Ruin Your Health With the Obama Stimulus Plan: Betsy McCaughey

[4dsc]

I thought this would make for a good discussion.. Thoughts??

Republican Senators are questioning whether President Barack Obama’s stimulus bill contains the right mix of tax breaks and cash infusions to jump-start the economy.

Tragically, no one from either party is objecting to the health provisions slipped in without discussion. These provisions reflect the handiwork of Tom Daschle, until recently the nominee to head the Health and Human Services Department.

Senators should read these provisions and vote against them because they are dangerous to your health. (Page numbers refer to H.R. 1 EH, pdf version).

The bill’s health rules will affect “every individual in the United States” (445, 454, 479). Your medical treatments will be tracked electronically by a federal system. Having electronic medical records at your fingertips, easily transferred to a hospital, is beneficial. It will help avoid duplicate tests and errors.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_mccaughey&sid=aLzfDxfbwhzs

[Aloha Spirit]

1. EHR usage has decreased medical errors significantly in nearby hospitals where studies were undertak

undertaken.
I read the article, and the links in the house version of the Economic Recovery Act, and was not convinced that doctors would be restricted in the way that the author suggests.
Daschle did not write the house bill, Obey's staff did. Having not read Daschle's book or been provided more about how Obey constructed that part of the bill, should I be convinced that this ties doctors' hands any more than they already are? The trickery that insurance companies and hospitals go through now to squeeze healthcare dollars out of the federal and state governments is ridiculous. I'm in favor of medicare and medicaid oversight, and also think that these provisions would save money, create jobs, and make healthcare safer and more effective. But that's just based on studies of healthcare changes in my state.

I'm glad you posted this... it's weird how we keep hearing about a down payment on universal healthcare, but that we haven't heard more about that in the cable news... I guess people are more worked up about TARP right now.

[Blue_Adept]

8. The reality of her article... and how Rush is using it.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200902100001?f=h_latest

[ErinBerin84]

9. welcome to DU.

Thanks for posting.


:)

[Blue_Adept]

10. heh

Been here since DU started, just don't post much.

[ErinBerin84]

11. oh, see

and I've been around for not so long at all.

But thanks for posting anyways, heh.

[Aloha Spirit]

13. Wow. Reassuring to know that that dope hasn't changed after all these years.

[ErinBerin84]

2. I'm interested to hear what everyone else has to say about this article

But I have issues with Betsy McCaughey....both for personal reasons that I can't talk about, and for issues with her that have been public. So, I'm probably already too biased, but again,I'm interested to see what everyone else has to say.

[terisan]

12. I have been pro-single payer universal healthcare for decades-but the the cost/

benefit ratios and other aspects of Daschle-type planning as well as prejudices against disabled people and others, are leading me to believe that the US is just not yet a cohesive-enough society (and still too beholden to polluters and other bad actors) for comprehensive universal healthcare that is fair and optimistic in its goals and objectives

In the era of the 1960s "Lifeboat Ethics" was a popular theme among people who thought they were being liberal. The main thesis was that the earth was a lifeboat and was too crowded for all the people on it and that some would have to be jettisoned. I think this theory has been resurrected in the Daschle-type planning.

[Bread and Circus]

3. I am all for a centralized medical record that patients and physicians can opt into.

[Uzybone]

4. I think she is full of crap

[terisan]

5. Medical Records should not be in a govt database. They should be held by patient or a central

database of the patient's choice. This would still make them available to a treating physician.

Our government has a history of not protecting individual privacy.

[Stephanie]

6. Betsy McCaughey Ross? Ex-wife of billionaire Wilbur Ross, who bought her the lt. governership?

Wilbur Ross is a billionaire steel magnate. He financed her campaigns and she became Lt. Governor, but Pataki booted her to the curb four years later. She then ran as a Democrat until Ross refused to finance her campaign anymore and then divorced her. She has a reputation for being wacky. I don't care what her opinion is on the stimulus. I wouldn't trust her opinion on anything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betsy_McCaughey_Ross

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9505E0DA113FF93BA25757C0A961958260&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

[Clear Blue Sky]

7. Databases aren't completely secure.

There is also the bit about rationing care. God help the old folks who will be denied treatment as their life expectancy is too short.