IN BOLD print........AND i did confirm the validity of this letter thru snopes...I LOVE IT.......snopes.com: Dr. Starner Jones

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"It isn't that liberals are ignorant, it's just that they know so much that isn't so."
- Ronald Reagan

Well the thing is you ALREADY are paying for it. Medicaid is ALREADY a program. So what is the point?

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Mom to Jake, Zach & Meghan
SJCC STREAKS FOOTBALL!!
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Yes Sher your point please let us know. We need and should have better health care for all Americans and I am so for the healthcare reform and sincerely hope and prays it happens. Peace. Catherine

I can't exactly speak for Sher, but I took her point to be we are already supporting ppl like the woman in the story and are concerned that the reform will include just more of the same only on a much bigger scale.

I think everyone is for health care reform. I know I am, but just not the bill that is being proposed.

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Melissa

What I really like is the follow up letter at the bottpm pf the page. Who is this guy to say who deserves health care and who does not?

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

Melissa I do agree with you about alot of people who abuse the system for all they can and literally get away with it, claiming they have nothing but yet they wear better designer clothes then me and you. While I realize there are so many people who clearly deserve to be taken care and truly are penniless and need help. Perhaps if our guidelines were strictly enforced and people did not abuse the system there would be a lesser problems and perhaps just perhaps better healthcare for all and especially those who truly need it so badly. Peace. Catherine

Exactly my thoughts. We need reform of some kind but just not what they are wanting to do.

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Proud to say I haven't shopped at a Wal-Mart since Sept 2003

I completely agree!

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Apparently 'this guy' is someone who is getting reimbursed pennies on the dollar to care for someone who claims to be too poor to participate in the 'regular system', but who obviously has access to enough capital to buy plenty of vanity items. He did not judge her lifestyle; he evaluated the net cost of the things she spends her money on vs. The things she 'needs' but can't seem to afford.

HE is the one who gets shorted when a patient is reimbursed at Medicaid rates.

I still don't think anyone can say who can afford medical care and who can't. I had some things back when I could not afford insurance.

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

I rather my taxes go to help people with medicaid with gold teeth, tattoos, etc. or not than to pay for a war!

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Support bacteria -- it's the only culture some people have!

If Vegetarians eat Vegetables. Do Humanitarians eat Humans?

'Vegetarian' is an old Native American word for bad hunter.

She spends her money on booze and ciggies. She spends our money on emergency medical care, probably for things that are not emergencies.

By my math, she could pay out of pocket for two office visits a month with her ciggie money alone.

susiecat girl I loved loved your comments now that is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. So many republicans are so worried about the cost of a healthcare reform that our current president Obama wants to put into effect. Yet why oh why no worry about all the excess of billions of dollars that have been spent on a war that Bush started. Just think for one moment how all that waste of money could have helped our economy and perhaps the issues of the cost of a healthcare reform would not bother people so much. Thanks Susiecat so much a point I have been trying to convey all along. Marilynk mentioned Clinto while I dearly admired him a president on a personal note I lost that faith with all his personal problems. Yes I know he is human but he also was our President our leader the person we are to trust to run our country.Peace and Amen... Catherine

Catherine, susie's comments are your truth, not necessarily THE truth. There is a difference.

And besides that, the cost of the health care bill is not the only problem with it. Not by far.

There is so much corruption in our health care system and no bill is going to change that. There has to be a better way. We just need to find it.

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Melissa

Agreed, mom.

The war and healthcare are not connected. Spending on one has nothing to do with spending on the other. The war is expensive, but will not, forevermore, fundamentally change our economic structure like the health care bill would have.

I am sorry I have to agree. I guess I am very conservative on this issue. I don't agree with paying for peoples' health care especially when people are not doing the most to keep themselves healthy. As for the war it isn't taxes paying for it. We won't pay for it our grandchildren and their children will. The war is being paid for by a deficit. That basically means we're borrowing the money for it. Think of this way: if you bought a house you couldn't afford and put it on a credit card and made the minimum payments on the credit card but the contract said you had to keep paying after death so instead of an inheritance your kids would have to pay it off at a higher rate than you pay it now.

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The political system is broke and it's a joke.

I guess I just don't get what's so extraordinary about this article that is should take up space on the front page of every newspaper.

He cared for a patient on government assistance that apparently spends money frivolously. O.K.? Is there anyone in America that isn't aware that this sometimes happens? Since when do oversimplified editorials become front page news?

I understand his frustration, but what makes his opinion so important that people are forwarding and posting it around as if it were something groundbreaking?

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

I would guess it's because he's a physician, which some may feel makes him uniquely qualified. *shrugs* I don't know. The healthcare system is broken, and I don't think we've seen anyone in recent history with the answer on how to fix it....

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Mental that one, I'm telling you. ---Ron Weasley, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets"

jen, you may call it oversimplified... but really, I think it's what we need more of.

Behind all the bureaucratic and political mumbo-jumbo are real stories that just aren't that complicated. Young lady has money. Young lady buys bling with her money. Young lady has not planned for her 'needs' and wants a handout when she's sick.

Best quotes I read today:

Margaret Thatcher: "The trouble with Socialism is, sooner or later you run out of other people's money."

"When you subsidize poverty and failure, you get more of both." - James Dale Davidson, National Taxpayers Union

I don't think it can be fixed. Our health system is one of the best in the world. But like I mentioned before, there is so much corruption. What is going to fix that? It come down to personal responsibility.

When I worked at a clinic about 10 years ago Mi. passed a mandate that said if you were on Medicaid and thought you were sick and couldn't get a same day appointment but felt you were really sick enough that you HAD to be seen that day and chose to go to the ER, once you got there the ER was supposed to call your clinic to get a number for you to be seen. This was supposed to cut down on needless ER visits by medicaid recipients. A Dr. was supposed to triage you in a way. Decide whether you were indeed sick enough to be seen in the ER. Yeah, it didn't exactly work that way. After a while, me, the file clerk was asked to just go ahead and give the number whenever the ER called. It just made no sense.

My point. No one follows the rules. People cheat. Medical coders in offices code to get more money, instead of coding for the actual issue. It is so ingrained in the system, it's just gonna take personal responsibility, and that's not gonna happen.

Congress cannot fix health care.

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Melissa

>>>he evaluated the net cost of the things she spends her money on vs. The things she 'needs' but can't seem to afford.<<<

Bingo

Melissa, how did gvt reimbursements compare, $-wise, to private insurance?

Well that's fine for an editorial page, but it's not actually "news" or even new. If it's an issue that concerns people, why not write their own opinion and fill up everybody's inbox with that? (can you tell this has already been sent to me several times?)

I agree that people with the means should be more responsible. But the reaction from people to it. e.g. OMG!! you have to read this!!!!! He's soooo right! EVERYONE needs to see it it!!!!!!!!! Leaves me a bit baffled, it doesn't even contain a workable solution, just an opinion that many others have already expressed time and time again.

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

War kills people. Health care saves people.

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Support bacteria -- it's the only culture some people have!

If Vegetarians eat Vegetables. Do Humanitarians eat Humans?

'Vegetarian' is an old Native American word for bad hunter.

Again susiecat excellent comment simple and right to the truth and to me it is the truth 100 percent... peace. Catherine

Yes, but sometimes war saves more people than it kills. I don't know about our current wars, but past wars (wwII) may have taken a lot of lives, but they saved many more.

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

Unfortunately we pay for that medical care anyway you look at it, whether she's on medicaid or just uninsured. The only option to avoid paying is to turn away emergency patients. Even most doctors that are bothered by the irresponsibility of others would have a hard time sending someone with appendicitis away to die in the alley next to the hospital.

If we enact a bill refusing care for people who don't have insurance or can't/won't pay, we run into a dilemma of deciding in a critical situation who does have insurance. Say a man has a heart attack in the middle of the store, minutes are on the line but he has no insurance card on him. Do medical personnel refuse to treat him until insurance can be verified? Most doctors couldn't ethically or morally do that, even if it were law. He gets treated (at a very high cost), it's later determined that he has no insurance and no means to pay, we all absorb the cost. Then we have to look at the fact that had he been receiving preventative care (at a much lower cost) this might not have ended this way. As distasteful as it may seem to provide routine medical care for those that could probably find a way to pay on their own, we need to find the solution that is most cost effective for those of us footing the bill,

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

My feelings exactly!

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The political system is broke and it's a joke.

That is very true, jen.

I just googled around to see how many people Saddam Hussein killed prior to our invasion of Iraq. If the bottom line question (regardless of the issue as too whether it is appropriate for us to invade another nation) is "How many people end up alive vs.how many people end up dead", consider this.....

My googling left me with these figures: Saddam Hussein was directly responsible for the deaths of 500,000 Iraqis and 800,000 Iranians when he launched a war to take over Iran. It is estimated that he then was responsible for the deaths of over 1,000,000 citizens - men, women, and children - who disagreed with him orwho resisted his control.

By my count, that is 2,300,000+ who died at his hand.

Contrast that with our invasion, during which an estimated 125,000 Iraqis have died (some bad guys, some civillian casualties) and just under 4,800 US soldiers have died.

Based on his history, stopping Saddam will likely have saved more lives than it took to fight this war.

I was against the invasion in Iraq, I thought our efforts should have been focused in Afghanistan and that we were spreading ourselves too thin. Regardless, I was still thrilled when Saddam was caught. Now the question is how many lives will be lost in the turmoil now created. Only time will tell if it was worth it. My hope is that while it may have been a huge risk that I was against, that stability will come to their country, that we won't see someone just as bad or worse take over down the road. Hopefully in hindsight, even with all the criticism we'll be able to look back and know we did the right thing....hopefully, we'll see.

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

Oh I dearly agree Saddam Hussein was a vile evil evil thing not even a man in my personal view. Yes he did kill so many of his own people and yes he needed to die and his sons also and his cohorts. However I still feel this war was not right and never will agree it was . I only sincerely wished there was a way to have him killed without starting a war and sincerely wish for it to be over soon. However my biggest fear is the day we retreat and remove our troops what a true scary feeling to wonder and think about what will happen. Does anyone here offer any thoughts as to what they think will happen when we retreat???. Peace. Catherine

It's really impossible to know whether the Iraq invasion was a good or bad thing at this point. We're all myopic because this is 'our time' in history. As an example, so many atrocities were committed by Europeans when 'we' came 'here' and pushed the Native Americans around. Sure, they did some bad things to us, but by and large we 'conquered' their space and took it.

It doesn't sound like a good thing at all.

But had we not... this country that you dearly love, Catherine, would not exist.

In the end, over time, it usually works out. Usually. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work out when there is such a deeply ingrained mindset within a nation that is holding them back... whether the mindset has to do with poverty, violence, hatred... whatever. So many nations, from Haiti to Saudi, have never progressed in the way we did. And unfortunately, for us to get where we are, some bad stuff apparently 'had' to happen along the way.

There are no easy answers.

" Health care saves people. " Most of the time yes, however, remember that the time spent taking care of that GOLD TOOTH could have really been spent taking care of a heart attack or stroke patient who really needed help.
Have any of you ever worked in the inner city in an ER?? I have. 10 LONG years there. and to be honest a good portion of our time was spent being a PCP because people are too lazy to go to the DR. That being said, it was the people on public assistance who used the ER as their PCP office becuase they did not have to pay anything. Those that had private insurance waited to go to the PCP or else we made them pay a co pay upfront.
Many patients called 911 and then TOLD them what hospital to take them to. Once there, they refused treatment and would walk to their "cuzzins" house. Amazing... It was a glorified taxi.
This system has been abused by a select group for way too many years. Until that changes, nothing is going to change.

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Be careful what you wish for.....

The letter doesn't state what she was being seen for, just that she had a gold tooth, not that he was taking care of her tooth. For all we know she was a heart attack or stroke patient.

But yes a lot of people use the ER inappropriately.

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

Jen, I can almost promise you it was not a heart attack or a stroke.

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Be careful what you wish for.....

Right...it does not say why she was there. I guess if you have a gold tooth, you desevre to just die??

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

" I guess if you have a gold tooth, you desevre to just die?? " Thats not what thuis article is saying at all... No one deserves to die. However if you can afford all these luxuries in life, then you can afford to pay your own way. That is the point of this...

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Be careful what you wish for.....

groovy, something tells me that if that young woman had gone to the ER with an issue from which she would be going to die that the physician would not have been feeling the need to write that letter to the editor.

More than likely, she was there because it was after hours and she had been dealing with a stuffy nose all week and wanted a script for something stronger than an OTC decongestant. It's all free in the ER after business hours, ya know!

Wow! How can you know that? I know people with gold teeth that are not like that!

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

You just don't know every persons situation. Plenty of people with gold teeth(don't know how long she had it or if it was a gift, etc.) can't afford care, so they would die if there was no help. I am not saying this was the case here, but how can you know for sure?

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

Are you being obtuse about this just to be obtuse?

It's not a value judgment about the gold tooth.

It's an economic observation. The hundreds of dollars spent on the frivolous gold tooth would have paid for a visit to a primary care physician during business hours.

How much does a gold tooth cost? - Yahoo! Answers

Let's say your student's families paid you for teaching them. Your going rate was $1,500 per student per year. You have 30 students in your classroom, so theoretically you should be bringing in $45,000/year.

20 of those families filled out paperwork saying they could not afford the $1,500, so the state was going to pay for them to be there. Unfortunately, the state will only reimburse you $400 per child for the year.

Now you will be making $18,000.

When the mom of one of your $400 kids comes to conferences carrying a Coach purse, wearing Seven for All Mankind jeans, and is seen pulling out of the parking lot in a new Beamer, will it leave you scratching your head? If so... does that mean you don't want her children to get an education? No... it will mean that you think a lady who can afford a Beamer, a Coach, and Seven's could be paying the $1,500 rate if she would make better financial decisions for herself.

The point is that all the taxpayers should not have to pay for everyone's health care. People need to be responsible for themselves. And I understand not having insurance. My last job did not provide it and went out of their way to ensure people did not qualify for it.
Part of responsibility is doing everything you can to keep yourself healthy and to make responsible choices with your money. There are lots of people who "can't afford" necessities but are getting new stuff: clothes, tattoos, gold teeth, new cars, etc.
And once again I'll say I do everything in my power to stay healthy and haven't gone to the dr. in a few years why should I pay for health care for someone who is morbidly obese due to poor choices, unhealthy due to poor choices and someone who waits until the last minute to go to the ER when they could have gone to the doctor and had it taken care of when it was a minor thing?
Health care like everything else is not a right it's a privilege. I have horrendous carpal tunnel I've learned to live with the pain and the numbness and work through it because I can't afford the surgery.

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The political system is broke and it's a joke.

"Plenty of people with gold teeth(don't know how long she had it or if it was a gift, etc.) can't afford care, so they would die if there was no help. I am not saying this was the case here, but how can you know for sure? "
Touche... How can you know for sure?? Have you ever worked in an inner city ER? I dont think you have... I have, therefore I am speaking from experience. Perhaps she should have to call 1800sellgold and sell that tooth to pay the bill... I bet she would have waited to go the her PCP.

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Be careful what you wish for.....

YouTube - "We're Number 37" - Paul Hipp

Nope, but working in an inner city school I have seen it all. I just never assume or judge.

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

I think that they're saying that if a person has a gold tooth, maybe she sould pull it out and sell it. Then she could pay the doctor.

Otherwise, it's just a reminder that she once enjoyed better times. It's awful when people don't know their places.

I didn't watch the video, but here's a list of 190 rankings, we come in at 37. Right below Costa Rica and above Slovenia. I guess if you consider being within the top 25% as "one of the best" then it fits. Unfortunately when compared only to other industrialized countries, we don't fair as well.

The World Health Organization's ranking of the world's health systems

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Once the game is over, the king and the pawn go back in the same box.

What is funny is....there is always a time when you can't afford something you need(well, for most people). So, does that mean we should rip out our fillings, sell our jewelry, why not our clothes, too? I am just saying that you should never assume or try and say what people should do, or sell when they are having hard times.

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon

"it's just a reminder that she once enjoyed better times" No what I am saying is she is using her money on stupid stuff and depending on the system to support her!!!

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Be careful what you wish for.....

You know this how?

Because she worked in the ER...lol

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"When you're drowning, you don't say 'I would be incredibly pleased if someone would have the foresight to notice me drowning and come and help me,' you just scream."

John Lennon