Co-pays, HUGE friggin Co-pays. Medicare pays approximately 80% of "covered" expenses.
Then there are those things like that Doctor recommended extra day in the hospital for recovery, that's not covered at all, because Medicare thinks it knows best when you should be back up on your feet and out of the hospital.
this... what is Obama's response on this? Is it written anywhere?
Once again, major parts of both of their plans is to bring cost under control. Part of the way Hillary Clinton is doing that is to have a larger user base... Universal Health Care.
Medicare and corporate insurance all play the game of trying to tell YOU what is best for YOU over your doctor and you.
You bring up a good point about the portability to other countries. The part about copays and cost of procedures should be addressed by the different cost controls and growing the base by making it truly universal.
what is Obama's response on this? Is it written anywhere?
If you find out, please tell me. I can't find out from either camp. I'll believe the cost lowering procedures when I see them. I've been alive far too long and seen far too many things to believe that corporate America and our "for profit" health care system will ever accept lower profits. The economics of scale, as far as "for profit" health care is concerned, is pure fantasy.
with Obama's plan, is that he seems to be giving in to the belief that we can not get Universal Health Care and possibly not the cost controls either. Why else would he use right wing fear tactics about reaching into our wallet, etc?
Seems that he does not believe he will be able to get cost controls or true Universal Health Care because he either would not try or the "powers that be" in the health care and pharma world are telling him NO!
Funny, but I believe the same about BOTH Clinton's and Obama's plans. It's all just so much rhetoric and no one has yet shown me that either plan is a plan for true affordable UHC in the US.
Unfortunately, neither has shown me that their approach is the better way to go either.
the problem is, that either of them will need We The People to help them fight this through congress and the pressure of the lobbyist.
That is one of the main reasons I wanted John Edwards! He spoke in plain terms about what needed to be done to accompish ANYTHING in DC.
I totally agree about JRE, he was the one I really thought might get something done by sheer force of will.
I wish Clinton and Obama could channel him, but I'll settle for the one that promises him a seat on the Supreme Court, after a stint as Attorney General of course.
