I'm not sure what the point of resurrecting a thread which is a month old was besides trolling?
gatlingun6 wrote:A little clarification:
1. I simply pointed out a methodological difference between Rasmussen and other polling firms such as Pew. If you think polls of likely voters are all that matter on any issue, I can't disagree with some of your conclusions. However, since AHCA has an impact on everyone to varying degrees, I want to know what the general populace think, and random live surveys of adults are the only way to do that. Rasmussen surveys are typically automated.
All adults improperly biases the survey to include people who can't vote for one reason or another. For example, all those illegal immigrants the Democrats want to give citizenship so they can get a bunch of voters. There are a lot of reasons the professional pollsters stick to likely voters and yes, some of it is just because there is money to be made providing data to politicians.
gatlingun6 wrote:2. Polling is a statistical science, but it is neither exacting nor precise because it is subject to human foibles. We know for example that question sequence, the way a question is asked, questions not asked, sample size, who is polled, etc, all bear on poll results. Do professional polling organizations skew polls on purpose? I can't say, but my gut says no. Generally they are quantitatively accurate based on the survey sample. If the sample is of likely voters that's what you get, if it's a random sample of adults that's what you get within the expressed margin of error.
Thanks for agreeing with me, but that isn't what you originally said. It very much is an exact probabilistic science in tabulation of statistics, but like all stats you can manipulate some things to get exact, but biased results. The results are exact calculations of probabilistic statements/questions...if you aren't reading them that way then you are reading them wrong.
gatlingun6 wrote:3. ABC News/WaPo polls are run by professional polling and statistical analysis businesses. 3 different firms handle ABC/WaPo polling. They are all run by professionals and staff who are well qualified. They are members of various Associations involved in polling, some have received industry awards and accolades. At least one has been in business for over 20 years. ABC/WaPo periodically uses academia to evaluate their polling operation. Where's the political bias?
The difference is exactly what you pointed out in #2. The professional polling and analysis is simply the mechanism for executing the poll. The bias is in its formulation which the media outlets often create or heavily influence. If you hand a set of house building plans to a contractor and tell them to build it, it really isn't their fault if you forgot a roof. The execution and analysis is very much a science, but the formulation is mostly an art and highly subjective...there is a lot of bias in that end of the game. You make this same point in #4, but that contradicts your claim here...I have a much longer memory than one paragraph.
gatlingun6 wrote:4. You used several phrases tested by operations research outfits like those run by Dr. Frank Lutnz, who is brilliant. His main message is: "It's not what you say, but what people hear". So AHCA becomes "Obamacare", end of life counseling becomes "death panels", AHCA becomes "government takeover of health care", which means what? <deleted trolling rant...at least it wasn't the whole post like the old days, eh?>
It means that the formulation of a poll is critical for valid results. The WaPo can send out a post to a professional organization to execute, but they either create or heavily influence the polls formation because they want a particular answer. E.g. poll all people, not just voters or likely voters...don't ask if they are citizen, just poll everyone...don't use the term "Obamacare"...etc.
I never questioned the statistical calculations or methods, but I did question their formulation practices. Formulation IMHO accounts for their heavily skewed polls.
gatlingun6 wrote:5. The lion's share of health care costs for Americans is paid by government at all levels. Just 2 programs, Medicare and Medicaid cover a combined 107 million people! That's without counting health care costs for federal and state public health services, the VA, the Armed Forces, federal, state, and local employees, and government contractors and sub-contractors at all levels. We, us, you and I pay those bills! If we do nothing, Medicare and Medicaid bankrupts the country. On their current curve costs are unsustainable. So someone wants us (the government) who pay the most to stay out of the market? Should government step aside and let a consortium of industry actors write the rules? Oops, we have that already to a degree. For example the industry virtually wrote Medicare Part D that rewarded themselves with a multi-billion dollar payout.
How does owning most of the market in any way make the government out of it? I've always said we never should have started those programs because the federal government has no such power and they were ignorant ideas from the beginning. They never were sustainable. The were folly from day one.
You do have one thing very right here though. The large corporations have been and will continue to buy politicians and write bills that advantage them exactly because people like you wanted to give the government the power to regulate those markets. If Medicare never existed then there would never have been a chance to write Part D would there?
gatlingun6 wrote:6. My mother, God rest her soul, walked into a hospital 3 years ago and did not walk out. She was in an intensive care unit for about a month after surgery. Ultimately she lost her fight due to a massive infection. I was there every single day discussing what to do, or not do with her primary care doctors, intensive care staff, and surgeons. She was on Medicare. So how often did I have to talk to a government official about procedures? Not once. How often did any doctor or hospital administrator say, we have to check first with the government. Again,not once. That prolonged stay was convincing: Anyone who thinks our health care market place is just fine is wearing a blindfold, it's broken and all the actors know it.
Appeal to emotion much? Oh wait, that's your whole platform.
Medicare has rules, those doctors/hospitals abide by the rules or else they wouldn't be paid. Of course they didn't have to check with the government, they have a whole team of lawyer who write hospital policy to be inline with the rules because they want to get paid. Government makes the rules, then they enforce compliance...its far to messy to actually get their hands dirty with actual decisions, but they do bind and limit what you will be offered. Unless you can pay for something extra, the hospital isn't going to offer you something Medicare won't pay for.
gatlingun6 wrote:7. In 2010 Medicare was a $509 billion dollar program, 12% of the federal budget, and 23% of total health care spending! Do nothing and around 2020 Medicare costs approache $1 trillion dollars! CBO says repeal would cost not save funds. The feds should step aside and allow industry to dictate how the funds should be expended? Why?
Your missing the whole point. Medicare is doomed to fail because it was never a sustainable program from the beginning. The very government regulations which you claim can save it were the cause of the very problem your complaining about! No, more government control won't save a thing...they should never have been involved in the first place and if we want a sustainable solution we must get them out entirely.
Ever hear one definition of insanity about doing the same thing over and over expecting different results? That's the government solution.
gatlingun6 wrote:8. AHCA was passed through reconciliation, a legal legislative procedure. <deleted trolling/rant>
Yes, which now it appears they even had to lie about that through accounting tricks.
gatlingun6 wrote:9.Is AHCA the best we can do? No, so let's improve it, not repeal it. <deleted trolling/rant>
Increasing government control will never be an improvement. I love how easy it is for you to want control over my life and decisions. Repeal is only one step towards improvement, we must repeal the other flawed "reform" acts as well. We must do away with unsustainable programs.
As a side note, at this rate we are leaping and bounding towards another civil war.
gatlingun6 wrote:I end as I began with polling, (Yeaaah he's done!). Polls are useful tools for our political leaders. However, they are not governing tools. We are not a direct democracy, which is a tyranny of the majority. We elect our political leaders, at least I do, with no expectation that they will faithfully execute a polling result. If they don't trip my smokeometer, and I can see some logical, rational basis for their stance, or vote. OK I can accept it, even when I don't like it.
Nice strawmen. Who claimed polls weren't useful? No one. Who claimed we should govern off of them? No one. Who said representatives should only do what polls say? No one. You made it up to make it sound like you had a good point. Gotta knock something down right?
