“Now, let me get this straight…We are going to pass a health care plan written by a committee whose chairman says he doesn’t understand it, passed by a Congress that hasn’t read it but exempts themselves from it, to be signed by a president that also hasn’t read it and who smokes, with funding administered by a treasury chief who didn’t pay his taxes…all to be overseen by a surgeon general who is obese, and financed by a country that’s nearly broke. What could possibly go wrong?”

I’m not sure who said it, but I like it.

Tags: Health Care, Quotes

Excerpts from Obama’s speech at a high school in Portsmouth, New Hampshire on August 11, 2009

First Obama said,

“Our deficit will continue to grow because Medicare and Medicaid are on an unsustainable path. Medicare is slated to go into the red in about eight to 10 years. I don’t know if people are aware of that. If I was a senior citizen, the thing I’d be worried about right now is Medicare starts running out of money because we haven’t done anything to make sure that we’re getting a good bang for our buck when it comes to health care. And insurance companies will continue to profit by discriminating against people for the simple crime of being sick. Now, that’s not a future I want for my children. It’s not a future that I want for the United States of America.”

Obama starts out strong. He admits that both Medicare and Medicaid are on an unsustainable path. He mentions that in 8-10 years, Medicare will be in the red. It’s probably less than 8-10 years, but it’s close enough.

Obama then goes on to make an outrageous claim. He says that insurance companies are profiting by “discriminating” against the sick. That’s not discrimination, that’s called a market. It’s providing a service. Is my plumber “discriminating” against me because I have a broken toilet? Is Grimaldi’s “discriminating” against me because I’m hungry? The insurance companies are providing a service, not “discriminating”.

The key point of Obama’s first statement is that, “Medicare and Medicaid are on an unsustainable path”. Later during the Q&A session of the same speech, Obama gets the following question:

“My name is Peter Schmidt. I’m a state representative from Dover. I’m a senior citizen. I have a wonderful government-run health care plan called Medicare. I like it. It’s affordable, it’s reasonable, nobody tells me what I need to do. I just go to my doctor at the hospital, I get care.

Now, one of the things you’ve been doing in your campaign to change the situation is you’ve been striving for bipartisanship. I think it’s a wonderful idea, but my question is, if the Republicans actively refuse to participate in a reasonable way with reasonable proposals, isn’t it time to just say we’re going to pass what the American people need and what they want, without the Republicans?”

Now here is where Obama has to tell Mr. Schmidt the truth. He’s going to reiterate the point he made 20 minutes earlier about the unsustainable path of Medicare. He’ll talk about how the program is going to run out of money. Wait for it…

“Well, let me make a couple of points. First of all, you make a point about Medicare that’s very important. I’ve been getting a lot of letters, pro and con, for health care reform, and one of the letters I received recently, a woman was very exercised about what she had heard about my plan. She says, “I don’t want government-run health care. I don’t want you meddling in the private marketplace. And keep your hands off my Medicare.” (Laughter.) True story.

And so I do think it’s important for particularly seniors who currently receive Medicare to understand that if we’re able to get something right like Medicare, then there should be a little more confidence that maybe the government can have a role — not the dominant role, but a role — in making sure the people are treated fairly when it comes to insurance. (Applause.)”

What happened to the unsustainable, running out of money part? That was so 20 minutes ago. Now government is able to “get something right like Medicare”. I see what you did there. Make a joke, tell a lie. Hopefully, when you’re done talking, people will still be thinking about the joke and not notice the glaring contradiction you just made. It should be noted that the quote ends with “(Applause.)”. It looks like the plan worked.

Tags: Health Care, Quotes

After a little re-reading, I’ve noticed another part of Atlas Shrugged that seems to be timely. Here are some quotes about a small-scale factory socializing, among other things, health care.

Atlas Shrugged – Part II – Chapter X

“The plan was that everybody in the factory would work according to his ability, but would be paid according to his need.”

“…it wasn’t too clear, but nobody asked any questions. None of us knew just how the plan would work, but every one of us thought that the next fellow knew it. And if anybody had doubts, he felt guilty and kept his mouth shut—because they made it sound like anyone who’d oppose the plan was a child killer at heart and less than a human being. They told us that this plan would achieve a noble ideal.”

“When it’s all one pot, you can’t let any man decide what his own needs are, can you?”

“Well, anyway, it was decided that nobody had the right to judge his own need or ability. We voted on it.”

“In the old days, we used to celebrate if somebody had a baby, we used to chip in and help him out with the hospital bills, if he happened to be hard-pressed for the moment. Now, if a baby was born, we didn’t speak to the parents for weeks. Babies, to us, had become what locusts were to farmers. In the old days, we used to help a man if he had a bad illness in the family. Now—well, I’ll tell you about just one case. It was the mother of a man who had been with us for fifteen years. She was a kindly old lady, cheerful and wise, she knew us all by our first names and we all liked her—we used to like her. One day, she slipped on the cellar stairs and fell and broke her hip. We knew what that meant at her age. The staff doctor said that she’d have to be sent to a hospital in town, for expensive treatments that would take a long time. The old lady died the night before she was to leave for town. They never established the cause of death. No, I don’t know whether she was murdered. Nobody said that. Nobody would talk about it at all. All I know is that I—and that’s what I can’t forget!—I, too, had caught myself wishing that she would die. This—may God forgive us!—was the brotherhood, the security, the abundance that the plan was supposed to achieve for us!

Tags: Health Care, Quotes