Kate, I too agreed with you until the end. I don’t share some religions’ (including my own) disapproval of that or similar surgeries. However, for a faithful person, morality cannot be separated from their faith. And while it may be inconvenient for you (it’s often inconvenient for them, too), it’s not a bad thing.

If you’re not familiar with it, I highly suggest reading about the Milgram Expirement. It illustrates very well what happens when authority figures try to tell people to act contrary to their morality.

There needs to be some sort of accountability. If not for consumer protection, then for economic stability for the American household. I believe in the power of prayer, but I don’t rely on it to pay the bills.

Even if the states’ rules could be overridden by one set of government regulations, not all insurance companies will compete in all markets (some parts of the country are higher risk than others and a free market system would allow insurance companies to decide what hospitals and regions not to deal with).

That too assumes you don’t have one provider to choose from your employer.

Granted, I chose Humana out-of-pocket in 2008 because they covered me when I worked in Virginia. From what I knew, Humana had a good reputation.

Right now, the lack of oversight allows corporations to act without fairness, transparency, honor, or honesty. You are right, however, in stating that several large corporations in various industries and our government are nearly indistinguishable due to corruption.

The difference is that if the people don’t like the CEO of a corporation that provides a needed service dishonestly, they can only pray the next one isn’t as bad when the current one decides to move on or retire. If I don’t like how government is running something, I petition those responsible and if they don’t act, I can vote against them.

The only people who can vote against a corporation’s leadership and policies are shareholders, who actually benefit from ripping off customers (and former customers).

The biggest problem with health insurance (compared to other forms of insurance) is that we have little idea of what we’re purchasing until we have to use it! The insurance company has too much power over the policyholder AND the healthcare providers. As a policyholder, my only alternative to self-insurance is a high-deductible policy where I only depend on the insurance company to protect me from catastrophe, but I now wonder IF I can even depend on it for that!

Another issue is government policies regarding insurance, because the government restricts who can sell what policies where and mandates what must be included in those policies it has little resemblance to a free market situation. You’re not allowed as an Indiana resident to buy insurance from an Arizona company. All this does is protect large corporations that have the financial or political clout to set up offices in each state.

I don’t think the free market ever guarantees you’ll never get screwed but I think it’s better to have the choice.

There are a lot of writers smarter than I that have addressed similar issues, if your interested I’ll email them to you. Hopefully I can still find them.