Posted by Racer on October 8, 2006, at 13:20:43
I really hate this feeling.
There are a couple of initiatives on the upcoming ballot here in California that are receiving heavy advertising on television. BOTH strike me as being rather misguided, in one way or another, and the advertising seems -- trying to think of a civil way to put this... Well, in one case, the ads don't tell you what the problem really is at all, they just say, "If this passes, it gives money to Hospital Corporations" without telling anything about how or why this might happen. The other is an energy thing -- and the ads include what comes across to my husband as blackmail on the part of the public safety unions. All I can say is that the second one just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I haven't read both all the way through, yet, but here's the cheat sheet on 'em:
Proposition 86 is a tax on cigarettes, so you could start off by saying it's regressive and rejecting it from that standpoint straight out of the gate. The money is to be used to help finance the costs incurred by hospitals in treating the uninsured.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of treating the uninsured. Health care in this state is very frightening if you don't have insurance. I was uninsured for about ten years, and I know it's horrible to be in that situation. For one thing, the hospitals and health insurers negotiate lowered rates. The uninsured are charged full price -- sometimes with a surcharge added, because they're self-pay. When I say lowered rates, I can give some examples from my own experience. I had a test done a while back, which cost $2300. My insurance covered about $700 of that -- the rest was written off. Had I been uninsured, I'd have paid more than three times what the insurance company paid!
San Francisco has this new idea to improve health care for the uninsured. The mayor, Gavin Newsom, said he started off trying to figure out how to get health insurance for the uninsured in the City. Then, when he realized that was impossible, he started looking at how to get health CARE for the uninsured, and that turned out to be possible. Sometimes it's about asking the right question, you know? (Political CBT?)
So, instead of a new, regressive tax on cigarettes in order to finance the cost of paying for the uninsured -- how about negotiating lowered fees for qualifying uninsured individuals? If that were done, I might not mind the thought of those new cigarette taxes.
**************************************************************************************************************
Proposition 87 is a tax for oil companies. Right now, California does not tax oil companies. Texas and Alaska do. So far so good, right? BUT then the tax is tied to an appointed commission that's supposed to use it to increase renewable energy. Uh... The proposition is supposed to prohibit the oil companies from passing the cost on to consumers.
The ads against it are pretty outrageous -- rather than offering anything like balanced commentary, they're scare ads. The first of 'em, at least, struck me as a bit funny: a woman standing at a filling pump, next to her LARGE SUV, talking about how petrol prices will go up. "Sorry, Hon, that ain't gonna be nearly so much of a problem for me: my Corolla still gets more tahn 30 miles to the gallon..."
Later ads, though, imply that police and fire services will be cut back because of the increased cost of fuel. One actually sounds as though the speaker is threatening us: it sounds as though he's saying, "If you vote for this, and it passes, we just won't respond to your emergencies."
I am dreading actually reading the whole proposition, because I feel almost duty bound to vote FOR this proposition just because of the way the ads against it are running. That bothers me, because I haven't heard anything about this commission that encourages me. Frankly, I'd prefer the oil companies just be taxed, with the proceeds going into either the educational fund or even the general fund.
Have I mentioned this before? I really hate politics. And I really, really hate political ads.
I'm not fond of push polling calls, either...
poster:Racer
thread:692985
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20060809/msgs/692985.html