Now Obama Discovers GOP Health Care Proposals?

Oh, the President must be really desperate

After repeating for months that Republicans have no solutions when it comes to health care reform, he now wants to discuss the very ideas he denied existed and has invited Republican leaders to the White House to find a “bipartisan” health care solution. How gracious of him.

You’ll have to excuse us for questioning the sincerity of the President’s newfound desire to work together. As Chairman of the Republican Study Committee, virtually every week in 2009, we requested to meet with the President to discuss health care and other central issues. Each time, a polite “thank you” email from the White House was the extent of our bipartisan discussions.  It’s interesting that only now – once his big-government dream is on political life support – does the President see a use for Republicans.  And it appears that use may be more political than rooted in policy goals.

In fact, the President’s invite to Republicans has come pre-packaged with some pretty audacious spin. For starters, this week the President has aggressively tried to frame Republicans as the obstructers to health care passage, unwilling to participate in the process.  That’s a pretty tough sell for a President with a 77-seat majority in the House and 59 Democrat Senators in the other chamber. And before taking that line, the President might want to check with his partisan partner, Speaker Pelosi, who famously told House Democrats they would be shut out themselves if they attempted to work with Republicans on health care.

That brings us to the second, more laughable, new claim from the White House: that the bill already contains Republican ideas and concessions from Democrats. Right.

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Tags: bipartisan negotiations, government health care, health care rationing, hr 3400, insurance mandate
Posted Feb 12th 2010 at 8:33 am in Congress, Healthcare, News, Obama, Politics | 74162163 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/tprice/2010/02/12/oh-the-president-must-be-really-desperate/Now+Obama+Discovers+GOP+Health+Care+Proposals%3F2010-02-12+16%3A33%3A00Rep.+Tom+Price+%28R-GA%29

Health Care Reform: The Dog That Was Not Allowed To Bark

Last week, Congressman Thad McCotter introduced a Bill HR 4500, The Freedom From Rationed Health Care Act, that invalidates a little known, hidden part of the Stimulus Bill. That hidden part of The Stimulus Bill created the rationing and enforcement boards.  Significantly, this “minor” fiscal trim makes the first part of ObamaCare null and void.

On November 7th, 2009, Speaker Pelosi marched to the podium and paraded her lap dogs to the microphone to proclaim “Victory” for herself, her Democratic House colleagues, and President Obama.  What about every other American? The “Victory” was the passage of the second part of ObamaCare, “The Health Care Bill.”  That’s right, the second part of ObamaCare is the 1,990 page bill that created 118 new boards, commissions, offices and bureaus. The same bill that will be paid for with (1)  $740 billion in tax increases,  (2)  a cut in Medicare to Seniors by $500 Billion, and (3)  a cost shift of $34 Billion to States in unfunded mandates.

This “Victory” was Pelosi’s and President Obama’s second victory on the health care front.  The first occurred under the cloak of darkness and obfuscation, in February 2009.  Hidden in The Stimulus Bill and passed into law were the ominous Obama, Pelosi, Reid rationing and enforcement health boards.

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Tags: doctor patient relationship, Glenn Beck, health care rationing, Health Savings Accounts, judge napolitano
Posted Jan 24th 2010 at 1:28 pm in Congress, Healthcare, News, Obama, Politics | 6469896 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/djanda/2010/01/24/health-care-reform-the-dog-that-was-not-allowed-to-bark/Health+Care+Reform%3A+The+Dog+That+Was+Not+Allowed+To+Bark2010-01-24+21%3A28%3A21Dr.+David+Janda

Rationing Medicare: Update

My last article, Medicare is Already Rationing Care, focused on one small aspect of a much larger story, a story every American needs to know. The battle over the meaning of medicine began 2,500 years ago, not last spring.

In the late 1990’s I gave a lecture entitled “Post-Hippocratic Medicine in the Shadow of Nietzsche” in response to Peter Singer, the chair of bioethics at Princeton University. Singer had proposed we not consider humans “fully human” until they reached five weeks of age (after birth). During the first four weeks, he argued, we should allow the overt killing of infants with disabilities. This was “cost-effective.” It served the “greater good” by controlling the skyrocketing cost of healthcare.

For a decade I studied the question ”How did America reach a place in her history where we could seriously consider resurrecting the ancient practice of infanticide?” What I discovered changed my life.

For the past 2,500 years physicians served only one of two roles in Western culture. They either followed Hippocrates and served the wellbeing of their patients, or they followed Plato and served the greater welfare of the State. The philosophy of Peter Singer is not new—it has been with us for millennia. We once again stand at these same fated crossroads of Plato and Hippocrates as we debate the future of American healthcare.

Based on my study of history, philosophy, and current events, I feared we were rapidly returning to the world of Plato; a world where physicians worked at the behest of government, not solely for the patient. To help Americans understand what was about to transpire, I launched  Physicians for Reform in 2006.

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Tags: Barbara Wagner, cancer treatment, consumer driven care, death panels, government health care
Posted Jan 10th 2010 at 6:01 am in Featured Story, Healthcare, Politics | 57846178 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/clgray/2010/01/10/rationing-medicare-update/Rationing+Medicare%3A+Update2010-01-10+14%3A01%3A51Dr.+C.L.++Gray

The Grinches Who Will Steal Your Health Care

After reviewing the latest version of health care reform emanating from “the greatest deliberative body in the world”, The Senate, I was transported to Whoville, target of The Grinch…..from this point forward renamed America. It would appear that “Your mean ones,”   Mr., Ms and Mr. Grinch (Obama, Pelosi and Reid) have heard and learned nothing from the town hall meetings and from all of the e-mails, phone calls, faxes and letters from ALL of us Whos.

The latest version of the Grinches’ health care reform is a carbon copy of the rationing of health care that passed the House in November. The core and the heart is three sizes too small in both versions, and cuts costs by denying and rationing care, the most inhumane and unethical means of cutting costs. However, Washington’s Grinches have added a couple of “presents” to further harm all of us Whos.

The Grinches’ first “present” is to “allow” everyone in Medicare, or who will soon be in Medicare, to pay for a larger percentage of the costs of this beast. How special is that? The Grinches Obama, Pelosi and Reid have decided to cut Medicare by $500 Billion over ten years to pay for their reform package, even though millions more seniors will be on Medicare in ten years. Let’s look at the data that the Grinches refuse to acknowledge.

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Tags: Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research, government health care, Grinch, health care rationing, health care reform
Posted Dec 20th 2009 at 5:38 pm in Congress, Healthcare | 49834267 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/djanda/2009/12/20/the-grinches-who-will-steal-your-health-care/The+Grinches+Who+Will+Steal+Your+Health+Care2009-12-21+01%3A38%3A55Dr.+David+Janda

Reason.tv: A True Tale of Canadian Health Care

Many advocates of health-care reform are admirers of Canada’s state-run, no-opt-out, single-payer system. Indeed, in 2003, President Barack Obama voiced enthusiasm for such a health-care program.

Proponents of Canadian-style health care should meet Cheryl Baxter, a Canadian citizen who waited years for hip-replacement surgery, only to be told that her operation would not happen any time soon. Instead of waiting, Baxter did what an increasing number of Canadians are doing: She flew to a clinic in the United States, paid out of pocket, and had a life-altering surgery in a matter of weeks rather than years.

Baxter’s experience doesn’t just throw damning light on Canadian health care. The sort of clinic she went to in Oklahoma suggests a different way of delivering health care in the United States, too: A simple fee-for-service
model in which providers openly advertise their prices, service, and reputation. Rather than a frustrating, complicated mess of intermediaries such as employers and insurance companies, U.S. health-care reformers should think about bringing medicine into line with the same dynamics that help deliver great service at great prices throughout most other parts of the economy.

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Tags: Canadian Health Care, Dan Hayes, death panels, fee-for-service, government health care
Posted Dec 8th 2009 at 8:02 pm in Healthcare, News, Politics | 4332660 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/ngillespie/2009/12/08/reason-tv-a-true-tale-of-canadian-health-care/Reason.tv%3A+A+True+Tale+of+Canadian+Health+Care2009-12-09+03%3A02%3A42Nick+Gillespie

A White House Power Grab that Congress and America Doesn’t See

To achieve the goal of a universal, single-payer health system, the White House must secure the power it needs by amending the Social Security Act to transfer pivotal controls from Congress to the executive branch.  This transfer of power would ultimately give the President and the majority party, in this case the radical left Obama White House and Pelosi-Reid led progressive Democrats, the authority to frame and manipulate new policy, coverage options, and reimbursements, ultimately reshaping the future US health care system into a something unrecognizable in this country.

The deliberate setup for the White House power grab is built into the each of the health care bills and, if they fail, little-known twin bills called “MedPAC Reform of 2009” are waiting in the wings.  The bills, S.B. 1110 and H.R. 2718, craftily amend the Social Security Act and transfer the Medicare guideline and rule setting processes, from the legislative branch to the executive branch.  These bills offer cover to one another in case one doesn’t pass the House or Senate, respectively.  Remember, Democrats need to gain executive branch authority by amending the Social Security Act over Medicare regulations and physician fee schedules to transform the health care system in a single-payer, socialized system.

More importantly, Medicare’s regulations and physician fee schedules are the keystone to developing payer systems and reimbursement models across the entire health care industry.  And where Medicare goes, insurers follow.

To underscore the far-reaching power, a bulk of the states already reference or utilize the Medicare guidelines and fee schedules in determining policy, coverage, and payment, which impacts certain state-specific plans, including, but not limited to, self-funded plans, automobile insurance payers, and state workers’ compensation funds and plans – affecting even Big Labor.   For the executive branch to have such authority over Medicare regulations with little oversight is alarming.  This raises further issues of the powerful impact these federal mandates could potentially have on the states in stripping them of their own management of their respective insurance industries.

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Tags: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, government health care, government rationing, government takeover, Health Care Financing Administration
Posted Dec 8th 2009 at 6:31 pm in Big Labor, Congress, Healthcare, News, Obama, Politics | 43214146 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/sahiller/2009/12/08/a-white-house-power-grab-that-congress-and-america-doesnt-see/A+White+House+Power+Grab+that+Congress+and+America+Doesn%27t+See2009-12-09+01%3A31%3A38SusanAnne+++Hiller

Health Care’s Coming Heart Attack – A Pre-Obama Care Death Panel?

If you would like a pre-Obama Care window into the possible future of American Health Care–if Democrats in Congress are successful in passing their sweeping health care legislation, you need look no further than government imposed rationing of heart disease prevention in this country. It is a travesty in the making and should demonstrate to everyone the capricious nature of government control over our health care.

I am writing of the Obama Administration’s – regulatory decision – to go ahead with a massive cut in Medicare payments to cardiologists. I emphasize that this is a regulatory decision because it was not made by the Congress legislatively (not that that would be ok) but, instead, it was made by the massive Health and Human Services Department of the US Government. Given the limited resources of the Medicare budget, in order to increase payments to general practitioners (in an effort to attract more such doctors – a good idea), bureaucrats needed to gore somebody’s ox and cardiologists were chosen (a horrible idea).

The decision to do so is astonishing.

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Tags: cardiologists, cardiology, death panels, government health care, government health reform
Posted Dec 6th 2009 at 11:11 am in Congress, Featured Story, Healthcare, News, Obama, Politics | 4179856 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/tdelbeccaro/2009/12/06/health-cares-coming-heart-attack-a-pre-obama-care-death-panel-2/Health+Care%E2%80%99s+Coming+Heart+Attack+%E2%80%93+A+Pre-Obama+Care+Death+Panel%3F2009-12-06+18%3A11%3A24Thomas+Del+Beccaro

ObamaCare: Let the Rationing Begin

Last week,  the Federal Government Ivory Tower trumpeted important news.  One of its illustrious Task Forces has decided that women in their 40’s would be the first to experience “Medical Darwinism.”

The United States Preventive Services Task Force, comprised of 16 appointees, decreed that:

1.       Women in their 40’s no longer need routine yearly mammograms

2.       Women aged 50-74 are to have mammograms only every other year

3.       Self breast exams are no longer to be done at any age

Of note, this Task Force does NOT have even one member who is a cancer specialist or oncologist, let alone a breast cancer specialist. This panel based its recommendations NOT on comprehensive new clinical studies or research, but rather on computer projections of certain data points.  A review of previous recommendations by the same Federal Government reveals that these recommendations are diametrically at odds with recommendations made just six months ago. So, what changed in six months?

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Tags: Arlen Specter, bending the cost curve, breast cancer, breast cancer screening, cost containment
Posted Nov 29th 2009 at 6:35 pm in Congress, Healthcare, Obama, Politics | 3791476 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/djanda/2009/11/29/obamacare-let-the-rationing-begin/ObamaCare%3A+Let+the+Rationing+Begin2009-11-30+01%3A35%3A18Dr.+David+Janda

Debate on PelosiCare: Crunch Time Tonight in DC

It is crunch time tonight in Congress. Speaker Pelosi is moving towards a full floor vote on the Obama/Pelosi Health Care Plan up for a vote. At the time of publishing, votes are expected around 8 or 9pm EST. I received a call early this morning that my Orthopaedic Services were in demand.  Apparently, the Speaker, the President’s Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel and their staffs have been “breaking arms of anyone and everyone in sight that is on the fence about The Bill.”  These Enforcers have put Freedom, Liberty and constituent representation aside.

Do your congressmen/women have any idea what is in this 1990 page Bill, and what it means for each and every American?  So you do not have to count, it creates 118 new boards, commissions, offices and bureaus.  Supposedly, ALL of these new entities will be selflessly looking out for your “betterment.”  Somehow, ObamaCare needs all of these levels of review and personnel to provide better and more available healthcare to more Americans, and plans to work this miracle do this at a fraction of current costs.  (Oh, and they will eliminate Medicaid fraud in the meantime.)  This has little connection with reality.

There is another option.  A different reform package has been purposed by The GOP Leadership, and every member of the minority has signed on.  In fact, before this debate is over maybe a few “Blue Dog Democrats” (now with broken arms) will sign on as well. This reform package:

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Tags: GOP heath care alternative, government health care, health care rationing, Health Savings Accounts, Nancy Pelosi
Posted Nov 7th 2009 at 4:04 pm in Congress, Featured Story, Healthcare, Politics | 2714678 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/djanda/2009/11/07/debate-on-pelosicare-crunch-time-tonight-in-dc/Debate+on+PelosiCare%3A+Crunch+Time+Tonight+in+DC2009-11-07+23%3A04%3A08Dr.+David+Janda

ObamaCare Vs. The Hippocratic Oath

Twenty-nine years ago I stood with my 150 classmates in Thorn Hall, at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago, as Dean James Eckenhoff asked us to raise our right hands and repeat after him:    

I will apply measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice.

I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect.  In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.

I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work.

Whatever houses I may visit, I will come for the benefit of the sick, remaining free of all intentional injustice.

Those words, from The Hippocratic Oath written in 400 B.C., changed my life and the lives of the thousands of patients my classmates and I have touched over the past twenty-nine years. 

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Tags: Barack Obama, Harry Reid, health care, health care rationing, health care reform
Posted Nov 1st 2009 at 6:17 am in Featured Story, Healthcare, Obama | 2358296 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/djanda/2009/11/01/obamacare-vs-the-hippocratic-oath/ObamaCare+Vs.+The+Hippocratic+Oath2009-11-01+13%3A17%3A22Dr.+David+Janda