What's the Hurry?

The problem with Obama's push for government-run health insurance

David Harsanyi | June 17, 2009

Weren't we promised some methodical and deliberate governance from President Barack Obama? What happened?

The president claims that we must pass a government-run health insurance—possibly the most wide-ranging and intricate government undertaking in decades—yesterday, or a "ticking time bomb" will explode.

If all this terrifying talk sounds familiar, it's because the president applies the same fear-infused vocabulary to nearly all his hard-to-defend policy positions. You'll remember the stimulus plan had to be passed without a second's delay, or we would see 8.7 percent unemployment. We're almost at 10.

A commonly utilized Obama straw man states that "the cost of inaction" is unacceptable. "Action," naturally, translates into whatever policy Obama happens to be peddling at the time.

When it comes to health insurance, though, there are still reactionaries. Take the folks at the American Medical Association, who have the impudence to claim that "reform" comes with the potential to destroy their industry and your choice.

"The introduction of a new public plan threatens to restrict patient choice by driving out private insurers," says an AMA statement. "The corresponding surge in public plan participation would likely lead to an explosion of costs that would need to be absorbed by taxpayers."

Guess what? That's the point.

A government-run public option can lose money perpetually. With the fiscal power of coerced taxpayers behind it, the public option would crowd out the private sector and demolish any competitive market—which is the only genuine way to bring down costs and keep the level of medical care high.

The Ted Kennedy-Chris Dodd Senate draft bill almost certainly would pave the way for single-payer, government insurance. And despite his protestations, Obama was once a supporter of a single-payer plan.

Moreover, the Congressional Budget Office, which has been a reliable pain in the butt for the administration with all its irritating "figures," contends that the bill would cost a trillion dollars. The CBO claims that even with the plan in place, 36 million people would remain uninsured in 2017. (Let's momentarily ignore the fact that the majority of the "uninsured" tally consists of the temporarily uninsured and those simply unwillingly to pay for insurance.)

Despite these concerns, Obama continues to claim the ability to "control" costs and expand coverage without, miraculously enough, adding to the deficit. Talk about a "ticking time bomb."

Doesn't a radical overhaul of one-sixth of the entire economy deserve more than "now! now! now!"?

There's a way to find out. As writer Virginia Postrel points out, we already have Medicare, a massive single-payer, government-run program and a "perfect environment for experimentation."

"If more-efficient government management can slash health-care costs by addressing all these problems," wrote Postrel, "why not start with Medicare? Let's see what 'better management' looks like applied to Medicare before we roll it out to the rest of the country."

As Postrel probably already knows, the effort to empower government with control of medical care is ideologically driven, making it impervious to experimentation. Socializing medicine is the grand prize for the left.

Comments

|6.17.09 @ 12:09PM|#

He should just tell us he'll nuke us if we don't do what he says. It'd be more direct and honest than the B.S. scare tactics he keeps employing.

|6.17.09 @ 12:12PM|#

LarryA|6.17.09 @ 12:15PM|#

About 1958 my father taught me that when a salesman offers a deal I have to sign right away, I should clap my hand on my wallet and leave.

Jake|6.17.09 @ 12:44PM|#

LarryA, that's almost identical to what my dad taught me in the 1970s.

The other applicable sales lesson I learned on my own: On a lark, my wife and I attended a timeshare presentation (yeah, in order to get a free Mexico weekend). After five hours of being pounded by the guy's pitch, we finally escaped. What was interesting about it was that we didn't have a single shred of information whatsoever from the meeting--they wanted us to be as uninformed as possible in addition to signing the deal right then.

The Mexico trip was worth it, just barely--and probably more for the sales education than anything.

Cloner|6.17.09 @ 12:48PM|#

"LarryA, that's almost identical to what my dad taught me in the 1970s."

As did mine. It's called workin' the hustle.

Peter|6.17.09 @ 1:38PM|#

You guys must be related.

|6.17.09 @ 2:16PM|#

You'll remember the stimulus plan had to be passed without a second's delay, or we would see 8.7 percent unemployment. We're almost at 10.

Did I say 8.7 percent? I meant 18.7. My measures have already *saved* us 8.7 unemployment percentage points.

Craig|6.17.09 @ 2:16PM|#

Isn't asking the Obammunists to slow down the rush to socialist medicine like asking someone who has announced plans to rob you, burn down your hospital, kidnap your doctor, steal your prescription medications, and unleash a plague to please not do it all at once, without holding enough meetings first to discuss it?

Why not just tell them to stop, and to stop trying? Who wants to be left with less money and worse health care?

Julio|6.17.09 @ 2:45PM|#

"Who wants to be left with less money and worse health care?"

Marxists.

Matt|6.17.09 @ 2:59PM|#

AHAHAHAHAHA! When the honeymoon ends? The honeymoon is never going to end. The next eight years is going to be a race to see which member of the White House press corps can ram more of Obama's cock down their throat.

|6.17.09 @ 4:06PM|#

The Beloved Leader claimed that opponents to the government healthcare are using scare-tactics to sour public opinion. I guess he's getting confused by the reflection in the mirror. He is the one using phrases like "ticking time bomb." He is the one who is telling us we are all going to suffer dire consequences if we do not get this plan passed NOW. There has to be something hidden in this bill that he does no want us to see. Otherwise, if i were so great, why couldn't we take a bit and debate it?

AxisofReason|6.22.09 @ 10:29AM|#

Like many critics of health reform, Mr. Harsanyi offers a parade of hypotheticals, but no empirical evidence.

The current reality:

Fact -- health care costs have skyrocketed for a decade under the vaunted competition of the current private insurance market.

Fact -- Administrative costs, sales and marketing costs and profit margins are costs that only apply to private insurers. Public insurance schemes in other countries do not bear these costs.

Fact -- Despite spending far more as percentage of GDP on health care than any other country, US life expectancy ranks 50th in the World.

Hollow predictions about the potential consequences of prospective policy changes are neither constructive nor credible, particularly if one does not acknowledge the insustainability of our current system. We have a cost problem that burdens American corporations and families.

http://axisreason.blogspot.com/2009/06/conservatives-competition-and.html