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AP Photo/Susan Walsh
10. Both sides of the aisle consistently reject it...and the more you push it, the more people turn against you (Obama's disapproval rating is now 56%).
9. You must deliberately stack the deck with slanted calculations and misleading budget gimmicks to manufacture the illusion that it is "deficit-neutral." ObamaCare will explode the deficit with 111 new federal bureaucracies.
8. While insisting that "reducing costs" is the central purpose, you refuse to do anything at all about the primary cause of skyrocketing costs--frivolous lawsuits (because trial lawyers are huge Democrat campaign donors).
7. Rather than reducing costs, as advertised, all indications are that it will dramatically increase them.
6. Once all the smoke and mirrors are cleared away, it is funded almost entirely by massive tax hikes...in the middle of a severe recession with double-digit unemployment.
5. The politicians have exempted themselves.
4. Most doctors oppose it, and 45% say they will quit practicing medicine if it passes.
3. It has been a total disaster everywhere it has been tried.
2. You must openly blackmail and bribe members of your own super-majority in order to keep your Constitution-trampling explosion of government intact.
1. The 10th Amendment expressly forbids you from even being involved in the issue.*
*For those who are constitutionally-impaired (liberals), click here for a simplified breakdown. As you will see, the left's bogus attempts to twist the "General Welfare" clause into a license for nationalizing everything away from the states don't even pass the laugh test...even according to the architect of the Constitution himself--James Madison.
Comments
8. While insisting that "reducing costs" is the central purpose, you refuse to do anything at all about the primary cause of skyrocketing costs--frivolous lawsuits (because trial lawyers are huge Democrat campaign donors).
Sorry, but wrong. First, almost no malpractice lawsuits are federal, so no federal law will affect them. (Also see your own argument re: 10th Amendment.)
Second, Texas passed some of the most extreme tort limits several years ago and, while that cut down on lawsuits, it did nothing to reduce either malpractice insurance costs or the rising cost of health insurance.
According to every study done, it turns out that lawsuits, frivilous and otherwise, have almost no impact on health care costs.
RC: "First, almost no malpractice lawsuits are federal, so no federal law will affect them. (Also see your own argument re: 10th Amendment.)"
So...trampling the Constitution to take over health care is okay because violating it in a much more minor way (by limiting frivolous lawsuits) is also unconstitutional? If forced to choose between them, the latter makes more sense.
Nice logic.
RC: "Texas passed some of the most extreme tort limits several years ago and, while that cut down on lawsuits, it did nothing to reduce either malpractice insurance costs or the rising cost of health insurance."
Sorry, but wrong...
Investor's Business Daily:
"The combination of prohibiting doctors and health care providers from being exposed to unlimited and arbitrary awards, and requiring an actual medical report at the outset, have cut the number of medical malpractice lawsuits in Texas in half."
www dot investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=509365
"Reality Check" indeed.
Where did I advocate 'trampling the Constitution'? I didn't comment on the bill overall, simply the common but incorrect assumption that tort reform was the answer.
Yes, it cut the number of lawsuits in half - BUT IT DIDN'T REDUCE THE COST OF HEALTH CARE, it's purported goal.
That's because it barely reduced malpractice insurance - and malpractice insurance really is only a tiny fraction of the total cost of health care. Combined, malpractice insurance and court awards make up less than 1 percent of health care costs.
All we as consumers 'gain' from tort reform is a restriction on our ability to sue doctors who actually screw up.
Here's a nice summary: www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/bus/columnists/jlanders/stories/DN-Landers_21bus.State.Edition1.9be351.html
And here's the General Accounting Office admitting that skyrocketing malpractice payouts and the insurance covering them is THE PRIMARY DRIVER of costs:
www dot gao.gov/new.items/d03702.pdf
Yet people like you continue to insist that cutting THE PRIMARY DRIVER of costs in half has nothing to do with costs.
Here is what ACTUALLY happened to malpractice rates in Texas:
www dot bizjournals.com/austin/stories/2005/10/10/story8.html
Also, limiting retaliatory punitive damage and making filers of bogus junk lawsuits pay their victims' court costs in no way keeps legitimate victims from suing.
Please stop misrepresenting things.
Additionally, all the evidence shows that skyrocketing costs coincide with GOVERNMENT INVOLVEMENT and less consumer choice...which is what ObamaCare will make ten times worse.
Medicare and Medicaid, for example, have seen rate increases at a third faster rate than everyone else. If you want health care costs reduced, curb frivolous lawsuits and GET GOVERNMENT OUT OF THE WAY.
Think about it. The post office, Amtrak, public schools, public housing public transportation...the private sector ALWAYS turns out a better product.
Here is a common sense way to put consumers back in charge (no Constitution-trampling, liberty-killing, deficit-exploding takeover necessary):
www dot investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=504860
The GAO ~only~ says that malpractice claims drive MALPRACTICE rates.
Dozens of health economists, the CBO ~and~ the GAO will tell you that malpractice costs - insurance and claims - are 1 to 2 percent of HEALTH CARES COSTS overall - and more recent studies say 1 percent or less, because most states already have instituted some kind of tort reform.
And I repeat: federal tort reform does nothing to affect decisions in state courts.
Bottom line is, you still don't get it - malpractice insurance rates and malpractice claims and awards are a miniscule fraction of health care costs; force-feeding some kind of federal tort reform will not save you or me a dime - and will expand that government influence to which you object.
It's nothing but political kabuki.
You want to reduce costs, you need real competition in the insurance business, not the limited options most people have.
I don't know that the much touted public option would fix that; the current bill, however, is crap.
And sorry, but limiting punitive damages creates a disincentive to avoid medical malfeasance, because it puts a top end on the penalty for being a bad doctor or, more commonly, an incompetent hospital or drug maker - the ones who might actually get hit with a large punitive judgment.
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