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Archive for the ‘Health care’ Category

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Health Care,ACORN,and the Democrats:Enough to Make One Sick

In Health care on December 22, 2009 at 9:52 am
According to an article in the Weekly Standard, ACORN will be able to receive funding  in Harry Reid’s health care bill. This has been an amazingly corrupt process,bringing the Democratic Party to a new low.The fact that Eric Holder isn’t investigating ACORN right now tells you all need to know.
Exclusive: ACORN Qualifies for Funding in Senate Health Care Bill

Senator Roland Burris is claiming credit for a provision in Harry Reid’s “manager’s amendment,” unveiled Saturday morning, that could funnel money to ACORN through the health care bill.

On December 9, Burris, an Illinois Democrat, pledged that he would filibuster a health care bill without a public option. “If we have to get 60 and it comes back and it does not have a public option in it, I will not vote for it,” he said. Then early last week he said he could vote for the bill if there were changes made to achieve the goals of the public option: “until this bill addresses cost, competition, and accountability in a meaningful way—it will not win [my vote].”

Asked last night before the Senate voted why he was planning to support a bill without a public option, Burris said: “We have a great bill–the best we could get. And it also covers most of our concerns: competition, cost, and accountability.” But had anything specifically changed in the text of the bill that helped him change his mind? Burris told THE WEEKLY STANDARD: “It was the disparity provision that was put in, which we had something to do with, in terms of making sure that diabetes and the other diseases that are affecting minorities are really studied by HHS in all of these pilot programs.”

The provision he cites, found on pages 240 through 248 of the manager’s amendment, requires that six different agencies each establish an “Office of Minority Health.” The agencies are the “Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.”

According to page 241 of the amendment:

In carrying out this subsection, the Secretary, acting through the Deputy Assistant Secretary, shall award grants, contracts, enter into memoranda of understanding, cooperative, interagency, intra-agency and other agreements with public and nonprofit private entities, agencies, as well as Departmental and Cabinet agencies and organizations, and with organizations that are indigenous human resource providers in communities of color to assure improved health status of racial and ethnic minorities, and shall develop measures to evaluate the effectiveness of activities aimed at reducing health disparities and supporting the local community. Such measures shall evaluate community outreach activities, language services, workforce cultural competence, and other areas as determined by the Secretary.’’

Rest of the article here – http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/12/exclusive_acorn_qualifies_for_1.asp

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The Truth About the Health Care Bill

In Health care on December 21, 2009 at 2:37 pm

Great article by Doc Zero – http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2009/12/20/the-illusion-of-design/

The basic argument in favor of government-run health care, among people who sincerely believe it’s the best way to reform the medical system, is that a program designed and administered by the State will provide health care to more people. As things stand, a certain number of people have no health insurance, and this is held to be unfair and dangerous… to the extent that the rest of us must endure a radical overhaul of the entire system, as the State takes control of the insurance industry first, and eventually all of medicine.

Why do these uninsured people lack coverage? The ostensible reason is that they cannot afford it, although in fact a sizable portion of the uninsured are young people who choose not to purchase expensive insurance, and many more are illegal aliens. Also, the nature of the laws surrounding health insurance make it very expensive to purchase privately, instead of receiving it as part of employment compensation, so rising unemployment (the signature feature of the Obama economy) means more uninsured. Still, the popular conception of the case for health care reform is based on the haunting image of millions of poverty-stricken sick people, wasting away from the lack of health insurance. As the slogan tossed around through Twitter earlier this year put it, “no one should have to die because they can’t afford health insurance.”

Why is health insurance so expensive that the poor cannot afford it? The Left believes this is a failure of the free market, with greedy health-insurance companies callously pricing their product out of reach, and slapping exorbitant premiums on anyone who isn’t the picture of health. The true answer is that government is primarily responsible for distortions in the health insurance market, dating back to the wage controls that made it commonplace for employers to offer health benefits as a means of attracting skilled employees. The law preventing the sale of health insurance across state lines is an example of government-induced price distortions. For a contrasting example of medical services becoming more affordable in response to free-market competition, consider the constantly falling price of Lasik eye surgery. The Left refuses to think clearly on this subject, and maintains that health care is a “human right” that should be available “free” to everyone.

Rest of the article – http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2009/12/20/the-illusion-of-design/