What other things should be "mandated" as a "solution" to those problems?

[begin_within]

[Posteritatis]

1. I'm becoming a fan of having to pass basic logic tests before one can exit the womb.. (nt)

[edhopper]

4. Driver's license,

education,
gun registration,
Worker's comp,
social security and medicare tax, without income ceiling


next question

[AllentownJake]

5. What one of those is done soley through a 3rd party for-profit enity

FAIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[edhopper]

9. Where in the op did you see that?

[izquierdista]

12. Education soon will be

If Arne gets his way.

[Oregone]

2. Housing, cars, food, Playstations, widescreen TVs

It wont affect the price of those goods one bit, and while we are all plugged-in playing Guitar Hero, we wont mind being assraped by the government

[kenny blankenship]

3. Mandate the purchase of handguns - to secure the public safety!

[donco6]

6. Paying Sylvan for tutors when your kids ain't learnin' n/t

[kctim]

7. Retirement and elder care

oh, thats right, they already are. So whats the big deal, you get what you ask for.

[Motown_Johnny]

8. many countries have mandatory military service for everyone

and I think it could be a good thing for us.


Get EVERYONE on the G.I. Bill. Have everyone trained on how to use firearms. Have everyone spend a couple years in an environment where constant drug or alcohol use will not be tolerated. Have everyone develop some level of discipline and respect for authority. Have everyone live for a couple of years in a community comprised of all races, creeds and colors. Get everyone's DNA on file.

If I were granted one Christmas wish it might be to have everyone spend 2 years in the military after graduating high school, and to have all high school drop outs go in early and receive extra training/education. Or it might be for a winning Mega Millions Lottery ticket, i'm not sure.

[kenny blankenship]

11. to make it parallel to the current mandate tho', you would have to sign everyone up for Blackwater

or Xe or whatever they call themselves these days. And you would have to also let them choose Dyncorp instead if they want "to ensure they have a choice". Then the mercenary corporations get your pay, in addition to their expenses training and outfitting you on a cost plus ten billing basis. Your sign up bonus sticks to Blackwater's fingers (call it a deductible) as does a percentage of your paycheck (call it a co-pay). And if you die, well that's too bad. The mercenary corporations are held blameless for whatever bullshit mission they sent you on because their arrangement is strictly with the Govt. not with you, and the Govt. pre-approved everything they did by continuing the contractual relationship. And so your relatives can't sue anyone, because the government has Sovereign Immunity, which sure works out swell for Blackwater.

[FLAprogressive]

15. +1

[Edweird]

35. I wonder how many of the bill's supporters also support Blackwater.

[tridim]

39. I've never seen any DU'er supporting Blackwater.

What are you getting at?

[Occulus]

19. End DADT for a whole generation first

Otherwise you'll be telling some people that they now must serve in a group that has told them their entire adult lives that they'd do nothing but harm by serving openly.

Not that there's any truth at all to that particular mindset, but I know I wouldn't be willing at all to serve in any military capacity if I were told I was required to. Fine me, send me to jail, whatever- the military doesn't deserve to have me, period. Not after what it's said about me and people like me...

[kestrel91316]

10. Life in prison for selling "medical insurance", lol. SINGLE PAYER NOW.

[Sebastian Doyle]

13. I have a mandated solution to the corporate aristocracy.

One might call it a "French" solution. Late 18th century, more specifically....

[FLAprogressive]

14. Houses for Homelessness, Credit Cards for the credit crisis, Drug screening for the drug "problem"

[Sub Atomic]

16. Mandate everyone work six months (minimum) as a waiter/waitress.

That sure would solve the 'assholes who think they don't need to tip' problem.

[juno jones]

43. I worked two years as a waitress...

That's why I became a cook (da-da-dah!) :evilgrin:

But I still tip well. ;)

And yes, a basic grounding in restaurants would serve as an example of hard work for little money or appreciation.

[valerief]

17. Well, the president has said that if mandates if work, then the

way to fix homelessness is to mandate everyone buy a home. He said that didn't work, so I guess that's the next mandate.

You know, since the public option was the only way to hold down HC costs and he campaigned on the PO and then he said he never campaigned on the PO...well, it follows the pattern that home-buying mandates are next.

[tridim]

18. No, he didn't say that as you stated.

:eyes:

Do you think we're stupid?

[valerief]

24. I don't understand. nt

[tridim]

27. Exactly.

[valerief]

45. I don't understand. nt

[valerief]

21. self-delete; posted to wrong post. nt

[Odin2005]

20. Mandate homeless people rent from slumlords.

[Warren Stupidity]

22. How about requiring everyone who works to pay into a retirement pension fund?

We could call it something like old age insurance?

And then maybe we could follow up with a similar mandate requiring everyone working to pay into an old age medical insurance program.

Oh, not those sort of mandates?

Car insurance mandaty enough for you?

[dana_b]

23. well, he said during the campaign that

having a health care mandate would be as silly as requiring homeless people to buy a house. So how about it? We all have to buy a house now or be fined!! It would help out the big mortgage companies so they wouldn't have to depend upon the government for bailouts and we'd all have a house! whoopeeeeee!!!!!

[ThePhilosopher04]

25. Surprised there's no mandate to purchase oxygen...

so we can breathe...I'm sure some private entrepreneur will figure out a way to claim property rights to air and charge us for it.

[ThePhilosopher04]

26. In all seriousness...

I wouldn't be at all surprised if the next mandate down the pike is private schools...I guarantee you conservatives will see this as an opportunity to gut the public school system (they already are) and will say, if we can mandate private insurance, we can mandate everyone attend a private school.

[tridim]

28. The conservatives have no power. Zero.

Democrats are good for public education. Quit spreading FUD please.

[ThePhilosopher04]

32. Cons have all the power...

that's why Dems cave like a house of cards every time they support or oppose anything...they railroaded Dems into voting for the Iraq war and going along with the Patriot Act when they were the majority, and railroaded them into supporting mandates for private insurance while being overwhelming minority...it's like being led around like a dog on a leash...amazing the power conservatives have, and amazing the lack of backbone and spine the Dems have...it's why the world is one fucked up place!!!

[tridim]

34. They just LOST.

Probably their worst single loss in 50 years.

Try reality some day, it's not that bad.

[ThePhilosopher04]

36. Quite the contrary...

they WON and are laughing all the way to the bank...they managed to turn the tables and force the Dems into supporting a MANDATE FOR PRIVATE INSURANCE, which is an extremely unpopular position...they can now sit back and say they opposed it all the way, and attack the Dems from both the left and right - and don't have blood on their hands by having supported it...I feel like I'm living in the Twilight Zone.

[tridim]

37. You're not participating in reality.

And you're a liar. Plonk.

[ThePhilosopher04]

38. You'll see reality...

next November, and again in 2012, if this thing isn't fixed when the bill is merged.

[juno jones]

44. I'm beginning to wonder if both education reform

and healthcare reform are gonna wind up as backdoors to 'faith based' organizations.

There are 'faith-based' clinics, just as there are 'faith-based' charter schools.

[Laelth]

29. k&r for a very good point.

This bill sets a disastrous precedent.

Kill the bill.

Forcing people to buy insurance is no more the answer to a failed health care system than forcing people to buy houses is the solution to homelessness.

:dem:

-Laelth

[JVS]

30. Mandated housing, food, and utilities

[slackmaster]

31. Use of the Metric System

Of course.

[treestar]

33. There already is

If you take food stamps, you are mandated to use them for food. This was a giveaway program to big agribusiness and General Foods.

If you take Section 8 benefits, you are mandated to use them for housing. Big giveaway to the slumlords.

I took one of the student loans out. The bastards mandated that I use it to pay for college. Then I had to pay it back. Big giveaway to the banks.

:sarcasm:

[ipaint]

40. And when the roads are paved we are

mandated to cut a check to joe's paving and asphalt. And when they repair the bridge down the street we make our checks out to harry's construction and ... oh wait. Never mind.

[ThePhilosopher04]

41. Yes, but...

we aren't mandated to pay individual premiums to private contractors...we pay Federal Income taxes that are used as Congress sees fit...I would be more than happy for my tax dollars to go towards a single-payer healthcare system, but mandating that individuals purchase private insurance is anything but.

[ipaint]

42. I understand that in fact this is what the mandate is all about-

Private insurance companies push for 'individual mandate'

"Private insurers lost an estimated 9 million customers between 2000 and 2007. In many cases, people lost coverage because they or their employers could no longer afford it as premium increases outpaced wage growth and inflation.

Recession job losses are adding to the toll. Some economists estimate that every percentage-point increase in the jobless rate adds 1 million people to the ranks of the uninsured.
The industry's real trouble begins in 2011, when 79 million baby boomers begin turning 65. Health insurers stand to lose a huge slice of their commercially insured enrollment (estimated at 162 million to 172 million people) over the next two decades to Medicare, the government-funded health insurance program for seniors.

"The rate of aging far and away exceeds the birth rate," said Sheryl Skolnick, a CRT Capital Group healthcare investment analyst. "That's got to be very scary. . . . This is the biggest fight for survival managed care has ever faced, at least since they went bankrupt in the late '80s."

...The industry fears that the government would force lower fees on hospitals and physicians, enabling a public health insurance plan to offer consumers a better bargain.
That, they say, would make it hard for private companies to compete for customers. Insurers also fear that a public option could easily be converted later into a single-payer healthcare system.
Health insurers don't see a public plan "as the nose of the camel under the tent; they see it as the front half of the camel under the tent," said Robert Laszewski, a former insurance company executive and industry consultant.
"They are interested in 45 million new customers," he said, "but the first thing in everybody's mind is preserving their right to do business in a way that can be profitable and meet shareholder needs."

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/07/business/fi-healthcare7?pg=3

It's a bailout to assist a private for profit industry that is having a hard time in the "free market". In other words we are getting screwed.

[rug]

46. Chess lessons.

[Sparkly]

47. National service

:hide: