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A Curious Oddservation

Is it odd (or not) that those who complain (now) most bitterly about the ineffectiveness and screwups in government, e.g., Iraq, Katrina, and the list goes on, are also the very same people who think single-payer/government controlled health-care is a good idea.  Does that really make any sense?

Posted in humor, stupid questions.

5 comments

By Mark – April 11, 2007

5 Responses

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  1. JewishAtheist says

    WTF? Katrina and Iraq were not “government’s” fault, they were Bush’s (and maybe the Louisana folks too, to be fair.) There is not one chance in a hundred that Al Gore would have started this war and the problem in Louisana was not too much government, but too little.

    It’s like (the conservative) P.J. O’Rourke said, “Republicans are the party that says government doesn’t work, and then get elected and prove it.” Kind of makes sense, considering the contempt they have for it.

    April 11, 2007, 18:43
  2. Mark says

    JA,
    Is the tint to your glasses that make you imagine that government incompetency is limited to the GOP (and specifically Bush). Clinton and Mogadishu/Blackhawk Down, Carter and the hostage rescue? I could go into more, but the notion that government incompetency is partisan is, well, I think both wrong and perhaps how you get the idea that government health care is a good idea. But how will you insure that when you put such a plan in place that henceforth only “competent” individuals get elected? Whence comes your confidence?

    April 12, 2007, 10:40
  3. JewishAtheist says

    Bush is uncommonly incompetent for a president, but that’s not even the point here.

    Although no government is perfect, there are some situations where it is a better choice to run things than the private sector is, generally when the needs of the people do not align neatly with turning a profit. Would Iraq have worked out better if the army were privatized and Bush were a private CEO in charge? No, he would be “staying the course” until he ran out of money. Would New Orleans have been better off if it were a tiny branch office of Bush, Inc.? No, he would have found it fiscally prudent to just cut them off and provide even less aid than he did.

    April 12, 2007, 11:40
  4. Mark says

    JA,
    On the first paragraph, … exactly.

    If a private organization where in the business of providing (for profit) rescue and recovery for cities due to natural disaster then I don’t think it would have been fiscally prudent (if not a monopoly like the government is in this case) to just “cut them off” for … they’d lose all their other clients and then be out of business.

    In general actually, I think the government should be constitutionally forbidden from entering into the actuarial/insurance type ventures because the incentives are all wrong. The incentive for the politician is to push the payment on the future for votes in the present, whereas a profit seeking organization wants to continue to exist so they can’t (sanely) push payment off in the same way, as they hope to make money both now and in the next decade. That is why, Health care (and retirement) as well as disaster insurance (as evidenced by the civil engineering faults and preparedness problems in New Orleans) should all be taken out of the governments hands.

    April 12, 2007, 16:48
  5. JewishAtheist says

    If a private organization where in the business of providing (for profit) rescue and recovery for cities due to natural disaster then I don’t think it would have been fiscally prudent (if not a monopoly like the government is in this case) to just “cut them off” for … they’d lose all their other clients and then be out of business.

    But isn’t that exactly what private insurance companies did (or tried to do) to New Orleans residents after Katrina?

    The incentive for the politician is to push the payment on the future for votes in the present, whereas a profit seeking organization wants to continue to exist so they can’t (sanely) push payment off in the same way

    Government at least has an incentive to provide health care to all, while corporations have an incentive to deny as many claims as it can possibly get away with. The answer doesn’t lie solely with government or solely with corporations, but with a mixture. Corporations to keep things running well, and government to guarantee that people don’t get screwed. When corporations aren’t adequately regulated, they happily externalize all costs so that they rake in the profits while the rest of us pay the bills.

    April 12, 2007, 21:28



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