Krauthammer nails it again... Obamacare tanking

[soosie]

Charles Krauthammer

What happened to Obamacare? Rhetoric met reality. As both candidate and President, the master rhetorician could conjure a world in which he bestows upon you health care nirvana: more coverage, less cost.

But you can't fake it in legislation. Once you commit your fantasies to words and numbers, the Congressional Budget Office comes along and declares that the emperor has no clothes.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/07/24/why_obamacare_is_sinking_97598.html

 

[Soaring]

Charles Krauthammer

What happened to Obamacare? Rhetoric met reality. As both candidate and President, the master rhetorician could conjure a world in which he bestows upon you health care nirvana: more coverage, less cost.

But you can't fake it in legislation. Once you commit your fantasies to words and numbers, the Congressional Budget Office comes along and declares that the emperor has no clothes.

President Obama premised the need for reform on the claim that medical costs are destroying the economy. True. But now we learn - surprise! - that universal coverage increases costs. The congressional Democrats' health care plans, says the CBO, increase costs in the range of $1 trillion plus.

In response, the President retreated to a demand that any bill he sign be revenue neutral. But that's classic misdirection: If the fierce urgency of health care reform is to radically reduce costs that are producing budget-destroying deficits, revenue neutrality (by definition) leaves us on precisely the same path to insolvency that Obama himself declares unsustainable.

The Democratic proposals are worse still. Because they do increase costs, revenue neutrality means countervailing tax increases. It's not just that it is crazily anti-stimulatory to saddle a deeply depressed economy with an income tax surcharge that falls squarely on small business and the investor class. It's that health care reform ends up diverting for its own purposes a source of revenue that might otherwise be used to close the yawning structural budget deficit that is such a threat to the economy and to the dollar.

These blindingly obvious contradictions are why the Democratic health plans are collapsing under their own weight - at the hands of Democrats. It's Max Baucus, Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, who called Obama unhelpful for ruling out taxing employer-provided health insurance as a way to pay for expanded coverage. It's the Blue Dog Democrats in the House who wince at skyrocketing health-reform costs just weeks after having swallowed hemlock for Obama on a ruinous cap-and-trade carbon tax.

The President is therefore understandably eager to make this a contest between progressive Democrats and reactionary Republicans. He seized on Republican Sen. Jim DeMint's comment that stopping Obama on health care would break his presidency to protest, with perfect disingenuousness, that "this isn't about me. This isn't about politics."

It's all about him. Health care is his signature reform. He knows that if he produces nothing, he forfeits the mystique that both propelled him to the presidency and has sustained him through a difficult first six months. Which is why Obama's red lines are constantly shifting. Universal coverage? Maybe not. No middle-class tax hit? Well, perhaps, but only if they don't "primarily" bear the burden. Because it's about him, Obama is quite prepared to sign anything as long as it is titled "health care reform.

This is not about politics? Then why is it, to take but the most egregious example, that in this grand health care debate we hear not a word about one of the worst sources of waste in American medicine: the insane cost and arbitrary rewards of our malpractice system?

When a neurosurgeon pays $200,000 a year for malpractice insurance before he even turns on the light in his office or hires his first nurse, who do you think pays? Patients, in higher doctor fees to cover the insurance.

And with jackpot justice that awards one claimant zillions while others get nothing - and one-third of everything goes to the lawyers - where do you think that money comes from? The insurance companies, who then pass it on to you in higher premiums.

But the greatest waste is the hidden cost of defensive medicine: tests and procedures that doctors order for no good reason other than to protect themselves from lawsuit. Every doctor knows, as I did when I practiced years ago, how much unnecessary medical cost is incurred with an eye not on medicine but on the law.

Tort reform would yield tens of billions in savings. Yet you cannot find it in the Democratic bills. And Obama breathed not a word about it in the full hour of his health care news conference. Why? No mystery. The Democrats are parasitically dependent on huge donations from trial lawyers.

Didn't Obama promise a new politics that puts people over special interests? Sure. And now he promises expanded, portable, secure, higher-quality medical care - at lower cost! The only thing he hasn't promised is to extirpate evil from the human heart. That legislation will be introduced next week.

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And, that's why it is important to not throw the baby out with the wash, but to control the costs that the doctors and hospitals charge for their services. Make it extremely difficult for a doctor to be sued for malpractice. Show in black and white what a CT scan machine costs and how many patients does it take to pay for it. Justify those enormous costs of the machines, tests, employees, etc. Be on the up and up with the costs in the first place, and don't drive the most expensive Mercedes and live in the most expensive houses as doctors. But, to turn it all over to the government which can't run a dog and pony show is ridiculous.

 

[Big Black Dog]

Make it extremely difficult for a doctor to be sued for malpractice.

Soaring - I agree with everything you said except for this statement. While I do not advocate suing a physician for a very trivial and minor mistake, physician's (especially very bad ones) make mistakes that sometimes does great harm to a patient. In a case such as this, I think a law suit is a proper thing to employ to bring some justice to the situation. Let's say for the sake of conversation, Joe, the patient needs a knee replacement on his right knee. He goes into surgery and comes out with a knee replacement on his left knee. His right knee received no surgical correction at all. A mistake was made by operating on his left knee instead of his right knee. He is no better off for the surgery, in fact, he is worse off because now he has the painful rehab to endure on his left knee and his right knee still has a problem. In a case like this, I think it is entirely appropriate to sue a physician. I would hope that you agree.

 

[strollingbones]

bad example dog....normally if one knee is fucked they both are....they tend to tour together you know....lets take the airman...you cant sue the military...dumbass doctors cuts the cartoid artery...

they have to amputate both of his legs due to this mistake....he will get disablity and that is it...i assure you having experience with military hospitals...you should be able to sue

 

[Big Black Dog]

bad example dog....normally if one knee is fucked they both are....they tend to tour together you know....lets take the airman...you cant sue the military...dumbass doctors cuts the cartoid artery...

they have to amputate both of his legs due to this mistake....he will get disablity and that is it...i assure you having experience with military hospitals...you should be able to sue
__________________

Bones, I don't think you caught on to what I was really saying. A physician, just like any other professional person should be "sueable" (is that even a word?) if there is a real and honest reason for it. I don't believe in trivial law suits when it is obvious that the person doing the suing is just hunting for gold. However, if it's legit, I'm all for it. I know what you are saying about when one knee is bad often times they both are but that isn't always the case. In my example, the point I was making was the physician operated on the "wrong" knee and he should be held accountable.

I do know a bit about how military medical facilities are run. I know that they, like all medical treatment centers make mistakes and they should be made accountable for their mistakes just like in the civilian world. Unfortunatley, it is all but impossible to sue a military medical facility or any member of their treatment team. I've always felt this was unfair and unjust. I have seen people that have had medical misadventures. Once when I was stationed on a ship in Charleston, there was a crewmember that did in fact have a problem with one of his knees. He was sent over to the Naval Hospital by me, because I was the Corpsman on this particular ship that the person I am talking about was stationed aboard. Sure enough, he required surgery to correct his medical problem. Well, they operated on the wrong knee. So, yes, I am very aware that the military makes mistakes in their treatment of patients from time to time but I don't think it is any more frequent than what happens in the civilian world. It's just too damned bad that servicemen have very little recourse when this happens as opposed to somebody how is a civilian being treated at a civilian hospital. It is almost impossible for a military servicemember to suit the US government for any reason - not just medical. I don't really know why that is but I know it's true.