Stupid Republicans
Per CNN today: "The yet-to-be-implemented system might [look] like the one in Massachusetts, which has had a similar penalty system in place since 2007. In Massachusetts, taxpayers are required to prove they had insurance by completing a three-page section of the state income tax form."
So all those people ranting about how the health care reform is a revolutionary and unprecedented violation of rights and freedoms- well, yeah, they're wrong as well as being plain wrong-headed. This has been happening for years in Massachusetts and the sky hasn't fallen there yet.
And all those people who complain that the reform depends too much on private for-profit insurance companies (and I include myself in that group), just remember- the original Democratic plan didn't do that. The plan that Democrats started out arguing for included a national single-payer system such as what most of the industrialized world enjoys (myself also now included- thank you, Australia!). But the Republicans negotiated away that bit of the solution in their indefatigable attempts to turn the reform package into a Frankenstein's monster of a bill even uninsured villagers would burn.
So all those people ranting about how the health care reform is a revolutionary and unprecedented violation of rights and freedoms- well, yeah, they're wrong as well as being plain wrong-headed. This has been happening for years in Massachusetts and the sky hasn't fallen there yet.
And all those people who complain that the reform depends too much on private for-profit insurance companies (and I include myself in that group), just remember- the original Democratic plan didn't do that. The plan that Democrats started out arguing for included a national single-payer system such as what most of the industrialized world enjoys (myself also now included- thank you, Australia!). But the Republicans negotiated away that bit of the solution in their indefatigable attempts to turn the reform package into a Frankenstein's monster of a bill even uninsured villagers would burn.