Obama's incoherent health care message

Ramesh Ponnuru:

There are two basic points about health-care reform that President Obama wants to convey. The first is that, as he put it in an ABC special in June, "the status quo is untenable." Our health-care system is rife with "skewed incentives." It gives us "a whole bunch of care" that "may not be making us healthier." It generates too many specialists and not enough primary-care physicians. It is "bankrupting families," "bankrupting businesses" and "bankrupting our government at the state and federal level. So we know things are going to have to change."

Obama's second major point is that--to quote from the same broadcast--"if you are happy with your plan and you are happy with your doctor, then we don't want you to have to change ... So what we're saying is, If you are happy with your plan and your doctor, you stick with it."

So the system is an unsustainable disaster, but you can keep your piece of it if you want. And the Democrats wonder why selling health-care reform to the public has been so hard?

...


He has more on the mixed messages from the Democrats. I would add that Nancy Pelosi seems to be saying that even if you like the health care you have now from the insurance company "villains" the Democrats are going to mess with it. Then there is Obama's changed message from health care reform to insurance reform. It is really surprising that anyone trust them on this issue.

Comments

  1. Reaganite Independent5:00 PM

    Now the DNC is deploying AFL-CIO palookas while at the same time hypocritically dismissing Obamacare opponents as paid shills -even running TV ads to slander them- and delirious SanFranNan is seeing imaginary Swastikas.

    This should make clear to anyone just what these power-drunk elitists think of your opinion.

    Note that whenever Obama, Emanuel, or Gibbs are asked about why polls show SO many people oppose their misguided Cap-n-Trade and Obamacare proposals, they ALWAYS segue-right-into “we need to educate the public…”.

    LOL- save your breath... Constitutionally-aware American patriots don’t take lectures from Marxists.

    http://reaganiterepublicanresistance.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. Aviva Gabriel4:33 PM

    By telling folks who opt out of paying for insurance that they'll have to pay a 2.5% tax, Obama is incentivizing the young and healthy to buy medical insurance.

    Few of the young and healthy will pay 2.5% in taxes to get...nothing! More will choose to buy medical insurance to avoid the tax.

    Thus, risk will be spread out. Insurers will have healthy people paying into the system over longer periods. Premium prices will not have to escalate to compensate for a lack of young, healthy customers.

    Premium prices may escalate for OTHER reasons, but not for the one you cite -- a narrow spectrum of old, sick people who are newcomers to paying for insurance.

    I believe it's fair to levy a 2.5% tax against people who refuse to invest in health care while young (if at all possible). Why should they reap the benefits of all the people who paid in for years by "buying in" when they reach 50 or 55?

    We ALL must contribute, according to our ability, to health insurance when healthy; it's our moral and fiscal obligation to our society and fellow humans.

    4:30 PM

    ReplyDelete
  3. Aviva Gabriel5:02 PM

    Oops. I meant to post the above comment in a blog post entitled "Obama's insurance reform 'plan.'"

    My comment doesn't relate to the topic of this particular blog post. Let me remedy this problem!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Aviva Gabriel5:03 PM

    Oops! I meant to post this to "Obama's Insurance Reform 'Plan,'" and not this one.

    Let me go remedy my error!

    ReplyDelete

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