Comments on: Health Care Reform: A Peek Behind the Curtain

By: mekhongkurt

mekhongkurt — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:56:56 +0000

Good article -- and some excellent responses. In fact, I was as interested in and impressed by the comments from others as I was in the article itself, which is no criticism at all of the article. Why? Well, for what those responses *don't* have: name-calling, demonizing others, scare tactics, all-capitalized hyperbole, absence of supporting evidence, and the like. Which do dominate in a great many of the threads I've read elsewhere. Even those taking a stnce differing or even opposite my own come across as reasonable people offering thoughtful views. And that's desperately needed in this debate. I'm no economist, certainly not a medical economist, so I'm not sure what the government can (and can't) do to improve our health-care system. However, I know it's not working well, and sometimes not at all, for way too many people. That's not to say I'm fully behind the President's ideas -- I have my own doubts and questions about certain aspects of the various versions floating around Congress -- but it is to say I do believe we have to do *something* and do it as quickly as possible. Thanks for the article, and thanks to all you who wrote comments in such a civil way.

By: time2bsmart

time2bsmart — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 08:07:00 +0000

So, it doesn't matter what the bill actually says...or that many american's have legitimate concerns about the content of the bill...he just wanted it passed to get it done? Sorry....I can't support the legislation the way it is...there are too many reasons to list. I am glad that America is waking up....

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:38:32 +0000

KT:
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What's funny is that they can probably hire 10 nobodies like me for free or next-to-free, but most folks like me would balk at the copyright restrictions Time-Warner would impose on their work. The High Sherrifs would have to accept a co-publishing agreement in which they weren't given exclusive license to whatever they put up on the web.
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Isn't that funny?
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They're screwing themselves out of an arrangement in which they would get the benefit of good eyeballs for advertising (not clicks, which don't mean a thing in terms of being on a page long enough to look at the ads next to pieces) coming to quality material that would enhance their content brand, all provided to them for next-to-nothing --and their whole claim to fame is content.
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If they'd accept the gigantic fact that writers don't need publishers to copy and disseminate content, and therefore copyright contracts need to reflect those realities in favor of writers, they'd have an entirely new way to generate hoards of income at little expense, given the relative ubiquity of people like myself available to contribute decent written work.
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Instead, they're gradually allowing blogs to supplant their failing business model.

By: Karen Tumulty

Karen Tumulty — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 20:17:47 +0000

Art: I have long argued that we should have a media blog here at TIME (though JP does that to some degree for television). Alas, this argument has had the usual effect that most of my arguments have with the High Sheriffs.

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:51:07 +0000

Art Pepper:
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But I'm not a professional writer. I make web/database applications for a living.
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How will anybody find me credible as a writer, if all I have to go on is empirical evidence and fact-based logical conclusions?
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I lack savviness:
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Savviness is what journalists admire in others. Savvy is what they themselves dearly wish to be. (And to be unsavvy is far worse than being wrong.) Savviness—that quality of being shrewd, practical, well-informed, perceptive, ironic, “with it,” and unsentimental in all things political—is, in a sense, their professional religion. They make a cult of it.

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, therefore I can never have the professional credibility to be hired by any news organization to write on anything.

By: Art Pepper

Art Pepper — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:20:42 +0000

Stuart: You should apply for a position as TIME's media critic. (Seriously.)
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TIME: You should open a new position for a media critic.

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:16:18 +0000

Sorry about that, folks.
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I hope that it's slightly worth it.

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:15:39 +0000

... .In January 1979, four in 10 thought the federal government should provide national insurance. Back then, more Americans thought health insurance should be left to private enterprise. . . . The infinitely important "process" story that would be in the public's interest for political journalists to cover would be describing in detail how, why and with whom Congress and the Obama Administration are negotiating, and why they aren't simply enacting what Americans elected them to enact. . A "peek behind the curtain" in that regard would get "people talking", alright --to their members of Congress. It's like the AIG bonuses all over again --why couldn't we have had the wall-to-wall reporting and outrage before everything happened? Maybe with Health Care Reform we can finally have the news of how they're screwing us in time for us to do something about it, KT.

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:15:04 +0000

HEALTH INSURANCE
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Americans are more likely today to embrace the idea of the government providing health insurance than they were 30 years ago. 59% say the government should provide national health insurance, including 49% who say such insurance should cover all medical problems.
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(continued)

By: stuartzechman

stuartzechman — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:13:52 +0000

CBS NEWS/NEW YORK TIMES POLL
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For Release: Sunday, February 1, 2009 9:00 AM
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AMERICAN PUBLIC OPINION: TODAY VS. 30 YEARS AGO
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January 11-15, 2009
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(continued)