Ramming “reform”
October 15th, 2009 . by NedYesterday while leaving the post office, I was targeted for a scam by two conmen (I’ll share more about that in another post), and one thing that I realized as I interacted with these guys is how valuable a perception of haste is when scamming a “mark.”
I’ve been ruminating over a soundbite I heard from John F. Kerry the other day, something along the lines of, “We’ve been waiting since Teddy Roosevelt to do this” (in reference to socializing healthcare or whatever he’s acting like this bill is going to do). That sounds about right and it’s consistent with what I’ve been reading in Jonah Goldberg’s, Liberal Facism. The Dems’ efforts on healthcare seem like a big rush for those of us who appreciate free markets (and free people), but maybe not for people like Kerry.
While radio channel surfing this morning I heard a great interview by Fred Thompson with healthcare expert James Capretta about the blushingly presumptuous (not to mention disingenuous) predictions from the Left about actual costs of current Liberal healthcare reform proposals. For example, the $821 billion estimate presumes $100 billion of reduction in fees paid to physicians that anyone in the know will admit are cuts that will not happen.
Another example was upwards of $100 billion that the Feds are presuming they can pass along to the States. Which was corroborated by candid statements from Gov. Bredesen. Terry Frank links to it at her place. terryfrank.net ยป Bredesen Predicts Even Larger Costs to Tennesseans
And now there’s word (via Drudge) that Harry Reid is admitting the gross underestimate of likely costs for taxpayer-funded health insurance. Let’s slow down a little Dems.
Also, at WisdomisVindicated.
Good post, Ned.
Yeah, revamped health care Democrat-style is a hurry up quick! rush job. Out of control kids in a candy store, these child-like leftists.
With all these cost estimates of reform, does anyone care to compare them with the estimates of no reform?
http://www.nchc.org/facts/cost.shtml
Jim,
Yeah, I heard a guest on Steve Gill’s show this morning claiming that doing nothing will cost more than doing what you Libs want to do, she laughingly said something like, “just think about the social security we are going to have to pay to children who lose their parent” and referenced the “using emergency room for routine medical care” shibboleth. I agree that Liberal, sledge-hammer, big government policies like forcing Emergency rooms not to deny care to even people who have the sniffles (but no money or health insurance!) are costly, but it is foolish–FOOLISH, to assert that use of healthcare is going to decrease when everybody can claim it and claim it for “free.”
I’m still waiting for the Soviet-style solution to out-of-control increases in higher ed “costs.” You’ve heard of “warmongers”? Well, folks on the Left are “gov’tmongers.”
By the way, perhaps the stupidest thing this nationally-renowned Liberal talk-show personality (Ellen Ratner) who was a guest on Gill’s show said was that she thinks the sport of football should be outlawed because it is violent. Serious.