Going Postal On Health Care

So President Obama was addressing a town hall and in trying to address claims that a government plan will drive private insurers out of the market he admitted that the government doesn't do things as well as private industry. Specifically he said that UPS and FedEx do a better job than the USPS.



Here is my question. If the government plan isn't going to be subsidized by tax money, as he appears to be claiming here, how is it going to provide health insurance to people who can't afford it now? That is the whole point of this thing isn't it? To provide health insurance to people who can't afford it? The money has to come from somewhere. If not from the people being insured and not from taxes, where is the money going to come from? Surely they aren't going to charge other people astronomically high premiums to subsidize those who can't pay. That would make the government plan a lot more expensive than any private insurance and so destroy it's competitiveness.

There's only one way the government can come up with the money to provide insurance to the 47 million uninsured. They've got to use taxes to subsidize the insurance. There's no other place for the government to get the money. The second the government plan is subsidized by tax dollars there will be no way for private insurers to compete. Private insurers have to make a profit or they will go bankrupt and out of business. The government doesn't have to make a profit because they can just seize the money they need through taxes. Which means the government can seriously undercut private insurers prices driving them out of business.

Don't Tread On Me

Civilized Debate

An unemployed man goes to a health care town hall meeting to try and make an honest buck selling "Don't Tread On Me" flags while learning something about the issue. Want to guess which side's supporters assaulted him?

Wisdom from the Village Elders

Seems an AARP meeting to promote Obama's health care plan didn't go quite the way the organizers planned...

Government Health Care Story of the Day

Here's a heart warming tale of government health care. A woman in Oregon was informed that the state health care plan won't pay for her chemotherapy but they will pay for her physician assisted suicide.



Here is an inconvenient difference between private and public health care providers. For a private health care provider, a dead patient is a lost revenue stream. For a public health care provider, a dead patient is a cost savings.

Government Health Care?

As we rush towards turning our health care system over to the government I find myself wondering something. Why do we keep looking at what Canada, Britain, and other countries have done with their health care systems? We already have several health care systems in this country that are run by the federal government. The Canadian government isn't going to be running our health care. The British government isn't going to be running our health care. Our government is going to be running our health care. If we want to know what we can expect from them we should be looking at how well they've done with the health care systems they already control.

Way back in 1787, the federal government made an agreement that resulted in the creation of the Indian Health Service to provide Native Americans free health care on the reservations. So how's that working out?

On some reservations, the oft-quoted refrain is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. It's a sick joke, and a sad one, because it's sometimes true, especially on the poorest reservations where residents cannot afford health insurance. Officials say they have about half of what they need to operate, and patients know they must be dying or about to lose a limb to get serious care.

Then there's the Veterans Health Administration, part of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. You may recall a couple of years ago when the VA's crown jewel, the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, was exposed as a cess pool.

Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

Now it's just recently come out that the VA isn't doing a particularly good job looking after our female veterans either:

The five veterans said women sometimes aren't properly informed upon discharge that health benefits are still available. They described how dealing with government is frustrating and confusing, and that often their unique needs, such as child care and sexual assault counseling, aren't understood by government officials.

Do you really believe the federal government will do a better job taking care of you than it has taking care of it's existing obligations? I don't.

Socialized Healthcare: Equal Time

We've heard a lot about how great and wonderful a nationalized health care system will be. ABC even ran an hour long infomercial for it recently from the White House. Not only did ABC choose to exclude anyone who wanted to offer an opposing point of view but they even refused to run paid ads before, during, or after the infomercial that would have presented the other side of the argument. So here is Steven Crowder with a look at how well Canada's socialized medicine program works:

Faces of Government Healthcare

Those who think letting the government take control of our healthcare system may wish to visit http://www.facesofgovernmenthealthcare.com/ for a sobering look at the reality of such systems.