Health Care
Commentary
When Private Insurers Are No Longer Private
The New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn reports that IMS, a respected global research and consulting firm, projected back in March that American drug companies would actually suffer negative growth from 2008–13. Then came Obamacare — or even the prospect of it. Now, as of last month, IMS has updated its projections ...
Business & Economics
The Pillage People Ride Again
On November 1 California began withholding 10 percent more from workers’ paychecks than the government already takes. This money grab, bad enough on its own terms, is a sign that the state has missed an opportunity to modernize the tax system and provide more stable revenue. Those were the tasks ...
Health Care
John R. Graham on “Straight Ahead with Bob Grant”
“Straight Ahead” with Bob Grant John R. Graham, Director of Health Care Studies, is interviewed by Bob Grant on the proposed health care reform bill. John Graham talks about what is in the 1,990 page bill and the huge federal bureaucracy that will be created if this health care legislation ...
Commentary
Collective Neurosis in Maine: Big Government Bad, We Need Gargantuan Government
Unfortunately, Mr. Gardiner gives more than equal time for those who blame Maine’s failures not on government control, but a sick and poor population. Talk about blaming the victim! These folks also blame the fact that Maine has a single, dominant, health insurer – without recognizing the government policies that ...
Commentary
On the Grinding Pace of the Health-Care Take-Over: A Historical Perspective
The 1965 amendments actually proved very easy to legislate, with over 70 percent majorities in both chambers. President Johnson signed the bill on July 30. No disruptive town-hall meetings or tea parties that August! Although I’m pleased that the 2009 bill is taking a lot longer, I must confess surprise. ...
Commentary
PhRMA Is Shocked About GosHealth
The comedy highlight, of course, is the plaintive cry about “killing tens of thousands of jobs in our industry.” Did PhRMA believe that the $80 billion deal would have increased such employment? Did it not occur to them that the $80 billion inevitably would come to be an opening bid? ...
Commentary
Mission Remission
National Review Symposium, November 9, 2009 Now that we have lost the battle, how can we win the war? As the health-care debate moves to the Senate, Obamacare opponents should emphasize that the Senate bill is not remotely moderate. It would cost $1.7 trillion in its real first decade (2014–23), ...
Commentary
Enemies of the People
And so we have, yet again, a perfect illustration of the truism that socialism would work perfectly if only there were no people. Since we do have people, with all their self-interested motives and unwillingness to bend their inherent nature to ideological demands, socialism in practice encounters problems, known as ...
Commentary
On the ‘Sacredness’ of Government Health Care
There is no doubt that the political class believes the “system” to be sacred. This is not surprising: Any ruling faction needs an established religion to control the people, and health care is the most likely candidate in this secular age. After all, Henry VIII claimed to believe that the ...
Commentary
Mutiny in Scrutiny?
The House bill has passed — barely and belatedly — and it is now dead. Nothing like it will ever pass the Senate. The question now is whether anything will, now that the voters have spoken in New Jersey and Virginia — and now that the exceedingly narrow margin in ...
When Private Insurers Are No Longer Private
The New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn reports that IMS, a respected global research and consulting firm, projected back in March that American drug companies would actually suffer negative growth from 2008–13. Then came Obamacare — or even the prospect of it. Now, as of last month, IMS has updated its projections ...
The Pillage People Ride Again
On November 1 California began withholding 10 percent more from workers’ paychecks than the government already takes. This money grab, bad enough on its own terms, is a sign that the state has missed an opportunity to modernize the tax system and provide more stable revenue. Those were the tasks ...
John R. Graham on “Straight Ahead with Bob Grant”
“Straight Ahead” with Bob Grant John R. Graham, Director of Health Care Studies, is interviewed by Bob Grant on the proposed health care reform bill. John Graham talks about what is in the 1,990 page bill and the huge federal bureaucracy that will be created if this health care legislation ...
Collective Neurosis in Maine: Big Government Bad, We Need Gargantuan Government
Unfortunately, Mr. Gardiner gives more than equal time for those who blame Maine’s failures not on government control, but a sick and poor population. Talk about blaming the victim! These folks also blame the fact that Maine has a single, dominant, health insurer – without recognizing the government policies that ...
On the Grinding Pace of the Health-Care Take-Over: A Historical Perspective
The 1965 amendments actually proved very easy to legislate, with over 70 percent majorities in both chambers. President Johnson signed the bill on July 30. No disruptive town-hall meetings or tea parties that August! Although I’m pleased that the 2009 bill is taking a lot longer, I must confess surprise. ...
PhRMA Is Shocked About GosHealth
The comedy highlight, of course, is the plaintive cry about “killing tens of thousands of jobs in our industry.” Did PhRMA believe that the $80 billion deal would have increased such employment? Did it not occur to them that the $80 billion inevitably would come to be an opening bid? ...
Mission Remission
National Review Symposium, November 9, 2009 Now that we have lost the battle, how can we win the war? As the health-care debate moves to the Senate, Obamacare opponents should emphasize that the Senate bill is not remotely moderate. It would cost $1.7 trillion in its real first decade (2014–23), ...
Enemies of the People
And so we have, yet again, a perfect illustration of the truism that socialism would work perfectly if only there were no people. Since we do have people, with all their self-interested motives and unwillingness to bend their inherent nature to ideological demands, socialism in practice encounters problems, known as ...
On the ‘Sacredness’ of Government Health Care
There is no doubt that the political class believes the “system” to be sacred. This is not surprising: Any ruling faction needs an established religion to control the people, and health care is the most likely candidate in this secular age. After all, Henry VIII claimed to believe that the ...
Mutiny in Scrutiny?
The House bill has passed — barely and belatedly — and it is now dead. Nothing like it will ever pass the Senate. The question now is whether anything will, now that the voters have spoken in New Jersey and Virginia — and now that the exceedingly narrow margin in ...
