[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Derek

I mean, you can enjoy those many freedoms in other countries but with an added social safety net. Though I refuse to believe you like your private health insurance. I assume you're grateful to have it, but it makes no sense when the resources for a universal system are there and not being taken advantage of.

what is "universal" to you. "it comes from the universe"? blanco please! stop lying!

my private insurance is great. one year when things went to shit with my business obamacare forced me into medicare. i refused and refused but eventually tried and... it was a fucking joke! they kept putting me in and taking me out of it.

at the same time they took the catastrophic health insurance plans off the table.

so the government actually placed me in health insurance limbo

TRUE STORY

Originally Posted by Derek

Like? What other power is going to tell capitalism no? Revolutionary power?

consumer choice tells capitalism no and yes and maybe every day.

what limits consumer choice is government meddling in markets--at the behest of existing market players of course. like when the gubmint took away my catastrophic $200/month plan and gave me some fake medicaid i never wanted.

Originally Posted by Derek

She rejected criminal justice reform every step of the way as a prosecutor and is now turning around and supporting it because of the way the tide has turned and electability reasons, for example. She jailed mothers for their children's truancy. How can anyone trust her?

ok so this government that jails mothers and shoots black people is who you want to run the health care system? lmfao

Originally Posted by Derek

I have, I know a lot about that stuff. I never said I want to replicate early 20th century Russia, just that Lenin and his writings are very influential for modern day leftists and that it's more complicated than "lenin bad man!!!".

lenin had a lot of good intentions, but like all absolutists he fucked up

Originally Posted by Derek

I mean, I'm talking about fundamental change to a broken capitalist system. The idea that progressivism will lead to a huge police state is funny red scare nonsense considering the amount of surveillance and policing going on right now. What up NSA.

so are you talking about a social safety net or a "fundamental change"? you got me confused now

Originally Posted by Derek

What is the logical conclusion of capitalism? Make no mistake, capitalism cannot sustain itself forever and it seems that countries will either grasp onto socialism or fascism as the ball drops. Government already belongs to the few and the elite due to factors that capitalism has facilitated. Didn't we just have a scandal were elite schools are basically pay to play institutions for the rich? These people go on to high positions of power but without the cognitive ability to lead and emphasise with real problems.

i don't know the logical conclusion because i'm not looking for it. i do not presume to deduce the ultimate goal of history like a marxist. capitalism is doing great lifting billions out of misery in a way that no utopian absolutist ever could (they inflicted misery instead).

as for the elite schools... any system where connections rule over performance is going to be corrupt. in socialism where everyone is "equal money", political connections are the real currency.

i prefer to pay with money, thanks.

Originally Posted by Derek

You're not going to agree with me but there has never even been a true socialist state! Lenin's end goal was to shift his party's autocratic position into a socialist state after seizing power. Whether you want to believe he would do that and whether that method is justifiable is up to you. Venezuela seemed to suffer more due to capitalist world economics and American neo-imperialism than anything to do with socialism. I don't know any leftist who sees Venezuela's case as anything other than an empty "BUT WHAT ABOUT" rebuttal.

yes yes same as the libertarians. "we've never had true libertarianism!"

lmao. pipe dreams.

like i said above (i was editing, maybe you didn't see) i spent nearly a year in a kibbutz. as ideal as socialism gets.

they recently added some capitalist fixes and stopped hemorraghing people

Originally Posted by Derek

Again, a lot of other countries have these things. They are subsidised greatly by the government through fair and proper taxation. I don't see how this is a fantasy. I would never trade the NHS with private health insurance and no one who lives here under a universal system would either.

keep your government-rationed health care and i'll keep my insurance-rationed health care. you're going to have rationing either way. i'll have a private room, you'll be in a ward. i'll get attention tomorrow, you'll get it in 9 to 12 months.

Originally Posted by Derek

Here's what I found (and already knew) with a quick google search:
GoFundMe CEO: One-Third of Site's Donations Are to Cover Medical Costs

People Are Raising $650 Million On GoFundMe Each Year To Attack Rising Healthcare Costs

"But the big business of GoFundMe is now medical bills. Since the company’s founding in 2010, it reports having raised $5 billion. Of that, a third went to the 250,000 medical campaigns the site conducts annually. Simple multiplication suggests that the number of people who have sought help has run into the millions."

250k campaigns a year for 8 years that's 2 million campaigns.

like i said before, a lot of people remain uninsured because obamacare did not go far enough and/or it actually raised their premiums.

again, i'll take the swiss model over your national army.

Originally Posted by Derek

Just because you have not met cancer patients who have had to resort to desperate measures to get help does not mean that there aren't MILLIONS out there who are just shit out of luck from no fault of their own. This is just one tiny sliver example of the many issues that a for profit system generates.

everyone dies in the end. me, you, and everyone we know. there is no amount of non-profit that can prevent this. we can only choose to allocate limited resources which have alternative uses. this is a fact of life and nature and governments are subject to it as well.

even non-money scenarios are subject to these limitations. we always have to choose and we have limits.

Originally Posted by Derek

I don't think it's there yet but it's changing. Studies show that a large percentage of young people engage more with socialism politically than anything else now, and that's because they have grown up in a capitalist world and haven't (and will probably never) see any of the benefits that their parents were given. I wonder if anyone didn't like the "trade off" when national health systems were implemented in other countries? No, people cherish their free healthcare and fight for it everyday away from the hands of right-wingers that want to sell it bit by bit to the private sector. Many can hold their nose all they want but it's the right and dignified thing to do.

yeah, they've engaged with socialism in books and speeches. i've engaged it in the flesh. not again, thanks.

Originally Posted by Derek

Nah it was part of a huge bomb scare epidemic that happened that day. Multiple universities and hospitals were effected.

ah shit...