A Grave Compromiser

There is currently rampant speculation that the White House may be willing to drop the so-called "public option" to have some sort of universal care passed. This would, on its face, seem a victory for conservatism but beware the details. Once the camel has its nose in the tent, the salesman has his foot in the door, it may be impossible for opposition to thwart single payer that the compromise seems to be abdicating. Those backing Obama care are not favorably disposed to speak truth when facts work against their desired outcomes. Let us take what the Democrats have widely cited at face value, their fictional fact that there are forty-seven (47) million uninsured Americans. Even without an open-borders amnesty which moderate Republicans and Democrats are scheming, which will bring in millions more aliens, the nearly fifty million already uninsured will break the system. Obama saying eliminating the deductions of the super-affluent like himself will pay for reform actually can not come near paying the newly engendered burden. The government could confiscate the entire incomes of the top two percent and still not cover the new expense, to say nothing of the delays in treatment with so many more lined up to seek preventative care. Healthy young people who would not have sought physician's counsel will now enter the system to access services they would have avoided since they feel someone else is paying for it for them, or if they happen to be the rare few amongst the high income tax bracket, why not now take advantage of something you are being forced to pay for anyway. Long waits and care rationing are inevitable. Even if end of life counseling is dropped, rationed and delayed care shortens lives. Doctors' incomes are bound to be adversely affected as well with consequently lowered reimbursement causing experienced, skilled physicians to retire early and making it less desirable for bright young students to enter the profession. Tort reform would enable doctors to avoid costly defensive medicine would have an immediate salutary effect in cost savings but seems to be a non-starter with Obama (himself an attorney and his Democrat party the beneficiaries of massive contributions from trial lawyers). If punitive judgements were simply capped at a quarter of a million dollars, injured patients could still receive compensatory damage for the real injuries they have suffered, up to and including the cost of lifetime care. All sorts of cost savings are possible if the evil possibilities of euthanasia and taxpayer subsidized abortion are excised from a compromise that promotes good medicine and sound budgets-both for taxpayers and for government. Watch out for a Republican Henry Clay who lets a bad new plan slip through-we have enough damnable compromisers already. Caveat emptor though-as always the devil is in the details, our politicians owe it to us to give us the chance to scrutinize any emerging bill.