Sorry for the delay... first, let me say I'm shocked and somewhat horrified by the news (to me) below and I hope the best for you.Date: Fri, 16 May 2003 08:48:13 -0700 (PDT) From: Zenswhen <bushchoked@yahoo.com>
> Every argument you can make as to why you should be able to sell used CDs at a price you choose, subject to general laws against fraud, also applies to a doctor's right to do the same thing with the service HE offers.Need is a funny word. Would you agree with me that people NEED shoes...that's it's practically impossible, in general, to do one's job and live one's life without shoes? What about cars, don't people need cars? And yet, we don't have government-run programs to guarantee that every has shoes and cars, or "shoe insurance", or the presumption that car manufacturers should give away free brand-new cars to those who can't afford them. Is your entrepreneurial spirit to be indulged only if you choose to sell superfluous gewgaws that people can take or leave, but disallowed and nationalized if you find your interest lies in more serious subjects?
Alan:
Except the most important one: no one NEEDS to have a used CD, but all of us absolutely have to have medical care at some point in our lives...
most likely MANY times in our lives. I'm about to enter a period of my life, for about a year, where I'll be on a treatment that's potentially as devestating as chemotherapy (no, I don't have cancer). If I don't do it, I die. It's going to cost me a LOT by any standard (that's with insurance), and I don't think a doctor should be able to say "Well, you want to live...give me all of your money AND go into debt."And so it's a good thing that you have insurance. Knowing little about your situation, I'll still guess that you have a choice of more than one doctor, so IF you were to run into someone so unreasonable (and dead to the interest in people that presumably brought him into medicine in the first place), as to demand all your money, you could go to another doctor. But also, you're implying here that if your need is strong enough you have a claim on that doctor's time and expertise *regardless of the doctor's wishes*, and I disagree. A medical diploma is not a shipping label into slavery.
It didn't used to be that way, as you and I both can remember, not so very long ago.What didn't used to be that way? medical care didn't used to cost a LOT, or doctors didn't used to say, "give me all your money AND go into debt." (And BTW, trading all my money, going into debt, and losing a life-threatening condition, in exchange for health, doesn't sound like a bad deal. Luckily, that actual situation is pretty rare.)