Today, you’re in charge of the nation’s finances. Some of your options have more short-term savings and some have more long-term savings. When you have closed the budget gaps for both 2015 and 2030, you are done. Make your own plan and compare.

You can decide how to close the deficit - I did it, first try!

Click here: Budget Puzzle -You fix it- Interactive

Wow ..Capping Medicare growth works wonders.

oh crap, I did a surplus on the outside years. adjusted giving us retired folks all I could .......... wella good outcome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! unless your 2 years old then you might be upset in 20 or 30 years but I will be long gone..........

It wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be, and I created surplus. Guess I'll apply for a position as a federal budget analyst.

Sg

Not trying to be a cold hearted ass here but I've seen two terminally ill patients kept alive for about 3 weeks longer than their normal life span at who knows what cost to the Medicare system in the last 6 months..

Ah just read this. Take a look as it is interesting as to the medicare thing with budget.

http://www.kff.org/pullingittogether/People-Behind-The-Entitlement-Debate.cfm

I saw in today's paper they have a drug that will add about three months life expectancy to those with prostate cancer. The cost - more than $65,000. So, the question is, are we willing to pay that much for that little added life? Call it death panels if you wish,but we must always be making hard choices about cost vs benefit. Somewhere there must be a line drawn. Where would you draw that line?

You know DV we are both old geezers and it is a really serous thing. The greatest portion of health care cost is in the last 1/10th of our lives. But it begs the question but not just in older years but younger to. At what cost? I watched a documentary on it once and this guy was paralyzed completely the only thing functioning was his brain but no voice, bodily, well you get it. Cost was over 250k a year to keep him alive on support. So it begs the question, when is enough enough? Cost benefit ratio ( years additional survival ).... what? Is it worth 50k in basic treatment to add 6 months on ones life? Just for all know, my wife had that decision to make before she died ................... it is a bitch believe me. When do you turn loose of your own hope of survival? Your Dads,? Mothers? and the biggy............. your children?

We will probably be gone before the real debate begins when they develop artificial organs and such. The next generation is going have a gut wrencher here.

I read somewhere that the Native Americans answer to health care for the elderly and infirm was to move camp twice a year, either you survive the journey or you didn't.

It is a major problem that we have come to believe medical care (regardless of cost) is an entitlement. Fundamentally, it's stupid on the face of it. We aren't immortal. Ain't none of us getting out of here alive. I agree that it's difficult to draw the line between "reasonable" medical care and "extraordinary" care, but it seems like it takes an entitlement mentality to always conveniently push the line towards extraordinary.

Sg

Were getting alot of help from the health care industry, from what I'm seeing. The individual I'm watching now was just recently flown to Portland on a Medivac even though he's dying of leukemia, I will say they did fix him up pretty good so he could enjoy the last few days of his life..

My wife's grandmother did that yesterday around 2:30.

Doctor assisted or just the hell with it I'm out of here?

Doctors know how long they can milk the insurance cash cow before the insurance company death panels make a ruling.

GH I was married to a RN surgery nurse for 23 yrs, a RN trauma turned consultant for 5. That said your statement implying that doctors or the medical community keep someone alive just to rake in money is so far past reality that one has to wonder if you should not utilize your insurance and seek help. My wife spent many sleepless nights over the process dying people dealt with. Doctors the same as it is not easy EVER to watch another human die let alone be the one that brings the bad news. The doctor that was a life long friend and co worker that did the bi on my wife that said cancer quite and retired after that, just had enough of death I was told. Being a doctor is a piss poor way to make a living, law school is much more lucrative.

Unless it was a warped attempt at humor you should rethink what you put down as you just made the bottom of the barrel.

Your right here, in the instances I've provided each time the patient was asked if this is what they wanted, but 99.9999% of people would respond the same way if given a chance. So maybe the Doc's aren't explaining it well but they come off as a bunch of mechanic's that keep telling you for 3800 bucks we can fix it right up for you instead of it's shot take it to the wrecking yard.

At times KK you are so full of [censored] that you must be blinded by the smell. Try a shower or bath it might clear that thing you loosely describe as a brain.

AM I was around Hospice and did not care for it. Did not care for when my FL passed, nor did I or my wife, so I cared for her. Hospice is needed, the terms suck as to what insurance companies cover vs the care. In the end it is better to die in your own bed in god's good time than hanging in with tubes going everywhere. It is the choice that is difficult for many as letting go is not easy. It is easier to die yourself than to hold the hand of someone you love dies. Don't know the awnser, just been there. As in all things in our society money comes front and center sooner or later.

KK your still full of [censored].

Don't have a sister. Hows your Mom doing?

Nice to see Kk looking at an empty wine bottle.

Pot, meet Kettle.

This is why nothing ever gets fixed, what were seeing here is exactly the same in Washington DC.

Yeah, the instances of doctors doing pro bono work to keep someone alive are overwhelming.

Or not.

Google Dr's without borders, My dentist goes to the poorest countries in the world to fix peoples dental problem's (local as well)he pays for it 100% on his own, retired to do it full time. His home is worth maybe $250k, no boats , fancy vacations or even fishing trips.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/19/60minutes/main5711689.shtml


He says modern medicine has become so good at keeping the terminally ill alive by treating the complications of underlying disease that the inevitable process of dying has become much harder and is often prolonged unnecessarily.

Not hard to find Aunty there's about a billion pages on the subject out there, and were not talking about Doctor's treating non terminal patients just the last 20 or so days.

Now that is a direct hit. Cancer / cemo sicker than hell from the treatment, hair all gone, can not do anything because of nausea, and you live 3 / 4 / 5 / months more. It is not living it is existing for the hope you will be the 1 in 10000 that it rolls back the disease.

Medicine offers hope to those who are ill. Many times things can be fixed or the disease controlled but when you get to 1 in 10000 and the cost is 50k for each month of life that is measured in months, then that is a false hope. We all are going to be terminally ill sooner or later but there just has to be a better way to approach ones own death.

So the exception becomes the norm to make it all better?

Already did, still found that it's a significant minority. But you go ahead and continue to be their water-carryin' ball washer.

GoHarley... Are you be a skeptic on Global Warming? Just curious if your "significant minority" arguments flip willy nilly depending on what FOX news tells you.

No. Although I believe Man did not create global climate change, per se, Man is signifcantly exacerbating the problem, which is of a great concern to our existence, IMHO.

My earlier argument is: simply because a relatively small minority of American doctors provide pro bono medical care to certain regions of the world, does not make the entire collective of American doctors a faction of altruism. American doctors, for the most part, are motivated primarily by money, not benevolence. The exception does not make the norm.

Fox news is an oxymoron.

Compared to what he makes in the army they might well be..

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Medicare-p...set=&ccode=


and the debate continues

Sure, Hank, you keep carryin' their water. But until you can provide some empirical evidence to refute my assertion that the vast majority of American doctors are motivated by money rather than benevolence, I'll consider the lack of as support for my affirmation.

And I hope you remember you're little diatribe above next time you feel like pontificating on global climate change, or the national debt, or taxes. Unless you can show that you've worked closely with numerous climate scientists, have a history of close working relations with nobel laureate economists, or had a hand in writing a public budget.

Go back and read my post again. Pay particular attention to that part about lack of empirical evidence. Your handful of local doctors is what percentage of all American doctors?