Monday, December 21, 2009

Health Care

For the past year the debate has been raging over “Heath care”, democrats suggesting that they want to reduce cost for those with insurance, insure those that are not or can not be insured, and guarantee through mandate that every American can buy insurance regardless of pre existing conditions. All noble and worthy causes! With Medicare fraud topping the 60 billion dollar mark there is no doubt that we need more controls. There is no doubt that people should have access to health insurance and that we should insure that for those that can not afford it, we provide some avenue for their health care needs. These are all reasonable and noble causes that every American can get behind, because every American knows a cancer survivor that can not get health insurance, they know those with fewer means that make the choice of housing and food over insurance of all kinds, not just health. The need is real and the cause is just, but are the methods being pursued noble and just? Or are the democrats simply seeking a means to an end (that end being single payer socialized medicine)?

Some of you may not realize that the federal government already has a couple of health insurance companies. One is Medicare, administered by the federal government with a budget of over $400 Billion dollars a year (14% of the nation’s total budget) with fraud that is rampant at 15%. Did you get that? 15% or roughly $60 Billion dollars of the over $400 Billion dollars is fraud and abuse! By 2013 the budget for Medicare will tower at $500 + Billion Dollars and represent a whopping 16% or our total outlay to the federal government, Please keep in mind that total defense spending is 20%.
The other is Medicaid; Medicaid is a subsidy program that disperses monies to the 50 states for them to partially fund health care for the indigent, low income, and uninsured. The budget for Medicaid is $216 Billion dollars in ’09 representing 7% or federal spending. If you do the math, the federal government spends 21% of OUR federal tax dollars on “Health Care” for us, the American People. Both systems are wrought with abuses and the government has done nothing to correct the problem. Instead they are budgeting cuts to these two programs that will reduce payments to doctors who are already cutting services to Medicare and Medicaid patients, reduce the amount of time they will pay for the rental of oxygen tanks for those that need them, yea that’s right, and cut the patient training for various services to seniors. GREAT plan! Do the people managing these plans strike you as the ones you want running your health care?

The reality is that the democrats do not want what they say they want, the reality is what they, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, have suggested it is… they want a single payer system and this is the way to get it! If the federal government passes this “Health Care” act, the costs will be so staggering that they will have no option but to either eliminate the program (equal to giving up control, and when have you ever seen the government do that?) or eliminate the system that exists and force a single payer system. By doing this they can mandate pricing and salaries for doctors and hospitals, they can ration the expensive tests, and as Obama said with his own words… evaluate the logic of spending a majority percentage of our health care dollars in the last few years of our lives (See Great Britain).

When Medicare was implemented in ’65 the house ways and means committee estimated that the Part A outlay would be 9 Billion Dollars annually by 1990, the actual cost for Part A… $67 Billion! Oversight? Inflation? The reality is that congress tells the American people whatever they must in order to get the bill passed. Like Medicare, this health care bill will not come in on budget and with the REAL cost being over $1 Trillion Dollars who knows what the final cost will be. If the Health Care bill follows the trend you will see it topping $1.5 Trillion Dollars, Is this sustainable with a total budget in ’09 of $3 Trillion dollars? And as you can see from the numbers above, Medicare has grown over 400% since ’90… can we afford a $4 + Trillion dollar bill in 19 years?
Sometimes the question should not be, can we do something but should rather be should we. We can fix health care though tort reform and mandates to insurers, by giving tax breaks to hospitals and doctors for un reimbursed costs, etc.

For the sake of your children and grand children, call your senator and DEMAND their NO vote on this bill. Ask them if this is so important, why they are willing to ram rod this through in reconciliation (a simple majority vote). They are killing this country and will destroy our ability to compete in the world.