Health care terrorism - Paul Krugman nails it...... oh yeah and IMPEACH!

The impeach part is just a nod to Jeff Lieber's current diary

This is about Paul Krugman's Op Ed in the NY Times today

Health Care Terror

Mr. Krugman makes the case that the "Medical Industrial Complex is doing whatever it can to protect their own fina ncial interests by attacking Michael Moore's film "SICKO", and by just trying to scare the hell out of everyone about single payer universal health care.

These days terrorism is the first refuge of scoundrels. So when British authorities announced that a ring of Muslim doctors working for the National Health Service was behind the recent failed bomb plot, we should have known what was coming.

"National healthcare: Breeding ground for terror?" read the on-screen headline, as the Fox News host Neil Cavuto and the commentator Jerry Bowyer solemnly discussed how universal health care promotes terrorism.

What I really like about Krugman is that he looks at it from an economists point of view. That way even the folks who will never buy (or never admit to buying) the moral aspect of this don't have any leg to stand on.

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics." So declared F.D.R. in 1937, in words that apply perfectly to health care today. This isn’t one of those cases where we face painful tradeoffs — here, doing the right thing is also cost-efficient. Universal health care would save thousands of American lives each year, while actually saving money.

So this is a test. The only things standing in the way of universal health care are the fear-mongering and influence-buying of interest groups. If we can’t overcome those forces here, there’s not much hope for America’s future.

•  Tip Jar

  by CTMET on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:02:47 AM PDT

•  The exclusive patent system

  that allows a company to charge whatever it wants for a drug is an ever-growing problem.

  All medical technology needs to be available under an all-inclusive 12% flat royalty on the wholesale price payable to the Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks and subject to division by agreement of inventor claimants or by a Patent Office employee using a point system laid down by Congress.

  by SingleVoter on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:13:39 AM PDT

  •  And am I mistaken?

    don't many of these companies receive extensions on the patent (I'm not sophisticated as to why) but I recall reading same.

    by xanthe on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:34:24 AM PDT

•  I'd like to make a biting comment but

  David Brooks opened my eyes yesterday on some Cato Institute thing on C-Span.  As an older "entitled" American living the good life (on SS) - I have to learn to make sacrifices.  Okay, that is my interpretation but it seemed pretty clear to me.  And it seems to be one of his themes.

  Listen up - the days of entitlement are over.  No, for us - not for them.

  The economic issue is an important way to talk about health care.  This admin has been a disaster to the country as a whole economically.  Why do people continue to listen to them?  Of course, I'm entitled so I'm immune.

  by xanthe on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:30:45 AM PDT

  •  There are sacrifices to be made...

    But sacrificing health care in your eldering years as an "entitlement" should never be one of them...

    by mudslide on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:42:36 AM PDT

    •  I have been making sacrifices all my

      life - first for my parents - my sister and I helped them buy their home - then my son - private school because public schools were dangerous.  I am happy to do my part - especially when people like David Brooke make sacrifices.

      My medicare recently went up because I sold my house one year and made a profit.  that seems completely fair to me.  (I hope they check my tax forms every year - we'll see.)  

      What sacrifices are you talking about mudslide - I'd like to hear - and you may have good points I haven't heard.  

      by xanthe on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 06:07:46 AM PDT

  •  The Cato Inst - it is to Larf

    Cato Inst has one thing and one thing only: money behind it. How they, and Heritage and AEI, parlay this into free network time is a scandal. To me, Cato exists to give cover to transfer what little workers and retirees from wage jobs have to the overly wealthy.
    [a] tax on wealth of 1% on those fortunes over $20 million per annum.
    [b] end the social security income cap.
    [c] institute a tax on the sale of stocks&bonds.
    [d] end mortgage deductions for 2nd, 3rd,4th, etc houses.
    [e] put the marginal income tax rates back to where they were in the 1950s: 70+%
    [f] raise the estate tax to 75% on those fortunes over $20 million
    [g] close the "foundation" loophole to keep the kleptocrats from sheltering their boodle.

    by daliscar on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 06:07:55 AM PDT

    •  thank you, Daliscar

      sometimes I think it's me.  Are you coming to the convention in Chicago?

      btw, you're a brick.

      by xanthe on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 01:11:10 PM PDT

•  I'm so glad he wrote about that

  I commented on the tactic in one of nyceve's diaries (see my comment Latest scare tactic from FRC, attached to nyceve's diary N.Y. Times (yawn) punts on healthcare.  Fox ran with the talking point, as did New York Sun.

  Turns out Ken Blackwell is behind it--after losing the Ohio Governor's race, he went to work for Family Research Council.

  From Tom Paine:

  Kenneth J. Blackwell, Ohio’s former secretary of state, long-time GOP political operative and an African American darling of both religious and economic conservatives. who was handily defeated in his race for governor by Democratic candidate—was recently hired by the Family Research Council (FRC)  as a Senior Fellow for Family Empowerment at Washington's premiere right-wing religious lobbying outfit.  

  "Over the years, we have known and worked with Ken Blackwell on the toughest issues facing families and our country," FRC President Tony Perkins  said in a mid-March news release.

  by CoolOnion on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:36:54 AM PDT

•  asdf

  When I heard them talking about National Health Systems causing terrorism, I thought, here we go again.  By their logic, allowing for a National Health System would allow these doctors to get lost in the governmental beauracracy.  

  Well, our healthcare system is moving toward corporate healthcare.  Fewer doctors in private practice.  More docs in corporations.  You think the government is a beauracracy?  Try a corporation.  And we all know that corporations excel at cover up.

  Another thought.  If people are so afraid of allow foreign docs in, why are we letting all these engineers in?  I am married to an engineer.  They are much more capable of planning an attack and carrying it off successfully.

   Just my thoughts.

  MKC

  by Deja Vu on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 05:55:45 AM PDT

  •  But the proposition is absurd, yet we notice it..

    ...and yet, because it's on Fox News, everyone is pulled into commenting on it, trying to make arguments against it and thus, the idea gains notice, is echoed by other media--cable, broadcast, and Internet,  and therefore some degree of credibility and millions of ears and eyes know of it.

    This is what Fox and other right wing media are so good at:  putting forth absurd ideas, and this particular one you may notice uses terrorism, something we are all scared to death of, with universal health care.  Thus, even though some people will write this idea off intellectually, their 'I'm scared' brain will still make a connection.  

    This meme is both brute force and also appeals to our fear based brain.

    Has anyone heard anything from Progressives/Democrats to innoculate us against this particular terror=health care  meme?  

    by quantumspin on Mon Jul 09, 2007 at 06:23:45 AM PDT