Sue Lowden, desperate to save her candidacy, falsely denies ever having advocated barter in an op-ed published by Politico:
Bartering, chickens and goats: these three words have put me at the epicenter of talk shows, late night TV and political commentary. I want to set the record straight, clarify my position and shed light on the real motives behind this attack.
The comment I made about bartering was not, and was never intended to be, a policy proposal. It was an example of how struggling families are working to pay for medical care in any way they can during these tough times.
Apparently, Politico doesn't fact check op-eds (which is great news for candidates who don't have to bother with being challenged by reporters with their pesky questions), so let me state for the record that Sue Lowden did in embrace barter as a realistic way to bring down medical costs for families without insurance. Moreover, she didn't do it just once, she did it twice -- and both times, she was on video.
"I think that bartering is really good," Lowden said earlier this month. "Those doctors who you pay cash, you can barter, and that would get prices down in a hurry." If you don't have health insurance, it's no big deal, because you can just "pay cash for whatever your medical needs are." What happens if you don't have enough cash? No problem! Just "go ahead and barter with your doctor." Bring a chicken or something. "I'm telling you, this works," Lowden said a week later. "Doctors are very sympathetic people. I’m not backing down from that system."
Now, the same Sue Lowden who said she's "not backing down" from barter, who said barter "is really good," and who said barter "would get prices down in a hurry," that very same Sue Lowden now says she never meant to propose barter and that she was merely giving "an example of how struggling families are working to pay for medical care in any way they can during these tough times."
Uh, no. Clearly, Sue Lowden embraced barter. She was enthusiastic about it! She said she wasn't backing off of it. And now, nearly three weeks later, her idea of damage control is to claim she never said it in the first place.