By Charles Krauthammer
WASHINGTON -- In the 48 hours of June 15-16, President Obama lost the health care debate. First, a letter from the Congressional Budget Office to Sen. Edward Kennedy reported that his health committee's reform bill would add $1 trillion in debt over the next decade. Then the CBO reported that the other Senate bill, being written by the Finance Committee, would add $1.6 trillion. The central contradiction of Obamacare was fatally exposed: From his first address to Congress, Obama insisted on the dire need for restructuring the health care system because out-of-control costs were bankrupting the Treasury and wrecking the U.S. economy -- yet the Democrats' plans would make the problem worse.
Accordingly, Democrats have trotted out various tax proposals to close the gap. Obama's idea of limits on charitable and mortgage-interest deductions went nowhere. As did the House's income tax surcharge on millionaires. And Obama dare not tax employer-provided health insurance because of his campaign pledge of no middle-class tax hikes.
Desperation time. What do you do? Sprinkle fairy dust on every health care plan, and present your deus ex machina: prevention.
Free mammograms and diabetes tests and checkups for all, promise Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer, writing in USA Today. Prevention, they assure us, will not just make us healthier, it also "will save money."
(More...)
More Health Care Nonsense
Shared via AddThis
21 comments:
Krauthammer is Kool! Whether his well-reasoned words will lead to well-reasoned action by our legislature remains to be seen. But at least he speaks them.
Saddle up, tighten the chin straps.
Here comes the real reason the boy was placed in placebo before us.
Heads up.
Krauthammer- in his words he displays both intelligence and common sense.
I hope Congress listens to them. But unfortunately, Congress wouldn't recognize common sense even if common sense consisted of being the side of 10 foot barn and it smacked right into them.
I think The Dems need to take their fairy dust to Hollywood and then they would really be in a land full of fantasies-NOT REALITY.
The thing I like about Krauthammer is, he is intellectual,via common sense, without being a snob about it.
Yes, the pointed head types in DC need to listen to him and us - the people on health care, and many other issues as well.
I Agree ! Prevention of the Health Care Bill will save untold Lives and Money !
amen..The Town Halls have just begun!..Heh I'm bacccccccccccck! ;)
Opie, I'm glad he's one of the good guys. If he were on the Left, they'd have made him an icon.
Incoming,
I've gotta agree. The biting and scratching will only be chapter two.
I am sick of Obama. I don't trust what he says or does.
Terri...
Fairy Dust?
Good one!
Scalawag,
Getting Washington to listen has been the never-ending task. The town halls have certainly got there attention.
Kid, I'm ready for health care reform, but not this steaming pile of 'progressive' droppings.
Woman, welcome back.
Wetzy, if you recognize him as an angry Chicago political thug, you have no reason to trust him.
I've had the same thought ..prevention is such a smoke screen for BIG SPENDING....and SOUNDS SO GOOD, but in application, on a grand scale, it's dumb.
And, really, let US know what's good for our preventing ourselves from getting sick; we don't need the THUGGERS.
Fairy dust, INdeed.
The first way health care reform should be addressed is by not allowing non-citizens or their anchor babies to enroll in medicaid. Send em back where they came from.
Z, all the catch phrases and heart-tugging phrases will be pulled out on this one.
BRTR... What a novel idea.
The Libs would argue that we should provide medical care for the whole world. Free. Or, better yet, make millionaires pay for it.
It's weird times for sure. We must fight Obama and his government health care take-over at all levels. Oh yeah and SCREW the SEIU thugs!
Krauthammer knocks down the myth of preventative health saving dollars with cold hard facts. The reason, I think, that such fantasies take root is that our culture views national economics individually and accordingly makes individual economic issues national.
That is, one guy doesn't stop to think that his check-up (the guy who slams three burgers a day) is not the same as the guy who has no history of heart disease. Why would we suppose that either would need or desire a similar health plan?
Many today think economics starts and ends with how it affects them (thus they never bother to check out what happens with their neighbor, and so on, when they do or don't get a check up).
Similarly, many think that history began on the day of their birth. Thus, we get politicians in charge of the US Military named Barack Hussein Obama.
DC, we do seem to live in a nation without even a short-term memory.
The subject of History might as well be Molecular Physics.
Post a Comment