A dedicated biker's opinion of ObamaCare and Dodd/Frank . . . . proving that old white guys have a place in the political debate.

Here I am at 12,300 feet. Does anyone doubt my intellectual abilities?

The following is a rather involved comment to one of the articles, here at Midknight Review. I hope my responses will be of help to others. The discussion deals with issues surrounding ObamaCare and Dodd/Frank. I am a retired carpenter who would rather be riding his 1800 vtx than writing or, even, thinking !! Any of you pointee heads see where I am wrong, feel free to chime in. My comments are in green.

From "Paul"
I'm also interested in the alternatives for reforming health care systems in the US. From what I have read all Republicans agree that health care reform should take place at the state level and that we should open up health insurance companies to sell insurance across state lines in order to spur competition and lower prices.

My problem with this is that you can easily see a parallel with credit card companies here where all CC companies have moved to the states with the least regulation. If we opened health insurance up like this states would start a competition to bottom out regulations to lure business to their states and in my opinion the health care industry already has too much political and financial power over health care.
Look, we buy our auto insurance across state lines and we save money because of it. I have a Master Card, but not because it is located in another state. I possess one because it is a MasterCard. Why do you think that WalMart is so inexpensive? Because, among other issues, it buys from a nationally located industry of vendors. If we make the vendor pool large enough and give them the freedom to format their own product, sooner or later , several insurance companies will be driven to "under cut" the others, and, wala, cheaper health insurance. Will this work? Who knows.. It is currently against the law.

For those who distrust government to manage healthcare I have to ask if they really trust a corporation?

Yes, but we can run a corporation out of business or sue them for malpractice. No so with the Government.

Worried about government death panels? Well, Cigna, Allstate, Geico, Liberty Mutual and every other health insurance company has been running them for years. Health insurance companies care about stockholders. Your individual health is at the bottom of their priority list.

Agreed. Death panels are everywhere. So, why not allow the people to shop plans? Sooner or later, an insurance company will guarantee "no death panels." That will never happen with the Feds.
While Dodd/Frank may add to the cost of doing business, does the cost outweigh the benefit? Should we allow the financial shell games to go unregulated? Isn't Dodd/Frank's purpose to protect consumers from the kind of financial shenanigans that put the world in the economic situation we are in.

Look. You write as if there are not regulations after regulations covering the financial markets. What did not get regulated, in the Dodd/Frank bill were Fannie and Freddie. No one dealt with the Federal policy of "Affordable Housing" -- the single most causative legislation contributing to the 2008 collapse. Understand the real danger with Federal regulations. They can be used to punish political opponents and reward political allies such as GE and GM and the AFL-CIO with its trust funds. The 1999 repeal of Glass-Steagall Act (GSA) apparently was a contributing factor, as well. Certainly, within nine years of its repeal, the sub-prime crisis hit the fan, a rather curious coincidence.