Where ObamaCare leads?
Let’s back up for a minute. I noted some time ago Jay Rockefeller went on record to say that at some point the government has to decide whether or not you are allowed to receive any more medical benefits if the cost outweighs the potential benefits.
As Mickey Kaus has noted, both Ezra Klein and Matt Yglesias are on record agreeing. Kaus writes:
Democratic blogger Ezra Klein appears to be positioning Dem health care reforms as a way to cut costs, on the grounds that a reformed system will be able to make “hard choices” and “rational” coverage decisions, by which Klein seems to mean “not providing” treatments that are unproven or too expensive–when “a person’s life, or health, is not worth the price.” Matthew Yglesias’ recent post seems to be saying the same thing, though clarity isn’t its strong suit.
Folks, this is the road ObamaCare will take us down. Is that what you want for this great nation? Is it? Do you want the government deciding who gets treatment? Who is “worth” saving? And yes, in he end deciding who lives and who dies.
There are, of course, other troubling aspects to ObamaCare. Take a gander at this piece
PRESIDENT Obama promises that “if you like your health plan, you can keep it,” even after he reforms our health-care system. That’s untrue. The bills now before Congress would force you to switch to a managed-care plan with limits on your access to specialists and tests.
Two main bills are being rushed through Congress with the goal of combining them into a finished product by August. Under either, a new government bureaucracy will select health plans that it considers in your best interest, and you will have to enroll in one of these “qualified plans.” If you now get your plan through work, your employer has a five-year “grace period” to switch you into a qualified plan. If you buy your own insurance, you’ll have less time.
And as soon as anything changes in your contract — such as a change in copays or deductibles, which many insurers change every year — you’ll have to move into a qualified plan instead (House bill, p. 16-17).
When you file your taxes, if you can’t prove to the IRS that you are in a qualified plan, you’ll be fined thousands of dollars — as much as the average cost of a health plan for your family size — and then automatically enrolled in a randomly selected plan (House bill, p. 167-168).
It’s one thing to require that people getting government assistance tolerate managed care, but the legislation limits you to a managed-care plan even if you and your employer are footing the bill (Senate bill, p. 57-58). The goal is to reduce everyone’s consumption of health care and to ensure that people have the same health-care experience, regardless of ability to pay.
See, you can keep your insurance, for a while anyway, as long as it meets certain criteria.
Again,is this liberty? Or is it slavery?
H/T Pundit & Pundette
Posted on July 20, 2009, in Calls to Action, Health Care and tagged Eithanasia at he end of ObamaCare. Bookmark the permalink. 1 Comment.
Gatordoug
darcprynce
Dave C
Um, you realize that Medicare (you know, the socialized medicine that the elderly have right now) can and does deny claims right now. The same goes for any private insurer. If you think everyone can and does have any medical procedure they desire, which is always covered, I would have to ask you, in what country on which planet do you live? My grandmother died because her kidney dialysis treatments were no longer effective and as such, were no longer covered. If she had continued with the treatments, she might have made it another week, but the costs for those treatments instead went to someone for whom it could make a difference. Again, this is now. No “ObamaCare”, just the current Best System in the World.
Also, if you think that outlawing pre-existing condition provisions in insurance policies is akin to slavery, I think you need to crack open a history book, because that word surely doesn’t mean what you think it means.