A new wrinkle on the whacked argument that health care reform is a cover for killing old people, via former Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen, appearing today on Fox: “You push elderly people into hospice instead of life extending treatments.”
This line of attack crystalizes for me one of the hallmarks of the anti-reform campaign. It implicitly acknowledges the worst deficiencies of the current system by arguing that reforms will make those existing problems far worse. Never mind that those deficiencies have proved to be intractable problems for the current system to address.
Current system rations care by excluding those who can’t afford private health insurance (New system will ration care!). Current system empowers insurance companies to deny coverage and refuse treatment. (New system will limit coverage and deny treatment!). Current system isn’t fully computerized and modernized (New system will give government access to your bank account!). Current system creates perverse incentives to over-treat patients and treats death as unnatural process (New system will kill seniors off by covering counseling on end of life issues and making hospice available!). And so on.
David Kurtz
David Kurtz is Managing Editor and Washington Bureau Chief of Talking Points Memo where he oversees the news operations of TPM and its sister sites.