Just heard on the news that The Comrade is holding a town hall meeting in New Hampshire today. He also said that he believes reasonable arguments will prevail in congress. Only I don't think he'd recognize a reasonable argument if it bit him on the ankle, so heaven only knows what the heck he's talking about.
The White House supposedly has launched a new website explaining away all the "myths and lies" about socialized medicine. I was going to go take a look at it, but I don't think the White House can tell me anything I don't already know. I've read the bill and actually listened to the arguments for and against it, so I'm way ahead of those buttheads already.
For those attending town hall meetings and everyone else, a few things to keep foremost in your mind:
HR3200 -- the Monster Socialized Medcine Bill in the House -- is only a rough outline of what socialized medicine will look like if it's ever passed and implemented.
You've heard that its "government option" will crowd out private insurance -- which is true. The US government has long-standing policies in place that are based on the proven fact that any product or service that is government-subsidized and government-funded has an unfair competitive advantage in the free market. Health insurance is not an exception. HR3200 includes the federally-subsidized "government option" to pave the way for socialized medicine. Even Barney (Fudd) Frank admitted as much.
The so-called "Advance Death Planning" provisions are in there, too, and when I read the bill, these counseling sessions were required for the elderly. Some congresscritters have claimed the counseling isn't required. Who knows? Maybe they changed this on that last day of congressional scheming behind closed doors before they recessed.
The bill does call for "re-allocating" $500 billion from Medicare to fund HR3200. That's in the bill. You might ask how the federal government is going to pay for Medicare without those funds, considering that more and more people retire every day and enter the Medicare system. I didn't see any suggestions in the bill for replacing these Medicare funds. Will they increase the Medicare co-pays? Send the elderly to Canada? Who knows? You can ask.
Every individual without insurance from their employer or somewhere else will be forced to get some kind of insurance or pay a fine of 2.5% of their annual income. That's in the bill. And any insurance you buy will have to be approved by the federal government; it will have to offer certain types of coverage or it won't count as health insurance. The Health Insurance Exchange will decide what kind of insurance counts as real health insurance -- including policies from private insurers.
The bill calls existing insurance policies "grandfathered" policies. People can keep them for now, and can add their dependents to this coverage, but the policies can't be changed in any way, and the premiums can't change. They're called "grandfathered" because HR3200 phases them out.
What HR3200 does NOT do is outline specific medical procedures and things like that. HOWEVER, it does set up a federal agency to review health care practices and determine "best practices." The bill doesn't really say why, but I'm guessing it will be so that federal bureaucrats can tell doctors what treatments they can provide to whom.
And, by the way, so-called "best practices" already are determined by private professional associations like the American College of Pediatricians and similar groups for other specialties. These private organizations educate and certify doctors in their specialties. These are the certificates that hang on the wall of your doctor's office. Also, doctors are periodically tested by these organizations in order to maintain their certifications. Seems like the federal government may be trying to replace these private associations. Who knows?
You can ask if the bill allows for government-funded abortion. This isn't mentioned specifically in the bill. Apparently the issue will be decided by the Health Commissioner or by some federal agency, if the bill passes.
The bill doesn't mention rationing, either. However, rationing is the inevitable outcome of providing universal access to health care without expanding the pool of available doctors, hospitals, and other related service providers. I haven't heard anyone from Washington address this issue at all. They just pretend "it can't happen here" and want you to trust them on this.
The bill's sponsors claim that the bill will cut costs. Personally, I can't figure out how that can possibly happen. The Health Commissioner or some other bureaucrat may just decide that it will only pay doctors $XX.XX for a certain procedure, or will only pay a hospital $XX.XX per day for a hospital stay. If this is below what the procedures actually costs the doctor or what a hospital stay costs the hospital, the doctor will be forced to find some other line of work and the hospital will close. This is just reality -- no matter what pie-in-the-sky promises a congresscritter might make. It's already happened with Medicare and Medicaid.
You can go on and on with all the various provisions in HR3200. Most are vague and very general. They don't really say how the Health Commissioner and all the various agencies this bill establishes will operate or anything like that. It has very few specifics.
Essentially what HR3200 does is transfer the power to make health care decisions from the individual to the federal government. It takes away your own right to make these decisions and transfers this authority to the federal government.
No bill could list all the details necessary to run the US health care industry. It would have to list every single activity in the industry and offer a regulation about how to handle it. HR3200 doesn't do this.... WHAT IT DOES DO IS ESTABLISH THE OFFICES AND AGENCIES THAT WILL REGULATE EVERY ASPECT OF HEALTH CARE.
Do you want to give the feds this kind of power?
Anyway, all of the above are some of the questions you can ask about at the town hall meetings. Otherwise, a really skilled politician will turn your questions around, confuse the issues, try to make you look like an uninformed idiot or a hysterical fool. I think this is what the Democrats plan to do now to try to secure some kind of support for HR3200 -- this crime against humanity.
So just ask for a "yes" or "no" answer to this: Does this bill establish a federal authority that will make health care decisions for me? Isn't "establishing" my health care options the same as "limiting" them? After all, I won't have any more options than those the federal government believes I need, no matter who provides those services.
And, How much will it cost? Not just in dollars, but in terms of keeping your rights and political freedom. If you're free, you can always make money. But once you give your rights away, they're gone for good.
I don't think I'm telling anyone anything new, either. Just don't let youselves get bogged down in the smiley-face "talking points" the White House passed out to Democrats -- marching orders on how to "sell" socialized medicine to people who clearly don't want it. Most congresscritters are good talkers, you know. They're usually very amiable people. That's how they got elected.
The thing is, stay focused on the major issue -- the transfer of power from you to the federal government. That's the most horrifying feature of socialized medicine. That's what we -- and the congresscritters -- really need to be aware of.
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