Health Care
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 ...
Commentary
What Would Yogi Say?
While the bill narrowly passed the House, it is not clear that Senator Harry Reid (D., Nev.) will be able to get the 60 votes needed to pass his bill by the end of the year. In fact, Senator Reid has said recently that it looks like his bill will ...
Commentary
Security and Stability
If Speaker of the House Pelosi is able to muster the 218 votes needed for passage by the House and approval later this year or early next year, there is no question that the final outcome will be higher premiums for all Americans and more uninsured. The president focused in ...
Commentary
Stupak Amendment
The goal here—the only goal—is to stop health-care socialism. Period. Giving the pro-life Democrats a reason to vote for it—passage of the Stupak amendment—seems to me to be madness. And suppose that it passes and the Senate passes its own version of health care “reform,” after which Waxman and Pelosi ...
Commentary
The AMA and AARP Don’t Speak for Doctors and Seniors
Hopefully the Congressional Budget Office will quit misleading people by saying that the House and Senate bills would each siphon hundreds of billions of dollars out of Medicare and spend it elsewhere. And hopefully the CBO will quit saying that if the bills don’t do this, they will add hundreds ...
Health Care
The AMA Is More a Monopoly in Crisis Than a Professional Association
As for the AMA, even the Wall Street Journal labels the AMA the “doctors lobby” (sic), while noting that 20 other physicians’ organizations are highly critical of the proposed legislation. Actually, state, county, and specialized medical societies are the real voices of the profession. The AMA is a business that ...
Business & Economics
Health Reform Would Bury Small Business
Investor’s Business Daily, November 6, 2009 President Obama recently delivered a special address aimed at quelling small-business owners’ concerns about Democratic plans for health care reform. The legislation, he assured, would “benefit millions of small businesses” and was “being written with the interests of Americans like you and your employees ...
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 ...
What Would Yogi Say?
While the bill narrowly passed the House, it is not clear that Senator Harry Reid (D., Nev.) will be able to get the 60 votes needed to pass his bill by the end of the year. In fact, Senator Reid has said recently that it looks like his bill will ...
Security and Stability
If Speaker of the House Pelosi is able to muster the 218 votes needed for passage by the House and approval later this year or early next year, there is no question that the final outcome will be higher premiums for all Americans and more uninsured. The president focused in ...
Stupak Amendment
The goal here—the only goal—is to stop health-care socialism. Period. Giving the pro-life Democrats a reason to vote for it—passage of the Stupak amendment—seems to me to be madness. And suppose that it passes and the Senate passes its own version of health care “reform,” after which Waxman and Pelosi ...
The AMA and AARP Don’t Speak for Doctors and Seniors
Hopefully the Congressional Budget Office will quit misleading people by saying that the House and Senate bills would each siphon hundreds of billions of dollars out of Medicare and spend it elsewhere. And hopefully the CBO will quit saying that if the bills don’t do this, they will add hundreds ...
The AMA Is More a Monopoly in Crisis Than a Professional Association
As for the AMA, even the Wall Street Journal labels the AMA the “doctors lobby” (sic), while noting that 20 other physicians’ organizations are highly critical of the proposed legislation. Actually, state, county, and specialized medical societies are the real voices of the profession. The AMA is a business that ...
Health Reform Would Bury Small Business
Investor’s Business Daily, November 6, 2009 President Obama recently delivered a special address aimed at quelling small-business owners’ concerns about Democratic plans for health care reform. The legislation, he assured, would “benefit millions of small businesses” and was “being written with the interests of Americans like you and your employees ...
