I for one am elated that the Mandate was upheld.
Getting millions insured will reduce the burden on all of us.
Having insurance is important and requiring people to buy it is as Chief Justice Roberts wrote a form of another tax.
The Affordable Healthcare Act will assure the health not only of individuals in this country but our countries economic health as well.
Shalom
As usual, I admire your intent, but you need to face reality. Obamacare has a long and bumpy road ahead of it before it - if ever - becomes anything significant. There are things imbedded within the program that will be decided by the Supreme Court down the line. And despite what you might think to the contrary, there is no way we can pay for it. Heck, even the Democratic leadership is beginning to admit that - don't you listen to your own folks?
Your elation surprises me a bit for a couple of reasons that affect you and your patients directly.
First is the fact that the government will be able to seize people's medical records. That is a violation of both the letter and principle of HIPAA, and will no doubt end up as a Supreme Court case. In the case of your own patients, that means their drug and mental issues would go directly into their dossier. Between hacking, leaks, and such, their issues would be far from private. I have a real big problem with that myself, and I would think you would too, as that virtually destroys patient confidentiality.
The second issue is the fact that the court decided it was not constitutional for the federal government to force states to expand their Medicaid programs. I believe the current count stands somewhere around 30 states that are not going to do so, and I suspect more will follow. Sadly, this will limit how much Obamacare will help those the program is intended to help to begin with - those without the means to secure insurance on their own. I'm honesstly not sure where that will leave us. As silly as it may sound, we may end up with segregated states - it is possible that poor people may migrate to those states with the better handouts. We could end up with 30 states with predominantly kiddle and upper class people, and 20 states with predominantly poor people. This could also portend a massive migration that would have a lot of demographic rammifications.
In different times, I wouldn't view these and other issues withthe flawed legislation as major stumbling blocks. Historically it is not uncommon to pass legislation and then go through a period of modifications until it is actually viable. But in this day and time, as polarized as we are, I can't see that happening. As I said, Obamacare is in for a long, bumy ride before anything comes of it - if ever.
Some of the provisions of Obamacare are both good and needed - I don't know of any reasonable person that would argue that. But the package as a whole is flawed, inefficient, far less inclusive than intended, and of course carries a price tag neither the public, business, or government can meet.
Of course that's inevitable when you have a bunch of wacko liberals passing legislation behind closed doors, and then make the famous Pelosi remark that Congress needs to pass it so they can see what it says. Obamacare will never come to full fruition without consensus, and as long as their are morons like Pelosi - on both sides of the isle - consensus will never happen. Whether it is this fall or 2 or 4 or 8 or however many years from now, Obamacare will be repealed - unless it is modified, of course to become viable. I'm just not sure what event or series of events it will take to get both sides of the isle working to gether to modify it. Right now it seems as if the term compromise is no longer in the beltway dictionary...