How to know when you’ve won the debate
When I came home from tenth grade — my first year in high school — with my schedule, my wise old grandmother (MWOG) looked at it and asked me, “What is Debate?”. When I told her, she gave me some pointers on knowing when you’ve won the debate:
-
When the other person starts calling you names.
-
When the other person starts yelling.
-
When the other person abruptly walks away.
I was camping out in blogs this morning when I ran across a person who didn’t like the Affordable Care Act. I realize that there are people who don’t like it. No problem. I happen to like it.
I had hernia surgery on October 31, 2003. It was paid for my insurance, but my insurance company immediately dropped me after paying the bill. I have not been able to get health insurance since then. Just try getting insurance after answering the question “Have you ever been dropped by an insurance company?” Or at least, answering truthfully, something MWOG taught me to do. Sometimes the truth hurts, but it’s better than lieing.
I was rooting hard for the Affordable Care Act to be passed. After it was passed, the people who disliked it derisively called it “Obamacare.” Now that the United States Supreme Court has found it constitutional, those who dislike it are calling it by its proper name, the “Affordable Care Act.” Proponents, including President Obama himself in a couple of recent posts from The White House, have taken to calling it “Obamacare.” Interesting.
Some of the health care provisions kicked in earlier this year, and as soon as they did, insurance companies started beating a path to my door trying to get me signed up — door knockers, mailers, emailers, telephone solicitors…..
As of July 1, 2012, I now have health insurance, vision insurance, and dental insurance again. I’m 57. Monthly cost is $262.88, co-pays are $20 to $100 depending on the type of health service (surgery is more expensive than an office visit), and THERE IS NO LIFETIME CAP! All of my previous policies, from my first in 1973 to my last in 2003, always had a one million dollar cap.
I was having a healthy (pun intended) discussion with the other blogger when all of a sudden he posted a reply and then shut off comments. I think MWOG would call that “abruptly walking away.”
Small-minded people just can’t accept differences, or even discussion about those differences.
Looking for real estate services in San Diego County?
I recommend
James Frimmer, Realtor
Century 21 Award, DRE #01458572
If you’re looking for a home inspector,
I recommend Russel Ray (that’s me!)
Posted on July 4, 2012, in My wise old grandmother and tagged affordable care act, obama 2012, obamacare. Bookmark the permalink. 32 Comments.
Well done…
We were rooting for it even though we’re not from the US or resident there. Great news you’re already feeling the benefits. Every person should have access to healthcare – it is fundamental.
The funny thing is that, using a generalization that seems to be good, the only people who don’t like it are the extraordinarly rich and well off. They, of course, have great health care already and don’t seem to want anyone else to have it, not even basic health care.
Yes, very well done and so true. I have some rabid, religious, small minded, relatives who email me crap about this and it burns me up. There is no point in debating anything with them!
Lovely bird of Paradise by the way.
Your grandma sounds like a whole lot of fun. I agree, health, or the basic pursuit of health should be a right.
My 18 year old son was diagnosed with diabetes at the age of one year old. I am so FOR health care reform. He can now remain covered by his dad’s health insurance until he’s 26 and he can’t be denied coverage for a preexisting condition when he finishes college and is on his own. I really don’t understand people who are NOT rich…who are just like me (including my own brother)…and still fight against this important piece of legislation. I’ve given up trying to convince people of the importance of this because really, they just end up sounding more and more irrational and angry. I’m hoping that when the dust all settles, the people who have been fighting all of this will finally see how humane and necessary this all is for all of us.
Thanks for contributing to the discussion, Carol.
I live in Canada and have never understood why the US was so long in having universal health care plans. By the way your current premium is a bit more than mine, but not much.
I’m glad to hear your success story insurance wise. Why is it that conversations pertaining to politics and religion always leads to 1. 2. or 3.? People need to lighten up, Francis.
It’s a polarized world we live in, and as it continues to be come more and more overpopulated, and more and more interconnected with global economies and instant global communications, it’s only going to get worse.
Your grandmother was indeed wise (although I suspect she was an eternally youthful lady). However, I sometimes worry that when enough of society forgets the truth of that advice, that it will no longer be true. Although, for every hundred people who fail to grasp the intricacies of civil discourse, I’m gratified any time I encounter one. Hopefully your WOG’s message will continue to spread.
I find it odd to hear that in the US Private Health insurance companies can ‘drop you’. Here in Australia the Govt encourages people to have private health insurance by subsidising 1/3 and penalising you in taxation if you DON’T have private health insurance.
You can choose which private health fund you want to belong to – the private health funds can’t choose you or revoke membership.
The Govt’s Medicare cover only covers basic stuff.
So with both the cover of Medicare and my Private Health Insurance I am still nearly $30,000 out-of-pocket from the last 14 years (over $100,000 worth of health bills & surgery).
So in Australia, I still find it appalling that I pay for the top cover of insurance (which I am struggling to afford) and am so far out-of-pocket. Anyway, now I’m unable to work due to chronic ill health and on a Govt disability pension I can’t ‘afford to be sick’.
Work that one out !
Try living in Florida! No one other than me seems to think Obamacare (or whatever you want to call it) has ANY redeeming features. And they get VISCIOUS about it. The whole thing exhausts me! Glad it worked for you!
how do you know when you’ve won the debate? . . . when the other guy pours his beer over your head
by-the-by, we have comprehensive health coverage here in the uk and to date i have had no problems seeing my g.p., nor having to wait an eternity to have selective surgery – nor has anyone i know – so that argument was always a bit strange to me; but the majority of us (and i still am a ‘card carrying american’) only know on any issue what the ‘main/lame’ stream media’ decide we should know and therefore fall like lemming off the cliff – anyone who thinks the aca is a bad idea should ask themselves what would happen if they lost their job (and their coverage) and fond themselves beneath the bumper of an uninsured drunk driver
At 1200 some pages, I’m not sure I understand all that the new health care plan involves. It seems to have horror stories from both sides. What I can identify with is the cost of health care. After resigning my position in January of this year, I got a rude awakening. Always having considered myself pretty healthy, I was surprised to see what few and common ailments I did have were a reason for denial by insurance. Now mind you I take no medication at all for health issues. So I had to go back and Cobra which is extremely expensive. Will try to reapply here shortly to see if insurance will change their mind and cover me. I don’t know if Affordable Healthcare/Obamacare is the answer but certainly changes are needed.
I like your grandmother. MIne said “the louder your voice the worse your argument.” Just watch one of those talking head shows and see if that holds true. Ironically, the ACA is essentially a GOP idea, which is interesting why so many conservatives are against it. It is patterned after the Dole bill in the 1990′s as an alternative to the Clinton Plan for national health care (referred to as Hillary Care – there is a pattern). And, it is very similar to the Romney Plan in MA which has been so successful, Senator DeMint (of Tea Party fame) advocated it for use by the country with the mandate in a letter to President Bush in 2007. Even Senator Grassley and Newt Gingrich supported it in 2009. Now that a Democrat has passed it as a compromise plan, it has become a pawn in a political game. While imperfect, the ACA moves us forward in attempt to improve our 38th in the world health care quality standing. There is an element of hypocrisy here and even loud voices cannot alter that fact.
I totally agree that we need something drastic and something that will level the field to allow care for everyone. I just hope to God (and that’s not an expression in this case, it’s a description) that it works!
And on the debate side of things, I’m painfully good at winning with the facts and used to measure my success much as your WOGM suggested. Then one day when my husband shouted in frustration and walked off, as I calmly sat there satified because I knew from the get-go that I was factually and, in that particular case, morally right….I let go of my supposed victory and really heard his last words. ‘All you care about is the facts.’ ‘Of course’, I was giggling in my head. And then I understood. He wasn’t talking about ‘right’ he was talking about how he felt. I have looked at arguments differently ever since that day and always consider my ‘opponent’s’ view with some heart as well as factual measure. Not a good Debate tactic necessarily, but somehow I think your WOGM would’ve agreed it’s a good way to go….
And after that little tangent…Whatever everyone’s take on the new legislation, I’m sure glad you have health care again, Russel. And that works for me!!
I hear you. However, for me, debates are with opponents, and those oppenents rarely are family or friends. Compassion, consideration, etc., I reserve for family and friends.
I hope I’m considered your friend! Yikes!
Yes, I do understand the difference you are drawing, and true debate is a wonderful thing. It’s just important that everyone involved agrees to the contest. And the compassionate eye has helped me ‘win’ even in the driest most logical arenas. Wisdom with Truth can’t be beat.
Wow. I was just having a conversation (debate) with someone on google+ about this very same issue. As a nurse, she was concerned what would happen to her job now that “Obamacare” has started to go into affect. And somewhere along the way the debate about the policy turned into a diatribe on degenerates. I think that’s another way to know you’ve won the argument. The other person just starts making wild generalizations that have no basis in fact or practical implications. Think your grandmother would agree?
Probably. Another one might be when the other side changes the subject.
I know I love a lively discussion. Very rarelty do I resort to calling names and yelling, but never have I turned off comments. Some people don’t want to grow.
I know for some people, this act may have improved life quality. For those who seldom get sick, though, and when they do, they self-treat, it is far too much money for betting that one day there might arise some reason to need it.
We almost never go to a doctor. We just take good care of our bodies and practice good quarantine. We have often, when we did submit to a doctor’s care, been very disappointed with the lack of expertise and even plain knowledge we encountered. It all seems very political, and in that way, frightening.
Now we are in a position to become uninsurable (you know the pain) due to hardly ever going to a doctor. Can you not see that? It seems like an improvement, and who knows, may actually be one for some people, but what am I paying for? In one year it would cost me more than all the doctor visits of my whole life.
I am glad you got your insurance back, because you are a very easy-to-like person and I adore your grandmother.
Nothing is free. Just like all the water is all we get, the same for all the wealth: it just sloshes around. It has to come from somewhere and it has to go somewhere, if even into a lobbyitst’s pocket. I want to pay for my own. I want cheap insurance that only covers the biggies with a big deductible. My needs are not being met. And I am paying for everyone else’s. It feels like taxation without representation. It just makes me so sad, mostly because the economy was already tottering . . .
But I still like you and your grandmother. And I just want to weigh in here, so please don’t think I am walking away from debating you. I am a trained debater, and you and I both do not want to go there. <3
I am a firm believer in the good of the society. That sometimes means that I have to sacrifice my individual desires for the good of the whole. Mr. Spock said it eloquently in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan as he gave up his life for the many:
Another way I can look at it is this: I don’t have children. Never wanted children. Throughout my life I’ve paid school taxes to educate the children of others. Is that fair?
It would have been more fair if the schools had been worth anything. The purpose was to educate future citizens . . . It would also have been more fair if the Constitution still reigned in the schools. I home schooled my own children but paid the taxes, grumblling all the while because education was not happening so I had to do it myself.
In the end, it is not about fair. It is about rule by law. Not happening, either.
But I will be fair, here: I will read whatever you have to say, and probably disagree, but really, really do intend not to engage, here. We have made it clear that our understanding of economics and government are wildly divergent. I want you for a friend, albeit a friend who disagrees. Can we not keep it there, now? Is all lost on that front?
We’ll have to agree to disagree about the worth of the schools since I’m a product of public schools, as are 99.9% of my friends.
I also prefer the current state of the Constitution in the schools instead of praying and other religious activities. That’s for the churches, which I think is why they have “Sunday School.”
Education happens in the schools, but too many parents want the schools to be baby sitters instead of educators. Teachers cannot be both.
I agree to disagree and stay friends. I will not be moved soon, nor will you. Why waste all the other benefits from each others’ lives?
Have to take issue with your comment about paying taxes for education being unfair for childless gay people (childless people full stop) – we pay those taxes so that we have the best young doctors, dentists, psychiatrists, health carers, you name it, that we need when we’re old and need them so very much!
That’s what I call the good of society. However, often the good of society is unfair to specific individuals.
Nuts. Accidentally posted that while proofing. Hope you can read it.