A woman who identified herself as a pediatric physician at U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee's townhouse meeting on health-care reform was revealed not to be a physician at all but a rabid Obama supporter. I suppose that qualifies for credibility these days.
Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin has received much haranguing from the popular press over her "death panels" remark.
What the Bill says:
1) IN GENERAL.—The Administration headed by a Health Choices
Commissioner division referred to as the ‘‘Commissioner’’) shall be appointed
by the President, advice and consent of the Senate. (pg. 40)
With regards to commissions set up to discuss and/or allocate care, funds and research:
‘‘(A) be designed, as appropriate, to take into account the potential
for differences in the effectiveness of health care items and services
used with various subpopulations such as racial and ethnic minorities,
women, different age groups (including children, adolescents, adults,
and seniors), and individuals with different comorbidities; (pg. 520)
To the end of life:
‘‘(3) PHYSICIAN’S QUALITY REPORTING INITIATIVE.—
7 ‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—For
purposes of reporting data on quality measures for covered
professional services furnished during 2011 and any subsequent year, to
the extent that measures are available, the Secretary shall include
quality measures on end of life care and advanced care planning that
have been adopted or endorsed by a consensus-based organization, if
appropriate. Such measures shall measure both the creation of and
adherence to orders for life sustaining treatment. (pg. 432)
What Sarah Palin said (after reading the bill the president apparently did not):
Section 1233 authorizes advanced care planning consultations for senior
citizens on Medicare every five years, and more often “if there is a significant
change in the health condition of the individual ... or upon admission to a
skilled nursing facility, a long-term care facility... or a hospice program."
[3] During those consultations, practitioners must explain “the continuum of
end-of-life services and supports available, including palliative care and
hospice,” and the government benefits available to pay for such services. [4]Now
put this in context. These consultations are authorized whenever a Medicare
recipient’s health changes significantly or when they enter a nursing home, and
they are part of a bill whose stated purpose is “to reduce the growth in health
care spending.” [5] Is it any wonder that senior citizens might view such
consultations as attempts to convince them to help reduce health care costs by
accepting minimal end-of-life care? As Charles Lane notes in the Washington
Post, Section 1233 “addresses compassionate goals in disconcerting proximity to
fiscal ones.... If it’s all about obviating suffering, emotional or physical,
what’s it doing in a measure to “bend the curve” on health-care costs?”
[6]
What (the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel) Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel wrote regarding the criteria of saving lives:
Maximizing benefits is a utilitarian value....
What the president said:
“Let me just be specific about some things that I’ve been hearing
lately that we just need to dispose of here. The rumor that’s been circulating a
lot lately is this idea that somehow the House of Representatives voted for
death panels that will basically pull the plug on grandma because we’ve decided
that we don’t, it’s too expensive to let her live anymore....It turns out that I
guess this arose out of a provision in one of the House bills that allowed
Medicare to reimburse people for consultations about end-of-life care, setting
up living wills, the availability of hospice, etc. So the intention of the
members of Congress was to give people more information so that they could
handle issues of end-of-life care when they’re ready on their own terms. It
wasn’t forcing anybody to do anything.” [1]
So- who is lying? Who is mistaken? Why the need for rationing what is purported to be a compassionate service to all?
Basically because public health-care isn't. The public pays for a system controlled by one body, a body not accountable to anyone. As populations get older and sicker and fewer taxpayers are born to prop up this system, rationing health-care is a very cost-effective measure for those who weigh human lives in terms of what they give us. One could make the argument for any number of gender-studies graduates who foment hatred and discord but that would just be evil.
Oh- and the health-care bill will cover elective abortions. I guess as long as it is cost-effective and not going to children under the age of ten or anything.
It gets better. The White House has a deal with a pharmaceutical company.
Bill Clinton's monumental task of freeing two journalists who worked for Al Gore from a North Korean prison isn't just fishy; it's wrong. One cannot simply walk up to Kim Jong-Il and ask for the safe return of one's compatriots. What did Bill Clinton promise North Korea? More to come.
When John Bolton talks about North Korea or objects to Mary Robinson being given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, I listen. After all, the medal shouldn't sink to the depth of the Order of Canada.
Some good news.
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