Obama Health Plan: Rationing, Higher Taxes, and Lower Quality Care

This study will explain how the health policy changes President Obama and Congressional Democrats support would cause millions of Americans to lose their choice of doctors and insurance coverage, require that access to care be strictly rationed, and cause the quality of care to deteriorate. Despite all this sacrifice, nationalizing health insurance in America would require major tax increases, slow economic growth, and increase the national debt.
Read the full report here.

The lurch to the left

I don't know who Pat Toomey is, or if he's a good man, but this assessment of what's happening in Pennsylvania from the WSJ ("Arlen Specter's Dilemma" Aug. 22) needs to happen in all the states.

At the picnic, Mr. Toomey railed against government bailouts and spending on a "breathtaking scale." He warned of coming tax increases, a pending government takeover of health care, and of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would allow unions to organize employees without secret-ballot elections. He also said that while the Obama agenda is cause for despair for conservatives, it also opens a door for Republicans.

"This lurch to the left is unacceptable to voters, including lots of Democrats and an overwhelming number of independents," he told the crowd. "This wildly ambitious agenda is their Achilles' heel—and our opportunity."

Indeed, what is different this time is that Democrats in Congress are going out of their way to provide grist for Mr. Toomey's mill—cooking up thousand-page, trillion-dollar helpings of reform and bailouts, and pushing health-care legislation that's driving independents into the GOP camp.

Many of us were not fooled

And many who were, are recovering their sanity and common sense.

"What if the first African-American president isn’t? Doesn’t that change everything? And dash some mighty big hopes? It’s not a question of skin color or mixed blood, it’s about where he places his heart and soul. And how he scooped up oceans of American benevolence toward black people and double-crossed it into a tidal wave that swept him into the White House where he has been living on so many false premises that even the mainstream media are starting to get shaky.

He fooled white people who don’t know enough about blacks to spot an imitation. He fooled black people who wanted so much to believe that they’d finally got their place in the sun that they squinted their eyes up and fell into the trap. He fooled conservative media that still today haven’t asked themselves what was wrong with the daily, weekly, monthly anti-Obama articles they hemstitched, carefully skirting the real issues. Many of his opponents are still pussyfooting. He fooled the Jews big time, but he didn’t pretend to be Jewish. Just put some of our boys in high places, did a cut rate seder, wore a kippa to Yad Vashem and reaped the benefits as sure as a token opens a turnstile." Read the entire article.

And it's not just conservatives who are catching on. The left is waking up to his scam, too. A Scandanavian blogger, Tundra Tabloids writes: So now even the Left is waking up to the reality that Obama will lie at will to suit his purposes, this time around it's doing what he said he would never do, that is, strike a deal with big drug companies for a deal that offers Obama's plan a short term gain, but to the drug companies, an even greater gain in the long run. Listen to the short broadcast.



If this is how he wheels and deals (back room deals and lying with a smile to his base supporters) in getting his health care scheme rolling, think of how he's acting in connection with the "peace process" between Israel and the Arabs. Obama shouldn't be trusted as far as one can spit.

UALC: it’s time to go

For years our huge, evangelical congregation in suburban Columbus with 3 locations and 9 services on Sunday and many ministries has been told we would leave if this happened. Let’s see if promises are kept. In April 2008 I wrote about the "Social Statement on Human Sexuality" at Digging for the Pony.

This ELCA draft does violence to our English language--verbal abuse, noun abuse, adverb abuse and adjective abuse, to say nothing of abusing our Christian faith. It is Scripture twisting and gymnastics! This draft criticizes "Lutheran historical teachings concerning homosexuality" with no footnotes (Book of Concord? Luther? Lutheran Brethren? Missouri-Synod Lutheran? Wisconsin Synod? the old ALC?). It does not analyze or reference any teaching, research or biblical criticism by known Christian homosexuals, theologians or Lutheran pastors who promote ordination and marriage for gays. It does find space to comment on and condemn children's clothing, playground bullying, consumerism, date rape, dangers of the internet, early sex education, grandparents raising grandchildren and inappropriate touching of female pastors. If you throw in the kitchen sink maybe no one will notice there is no Biblical foundation?

I checked the website today, and found out the temperature in Columbus is 63, but didn't see anything about this issue. Nor did I really expect to. ELCA (our synod) has been spiritually wandering in the wilderness and losing members ever since it was created in 1988 out of a liberal and a moderate synod whose ethnic differences had blurred over the years.

From Episcopal Life online: The 2009 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) on August 21 approved opening the ministry of the church to pastors and other professional workers living in committed same-gender relationships.

The resolution passed by a vote of 559 to 451 and overturns previous church policy that prohibited participation of gays and lesbians in church ministries unless they were celibate.

Discussions about human sexuality have dominated the August 17-23 assembly in Minneapolis, the chief legislative authority of the 4.6 million-member denomination. More than half, or about 1,045, of the 2,000 participants are voting members at the gathering, themed "God's work. Our hands."

The assembly also approved a resolution committing the church to find ways for congregations that choose to do so to "recognize, support and hold publicly accountable life-long, monogamous, same-gender relationships." It did not use the word "marriage." It also approved, by a vote of 771-230, a resolution committing the church to respect the differences of opinions on the matter and honor the "bound consciences" of those who disagree.

In 2008 I concluded with, "I don't know what our congregation (UALC) is waiting for--it took this sexuality task force seven years to write a mish-mash and hodge podge and submit it to the people of God as a serious work. Every paragraph looks like the sentences were drawn from a hat of former reports and pasted to a page. It is an insult to our common sense and a travesty of our faith. It's time to go. It really is. These people will not back down; they'll just wear us out."

Who are those 47 million Obama says are without insurance?

First, this issue isn't about the uninsured, nor the cost of health care. That's scare tactics. This is a power grab full of lies and deception. If you've ever gone to the ER, you know there are plenty of uninsured people who have access to good treatment--maybe better than yours.

The statistic comes from the latest U.S. Census Bureau Report, “Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2007,” which can be accessed through the U.S. Census official website, according to Liberty Counsel.

"On page 30 of the report, the number of “PEOPLE” who were uninsured in 2006 was 46,995,000, which actually dropped by 1.3 million in 2007 to 45,657,000. But who are these people? Of the 46 million “PEOPLE” without insurance, 10,231,000 are listed as “Not a citizen” in 2006. In 2007, this figure is 9,737,000.

Beyond the noncitizens, a large number are high-income earners. Under the “Household Income” section, the number of uninsured who make $75,000 or more is 9,283,000 in 2006 and 9,115,000 in 2007. An additional 8,459,000 in 2006 had a household income of $50,000 to $74,999. In 2007 this number was 8,488,000.

In addition, a May 2003 nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office report, “How Many People Lack Health Insurance and For How Long,” says, “It is frequently stated that about 40 million Americans lack health insurance. That estimate, however, overstates the number of people who are uninsured all year. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that between 21 million and 31 million people were uninsured for the entire year in 1998 – the most recent year for which reliable comparative data are available. Since then, the number which is uninsured all year probably has not changed substantially, given historical trends. The uninsured population is fluid, with many people gaining and losing insurance.” "

Unfortunately, Obama is actually forcing more people into uninsured status by doing everything he can to keep us in a deepening recession, from cap and trade to higher taxes which reduces investment, to demonizing the people who actually pay the bulk of the tax load.

If you refuse to read right wing think tanks, like Liberty Counsel, check out the CBO report. The stats and figures come from that report. Obama is taking a sledge hammer to swat a fly. The purpose is not to protect or help the sick and poor--that's just to get your attention--it is to take control of a large segment of the economy. If he cared about all the uninsured illegals, he could have just sent an invoice to the Mexican government. If he cared about the costs, he wouldn't have proposed all those mandates in order to bankrupt the insurance system.

Or he could have asked me a vet med librarian

I had noticed this back in the 1990s when I was writing my own articles and/or helping professors do their research. On-line didn’t mean better research, and sometimes it didn’t mean faster.

James Evans writes for Britannica Blog: “For a report published in Science (July 18, 2008), I used a database of 34 million articles, their citations (1945 to 2005) and online availability (1998 to 2005), and showed that as more journals and articles came online, the actual number of them cited in research decreased, and those that were cited tended to be of more recent vintage. This proved true for virtually all fields of science. (Note that this is not a historical trend…there are more authors and universities citing more and older articles every year, but when journals go online, references become more shallow and narrow than they would have been had they not gone online.)

Moreover, the easy online availability of sources has channeled researcher attention from the periphery to the core—to the most high-status journals. In short, searching online is more efficient, and hyperlinks quickly put researchers in touch with prevailing opinion, but they may also accelerate consensus and narrow the range of findings and ideas grappled with by scholars.”

When professors came to the library, sat down with their favorite, generalist journal on medicine, biochemistry, nutrition, or cancer, they would scan the table of contents, and couldn’t avoid seeing areas of interest outside their own, something to perk a brain cell in a new direction. On-line database searching narrows and refines, but it also imprisons the mind.

Holding my breath

This morning we're taking our house guests to the Patio Restaurants for pancakes. They love those, and it's this food critic's opinion that the Patio has the best on the peninsula. So this morning after my walk I poured my chubby legs in some linen short pants (don't know if they are Capri's) of a gorgeous aqua color and left the waist unbuttoned. They didn't fit at all in June, because I'd washed them (tag said dry clean only). However, how dumb would I have to be to pay $4 at the thrift shop, then $6 to dry clean them? I'd never buy this at a retail shop--the pants have little beads around the cuffs with a shear fabric insert. But for $4, they looked like they said, "fun in the sun."

I thought it would be easy to lose my Ireland and Italy gained weight this summer--maybe 1/2 lb a week sounded reasonable. However, even without a fast food restaurant within miles, and Abigail's Tea Room closed, I managed to find my way to the crackers and cheese and peanut butter in my own kitchen, as well as second helpings.

However, I have been walking every day, some days even 4 or 5 miles. My friend Lynne is now up to 10 miles a day--I think it's the competition from her favorite Republican slug. So although I haven't lost anything, the clothes are looser. My daughter, who was told about 6 months ago that she would need yet another medication to control her fast approaching diabetes, said NO, I'll do anything, even exercise. This is my sweet baby who smiled up from the crib the 4 hours she was awake, and then slept the rest of the time. (If you have an exceptionally "good" child who never minds going down for a nap, and sleeps 12 hours at night, Hashimoto's might be in her future.) And boy,has she exercised, dropping 4 sizes, now getting into size 10 slacks. So it can be done. Also, all her lab numbers are now normal. That's the good news--she's beautiful at any size, it's her health that's important.

Enjoying our teen-age guests

After a visit to the Marblehead lighthouse and lunch today, my husband will drive our young friends back to Kent and their host families. Monday they begin intensive English classes at University of Akron. I think their English is superb--E. scored the highest in his class--but it isn't sufficient to pass a college class on another topic. We invited another Haitian over to visit with them, and although he is a U.S. citizen and has lived here for 24 years, the boys were much easier for me to understand. But still we had to explain idioms and slang--some of which are so common to us we don't even think of it that way. Imagine trying to explain what a "clunker" is when an automobile ad comes on TV for Obama's program (they love Obama and are thrilled that a black man has been chosen seeing him perhaps in more messianic terms than even American blacks who thought he would pay their mortgage and car loans--they think he'll rescue Haiti!). My son has been on the receiving end of that clunker scam (auto dealership) and has to destroy Jags and Mercedes in that give away sponsored by us taxpayers in the name of a green environment (really just a token for the unions). But I digress. Or watching Judge Judy yell at a defendant, "Do you catch my drift!" TV is both a help and hindrance to learning English. It is loaded with exaggeration and misinformation, people shouting, promising, cajoling, etc. I hope they can learn to filter what they see and hear--many Americans cannot.

E. showed me some of his photos on his digital camera taken the day my husband took them for their first sail. They were excellent--he seems to have a natural eye for composition, something we haven't learned since digital cameras are a bit new for us. I just haven't figured out how to get them from his camera to my laptop cache.

They've been willing to try a few new foods--but are cautious. Teen-agers generally aren't eager to eat the unfamiliar. They both passed on fresh sliced peaches--a real treat for us this time of year--but were eager for bananas which they quicly spread with peanut butter. Last night again they passed on blue berries, but were happy for a bowl of grapes. We had grilled bratwurst, a first for them, but they asked for seconds so that passed. Also, peas was a first, and they cleaned that up. Corn is no problem either, although my husband won't eat that. I fried up some onions and peppers just to top anything that looked unfamiliar, and that they really liked.

When they are bored with old people (my husband will talk them to death), they go in their room and play cards or take a walk. Yes, it's been great fun and we've thoroughly enjoyed their company.

The Council for Affordable Health Insurance

"At a time when both Congress and state legislatures are considering health care reform, it's very important to recognize that government usually makes health insurance more expensive, not less expensive," said Dr. Merrill Matthews, CAHI's executive director.

CAHI has regularly tracked all state mandates since 1992, and its actuarial team estimates the impact those mandates have on the cost of a health insurance policy. For the year ending in 2008, CAHI has identified 2,133 state and federal mandates, an increase of 172 over last year's figure of 1,961 state mandates. This year CAHI is also including federal mandates because they affect state coverage.

"Mandates come with a cost," continued Matthews. "While mandate advocates like to claim that mandates lower the cost of coverage, that's not the actuarial experience. They raise costs because utilization goes up. Those costs are then passed on to consumers in the form of higher health insurance premiums -- increases that make coverage unaffordable for millions of Americans."

Check the web site HT Dave

Here's Obama's health care mandates that raised insurance costs in Illinois.

What Obama said about death guidance groups back in April

This was after he didn’t actually say what he would have done if told his Grandmother couldn’t have a hip replacement when she was terminally ill . . . He just said it would be upsetting. Well, yes, Mr. President. That‘s why people are showing up at Town Halls--it‘s upsetting. (At Bloomberg. Com April 29)

THE PRESIDENT: So that's where I think you just get into some very difficult moral issues. But that's also a huge driver of cost, right?
I mean, the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill out here.

LEONHARDT: So how do you - how do we deal with it?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think that there is going to have to be a conversation that is guided by doctors, scientists, ethicists. And then there is going to have to be a very difficult democratic conversation that takes place. It is very difficult to imagine the country making those decisions just through the normal political channels. And that's part of why you have to have some independent group that can give you guidance. It's not determinative, but I think has to be able to give you some guidance. And that's part of what I suspect you'll see emerging out of the various health care conversations that are taking place on the Hill right now.

HT Baldilocks

How did Bill Ayers get tenure at U. of Illinois?

Every envelope I get from the Alumni Association or Foundation of the University of Illinois is returned with a note, "Not as long as you employ terrorist Bill Ayers." Accuracy in Media has an interesting theory on how and why he and his wife are teaching at the college level and why there is no investigation.

The University of Illinois, which employs communist terrorist Bill Ayers as a professor, has been hit by an admissions scandal which has forced the resignation of the chairman of its board of trustees. An investigation by the Chicago Tribune found that more than 800 undergraduate applicants received special consideration from 2005 to 2009 because "they had powerful patrons, including elected officials, trustees and donors." It added that "Dozens more law and graduate school applicants also got preferential treatment."

But how did Bill Ayers get his job? All signs point to his rich father, Thomas Ayers, who was CEO of Commonwealth Edison and a major power player in the Chicago establishment.

Will the Chicago Tribune investigate this? Thomas Ayers sat on the board of the Tribune Company, which publishes the Tribune. Thomas Ayers also sat on the board of Northwestern University, where Bill Ayers' wife and fellow terrorist Bernardine Dohrn got a teaching job.

Story here.Too bad they didn't kill some dogs; PETA could go after them. Why do Illinois taxpayers put up with this travesty?

Our guests, two Haitian teen-agers

My husband called yesterday to let me know we'd be having two guests for three days, two young men he met when he was teaching architectural drawing in Haiti. So my mind is looking through the cupboards and frig wondering what to feed them. It's been many years since I had a teen-ager in the house, and I seem to remember they eat constantly. Haitians actually appear healthier than Americans because most are not overweight. In fact, they are quite thin. From my husband's visits I know beans and rice, rice and beans, and the occasional chicken or goat are standard fare. You don't want me fixing rice anymore than you'd want my coffee, and well, goat meat's a bit scarce this time of year. E. and F., who speak 4 languages but are having some intensive training in English right now, are in for an amazing ride--they are coming to the U.S. with the help of Christian sponsors to become doctors. That's what--10 or 12 years of education? I guess no one from Communist Cuba or Venezuela offered. Their first Ohio winter should be a shocker to their systems. Right now it's hot and humid, with nothing to worry about except air conditioning. Not so Akron in February.

Last week I attended a seminar by Dr. Gene Swanger on Buddhism. He noted in passing that when he'd take college students to Japan for 6 weeks the first thing they'd notice were similarities, "They are just like us!" This is because we are all--everyone of us--mind restricted to the culture we know best. It's only after some familiarity that we notice and become comfortable (or uncomfortable) with the differences, which are so vast it could take years to really understand another culture. And you don't get this sitting in the classroom.

I've never seen a study on this, but I think we first notice color and clothing (or fashion if you are female) because everyone has skin and we all wear clothes! "They are just like us!" You see smiles, gestures, state of health, and then later begin to see that a gesture or movement doesn't mean what your culture taught you.

It should be an interesting three days of learning and sharing from both sides. If a Haitian woman found out on short notice she would be having guests, she'd also be thinking about what to feed them to make them feel at home and to put her family's situation in the best light. In that, we are very similar.

Clean up your own trash

If the green-goes would set a good example, maybe picking up trash 10 minutes a day instead of flying across the globe to attend meetings, they might be more inspiring. If everyone took care of her own yard, carried baggies to clean up after his own dog, always put his trash cans promptly back after pick up or kept them covered to protect from animals, didn't toss cigarette butts in the street, and carried home her own trash from picnics, it wouldn't be long before we'd all have a better environment.

I can remember my mother saying while digging thistles instead of using chemicals, "I can't save the world but I can clean up four acres."

Trash in the creek
Pop on the rocks
Ubiquitous bags

The issue is trust

Neo-Neocon says it best: ". . . it appears to be dawning on an increasing number of Americans that President Obama cannot be trusted. There are two reasons for this. The first is that so many of the things he promised during the campaign—transparency, bipartisanship, unity and an end to blaming, a post-racial presidency, no catering to special interests and lobbies, and posting of bills in a timely fashion online, to name just a few—have not only been violated, but have been boldly, flagrantly, and shamelessly violated. The second thing is that his pre-election stance as a moderate is seen to have been a lie as well, and that’s even more basic—at least for the moderates and Independents who gave him the support he required to put him over the top and guarantee his election.

One can talk about this policy of Obama’s or that one, and agree with certain elements of his program and disagree with others. But although these are very important issues, they are not the issue. Trust is."

Good health is worth the price, part 2

This is part 2 of a guest blog written by Joan Barris of Lakeside. Here's the first part.

For years I battled neck pain, sinus congestion, chemical allergies and the resulting vertigo. Traditional medicine gave me this response: "The only answer to chemical allergies is avoidance." Easier said than done. The vertigo and sinus issues were treated with prescriptions that simply didn't work and had side effects. Physical therapy for the neck pain exacerbated the problem. As my symptoms worsened, the doctor ordered first a CT scan and then an MRI, which showed nothing. I was a "healthy senior" with mild hypertension. I began complaining to anyone with the patience to listen--"these issues are real and make my daily life not enjoyable."

At my last visit to the ENT, he reported that the tests were negative and dismissed me with, "I'm here if you need me." He saw me as a hypochondriac, I surmised. Then I discovered Susan Mikolic (see www.SteppingStonesMentalHealth.com) and read her story about overcoming mental maladies with diet. Her journey began with Dr. Keith Jordan, a holistic practitioner/chiropractor (see www.owcenter.com). Her simple advice was shop the perimeter of the stores. All fresh meats, fruits, vegetables. No preservatives or additives. That I knew I could do, but I needed more.

In March 2009 I called Dr. Jordan's office and miraculously got in on a cancellation by a new patient--18 ready-made appointments. In the first two weeks he adjusts my neck, pulling so hard on my skull I thought my head would come off. Then he gives me a paper about sugar metabolism, Sweet Nothings which asked: Is your body metabolizing sugar properly? Do you experience fatigue, moodiness and cravings, weight gain, headaches, hyperactivity/attention problems, or allergies? There are key guidelines to a sugar control diet. There is a list of DO NOT EAT foods and a list of RECOMMENDED foods. I will be drinking lots of water, eating whole foods, limiting intake of grains, avoiding sugars of all kinds, not ingesting caffeine and combining foods appropriately. The admonition is, "If in doubt, don't eat it." Snack ideas: Fruits--up to two pieces per day, berries, vegetables, cheese, raw nuts. Dr. Jordan gave me some nutritional supplements and prescribed a series of infrared saunas. For the next 21 days I would be detoxing. I was primed for the task, set with the intention to do this exactly right.

It took only two weeks of this regimen and I knew I was on to something that worked. I was already beginning to feel better. I am now 6 months into the program and have lost 20 pounds. I feel so much better in every area that used to bother me. I've never felt ravenously hungry because there is no caloric restriction. And no cravings! Not once had any medical professional asked me what I eat. If we were all on the Sweet Nothings program we wouldn't be needing their services?

I have to admit is is difficult to run a bed and breakfast and be away from home and stay 100% on the plan, but I do my best. Having a Farmer's Market here in Lakeside twice a week helps my cause. And if I simply must have ice cream (3 times this summer), I bring my stash of organic raw cacao nibs and sprinkle them over a small dish of vanilla ice cream.

So here's my bottom line. For the price of good food, and some holistic treatments, I achieved wellness I had not known for a number of years. It was worth the price--every cent!

Joan recommends these titles:

Barbara Kingsolver, "Animal, vegetable, miracle."
Joshua Rosenthal, "The energy balance diet."
Renee Loux, "The balanced plate."
Jacqueline Paltis, "The sugar control Bible and cookbook."

End Part 2.

The dying young maple tree

This morning on my walk along the lakefront at sunrise, I stopped at a memorial tree, about 15 ft tall, dedicated to a young man who had died at age 20, over 20 years ago. Those types of memorial plaques are sad to read and I always think of the parents and siblings, who may still note the special days. "This year he would be 41," or "I wonder if he'd be married and bringing his children to Lakeside."

Unfortunately, the tree was dying too. I think it is a combination of our dry weather this summer, and over mulching. It had the "volcano" mulch style instead of the donut hole, so what little natural watering we've had through rain couldn't get to the roots. This tree still needed gallons and gallons of water each day to survive. It was born and bred in a nursery, not particularly hardy like the "volunteers" I see growing up through the boulders that were brought in to protect the shoreline.

Last Friday classmates from my high school graduation class gathered on the campus (the college closed in 1932, but it is still called the campus) to dedicate a tree to memorialize our deceased class members and friends. Over the years, many of the trees have died, and last summer a terrible wind storm took down many. A few words were spoken about each person and an original poem written for the occasion was read. What a nice idea. I hope to have some photos soon to put on the class blog.

Good health is worth the price, guest blog

By Joan Burris, owner Idlewyld B&B, Lakeside, Ohio

When Norma Bruce asked if I would like to write a guest blog about my holistic journey leading me to better health, I agreed. I've been munching and crunching ideas, not potato chips, to best explain the changes in my lifestyle to overcome a number of health issues.

I begin with the story of how we met--the fortuitous events that led to our connection. After years of believing that only my older sister had artistic talent in our family and that I was doomed to visit galleries and lament that I'd like to paint like those people, I decided to take a watercolor class at the Rhein Center in Lakeside. It was a safe place where I could fail without humiliation, or at least paint something I would like. Two years later, I can honestly say there might be a modicum of latent talent--or what one instructor kindly called enthusiasm.

So, carrying this enthusiasm further, two years later I enrolled in the Watercolor and Perspective Drawing Class taught by Norma's husband. Although now comfortable with the medium, I knew I avoided the drawing part. Again, I surprised myself. I actually was able to draw something that I liked. Having a good and patient instructor added to my own enthusiasm helped.

In another class at the Rhein, I met Norma, this time in Bob Moyer's class (my instructor during the winter months). It didn't take long for us to make the connections--her husband, my teacher, and our enjoyment of watercolor. We discovered we both like to write, and I checked her blog. I take writing classes at Rocky River Senior Center with Sally Leamon, another Lakesider. As Norma and I began to chat--perhaps it was herb class with Jan Hilty--our conversation turned to how food impacts our lives--and mine in particular. I think of the old overused adage: "We are what we eat." It is timely.

End pt. 1--look for Joan's story of how she changed her health problems and complaints by changing her diet.

Health care worker on HR 3200

This is a viral e-mail, if that makes you toss it, so be it. I won't even try to track it down, because the numbers make some sense, and I'm a bit math challenged.

From a health care worker

Rationing HealthcareShare

Today at 1:23 pm I was able to be a part of a large roundtable on healthcare reform last week. I refuse to be one of those people who criticizes but never gets involved. It's like the people who complain about politics but never vote. The hypocrisy, to me, is over-whelming.

After reviewing (endlessly) HR-3200 and reading countless people's interpretations of it, I am back where I started: This is a common sense issue. We can't make a trillion and a half dollars appear by wishing it into existence. We can't create Medical Clinics that can survive without income. We can't make doctors work 24 hours a day. None of the 'math' in any of this proposal makes sense.

There are some facts in health care that people 'outside' of health care don't understand. One of these issues is a 'payor mix.' Using arbitrary numbers to make it understandable, it goes something like this:

It costs 25 cents on every billable dollar to actually see a patient (a bill for a hundred dollars actually consumes 25 dollars in resources). Private Insurance reimburses 40 cents on every dollar (leaving 15 cents for 'profit.' [40 cents - 25 cents actual cost]) Public insurance reimburses 10 cents (creating a deficit of 15 cents per patient). The healthcare facility takes the 15 cent loss away from the 15 cent profit made on the privately insured patient, so that the facility doesn't lose money. So, if a Physician is able to see 20 patients a day, they have to be careful that no more than 10 of them are publicly insured. That number is realistically lowered to 5 because there must be some money for future expansion, charity care, research, and (God-forbid) some profit for the people who make it work. Because of this FACT in healthcare, every provider must watch their 'payor mix.' If there are more publicly insured patients than privately insured patients, then money runs out really quickly. So what does this mean under the 'new' healthcare plan? There is only one logical conclusion: rationing of healthcare. Not mandated by law, but mandated by necessity. Since the number of 'public' slots is rationed to 25% already...what happens when the number of people needing those slots triples? Well, to be frank, nothing. The facility can only see 5 patients (25% of 20), or they don't remain financially soluable. So what will happen is, wait times will triple. Right now, in my practice, the wait time to see a Physician (even if you are privately insured) is about 6-8 weeks. Publicly insured can be two to three times that, depending on specialty. Using 2 months as a really conservative estimate, means that the wait time goes from 2 months to 6 months.

And so, current (and future) problem number 2: Since the patient can't get into the clinic to see their doctor, they go to the emergency room for a non-emergent issue. Emergency Rooms are substantially more expensive to operate. Here, the cost may be 50 cents on the billable dollar instead of 25. And, it is a fact that most of the people who go to the emergency room at the hospital that I work for are publicly insured patients (not UN-insured, as the government would like us to believe). They go there because their healthcare is already rationed. Privately insured patients have a tendency to avoid the ER for non-emergent issues because they, most often, have a co-pay percent. They won't pay 20% of the ridiculously high priced ER if they can wait and pay it on a lower-priced clinic visit. The publicly insured do not care because it costs them NOTHING either way. And so, more and more go to the ER. Since the public insurance reimbursement does not cover the costs of being seen, that deficit is passed on, again, to the privately insured, causing the facility to 'raise' their payor mix to offset the costs.

This is a factual cycle that already exists in healthcare, and will only get worse as public insurance expands.

And it will expand far beyond the currently uninsured. Smaller businesses who currently offer health insurance (averaging between 12 and 15 percent of their payroll expenses) would possibly see the 8% fine (for dropping their employee's coverage) as the only way to stay afloat. There WILL be a mass exodus from private insurance companies. People who like their coverage WILL lose it. Healthcare will become even more rationed. But look at the bright side. It will only cost us 1.5 trillion dollars, according to the Federal Government's projections. . .by the way, the federal government's projected cost for the 25-year Medicare start up was 10.6 billion....it actually cost 107 billion.

To try to put the amount of money that we are talking about into perspective, let me put this forward:

Counting seconds backward:
1 million seconds ago was about 11 days ago
1 billion seconds ago was in 1979
1.5 trillion seconds ago was approximately 46,000 BC.

We can't afford any part of this math, even if the $1.5 trillion estimate weren't 1000% off.

Call your congressman. Really.

Now, I don't have a name to track down for that e-mail, although the reimbursement plan and ER problems sound just like what I've heard about from people who work in medical care. However, this "pediatrician" was apparently a plant, and not a doctor, just a woman pretending to be, at a Texas Townhall. Whether the Obama folks planted her we don't know, but I've never heard a doctor (expect Toes' brother) who supported this.

See her story at Patterico's Pontifications. The Houston Chronicle ran with her story, and didn't check it out. Is anyone who she says she is any more?

How liberal is your church?

Christians fight about almost everything--baptism, end times, Bible translations, role of women in the church, clothing (is a zipper more worldly than a button?), but on politics, they do have some agreement. You are probably a member of a liberal congregation (although not necessarily a denomination) if you can spot the key words in your literature, sermons, workshops, retreats, magazines: Healthcare reform, social justice, inclusiveness, peace at any price, Bush blaming or bashing.

If you find yourself nodding in agreement (or nodding off) with most of your religious life speakers, academic faculty and government retirees/CNN wannabees hired to inform and entertain you, then you're in a liberal church. And that's probably where you are comfortable, and where you belong. Peek in the congregational wallet. Conservatives give more than liberals at every level from voluntering time to donating money, but all churches could benefit if the $5/week folks would just double that. Churches could then be right up there with the gambling industry, which incidentally would fall apart without Christians like Governor Strickland, a former Methodist pastor.

Journalists vote 100:1 Democrat party to Republican. Librarians vote 223:1 Democrat to Republican. So that reflects what we see in the news, what gets published and which titles are purchased for public libraries. This is your community; do you really want it from the pulpit? Or check the speaker or preachers' resumes. A Congregational, Episcopal, Lutheran or Methodist pastor who believes marriage is for one man and one woman is probably on his or her way out the door in career terms. Many churches now have their sermons on-line--that might be a clue. Major universities don’t promote conservative faculty (if their views are public) and faculty at 2nd and 3rd tier colleges are probably hoping to move up. For that they'll need to carry the liberal union card. There is no freedom of thought, speech or publishing at major name universities; there is some at the smaller schools. Check the buzz words in the publication or sermon or workshop titles. Terms like “food insecurity,” “health disparities,” "income gaps," “intervention research,” “community-based,” “upstream,” or “racial bias” ought to be red flags. If sin is an old fashioned word in your church, except where it appears in criticizing the Republican party, yes, you are in a liberal church, and I hope you find it safe and comfortable with your beliefs never challenged by Scripture. When you find out you can't even reform yourself, let alone a whole town or country, we will welcome you home with open arms.

The smoking violin

Each week in the Lakesider (our weekly newspaper) there's a notice about smoking in "public areas." By next summer you won't be able to step outside a shop, restaurant or auditorium to smoke, because you'll be on public grounds. Depending on how that's interpreted, everything here belongs to the association except your cottage. An oldtimer told me last week (because we've only been coming here since 1974 we aren't oldtimers yet) that when he was a child, the cars and luggage were searched carefully before visitors were given a gate pass to be sure no one was bringing in alcohol. Not sure what they'll do about the smoking violinist I've been seeing for 30 years. Every day during symphony season, he walks the streets when he's not performing or in rehearsal. This man probably walks 4 or 5 hours a day and looks no different than the first time I saw him.

Smoking is rather rare these days among the educated middle and higher income group. It's just not reinforced among your peers, the way it was in high school, or the working place of blue collar workers. Obama's first tax was on the poor, less educated and lower income people. His plan to tax the middle income is buried with the health care premiums combined with the tax code in his single payer plan. The Lakeside violinist is probably not wealthy, but the new tax didn't defer him. I imagine his wife, mother, colleagues, doctor, pastor, friends, everyone has told him to stop. I don't think Lakeside rules or the President (who hasn't stopped smoking himself) with higher taxes, will stop him. It's a mind altering drug, and terribly addictive, particularly if started young when the brain is still developing.