny them that profit by not using them. But the MOTIVATION behind it was based in Marxist dogma. It was the notion that everybody ought to be able to get the same health care perks that executives were getting, out of a sense of "fairness" that drove the entire program, and it was clearly one of a number of steps in the long, slow, corrosive Marxist plan to carve away the foundations of individual liberty this nation was founded upon. It so happens that both the Progressive agenda and the Marxist agenda aligned in this respect (as it has in many others for reasons I'll explain) so they became odd bedfellows with the same short-term objective but different long-term objectives...sort of.
Progressivism as founded by T. Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson and their ilk is the notion that the public doesn't really know what's best for them, and that they need to be lead by a strong leader and managed by a "scientific" bureaucracy made up of putatively non-partisan bureaucrats and minions who use science, reason and logic to regulate rather than either the consent of the governed or their desires as expressed through democratic decision making. Progressives see the proletariat as simply incapable of ruling themselves, and they tried to rename monarchy, oligarchy and other forms of tyrannical rule as "Progressivism" by substituting "science" and "reason" for deistic or hereditary privilege.
Progressivism as announced by it's prime mover, Woodrow Wilson, looks much like British monarchy and the parliamentary process, of which Wilson was greatly enamored. His vision was that the President, who is elected by the people, is both closet to understanding the will of the people and best qualified (presumably merely because he was popular enough to be elected) to RULE the country with the help of unelected ministers and bureaucrats who would have all but unlimited power to make law and regulate as they saw fit (under the general guidance of the President) because they are presumptively smarter and more able to make proper management decisions than the democratic majority...or anybody else. Congress was to take the form of a debating society in which elected representatives argued general policy, and perhaps voted on what to ADVISE the President to do, but which would actually have little or no power to command the President to do or not do anything.
It would be up to the President, as advised by his "scientific experts" (ministers and minions) to actually make the laws and regulations to supposedly reflect the will of the people, first as understood by the President, and tertiarily as suggested by Congress.
In other words, Progressivism is fundamentally dictatorial tyranny with a load of makeup pasted on it to make it look like it's "scientific" (kind of like Hitler's "scientific" determinations of the animalism of Jews) and therefore superior to outright dictatorial despotism.
In point of fact, Adolph Hitler was a great admirer of Woodrow Wilson and the Progressive platform and he actually modeled much of his regime on the fundamental ideals of Progressivism.
In short, Progressivism is a political philosophy that says that the Executive Branch should be the supreme authority of the State, that the Judicial Branch should be limited to supporting and facilitating whatever the Executive Branch decides is best for the nation, and that the Legislative Branch become nothing more than a debating society which gives recommendations to the Executive that are in no way binding on the President, who runs everything.
Where Marxism comes into this is first that Marxism inherently believes that until (in philosophical Marxism) the culture, thinking and practices of the proletariat have been molded into the utopian "stateless" and "classless" society of theoretical Communism, it is necessary, as an interim part of the evolution of the Communist state that the proletariat be closely supervised and managed while they are being generationally indoctrinated and educated into the proper Communist behavior. This is where Socialism comes in. Socialism is just one stage in the theoretical process, but because of human nature socialism always requires (again theoretically) a period of adjustment wherein the elite class of Marxist True Believers exercise strict control over the people and the economy in order to properly train the proletariat to be successful Communists. This is called State Socialism, and it is characterized by political, economic and social control being centralized in an elite group "chosen" for their skill and ability to manage the necessary social indoctrination and central planning that will, theoretically, move the culture in the desired direction...by force if necessary.
That's what Stalin's gulags were all about. They were set up to remove malcontents and "counterrevolutionaries" from the general population and "reeducate" them into proper Communist thinking and behavior. In theory. In reality they were simply places to dump and eventually liquidate counterrevolutionaries. Mao was somewhat less obtuse and simply shot counterrevolutionaries in the back of the head, like Pol Pot did.
State Socialism however is where attempts at theoretical Communism ALWAYS inevitably come to a grinding halt. Because once the Marxist elite attain power and control, they, like any other despots, are loathe to give it up and will always find excuses to defy the "democratic" will of the people and cling to power, largely by eliminating their enemies. Thus the gulags, thus the Ukrainian Holomodor of 1932-33, thus the Killing Fields of the Khymer Rouge, etc..
I won't go into how and why ALL socialist societies are State Socialism either in practice or in waiting just now.
The point is that particularly in the US, where the Marxists (lead by the Frankfurt School) learned that revolution was not possible and that long-term (and I mean centuries) reeducation of the children was the only way to attain the Marxist goal of...whatever they think the goal is. They're a bit squishy on the end-state goals. But the problem is that where their plan is headed is inevitably to State Socialism, central planning, and Marxist tyranny, which again is where ALL forms of socialism eventually end up...sooner or later.
The reason that I call Obama a "Marxist Progressive" is because he is adhering to BOTH political agendas at the same time because the Progressive agenda dovetails very nicely with the Marxist State Socialism agenda right up to the point where the President has to step down and cede power to a new elected President, who then has the individual power to reverse everything that the prior President has done...if the new President deems that the winds of public opinion have changed.
So Marxists are using Progressives as useful idiots and political puppets and are manipulating Progressivism in order to achieve the thing that both Progressivism and Marxism require to move to the final stage: total control by the Executive Branch. It's perfectly obvious that this is exactly what Obama is doing to anyone with a modicum of understanding of either Progressivism or Marxism, with his stated intent to simply bypass Congress and do what he wants administratively through his power over regulatory agencies, to whom Congress, in a long-term slide into Progressivism, have ceded their constitutionally-mandated duty, power and authority to make law.
What Obama and his covert Marxist supporters and minions are working towards is achieving the Progressive Administrative State where all the power of control lies with the President. At that point it's a simple matter to strike the Progressive banner and the Stars and Stripes and raise the Hammer and Sickle because the basic goal and requirement of State Socialism has been achieved under the guise of Progressivism: total centralized control vested in the Executive branch.
And THAT is why Marxists and Progressives are so very dangerous to our liberty and freedom.
Your narrative claims it was an attempt at Marxism, well if by Marxism you mean the redistribution of wealth from the many to the few, you are correct. It may have been sold to Marxist Dupes as a good idea, but it was all about consolidating profit, not some beneficial socialist idea. THAT would have been a national health service.
Wrong. It's all about a PROCESS of centralizing power and control. Like Weimar Germany, the objective is to dangle profits in front of private business to get them to go along with government assumption of power and control. But once that power and control is consolidated in the Executive, it's easy just to "nationalize" the private industry and continue with the real objective: State Socialism.
Hitler did this exact thing.
Obama is doing it right now.
Anyone who knows anything about economics can see that, as Harry Reid inadvertently let slip, Obamacare is just a stepping stone to "single payer" health care...which is socialized medicine.
What will happen is that private industry will be burdened with regulations mandating all sorts of treatments that they must provide by law. This will force the industry to either raise premiums or go out of business, either of which is fine with the Marxist in Chief. If they go bankrupt, good, there's fewer companies to manage. And when they raise premiums out of the reach of "Joe Average Laborer" why then the Marxists will agitate for nationalizing health care because rapacious insurance companies are predating on the "middle class" by making premiums so high. And that will be that. Objective achieved.
It's not really all that complex a conspiracy. And the insurance industry is going along with it because at the moment they have no choice. It's either make a profit until socialized medicine comes along or be put out of business right now. That's the carrot and stick that Obamacare wields.
But the end game is perfectly clear to anyone who cares to actually examine the facts.
Seth wrote:
Pointing to Nixon is not exactly a good way to pin anything on Republicanism. You do remember that he was a crook and was driven from office, right? Besides, I'm no great fan of Republicans either, as many of them are themselves Progressives. George Bush the Younger was one of the most egregious examples of a RINO Progressive. He presided over the largest expansion of the federal government and it's power in the history of the United States...until Obama came along and easily bested him.
Yes I am aware of Nixon's history. Are you claiming that the actions that led to his dismissal are relevant to his policymaking? I will grant you that Bush Jnr did preside over a invasive security state that would have made the Communist Regime proud, but are you claiming that the Republican party and Presidents Ford, Reagan Bush and Bush were actually Frankfurt school Marxists? Does this include Joe McCarthy, does this include the Dominionists? Was Reagan's hard on for Milton Freidman a just a ruse?
Certainly not Reagan, but Nixon, Ford and Bush the Younger were staunch big-government Progressives at heart, if not in name. The thing about Progressives is that they come in all flavors and sizes, and the smart ones only push the Progressive agenda when and where they can get away with it by duping the public into thinking its for their own good. Like the EPA. Nothing the EPA does could not be done by the states working together if they wanted to. Centralizing power over the "environment" in Washington was a Progressive move towards "scientific executive management" of the nation.
The consent of the governed is given by voting.
Seth wrote:
Most times yes. But the consent of the governed is also explicitly stated in the Constitution itself, which is a charter of restrictions on what government is permitted to do. And the 13th Amendment says neither the government nor anybody else can force anyone other than a prisoner duly convicted of a crime into involuntary servitude. And if being forced to work and turn over my money for redistribution to other people isn't involuntary servitude I don't know what is. It's functionally no different from sending me to Siberia to build the Road of Bones.
Yes you've said as much before and I still think you are mistaken since you are not forced to work, thus your servility is that of your own choosing. By choosing to work you choose to take part in the system with its laws and taxations (some of which is being taken directly from you and given to plutocrats). you can always choose not to play the game. There is no coercion or compulsion.
Wrong. I'm not forced to work, but I am forced to turn over a portion of what I earn to redistributive taxation. I have a RIGHT to work, and a RIGHT to profit from that work. The government does not give me permission to work as a perquisite of citizenship that they could base a claim upon my labor upon. My labor belongs to me, completely. I am obliged to pay for those government services and benefits I enjoy or use, that's the reason that "consumptive" taxes are acceptable even in Libertarianism (to some extent).
But redistributionary taxation is nothing other than the collective claiming dominion over the labor and property of the individual by saying "if you work, you owe X percent to the collective." But there is no basis in our Constitution for such an assumption, and indeed the document was written to DENY that assumption on the part of King George, who levied irrational and confiscatory taxes on the Colonies all the time. It doesn't really matter what the stated purpose of a tax is, if it's PRACTICAL EFFECT is to seize the property (and therefore the labor) of one individual and transfer it more or less directly to another individual or individuals for their benefit when doing so does not pay for some benefit that the payer has enjoyed from government, like a road or a bridge or fire protection, then that "taking" is redistributive and, in my view, entirely unconstitutional for previously mentioned reasons of involuntary servitude.
You have quibbled in saying that no one is forced to work, but that's not really true. People who DO work, and nearly everyone MUST work in order to survive, have the right to enjoy the fruits of their labor...even Marx said that...and before anyone can take those fruits from them they have to have a legitimate, moral and ethical reason to do so, otherwise it's just theft...the initiation of force and fraud simply because the government is the biggest and best-armed bully in the 'hood.
So I don't buy the evil Marxists did this.
Seth wrote:
But they did, in cahoots with the Progressives. Go read up on the Frankfurt School. What the Marxists in the US realized is that they could never accomplish it by revolution in the US, instead they would have to take the long view and infiltrate the government, but mostly the educational system, in order to change the way children were taught to think. And it's been going on for a hundred years and it's working pretty well precisely because people are being slowly boiled alive rather than dumped in the fire. The good news is that Obama appears to have badly overstepped and tipped the Marxist Progressive hand too soon and people are waking up to what he and his ilk have been trying to do, and they are rejecting it. Time will tell though.
I have heard this exact argument many times before, from Alex Jones, only he blames whomever is his chosen boogeyman of the week, Frankfurt School, Trilateral commission, Unicef, Alien space lizard illuminati working with Chicago School ninjas. These long game fringe narratives are entertaining and of course there is of course a kernel of truth to them, which is what makes them so potent but the ideation between the links of these narratives are not borne out by perception only by supporting narratives. Critical pedagogy is a dangerous idea I will grant you. However that only works in a functioning public school system and by all accounts that's failing in the U.S. too.
Ad Hominem Tu Quoque fallacy.
I agree it is a perversion of the Free Market Economy, but then I'd put it to you that it comes from the Right, especially plutocrats who are happy that the government is forcing businesses (and now individuals) into purchasing health insurance, because it was profitable for THEM.
Seth wrote:
Oh I don't disagree at all that the insurance industry was not in collusion with and complicit in all this. They made a devil's bargain with the Progressives, just like Krupp Steel and other large industries in Weimar Germany made with Hitler, who told them "I'm a socialist, but as long as you toe the party line and support my regime, you will be allowed the privilege of profiting from your labor. If you don't cooperate however, I'm going to stand you all up against a wall, shoot you, and nationalize everything."
I think you are hitting close to a revelation about what type of "Marxists" these "Marxists" you keep talking about in U.S. politics actually are and no it's not Nazis.
I didn't say they were, but you do know what "NAZI" stands for, right?
The insurance industry leaped at the chance to obtain government monopoly protection for their new "HMO" scam.
That doesn't mean it was the right thing to do, nor does collusion between big business and government axiomatically mean the programs and purposes emanate from the right. Clearly they don't, they emanate from a witch's brew of Marxism, socialism and Progressivism.
Well no it doesn't axiomatically mean that, but more often than not it does.
Fallacious appeal to common practice.
The "bail-out" was Marxism in action was it?
Absolutely. Marxist Progressivism to be exact.
Actually scratch that, I'd imagine you'd think that the case, since it couldn't possibly be about keeping plutocratic allies afloat but rather keeping an unnecessary workforce employed? Is that how you would frame it?
Do you think the "bailout" of General Motors was about keeping plutocratic allies afloat or about keeping an unnecessary workforce employed? Here's a clue: National Auto Worker's Union.
You don't seem to understand that the "Bailout" is about BOTH Marxism and Progressivism, at the same time. Each individual bailout had a different short term purpose, but the ultimate long-term purpose assists both Marxism and Progressivism, but in slightly different ways. It's pretty complex how it's all been planned out, but the Progressives have had a hundred years to do it, and the Marxists have been duping the Progressives that whole time.
Anyway, the original point was that your narrative on HMO's is at odds with both the historical consensus, the words of those who were involved and my own experience. Prove me wrong.
Sometimes you can't see the forest for the trees. It's hard to see the complex nature of the conspiracy from the inside. You have to step outside of your own preconceptions and biases to see the big picture and discern the truth.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
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