What's the Hurry?

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

David Harsanyi | June 17, 2009

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Once all the recent spending, all those deficits and the failed "stimulus" begin to catch up with Congress and the president, more reactionaries surely will emerge. Once the White House honeymoon ends and people start posing some prickly queries, it's going to get even harder.

So that's the rush.

David Harsanyi is a columnist at The Denver Post and the author of Nanny State. Visit his Web site at www.DavidHarsanyi.com.

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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