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I woke up this morning from a good night’s sleep, and promptly saw a nightmare. MSNBC is reporting on a new project of the credit industry called “MedFICO.” Go read the article, I’ll wait for you.

Okay. So, I saw this over on Slashdot this morning. If you ever read stuff over there, I am sure you can imagine the discussion that is taking place over the whole thing. I am going to chose to ignore the part of the article that says the scores would be designed to be used only after a patient is given treatment. I do this for these reasons: there are followups, as mentioned, which could be negatively impacted, people will always screw stuff up, and there is no precedent to believe that such a score couldn’t and wouldn’t be abused. Just look at normal credit scores. Hell, landlords these days will do credit checks on people. Why? If they don’t pay, you kick them out. It’s worked for decades. Their credit has nothing to even do with it. It is inevitable that such a score would be used for unscrupulous and unintended reasons reasons. That is what happens with a system desiged to mine private people’s information and sell it to the highest bidder.

Imagine, someone goes to the ER, and gets treated. Hospital bills them and then checks the person’s MedFICO score, and finds out that they are a high risk. The person comes in for a followup, and they are gently “referred” to a non-network health group. If you don’t think that wouldn’t happen, you are clueless as to how the country works. Worse yet, they come in for a follow up, and are quietly assigned a lower priority, and end up sitting for hours waiting while the good scored people go ahead of them. A 15 minute appointment now takes three hours.

The fact that healthcare is in any way tied to a profit margin is the scariest damn thing in the world. Need an MRI? Go ask what it costs. They won’t tell you. Why? Because different people get different prices based on if they have insurance or not. So they will inflate prices by hundreds of percent to cover insurance “processing” fees. It’s gross. People are a consumable commodity for the industry, something to be milked. It’s not about actually helping them (at least, maybe it is to some doctors), because the administrators and support services have one goal: make investors happy. That’s who’s important.

“But Michael, socialized healthcare isn’t any good!” Really? That’s news to me, and Canadians, and most of Europe, and Australians. “B-b-but Michael, the taxes!” Yeah, sucks huh? Tough. You’ll appreciate it that month you’re between jobs without health insurance and are diagnosed with cancer. And that’s not to say that there isn’t a happy medium between socialized and free market health care. But look, we have socialized fire protection, law enforcement, why draw the line there? Why the push back on health? Why are the former two okay, and the latter some crazy taboo? If you screw around, cost those departments unacceptable amounts, there are ways that you can be found culpable for the bill. I’m sure the same could be done in health care. Frankly, I can’t figure out how what they want to do isn’t a violation of HIPAA. My medical billing records are as private as any charts in my opinion.

And so many people think that because doctors come out with hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt from school, that somehow gives them a pass on charging high amounts. Pardon the language, but that’s bullshit. The fact that schools charge so much is not the patients’ fault. It’s a problem with the system. The fact that insurance companies and HMOs are there to make money, forcing inflated costs, and not care for people isn’t my fault. The system is dangerous, and it will chew you up, and spit you out, make no mistake about it. That isn’t the burden of the patient though, and so many people accept that it apparently is! We are caught in a cross fire, and unfortunately neither side of the system sees the other, they just see us. This is true in so many other places as well. This is how capitalism fails. Money cannot and should not ever be put ahead of the moral fabric of society. When it is what we have now is the result, and there’s a lot of room for it to get worse.
Don’t worry, the first time someone is denied, or receives second rate health care because of this, it will come under serious fire. And it will happen, have no doubt. The more that you dehumanize a field like health care, the worse that speaks to us as a society.

What would House say?

Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase its public health assistance to Sub-Saharan Africa.

So, yesterday I agreed to spend some time up at Pittsburg High School judging for their debate tournament. It’s something I tend to do often when I can, and it’s generally an okay time. Especially when judges’ lounges are well stocked. Being well fed and coffeed up can make a big difference in any activity. Sadly, the “Starbuck’s” coffee that was offered up was the worst coffee that I have ever had. Anywhere. Ever. I don’t know if it came straight from Starbuck’s, or if they just bought the beans and brewed it there or what, but it was downright awful. It was like drinking liquid hate.

Anyway, I wish I knew what it was, but debate now is only a shadow of what debate was when I was in high school only seven years ago. We fought tooth and nail for the rounds that we won. Now, the open teams that are breaking are on par with good novice teams of a decade ago. It makes me sad. And it isn’t new. I’ve discussed this situation with a number of people over the past years. I am being told that the new crop of novices are showing more promise than normal. Here’s hoping…

For instance, there is no such thing as an existential inherent barrier. No matter how hard you want it. You can neither prove, nor mandate through an existential problem in a debate round. Procedural or attitudinal, those are your two options. Pick one, define it, and go. Don’t make crap up just because you want to run a squirrel case. And for Buddha’s sake, signpost your damn arguments so I know where they need to flow. By the way, naming a solvency take out a “negative position,” and flowing it off case is ignorant. Flow it under Solvency and fricking run it as what it should be. The easiest way to beat a case down is straight on, full ahead attacking it. Trying fancy arguments you don’t know how to run and creating “cool” off case takeouts just frustrates me and makes you look dumb. Last but not least, the 2AC is not a place to be extending case with additional advantages. Learn the meaning of Prima Facia.

And why do people give up so easily? I’m already burning my Saturday to be there, the least they could do is give a full five minute rebuttal instead of giving up and sitting down after one. That’s the fast lane to a 4. Even if you are losing, there are points to be scored for standing up and fighting with some confidence. Who knows, maybe the other team will drop the argument and flow it to you.

The crazy part is, probably the best case that I heard was a canned case a novice team ran. When I say best, I don’t mean they were the best debaters of the day or anything. But their case idea was so nice and simple, and would create such nice clash. Send 1,000,000 additional aid workers to Africa. Simple, concise, topical. Sure, lots of attack angles for the Negative, but that makes for a good round. And the idea would be an easy one to find plenty of support on. It’s better than the Plumpynut case an open team ran. Not because the idea was horrible, but because there is no such thing as a self sustaining plan. Nice try though. You have to spend money to make money. They were also the existential inherent barrier people.

Even then, I fault the negative team for not trying to attack it from a more generic malnutrition angle. These kids need to work on some critical thinking skills in a big way.

All told, it ends up sorta frustrating, but I’m glad the kids do it anyway. Debate teaches very valuable skills that come in handy in college and work. I guess I’m just a sucker for the torment, heh.