For those who continue to support Obamacare and believe the fallacious claims regarding its benefits including substantial cost saving, maintenance of quality, easy availability of care with no rationing, we have a reality check for you: examine the Massachusetts “experiment” in healthcare. It is an unmitigated failure on the premier and expected fronts – cost, quality and availability.
The Massachusetts healthcare system should portend what America can expect when such a plan is implemented nationally. Well, actually worse as it would be run by the Federal Government.
Costs Soaring After Bay State Health Change
Sally C. Pipes 06/30/2010
Anyone wanting a preview of Obama-Care need just focus on Massachusetts, the state that provided the blueprint for Obama's plan. It makes a great case for making haste in repealing ObamaCare.
In Massachusetts, health care prices are out of control, emergency rooms are overcrowded, the government is at war with itself and private insurers are running in the red, refusing to enter critical markets on the government's unrealistic terms.
The party line now is that the Bay State's reform was not about cost control but rather expanding access to care. The program's backers claim that the price spiral they find themselves in was expected, anticipated, even if they didn't actually have a plan for it.
That's a revisionist's tale. In early 2006, the plan's backers — led by then Republican Gov. Mitt Romney — adamantly asserted that his plan would in fact control costs, provide universal coverage and improve the quality of care. (If this sounds familiar, it's because Obama's team borrowed the marketing scripts.)
Disinterested outsiders predicted that both prices and total costs would most likely increase under the government-dominated system, since massive new demand, reimbursed at the lowest prices, would be forced on a fixed supply. They were shouted down by insiders vested in getting the reform passed.
Guess who was right?
Two data points are harbingers of collapse. First, an academic study "The Effect of Massachusetts' Health Reform on Employer-Sponsored Insurance Premiums" by professors John F. Cogan, R. Glenn Hubbard and Daniel Kessler, confirmed the prediction.
Massachusetts' reform not only did not decrease prices and spending, as promised, but prices are increasing at rates greater than national trend lines and greater than rates in the Bay State prior to reform.
Three years prior to reform, insurance premiums for employers were increasing 3.7% more slowly in Massachusetts than in the rest of the country. Today, the opposite is true. Prices in Massachusetts are increasing 5.7% more than in other states. In Boston, prices for employer-provided family plans are increasing 8.2% faster than in other large metropolitan areas.
"Because the plan's main components are the same as those of the new health reform law," the study's authors note, "the effects of the plan provide a window onto the country's future."
Post-reform, prices are up, more people have insurance, and more people are headed to the emergency room. If this sounds odd, it should. Among former Gov. Romney's favorite arguments for reform was that it would shift dollars from inefficient emergency room care to the more efficient venue of the primary care doctor.
The Obama administration passed its reform on the backs of health insurers — couching the reform as health insurance reform rather than the actual remaking of health care delivery.
In this election year, Gov. Deval Patrick's administration has torn this page from Obama's playbook. He demanded the right to approve insurance prices in February and then had his bureaucrats deny necessary increases in April. Prior to reform, rates had to be actuarially sound. Post-reform, it's more important that they be politically sound.
Those in his own bureaucracy charged with making sure that insurers can pay their bills called this a "train wreck" and put three insurers under solvency watch. The Patrick administration stood resolute in its election-year pandering. "It's unacceptable for consumers to be treated this way and it will not be tolerated," thundered Massachusetts Insurance Commissioner Patrick Murphy, in April.
Last week, the administration's own hearing officers sided with the first insurance company whose case made it through the process. The increased rates, it determined, were fair and necessary.
The Patrick administration's political folks, like Romney's before, will not be swayed by inconvenient facts. Insurance commissioner Murphy "strongly disagrees" with his own hearing officers' ruling.
Is it any wonder then that the state's bureaucracy responsible for managing its health care cannot entice any of the state's major insurance carriers to offer plans to small businesses? Carriers representing 90% of the state's insurance market share are refusing to offer plans to small business through the state's Connector.
"Given the rate cap that the administration has imposed on the health plans, none of them is in a position to enter into any new endeavors with the state at this time," explains Eric Linzer, a spokesperson for the industry association. State officials have responded by sending letters to insurance carriers threatening legal action.
Get ready to wait, America — unless ObamaCare is repealed and reversed.
• Pipes is president and CEO of the Pacific Research Institute. Her next book, "The Truth About ObamaCare" (Regnery Publishing), will be released in August.
This is just one hospital. Multiply this same story by every hospital in this country with every case and you can't even grasp the unlimited scope and cost of this problem. It is an absolute outrage that must be summarily stopped. It is bankrupting hospitals, forcing many to close. The costs of this unreimbursed care to the states is in the tens of billions of dollars per year at minimum with millions of taxpayers on the hook for these avoidable expenses.
The answer is secure the border and immigration reform.
In the 1950’s, Ronald Reagan warned us that health care could be used as a means to introduce and implement socialism. His words were quite prescient.
Though the public was and is vehemently against government run health care, the Obama Administration, Pelosi and Reid used bribery of corrupt politicians, and threats, lies or disingenuous arguments with feckless other in order to acquire enough votes to pass the legislation.
Again this was done in spite of overwhelming sentiment by the public against socialized medicine. It was a coup by a power hungry and ideologically driven government that disdains its citizens.
Now it is our turn …!
Obamacare Equals Socialism on Steroids
David Limbaugh May 13, 2010
We knew Obama was prevaricating when he told us his purpose to cram through Obamacare was to provide universal access to coverage and reduce costs, but how many people did he manage to fool? How many are still fooled?
He repeatedly complained that America spent more on healthcare than other nations "but wasn't any healthier." He grossly distorted the numbers of chronically uninsured. He lied about his support for a single-payer plan and in denying that the "public option" was a Trojan horse for such a plan. He misled us concerning his intention to federally fund abortions and the coverage of illegals.
He deceitfully insisted that he wouldn't interfere with the patient-doctor relationship, that patients could choose to keep their own plans, that his plan wouldn't lead to rationing and that it would increase the quality of care.
Perhaps his most cynical fraud was his line that he would not sign a bill that would add one single dime to the federal deficit. Along with the uninsured canard, this was his biggest selling point for Obamacare: Healthcare costs were skyrocketing, and he had the magic bullet to remedy that.
Well, we already have objective proof (courtesy of a delinquent Congressional Budget Office pronouncement) that this, too, was a lie.
Obama and congressional Democrats moved budgetary mountains (in the way David Copperfield moves mountains onstage) to create the CBO-supported illusion that his bill wouldn't increase federal budget deficits.
By asking the CBO to make absurd assumptions and by borrowing from other mythical funds (Medicare), Obamacrats were finally able to make the numbers balance, just long enough to give Obama cover to sign the bill.
But less than two months after he signed the bill into law, the CBO, in response to Rep. Jerry Lewis' request for a rescoring based on realistic assumptions instead of the bogus ones Democrats submitted, has already admitted its estimate didn't take into account "discretionary" expenditures that will add some $115 billion worth of costs.
With the publication of this news, the administration is now making noise, threatening not to fund the bill unless Congress finds sufficient savings elsewhere to nullify that "unexpected" cost increase.
Give me a break. Just how stupid can these people think we are? They knew about these false assumptions before Obama signed the bill, and they're not about to withdraw their wholesale endorsement for Obama's crowning legislative "achievement."
But as bad as Obama's lies were about the costs of his plan, many of us warned that a greater evil in Obamacare was its guaranteed path to reducing our freedoms.
Ronald Reagan was not just issuing platitudes when he said, "One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people has been by way of medicine. It's very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project . . . From here, it's a short step to all the rest of socialism."
No truer words were ever spoken, and you can be sure that Obama believes it, too, which is exactly why he misrepresented almost every aspect of his plan in order to get it passed — and even then, just barely.
His real purpose, as many of us have been telling you ad nauseam, is to greatly increase the size and scope of government and government control and, in the process, further radically redistribute wealth. He's a socialist. These aren't just words. He really is.
As it turns out, we don't have to wait any longer to prove we were correct about this, too. Obama has nominated Donald Berwick to run the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
I discovered in research on my upcoming book that experts believe that under Obamacare, the role of the CMS will be greatly expanded to define the quality of healthcare for every insurance plan, set reimbursement rates for physicians in Medicare and Medicaid, and decide how valuable certain treatments are.
According to Robert M. Goldberg of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest, Berwick essentially "will get control of the practice of medicine."
It would be scary enough for a bureaucrat of normal sensibilities and saner politics to have such control, but RedState has uncovered the extent of Berwick's radicalism — like so many of Obama's other appointees.
Berwick is an Ivy League academic who loves wealth redistribution and believes that healthcare is an ideal vehicle to achieve it.
Berwick said: "Any healthcare funding plan that is just, equitable, civilized, and humane must . . . redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate. Excellent healthcare is by definition redistributional."
Berwick also lusts after the British system of socialized medicine, saying that America's healthcare system runs in the "darkness of private enterprise."
Pelosi to Aspiring Musicians: Quit Your Job, Taxpayers Will Cover Your Health Care
Sounds like socialism … er, communism as in communist Russia of the 1970’s.
We need to stop this transfer of wealth and killer of motivation and productivity which enslaves working individuals and forces them to pay for those who are not contributing.
Congressional Democrats have arrogantly and unequivocally indicated in no uncertain terms that they know what’s better for the America than its citizens do and want to pass Obamacare come hell or high water and do it soon. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is seeking an immediate vote on the recently changed legislation despite the fact that no Senators have had the opportunity to read what they will be voting on. This is all in the face of strong and vociferous opposition by the majority of voters who don’t want the government running their healthcare.
The following editorial by Larry Elder clarifies some of the general issues in a straightforward manner.
Is Imbecility Covered Under Obama Plan?
By Larry Elder
Americans overwhelmingly like their health care and insurance. While they reject ObamaCare, the president and Congress insist on driving it through.
Up to 85% of us already have health insurance and are satisfied with it. Lacking health insurance is different from lacking health care — which, by law, emergency rooms must supply. Millions go without health insurance by choice.
Deduct from the number without insurance those who have access to it via entitlement programs, those temporarily without it while between jobs, those here illegally and those who could go on their parents' insurance plans by paying affordable amounts — and you're down to 10 million to 15 million people without insurance for longer than a year. This is 5% of Americans.
To address this, the president and the Democrats are this close to a complete government takeover of health care. And a takeover it is. Assuming some kind of plan reaches the president's desk, it will — at minimum — force all Americans to purchase health insurance or pay fines or worse.
It will force nearly all employers to provide health insurance or pay fines. It will tell health insurers that they must accept applicants with pre-existing illnesses and restrict their ability to "discriminate" based on factors like sex and age.
Incredibly, the president and Congress tell us that our economic recovery hinges on "health care reform" and that they can achieve it — providing millions of people with health insurance estimated to cost a trillion dollars in the first decade — while simultaneously reducing the deficit.
The plan anticipates cutting hundreds of billions from the popular Medicare programs, whose beneficiaries vote in numbers greater than any other age group. Doctors and hospitals already complain that Medicare reimbursements fall short of costs, let alone profits. Good luck with that.
"Health care reform" achieves its deficit-reducing magic by collecting taxes in the early years — building up money — while paying out very little. Only after the first four years does money go out. It also forces states to pick up part of the tab. So, voila, it actually reduces the deficit — at least in the first decade. Then what?
The Congressional Budget Office — in cost estimates full of caveats, conditions and on-the-one-hands — says that it could/might/may reduce the deficit in the second and third decades, too. Again, this assumes continued cuts in doctor and hospital reimbursements.
Despite the White House photo-op of docs in their white frocks, most physicians oppose ObamaCare. They resent further government supervision and control over their practice. An IBD poll found that 65% "oppose" ObamaCare and that 45% would consider taking early retirement or leaving their practice if the bill went through.
Given the broad opposition — most Americans, most doctors and seniors in fear of cuts in Medicare — why do it?
First, the Democrats — now in control of all three branches of government — have convinced themselves that they face a political price if they fail.
ObamaCare supporters, based on bogus assumptions and inflated numbers, argue that many, if not most, bankruptcy filings are due to health care bills. If, as President Obama asserts, "reforming" health care and economic prosperity go hand in hand, how can they abandon it?
Second, while a large majority of Republicans and most independents oppose these "reforms," Democrats overwhelming support them. They consider health care and health insurance a right — never mind the Constitution or the price tag — and think "the rich" should bear the costs.
Congressmen fear an electorate upset at a failure "to deliver" a victory over the evil, money-grubbing insurance companies.
Third, many believe in good faith that this is the "right thing to do."
This ignores the mountain of evidence that government command-and-control health care reduces quality, reduces innovation and inevitably leads to rationing. The president of the Canadian Medical Association says Canada's system — a single-payer kind, favored by President Obama — is "imploding." She calls for more competition.
Critics of our health care system say citizens in other countries enjoy longer life expectancies. But after adjusting for homicides, infant mortality due to teen pregnancies and low birth weights, obesity and other factors, the discrepancy disappears.
Our system produces the world's best results for cancer patients who go into medical care at the same time similarly situated patients enter their countries' care. Our drug companies lead the world in coming up with new life-extending and -enhancing drugs, a record at risk given new controls and taxes under the guise of "reform."
When the ObamaCare bill comes due — when the deficit explodes and the costs are "controlled" through government-directed rationing — supporters, including Obama, will long have departed Washington, leaving others to deal with the mess.
We have stated many times in previous posts that Obama and the Democrats in Congress want to impose a healthcare system on an unwilling American public that is the polar opposite of what these politicians speciously claim it to be. There will be severe restrictions on choices and availability of care with governmental rationing. Waiting times will be longer while the quality of care will plummet yet the total cost borne by each individual will significantly increase both through more expensive premiums and usurious taxation.
Congressional Democrats and Obama claim that their healthcare legislation establishes a great system for the American people. If it really is so fantastic then why are they refusing to agree to amendments that would force them to use the same healthcare system as they want to impose on us? The answer is because they know this system will be disastrous – limiting choice, rationing and restricting care, creating prolonged waiting times before receiving care and being far more costly for significantly inferior quality. Why should they have to give up their privileged premium care that is subsidized by the American taxpayer and provides them with myriad choices?
This whole healthcare reform is all about government control and nothing more. As Investors Business Daily put it:
“… health reform's purposes were advertised as cost containment and near-universal coverage. But what Democrats are set to enact will spend trillions dramatically increasing insurance premiums, and leave millions still without insurance.
In other words, their push for health reform has been based on lies. The real purpose: to gain control of America's health system.
And on top of the lies is the hypocrisy the American people have come to expect from their politicians: continuation of the nearly 50-year-old loophole providing senators and House members with a wide choice of private health plans.”
We need to continue fighting to stop this legislation as well as vigorously work at ousting these arrogant, imperious members of Congress who are ruling us rather than representing us!
Reform For You, But Not Congress
Investors Business Daily 12/04/2009
Hypocrisy: If the $2-trillion-plus government health care plan that Congress has come up with is so great, why do lawmakers refuse to live under it themselves? Their designs have been based on lies from the start.
The left thinks Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., and David Vitter, R-La., have shot themselves in their feet. After unveiling last week their amendment that would force Senate and House members to cover themselves with any government health plan that passes into law, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, a champion of the public option, proceeded to ask if he could sign on as a co-sponsor. Liberal Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said he might want to, as well.
"Coburn and Vitter weren't counting on that kind of support," gloated Nation magazine Washington correspondent John Nichols. "If they're smart, the rest of the Democratic caucus will follow Brown's lead and sign on for the public option."
Well, when it comes to feathering their own nests, congressional Democrats are smart. And they're not about to subject themselves to anything less than the taxpayer-subsidized, gold-plated array of private coverage choices they've enjoyed for nearly a half century in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program.
Coburn and Vitter's idea of politicians living under a government plan "was opposed unanimously by Democrats during interviews on Thursday," the Hill newspaper reports. The paper also noted opposition from senior Republican senators such as National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn of Texas and Minority Whip Jon Kyl of Arizona, who asked: "Why would I want to put my family in that, let alone anybody else's family?"
Senators and representatives from both sides of the aisle know how good they have it under the FEHBP, the world's largest group health program. The reason Congress' own health care works so well is that it's based on consumer choice and market competition — the opposite of what it's trying to impose on everybody else.
Members of Congress and millions of federal workers may choose from hundreds of private fee-for-service plans, HMOs or preferred provider organizations, with no federal worker living anywhere enjoying fewer than a dozen options.
FEHBP members can easily switch plans if they become dissatisfied; that puts competitive pressure on insurers to provide quality and value. Surveys show that members love their coverage, which is why almost all federal employees join the program.
The FEHBP is shielded from state regulation and Uncle Sam subsidizes premiums by more than 70%. Canadian physician and Manhattan Institute senior fellow Dr. David Gratzer, whose opposition to government-run health care comes from first-hand experience, observes that "the federal government's role in the FEHBP is to pay the bills," unlike the fiscally doomed Medicare program, of which "Washington is the designer of benefits."
Today, instead of the federal takeover Democrats are rushing to enact, lawmakers could give Americans the kind of high-quality health care choices they enjoy. A simple system of vouchers would allow recipients to choose any health plan on the market. The system could be means-tested, with Medicare giving "larger vouchers to poorer and sicker seniors and smaller vouchers to healthy and wealthy seniors, using current health-risk-adjustment mechanisms and Social Security data on lifetime earnings," says Michael F. Cannon, director of health policy studies at the Cato Institute.
Vouchers "would contain Medicare spending, and are the only way to protect seniors from government rationing," according to Cannon.
"The FEHBP is an excellent model for designing a system based on broad personal choice," argues Robert Moffit, the Heritage Foundation's director of health policy studies. "There is no reason," he adds, "why a reform of Medicare could not establish a similar structure for national plan options," including integrating private retiree health insurance into the system.
But instead of such common-sense reform, Americans are staring at thousands of pages of new regulations on their personal medical treatment, including a government-run option that will devastate the private coverage most Americans have and like. The inevitable result, as independent studies warn, is thousands of dollars more to pay in health premiums.
In last year's presidential campaign, health reform's purposes were advertised as cost containment and near-universal coverage. But what Democrats are set to enact will spend trillions dramatically increasing insurance premiums, and leave millions still without insurance.
In other words, their push for health reform has been based on lies. The real purpose: to gain control of America's health system.
And on top of the lies is the hypocrisy the American people have come to expect from their politicians: continuation of the nearly 50-year-old loophole providing senators and House members with a wide choice of private health plans.
The House Republican Conference has compiled a list of all the new boards, bureaucracies, commissions, and programs created in H.R. 3962 which is Pelosi's legislation for the government takeover of health care and the abrogation of the rights, freedoms and pillaging of the hard earned incomes of American citizens. Specifically identified in the article New Federal Bureaucracies Created in Pelosi Health Care Bill on the GOP.gov website, these include:
Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 111(d), p. 61)
Grant program for wellness programs to small employers (Section 112, p. 62)
Grant program for State health access programs (Section 114, p. 72)
Program of administrative simplification (Section 115, p. 76)
Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 223, p. 111)
Health Choices Administration (Section 241, p. 131)
Qualified Health Benefits Plan Ombudsman (Section 244, p. 138)
Health Insurance Exchange (Section 201, p. 155)
Program for technical assistance to employees of small businesses buying Exchange coverage (Section 305(h), p. 191)
Mechanism for insurance risk pooling to be established by Health Choices Commissioner (Section 306(b), p. 194)
Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund (Section 307, p. 195)
State-based Health Insurance Exchanges (Section 308, p. 197)
Grant program for health insurance cooperatives (Section 310, p. 206)
"Public Health Insurance Option" (Section 321, p. 211)
Ombudsman for "Public Health Insurance Option" (Section 321(d), p. 213)
Account for receipts and disbursements for "Public Health Insurance Option" (Section 322(b), p. 215)
Telehealth Advisory Committee (Section 1191 (b), p. 589)
Demonstration program providing reimbursement for "culturally and linguistically appropriate services" (Section 1222, p. 617)
Demonstration program for shared decision making using patient decision aids (Section 1236, p. 648)
Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicare (Section 1301, p. 653)
Independent patient-centered medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302, p. 672)
Community-based medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302(d), p. 681)
Independence at home demonstration program (Section 1312, p. 718)
Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (Section 1401(a), p. 734)
Comparative Effectiveness Research Commission (Section 1401(a), p. 738)
Patient ombudsman for comparative effectiveness research (Section 1401(a), p. 753)
Quality assurance and performance improvement program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1412(b)(1), p. 784)
Quality assurance and performance improvement program for nursing facilities (Section 1412 (b)(2), p. 786)
Special focus facility program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1413(a)(3), p. 796)
Special focus facility program for nursing facilities (Section 1413(b)(3), p. 804)
National independent monitor pilot program for skilled nursing facilities and nursing facilities (Section 1422, p. 859)
Demonstration program for approved teaching health centers with respect to Medicare GME (Section 1502(d), p. 933)
Pilot program to develop anti-fraud compliance systems for Medicare providers (Section 1635, p. 978)
Special Inspector General for the Health Insurance Exchange (Section 1647, p. 1000)
Medical home pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1722, p. 1058)
Accountable Care Organization pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1730A, p. 1073)
Nursing facility supplemental payment program (Section 1745, p. 1106)
Demonstration program for Medicaid coverage to stabilize emergency medical conditions in institutions for mental diseases (Section 1787, p. 1149)
Comparative Effectiveness Research Trust Fund (Section 1802, p. 1162)
"Identifiable office or program" within CMS to "provide for improved coordination between Medicare and Medicaid in the case of dual eligibles" (Section 1905, p. 1191)
Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (Section 1907, p. 1198)
Public Health Investment Fund (Section 2002, p. 1214)
Scholarships for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 1224)
Program for training medical residents in community-based settings (Section 2214, p. 1236)
Grant program for training in dentistry programs (Section 2215, p. 1240)
Public Health Workforce Corps (Section 2231, p. 1253)
Public health workforce scholarship program (Section 2231, p. 1254)
Public health workforce loan forgiveness program (Section 2231, p. 1258)
Grant program for innovations in interdisciplinary care (Section 2252, p. 1272)
Advisory Committee on Health Workforce Evaluation and Assessment (Section 2261, p. 1275)
Prevention and Wellness Trust (Section 2301, p. 1286)
Clinical Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1295)
Community Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 1301)
Grant program for community prevention and wellness research (Section 2301, p. 1305)
Grant program for research and demonstration projects related to wellness incentives (Section 2301, p. 1305)
Grant program for community prevention and wellness services (Section 2301, p. 1308)
Grant program for public health infrastructure (Section 2301, p. 1313)
Center for Quality Improvement (Section 2401, p. 1322)
Assistant Secretary for Health Information (Section 2402, p. 1330)
Grant program to support the operation of school-based health clinics (Section 2511, p. 1352)
Grant program for nurse-managed health centers (Section 2512, p. 1361)
Grants for labor-management programs for nursing training (Section 2521, p. 1372)
Grant program for interdisciplinary mental and behavioral health training (Section 2522, p. 1382)
"No Child Left Unimmunized Against Influenza" demonstration grant program (Section 2524, p. 1391)
Healthy Teen Initiative grant program regarding teen pregnancy (Section 2526, p. 1398)
Grant program for interdisciplinary training, education, and services for individuals with autism (Section 2527(a), p. 1402)
University centers for excellence in developmental disabilities education (Section 2527(b), p. 1410)
Grant program to implement medication therapy management services (Section 2528, p. 1412)
Grant program to promote positive health behaviors in underserved communities (Section 2530, p. 1422)
Grant program for State alternative medical liability laws (Section 2531, p. 1431)
Grant program to develop infant mortality programs (Section 2532, p. 1433)
Grant program to prepare secondary school students for careers in health professions (Section 2533, p. 1437)
Grant program for community-based collaborative care (Section 2534, p. 1440)
Grant program for community-based overweight and obesity prevention (Section 2535, p. 1457)
Grant program for reducing the student-to-school nurse ratio in primary and secondary schools (Section 2536, p. 1462)
Demonstration project of grants to medical-legal partnerships (Section 2537, p. 1464)
Center for Emergency Care under the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (Section 2552, p. 1478)
Council for Emergency Care (Section 2552, p 1479)
Grant program to support demonstration programs that design and implement regionalized emergency care systems (Section 2553, p. 1480)
Grant program to assist veterans who wish to become emergency medical technicians upon discharge (Section 2554, p. 1487)
Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (Section 2562, p. 1494)
National Medical Device Registry (Section 2571, p. 1501)
CLASS Independence Fund (Section 2581, p. 1597)
CLASS Independence Fund Board of Trustees (Section 2581, p. 1598)
CLASS Independence Advisory Council (Section 2581, p. 1602)
Health and Human Services Coordinating Committee on Women's Health (Section 2588, p. 1610)
National Women's Health Information Center (Section 2588, p. 1611)
Centers for Disease Control Office of Women's Health (Section 2588, p. 1614)
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Office of Women's Health and Gender-Based Research (Section 2588, p. 1617)
Health Resources and Services Administration Office of Women's Health (Section 2588, p. 1618)
Food and Drug Administration Office of Women's Health (Section 2588, p. 1621)
Personal Care Attendant Workforce Advisory Panel (Section 2589(a)(2), p. 1624)
Grant program for national health workforce online training (Section 2591, p. 1629)
Grant program to disseminate best practices on implementing health workforce investment programs (Section 2591, p. 1632)
Demonstration program for chronic shortages of health professionals (Section 3101, p. 1717)
Demonstration program for substance abuse counselor educational curricula (Section 3101, p. 1719)
Program of Indian community education on mental illness (Section 3101, p. 1722)
Intergovernmental Task Force on Indian environmental and nuclear hazards (Section 3101, p. 1754)
Office of Indian Men's Health (Section 3101, p. 1765)
Indian Health facilities appropriation advisory board (Section 3101, p. 1774)
Indian Health facilities needs assessment workgroup (Section 3101, p. 1775)
Indian Health Service tribal facilities joint venture demonstration projects (Section 3101, p. 1809)
Urban youth treatment center demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1873)
Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for diabetes prevention (Section 3101, p. 1874)
Grants to Urban Indian Organizations for health IT adoption (Section 3101, p. 1877)
Mental health technician training program (Section 3101, p. 1898)
Indian youth telemental health demonstration project (Section 3101, p. 1909)
Program for treatment of child sexual abuse victims and perpetrators (Section 3101, p. 1925)
Program for treatment of domestic violence and sexual abuse (Section 3101, p. 1927)
Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1966)
Committee for the Establishment of the Native American Health and Wellness Foundation (Section 3103, p. 1968)
Does anyone really think that this massive increase in the federal government bureaucracy will actually improve our healthcare, make it more efficient and less costly?
"The Senate Finance Committee health bill released last week controls doctors by cutting their pay if they give older patients more care than the government deems appropriate. Section 3003(b) (p. 683) punishes doctors who land in the 90th percentile or above on what they provide for seniors on Medicare by withholding 5 percent of their compensation.
This withhold provision forces doctors to choose between treating their patients and avoiding government penalties. HMOs used the same cost-cutting device in the early '90s until it was deemed dangerous to patients and outlawed. Now, lawmakers want to use it against the most vulnerable patients, the elderly. This bill and four others under negotiation also would slash about $500 billion from future Medicare funding."
Do you really want the Government dictating your medical care?
The following op-ed was written by well respected physician, Elizabeth Lee Vliet, M.D. In it, Dr. Vliet delineates her vehement opposition to the present healthcare reform.
In the 2008 campaign, we heard healthcare in this country is “broken” and must be “reformed.” We heard “healthcare reform” would be the signature piece of an Obama Presidency. We were promised no new taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000 per year. We heard promises of transparency in government. We heard promises of a White House that would listen to all. Now that President Obama and a Democratic majority are in office, what have we gotten?
The healthcare proposals have become a massive power grab to control your money, your health options, your businesses, your liberty, and ultimately your life. It is not about insuring the poor.We already have Medicaid to cover the poor.
What the Democratic majority is doing to healthcare in this country is a crime. Punishment won’t fall on Congress and the President, who are excluded from the healthcare proposals. Punishment falls on the American people, especially the elderly.
Word of a new “stealth” strategy to ram healthcare “reform” through the Senate raises even more cause for alarm and adds to the crime of this massive power grab. The plan appears to be for Senator Majority Leader Reid to merge the two Senate bills that have passed out of committee, and attach them as an amendment to a House TARP bill, already passed by the House but curiously gathering dust in the Senate. Once the Senate votes on this “TARP” bill with the healthcare amendment tucked neatly inside, the healthcare punishment is a “done deal” without further debate. Such an abuse of power and due process would be an unforgiveable crime against the American people, perpetrated by the very people elected to represent us.
Instead of “health insurance for all,” the House and Senate healthcare bills have become punishment for all. Here is the list of Americans who face the healthcare “reform” punishment:
- Punishment for the sick. Those who have medical expenses each year will no longer beable to deduct those expenses on taxes until the expenses reach 10% of adjusted gross income (AGI). The current deduction is set at expenses above 7.5% of AGI, so the Senate plan now ADDS a 2.5% tax on those who are already paying out of pocket for medical expenses. Clearly, if someone is spending more than 7.5% on medical costs,that person is ill. The Senate bill makes the sick even sicker from the stress of having to pay more taxes!
- Punishment for the elderly. Medicare cuts of 404 BILLION is the latest figure released by the Senate; earlier the White House budget office said $500 Billion – more than a full year’s Medicare budget – would have to be cut from Medicare. How can anyone begin to think these cuts will not penalize the elderly by delaying, rationing, or denying treatment?
- Punishment for young people. Young healthy people who do not buy government mandated insurance will be punished with the form of a excise tax – reported amounts have been from $1900 to $3800 per person.
- Punishment for anyone not paying the excise tax. The IRS fine for non-payment of tax can be $25,000 and a year in jail. So those who are punished by the new tax risk being accused of a tax crime if they don’t buy government-mandated insurance and who don’t pay the penalty tax.
- Punishment for insurance companies. Companies providing “generous health insurance plans” will be hit with a 35% tax.
- Punishment for consumers who buy “generous” health insurance policies, as the tax on insurance companies is passed on to purchasers.
- Punishment for those who buy their own health insurance…a new 40% tax. Does it really make sense to punish the responsible people who take care of their own healthcare bills?
- Punishment for low income seniors, Hispanics, and Blacks who will lose their Medicare Advantage program under the new proposals.
- Punishment for those with Health Savings Accounts – HSAs will be extinct.
- Punishment for specialists who serve mainly elderly patients, such as cardiologists and oncologists. Such specialists are slated to have their reimbursements for services slashed by 44% under the Senate bill.
- Punishment for medical device makers in the form of new taxes (a tax that will be passed on to consumers).
- Punishment for all doctors, who are required to purchase expensive new computersystems and software to convert to Electronic Medical Records to meet the 2014 mandates in the Stimulus Bill.
- Punishment for those who value their medical privacy. The Stimulus Bill requires all physicians, beginning in 2014, to send patients’ medical records directly to the federal health czar without further permission from patients.
- Punishment for all 50 State governments. Already running at a deficit with the recession, State governments face catastrophic increases in costs with Medicaid costs being shifted to them by the Federal government under the new proposals.
- Punishment for everyone, due to Speaker Pelosi’s proposal for a National Sales Tax (also called a VAT) to pay for healthcare reform. This new tax would hit everyone hard in a recession, and would be on TOP of existing state and local sales taxes.
- Punishments for all. All, that is, except the exempted elite: members of Congress, the President and his family, trial lawyers, and Unions (SEIU, AFL-CIO, and others). The exempted elite retain their private care while becoming the very ones who force more taxes, penalties, higher costs as punishment on the rest of us.
This reminds me of the Soviet Union when I visited there in 1974 and 1975. The Soviet ruling elite were the only ones with cars, comfortable apartments…and access to the best healthcare.
I understand at a personal and professional level the perils of government-run healthcare. I have patients in my practice who have come many countries with government run healthcare that doesn’t address women’s unique health needs. I live in a state with a large Native American population, whose healthcare under the Indian Health Service, run by the federal government, has been abysmal. I have personally had an emergency hospitalization in England. I am walking today because I had the best spine surgery care in the world at Johns Hopkins. If I had lived in Britain, or Canada, or Europe and had to wait for MRIs and surgery, I would paralyzed from the neck down.
I will never agree that nationalized healthcare anywhere provides better quality of care than we have in the United States. I am not alone. Recent polls by different organizations have found that 80-90% of M.D.’s and D.O.’s oppose government-controlled healthcare.
Don’t be fooled by the American Medical Associations endorsement of Obamacare. Only 17% of practicing physicians actually belong to the AMA. Last week’s “white coat” photo op at the White House was a carefully selected group of 2008 campaign donors “Doctors for Obama.” They were NOT anymore representative of practicing physicians across this country than the AMA.
The American people should be even more alarmed by a recent Investors Business Daily poll: 45% of doctors who responded said they would retire or resign from medicine rather than practice medicine under government control. Who will take care of patients then?
The proposed healthcare plans are the most massive transfer of power to the executive branch of government that has ever occurred or has even been contemplated. This concentration of power in the executive branch violates the Constitutional requirement for balance of power, and for separation of powers among the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of government.
This crime against the American people is far worse than the Stamp Act levied by King George.
That was the final straw that set off the first American Revolution.
Canadians are fed up with their government controlled healthcare system and are seeking a return to privately run one. They are fed up with interminable waits to be evaluated by a physician or receive treatment, restrictions on care received as well as inability to obtain the care, difficulty in extrication from waiting lists and illegality of obtaining private self-paid care. Despite this and worldwide evidence of abysmal failure of socialized on multiple levels, Obama and the Democrats in Congress are relentlessly seeking to impose such a system on the unwilling and outraged American people.
If Obamanocare is approved by Congress, you will be in for a startling discovery as paraphrased in the parlance of Congressional Democrats:
“'If you've got health insurance, you like your doctors, you like your plan, too f..king bad - you won’t necessarily see your doctor or maybe any doctor, for that matter, for a long time. And forget about your plan, we forced it into bankruptcy by our mandates and pricing policies."
Most of the news media, ideological adherents of the more liberal Democrats and staunch supporters of healthcare reform, would have you believe that a majority of physicians are in favor of Obamanocare. They use meretricious arguments with deceptive presentations of information and facts which often are knowingly false just to try to convince the public that doctor support the proposals so you should too.
A common tactic is to cite the AMA’s support of the changes while also speciously informing the public that it is “the association that represents American doctors” or that it is the “primary lobbying association for physicians”. This further “confirms” the public’s misconception of the role and importance of the AMA and adds credence to the posture these presentations are taking.
For most American doctors, the AMA is irrelevant and inconsequential. Despite the high level of importance that the media accords the AMA for purposes of their rhetoric, only 18% of American physicians are members and most belong for purposes other than lobbying. The AMA does some lobbying but that is not its primary purpose and furthermore, there is little physician support behind its positions. Many of the small minority of physicians who were members have been so outraged by the AMA’s public position that they are defecting and cancelling their memberships.
A recent IBD/TIPP Poll of 1376 randomly selected physicians revealed that two thirds opposed the present proposals. Even more significant is that 45% of physicians would consider leaving medicine or retiring early if one of these plans is passed. This extremely high percentage illustrates the immense dissatisfaction that physicians have with the present legislation and the grave consequences that the proposals would have on healthcare in general.
Obama’s healthcare speech delivered before Congress and to millions of Americans watching failed at its attempt to increase public support for the healthcare reform bill. It was, in our opinion, an uninspired rehashing of previous deceptions, lies and impossibilities that are not supported by reality and which contradict the provisions of the bill.
As we have fervently stated before, this legislation just boils down to the liberal ideology that the government knows best and should have complete control of the healthcare sector including unfettered access to medical, tax and financial information. It is not about lowering the total cost of healthcare or making it more affordable.
Anyone with even the most elementary knowledge of economics can tell you that as the price of a service facing an individual decreases, the demand increases. Without getting into the complexities of the differences of the price from the real cost of the service, the bottom line is that overall expenditures will increase disproportionately. To this equation add millions of more patients now desiring to use/overuse healthcare services and you end up with massively increased costs, staggering budget deficits, oppressive taxes to help pay the skyrocketing costs, rationing and poor quality healthcare (just to name a few problems).
Unfortunately, there are countless more dangerous provisions contained within the Obamanocare bill. The article below parses Obama’s address and enumerates several areas where he overtly, irrefutably and intentionally lied.
…the charlatan-in-chief, Barack Obama, … speech to a joint session of Congress was both a masterpiece of rhetoric and a shameless fraud.
To tell us, with a straight face, that he can insure millions more people without adding to the already skyrocketing deficit, is world-class chutzpah and an insult to anyone's intelligence.
Europe's ban on the incandescent light bulb began phasing in this month, and the U.S. will soon follow. Is Thomas Edison to blame for global warming? And why are we exporting green jobs?
Single Payer: In Britain, where the public option is about all most patients get, a newborn has died because national guidelines recommend that the baby not be treated. Yet again, government care produces tragedy.
The mother, Sarah Capewell, reportedly begged doctors to save the baby, who was born 21 weeks and five days into her pregnancy. But guidelines used by Britain's National Health Service say that babies born fewer than 22 weeks into a pregnancy should not be treated.
We wonder how many of our Congressional Representatives and Senators have actually read the Healthcare Reform Bill personally rather than having their staff provide them with a synopsis. If consistent with their previous history of presumptuously not reading legislation that they have written and sponsored (Cap and Trade and Porkulus Spending bills, etc.), we surmise that a majority of Democrats have no clue what is contained in the Obamanocare legislation. Fortunately, many Americans have made the prodigious and heroic effort to scrutinize the bloated and arcane 1017 page bill and what they have uncovered has been shocking to say the least. What has been discovered are provisos that often have nothing to do with healthcare delivery or quality but instead with such inimical dictates as wealth redistribution, affirmative action, rationing, and unwarranted government intrusiveness and control. These are dangerous for America and Americans. We have dissected many of these issues here in previous articles.
The following is a letter to Senator Bayh written by Dr. Stephen Fraser, an Anesthesiologist practicing in Indianapolis, who pored through the entire document and enumerated several areas of concern. Many of these issues have been intentionally and dishonestly denied by Obama, Pelosi and the Congressional Democrats. You can check them out for yourself to vouch for their validity.
July 23, 2009
Senator Bayh,
As a practicing physician I have major concerns with the healthcare bill before Congress. I actually have read the bill and am shocked by the brazenness of the government's proposed involvement in the patient physician relationship. The very idea that the government will dictate and ration patient care is dangerous and certainly not helpful in designing a healthcare system that works for all. Every physician I work with agrees that we need to fix our healthcare system, but the proposed bills currently making their way through congress will be a disaster if passed.
I ask you respectfully and as a patriotic American to look at the following troubling lines that I have read in the bill. You cannot possibly believe that these proposals are in the best interests of the country and our fellow citizens.
Page 22 of the HC Bill: Mandates that the Govt will audit books of all employers that self insure!!
Page 30 Sec 123 of HC bill - THERE WILL BE A GOVT COMMITTEE that decides what treatments/benefits you get.
Page 29 lines 4-16 in the HC bill: YOUR HEALTH CARE IS RATIONED!!!
Page 42 of HC Bill:The Health Choices Commissioner will choose your HC Benefits for you. You have no choice!
Page 50 Section 152 in HC bill: HC will be provided to ALL non US citizens, illegal or otherwise
Page 58 HC Bill: Govt will have real-time access to individuals finances & a National ID Healthcard will be issued!
Page 59 HC Bill lines 21-24: Govt will have direct access to you ur banks accounts for elective funds transfer.
Page 65 Sec 164: is a payoff subsidized plan for retirees and their families in Unions & community organizations: (ACORN).
Page 84 Sec 203 HC bill: Govt mandates ALL benefit packages for private HC plans in the Exchange.
Page 85 Line 7 HC Bill: Specifications for of Benefit Levels for Plans = The Govt will ration your Healthcare!
Page 91 Lines 4-7 HC Bill: Govt mandates linguistic appropriate services. Example - Translation: illegal aliens.
Page 95 HC Bill Lines 8-18: The Govt will use groups i.e., ACORN & Americorps to sign up individuals for Govt HC plan.
Page 85 Line 7 HC Bill: Specifications of Benefit Levels for Plans. AARP members - your Health care WILL be rationed.
Page 102 Lines 12-18 HC Bill: Medicaid Eligible Individuals will be automatically enrolled in Medicaid. No choice.
Page 124 lines 24-25 HC: No company can sue GOVT on price fixing. No "judicial review" against Govt Monopoly.
Page 127 Lines 1-16 HC Bill: Doctors/ American Medical Association - The Govt will tell YOU what you can make! (salary)
Page 145 Line 15-17: An Employer MUST auto enroll employees into public option plan. NO CHOICE!
Page 126 Lines 22-25: Employers MUST pay for HC for part time employees AND their families.
Page 149 Lines 16-24: ANY Employer with payroll 401k & above who does not provide public option pays 8% tax on all payroll.
Page 150 Lines 9-13: Business's with payroll btw 251k & 401k who doesn't provide public option pays 2-6% tax on all payroll.
Page 167 Lines 18-23: ANY individual who doesn't have acceptable HC according to Govt will be taxed 2.5% of income.
Page 170 Lines 1-3 HC Bill: Any NONRESIDENT Alien is exempt from individual taxes. (Americans will pay)
Page 195 HC Bill: Officers & employees of HC Admin (GOVT) will have access to ALL Americans finances /personal records.
Page 203 Line 14-15 HC: "The tax imposed under this section shall not be treated as tax" Yes, it says that!
Page 239 Line 14-24 HC Bill: Govt will reduce physician services for Medicaid Seniors, low income and poor are affected.
Page 241 Line 6-8 HC Bill: Doctors, doesn't matter what specialty you have, you'll all be paid the same!
Page 253 Line 10-18: Govt sets value of Doctor's time, proffession, judgment etc. Literally value of humans.
Page 265 Sec 1131: Govt mandates & controls productivity for private HC industries.
Page 268 Sec 1141: Federal Govt regulates rental & purchase of power driven wheelchairs.
Page 272 SEC. 1145: TREATMENT OF CERTAIN CANCER HOSPITALS - Cancer patients - welcome to rationing!
Page 280 Sec 1151: The Govt will penalize hospitals for whatever Govt deems preventable re-admissions.
Page 298 Lines 9-11: Doctors, treat a patient during initial admission that results in a re-admission -Govt will penalize you.
Page 317 L 13-20: PROHIBITION on ownership/investment. Govt tells Doctors what/how much they can own!
Page 317-318 lines 21-25, 1-3: PROHIBITION on expansion- Govt is mandating hospitals cannot expand.
Page 321 2-13: Hospitals have opportunity to apply for exception BUT community input is required. Can u say ACORN?!!
Page 335 L 16-25 Pg 336-339: Govt mandates establishment of outcome based measures. HC the way they want. Rationing.
Page 341 Lines 3-9: Govt has authority to disqualify Medicare Advance Plans, HMOs, etc. Forcing people into Govt plan.
Page 354 Sec 1177: Govt will RESTRICT enrollment of Special needs people! Unbelievable!
Page 379 Sec 1191: Govt creates more bureaucracy - Tele-health Advisory Comittee. Can you say HC by phone?
Page 425 Lines 4-12: Govt mandates Advance Care Planning Consult. Think Senior Citizens end of life patients.
Page 425 Lines 17-19: Govt will instruct & consult regarding living wills, durable powers of attorney. Mandatory!
Page 425 Lines 22-25, 426 Lines 1-3: Govt provides approved list of end of life resources, guiding you in death. (assisted suicide)
Page 427 Lines 15-24: Govt mandates program for orders for end of life. The Govt has a say in how your life ends.
Page 429 Lines 1-9: An "advanced care planning consultant" will be used frequently as patients health deteriorates.
Page 429 Lines 10-12: "advanced care consultation" may include an ORDER for end of life plans. AN ORDER from GOVT!
Page 429 Lines 13-25: The govt will specify which Doctors can write an end of life order.
Page 430 Lines 11-15: The Govt will decide what level of treatment you will have at end of life!
Page 469: Community Based Home Medical Services = Non profit organizations. Hello, ACORN Medical Services here!!?
Page 472 Lines 14-17: PAYMENT TO COMMUNITY-BASED ORIGINATION. 1 monthly payment 2 a community-based organization. Like ACORN?
Page 489 Sec 1308: The Govt will cover Marriage & Family therapy. Which means they will insert Govt into your marriage.
Page 494-498: Govt will cover Mental Health Services including defining, creating, rationing those services.
I guarantee that I personally will do everything possible to inform patients and my fellow physicians about the dangers of the proposed bills you and your colleagues are debating.
Furthermore, if you vote for a bill that enforces socialized medicine on the country and destroys the doctor/patient relationship, I will do everything in my power to make sure you lose your job in the next election.
Respectfully,
Once again Obama is gratuitously attacking physicians asserting that greed motivates their decision-making. In his latest intentional deception, he claimed that family care physicians collect “$30,000, $40,000, $50,000” for amputations while the reimbursement for cognitive services such as assisting patients in weight loss, dieting and monitoring their medications is “a pittance”.
In actuality, Medicare reimburses a surgeon between $541 and $708 for a foot amputation. This intentional deception designed for political points is so egregious, irresponsible, and depraved that the President should be thoroughly rebuked for it. Aside from a few medical organizations that took offense and issued statements, the mainstream news media accepted it as dogma. The effect is that many of the public who are uninformed in such matters may be swayed by such baseless screed.
This is a President who will confabulate the most outrageous statements just for political points. This is despicably immoral and must be vigorous, loudly and inexorably challenged.
The overall healthcare system in the United States is probably the best in the world though it is not without areas that can be improved. If you just listened to the shrill demagogues of the far left wing of the Democratic Party, one would think that we have a "healthcare crisis" in America. However, closer great scrutiny reveals not only do we have the best healthcare delivery system in the world but we also have premier healthcare technologies, cutting edge surgical procedures, and pharmaceutical innovations. What we have in America is a "health insurance catastrophe" largely caused by Congressional mandates over the years, a malignant unfettered tort system wasting tens of billions of dollars of resources annually, and unreimbursed healthcare due to illegal immigration and related issues.
Approximately 1/6th of our population does not have any medical insurance coverage either because of a lifestyle choice, they are temporarily between jobs, have not applied for federal coverage for which they are eligible, or are not a legal citizen of the United States. All of these people, however, do have access to medical care. If they show up in an emergency room , they must be treated. That is a Federal law. They can not be turned away! The rest of us who have employer provided heath insurance plans or have purchased private insurance on our own are paying for these estimated 47 million uninsured.
Let's repeat this again: EVERYONE in America has access to the healthcare system even if they are unable or unwilling to pay for services rendered and even if they have no insurance.
So what is all the fuss about at Town Hall meetings set up to discuss President Obama's obsession with healthcare reform?
Obama and Congressional Democrats claim that this reform is all about increasing the quality of care, increasing affordability and making healthcare available to all Americans. Unfortunately, these reasons are all fallacious and are pretenses for the real goal: Government run and controlled healthcare with social engineering and wealth transfer. Everything else is an intentional LIE! What, for example, does affirmative action in medical school admissions have to do with quality of health care? There are many more affirmative action provisos like this one in the legislation.
All across the United States innumerable Americans - most of whom have never protested anything in their lives - are doing so also because they do not trust the Federal Government. Period. One only need to look at the abysmal track records of Social Security (going broke), Medicare and Medicaid (grossly underfunded and going broke) and the United States Postal Service (posted a $7 billion loss in 2007 and 2008) to see the typical inefficiencies, incompetence and wretched mismanagement characteristic of the Federal government.In the end, we the TAXPAYERS, will be paying the price and ending up with less and rationed care, higher taxes, fewer choices, inferior quality of care and fewer innovations.
Then we have privacy issues, bureaucratic interference in an individuals' medical care, rationing, etc...
The White House has established an e-mail account, flag@whitehouse.gov, for the explicit purpose of collecting information about websites that don’t agree with the President’s healthcare legislation. The Obama administration is essentially requesting citizens to turn in other citizens. Isn’t this what was going on in Russia under Stalin and others and in Nazi Germany? Some more similarities between Obama and ruthless despots.
Who is a major player behind this snitching site? It is Obama’s healthcare czar, Nancy DeParle, who is part of the Office of Health Care Reform that was established by executive order but operates in a stealth fashion. Its operations are in violation of Obama’s pledges of transparency with his administration. Anyone hear the ACLU compaining about this? We didn't think so!
In the following expose, Michele Malkin explores the sinister and byzantine connections with far left groups and corrupt influences that are present.
The United States has the best healthcare system in the world. Period! There is no other country where the composites of overall care, outcomes and effects on the economy are better. Most Americans are in agreement with this assessment. A poll taken in 2006 by ABC News, the Kaiser Family Foundation and USA Today found that 89% of Americans were quite happy with their healthcare.
Does this overwhelmingly positive sentiment by Americans provide a reason to totally dismantle and destroy the best system in the world and replace it with a government controlled one? Of course not! Can improvements be made to our healthcare system? Of course! What we don’t need is an excuse by the Federal government to take full control of our healthcare thereby abridging our freedoms and liberties to make choices regarding our health and the ability to obtain the appropriate care.
You and every other American have the right to know the facts regarding the proposed Federal government healthcare reform. Unfortunately, what has been sold to the public is a Trojan Horse – it is not what it appears to be and what many politicians want you to believe (so they can garner public support for its passage). The Federal government wants to impose socialized medicine on us, a system which has failed everywhere else that it has been implemented. That is why, for example, tens of thousands of Canadians come to the United States each year to have routine and not so routine procedures performed. They were either told either that they would not be eligible for treatment or would have to wait months or even more than a year to be able to be treated. If you have a brain tumor, breast cancer or advanced heart disease, this is a death sentence.
You may also want to know that if this plan of socialized medical care were so superior, how come Congress is exempting itself from it and will have its own gold-plated plan? When President Obama was asked a theoretical question that if the need arose for his family to obtain care which it couldn’t obtain through this government run system, he indicated that he would look elsewhere for their care. These are definitely not ringing endorsements of the government run plan from those who should know its design best!
Politicians may point to the AMA’s (American Medical Association) and ANA’s (American Nurses Association) endorsement of a government run one-payer system as a selling point for the plan. After all, these are the professionals who are intimately involved in our medical care. This is an unfortunate misconception. Although the AMA has been in existence for over 160 years, it is not the true, representative political voice of or for American doctors. As a matter of fact, only around 20 percent of physicians belong to the organization and most of these are not doing so for political reasons. The overwhelming consensus of physicians and nurses nationwide is that this plan is very bad for Americans and for America.
The following are just some of the issues that you need to consider regarding the proposed government takeover of the healthcare system:
It will:
Result in the rationing of care. Many individuals for a variety of reasons (such as age or cost) will be unable to obtain medical care despite having the government coverage
Decrease the quality of medical care
Cause prolonged waiting times to see your physicians
Increase the death rate both due to inability to obtain medical care in a reasonable period of time as well as a result of inability to receive certain treatments because government bureaucrats deems them too expensive
Increase morbidity/ suffering because of prolonged waits to see a physician and inability to receive certain treatments because government bureaucrats deems them too expensive
Place layers of bureaucracy between what your doctor recommends for you and what you can actually receive
Allow for full government access to your medical records and privacy and make protecting your private medical information nearly impossible
Result in massive tax increases that will affect all Americans directly and indirectly
Cause a permanently higher unemployment rate (see European countries) due to the exorbitant costs of mandated coverage on businesses
Result in lower salaries and hourly rates of employees to compensate for the high cost of employee mandated insurance – whether or not the employee wants or needs the insurance
Massively increase the budget deficit by trillions of dollars or more – and still not be able to be fully funded
Will be far more expensive than our present system of healthcare – which was a major selling point of this plan.
Be extremely complex and convoluted with the creation of many new government agencies and oversight groups. Think of the Post Office inefficiencies and poor customer service on steroids.
Result in the stifling of medical innovations and implementation of new technologies
It will not:
Result in universal medical coverage for all Americans
Lower the total cost of healthcare
Increase the quality of medical care delivered
Make it painless to obtain medical care
Increase the efficiency of healthcare
Allow you to maintain your private insurance long term for a variety of reasons
Address tort reform in any meaningful way. In order to protect themselves from frivolous lawsuits, doctors are forced to practice “defensive medicine”. This translates into subjecting patients to costly unnecessary tests and procedures (many of which the patients demand and the doctors don’t feel would otherwise be warranted) adding up to billions of dollars wasted every year.
Buried within the more than one thousand page Congressional healthcare legislation is a provision for end of life counseling of seniors. The intent, of course, is to reduce expenditures for healthcare for those that may have a poor prognosis for survival. Depending on whether it is you, your relative or someone else’s family member, this proviso is in essence a form of rationing.
According to Betsy McCaughey, an expert on this legislation, a "troubling provision of the House bill compels seniors to submit to a counseling session every five years (and more often if they become sick or go into a nursing home) about alternatives for end-of-life care (House bill, Pages 425-430)."
Much of the cause of high insurance premiums and dwindling options is a consequence of the actions and inactions of Congress as well as state legislatures. The piling on of mandates, limitations of interstate options, inequities in taxation status, and legal inflexibility of plans are just a few of the significant issues that are at the root of the problem.
The stealth insertion of affirmative action provisos in the Obamanocare legislation is reprehensible, dishonest and insulting to the American people. These racially based stipulations alone should relegate this proposal to oblivion. IBD captured its essence succinctly: “It's affirmative action on steroids, deciding everything from who becomes a doctor to who gets treatment on the basis of skin color.”
This is massive program that will legislate and implement “legal” reverse discrimination which is blatantly wrong both legally and morally. This is remarkably similar to the recent Ricci vs. DeStefano and the City of New Haven firefighters case that “racially empathetic” Sonia Sotomayor ruled against but was subsequently overturned by the Supreme Court.
IBD shrewdly noted, “Whether it's that firefighter coming up the ladder, or the brain surgeon about to remove that tumor in your head, everybody wants that person to be the best regardless of race or ethnicity — and not admitted by quotas and promoted by political correctness.”
Though not necessarily assuming fault or jumping to conclusions, Michael Jackson’s death may be the quintessential example on two counts of the downside of using race as a criteria versus qualifications. It is not clear if Michael Jackson selected his doctor, who now is being investigated for manslaughter in his death, solely because he was black (see Kanye West's deceased mother's scenario). Secondly, he should have thought more about checking the doctor’s training, credentials and qualifications before selecting of him. If he did, he would have discovered that apart from other significant issues, this doctor attended a medical school that historically trains black physicians who quite frequently lack the intellectual aptitude and scholastic credentials required to attend “mainstream” medical schools. This same medical school consistently ranks at or near bottom in comparison to the other medical schools in this country. If you want great quality, you have to start with the best raw materials.
There is also a significant and unfortunate unintended consequence of affirmative action that can be problematic for the countless members of those minorities who have succeeded because of their abilities and not because of quotas or racial preferences. For example, if you have an emergent medical problem and the doctor who is about to treat you who is Afro-American, can and should you trust his/her abilities and judgment? You think: Is he/she a doctor because he/she earned it based on personal merit and intelligence or because of skin color and affirmative action? This should never be a question that one is forced to ponder! On the other side of the coin, minority physicians who earned their medical degree based on merit like everyone else shouldn't have to deal with the questioning of their abilities just because race based affirmative action quotas.
Fortunately, Americans and more Congressional politicians are coming to their senses and realizing that Obama’s campaign to sell his government run healthcare plan is replete with rhetoric, lies and deceptions and not reality and desired solutions. For example, he promises more coverage and medical care but with decreased costs yet the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that this plan will result in an increased cost of in excess of $1 trillion dollars which is still considerably underestimating the true amount.
In the following insightful editorial, Charles Krauthammer assesses the baseless rhetoric, inconsistencies, politics and major shortcomings of this healthcare plan in general.
Has Congress become an imperial political entity that imposes mandates on its citizens but exempts itself? Yes, unfortunately, but this is not even a recent phenomena. This furtive practice which is dishonest, morally corrupt, and reflects an abuse of power and disdainful attitude of many politicians, must end. They are supposed to be our representatives who serve for the American people and not for their own aggrandizement of power, wealth and perks.
This leads to Obamanocare and the government takeover of the healthcare system. Congress wants to impose this draconian system on the American public, one that will result in rationing of medical care, long waits, significant restrictions and generally inferior quality care. They, however, will keep their separate gold-plated healthcare plan funded by the taxpayer and which has none of these issues. Very few Americans are aware of their exemption and Congress and Obama will surely not advertise it. Congressional Democrats and Obama also have not only been dishonest regarding much of this program but have overtly lied about provisos buried deeply within this mammoth labyrinthine bill. Let the imperial politicians feast on wine and caviar while the average American is stuck with bread and water … and the oppressive taxes!
During his press conference on July 22nd, Obama made the following statement regarding physicians, reimbursement and decision making:
“So if they're looking and you come in and you've got a bad sore throat or your child has a bad sore throat or has repeated sore throats, the doctor may look at the reimbursement system and say to himself, ‘You know what? I make a lot more money if I take this kid's tonsils out.”
Though this statement might have been expressed for political reasons in order to reacquire public support for his government takeover of the healthcare system, it once again demonstrates him to be uninformed, irresponsible, incompetent, biased and arrogant. This together with Obama’s stalwart support of trial attorneys who are among his largest benefactors and his unwillingness to explore meaningful tort reform, are just more evidence why he and the government can’t and shouldn’t be trusted in controlling the healthcare system for more than 300 million Americans.
Republican Tom Price, M.D. (R-GA), who had practiced medicine for over twenty years, was incensed by Obama’s comment and the implication that doctors may be more interested in money than in helping patients. He issued the followed response:
“It’s obvious President Obama has absolutely no idea what motivates someone to enter the field of medicine,” said Chairman Price. “Medicine is about service and helping one’s fellow man. By insinuating that doctors make treatment decisions based on how much they will be paid, the President displays an astounding disregard for that service and insults every single medical practitioner.
“The only possible explanation for such a comment is his failure to understand the root problems and challenges of our health care system. If the President is sincerely interested in reducing unnecessary procedures, he should speak to his friends in the trial bar about medical malpractice reform. Instead, the President would rather attack those who are responsible for providing the highest quality healthcare in the world.”
Who do you want managing your healthcare, Doctors or politicians and attorneys? We thought so!
The Obama and many of the Democrats are duplicitously trying to reassure the American people that government controlled healthcare will allow everyone to have affordable health insurance and improved quality of care. They also have the option of staying with their private health insurance if desired.
THIS IS ALL A BIG INTENTIONAL LIE – EVERY BIT OF IT!!! None of this is true. Period!
The government is intentionally withholding information and deceiving the public so as to maintain enough support for the passage of this massive, disorganized, bankrupting healthcare reform bill. This collusion of deception by our government was also editorialized yesterday regarding Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings.
Ignoring the other issues for now such as quality, rationing and costs, Investor’s Business Daily noted that on page 16 of the House bill, private health insurance is prohibited unequivocally. And that is just for starters regarding this bill.
Americans need to wake up and relentlessly contact their Representatives as well as their Senators.
There is no high quality, inexpensive successful single payer government directed healthcare system in the world. Period! It has been an expensive failure wherever it has been implemented. Inevitably, there is rationing of care, long waiting times to be able to receive care, increased mortality and morbidity, and stifling of medical innovations and implementation of state of the art treatments and diagnostic methods. And wouldn’t you know it, this is exactly the healthcare system that Obama and his fellow Democrats want to impose on the American people! Of course, they will be able to keep their special Rolls-Royce healthcare benefits. Like other similar legislative edicts by Congress, it applies to everyone else but them.
The Medicare program is just a fraction of the size of what the federal government would be creating with it proposed healthcare reform yet it has failed at running the former. It is pure government logic then to propose an entity that can be a gargantuan failure costing trillions of dollars more per year yet require rationing and resulting in inferior quality of care.
Do a majority of the members of Congress have brains? (Sorry, that evaluation is not a covered service!) Little known by the public is that Congressional members have their own healthcare system (Rolls-Royce quality) and therefore will not be forced to deal with socialized medicine personally. It is not good enough for them but it is good enough for everyone else!
In the following video, Republican Congressman Dave Camp discusses some of the major proposals of the Republican alternative to healthcare reform. Though there are no cost estimates, it appears that the overall price tag should be significantly less and therefore more affordable to the American public than the Obama(no)care plans. Of significant importance is that it also will address tort reform which contributes billions of dollars annually to the overall cost of medical care without having a significant impact on quality. The Democratic proposals do not address this issue which is not surprising as attorneys are one of the largest benefactors of the Democratic Party. This plan also will not lead to rationing or loss of most of your healthcare rights like that of Obama(no)care.
Among the top supporters and financial contributors to Obama and the Democratic Party are attorneys. The present legal situation is like a sweepstakes with more favorable odds and often obscene payouts. The lack of financial or other disincentives to sue further exacerbates the situation.
The following editorial further illustrates problems associated with government run healthcare plans. The Obama administration and the Democrats in Congress glibly tout this as an affordable panacea for the country’s healthcare needs rather than what it truly is - another bankrupting entitlement program without proper constraints. The financial stakes for healthcare “entitlement” are enormous, potentially dwarfing any other government liability except for Social Security.
In its present iteration, this is yet another proposed massive wealth transfer that will penalize productive, hard working Americans individuals who will be forced to pay the exorbitant taxes to support the program to get much less than what they have now. (Will it provide gold plated coverage for illegals?) What will they be receiving in return? A healthcare system that will be far inferior to what we have at present which is among the best in the world. There will be rationing of care, long waits, and unavailable treatment modalities. Just ask people living in Canada or England how bad socialized medicine is. People are dying waiting for care. Need a cardiac catheterization? You will have to wait 9 months. Hernia repair? Can’t do it this year – we have reached the predetermined number that is allowed. Need a rotator cuff repaired? That wait will be at least another 10 months…or more. Or, you can go to the US and pay out of your pocket but you can have your surgery performed right away.
Here is a very important question. Have you heard one word from anyone in the Obama administration or from the Democrats about Tort Reform? There has been no mention of legal reform whatsoever. That should not be surprising as the legal “profession” is among the largest contributors to the Democratic Party. The costs of medical care related to the practice of defensive medicine are quite substantial and comprise a sizable percentage of the overall costs of medical care. These costs are simply to protect physicians and other healthcare personnel from frivolous lawsuits and usually add little to the decision making or quality of care in the treatment of patients.
There are myriad unanswered questions that need to be addressed in healthcare reform.
Contemplating having to deal with a one “provider” healthcare system is bad enough. In any business that is known as a monopoly and we know the inimical consequences of this. When the government is the entity running the system, we are really in trouble. A few examples may come to mind. The Post Office, IRS, any Federal government office, and Medicare! Is the post office a paragon of polite and helpful customer service and organization? Didn’t think so! How about paying your taxes? Is the IRS with its infinite, arbitrary, political and arcane rules user friendly? Didn’t think so either! What about cost controls? The government has been known to pay more than $800 for a hammer or $2000 for a toilet seat? Billions of dollars are lost yearly by the federal government through Medicare fraud and inefficiencies. Should we trust them with our lives, health and tax dollars to oversee and control a system multiple times larger? Absolutely, unequivocally not!
We could cite myriad examples of government inefficiencies, disorganization, lack of controls and security, etc. The point is that even though the current system is flawed and needs reforming, placing the entire control in the hands of one provider, particularly the Federal government is a recipe for disaster on many fronts.
The following article delineates some relevant but important issues regarding socialized medicine. What's Wrong With Competition In America's Health Care System?
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