Pajamas Media

122 Comments

1. Moogie:

AWR Hawkins: You are saying what I have been saying all along. Rush must have overheard me at some point, since he’s saying the same thing I have been saying, and I know I didn’t hear it from him, since I don’t listen to him (not that I don’t like him – I just don’t listen to talk radio … or music radio, for that matter).

Health care reform (I refuse to call it “insurance” reform), cap and trade, government bail-outs and buy outs … they are all vehicles for more government control and the institutionalization and nationalization of everything that involves free enterprise and capitalism. They’ll keep doing it to one institution after another (today, health care, tomorrow: energy companies): remove federalism and replace it with collectivism, ultimately leading to tyranny.

They continue to lie – the latest being this faux “surrender” – “Oh, well I guess we won’t be able to have a public option after all, but that’s okay because we will be just as happy with the implementation of a non-profit co-op plan – in fact, that’s what we’ve been wanting all along! Hee hee hee… Silly us, calling it a public plan when we really meant a non-profit co-op!”

This they say as they slip it in under the guise of something “different” when it’s still going to be the exact same thing they are proposing. Right.

While conservatives get mired in the details of a bill that was written in some of the most convoluted legal-insurance-ese I’ve ever seen, they will simply replace one word with another (can you say “insurance” rather than “care?”). And they will still lie about it.

And the dupes – the “useful idiots” as Besmenov calls them – will keep yammering for “free” this and “equality” that.

God help us all if this Trojan Horse is passed.

Aug 16, 2009 - 11:50 pm 2. vivo:

“ABC News confirms that ObamaCare will require obese citizens “to undergo diet counseling,” with the understanding that “those who fail to lose sufficient weight could face further ‘reeducation.’”

All doctors I know recommend weight control to avoid negative conditions like diabetes, pancreatic disorders, kidney failure and all sort of derivative ailments.

Is diet counseling so bad?

People forget more than 50% of what they are told. Is reeducation so bad?

Obese people don’t fit in cars, airplanes, chairs, buses or bicycles, or clothes. Then when the crisis arrives, they throw all kinds of money that could have been spent on better pursuits.

So, why make something good look so bad?

Aug 17, 2009 - 2:50 am 3. rachel peepers:

Before ObamaCare pulls the plug on the lifesaving, albeit expensive procedure you need,
you better hope that the American People who Nancy Palosi calls Nazis, force Barack to pull the plug on Health Care Radical Overhall, which Palosi calls reform.

Incidentally, while Barack and Palosi try to stick us with ObamaCare, they keep the good kind of care where doctors, not bureaucrats, make treatment decisions for their patients.

Just like it is now for us.

Aug 17, 2009 - 3:02 am 4. Bob:

The Obama administration’s policies are all about control, from TARP (how much will CEO “be allowed” to make), the auto bailout (”green cars” and executive compensation), the Porkulus/Stimulus Package (Democratic pet programs which have failed to keep unemployment below 8% as promised or provide any real stimulus outside the growth of public sector job) to health care (setting treatment parameters that will determine when the plug is pulled on grandma). Whether this guy is a Socialist joker like the posters suggest or just a runaway Statist, he’s all about the government controlling our lives and the Democrat Party controlling the government. If America is to remain the Land of Liberty, this guy and his big government programs have to be rejected. Health care is a good place to start.

Aug 17, 2009 - 3:48 am 5. Mark:

At the end of the day, it really is all about control. However, there seems to be a ground swell within the country that is saying, “No, you work for us!” And this is based in large part on the executive and congressional branches of our federal government behaving as though they are autonomous and unaccountable to the majority of Americans who live productive lives and do not want more government interference and control in and of their lives. Frankly, it’s time our federal politicians developed a healthy respect for and outright fear of the electorate.

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:06 am 6. sixbf:

Barack Obama

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:46 am 7. Samizdat:

MR Hawkins is correct. The liberals view us as plastic to be manipulated and formed to their socialist requirements. George Will identified this tendency in the lefties sometime ago.

HB3200 is in trouble and that means opponents like me have to be even more vigilant as it is likely that John McCain and Lindsey Graham are about to come riding in and rescue the Democrats from their untenable position. Now I hear Republicans talking about backing a Coop idea using my money. This is why Republicans are not much better than Democrats.

For both parties it’s all about control and the restriction of our liberty. Coops aren’t going to save a dime or control costs.Congress ignores the fact that the majority of us are happy with our health care.

We don’t need reform of this type. The bill is a disaster. Go read it and you will see how poorly drafted and ill concieved it is. Make sure you get ahold of your Congress man or woman and tell them you are not in favor of the coop idea either.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:13 am 8. Anonymous:

Controlling everything and everyone will bring about utopia! (Look how well it worked for the Soviet Union.)

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:24 am 9. George S:

…what should be obvious to everyone seems not to be able to penetrate the minds of liberals, once their ranks reach 50% plus one EXPECT MOB RULE. CHICAGO STYLE

watch this clip and you will understand why they continue to make the same arguments over and over no matter what they are shown or told.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTmbcyeZ9ic&feature=related

this clip gives great insight into the lefts blind following of an ideology that will bury them at the same time it buries us.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:06 am 10. Kazooskibum:

The Democrat Party is a criminal enterprise.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:10 am 11. Khiri:

Vivo: Is reeducation so bad?

Really?! Dude, you frighten me.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:33 am 12. Paul -Indiana:

Are you still proud that you voted for Obama? [chuckle]

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:45 am 13. eman:

vivo,

We are not ants whose value to the Colony is the only thing that matters.

For the last one hundred years our freedoms have been eroded and stifled by those among us who say they want only what is best for us. Now we must cast off our chains.

Why do you fear and dislike Freedom so much?

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:00 am 14. tanstaafl:

Should ObamaCare pass, every “health risk” will be used to further government intervention in our lives.

It’s the operative principle. Panic mode, keep the population in a lather, everything has to be done yesterday.

“the flu” will be/is being used similarly, mobilizing to have troops stationed outside the school to handle the coughing kiddies (ok, maybe I exaggerate a little, but didn’t we used to handle this kind of stuff with common sense ?)…BTW, have you read that the the new jab, the flu vaccine, might have Guillian-Barre implications like the vaccine developed in the 1970’s ?

That would be fun, don’t get the flu, but destroy your nerve pathways.

Anyway, engendering panic to assert control seems to be the operative mechanism of “government” these days.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:10 am 15. AThinkingPerson:

Again a liberal overlooked the most important word in their quote…Re Vivo #2…“ABC News confirms that ObamaCare will require obese citizens “to undergo diet counseling,”. Vivo went on to say this was a “good thing”.

The key word is REQUIRE. What sort of government FORCES it’s citizens to undergo counseling?

For some odd reason, a liberal always finds comfort in the fact that big brother will lead them around by the nose. I’m a bit more independent than that apparently.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:15 am 16. Moho:

It’s the operative principle. Panic mode,

That’s rich coming from you people. “They’re going to pull the plug on granma”. Yeah, not panic mode.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:25 am 17. Ed Wallis:

FROM:
http://townhall.com/blog/g/03d1d552-9218-45c2-8eae-693da61b76b7?comments=true&commentsSortDirection=Descending

Michael Tanner of the CATO Institute cautions that opponents of a government-run “public option” should not be fooled by this “compromise.” It’s suggested that these co-ops would be nonprofits, but many insurers are already classified as “nonprofit” companies–including “mutual” insurance companies and groups like Blue Cross. In addition, states already have the power to set up their own health care co-ops and a number already exist. So, if the “new co-ops” are to operate under the same rules as other nonprofit insurers, why bother?

Supporters of government-run health care have no intention of letting the co-ops be independent enterprises. In fact, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) makes it clear, for example, that the co-op’s officers and directors would be appointed by the president and Congress. He insists that there be a single national co-op. And Congress would set the rules under which it operates. As Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) says, “It’s got to be written in a way that accomplishes the objectives of a public option.”

If a “co-op” is run by the federal government under rules imposed by the federal government with funding provided by the federal government, that is government-run health insurance by another name.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:29 am 18. Jason:

Right on. The Dems want to control every detail of our lives. This is why they’ve been shameless in their pursuit of Obama-Care, because it’s really the pursuit of a despotism (to a degree).

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:31 am 19. JED:

This is mastering the obvious, and then, common sense is not so common. This whole slick scam was never about health. It is only about trying to get a piece of the $2.5 trillion dollar health care pie. It is about forced charity. It can never be about making Americans and illegals more healthy. It is about government largess, grandstanding with our money. It will not increase productivity or stimulate the economy. If anything it will enable the obese, the risk takers, the addicts, and the co-dependents to become more unhealthy. It will cost more than it ever can be worth.
Insurance companies are like casinos willing to trade premiums for the fear of illness. They survive and thrive by profits. A fed competitor only has to raise more taxes to sustain its never-ending bureaucratic sink-hole. It is not competition, but only a big step to federal monopoly. Hope and fear indeed! Obamacare is the same casino with completely rigged machinery, trading fear for taxes. Like the stimulus and cap and trade, it does not address the problem, but only incites radical changes to feed radical pockets.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:36 am 20. HLH:

Great piece AWR. As “A Thinking Person” has pointed out, Obama-Care is going to “require” that we live our lives the way Democrats would have us live them. It is all about control.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:36 am 21. Khiri:

Geez, Moho, stop being a dupe and read the f’ing bill!

There is so many scary, scary things in this bill. If you’re not panicking, you’re not paying attention!!

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:43 am 22. Moho:

Khiri–> yes, let’s hear some. First, post your link to the bill. Next, quote the scary things and where to find them in the bill.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:01 am 23. Samizdat:

Ed Wallis at #17,

Dead on the mark bulls eye. Coops are a trojan horse to get around the single payer government option unpopularity.

Make sure you let your Congress people know you know what they are trying and that it is unnacceptable. Spouting off here is not as effective as a personal email to your congress person, Republican or Democrat.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:11 am 24. Khiri:

The bill:

http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h3200/text

Professor John David Lewis’ evaluation:

http://www.classicalideals.com/HR3200.htm

From Redstate.com:

http://www.redstate.com/jeff_emanuel/2009/08/10/health-care-bill-fact-of-the-day-once-obamacare-takes-effect-your-only-alternative-is-government-approved-or-government-run-health-insurance/

Chuck Norris and “home visitation” program:

http://townhall.com/columnists/ChuckNorris/2009/08/11/dirty_secret_no_1_in_obamacare

This is a start.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:41 am 25. Khiri:

And the ‘non-existent’ Republican alternative:

http://www.americanroadmap.org/

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:44 am 26. Frank Logan:

#9 George S. linked to a 1984 ( yes 1984) interview of ex KGB agent Yuri Bezmenov that is timely today. He says the KGB had four stages over 50 years to undermine an enemy culture. For me, it explains Alinsky and Ayers and their ilk and our (non) educational system.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=4CDAB99FAB5980BA

Watch it and pass it on to everyone in your contact list. Now is the time to take back our liberty.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:46 am 27. The Shadow:

Instead of readuing this dope, you should spend your time reading people like Atul Gawande who acutally studies healthcare.

“10 Steps to Better Health Care
Health Care, Medicare

Atul Gawande, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Donald Berwick, Institute for Healthcare Improvement
Elliott Fisher, Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice
Mark B. McClellan, Director, Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform

August 12, 2009 —
We have reached a sobering point in our national health-reform debate. Americans have recognized that our health system is bankrupting us and that we have dealt with this by letting the system price more and more people out of health care. So we are trying to decide if we are willing to change — willing to ensure that everyone can have coverage. That means banishing the phrase “pre-existing condition.” It also means finding ways to pay for coverage for those who can’t afford it without help.
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Mark B. McClellan, Alliance for Health Reform, July 2009

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Policy Changes to Improve Health Care Quality
Mark B. McClellan, Congressional Health Care Caucus, May 18, 2009

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Fostering Accountable Health Care: Moving Foward in Medicare
Elliott Fisher, Health Affairs, January 27, 2009

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Both of these steps stir heated argument, not to mention lobbyists’ hearts. But what creates the deepest unease is considering what we will have to do about the system’s exploding costs if pushing more people out is no longer an option. We have really discussed only two options: raising taxes or rationing care. The public is understandably alarmed.

There is a far more desirable alternative: to change how care is delivered so that it is both less expensive and more effective. But there is widespread skepticism about whether that is possible.

Yes, many European health systems have done it, but we are not Europe. And evidence that places like the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota or the Cleveland Clinic are doing it is likewise dismissed because their unique structures (for example, their physicians work on salary rather than being paid for each service) make them seem as far from Middle America as Sweden is.

Yet in studying communities all over America, not just a few unusual corners, we have found evidence that more effective, lower-cost care is possible.

To find models of success, we searched among our country’s 306 Hospital Referral Regions, as defined by the Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care, for “positive outliers.” Our criteria were simple: find regions with per capita Medicare costs that are low or markedly declining in rank and where federal measures of quality are above average. In the end, 74 regions passed our test.

So we invited physicians, hospital executives and local leaders from 10 of these regions to a meeting in Washington so they could explain how they do what they do. They came from towns big and small, urban and rural, North and South, East and West. Here’s the list: Asheville, N.C.; Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Everett, Wash.; La Crosse, Wis.; Portland, Me.; Richmond, Va.; Sacramento; Sayre, Pa.; Temple, Tex.; and Tallahassee, Fla., which, despite not ranking above the 50th percentile in terms of quality, has made such great recent strides in both costs and quality that we thought it had something to teach us.

If the rest of America could achieve the performances of regions like these, our health care cost crisis would be over. Their quality scores are well above average. Yet they spend more than $1,500 (16 percent) less per Medicare patient than the national average and have a slower real annual growth rate (3 percent versus 3.5 percent nationwide).

Caveat: Because we relied on Medicare data for our selections, it is possible that some of these regions are not so low-cost from the viewpoint of non-Medicare patients. But overall data strongly suggest that most of these regions are providing excellent care for all patients while being far more successful than others at not overusing or misusing health care resources.

So how do they do that? Some have followed the Mayo model, with salaried doctors employed by a unified local system focused on quality of care: these include Temple, where the Scott and White clinic dominates the market, and Sayre, where the Guthrie Clinic does. Other regions, including Richmond and Everett, look more like most American communities, with several medical groups whose physicians are paid on a traditional fee-for-service basis. But they, too, have found ways to protect patients against the damaging incentives of a system that encourages fragmentation of care and the pursuit of revenues over patient needs.

The physicians and hospital leaders from Cedar Rapids told us how they have adopted electronic systems to improve communication among physicians and quality of care. Last year, they decided to investigate the overuse of CAT scans. They examined the data and found that in just one year 52,000 scans were done in a community of 300,000 people. A large portion of them were almost certainly unnecessary, not to mention possibly harmful, as CAT scans have about 1,000 times as much radiation exposure as a chest X-ray.

“I was embarrassed for us,” said Jim Levett, a cardiac surgeon and the head of a large physician group. More important, the area’s doctors and clinics are turning that embarrassment into change by seeking out solutions to reduce the expense and harm of unnecessary scans.

That number of scans in Cedar Rapids may seem shocking, but there is nothing surprising about it. Nationwide, we do 62 million CAT scans a year for 300 million people. So Cedar Rapids’s rate was actually better than average. But all medicine is local. And until a community confronts what goes on in its own population — to the point of actually seeking the data and engaging those who can solve the problem — nothing will change.

The team from Portland told us of a collaboration of doctors, state officials, insurers and community leaders to improve care. For more than four years, physicians have been tracking some 60 measures of quality, like medication error rates for their patients, and meeting voluntary cost-reduction goals.

Asheville, after gaining state support to avoid antitrust concerns, merged two underutilized hospitals. In Sacramento, a decade of fierce competition among four rival health systems brought about elimination of unneeded beds, adoption of new electronic systems for patient data and a race to raise quality. Sacramento also went from being one of America’s high-cost areas for health care to being among the low-cost elite.

In their own ways, each of these successful communities tells the same simple story: better, safer, lower-cost care is within reach. Many high-cost regions are just a few hours’ drive from a lower-cost, higher-quality region. And in the more efficient areas, neither the physicians nor the citizens reported feeling that care is “rationed.” Indeed, it’s rational.

Many in Congress and the Obama administration seem to recognize this. The various reform bills making their way through the process have included provisions to protect successful medical communities by incorporating payment approaches that reward those that slow spending growth while improving patient outcomes. This is the right direction for reform.

There is a lot of troubling rhetoric being thrown around in the health care debate. But we don’t need to be trapped between charges that reforms will ration care and doing nothing about costs and coverage. We must instead look at the communities that are already redesigning American health care for the better, and pursue ways for the nation to follow their lead.

Atul Gawande directs the Center for Surgery and Public Health at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and is a staff writer at The New Yorker; Donald Berwick is the president of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement in Cambridge, Mass.; Elliott Fisher directs policy-reform efforts at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice; and Mark McClellan is the director of health care reform policy at the Brookings Institution. All are physicians.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:18 am 28. tanstaafl:

“They’re going to pull the plug on granma”. Yeah, not panic mode.

Mo-Ho, that’s Obama’s characterization, literally his words day before yesterday.

It’s not the way intelligent people frame the controversy over the section of HR3200 that addresses older, sick people getting “end of life counseling” from some government paid, agenda driven shill.

As for this government and its “panic now/panic often” approach to asserting control, the only remaining question is whether they’re operating out of sheer stupidity (Big Sis Janet Napolitano might herself be something of a “man caused disaster”) or malicious intent, which might describe the Soros-like agenda of some of Obama’s Czars.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:21 am 29. Ed Wallis:

Dear khiri,

PLEASE IGNORE THE TROLLS. Their posts are designed to deflect, divert and distract from serious dialogue.

“moho”, “vivo,” “the shadow” and others of their ilk are just displaying the dying vestiges of Leftism unmasked.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:28 am 30. tanstaafl:

The aphorism you heard as a child and maybe didn’t attach a lot of weight to at that time…is coming into sharper and sharper focus.

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”

Also…(and there are thousands on these themes…

The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes.~Thomas Paine

If we become a people who are willing to give up our money and our freedom in exchange for rhetoric and promises, then nothing can save us. ~Thomas Sowell

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:32 am 31. Khiri:

Ed, I usually do ignore the trolls. But I thought the links might be helpful for other folks.

Thanks!

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:51 am 32. The Shadow:

Poor Ed Wallis – He hates facts. He must rather wallow in ignorance. Here is another pearl;

“Economic Scene
Health Care Rationing Rhetoric Overlooks Reality
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LinkedinDiggFacebookMixxMySpaceYahoo! BuzzPermalinkBy DAVID LEONHARDT
Published: June 17, 2009
Rationing.

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More to the point: Rationing!

As in: Wait, are you talking about rationing medical care? Access to medical care is a fundamental right. And rationing sounds like something out of the Soviet Union. Or at least Canada.

The r-word has become a rejoinder to anyone who says that this country must reduce its runaway health spending, especially anyone who favors cutting back on treatments that don’t have scientific evidence behind them. You can expect to hear a lot more about rationing as health care becomes the dominant issue in Washington this summer.

Today, I want to try to explain why the case against rationing isn’t really a substantive argument. It’s a clever set of buzzwords that tries to hide the fact that societies must make choices.

In truth, rationing is an inescapable part of economic life. It is the process of allocating scarce resources. Even in the United States, the richest society in human history, we are constantly rationing. We ration spots in good public high schools. We ration lakefront homes. We ration the best cuts of steak and wild-caught salmon.

Health care, I realize, seems as if it should be different. But it isn’t. Already, we cannot afford every form of medical care that we might like. So we ration.

We spend billions of dollars on operations, tests and drugs that haven’t been proved to make people healthier. Yet we have not spent the money to install computerized medical records — and we suffer more medical errors than many other countries.

We underpay primary care doctors, relative to specialists, and they keep us stewing in waiting rooms while they try to see as many patients as possible. We don’t reimburse different specialists for time spent collaborating with one another, and many hard-to-diagnose conditions go untreated. We don’t pay nurses to counsel people on how to improve their diets or remember to take their pills, and manageable cases of diabetes and heart disease become fatal.

“Just because there isn’t some government agency specifically telling you which treatments you can have based on cost-effectiveness,” as Dr. Mark McClellan, head of Medicare in the Bush administration, says, “that doesn’t mean you aren’t getting some treatments.”

Milton Friedman’s beloved line is a good way to frame the issue: There is no such thing as a free lunch. The choice isn’t between rationing and not rationing. It’s between rationing well and rationing badly. Given that the United States devotes far more of its economy to health care than other rich countries, and gets worse results by many measures, it’s hard to argue that we are now rationing very rationally.

On Wednesday, a bipartisan panel led by four former Senate majority leaders — Howard Baker, Tom Daschle, Bob Dole and George Mitchell — will release a solid proposal for health care reform. Among other things, it would call on the federal government to do more research on which treatments actually work. An “independent health care council” would also be established, charged with helping the government avoid unnecessary health costs. The Obama administration supports a similar approach.

And connecting the dots is easy enough. Armed with better information, Medicare could pay more for effective treatments — and no longer pay quite so much for health care that doesn’t make people healthier.

Mr. Baker, Mr. Daschle, Mr. Dole and Mr. Mitchell: I accuse you of rationing.

•

There are three main ways that the health care system already imposes rationing on us. The first is the most counterintuitive, because it doesn’t involve denying medical care. It involves denying just about everything else.

The rapid rise in medical costs has put many employers in a tough spot. They have had to pay much higher insurance premiums, which have increased their labor costs. To make up for these increases, many have given meager pay raises.

This tradeoff is often explicit during contract negotiations between a company and a labor union. For nonunionized workers, the tradeoff tends to be invisible. It happens behind closed doors in the human resources department. But it still happens.

Research by Katherine Baicker and Amitabh Chandra of Harvard has found that, on average, a 10 percent increase in health premiums leads to a 2.3 percent decline in inflation-adjusted pay. Victor Fuchs, a Stanford economist, and Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist now in the Obama administration, published an article in The Journal of the American Medical Association last year that nicely captured the tradeoff. When health costs have grown fastest over the last two decades, they wrote, wages have grown slowest, and vice versa.

So when middle-class families complain about being stretched thin, they’re really complaining about rationing. Our expensive, inefficient health care system is eating up money that could otherwise pay for a mortgage, a car, a vacation or college tuition.

The second kind of rationing involves the uninsured. The high cost of care means that some employers can’t afford to offer health insurance and still pay a competitive wage. Those high costs mean that individuals can’t buy insurance on their own.

The uninsured still receive some health care, obviously. But they get less care, and worse care, than they need. The Institute of Medicine has estimated that 18,000 people died in 2000 because they lacked insurance. By 2006, the number had risen to 22,000, according to the Urban Institute.

The final form of rationing is the one I described near the beginning of this column: the failure to provide certain types of care, even to people with health insurance. Doctors are generally not paid to do the blocking and tackling of medicine: collaboration, probing conversations with patients, small steps that avoid medical errors. Many doctors still do such things, out of professional pride. But the full medical system doesn’t do nearly enough.

That’s rationing — and it has real consequences.

In Australia, 81 percent of primary care doctors have set up a way for their patients to get after-hours care, according to the Commonwealth Fund. In the United States, only 40 percent have. Over all, the survival rates for many diseases in this country are no better than they are in countries that spend far less on health care. People here are less likely to have long-term survival after colorectal cancer, childhood leukemia or a kidney transplant than they are in Canada — that bastion of rationing.

None of this means that reducing health costs will be easy. The comparative-effectiveness research favored by the former Senate majority leaders and the White House has inspired opposition from some doctors, members of Congress and patient groups. Certainly, the critics are right to demand that the research be done carefully. It should examine different forms of a disease and, ideally, various subpopulations who have the disease. Just as important, scientists — not political appointees or Congress — should be in charge of the research.

But flat-out opposition to comparative effectiveness is, in the end, opposition to making good choices. And all the noise about rationing is not really a courageous stand against less medical care. It’s a utopian stand against better medical care.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:55 am 33. Eric:

It is absolutely about control. That has been the Progressive goal for almost a century. The Left is populated by people that believe they are better qualified to runt he lives of We the People than are 300 million Americans acting everyday in their own best interest.

We must not only defeat Obamacare in its totality, we must start pushing back against decades of unconstitutional federal encroachment.

It’s time to stop playing games with the Left and force them into a Constitutional showdown. We must never compromise because they are masters at incrementalism. Allowing them half today, half tomorrow will result in their getting 100% of what they want. Unlike Conservatives who just want to be left alone the Left wants to control us so we must be ever vigilant and heed the words of Thomas Jeffersomn “In questions of power, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.”

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:58 am 34. Frank Logan:

Hello!!! How about some of you intellectual giants on this thread, critiquing this interview for those of us too stupid to understand it.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=4CDAB99FAB5980BA

Aug 17, 2009 - 10:20 am 35. Anonymous:

watch this clip and you will understand why they continue to make the same arguments over and over no matter what they are shown or told.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTmbcyeZ9ic&feature=related

this clip gives great insight into the lefts blind following of an ideology that will bury them at the same time it buries us.

IF YOU VIEWED THE ABOVE CLIP YOU WILL UNDERSTAND THAT THERE IS NO POINT ENGAGING THE TROLLS …they want you too, don’t bother with them.

Aug 17, 2009 - 10:25 am 36. Moogie:

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” – Declaration of Independence

Aug 17, 2009 - 10:26 am 37. MarkD:

I refuse to cede control of my life to any community organizer.

Aug 17, 2009 - 10:27 am 38. Moho:

TrampstampflMo-Ho, that’s Obama’s characterization, literally his words day before yesterday. It’s not the way intelligent people frame the controversy over the section of HR3200 that addresses older, sick people getting “end of life counseling” from some government paid, agenda driven shill.

I give you points for being a bold liar. However, when you’re dealing with people who actually read newspapers, I suggest you give it your A game, if you, indeed, have one, and not the low-level discourse you share with the troglodytes that believe everything they hear on Fox News.

Senator Charles Grassley:

Should not have a government run plan to decide when to ,b>pull the plug on grandma”

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/12/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5237320.shtml

Come on dude. Do you think its fun making you look like an idiot/liar every day?

Aug 17, 2009 - 11:01 am 39. myth buster:

Shadow, why shouldn’t people who pay for their care be able to expect better care than those who receive care by charity? If one gains nothing by paying for health care, why should anyone pay for it?

Aug 17, 2009 - 11:17 am 40. Jeff Weimer:

2. vivo:

“ABC News confirms that ObamaCare will require obese citizens “to undergo diet counseling,” with the understanding that “those who fail to lose sufficient weight could face further ‘reeducation.’”

All doctors I know recommend weight control to avoid negative conditions like diabetes, pancreatic disorders, kidney failure and all sort of derivative ailments.

Is diet counseling so bad?

People forget more than 50% of what they are told. Is reeducation so bad?

Obese people don’t fit in cars, airplanes, chairs, buses or bicycles, or clothes. Then when the crisis arrives, they throw all kinds of money that could have been spent on better pursuits.

So, why make something good look so bad?

Vivo, you just don’t get it. Or you are being willfully obtuse in order to forward a false argument. Diet counseling is not “bad”, and it goes on every day, and is rightfully between the doctor and patient. But that is not the problem, and you pointedly ignore the real issue. Why should that or anything like it be codified into law? Unless, of course, the law is the rules and regulations for a health care enterprise, of course.

You seem to be absolutely okay with the idea that if it is good for you it should be compulsory. Allowing an unborn child to live is undoubtedly good for the child – so why do you support abortion?

I love your question “Is reeducation so bad?” It lays bare the budding totalitarian inside. Go ahead and ask those “reeducated” by Stalin his great purges, those “reeducated” by Mao’s “great leap forward”, and those “reeducated” by the Angkar of Cambodia.

You can’t. They are all dead – of “reeducation.”

And yet you still wonder why we resist these incursions on our liberty. I sincerely hope your parrying with us will one day bring you to see the world from our point of view, you may be saved yet.

Aug 17, 2009 - 11:44 am 41. G. Soros:

stop ..STOP FEEDING THE TROLLS …if after viewing the video link below and you still think there is some value in engaging them go ahead. BUT WATCH THIS CLIP ..the whole interview is also worth watching.

watch this clip and you will understand why they continue to make the same arguments over and over no matter what they are shown or told.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTmbcyeZ9ic&feature=related

this clip gives great insight into the lefts blind following of an ideology that will bury them at the same time it buries us.

Aug 17, 2009 - 11:48 am 42. Moho:

ABC News confirms that ObamaCare will require obese citizens “to undergo diet counseling,” with the understanding that “those who fail to lose sufficient weight could face further ‘reeducation.

I’m not calling you a liar, mostly because there are so many distortions on this site, that the word has literally become meaningless. However, I will note that I googled “abc news” the word “obese” and the word “Obama” and “health care” in nearly every permutation I could think of and came up with absolutely nothing. You’re either just making this up or mindlessly regurgitating something you heard elsewhere…

Aug 17, 2009 - 12:13 pm 43. Linda:

It doesn’t matter what the President or congress want! It is our Healthcare & lives & country not his or theirs & therefor it is our choice not his or theirs! If Obama & Congress want public option then Obama & congress can be the only ones to get on it, not us! Then we can VOTE them all OUT of office on the next ELECTIONS!

Aug 17, 2009 - 12:15 pm 44. vivo:

11. Khiri:

“Is reeducation so bad?

Really?! Dude, you frighten me.”

I’m using the word as printed here. A better expression should be ‘follow up visit’. It’s your fault that you politicize a teaching/medical term.

13. eman:

“Why do you fear and dislike Freedom so much?”

Yes, you’re free to be obese. Diet counseling doesn’t mean you’re going to be forced to do something. Many people make bad choices and it affects the whole society.

15. AThinkingPerson:

“The key word is REQUIRE. What sort of government FORCES it’s citizens to undergo counseling?”

Ask your doctor. The USA is a land of fatties, which makes them unhealthy for the most part. That leads to costly medicine. Are forced to study and take a driving test? Yes, otherwise you wouldn’t function in a safe manner. Go ahead and protest at your DMV.

29. Ed Wallis:

“PLEASE IGNORE THE TROLLS. Their posts are designed to deflect, divert and distract from serious dialogue.”

Yes, only your dialog is serious. Ummmh.

fear = ignorance

40. Jeff Weimer:

“Why should that or anything like it be codified into law?

Unless, of course, the law is the rules and regulations for a health care enterprise, of course.”

You answered your own question.

41. G. Soros:

“watch this clip and you will understand why they continue to make the same arguments over and over no matter what they are shown or told.”

And conservatives don’t do this? Just watch your dear friends Limbo, O’Reilly,, Hannity do it over and over and over again. Get serious!

42. Moho:

I’m in this discussion because these guys make up their own loaded words, they just want to irritate people without adding anything of value. Typical demagoguery.

Aug 17, 2009 - 12:46 pm 45. George S.:

do not respond to the trolls …do not engage the trolls.

watch this clip. the whole interview is good, this particular clip highlights the mindset of the liberal maxrist in the USA ..they do not even know they are marxists but they defend the marxist ideology….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTmbcyeZ9ic&feature=related

this clip gives great insight into the lefts blind following of an ideology that will bury them at the same time it buries us.

Aug 17, 2009 - 1:02 pm 46. Anonymous:

Vivo: Many people make bad choices and it affects the whole society.

Yeah, like vote for Obama.

Aug 17, 2009 - 1:14 pm 47. AThinkingPerson:

Vivo (#44)… So to be clear, you’re OKAY with government required counseling for fat people?

How is government requiring counseling anything akin to the DMV by the way?

Yet more BS from a liberal “I want the government to take over my personal life” Democrat.

Vivo…grow a set buddy. PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. Learn it. Love it. Live it.

Aug 17, 2009 - 1:21 pm 48. Berlet98:

Twistin’, Twistin’, Twistin’ the Truth Away-ay!

With apologies to Sam Cooke and his 1962 hit record during the twist craze, “Twistin’, Twistin’, Twistin’ the Night Away,” almost fifty years later, President Obama has been twisting and distorting the health care debate as if he were in the manic throes of a twist competition.

With as much regard for truth as Bill Clinton had for trysting his nights, and days, away, Obama seems out to set a record for political prevarication.

In the process, he is engaging in an unprecedented demeaning of the American people, of the insurance industry, and of Americans’ right, indeed responsibility, to constitutionally make their voices heard on contentious issues before Congress.

Take, for example, his recent attack on protestors and television coverage of those protests in his staged town hall rally in Belgrade, Montana. Obama whined that, “TV loves a ruckus. . . What you haven’t seen on TV and what makes me proud are the many constructive meetings going on all over the country:” http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/52555

His odd pride in virtually nonexistent “constructive meetings” notwithstanding, he must only view the Fox News Channel if all he’s seen are ruckuses.

Most of the left wing media, which means most of the media, have been forced by public opinion to cover the Obamacare protests but they do so briefly and grudgingly, always followed or preceded by more extensive coverage of his manipulated town halls such as that in Montana.

As for “constructive,” the dozens of other town halls conducted by his Democrat congressmen and senators have been exercises in stonewalling by said congressmen and senators. How could they be in any way constructive when our legislators refuse to answer pertinent questions?

Or, take his town hall last Tuesday in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, yet another instance of political manipulation where the audience was stacked with supporters who lobbed softball questions.

Is it really probable that, with all the demonstrated anger and revulsion toward Obamacare shown in other town halls throughout the country that not one truly angry questioner would show up in Portsmouth?

Apparently, our arrogant, egotistical Obamassiah thinks so or else why would he conduct such a charade in which he reiterated his blatant lie that 46 million “Americans” are deprived of health care in the United States:? http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/52405

The good news is that that number shrank by a million in less than a month based on the fact he previously lied that it was 47 million. Maybe his trusty teleprompter fibbed to him again?

Today I heard on CNN that the uninsured number 48 million. It seems the precise figure is in a great state of flux as well as in a great state of exaggeration.

See the Census Bureau stats here: http://www.census.gov/prod/2008pubs/p60-235.pdf.

They show the total of uninsured citizens to be about 36 million and the Census Bureau doesn’t break down how many of those are healthy young people who don’t care if they have health coverage and those who refuse to pay for any insurance coverage.

Illegal aliens, correctly, aren’t included in the CB numbers since they’re not Americans. Perhaps Obama can’t tell the difference?

The Sarah Palin-described “death panels” and the “single-payer,” (read “government healthcare option”), may have been back-burnered for the nonce, but both may again rear their ugly heads.

As Sen. Chuck Grassley points out, . . .

(Read the rest at http://genelalor.com)

Aug 17, 2009 - 1:24 pm 49. Samizdat:

Khiri,G Soros, A Thinking Person, etc,

I am joining Ed Wallis re further communication with the deadend trolls. These visitors are incapable of dealing truth. They are relativists and not worth the time. The last straw for me was last week when I caught one of them in an outright falsehood. Unfortunately fraud is the coin of their realm. You know the old Marxist ploy, “By any means necessary.” There are 6 of them who aren’t worth further contact.

I request you join us and stop purchasing their publication.When I see their names at the top of each entry I just keep scrolling along.

I communicate with lots of lefties, just not the dishonest ones.

Aug 17, 2009 - 1:49 pm 50. goy:

48. Berlet98: – … the Census Bureau doesn’t break down how many of those are healthy young people who don’t care …

And of course this entire line of “millions of uninsured” is just a long, flopping red herring.

What people want access to is affordable health care, not insurance – especially not for routine cost-of-living expenses like checkups, flu shots and the non-catastrophic illnesses and injuries that every person experiences.

Nothing in the Democrats’ bill does anything to bring health care costs down. The only way government can do that is through wage and price controls, which will destroy the quality of the care we have now.

One doesn’t purchase insurance to cover the standard costs of living like food. Routine health care is just another cost of living. Insurance is a tool for mitigating financial risk. Abusing it to redistribute wealth is what this administration has PROVED that it is all about.

The professional political class needs to STOP arguing about “coverage” and work to bring health care costs down through market incentives.

Aug 17, 2009 - 2:24 pm 51. AThinkingPerson:

Samizdat: I’ll try, I promise. It’s just so FRUSTRATING to see them spout the liberal party-line BS and stand idly by.

Aug 17, 2009 - 2:29 pm 52. Yoda:

@51. AThinkingPerson: – … I’ll try …

There is no ‘try’.

Aug 17, 2009 - 2:44 pm 53. venividivici:

50

goy,

I hear you, but isn’t it probably true that people with insurance benefit from the bargaining power of the insurer, who negotiates on behalf of the individual members to get a specific rate from doctors, as well as the implicit quality control that the insurer enforces over the doctors in their network, which is important in a mobile society like ours?

I’ve read your comments before and as I recall, you are very much against “comprehensive” insurance and I think your position makes sense on one level, which is that the pricing scheme of health care under third-party payor systems doesn’t place enough of a burden on the individual to monitor costs, but aren’t there some benefits from it that an individual paying cash to a doctor whose skills are an unknown can’t get?

Aug 17, 2009 - 3:27 pm 54. Khiri:

Samizdat, you and Ed are right. I usually do what you do and scroll right past their posts. Once in a while I do read vivo (not sure why, but I do. Maybe he is sometimes more ‘reasonable’ than the other trolls, which isn’t saying much) and on this post, I did read and respond to Moho’s response to my post.

Like AThinkingPerson, I too get frustrated by the outright lies, poor debating skills and childish insults. But like petulant children, they’re best ignored.

I will follow your advice. Thanks!

Aug 17, 2009 - 3:27 pm 55. Michael:

When the government requires counseling or reeducation the bureau that is in charge of it becomes invested in results. With government backing coercion to get good program numbers (results) becomes very important for the program director. If a “follow up” doesn’t work then maybe a camp will work better…

Aug 17, 2009 - 3:41 pm 56. Moho:

THinkingperson–>”It’s just so FRUSTRATING to see them spout the liberal party-line BS and stand idly by.”

Oh, boo hoo. Did someone make little widdums cry by challenging his itty-bitty viewpoint? There, there, now…let it all out…

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:11 pm 57. Jeff:

This piece is dead on AWR. The Dems seek control period. They don’t care about anything else (they certainly don’t care about improving healthcare). It’s all about furthering their ability to reach into our lives and dictate behavior.

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:22 pm 58. Bohemond:

Viv0;

“Access to medical care is a fundamental right.”

No, it isn’t. And the fact that you actually think so reveals everything one needs to know about you.

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:24 pm 59. Jeff:

PS – Dear “vivo” – your post is ridiculous. Your assertions rest on personal judgments. Your criticism of obese people could be applied to smokers or any one else (depending on personal whims). The government has no business deciding which body size is best – period. To assume otherwise is to provide power hungry bureaucrats with yet another way into our lives.

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:25 pm 60. Mistah Magoo:

Careful, Mo–>it starts with hysterical and pathetic weeping, and then it moves on quite quickly to raiding a post office or climbing a clock tower with an assault rifle. Leave these crackers be…they’re as bright and dangerous as cactus to the unsuspecting..

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:34 pm 61. Samizdat:

A Thinking Person and Khiri,

I really appreciate your responses to the previous anti trolling appeal. It wasn’t really meant as advice. It was more meant as a tactical strategy and an attempt to isolate the offenders. These people promote their agenda despite fact and are willing to decieve and commit fraud in order to advance their political position. I say it is time to close ranks and neutralize their tactics. My prior post was meant as a rallying appeal. If you choose to join us, here’s to you.

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:40 pm 62. Alexander Hine:

News from OZ

The part of this article dealing with the use of health problems as tools for social control was particularly interesting to me, as this kind of thing has been happening more and more under Kevin Rudd. Once the government is paying for your health care, it is actually quite reasonable for them (and for citizens) to submit that those who are endangering their own health should have their coverage curtailed. It can go further than this, as well, and lead to general tax grabs based on the costs of health care – so in Australia we have an “alco-pops” tax (that is, a tax on pre-mixed alcoholic drinks popular amongst teenage girls) which, even if I accepted its rationale has failed miserably and actually pushed young people towards buying straight spirits and mixing their own drinks – which I don’t need to tell you wil lead to more troubles than having the 5% alcohol level guaranteed. There is also much talk now about introducing any number of sin taxes – on fast food, cigarettes, alcohol etc., in fact the plan is to force the minimum price of a pack of smokes up to $20 (AUD) and make all the packaging black and white and covered almost entirely in government health warnings!

Anyways, can’t rave to my lefty friends about this stuff, so I rave to you strangers

A. Hine

Aug 17, 2009 - 4:45 pm 63. venividivici:

The most pathetic thing about the trolls is the discrepancy between what they type online and what they’d have the balls to say in person. That is, if they value their teeth.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:00 pm 64. venividivici:

“Access to medical care is a fundamental right.”

I sincerely hope that some day you get to live in a society that believes this tripe. Just not the one I live in.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:01 pm 65. Mistah Magoo:

You know, Republicans would be much less vulnerable to the charge of racism if there was even one elected black Republican congressperson. Think about that after you dry your eyes.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:04 pm 66. goy:

@53. venividivici: – …isn’t it probably true that people with insurance benefit from the bargaining power of the insurer, who negotiates on behalf of the individual members…

Well, let’s think about that. If the insurers are doing this, then why are costs skyrocketing at higher and higher rates each year? At best, if they’re negotiating on behalf of members, they’re doing an exceedingly piss-poor job. Collective bargaining has worked quite well for other groups, like labor unions, who have benefited so greatly that they’ve driven an entire industry (automotive) into bankruptcy. Health care plan members, not so much.

The fact is that an insurance company is a business-for-profit. This is as it should be. They negotiate based on their own best interests. There is no evidence that they act for the benefit of their members in any but the most superficial ways. And the fact is that the economics of the current, broken market model are against any other course.

When prices for health care go up by 4%, insurers simply raise rates. Far more importantly, however, their cash flow increases. Next to increasing profit, increased cash flow is the most significant thing a company can do to increase its holdings, stock position and P&L. There is literally no motivation whatsoever for an insurance company to work to keep costs down. And this is reflected in the data.

The problem is with US. Insurance is a tool for mitigating financial risk, but we completely abuse it. When we use insurance to pay for a commodity cost of living like routine health care – costs every person knows they’ll incur in any given year – we’re doing nothing more than “spreading the cost around” (uhm… sound familiar at all?). This is just socialism, which might provide the hint that explains why the government is so hell-bent on seizing control of this market.

-… to get a specific rate from doctors, …
Unfortunately, the fact is that they don’t. Look at any EOB. I’m looking at one as I type this. The hospital billed $800 (anesthesia) and the insurer paid $467. Then they had the gall to print – on the EOB – “savings to patient: $333″, as if hospitals could even come close to demanding $800 for this item if they had a direct relationship with consumers.

This is completely bass-ackwards. *I* am the consumer, not the insurance company. Yet I had no input whatsoever into the price negotiation, and as far as I’m concerned, $467 for 15 min. of anesthesia (this is the cost JUST for the drug) is highway robbery, and the provider could never get away with charging this if the insurance company was actually on the hook for the cost. They’re not – they simply pass the cost onto the consumer. The market as such is fundamentally broken. There is absolutely nothing working to keep costs under control, which is why (thanks again, BC), cost increases are outpacing inflation more each year.

- … the pricing scheme of health care under third-party payor systems doesn’t place enough of a burden on the individual to monitor costs, …
Correction: there is absolutely no incentive whatsoever for the individual consumer to concern herself with cost, period. In fact, all aspects of the current system actively “hide” the cost of health care from the consumer, completely disassociating us from everything but the co-pay. And it wouldn’t matter if we DID monitor costs, because we have absolutely no control over them. The agreement between the insurer and the provider determines that.

- …but aren’t there some benefits from it that an individual paying cash to a doctor whose skills are an unknown can’t get?
Not with the way the system is currently rigged. Remember – an insurer is not liable in any way for a doctor’s (or a drug’s) efficacy, let alone liable for harm they may do. Insurers thus have absolutely no concern regarding provider quality (or lack thereof). They’re simply a claims processor. Doctors’ skills are an unknown to the insurer as well. There’s no ‘vetting’ process used to accept practitioners into the plan. If they accept the rate contract and have no outstanding malpractice cases (and often, even if they do), they can submit claims.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:16 pm 67. Moho:

These people promote their agenda despite fact and are willing to decieve and commit fraud in order to advance their political position.

A lie, Samizdat. I’ve faced the ironically named “thinkingperson” with well documented and cited arguments countless times before several times, and more than once made him appear like the idiot he chooses to be. I don’t do this to get your attention, I do this so that the less ideologically strident and open-minded people who read this blog get access to at least some kind of alternative to your endless, fact-less crap and become aware of just how baseless your positions really are. And just how much your rationales for your issues–”death panels” to “pulling the plug on grandma” to “the bill is moving too fast”–shift depending how dumb they’ve been revealed to be. I’ve made you look like an idiot a few times as well, I don’t care if you acknowledge it; we both know its true. I’m going to keep on doing it. Its better if you ignore it, you’ll maintain at least a sliver of self-esteem that way.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:18 pm 68. The Shadow:

Let me see if I understand the wingnuts. “Please do not read any facts. It might confuse your simple minds.” I love it. You must have all done very will in science and logic. “why is that true student” “Well I just believe it and that makes it true, doesn”t it” “That will be an F, Son.”

This whole post would be a great example for a logic class. Dunces – DopeyPerson, Ed Wallis, Veni. Rachel Peepers is excused for medial reasons

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:41 pm 69. Commuter:

65. Mistah Magoo: said

“You know, Republicans would be much less vulnerable to the charge of racism if there was even one elected black Republican congressperson.”

Let’s look at the Senate a moment.

Brooke, Edward William, 1919–, U.S. senator (1967–79), b. Washington, D.C. Admitted to the bar in 1948, he served (1963–66) as attorney general of Massachusetts, where he gained a reputation as a vigorous prosecutor of organized crime. Elected (1966) as a Republican to the U.S. Senate, he became the first African-American senator since Reconstruction.

Since reconstruction, there have been 3 other African American US senators. All democrats from Illinois.

Carol Moseley-Braun (1993) – elected, served one term, lost re-election bid while under investigation by Federal Election Commission.
Barack Obama (2005) – elected unopposed, served less than one term, upper 10% of Senate for missed votes.
Roland Burris (2009) – appointed.

Also interesting that except for a few governors and a few scattered US Representatives, Massachusetts has been solidly in the Democratic column since Brooks’ day. Yet there have been no African-American US Representatives representing Masssachusetts, democrat or republican. Ever.

Aug 17, 2009 - 5:48 pm 70. venividivici:

If the insurers are doing this, then why are costs skyrocketing at higher and higher rates each year? At best, if they’re negotiating on behalf of members, they’re doing an exceedingly piss-poor job.

Well, it’s kind of hard to disprove the notion that prices wouldn’t go up even faster without insurers, since presumably they are getting some sort of volume discount from providers. A provider’s cash flows are also smoother if they know that an insurer covers X-number of thousands in the local area and the provider can count on Y% of those policyholders being patients. It beats having to market your services to win every customer, so I would think the providers would value that enough to modify the price schedule for the biggest insurers, giving the policyholders some type of benefit.

When prices for health care go up by 4%, insurers simply raise rates.

Even without insurers, rates would go up 4%, though. If the provider is not a price-taker in the market and can unilaterally raise prices without destroying demand, it won’t matter if the customer is paying or a third-party is paying.

The problem is with US. Insurance is a tool for mitigating financial risk, but we completely abuse it. When we use insurance to pay for a commodity cost of living like routine health care – costs every person knows they’ll incur in any given year – we’re doing nothing more than “spreading the cost around” (uhm… sound familiar at all?).

I agree. I have a high-deductible plan with an HSA for this very reason. I only need catastrophic coverage and I like the tax-deferral of the HSA.

There is absolutely nothing working to keep costs under control, which is why (thanks again, BC), cost increases are outpacing inflation more each year.

I haven’t done an analysis of exactly what drives cost increases, but typically it is a function of product/service improvements, rises/falls in supply/demand, increases/decreases in regulatory costs/labor costs, etc. It sounds like you are saying that the driver is simply pricing power on the part of providers, but that those costs are passed on to consumers through increased insurance premiums. But isn’t a lot of the price increase due to improvements in the treatments available and the costs providers incur in making them available?

Doctors’ skills are an unknown to the insurer as well. There’s no ‘vetting’ process used to accept practitioners into the plan.

I remember reading that one of the big insurers was going to roll out some web technology that allowed patients to rate the doctors in the network.

Still, there’s a big issue that none of this touches, which is employer tax-deductability for insurance premia paid on behalf of employees. It seems like this factor allows the insurers to “fail” in their capacity as negotiators on behalf of the end-customer because the employer just writes off the resulting expense. It’s only now, when the expense is too large a proportion of revenues, and the employer has to push some of it back on the employee, that the need to contain costs becomes a priority for the employee.

Like I said, I was just curious on what your thoughts were on the insurers as aggregators of consumer demand and, hence, negotiating power vis-a-vis providers. I see your point about lack of incentives to push back on providers (although, still, the insurers then have to pay out claims from that higher cash flow, so it’s not as if that flows to the bottom line), but it also seems as if the insurers are not able to really push back on provider price increases because they know the value of what the providers bring to the table is constantly increasing, so paying more for it is reasonable.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:00 pm 71. venividivici:

Of course it’s Constitutional. Obama’s a “Constitutional scholar” after all. The first comment is an instant classic.

http://electriccityweblog.com/?p=4765

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:14 pm 72. venividivici:

I don’t do this to get your attention, I do this so that the less ideologically strident and open-minded people who read this blog get access to at least some kind of alternative to your endless, fact-less crap and become aware of just how baseless your positions really are.

Maybe you should spend some time advising Obama, so he can avoid fact-free diatribes on rogue tonsil-pullers and foot-amputaters and their $50K operating fees that are actually more like $1K. How ’bout doin’ us that favor, ace? He probably needs you more than we do, given the way support for even doing anything is cratering.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:32 pm 73. Samizdat:

An observation,

Obamacare has had a very rough couple of weeks as have all of its champions. President Obama is losing popularity with alarming speed given the youth of his administration. Democrat House and Senate members have been hammered for supporting the bill. Barbara Boxer and Arlen Spector are increasingly unpopular in their home states. A number of House members don’t currently dare to show themselves in their districts. HHS Sebelius has been hammered in public and has been openly laughed at in a townhall meeting. The public option is on the table, then it’s off the table. Any opposers are deemed nazis and unamerican.

This isn’t because conservative opposition is cunning and hyper organized, it’s because the legislation is that bad. The Dems can pass this without a Republican vote, yet they don’t seem to have the stomach for that. You know why! It’s because they know it ain’t about healthcare, it’s about control and the rise of the nanny state. They need political cover to pull it off and create a diversion for fall 2010.

A reading of the legislation, crafted exclusively by Democrats at their insistence, shows just how amateur it is. It is vague and confusing, except for the power it concentrates in the hands of administrators.It is both foolishly assembled and pernicious at the same time.

A bad couple of weeks for a bad bill drafted by some short sighted ideologues with monopoly power who have managed to make Republicans relevant again. Who would have thunk it?

The great thing is that there are liberals who regularly comment here who will completely deny the legislation or their champions are in trouble. That’s why it and they are in trouble.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:39 pm 74. venividivici:

The Dems can pass this without a Republican vote, yet they don’t seem to have the stomach for that.

It’s amazing that there are still politicians on the Dem side who have the sense to know that if this passes, people will hate it. Instantly. It will be like that scene in Terminator 3 when they turn on Skynet and it instantly starts to screw everything up.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:56 pm 75. Moho:

Samizdat–>Support some of your statements. Boxer’s polling has shown her in the tubes since March:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/03/06/PLFB16A0GA.DTL&type=politics

The health care legislation has nothing to do with it.

A number of House members don’t currently dare to show themselves in their districts.

Really? What is this number and in which districts?

A reading of the legislation, crafted exclusively by Democrats at their insistence, shows just how amateur it is.

Ok, put up or shut up, excerpt the portions you’re speaking of, with a link to the version of the bill you’re addressing.

The great thing is that there are liberals who regularly comment here who will completely deny the legislation or their champions are in trouble. That’s why it and they are in trouble.

We all know why its in trouble. A concerted marketing campaign, with the addition of a small group of uninformed and nearly-illiterate hillbillies, coupled with the shameless mendacity of sites like Pajamas Media and the fools like you who have no critical thinking skills. Ask any of the people who think there’s something wrong with the bill, and they will respond with a litany of unsupported fantasies–grandma, socialism, single payer….literally nothing that’s in the bill is actually behind the protests.

I hope you idiots are happy with yourselves. You’ve once again proved that Americans are amongst the stupidest people in the world.

Aug 17, 2009 - 6:57 pm 76. Moho:

If you people really want to be mad at Obama for something legitimate…if you really want to be scared about the loss of your liberties, then read this. This is a process that began in the Bush administration. I suppose you all were just pleased as punch with it then. It now continues under Obama and it is the real danger to your rights, it is the real tyranny and a dangerous precedent. At this point, its only affecting people deemed “terrorists”, but since you all believe that Obama hates white people, I can’t imagine why it isn’t putting the fear of g-d into you….

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=overdue_process_09

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:08 pm 77. venividivici:

I hope you idiots are happy with yourselves.

I’m ecstatic, you half-educated pseudo-intellectual blowhard.

Your pain is like a soothing balm to me. I only hope there is more of it in the future and that I haven’t seen the last of its supply.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:08 pm 78. venividivici:

If you people really want to be mad at Obama for something legitimate…if you really want to be scared about the loss of your liberties, then read this.

Yeah, because something that happened to one Afghani kid (wrong though it may have been) is EXACTLY of the same import as something that would impact hundreds of millions of Americans and their health care.

At this point, its only affecting people deemed “terrorists”, but since you all believe that Obama hates white people, I can’t imagine why it isn’t putting the fear of g-d into you….

Because he doesn’t have the manpower to enforce anything like that on a broad swath of the population.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:16 pm 79. goy:

@70. venividivici: – … it’s kind of hard to disprove the notion that prices wouldn’t go up even faster without insurers, …

Actually, it’s not hard to disprove at all. Every OTHER commodity market where the consumer has a direct relationship with the provider, costs remain relatively affordable. In no other market do we see this sort of extra-inflationary cost increase.

- … since presumably they are getting some sort of volume discount from providers.
Not sure why anyone would presume this. There’s no evidence to support it.

- A provider’s cash flows are also smoother if they know that an insurer covers X-number of thousands…
Even if this is true – and again, I haven’t seen any data that supports it – it’s not enough of a benefit to justify going bankrupt keeping it in place.

- It beats having to market your services to win every customer, …
Insurance companies do ZERO marketing for providers. This is not a factor.

- Even without insurers, rates would go up 4%, though.
You missed my point. The amount was just an arbitrary number. The fact is that insurers are only positively affected by cost increases, since (a) they can just raise rates to compensate and (b) the increased cash flow is beneficial to their business model.

- I agree. I have a high-deductible plan with an HSA for this very reason. I only need catastrophic coverage and I like the tax-deferral of the HSA.
And if everyone did this, instead of pooling their resources in comprehensive plans, the same forces that keep prices affordable in every other market would force health care costs to move back into equilibrium (i.e., in line with inflation). It’s important to recognize this “back” point: when the majority of people paid for health care directly, prices were affordable.

- I haven’t done an analysis of exactly what drives cost increases, but typically it is a function of product/service improvements, rises/falls in supply/demand, increases/decreases in regulatory costs/labor costs, etc.
All true. But – again – the part you’re missing is that all markets except for health care exist in an economic model where the consumer ultimately determines the price the market will bear.

- It sounds like you are saying that the driver is simply pricing power on the part of providers, …
No. The driver is the natural tendency of costs to increase – which exists in all markets. The “driver” is actually a missing “resistor” – there is nothing acting to keep costs under control.

- But isn’t a lot of the price increase due to improvements in the treatments available and the costs providers incur in making them available?
Of course. Again, this aspect of health care is no different from other markets. In those markets, billions poured into R&D for technological innovation typically result in price reductions (e.g., computers, printers, LCD monitors, consumer audio, etc.) with respect to the level of quality offered. Health care, again, is the ONLY market where this phenomenon works the opposite way. One could make the case that the military-industrial complex also falls into this category, in which case one also needs to recognize that it’s not a typical market either, for many of the same reason.

- I remember reading that one of the big insurers was going to roll out some web technology that allowed patients to rate the doctors in the network.
Come on. Who uses that stuff to decide on a provider? And even if they do, it’s not the insurer vetting the provider any more than Amazon vets its products. It’s the other consumers providing the ratings. There are plenty of systems online that provide this service which are NOT run by insurers.

- Still, there’s a big issue that none of this touches, which is employer tax-deductability for insurance premia paid on behalf of employees.
Au contraire – employers should not be involved in insuring employees, period. The hassle and expense in providing and administering the health benefit far outweighs the tax advantages (ask a small business owner). If people wise up and move to high-deductible/low-premium policies en mass, the entity best suited to administer group catastrophic policies of this type would be your local municipality, for several reasons noted in my original post.

- Like I said, I was just curious on what your thoughts were on the insurers as aggregators of consumer demand …
The short answer is that they’re not. At least none of the ones I’ve worked for. They are brokers / claims processors / middlemen – taking a cut from the cash flow contributed by those who pool their resources to “spread the cost around” while purchasing health care. They contract with providers, accept their claims, and pay out monies based on those contracts. They have no incentive to bargain on behalf of the consumer and every reason to allow costs to slowly rise (just exactly as we’ve seen).

- … the insurers then have to pay out claims from that higher cash flow, so it’s not as if that flows to the bottom line),
You’re misunderstanding cash flow, as opposed to profit. Increased cash flow boosts the amount of money a business has in the bank at any one time (or reduces the rate at which it needs to borrow from investors). This has only positive effects on the business’ operation. Credit card outfits, for instance, operate almost entirely on the basis of massive cash flow at very low % overall profit. Those businesses are worth billions$.

-… but it also seems as if the insurers are not able to really push back on provider price increases because they know the value of what the providers bring to the table is constantly increasing, so paying more for it is reasonable.
There’s no evidence to support this. What’s more, there’s not rationale that would support increases that run at rates so much more than inflation. Health care just isn’t getting THAT much better THAT much faster.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:34 pm 80. Moho:

Veni–> You’ve proven that you really are uninterested in civil liberties. Perhaps you’re invented worries about healthcare affect more Americans than the reality that the entire structure of habeas corpus–practically the foundation of the constitution–is an open question. The precedent has been set, where it goes from there is just a matter of degrees. If you were really concerned about the issues you claim, this would be close to the top. You needn’t drop your fantasies about health care to have an interest in it. The fact that you don’t have any interest is indicative of the fact that almost all of your concerns emerge from your party bias. Pathetic.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:36 pm 81. bibio44:

“Rush Limbaugh has spent weeks telling listeners that the president’s plan isn’t about health care, but about “government control of life [and] death” and everything in between. As usual, Limbaugh is right.”

To quote a great statesman, Rush Limbaugh is a big fat idiot.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:37 pm 82. Moho:

Veni–> I’ve never claimed to be educated nor have I claimed to be an intellectual. The fact that I’ve rubbed your nose in every argument I’ve had with you and everyone else is much more a product of the lack of critical thinking skills here, than it is a testament to my own. Think about that–I’ve revealed every one of your arguments to be completely baseless and it hasn’t stopped you for a moment. This is the center of gravity of your party and your movement–utter baseless bs. And the more, the better. Your handlers came up with a brilliant strategy for a public of lazy thinkers full of angst and ambient anger. Literally, the political equivalent of primal scream therapy. Ride it all the way to the top, as you dismantle the very few intelligently designed governmental programs and structures we have in this country. As you said, you’re ecstatic about proving that Americans are just about the dumbest per capita lame-brains on the face of the earth. Pop your collars, teabagging lunkheads, you’ve finally proven that you really are dumber than dirt.

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:42 pm 83. Samizdat:

Venividivici,

I don’t have much use for the California governor and his shallow movies.

You are right that there are some more adult members of the Democrat party, people like Ben Nelson and Kent Conrad, who can sense the long term implications of passing HB3200, and the permanent anvil around the ankle effect it will have on the their membership. They know the bill will not save a dime, will siphon funds from Medicare, will cause rationing and will anger their constituents as their choices become more and more restricted and they have to subscribe to the government option. Conrad is actually a pretty decent numbers guy.

It is actually humorous to me, now that the legislation has been exposed for the fraud it is and it’s popularity is in free fall, that there are individuals and some groups that still support it. I am not talking about SEIU, I expect them to throw in. I’m talking about Pharma and the AMA, and people like Kruggman. They can’t understand that that loud grating sound they heard tem minutes ago was an iceberg making contact below the water line and the rats running by them are seeking higher ground. They think the water around their ankles is implementation of the Titanic’s new hygene initiative as they try to get used to the icy temperature. Talk about clueless.

Oh, I know, you and I are just stupid for not understanding the beneficence. It’s all the bad old Republican’s fault; after all they own Time, Newsweek, the NYT, Boston Globe, LA Times, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN,MSNBC,DAILY KOS,PHILLY ENQUIRER, AP, Reuters, etc,etc etc. Yeah, that’s the ticket!

Aug 17, 2009 - 7:53 pm 84. Leatherneck:

Vote Independent! Throw the bums out. It appears both parties have sold out to special interests rather than doing the will of the people they work for.

Try not to be to crude Moho. I bet you teabag often.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:05 pm 85. Jeff Weimer:

44. vivo:
40. Jeff Weimer:

“Why should that or anything like it be codified into law?

Unless, of course, the law is the rules and regulations for a health care enterprise, of course.”

You answered your own question.

And that answer confirms my suspicion that you are in favor of making compulsory that which is good for you. Are you really that passive-aggressive? Do you need to put into power someone else to tell you what you need to do?

Still, you never answered my other questions. Here, let me take that out so you can concentrate on the rest of my post:

Vivo, you just don’t get it. Or you are being willfully obtuse in order to forward a false argument. Diet counseling is not “bad”, and it goes on every day, and is rightfully between the doctor and patient. But that is not the problem, and you pointedly ignore the real issue. Why should that or anything like it be codified into law?

You seem to be absolutely okay with the idea that if it is good for you it should be compulsory. Allowing an unborn child to live is undoubtedly good for the child – so why do you support abortion?

I love your question “Is reeducation so bad?” It lays bare the budding totalitarian inside. Go ahead and ask those “reeducated” by Stalin his great purges, those “reeducated” by Mao’s “great leap forward”, and those “reeducated” by the Angkar of Cambodia.

You can’t. They are all dead – of “reeducation.”

And yet you still wonder why we resist these incursions on our liberty. I sincerely hope your parrying with us will one day bring you to see the world from our point of view, you may be saved yet.

I’m waiting.

Aug 17, 2009 - 8:53 pm 86. Omar:

Why is Rationing by price better than rationing by fiat[i.e. by government]?

http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/08/rationing_by_any_other_name.php

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:00 pm 87. Moho:

Leatherneck–>from your screen name, I can tell you meant to write “I hope you teabag often”. Well, I don’t really tell people my sexual orientation on the internet, because its none of their business. But I can tell you, you don’t have a chance.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:21 pm 88. Preston:

Right on AWR. The Dems want to control our lives to the inth degree.

Aug 17, 2009 - 9:41 pm 89. vivo:

85. Jeff Weimer:

“’m waiting.’

I had a minor time-consuming problem. May or may not answers all the questions.

Aug 18, 2009 - 3:41 am 90. tanstaafl:

Mo-Ho

I give you points for being a bold liar. (#38)

You’re calling me a liar for stating that “pulling the plug on grandma” was Obama’s own (dumb) characterization (this past Saturday) of the suspect section of HR3200?!

Right now, Mo-Ho, I’d say you’re…

Lower than a snake’s belly

Aug 18, 2009 - 6:59 am 91. Moho:

Yes, Trampstamfl, and I’m doing it again and using the same link that I did the last time to demonstrate to others that, no, it wasn’t Obama’s own characterization, but the characterization of Grassley. For those of you able to comprehend images and audio, it was clear that Obama was criticizing those like Grassley who said exactly the words that he was repeating.

You said:
Mo-Ho, that’s Obama’s characterization, literally his words day before yesterday.

So they were not his words, he was repeating those words in order to address what somebody else had said. If you can’t understand that, you may want to talk to your doctor about some of the medication out there for cognitive dysfunction.

Grassley said:
“Should not have a government run plan to decide when to ,b>pull the plug on grandma”
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/12/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5237320.shtml

Two days later, Obama criticized people who said that:

What you can’t do — or you can, but you shouldn’t do — is start saying things like, we want to set up death panels to pull the plug on grandma. I mean, come on. (Applause.) I mean, I just — first of all, when you make a comment like that — I just lost my grandmother last year. I know what it’s like to watch somebody you love, who’s aging, deteriorate, and have to struggle with that.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/08/barack-obama-colorado-healthcare-text.html

I was being generous before, Trampstamp, when I said you were a liar. I think you’re an idiot, but in my book, being a liar is slightly less insulting. I’ll know better than to show you any courtesy next time.

Aug 18, 2009 - 7:24 am 92. Graham L.:

AWR Hawkins: “As usual, Limbaugh is right.”

Man, if one sentence could completely discredit an author’s credibility, that sentence would be it.

Rush Limbaugh, the guy who got fired from commentating on NFL games for ESPN after stating live on national television that black people aren’t very good quarterbacks, and that the only reason Donovan McNabb got to be quarterback was because of affirmative action in the NFL.

If you think Limbaugh is usually right, that means that you are usually wrong.

Aug 18, 2009 - 7:27 am 93. tanstaafl:

…it wasn’t Obama’s own characterization

Barack Obama used the words.

On Saturday, August 15, in Grand Junction, CO

He didn’t say he was quoting anyone, but, one might guess, wanted to project the notion that objections to the house bill were as dumb as that characterization. (If he wasn’t manipulating that way and really believes that substantive objection to that measure can really be reduced to such terms, then he’s even more profoundly intellectually challenged than I thought.)

He went on to further demonstrate idiocy by, once again, bringing up that poor (now deceased) woman who raised him in Hawaii,using his beleagured grandmother to, yet again, score some dumb point. (I think you could translate it on Saturday to…”hey, I had a sick grandma, too, I wouldn’t wanna pull no plug, I got compassion !”

I’d call that Unabashed Idiocy.

Hey, Mo-Ho, didja you know that the Adam & Eve thing is out and that the world began in August, 4, 1961 ?

Betcha didn’t know that !

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:04 am 94. The Shadow:

I thought the wingnuts would be interested in this from the latest issue of America. The author is the Rev Michael Place, a theologian and past president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association and current chair of the International Federation of Catholic Health Institutions

“”In Catholic theology, access to health care is a fundamental social good, because health care is essential to human dignity; as such, healthcare is an aspect of the common good..Society and the state have a dual obligation to protect the right to health care and to provide the necessary means for its fulfillment. …We already ration health care. We just refuse to admit it. .. (We should be) evaluating all that is proposed in the light of social justice, without first question being what any proposal will do to or for the poor and vulnerable.”

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:08 am 95. Moho:

trampstampfl:

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/alzheimers/AZ00015

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:25 am 96. tanstaafl:

Mo-Ho

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:32 am 97. Moho:

Graham L: Don’t forget, the man who for years decried drug addicts and then was busted for being an opiate addict.

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:53 am 98. Ed Wallis:

Breathtaking video: “Dem wants to eliminate private health insurance altogether”

http://hotair.com/archives/2009/08/18/video-dem-wants-to-eliminate-private-health-insurance-altogether/

Aug 18, 2009 - 11:16 am 99. Graham L.:

You didn’t get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate energy policy.
You didn’t get mad when a covert CIA operative got outed.
You didn’t get mad when the Patriot Act got passed.
You didn’t get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us.
You didn’t get mad when we spent over $600 billion(and counting) on said illegal war.
You didn’t get mad when over 10 billion dollars simply “disappeared” in Iraq.
You didn’t get mad when you saw the Abu Grahib photos.
You didn’t get mad when you found out we were torturing people.
You didn’t get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans.
You didn’t get mad when we didn’t catch Bin Laden.
You didn’t get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed.
You didn’t get mad when we let a major US city drown.
You didn’t get mad when the deficit hit the trillion dollar mark during the Bush years after he inherited a surplus from Clinton.
You finally got mad when.. when… (wait for it… )

You finally got mad when the government decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick.

Yes, illegal wars, lies, corruption, torture, stealing your tax dollars to make the rich richer, are all okay with you – but helping other Americans… psshhh, **** that.

Aug 18, 2009 - 12:01 pm 100. goy:

@99. Graham L.: – ???

Who’s this “You” you keep referring to?

And did you think no one would notice that – ONCE AGAIN – you’ve plagiarized other people’s work by blindly copying and pasting garbage you found out on the internetz?

- …Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate energy policy.
Are you saying they weren’t the most qualified to do so?

- You didn’t get mad when a covert CIA operative got outed.
No reason to get mad. She’s never been affirmed as ever having had “covert” status. What’s more, her husband is the one most responsible for “outing” her as a CIA employee.

- You didn’t get mad when the Patriot Act got passed.
Wasn’t any reason to be mad about this.

- You didn’t get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us.
Are you referring to Grenada? Panama?

- You didn’t get mad when we spent over $600 billion(and counting) on said illegal war.
Wars are expensive. Were you ignorant of this?

- You didn’t get mad when over 10 billion dollars simply “disappeared” in Iraq.
As opposed to the hundreds of billions that have simply “disappeared” recently?

- You didn’t get mad when you saw the Abu Grahib photos.
Do YOU get mad when you see terrorists undergoing hazing rituals? (p.s. you forgot about the Koran-in-the-toilet thing, dummy)

- You didn’t get mad when you found out we were torturing people.
Three known terrorists? I’ll bring the water – in a jug bearing the name of one of my friends who was killed on 9/11.

- You didn’t get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans.
You mean the ones where one end of the conversation was outside the country? That wasn’t illegal. Nothing to be mad about there.

- You didn’t get mad when we didn’t catch Bin Laden.
I did. Clinton totally screwed the pooch on that one.

- You didn’t get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed.
Sure did. But they were a tad over-hyped.

- You didn’t get mad when we let a major US city drown.
You must be kidding. Next time try living above sea level in an area NOT known for frequent, devastating, Class 5 hurricanes.

- You didn’t get mad when the deficit hit the trillion dollar mark during the Bush years after he inherited a surplus from Clinton.
The deficit didn’t hit the trillion dollar mark until Congress and BHO started mortgaging our children’s children’s children’s future away with the Spendulus. And when Social Security funding was subtracted from his “unified budget”, Clinton had no surplus.

- You finally got mad when the government decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick.
Wrong again. First, there is no general “right” to see a doctor. Second, if someone is critically ill, EMTALA statutes already specify that they must be given critical care. No changes in the law are needed for that.

If anyone’s “mad”, it’s because this Congress and this administration want to usurp the authority to control everyone else’s right to see a doctor.

The Supreme Court has already ruled on the government’s authority to legislate the relationship between doctor and patient.

The case was Roe v. Wade.

Look it up.

Aug 18, 2009 - 12:46 pm 101. goy:

Graham L. plagiarizes again.

Aug 18, 2009 - 12:49 pm 102. Moho:

Amen Graham L….there’s a great interview with Lawrence O’Donnell of a teabagging lady who got her fifteen seconds of fame. He asks her why the Iraq and Afghan wars didn’t wake her politically. Her response, and I’m only slightly paraphrasing, was “were in a constant state of war”. So, why would anyone be bothered about that? Throwing our money away on wars is the American way.

Aug 18, 2009 - 12:52 pm 103. The Shadow:

I don’t know if Ed Wallis is a congental liar or just plain stupid. I think it probably a combination

Aug 18, 2009 - 1:56 pm 104. Graham L.:

102. Moho: “Amen Graham L….there’s a great interview with Lawrence O’Donnell of a teabagging lady who got her fifteen seconds of fame. He asks her why the Iraq and Afghan wars didn’t wake her politically. Her response, and I’m only slightly paraphrasing, was “were in a constant state of war”. So, why would anyone be bothered about that? Throwing our money away on wars is the American way.”

Sure, if it’s a Republican war, then it becomes a holy Crusade and God is on our side, so we must fight regardless of the cost, even if we have to send in our troops underequipped. If it’s a Democrat War, suddenly it’s “But what about the DEFICIT?! We need to stop teh overspending!!!”

What a joke.

Aug 18, 2009 - 2:05 pm 105. Linda Rivera:

HEALTH and LIVES ENDANGERED by the Unethical

British Newspaper – http://WWW.DAILYMAIL.CO.UK
Swine flu jab link to killer nerve disease: Leaked letter reveals concern of neurologists over 25 deaths in America By Jo Macfarlane

15th August 2009

A warning that the new swine flu jab is linked to a deadly nerve disease has been sent by the Government to senior neurologists in a confidential letter.

The letter from the Health Protection Agency, the official body that oversees public health, has been leaked to The Mail on Sunday, leading to demands to know why the information has not been given to the public before the vaccination of millions of people, including children, begins.

It tells the neurologists that they must be alert for an increase in a brain disorder called Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS), which could be triggered by the vaccine.

GBS attacks the lining of the nerves, causing paralysis and inability to breathe, and can be fatal.

The letter, sent to about 600 neurologists on July 29, is the first sign that there is concern at the highest levels that the vaccine itself could cause serious complications.

It refers to the use of a similar swine flu vaccine in the United States in 1976 when:

* More people died from the vaccination than from swine flu.
* 500 cases of GBS were detected.

One senior neurologist said last night: ‘I would not have the swine
flu jab because of the GBS risk.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206807/Swine-flu-jab-link-killer-nerve-disease-Leaked-letter-reveals-concern-neurologists-25-deaths-America.html

Aug 18, 2009 - 2:22 pm 106. Linda Rivera:

MILITARY ENFORCED VACCINATIONS

http://WWW.WORLDNETDAILY.COM
Forced vaccines: Ready for yours?
Janet Porter
August 18, 2009

The CDC reported that the United States has the “largest number” of H1N1 cases, noting, “however, most people who have become ill have recovered without requiring medical
treatment.”

In Monday’s Financial Times, Dr Richard Halvorsen, author of “The Truth About Vaccines,” said: “… in most cases this is a mild virus which needs a few days in bed. I’d question why we need a vaccine at all.”

Austrian investigative reporter Jane Burgermeister, on Wednesday’s Faith2Action radio program, said France is already responding to the Pandemic “Level 6″ complete with military-enforced mandatory vaccinations. She added, “They are going to be mandatory throughout Europe.” But that’s not all.

Burgermeister reported:

According to the International Health Regulations of 2005, which has been incorporated into legislation also in The International Partnership on Avian Influenza of 2005 of the USA … the WHO and the U.N. become the controlling agencies of the U.S. in the event of a declared Level 6 Pandemic, and are entitled to control of this country under martial law … under the pretext of fighting a pandemic emergency.

Refusing a WHO-mandated vaccination has been criminalized; police can therefore use deadly force against “criminal suspects” refusing these vaccines.

Perhaps this is a reason why the Pentagon is preparing to “make troops available,” as Fox News reported, to work with FEMA. Fisher said Congress passed post 9/11 regulations, over the objections of the governors, granting the federal government the authority deploy the National Guard.

Last week, I reported about the ads the Army and National Guard are posting for “Internment/Resettlement Specialists” for “confinement,” “control,” “custody,” “supervision” and “counseling individual prisoners in rehabilitative programs.”
Just who are these high school graduates (they seek to hire) going to supervise and control in resettlement and internment camps?

Check out this YouTube video from a guy who spotted a “Mass Evacuation Bus.”

Who gets put on one of these huge government buses without windows?
Maybe it’s those who refuse to take the potentially paralyzing swine flu vaccination.

Check out the “sessions” at an “International Swine Flu Conference
” that is being held at the Hyatt Regency Washington on Capitol Hill Aug. 19-20.

You’d expect a conference like that to have some sessions like “Frequent Hand Washing,” but according to Burgermeister, they’ll be discussing such things as:

* “Unwillingness to follow government orders”
* “Control and diffuse social unrest and public disorder”
* “Protect police forces from falling ill and from being hurt in civil disturbances” and
* “Manage a surge in crime and meet routine requests at the same time.”

The promotional brochure also lists, “Mass fatality management planning.” (And that’s probably just from the vaccinations.) Somebody needs to go to that meeting tomorrow to see what else they’re saying.

Before they line up your children to give them a swine flu vaccination in school without telling you, find out more, and speak out. Your life and your freedom may depend on it.

Then, attend our web conference tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern – sign up at http://www.f2a.org.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=107228

The flu shots contain health destroying toxic ingredients which is why the military will be used to force people to take the deadly flu shots. And the flu drug companies CANNOT BE SUED BY VICTIMS FOR DISABILITY AND/OR DEATH AS A RESULT OF THE HORRIFYING FLU SHOTS.

Aug 18, 2009 - 2:23 pm 107. Linda Rivera:

Dr. Mercola: Do Drug Companies Secretly Favor a World Flu Pandemic?
http://WWW.MERCOLA.COM
And not only are vaccines ineffective in preventing flu in your children, they are equally useless for adults, including the elderly.

Most flu vaccines contain dangerous levels of mercury in the form of thimerosal, a deadly preservative that is 50 times more toxic than regular mercury.[10] If taken in high enough doses, it can result in long-term immune, sensory, neurological, motor, and behavioral dysfunctions.

Disorders associated with mercury poisoning include autism, attention deficit disorder, multiple sclerosis, and speech and language deficiencies.

The Institute of Medicine has warned that infants, children, and pregnant women should not be injected with thimerosal, and yet the majority of flu shots contain 25 micrograms of it.

It has been calculated that, by age two, American children have received 237 micrograms of mercury from vaccines alone, which far exceeds the current EPA “safe” level of 0.1 mcg/kg per day.

But that’s not all. Other toxic substances found in various flu vaccines include:
Ethylene glycol (antifreeze)
Neomycin and streptomycin (antibiotics)
Resin and gelatin – known to cause allergic reactions
Formaldehyde – a known cancer causing agent
Aluminum — a neurotoxin linked to Alzheimer’s disease
Polysorbate 80 (Tween80™) – which can cause severe allergic reactions, including anaphylaxis
Phenol (carbolic acid)
Triton X100 (detergent)
Egg proteins (including avian viruses)

Novartis, another Big Pharma player, also announced on June 12 that it, too, has produced a swine flu vaccine using cell-based technology and the adjuvant MF59?.

The MF59? adjuvant is oil based and contains Tween80, Span85, and squalene. In studies of oil-based adjuvants in rats[13] , the animals were rendered crippled and paralyzed.

Squalene brought on severe arthritis symptoms in rats, and studies in humans given from 10 to 20 ppb (parts per billion) of squalene showed severe immune system impact and development of autoimmune disorders.[14]
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2009/07/28/What-are-the-Dangers-of-Mandatory-Swine-Flu-Vaccination.aspx

The flu shots are clearly INTENDED to permanently and severely damage our health and cause countless deaths.

Aug 18, 2009 - 2:24 pm 108. vivo:

47. AThinkingPerson:

“How is government requiring counseling anything akin to the DMV by the way?

YOUR doctor is giving you diet counseling, how is that different from a govt request that you talk to YOUR doctor?

“PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY. Learn it. Love it. Live it.”

Are you obese? It’s your ‘personal responsibility’ to seek counseling!

54. Khiri:

“I too get frustrated by the outright lies, poor debating skills and childish insults. But like petulant children, they’re best ignored.”

My exact same feeling . . .

58. Bohemond:

Viv0;(sic)

“Access to medical care is a fundamental right.”

“No, it isn’t. And the fact that you actually think so reveals everything one needs to know about you.”

Where did I say that?

But whomever said it he’s on the right track. YOU don’t have that right? When sick, YOU don’t have the right to get cured? Oh, yeah, you just drop and die . . . That’s your bright option!

59. Jeff:

“The government has no business deciding which body size is best – period. To assume otherwise is to provide power hungry bureaucrats with yet another way into our lives.”

Ask your doctor if your body size is ‘acceptable’ or healthy. Oh, you don’t go to doctors? No wonder. You’re afraid to know the truth about your brimming health. But you eat FDA approved foods. Ooops, better stop eating GOVERNMENT approved freedom-interfering stuff . . .

85. Jeff Weimer:

“Do you need to put into power someone else to tell you what you need to do?”

Ask your doctor.

“Why should that or anything like it be codified into law?”

Because people will not follow their doctors ORDERS or even visit a doctor. It’s like paying taxes, would you pay them if they were voluntary?

“I love your question “Is reeducation so bad?” It lays bare the budding totalitarian inside.”

You picked that word, a better term is ‘follow up visit’. Don’t get paranoid.

Aug 18, 2009 - 2:44 pm 109. vivo:

92. Graham L.:

“AWR Hawkins: “As usual, Limbaugh is right.””

Why discuss Limbo? He’s as discredited as the people who listen to him.

100. goy = blind, deaf, heartless, totally mentally handicapped.

Don’t feel bad, ignorance is bliss.

Aug 18, 2009 - 3:03 pm 110. goy:

@108. vivo: – When sick, YOU don’t have the right to get cured?

No. You don’t have that right. I’m sure that’ll come as a news flash to you.

You don’t have any right to demand to be cured of anything – including your very obvious stupidity.

You have no right to demand the labor or property of someone else.

In very narrowly defined circumstances, EMTALA statutes require that a medical practitioner or facility may not refuse critical care treatment when it’s needed, even if the patient can’t afford to pay for those services. That’s as close as you’ll get.

The bill controlling EMTALA does not cite any Constitutional grounds to justify it – like 99.9% of all other bills passed by Congress.

Aug 18, 2009 - 3:10 pm 111. Nick:

Dude you’re crazy.

Aug 18, 2009 - 3:11 pm 112. Leatherneck:

Good one Moho. I supsect there are those kinds of individuals in every group. What they do in their own homes, I do not want to know.

I doubt if all the above posters swing that way. But, you already knew that.

Aug 18, 2009 - 4:21 pm 113. goy:

@109. vivo: – blind, deaf, heartless, totally mentally handicapped.

Funny how ad hominem isn’t any less fallacious (or desperate) when you use it than it is when Mofo uses it. Although it’s a dead giveaway that you’re completely out of facts and ideas. As usual.

Aug 18, 2009 - 4:44 pm 114. AdrianS:

When our government decided that there were families with children who were suffering because hardships meant that they would not have enough money to eat, the government set up a program that kept those families fed using food stamps. The government did not take over all of stores and supermarkets in the country and convert the entire country to a socialistic government-run nationwide food distribution bureaucracy. Can you image if it had? We would be getting only the amount of food-stuffs that the government thought or decided we should have? The elderly would be cut back severely because, since they no longer work, perhaps a can of non-gourmet cat food per day would do.

What then gives bureaucrats the idea that if a few million individuals, or families, need to (or should) have insurance and/or healthcare, the government needs to take over the entire health care system in order for those few to have a health care plan?

Could it be that the solution to the problem is simpler than meets the eye? Like the food stamp programs, perhaps the government should just allow for applications from those who feel they need health care assistance and take their application. After verifying their income resources, the government could just give those few individuals and/or families a subsidy. So they can afford health care, buy down the policy.

Then, the government should do what a government should do — that is, do whatever it takes to promote and motivate the economy — encourage enhance trade incentives — so that those same people, the poverty-line folks, can earn decent wages and have jobs that allow them to work for a living instead of idling by on welfare.

I guess this idea is too simple. But how about this: The poor don’t have decent clothing; perhaps the government should take over Macy, Wal-Mart, J.C. Penny’s, and all clothing retailers so that EVERYONE can have clothing allotted to them controlled though a socialist government run clothing care program with an emphasis on clothing those working and under 65 years of age.

Aug 18, 2009 - 4:49 pm 115. vivo:

110. goy:

“You don’t have any right to demand to be cured of anything – including your very obvious stupidity.”

If you are w/o health coverage, you have a bad traffic accident, you will plead NOT to be taken to any medical facility not covered by the Constitution (!!).

You have a LOT of nightmares, don’t you?

113. goy:

“Although it’s a dead giveaway that you’re completely out of facts and ideas. As usual.”

Not really. Why waste my time with a hamster running on a wheel? Although I accept that your ‘facts’ are very entertaining.

Aug 18, 2009 - 8:15 pm 116. goy:

@115. vivo: – You have a LOT of nightmares, don’t you?

Only in your feverish, straw man dreams, viv’.

@113. goy: – I accept that your ‘facts’ are very entertaining.

I’m happy you’re entertained, though I’m sure that doesn’t take much. The facts stand on their own either way.

Aug 19, 2009 - 12:37 pm 117. Cybergeezer:

The Shadow;
Brilliant!The Federal Government shall use a tried and true business model for administering their Health Care!
Yea: And there really is a Santa Claus; Ho, Ho, ho! Nice fairy tales!

Aug 20, 2009 - 11:10 am 118. Paul -Indiana:

#65. Don’t you think that Andre Carson is black enough? In addition, dumb enough.

Aug 20, 2009 - 11:37 am 119. The Shadow:

I came accross a great word that applied to the wingnuts here “Bayard” Look it up in the OED

Aug 20, 2009 - 11:46 am 120. myunkie:

Thanks.

While it seems liberalism is all about control, it looks like there is a more subtle plan here. 1,000 pages were written about extraneous details. The core is the savings of 500 billion from medicare. Medicare is broke and any honest solution will cost the democrats votes. So, the 500B in savings is critical to the survival of the democrat’s majority. The plan has two simple thrusts: the effective thrust is the “savings”. Well, that won’t come from savings in expenses since those are low already. It won’t come from cutting fraud since there are not sufficient resources proposed for that. It can’t come from cutting the reimbursement scale since the current schedule has already strained availability. So, the savings have to come from reducing the number of procedures. Limiting them to the “effective ones”, exactly as you described, as a private discussion between a patient and her bureaucrat.

The hints are everywhere; the effectiveness studies funded in the stimulus bill, reference to “taking the pain killer”, Obama’s grandmother’s hip and the notorious ones who use “80%” of the benefits. And the most draconian, “these decision cannot be made in the usual way….”. The hardship under ObamaCare will not be the result of government incompetence but part of the plan.

The second thrust is to hide the intent. We can hide the 20 or 30% of seniors that will be adversely affected by mixing them in with all those young folks that don’t need care. Then the restrictions will only affect a small percent of all those covered. It is brilliant. It reminds me of the insurance company that brags of 97% customer satisfaction. But since only 12% of the auto customers have a claim in a given year, that means that 25% of the claimants are dissatisfied. Obama’s plan is to muffle the cries of those in need in a sea of “satisfied customers”.

God help us.

Aug 21, 2009 - 3:32 pm 121. SteveB/Colorado:

#100 Goy (in response to Graham L. “….Cheney allowed energy companies to dictate energy policy.”). “Are you saying they weren’t the most qualified to do so?”

No, I don’t think Graham is saying that. But I am. Your comment is the energy equivalent of saying that AIG, Lehman, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, etc. were the best qualified to dictate policy on credit default swaps and various other derivatives.

Energy policy discussion is something that all citizens should have the right to participate in, not just energy companies. Yet, citizens were denied that right thanks to V-P Cheney’s “secret” energy task force that he convened in early 2001.

The mantra last election and for the prior 8 years was “drill, baby, drill.” Yet, as of June, 2008, before the recession hit big time, companies were sitting on over 67 million acres of undeveloped O & G leases, on-shore, mostly in the West, and off shore. Sale of leases conveys a property right to energy companies. What we’ve seen since 2001 is the biggest land grab of the federal public land since the late 19th century days of the railroad robber barons.

Federal agencies are required by law to manage National Forest and Bureau of Land Management lands under a principle of multiple use. Here in Colorado, we now have BLM field offices where 90% of the acreage has either already been turned over, or is proposed for sale, to the energy industry. That’s not multiple use. It’s management for one interest; an interest that here in Colorado has been detrimental to other uses such as hunting and fishing.

That’s the result of allowing energy companies to dictate government policy. Suggest that you do some homework before posting such a statement in the future.

Aug 22, 2009 - 12:24 pm 122. goy:

@121. SteveB/Colorado: – No, I don’t think Graham is saying that.

Really. What was your first clue?

Was it the fact that his entire post was one long, insipid example of reguripasted plagiarism? Is that what made it obvious that he actually wasn’t “saying” anything at all?

Or was it the fact that he didn’t bother to note that he was just spreading drivel he found on someone else’s web site?

Your comment is the energy equivalent of saying …
Only if straw man arguments are valid. Guess what: they’re not.

Aug 22, 2009 - 8:40 pm

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