[thankyoufriend]

I love this take, thank you.

In my reading, I came across the term "Mixed economy" which I think aligns with what you're saying. Nobody is arguing in good faith that socialism/communism would have 100% coverage of the economic system. There would be room for luxury goods to operate under roughly the same economic conditions. The key difference being that basic needs like food housing and Healthcare would operate under state control for the benefit of all citizens. We would have some vote in their operation via representatives, unlike now where we have 0 say in private operations unless we pay to play. And some people don't have the means to pay, so they don't get to play.

[Spivak]

Pretty much yeah, I wouldn't put as much in the state controlled basket as you but like that's a policy discussion—I don't think we have some fundamental disagreement that means we couldn't work together and be pragmatic. One of us doesn't have to "win" control of the government to make progress.

[thankyoufriend]

Agreed, we seem to both be operating with a common goal of materially improving people's lives.

[kulahan]

I’ll just say thank GOD at this moment in time I’m not relying on Trump not to take away healthcare and housing from people he doesn’t like.

[Spivak]

Yeah, this is ultimately why I don't love the idea of single payer. But honestly I'm (slowly) warming up to it as the fears of government controlling healthcare in the way you describe are starting to happen anyway. I guess we'll see how bad it gets and how successful government is at sticking their fingers in private healthcare.

[atmavatar]

Private insurance is no better.

Before the ACA, there were dozens of reasons for which you could be deemed uninsurable, not the least of which is that you had a "pre-existing condition" (i.e., you were unlikely to be profitable enough). North of 15% of the US population lacked health insurance as a result. Even after ACA's passage, we straddle 10% uninsured, rising above some years and falling below in others.

When we have regular, required medication like insulin costing tens or hundreds of times more here than anywhere else on the planet, being uninsured can be a particularly cruel, slow death sentence.

Still, the joke's on GP: he/she still is relying on Trump not to take away healthcare and housing from people he doesn't like (re: poor people, i.e., nearly everyone). The BBB guts medicaid and ACA subsidies, which will ultimately remove health insurance from millions either directly or pricing it out of reach, and his combination of tariffs and deportations of (often times not-so-)illegal immigrants make building more housing difficult and significantly more expensive.

Expect even harsher austerity measures and/or batshit insane policies the next time the Republican party wants to shake the tax cut for billionaires tree or perhaps even just for shits and giggles since many of the cruel policies are there to put the rabble in their place.

[thankyoufriend]

It's crazy to me that many of the people who are so proud to be American don't seem to realize that they are actually at odds with the spirit of America. They latch onto superficial anti-gubbermint thinking while surrendering their rights to billionaires. Being an American is supposed to be about telling powerful people to go fuck themselves, standing up for inclusive equality and reckoning with our slights against what we claim to believe. It's supposed to be about modeling democratic ideals to show the world there's a better way. It's supposed to be about being so morally righteous that others come to their own conclusion that we're worthy of emulation, and not because we regime changed them. Somehow we let all of that get away from us.

[thankyoufriend]

Why would we allow the president to do that? The power of the purse rests in the hands of our elected representatives. Something to think about.

[kulahan]

If you watch modern American politics, the President has vastly more power than he was ever meant to be, combined with a house and senate that follow his wishes to the T.

Why would we allow the president to do that? Because at some point in the last 300 years we decided it was a necessary power for him to get past some crisis, and no President ever relinquishes power.

[thankyoufriend]

No disagreement from me. I just think that the argument that the state shouldn't offer Healthcare because the president could cancel it is interesting to think about. Maybe I misunderstood you, but that's how I interpreted it. As the other poster said, he's basically canceling it now anyway for millions of people so it seems to me that presidentual power is irrelevant to the concept of state run Healthcare. Sent from my bidet.

[kulahan]

I kept it pretty vague intentionally because I was simply complaining about how dangerous that one particular thing would be right now. I'm undecided on how the overall healthcare issue should be attacked.

[thankyoufriend]

I just want people to be open to try things. One thing that this administration has proved is that you can actually make parts of the government move faster, for better or for worse. We stopped innovating on democratic ideals, and the world is starting to lose faith in us. I think we all feel that on some level.