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Net neutrality advocates are planning two days of protest in Washington DC this month as they fight off plans to defang regulations meant to protect an open internet.
A coalition of activists, consumer groups and writers are calling on supporters to attend the next meeting of the Federal Communications Commission on 26 September in DC. The next day, the protest will move to Capitol Hill, where people will meet legislators to express their concerns about an FCC proposal to rewrite the rules governing the internet.
The FCC has received 22 million comments on "Restoring Internet Freedom", the regulator's proposal to dismantle net neutrality rules put in place in 2015. Opponents argue the rule changes, proposed by the FCC's Republican chairman Ajit Pai, will pave the way for a tiered internet where internet service providers (ISPs) will be free to pick and choose winners online by giving higher speeds to those they favor, or those willing or able to pay more.
The regulator has yet to process the comments, and is reviewing its proposals before a vote expected later this year.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @03:28PM (31 children)
Yeah, because that'll work great! Hell, the 'free market' can't even do health care worth a crap. The U.S.'s free market is more expensive and no better to less effective than pretty much any other industrialized country on the planet. Did I mention your 'free market' is MORE expensive. LOL. And that's in a market that doesn't have a physical restriction of having to have infrastructure running to every building. You need to stop fantasizing about your imaginary 'free market', get off your unicorn, put the meth down, and join the rest of us in the real world..
(Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @03:53PM (30 children)
The free market gave the US the most advanced healthcare industry on the planet despite massive government interference. Care to try again?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @04:14PM (25 children)
What exactly do we have, other than high costs, that other countries don't?
Other countries have lower rates of infant mortality. Other countries have longer life expectancy. Other countries have lower rates of obesity. The only thing we're "most advanced" at with health care is how much we spend on it.
Try being one of the tens of millions of Americans without health insurance and then tell us all how advanced our health care system is.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @04:18PM (24 children)
Sell that garbage to someone that doesn't know that other countries rely on the advances in healthcare that the American market has created. Consider for a moment every healthcare advancement that's come out of the US and then picture the world without any of them.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @05:13PM (8 children)
Care to separate those advances which were developed at public universities or using research grants from NIH or other government agencies vs. those made by for-profit health institutions using their own moneys?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @06:19PM (7 children)
Let's do it the easy way instead. You point out a significant medical advancement from a nation that at the time had socialized medicine and I'll point out two from just the US.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @08:34PM (5 children)
ongoing socialized medicine [nhsggc.org.uk]
Nice goal post moving, you're an intellectual GIANT TMB, GIIIANNNT /s
Guess you just can't face the facts that so much of the US advances are funded by tax payers, your poor model of perfection is so iiiiignoraaant. You're an ignorant FOOL TMB, ignorant as FUCK. If you'd at least stop posting that shit online like its the second coming of christ I wouldn't need to point out your deficiencies.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @08:59PM (4 children)
Oh, you mean they're funded by capitalists who've had their money stolen? Yeah, no shit. There wouldn't be anything to steal if it weren't for capitalism.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @10:50PM (3 children)
You're really swinging for the fences here. I guess you really are the taxation is theft guy, TMB the bloody idiot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @12:15AM (2 children)
When you have no valid argument, ad hominem, amirite?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:54PM (1 child)
That is the way TMB operates, I just have no desire to point out the problems with the base assertion that capitalism is the only reason humanity has advanced. It is arrogant and naive, and no amount of arguing will change the mind of the likes of him.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @05:02PM
And yet for all your enlightenment, the best you could come up with is a one-line post to call TMB names?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @11:19PM
You're the one who made the assertion. It's your responsibility to provide evidence for your claim.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @05:40PM (14 children)
hahahahaha, yeah the US is the sole inventor of all modern technology. Get off your high horse you nit.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @06:17PM (13 children)
If you'd bother to check your history books, we damned near have been in healthcare for the past hundred years or so. This attitude of superiority comes from being genuinely superior.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @07:13PM (12 children)
Yes, the US was the world leader for a long time after WWII due to our economic maneuvering. That doesn't make us inherently better, we were just lucky to be positioned so well after the war. But hey, you never let extenuating circumstances stop you from making stupid statements so please, do continue with your arrogant stupidity trying to sell US healthcare as a "better system".
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @07:26PM (11 children)
Yes, yes it very much does make us better when the metric is what system has produced the most medical advances in the world. Do please tell us how socialism or communism is better even though it has failed to produce anything worthwhile every single time it has been tried at a national level.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @08:21PM (10 children)
Because all the data on socialized healthcare shows it is better for the citizens and private healthcare options are still able to exist, but they must compete on a level playing field instead of their monopolistic insurance influenced field. Suck a dick you red herring piece of crap.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday September 20 2017, @09:02PM (9 children)
No, it most certainly does not. All the data shows that you get shitty care and insane waits for any kind of treatment. Even if you're willing to pay more. Why the hell do you think so many people come to the US for treatment?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @09:42PM (8 children)
Not GP, but to answer your question, look at the numbers, they don't. Comparatively, very few people come to the US for treatment. Although I do agree that the numbers are indicative of the quality of the US's health care system (spoiler: it sucks)
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @10:53PM (7 children)
He doesn't care about facts, he only cares about propaganda. Dude is fucking dumb. All this same shit has been trotted out before, but he always returns to the same crap arguments that ignore reality. My guess is he just can't BELIEVE the US empire is falling so he's falling back on the comfortable and familiar dreams.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @12:09AM (6 children)
So, all you got is ad hominem...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:26AM (5 children)
It's not ad hominem to say someone doesn't care about the facts, and are kind of dumb, when they just made an easily checked and objectively false statement. To declare the US health care system is the best on the planet is patently false and not backed up by data. To rave about 'why do so many people come to the US for health care' when less then half the number of people go to the US as go to Iran is absurd. That the poster doesn't care about facts is not ad hominem, it's just a fact.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @04:28PM (4 children)
The statement "Dude is fucking dumb" is ad hominem, and it is pathetically deceitful of you to try to claim otherwise. If the false statement is so easily checked and objectively demonstrated to be false, why not post THAT instead of a post that a third-grader would be ashamed of?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @05:37PM (3 children)
The original 'Dude is fucking dumb', wasn't me. But the only thing improper about the statement is the term 'fucking" and while it distracts from the point and is not helpful, it's not really ad-hominem.
dumb
adj 1: slow to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity;
"so dense he never understands anything I say to him";
"never met anyone quite so dim"; "although dull at
classical learning, at mathematics he was uncommonly
quick"- Thackeray; "dumb officials make some really
dumb decisions"; "he was either normally stupid or
being deliberately obtuse"; "worked with the slow
students" [syn: {dense}, {dim}, {dull}, {obtuse}, {slow}]
I think that in this case, I'd give the benefit of the doubt and go with 'being deliberately obtuse' as the most accurate use of the term dumb. But i think 'dumb' is a perfectly valid word choice for someone who deliberately and repeatedly spouts obvious untruths. It's accurate, not ad-hominem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @07:25PM (2 children)
True or not, attacking the person rather than the argument is ad hominem, and is an invalid debate tactic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @10:42PM (1 child)
In retrospect, I have to agree. Calling the poster dumb was ad hominem, calling the action dumb would not have been.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 22 2017, @12:22AM
Whoa, wait, what? Listen, pal, that's not how it works around here. Once you've made a claim, you stick to it no matter what.
Seriously, though, I look forward to throwing more ideas around with you, AC, to see what bits break off whose ideas first. =)
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Wednesday September 20 2017, @04:26PM
I think the problem is coverage, not quality.
(I won't even get into who is eligble for said coverage and how to fund it)
I have to wonder if some of our incredibly expensive cures would be less expensive of the economies of scale were to kick in -- or if only people like the pharma bro guy are responsible for many of the costs of what could be cheap, but isn't.
Anyway, a taxpayer handout for everyone to get covered, plus jerks like him and his business plans to raise prices because he can -- clearly will make any solution cost more than it has to, even if we had remained with what we had before the ACA. It's insurance that pays through the nose most of the time, and our system makes our premiums go up in part due to that kind of greed.
But there's no question the US has among the most advanced medical care systems for diagnosis and treatments that one could hope for. In intractable problem is that many people hope to be a part of it and don't have the resources to do so.
Preventative maintenance coverage could do a lot to keep costs down...while still offending nearly everyone as not being enough in either direction.
Regardless, I'd pay a few more bucks in taxes* as part of some massive government initiative to try to prevent the spread of preventable illnesses and raise the standard of living, but that opinion is not shared by everyone.
*I don't know what that amount actually is, but my opinion of what acceptable costs would be based on what actually is proposed and who is actually covered...the sky is not the limit
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @04:39PM
If you weren't a poor person you could have traveled to other countries to see their healthcare systems for yourself.
Maybe there is some million dollar an hour dick extension surgeon somewhere in the USA but the average joe schmoe might as well go to fucking china.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 20 2017, @05:00PM (1 child)
You almost owe me a new keyboard, good times. Well let's see, the U.S. is sooo advanced we must have the longest life spans... Japan, Switzerland, heck can't even see the U.S. on that list. Well it must be child mortality?... Luxemburg, Iceland... nope the U.S. is far, far down the list.
Hmm, well the US must be so obviously better than everyone else that people must come to the U.S. in droves to get a piece of the fantastic level of health care available here. How many Health tourist does the U.S. get? Let's go with the high end, the U.S. gets like 85K health tourist! It MUST be the best, go USA, go USA!... But wait, Singapore gets 400K+ people a year, that just must be an outlier, ohhh, Thailand gets 400K+ too, and Malayasia 340K+. Okay who compares to the US, wait Iran gets 200K+, India 150K+, fuck, the US must really suck.
Well how does the US compare in health ranks by the WHO? Is it in the top 10?... nope. Top 20 for fucksake?... nope.
Your beliefs seem to be based on delusions of nationalism. Brother, I'd suggest you get some mental health care, but considering the health care system your in, well, your screwed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 21 2017, @01:11AM
But President Reagan got rid of it back in the 80s :)