What would YOU be willing to "give up" to have decent health care legislation pass?

[SoCalDem]

I would give up:


undeclared wars
unneeded war planes
pay raises for some of my hired help (senate/house/SCOTUS)
bail outs to mega-super-humongo banks
tax cuts for people making $300k or more (including ALL income..even their precious dividend/interest/cap gains, etc)
the cap on Social Security

[T Wolf]

1. ...having to fight the insurance company over every god-damn thing - even getting back

my own money put into a flexible spending account.

I'd also give up the right (of registered republicans) to vote.

[kestrel91316]

2. War for oil; corporate welfare;

[Iggo]

3. Rich neighbors.

[BeatleBoot]

4. Chocolate

[FiveGoodMen]

5. 99% of Congress

[State the Obvious]

6. Snacks...(or have a snacks' tax) so I can lose a few pounds. nt

[cdsilv]

7. Seriously, I'd give up a few more tax $ for HEALTH CARE....NOT...INSURANCE!

[liberalmike27]

8. Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to start

Tax breaks for the rich.

We need a couple of more on top, like 350,000 to a million, a million to ten million, and ten million to a hundred million, then 100 million and above.

It's pretty absurd that the top tax rate ends where it does, when Larry Ellison made 192 million in 2008.

Can the cap on SS insurance, and change the law where for the first 15,080 (minimum wage, as of Friday) you don't collect it from employees, or employers.

Throw all income, including capital gains into one category, and don't allow them to get away with a paltry 15 percent. Rich folks would pay more for their capital gains, just like for other earned income, and the poor would pay less. Truth is though, the poor don't really own much stock, so it wouldn't make much difference at the bottom.

These things would go a long way to paying off the huge debt we've built up, and to create some jobs to push us toward full-employment. After all, they promised us jobs for all those tax cuts, and they welshed on their deal. No one should feel sorry for them.

We really need to start viewing the tax rate from the amount folks have left after the taxes, not on how much they pay. This is the solution to democrats reframing the issue. You make a million a year as a talking head on television, and you whine to a democrat. The democrat says, Oh that's tough for you, getting along on a half-million a year. How terribly tough for you.

[PVnRT]

9. Foreign military bases

It's a sacrifice, I know, but I'm willing to make it.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. $40 Billion a year to keep people from smoking pot, for starters. nt

[Fumesucker]

11. The drug war..

And the prison industrial complex would do for starters.

[Greyhound]

12. The insurance industry, and a seemingly endless list of giant corporations. n/t

[dysfunctional press]

13. but you'd want to 'give up' those things regardless...

the process of compromise usually means that you give up something that you want, or let the other side have something IT wants, in order to get something that you want more.

what is something that you're FOR that you would be willing to forego to get national healthcare done?

[Hydra]

26. The "Compromise" we're being asked to make right now

Is to give more to them than we already are for the same thing we already have.

[dysfunctional press]

30. that's not even close to an answer.

what thing/issue that you want would you be willing to forego to have a quality healthcare system?

for instance- would you accept single-payer universal coverage that covered everything for everyone- but abortion would be illegal.?

[Javaman]

14. Not my Klondike bar!!! nt

[CTyankee]

18. Can we get one right now? I'm so in the mood for a Klondike bar...

I get these cravings...

[inna]

15. does anyone know how much repealing the obscene cap on SS...

... alone would save??

just curious if anyone knows the stats; it is a mind-boggling amount of $$.

[Greyhound]

24. Not offhand, but the figures have been posted here numerous times.

Click the search icon.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

16. I like your list!

:-)

[Vinca]

17. Health insurance benefits for the House and Senate.

[fujiyama]

19. All of the above plus

the right to accumulate unnecessarily huge amounts of wealth (I'm talking hundreds of millions or billions).

We allow CEOs to actually make seriously twisted amounts of money but can't provide adequate health care for all citizens. Just doesn't seem right.

CNN had this really annoying take on the surtax and a couple in MD that makes 1.5 million a year and that after the Bush tax cuts expire and an additional tax is placed they would pay almost 700k.

I don't know about you but I'd be fine making about 800k a year knowing that fellow citizens are healthy...

[salguine]

20. I'd give up not feeding rich people into wood chippers.

[lumberjack_jeff]

21. Supermodels. n/t

[KamaAina]

22. Why do you hate America so much?

Class warfare! Class warfare! Class warfare!

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

[mainer]

23. You can't give up what you don't have

e.g., tax cuts for high-income earners. (That is, unless you're a high-income earner.)

I'd like to know what people are actually willing to personally give up. It's an interesting question.

[zanne]

25. Are those baby skunks in your avatar?

Do they spray?

[SoCalDem]

32. I hope not... for those little girls' sakes

I would be more worried about Mom showing up and spraying them:)

[MagickMuffin]

27. Halliburton and KBR government contracts

Especially since they have a BAD habit of invoicing/charging for work TWICE. Double billing. As well as other defense contractors funding.

They ARE a drain on our economy, since a large portion of their work isn't done here at home. And they pay NO taxes with ALL their offshore taxhavens.

Also the War on DRUGS.


I CAN DO WITHOUT THEM!


edit: thought of a few more things!

[slackmaster]

28. Our national commitment to fully adopt the Metric System

(sigh)

[2Design]

29. yes n/t

[JNelson6563]

31. Excellent thread.

I love all the ideas of what people are willing to do without, I too would do without all that stupid shit too that consumes so much of our resources.

Julie