Watch this clip and stand and then realize Maria Bartiromo makes her living discussing business and finance:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
That is Bachman/Palin level stupid. The only thing missing from her outfit was the giant USA foam finger.
(via)
Napoleon
Well she does have the most awesome pouty lips. That must count for something.
WyldPirate
The level of stupid on Morning Joe is so high that it makes me want to bleach my brain for having watched.
IndieTarheel
Gloryhallastoopid, pin the tail on the flunky…
scav
Ummm, it’s not like TV financial experts, let alone designated money honeys, are supposed to have any acumen. It’s a feature.
r€nato
I’ve heard of this Bartiromo but never seen her in action until just now.
Wow. That’s a whole lot of stupid. Catch her pouting after Taibbi was done with her?
SGEW
That look on her face after Taibbi’s done is priceless (at 5:27).
mai naem
I was watching this this AM. Maria Antoinette Bartiromo has no fucking clue. There is basically no chance that she is ever going to face bankruptcy due to medical bills because she’s a multimillionaire in her own right and then her hubby is a multigazillionaire in his own right. And BTW the bimbo should also know that drugs have to be approved here too. Amgen makes a bunch of money of epogen because medicare pays for it. Guess what, Maria the big bad gubmint pays for it.
John Cole
My personal favorite was that the number of 47 million uninsured Americans contains a whole lot of illegal aliens so it can’t be right.
Illegal aliens are, by definition, not Americans.
Tonybrown74
I almost expected her to say, “No no no no no no no!!! You’re a doodie head!!!”
They’re all children, the whole lot of them!
r€nato
Joe Klein nailed it. A party of nihilists.
SGEW
Also noteworthy: Taibbi’s sardonic laughter when one of the commentators says that “everyone at this table” can get the “best” health care . . . right after Taibbi talked about his own need to travel to Brazil to get a medical procedure done!
Guess they don’t consider him to be “at the table.”
JenJen
Thanks for posting this! I was watching live this morning, and was so happy to see my crush, Matt Taibbi, on Morning Joe. But nothing could have prepared me for Bartiromo’s willful ignorance. It was a sickening thing to watch.
I imagine Bartiromo is a millionaire, and I imagine her health care is super-awesome, and so maybe she just doesn’t get it, but the American exceptionalism was nauseating, especially when Taibbi came back at her and explained how actually, no, we don’t have the best health care in the world.
After patiently listing things like infant mortality and life expectancy rates as yardsticks by which a nation’s health care quality can be measured, she still came back at Taibbi and said, “But how do we know they have better health care?” Was she listening to a fucking thing he said?
Part of me couldn’t help but wonder if Bartiromo has it out for Taibbi, seeing as how he said some pretty harsh stuff about her pals over at Goldman-Sachs.
Again, thanks for posting that, because I thought it was very illuminating this morning and am happy others can see it. Really gives one a good idea of what we’re up against.
shoutingattherain
I think I’d like to have a beer with MTaibbi. He seems so refreshingly normal.
Ed in NJ
This argument that there will be no more innovation if profit margins are cut is so disingenuous. In other words, research funding is going to be cut before companies take less profits. How is that a winner for her?
David
Someone tell Maria that the government in the UK doesn’t decide what a person’s healthcare is or isn’t. The drugs she is talking about are legal and available with a prescription in the the UK. You can purchase insurance that will pay for them or just purchase the drugs.
It’s simply not a problem.
NoVa Commie
FYI replay of Barney Frank townhall on C-SPAN now…
Anastasius
Oh my, listen to her voice turn into a screech when she goes: “This is TOTALLY debatable!”
r€nato
@David:
but what about the death panels? And do they really make you into soylent green after you turn 65 in soshulist England?
PeakVT
Bartiromo and the rest of the biz nooz bimbos make a living luring retail marks into markets they don’t understand and can’t compete in.
gizmo
Part of the underlying stupid with our pundit class is their assumption that America is The Fucking Greatest Place on Earth. That is a very hard thing for dimwits like Bartiromo to accept. They have the flag planted so far up their ass that their faux patriotism clouds their vision, and they are utterly impervious to factual persuasion.
riffle
I forget who said this, but it’s great: the fact that Sheikhs were buying Rolls Royce autos in the sixtied doesn’t mean the UK car industry was the best in the world.
Napoleon
Matt T. is one of the best things progressives have going for them now since he is: 1) knowledgeable, 2) smart, 3) willing to go after the stupid and call people out and 4) funny and entertaining.
gypsy howell
Mario Bartiromo makes her living
discussing business and financeas a Wall Streetwalker .TR
It was a god smackdown, but I kept waiting for the obvious response:
“Who cares how attractive our health care system is to the elites of the world if it’s not working for average Americans? I don’t care if a Saudi Prince or a German banker wants to come here for their surgeries. If it’s not working for ordinary Americans, it’s not working period.”
TR
*good* smackdown
A god smackdown involves lightning.
Dan L
I loved her on Will and Grace.
media browski
Taibbi handed her ass to her, but that pout was, well, meow Maria, and meet me in the boardroom!
The Grand Panjandrum
I would go to THIS hospital in Bangkok, Thailand before I would go to many of the hospital in this country AND save money after paying for travel and lodging.
My father uses the VA and gets very good care. He had major surgery two years ago and is still under a doctors close supervision. SEE proof the VA is GREAT. (OK hyperbole, but you get my drift.)
Bartiromo is just another right winger looking to be offended any time someone doesn’t bow to the American exceptionalism mythogology.
Most of us probably remember the famous poster from Bill Clinton’s campaign war room: It’s the economy, stupid. The Democrats need this one for the healthcare reform war room: It’s the Insurance Companies, stupid. Until the compensation model is change from reimbursing for individual procedures to reimbursement for outcomes absolutely nothing will change. Nothing. They will be kicking the can down the road.
gypsy howell
@TR:
Maria Antoinette Bartiromo, indeed. She simply did not want to understand the difference between having superb medical care available to you IF YOU CAN AFFORD it, and the issue at hand here, which is that a huge chunk of Americans CAN NOT afford it.
ericblair
@r€nato: but what about the death panels? And do they really make you into soylent green after you turn 65 in soshulist England?
Only if you’ve been grass-fed. They’re concerned about their diets over there, dontchaknow.
Maria’s job is to be a pump monkey for GE. Usually she’s pumping the stock markets; today she’s pumping their medical businesses. Same shit; the skill set transfers quite nicely.
dom
The standard talking point for proponets of single payer, or the public option is that 47 million people are uninsured, not necessarily Americans only. Sure, she misspoke, but doesn’t make her completely inaccurate.
And yes, this number includes illegal aliens, people in between plans and people who just don’t want insurance even if they can afford it, etc. This number hasn’t even been debated or discussed or thought about. Just thrown out there to the sheeple who are expected to STFU and just accept it. Becasue we have to pass healthcare reform yesterday, so who cares if anyone has even read the bill or knows what’s in it. We’ll worry about that somewhere in 2020 or something.
Bartiromo is a corporate hack. Always was. Always will be. As you say, her job is to “discuss” money and finance. Doesn’t mean she knows anything about them.
JenJen
Ha! Just read Atrios’ summary of Bartiromo:
“America is awesome because it’s America, and it is.”
Exactly.
cleek
wow, she’s a fucking numbskull.
UncommonSense
USA! USA! USA!
THESE COLORS DON’T RUN!
AMERICA, LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT!
YOU’RE WITH THE FOR-PROFIT INSURANCE INDUSTRY, OR YOU’RE WITH THE TERRORISTS!!!!!
She’s as stupid and uninformed as a Fox “News” viewer.
WHERE’S THE GIFT CERTIFICATE!!!!111!!!1!!!!!
cleek
and, who knew that Ms. Chanandler Bong was a political junkie ?
Greg G
Wow the level of ignorance is incredible. It blows the mind. What was with that last comment about the VA. The VA actually has quite good care, and compares favorably with private health systems and medicare.
Best,
Greg
KG
this is totally off topic, but I just can’t pass up sharing it with someone because, the stupid, well, it burns.
Maggie Gallagher took up Chapman’s gay marriage challenge. Here first five predictions are nothing we haven’t heard before. But she added a sixth, in a separate post, saying that fewer gay couples will get married, and she throws this out there:
Anyone want to bet that less than half of all straight couples are married? Isn’t that the fucking point of dating?
Just Some Fuckhead
I’d forgotten how bereft of substance Joe and Mika are.
Punchy
Her argument was basically, “Yaw! Shaw! As if! I say you’re, like, sooooo wrong, and no take backsies!”
Mike
I’m surprised that health care progressives like don’t bring up
the growing medical tourism industry when confronted with the
“everybody wants to come to America for health care” argument.
Taibbi’s trip to Brazil is part of a trend; Americans increasingly traveling abroad for expensive medical procedures.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_tourism
Drosophila Slayer
Is it bad that I had a dream about a three-way involving myself, Maria Bartiromo and Sara Palin? What can I say, no brains and pouty lips turns my crank, baby!
maya
If Maria Bartiromo is to Jim Cramer as Joey the Scar is to Mika the Pole and David Gregory is to Karl Rove what then in this equation is the coefficient of x?
Answer: Tom DeLay
Jeff
I’d like to add that Mika is quite an idiot, too.
6:47 Scarborough: “Will our health care sytstem, if we turn it over to the federal government, will it look like Medicare? Or will it look like …”
Mika “What will it look like?”
Hi, dumbasses that get paid crazy amounts of money to appear ad nauseum saying idiotic things: Obama is not talking about “turning health care over to the government.” At his best, he’s talking about a government-run plan as an option.
Wow, I just wasted enough time watching this video and posting this comment to earn 0:01 in Mika and Joe’s salaries, respectively.
SrirachaHotSauce
The idea that a Maria Bartiromo can be so profoundly misinformed (and, apparently incurious) on a subject of this importance is pretty shocking, considering that NBC holds her up as a “journalist” exemplar in a pretty technical field.
The good news is, I think about 500 people in the country outside of Wall Street and the tv industry actually know who she is.
And 490 of those are bloggers. Fifty of them are DougJ.
Stooleo
The cluelessness of the punditry surely has no bounds. This bitch has probably never had to make a tough choice about money, ie paying bills or eating. Kinda reminds me when McCain made that gaff that no one would pick lettuce for 50 buck an hour. 100% pure clueless.
Hey I have an idea, there should be a reality show where a pundit is taken to Arkansas or Kentucky or West Virginia and then they try to survive for 3 months on a 45,000/ year salary. I could get behind that sort of entertainment.
YellowJournalism
When Taibbi mentions the infant mortality rate, her first response is “We’re obese.”
Yeah, it’s all those obese babies raising the rate, there. You could tell she wasn’t even listening to what he was saying, that she had her talking points all primed and ready to go, thinking he was going to start off talking about US life expectancy.
She also mentioned citizens who were living abroad being part of the 47 million, as if that would account for such a significant proportion as to make the 47 million number dismissable.
Mike G
Barfiromo was always clueless on finance, a bubble-headed sock puppet who memorized a few phrases and was hired because she looked cute.
She knows how her bread is buttered and that she has to uphold the conceit that “Murka’s bestest at everything and perfect because it just is” to keep her mouth-breather audience and advertisers happy.
She fits right in with the vapidness of the other hosts. The quintessential news bimbo and a prime exhibit at the shitty state of the media.
EEH
@Mike: I was just thinking that very thing.
GregB
Bartiromo and Kramer are the new Laurel and Hardy.
Effin A. She is horrendous.
-G
arguingwithsignposts
Bartiromo is playing the McArdle part here. “We don’t know that it’s better healthcare.” I don’t think the issue is really “better healthcare.” It’s *coverage*
Morbo
Maria Bartiromo: Secretary of the Treasury after President Palin’s election. The horror.
kth
Jeff Skilling in a skirt. Not as smart as Skilling, but the same cavity in her chest where most people have a soul.
General Winfield Stuck
And about all those folks who are satisfied with their healthcare visa vi insurance. How many of them have had catastrophic illnesses? Not that many. Most who do get really sick, we hear a giant whaaaaa… when they start negotiating every insurance payment while being treated and end up being stuck with huge patient costs despite having the great coverage they thought they had, and as Matt said, often end up in bankruptcy, either legally, or having to spend their life savings. That is if they don’t get dropped for not crossing a T in their original application.
These fools, joe, mika and Bartaromeo just can’t hear the numbers Matt was laying on them, or don’t want too. Could be cause they have Cadillac policies and the extra cash to pay the ransom for their lives when it’s necessary. Could also they’re just idiots and can’t help themselves.
Demo Woman
Avastin is a cancer drug that may extend the life of a cancer patient by a few months. When my ex was battling colon cancer two years ago, I did some research. (He’s fine now)
Any way avastin is used for stage 4 cancer and is not always covered by health insurance. It is not a cure and is very expensive. My information may be outdated but for her to say to UK won’t cover it without mentioning that most insurance companies won’t either seems disingenuous.
Insurance companies might have eased up during the last year but I don’t it.
arguingwithsignposts
@Stooleo:
I think you’re shooting high with that $45,000 number. Try it on $35,000, i.e., the salary of a public school teacher.
And Joe is so stupid saying “if we turn the healthcare over to the government.” NOBODY is talking about turning healthcare over to the government.
Idiots.
EnderWiggin
NOTHING EVER EVER EVER IS BETTER THAN THE US. USA IS #1, ALWAYS #1, AND NEVER CAN BE IMPROVED ON!!!!
Imagine running a business like this. Assuming that our company is always the best, and when shown any evidence that Company Y down the street is doing something better, simply deny that the evidence is true and don’t improve.
Jeff
OMFG–
First–the British organization that makes these decision, called I think NICE (how’s that for ironic) is really no different than in some ways from a hospital P+T committee. They look at the available evidence, for various medications, including the cost and effectiveness, and try to make informed decisions about which medications should be used, as first line agents which as second line, etc…
It’s not as if British physicians are reduced to waving rattles , and boiling herbal potions from the backyard garden.
Secondly– the VA actually is a very good system, and it is leading the way in electronic records, and has better record keeping and better error rates than many private hospitals.,
Comrade Mary
“Oh, honey don’t cry. I know you’ll miss him a lot, but I promise you, we’ve taken him to a wonderful farm where he can run around and play and be happy.”
amorphous
We’re going to need a “You, sir, are and idiot :)” tag.
freelancer
@John Cole:
Some inadvertant ethno-centrism is concern-trolling the hell out of that sentence.
Paul L.
Matt “Plastic Turkey” Taibbi sounds like one of the Soviet apologists from the 80s.
The Soviet system is the model for the command economies of the Future. The US system can not match the efficiency provided by the great central planners in the Kremlin.
In the video, Taibbi claims there are 1300 different private Insurer and doctors have to fill out paperwork for each one of them.
I thought insurance companies were limited to selling in a particular State and you could not purchase out of State Health Insurance.
So each State has 1300 different private Insurers? Does each Doctor have to deal with all 1300? Or is he being dishonest?
Nice combover Matt.
Joe Beese
I’ve got a giant finger for her.
KG
@ EnderWiggin: actually, I’m pretty sure that’s what happened to GM and Chrysler. And possibly Ford.
And then they went and bought up the competition.
SrirachaHotSauce
@Paul L.:
Even for you, that post is embarassing.
Kyle
@Paul L.
You sound like an apologist for corporatism, or a blind tool of advertising.
There are seveal dozen examples of better, lower cost and more efficient healthcare systems in the industrialized world.
You are the equivalent of an East German my-country is-always-the-bestest authoritarian suckup claiming that a Trabant is superior to a Mercedes.
amorphous
@Paul L.: It’s so appropriate that your Bleg is titled “Kingdom of Idiots.”
Paul L.
Forgot the link to Matt “Plastic Turkey” Taibbi’s video.
Health Care Reform: Sick and Wrong
Can I use the progressive Limbaugh argument and comment on his weight and proto double chin?
Jeff
<In the video, Taibbi claims there are 1300 different private Insurer and doctors have to fill out paperwork for each one of them.
I thought insurance companies were limited to selling in a particular State and you could not purchase out of State Health Insurance.
So each State has 1300 different private Insurers? Does each Doctor have to deal with all 1300? Or is he being dishonest?
Nice try, dumbass. More likely they have to deal with the single insurer who has the majority of subscribers in the area, and thus can set policy and prices at where ever they like.
Calouste
@YellowJournalism:
Most US citizens living abroad would be covered by that country’s health system. I doubt many of them would be interested in using the US health system as they can get better care at lower cost where they live.
Violet
Gawd she’s stupid.
My question – when idiots like Maria Bartiromo say things like, “I don’t want to government deciding what drug I can have,” why don’t people, like Matt Taibi in this case, respond , “Would you prefer your insurance company tell you what drug/procedure/surgery you can have? Because that’s who’s deciding now. Is that really any better?” And then point out that if you have money you can go anywhere you want. But for those who depend on their insurance, the insurance company is already deciding what they can and can’t do. If it’s the government, at least the costs would be better controlled and you couldn’t be dropped.
It makes me nuts that people don’t point out the obvious – over and over again. People like Maria Bartiromo get away with insisting that “the government will decide what you can and can’t do” without any balance showing that that kind of thing is already happening every single day. It’s just the insurance company making the decision.
Patrick
It seems like sometime last weekend, this whole debate got serious. People, not just bloggers and tea baggers, are all talking about it. Maria is clueless (and did she get the number of that wall?), but Taibbi gets out more good information in these seven minutes than I heard in the prior 7 months on TV.
I read a lot of political blogs, I know I’m up on all this. Maria should be too, which is why this is funny to us. But, 90% of the people don’t pay attention and they are paying attention now it seems. And right now, the Left seems to be dominating the conversation and the Right is stuck back a few weeks with Death Panels and UK, and unless you are a Fox News watcher, you are beyond that.
Geeno
@Paul L.:
No you are only allowed to say such things about Michael Moore. Lord, Man! Read the etiquette handbook.
General Winfield Stuck
Well, who the hell else is gonna fill em out. Gas pumpers, meter readers, or maybe insurance gnomes in the basement trying to save a nickel by offing gramma early.
It’s doctors knucklehead, then the basement gnomes get out the erasers make profitable corrections.
SpotWeld
Linked to intrdoce some solid numbers
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/aug/18/barack-obama/number-those-without-health-insurance-about-46-mil/
The numbers “46 million Americans don’t have health insure” does include a number of illegal aliens. That number is roughly 9.7 mill.
80% of the number represents naturalized (or legal aliens?) people who don’t have insurance.
And the even more important thing to note is that more “regular” Americans don’t have sufficient insurance!
Excellent American Health care doesn’t mean crap if your access to “life liberty and the pursuit of happyiness” is overshadowed by debt the first time you have a serious illness.
Notorious P.A.T.
She is an idiot, alright.
BFR
Any way avastin is used for stage 4 cancer and is not always covered by health insurance. It is not a cure and is very expensive
I had an avastin intraocular injection for diabetic macular edema. It seemed to work quite well but it’s an off-label usage as I understand it.
scav
Hey, what red-blooded “real” ‘mercan would be for anything else but apple pie, Mom and 100% for-profit death panels!
Mark S.
I can’t look at Scarsborough without thinking of Matthew Perry. I keep expecting Joey and Phoebe to be sitting with him on the roundtable. Actually, that would probably be an improvement.
Demo Woman
@BFR: It’s suppose to be a good drug. Did your insurance company cover it?
It does extend life with some types of cancer but with stage 4 colon cancer, it’s normally just months.
AnotherBruce
You know, I’m going to give Scarborough credit for having Weiner and Taibbi on his program. And even though Joe had people, including himself, that had no credible arguments to counter these guys, at least he let them make their case.
Notorious P.A.T.
“Matt Taibbi sounds like one of the Soviet apologists from the 80s.”
Why, because lots of people went around saying “the Soviet Union’s government is a failed system”? I admit, I don’t get it.
BFR
It’s suppose to be a good drug. Did your insurance company cover it?
Yeah, my insurance covers just about anything & everything. My perception at the time was that the Avastin helped reduce/slow the swelling down so my eyesight stabilized but it’s hard to know for certain.
freelancer
@Paul L.:
Go find Makewi and swap STD’s.
Notorious P.A.T.
No one would do research if there were no profit in it! ! !
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/14/AR2009081401765_pf.html
YellowJournalism
@Calouste: Actually, I am one of those citizens, and my health care here in Canada is much better than what I would have had if I’d been able to afford insurance down in the states. My point was that the number of us living outside the US is not significant enough to overlook the millions and millions of Americans still in the US that have no insurance and aren’t likely to be able to afford some or be approved by an insurance company for such reasons as pre-existing conditions and age.
BTW, I loved the disgust in her voice when she mentioned Americans living abroad. Not as full of bile as when she mentions illegal aliens, but it was pretty funny to listen to just the same.
Demo Woman
@BFR: I hope that it works for you.
jl
Recently, in recent clip I saw, Bartilomo thinks that all the top drug companies are based n the US (it more like 2 of the biggest five, and about five of the biggest ten). She said ALL of the research occurs in the US. It is true that there has been a big move to doing research in the US, so it is about 65% of research funds worldwide, but it is not all. About half the actual medical and basic research labs are in the US, and about 40% in Europe.
If you look at the whole industry, the concentration of pharmaceutical companies headquartered in the US is about middling among what are considered ‘research intensive industries’ lower than information technology and higher than automotive.
A lot of innovative new work in drug discovery is in India. A lot of new research in the genetics of pharmacy must be done overseas because it is too difficult to find large enough samples of different racial backgrounds in the US. A lot of the US based studies on the genetics of drug metabolism are based on small samples, and may not be reliable.
And she claims to be a business reporter. Now she answers Taibbi’s reasonable claims with cherry picked sound bites about two cancer drugs.
Kirk Spencer
I’m going to disagree with some of you. I don’t think Bartiromo was clueless or stupid. She hit the points too well, too cleanly to do so – no stumbles, no nothing.
That pout at the end? It looks to me like grudging admiration for the opponent who outplayed her.
tripletee
@freelancer:
Whoa, that’s out of bounds. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. What did those STDs ever do to you?
Demo Woman
@Kirk Spencer: So you think she was spewing bull but well rehearsed bull?
The Grand Panjandrum
Bachman you write? Bachmann: No Government Control Over My Body!
And the material just keeps writing itself.
malraux
I’ve got to question the claim that our health care is best i you can afford it. I might buy that our elective cosmetic medical system is the best. But I don’t know i any evidence that, ignoring access issues, the US system is all that great. Cancer survival rates are basically average, for example. Pretty clearly other countries do ongoing health issues much better, as those are about both reducing access issues and good incentives. What is the basis for the claim that American medical care is the best in the world ignoring access? Mythological stories about Canadians having to come to the US for care?
Anne Davis
I agree with you John, Maria is Bachman/Palin level stupid. I just can’t believe how unintelligent she is. I know she would loose big time on the show, “Are you smarter than a 5th grader?” For laughs dig up the video of her on Celebrity Jeopardy, she could not answer any questions, except one.
Kirk Spencer
@Demo Woman: Yeah, basically. She’s staying honest to the ones who pay her salary. No, not the network, the ones from whom the network gets money. (Don’t like, don’t watch. Don’t watch, don’t pay. Don’t pay, network goes bust. Network will fire the reason they’re not liked before that happens.)
Jay B.
@The Grand Panjandrum:
Did she say “except my uterus!”? Because if not, well, she’s a little mixed-up on the whole “pro-choice” argument.
Crazy like a crazy fuck, she is.
les
Are you suggesting that Bartiwhosis was in Bachmann-Palin Overdrive?
Gex
@The Grand Panjandrum: Wow, sounds like Bachmann has come out as being pro-choice. That’s a surprise!
Tim in SF
I feel less of a person for listening to that idiot woman.
John, I thought you’re supposed to watch that stuff so I don’t have to.
jl
I think that if you have access, the US health care system is among the best (along with Japan, France, Australia, New Zealand and Canada) for advanced cancer care, heart attacks and stroke.
Interesting to note that the main reason the UK is NOT the best at cancer survival rates is that it has had crummy early detection programs. It was very late among high income countries in expanding screening programs for breast cancer to middle aged women. There is a consensus among international cancer researchers that the UK’s problems in survival rates stemmed mainly from cancers being discovered at a later stage.
The actual care in the UK once you are diagnosed was not criticized. In some ways, diagnosis and treatment adopted new techniques quicker than in the US.
Now, what would the market based conservative ‘consumer driven care’ that would require consumers to pay more for tests and exams do? If not carefully planned to encourage for example, middle aged women to get breast exams, it would produce the same situation that the UK had until recently. Lots of women being diagnosed with cancer in later more serious stages, and lower survival rates.
The ignorance and dishonesty displayed by the right wing in the US is not only embarrassing, it is downright dangerous the US making good choices in healthcare, IMHO.
linda
damn, matt was way too easy on her. i can’t wait for his true/slant take on this is..
Xecky Gilchrist
@EnderWiggin: Assuming that our company is always the best, and when shown any evidence that Company Y down the street is doing something better, simply deny that the evidence is true and don’t improve.
I worked for a company like that. They went Chapter Seven.
OC
All she was missing (along with the foam finger) is the manly chest-pound and a chant of USA! USA! Stop waving the flag like an idiot and buy a fucking clue. All sarcasm aside I think she’s a subscriber of the “I’ve got mine so there’s not a problem” mentality. Too many people in this country can’t see the big picture or simply don’t care.
ChrisB
@mai naem:
Just what I was yelling at my TV this morning. Bartiromo is a multi-millionaire and the people she interviews make even more. And yeah, our government pays for those drugs here.
Exactly right.
(And don’t get me started on Scarborough and his idiot co-host.)
Anne Laurie
Or a red-white-and-blue cross (illumination optional). Because Bartiromo wasn’t “arguing” with Taibbi, in the sense of rebutting his facts, she was reciting a religious incantation against what she perceived as his hell-driven anti-Americanism. Like a medieval cleric attempting to cast out demons, Bartiromo’s indignant “Innovations! Best in the world! Numbers, I dispute thee, numbers!” outbursts were intended as arrows against EEEVIL, not as actual facts.
If her usual finance gig is the “Praise Wall Street, from Whom all blessings flow” positive version of today’s negative, she really is an indicator of the modern monetary apocalypse.
Blue Raven
@les:
Now THAT would be a great tag.
wobbly
Yes, the VA does provide good healthcare, provided that the patient lives near one of their facilities, whose numbers are rapidly shrinking.
If my spouse breaks his leg tomorrow, will the VA send an ambulance to take him from Rochester to Buffalo, the nearest VA that offers surgery?
My spouse had an elevated PSA test at the local VA outpatient clinic in Rochester a couple of years ago and had to drive 40 miles on icy roads to get the follow up biopsy in Canandaigua.
Normally, the procedure could have been done at the outpatient clinic here in Rochester, but the equipment needed had been broken for about a year and a half.
I admit this was Bush’s VA, but is Obama’s any better?
My spouse’s primary care VA MD just last month told him he’s due for a “routine” colonoscopy.
My spouse needs to drive himself to Buffalo to get the procedure and find a ride home on his own in order to get the “free” (oops, paid for by his years of service) excellent health care.
shoutingattherain
@EnderWiggin:
GM and Ford tried that back when Toyota and Honda came to town. I don’t remember it working out too well for US automakers.
wobbly
The woman’s name is Maria, by the way, and if John Cole is AGAIN evoking his problems with her outfit and weight as a problem….
Didn’t he have the same problem with Senator Clinton not so long ago?
sugarbiscuit
Taibbi is great, but why the hell did we have to wait until almost the end of the segment for the best retort to Baritoroma’s nonsense:
The healthcare crisis is not an issue about the quality of healthcare in America, but the indisputably high quantity of Americans who have little access to that healthcare, regardless of its quality.
In other words, rich folks, this ain’t about you.
EthylEster
@BFR: My father is in some kind of trial (or it was a trial when he started getting injections in the eyeball) that was using Avastin. His macular degeneration has stabilized.
Evidently this treatment is not very expensive since so little is injected into the eyeball. The cost is covered either by Medicare or his retired Air Force medical benefits.
sugarbiscuit
@wobbly: comprehension-wise, you and Maria deserve each other.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Napoleon: yeah and have you noticed that the poutiness of her lips changes on a regular basis. It depends if she is appearing the day after the collagen shots, if that is the case she looks like a wide mouth bass.
HyperIon
Howard Dean was in Seattle in July giving a talk. It is being shown on our local access channel these days. He is a smart and straightforward guy who always teaches me something. In this talk he says “80% of Americans have coverage. 80% of those folks like their coverage. But they don’t know what it costs.” I’d say that rather succinctly summarizes the situation.
I am one of the 64% he’s talking about except I know what my company pays to insure me. It’s a shit ton of money, about $700/month for very nice coverage. Which I do not need but have no choice in the matter.
SITE MAINTAINERS: PLEASE DON’T FORGET THE EDIT FUNCTION!!!!
I’m really tired of trying to accomodate/decipher all the typos and misspellings when I am reading comments here.
HyperIon
accomodate => accommodate
oh, well.
General Winfield Stuck
@wobbly:
A lot of places VA contracts with local private med centers for emergency service. I live in a little town in S, NM that has a VA clinic but is 220 miles from the nearest VA med center, but for emergency services contracts with the local hospital. I doubt that is true everywhere, but could be where you live.
Maurs
I’m really tired of trying to accomodate/decipher all the typos and misspellings when I am reading comments here.
Go find another blog.
Downpuppy
Be patient, Maurs.
For a brief shining moment, we had all sorts of buttons and (O Holy Night!) an EDIT function.
We all long for a return to that Golden Age in our own ways.
Ty Lookwell
Jeez, what happened to Maria? The last time I saw her was back during the tech bubble days while on the StairMaster and she was teh shiny pert new hotness, and now… she looks dumpy, greasy, pop-eyed and unhinged. Makes me think of Orwell’s comment about getting the face one deserves by 50… she’s on her way. (sorry to be so superficial and sexist).
I wish Taibbi was as aggressive in person – where he’s quite personable, though not quite so eloquent – as in print. I’d love to see the old NYPRESS Taibbi come to life on TV and serious kick some ass with righteous gobs of humiliation, instead of merely allowing Maria to embarrass herself with her own greasy, uninformed, pampered idiocy.
Maurs
@Downpuppy I know. It’s a work in progress. Yet, I haven’t had much trouble reading the comments despite spelling and or grammatical errors. Long day I guess.
humstain
Maria Bartiromo – the hottie of the pant load set – just mind numbingly stupid.
General Winfield Stuck
@Ty Lookwell:
Too much time in Penthouse Hot Tubs I suspect. Hard times caused a cutback in primo bubblebath and Rose Pedals.
Joel
I’m covered by the State of Washington, a pretty good plan by all means, although nowhere near the best. On top of my benefits expenses, covered by my employer, I had to pay ~$2500 out of pocket for emergency hand surgery after an accident last year. I then had to shell out another $3000 for a pair of hearing aids for an unrelated issue.
I’m fortunate to be able to afford this, but others are not.
Chief
I’m not sure who the bald black guy was who spoke at the end there, but I’ll give him credit for nailing it right on the head: American health care is great, if you can afford it. The problem is that way too many people can’t afford it anymore.
bago
@KG: Silly me. I thought the point of dating was fucking.
General Winfield Stuck
@bago:
It used to be that way in the Paleozoic Hippie Days./ except it was more like fucking sometimes led to dating. I miss em, i do.
bayville
A lot of crosstalk in the debate, but I could’ve sworn Bartiromo punctuated her argument with “”Ba ba booey”.
Hawes
After Pouty Maria went on about how all the good innovation was ‘Murican, I did some research.
Joint Replacement surgery was perfect in the US and UK.
Heart transplants=South Africa
Face transplants=France
Laparascopy=Germany
CT Scans=UK
Stents=Dutch, Swedes and French
Beta Blockers=UK
Statins=Japan
Insulin for diabetes=Canada
Isolating the HIV virus=France
We still have immunosuppresants, kidney and lung transplants and the MRI
USA! USA!!! USA!!1!!!
Joel
He may be a douche, and the Nobel committee might not have recognized him, but you can’t totally short Robert Gallo here.
Joel
Also, the PET scan (Michael Phelps – not the one you’re thinking of) is also US.
Research is an international affair, of course, and none of this is related to the discussion of health care. It’s what Republicans would like us to believe, however.
dan robinson
I saw that this morning and Matt didn’t nail her on her arguments. She was saying that health care in England isn’t as good as it is here because two drugs were not available.
That is a pretty inane argument. As they were wrapping up the show, she said she learned that the number of uninsured is only 20 million, not 47 million. The 47 million number comes from the census. I don’t know where she got her 20 million number.
Lesley
I kept expecting her to express doubt about the Holocaust.
Lesley
@dan robinson:
Matt could have reminded her that private insurers routinely deny coverage for medical treatment, including prescription drugs.
But to be fair to him, he so often has to duke it out with these idiots, and does a good job most of the time, we can’t fault him for not remembering everything.
At the end, one of the commentators reiterated the point which is access is the big problem in the US. Without access you don’t have good health care.
strawmanmunny
Another good question for Maria is where does most of the money come from for medical research in the USA? I believe that quite a bit comes from……..the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT.
Redleg
That’s how we train ’em in B-School. Young, dumb, and full of… shit. Bartiromo is like so many students I’ve had- a big fucking cheerleader for free-market capitalism while ignoring the fact that the government has an important role in allowing business incorporation, enforcing legal contracts, providing infrastructure and support, providing a legal framework for business and commerce. People like Bartiromo take it for granted that our country and system is the best of all possible worlds and that any glitches in the system can be solved through “free market solutions.” Bwah ha ha.
Chuck Butcher
I made a couple mistakes last night, one was falling asleep on the couch while blogging with MSNBC on the television. The next was waking up in the middle of the night (PDT) to Morning Joe and taking it seriously enough to get pissed. Why MSNBC is busy doing Faux-lite I’m not too sure, particularly in the face of the rest of their programming. Is this for the caffeine starved demographic? I’m pretty sure I was stupid sleepy, but the Wall Street shill chick versus Matt seemed like a win for him not her. It would seem sleepier and stupider would be required to hand the Republican boosters a win….
TR
I have to disagree with some of the posters here.
That woman is not remotely hot. Aside from the bitchiness she radiates, she has over-collagened lips and a dowdy body.
Sorry, but she’s almost as ugly on the outside as she is on the inside.
ShortWoman
Feeling better and better about my decision some months back to swear off CNBC.
InflatableCommenter
@TR:
Totally agree. For me it’s the “Run Away Factor.”
To the extent that the sight and sound of a woman makes me want to run away, that woman is not hot. Unless she is actually on fire, in which case, we are talking about a safety issue.
Bartiromo makes me want to run away at about a 7 on the Run Away scale. Where, for example, Ann Coulter would be a 10.
Huge Ackman
On the topic of Maria Baritromo = hot…
She is. For a cable news business and finance correspondent.
When the cameras go off and she’s part of the real world, I’d say she’s about a 6 or a 7.