Bachmann told Cathy Wurzer that "rationing is most definitely part of this bill... a lot of what this bill is about is having these various boards make decisions about reducing options and reducing care..." On her own website, she quotes Newt Gingrich:
"The inevitable result of this pressure to control costs will be rationing, whether it occurs during this administration or the next. At some point, the government will be forced to deny care to those who don’t meet the latest “quality-adjusted life years” cost-benefit analysis.
"So the decision on what treatment to pursue that once would have been made by you and your doctor is now made for you by a bureaucrat using a formula -- a formula to literally determine if your life is worth saving."
Apparently nobody explained to either of these two that rationing is exactly what private insurance companies already do.
Denial based on pre-existing conditions?
Excessive testing required before covering treatment?
Refusing to pay for life-saving techniques because they're "experimental"?
If health care is going to be rationed, do you want it done by a body under the control of democratic laws, or by a for-profit company that makes money by denying your care? Perhaps now is a good time to point out that insurance executives make far more money than any doctor you will ever see. And the first person to make over $1 billion in bonuses works for a health insurance company. Does anyone else see the problem with letting free market control your health care?
Here's another goodie from Bachmann's site:
There are too few shining examples of profitable and efficient government enterprise – take a gander at the failing postal service or struggling Amtrak, for example – for us to entrust the nation’s health care system to Washington’s management and oversight.I have a couple things to point out here:
First, I'm willing to make a fairly rational guess that the USPS is failing because of the increase in electronic transfers of mail and files. If the gov't ran a newspaper that happened to be losing money, would you also say that it proves federal incompetence? Oh wait, the same thing is happening to every other paper in the country. Well, lo and behold, it's not just the USPS that's losing money. UPS is crashing, too. Private companies don't always beat out the gov't.
I'm getting away from myself. To be honest, I don't really want gov't health insurance if it looks like the post office because I don't like the post office. So let's instead look at a more appropriate comparison, such as the way gov't already manages health care.
Dr. Filice works at the Minneapolis VA Clinic, and says that it represents how all of America's citizens should be treated by the health care system.
And I'm sure I don't need to point out that more than 94% of Medicare recipients are happy with their health care coverage."I think that the VA experience shows that it's possible for government to be a good player; an accountable player in that mix," Felice said.
Felice said the VA is a model that lawmakers should consider emulating as they try to overhaul the nation's health care system.
Okay, so we all realize that providing a public option for the uninsured will cost money. This is true. And I hear a lot of people complain about not wanting to subsidize people's health care with taxes. Here's a newsflash for you: YOU ALREADY SUBSIDIZE CARE FOR THE UNINSURED. And you know what? It costs more than it would if they were insured.
Let me explain why this is...
Gov't health care centers, such as county hospitals, are required to provide emergency care for all patients, regardless of whether they can pay for it. If they can't pay, the hospital -- funded by your taxes -- has to cover the costs. Emergency care is exponentially more expensive than clinical care, which means the easiest way to reduce this tax burden is to provide uninsured patients access to preventive care. Allowing access to preventive care will also discourage patients from using the emergency room for non-emergency injuries.
So, do you want to reduce the cost of health care? Provide a public insurance option.
6 comments:
If health care is going to be rationed, do you want it done by a body under the control of democratic laws, or by a for-profit company that makes money by denying your care?
That's essentially what it all boils down to. There's a large number of folks who feel taht the best decisions are made by the free market, and not by the government. But most politicians realize that when the argument is framed this way, they lose.
So they'll make fear-mongering claims that don't hold up to logic, like rationing, or they'll just make stuff up, like death panels.
I don't get how Michelle Bachmann got elected. She's like a caricature of everything that's wrong with the Republican Party. She's crazier than Sarah Palin. I feel bad just throwing pointless insults out there with no substance, but at a certain point, you stop saying "no, you're wrong, and here's why" and you simply accept that anything that comes out of their mouth is going to be nonsense.
There have always been fringe lunatics that I didn't understand, but the mainstream crazy that I've been seeing since Obama was elected just baffles me.
Heh... I suddenly realized I used a term designating lefties in the original title.
Oops.
@Vieau:
Echoing my thoughts exactly. The insurance model boggles my mind. How can the US not afford to treat its citizens?
And for that matter, why do we still operate on an employer-provided insurance model? Haven't we grown out of that phase?
And the rationality points are spot on. Logic can only go so far, and too often it's not far enough. I get the impression that Palin is wonderfully stupid, but Bachmann strikes me as truly crazy.
In that interview, she said that no one has discussed a model where people can just choose and buy their own insurance, and that's the best way to go...
Does she not realize that is the exact same program we already have.
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