Morgen Richmond
HotAir.com
4/5/2012
In the summer of 2009, at the peak of the legislative debate over ObamaCare, a video clip we produced at my old blog went viral of former Labor Secretary Robert Reich speaking at UC Berkeley. Reich was giving a made-up campaign speech demonstrating what a candidate for president would say if they were being fully honest with the American people. It’s an oldie but a goodie, especially in light of recent events. Watch:
Reich would subsequently claim his comments were taken ‘out of context’ (don’t they always), but the campaign ‘truths’ he revealed are looking more and more accurate. Take Reich’s first assertion, that re-organizing the health care system to improve care for everyone would require the young and healthy to pay more. This reality of course is at the very center of the Supreme Court debate over the individual mandate, with several of the Justices, including Elena Kagan, noting that the mandate will force young people who would otherwise elect to not buy insurance to subsidize the healthcare costs of others. The fate of the mandate is yet to be decided – but Reich was right.
Reich’s next statement was that healthcare reform would require the rationing of drugs and advanced medical technologies for the elderly in the last years of their lives in order to cut costs. Leading to his now infamous conclusion that ‘we’re going to let you die’. Just this week reports came out of an initiative from the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation (ABIM) recommending that doctors reduce or eliminate their use of 45 common medical treatments the Board deemed ‘unnecessary’. Frivolous things such as stress testing for cardiac disease, the use of imaging in cancer diagnosis, and even the prescription of antibiotics in some cases….
The article continues at HotAir.com
Related: Germany set to tax the young.
GERMANY is proposing to levy extra taxes on the young to pay for the costs of the country’s growing numbers of old people, under government plans for a ”demographic reserve” levy.
Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats have drafted proposals that, if law, would require all those over 25 to pay a proportion of their income to cushion Germany against a looming population crisis.
The German Chancellor’s ruling party is seeking extra sources of revenue to pay for soaring pensions and bills for social care costs as Germany’s ”baby boomer” generation ages amid a decline in the birth rate…
Update: Illegal aliens get top notch health care, say immigration officials
If a Mexican national wishes access to a full array of healthcare services, all they need do is cross the border into the United States and make certain they’re captured by agents from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE).
Providing quality healthcare to illegal aliens who are in ICE’s custody is an important and challenging task — one that Assistant Director for ICE Health Service Corps (IHSC) Dr. Jon Krohmer claims is taken very seriously, officials at the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement on Tuesday.
The ICE Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) ensures the safe and humane conditions of confinement for aliens detained in ICE custody. This includes the provision of reliable, consistent and appropriate health services…
