Obama’s misleading scare tactics
Last month, I gave the President a hard time for denouncing GOP scare tactics, while relying on his scary stories to build support for his healthcare plan. On Monday, ABC’s Jake Tapper pointed out that the President’s scary stories were “not quite accurate” or, in plain English, completely misleading.
First up, there’s the man who died when his insurance company cut off his chemotherapy because he allegedly failed to report he once had gallstones. Actually, the man got his coverage back, got his chemotherapy, and lived for three and a half more years.
Next up, there’s the woman with cancer whose coverage was cancelled because she forgot to report a case of acne. Turns our the acne had nothing do with her cancellation (although to Obama’s credit, it does seem the woman actually had some pimples.)
As Tapper notes, the whole truth still makes the insurance companies look pretty heartless. But if the President wants to denounce the liars and cynics who oppose his plan, he should work a little harder to be part of the reality-based community.
Incidentally, this was how I closed out my original post about Obama’s scary stories:
So I guess if I provide a few examples of terrible things that happen in Canada, I would’ve responsibly documented the perils of government-run healthcare?
Per the Wall Street Journal:
When the pain in Christina Woodkey’s legs became so severe that she could no longer hike or cross-country ski, she went to her local health clinic. The Calgary, Canada, resident was told she’d need to see a hip specialist. Because the problem was not life-threatening, however, she’d have to wait about a year.So wait she did.
In January, the hip doctor told her that a narrowing of the spine was compressing her nerves and causing the pain. She needed a back specialist. The appointment was set for Sept. 30. ‘When I was given that date, I asked when could I expect to have surgery,’ said Woodkey, 72. ‘They said it would be a year and a half after I had seen this doctor.’
So this month, she drove across the border into Montana and got the $50,000 surgery done in two days. ‘I don’t have insurance. We’re not allowed to have private health insurance in Canada,’ Woodkey said. ‘It’s not going to be easy to come up with the money. But I’m happy to say the pain is almost all gone.’
As I said before, anecdotes can’t prove a broader point. But they should at least be true.
Cross-posted at Conventional Folly
27 Responses to “Obama’s misleading scare tactics”
Hmm…so people on both sides are cherry picking bad examples of both systems. Sadly for America, it is much much easier to find examples of health insurance companies trying to deny coverage to insured customers than it is to find people in Canada that had to wait a long time for their surgery.
In Canada, you have to wait sometimes. In America, you get to die in an emergency room.
So basically the insurance company did kick him off…
Obama watched Bush and learned how to use scare tactics, the disciple has become the master.
Leonidas, “Obama watched Bush and learned how to use scare tactics, the disciple has become the master. It started with the stimulas being rammed through, and hasn't stopped.”
Wait a minute… The congressional Dems gave the congressional Republicans everything they asked for in the stimulus bill. Since when did that become ramming legislation through?
And by the way… the Dems are giving the GOP other things they want to see (or not) in legislation. Remember those “death panels”? That was put in the Senate bill by a Republican. And then when otehr Republicans didn't want it in, that provision was taken out.
What about the uproar in the healthcare bill about illegal immigrants getting healthcare? There was nothing in the bill which funded it, but it was traced back to possibly being about the enforcement provisions… so the legislation was amended to make absolutely clear that illegal immigrants would not be part of the healthcare overhaul.
The Dems just LISTENING to Republicans is way better than the GOP treated the Dems when the GOP was in power. The Republicans are getting lots of stuff they want in this legislation.
By the way, in case you've forgotten, the Republicans lost in November because America voted for the Dems (and Obama vision). The GOP won't be happy unless they're in power and the can get EVERYTHING they want.
So don't tell me that Obama is ramming legislation through. If that was the case, why wasn't the healthcare legislation settled months ago?
Let me give you a scare tactic grounded in reality.
An employee works for a small company for 20 years without calling in sick a single day.
One day, he turns up sick and when he goes to the Emergency Department, they diagnose a chronic illness (you pick it, cancer, diabetes, heart disease).
He is out of work for about a month since he is in the hospital, and on the third week of his hospitalization, he gets his notice of termination. In that notice, he is offered COBRA benefits, which will only cost him more than he was earning when he was working.
In a “right to work” state. This is not just plausible, but predictable. I have known people it has happened to.
So tell me, smart guy, what does this fellow do?
I really want to know what you think, because there are thousands of people hanging on your words.
Ah, yes. Scare tactics.
A more nuanced and honest look at health care insurance in Canada.
Here's the gist of this article. The right is bummed out about Obama using “scare tactics” to wield an agenda the author calls “his”…
The agenda, pal, is 80% of the People's agenda. Obama knows how to do math to get re-elected.
And the right having an issue herding with fear? Plllleeaaassseeee…lol…
Ever hear of Dick Cheney?
For your enjoyment…
What Canadian health care is really like: 1. My Health Card
What Canadian health care is really like: 2. Sword of Damocles
What Canadian health care is really like: 3. Heart surgery in a public system
“The people's agenda”.
No, pal. 80% believe healthcare needs overhauled – not, as you imply, want socialized medicine.
80% want healthcare legislation. If you were to put out a poll asking if people wanted strict regulation of healthcare, pharmaceuticals, insurance corps, and lawsuit abuse – OR – public option social medicine; I wonder which our countrymen would choose?
Scare tactics are not owned by Dems or Reps. Both use them. It's well documented.
In Canada, you have to wait to even GET a family physician. You are put on a waiting list and eventually you are blessed with being chosen. I several towns, they hold lotteries to choose names for the privilege of becoming a patient. So if you have a doctor yet, socialized medicine is GREAT for colds, flu, infection and the like. When you get heart surgery, biopsies, or any other critical procedure, you suffer the cold fate of waiting and possibly being denied. God forbid you want a vasectomy, breast reduction, or corrective eye surgery. Those procedures are “elective”.
JD Please supply a citation for your absurd lottery claim and waits for heart surgery. The same things happen in the US if you lack insurance, are poor or live in a rural area far from any research hospitals. While living near Ontario (Windsor), I don't here those stories or read that in any Canadian papers.
http://www.windsorstar.com/
No articles from the Star:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=lottery+he…
http://www.montrealgazette.com/
http://www.montrealgazette.com/health/men/solut…
This Google search of the Montreal Gazette shows no evidence of lotteries for care.
Myth: There are long waits for care, which compromise access to care.
There are no waits for urgent or primary care in Canada. There are reasonable waits for most specialists' care, and much longer waits for elective surgery. Yes, there are those instances where a patient can wait up to a month for radiation therapy for breast cancer or prostate cancer, for example. However, the wait has nothing to do with money per se, but everything to do with the lack of radiation therapists. Despite such waits, however, it is noteworthy that Canada boasts lower incident and mortality rates than the U.S. for all cancers combined, according to the U.S. Cancer Statistics Working Group and the Canadian Cancer Society. Moreover, fewer Canadians (11.3 percent) than Americans (14.4 percent) admit unmet health care needs.
Read about the other Canadian health care myths here:
http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_12523427
According to who? Please cite your source on this.
jeffersondavis, your citations for your opinions are???? Not sure why you think other commenters are uneducated about the difference between opinion made up in your mind, and reality. They/we actually read documents, studies.
OTTAWA – Sept. 28, 2009 – Canada continues to have one of the highest infant mortality rates in the developed world, a trend that has held since the 1990s, according to a new study.
Canada recorded five deaths for every 1,000 live births in 2006, placing it 15th out of 17 peer countries, according to a report card of health indicators released by the Conference Board of Canada Monday.
Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=20438…
Here's another;
Dr Joseph et al concluded that Canada's low rate of infant mortality can be attributed “substantially” to government health and social services programs designed in the 1950s and 1960s — such as the 1967 implementation of universal medical insurance
http://www.canadianmedicinenews.com/2009/01/pau…
And the sources should shut-up LionAslan for at least a second or two.
Mortality Rates:
http://www.canadianmedicinenews.com/2009/01/pau…
http://www.nationalpost.com/story.html?id=20438…
Long Waits:
http://healthcare.ncpa.org/commentaries/canadia…
These are Canadian sources about Canadian mortality rates.
And while the Canadian infant mortality rate is 5.4 per 1000 live births, the US infant mortality rate is 6.6 per 1000 live births according to this site. Here are a couple more tables. The numbers are different, but both agree that Canada has a lower infant mortality rate than the US.
So… What are you trying to prove there? According to the article you, yourself cited:
Do you want us to think you don't read your own sources? Done.
Yes, of course I read the sources. Wouldn't have posted them otherwise.
I did not say that our healthcare system didnn't need fixed. It has many many problems that could be addressed through tight regulation of the insurance, healthcare, pharmaceutical industries, as well as tort reform. However, as I'm sure you're aware, Congress doesn't want to go that route (either party) because their pockets are lined through those industries.
I noticed you didn't address the long wait resource.
That's established.
Oh, pardon me. Of course you read your resource. I was fooled into thinking you hadn't because of your failure to grasp the the implication in it that was most relevant to the US healthcare debate: that as bad as people complain Canadian healthcare is, the US has it even worse by every metric.
Except wait time.
So, you want me to address that one? OK. In Canada, to put it roughly, heart attacks go to the front of the line, hangnails go to the back, and everybody else lines up somewhere in between. Sucks if you're a Canadian with a hangnail; great if you're a Canadian having a heart attack. They triage their patients differently than we in the US do. In the US, money moves you to the front of the line and lack of money moves you to the back. (Except in the Emergency Rooms, but these are often clogged up with poor people who can't get treatment any other way.)
I daresay that the longer waiting times in Canada are part of the price they pay for having better overall health than US citizens do.
(Quick aside. My Canadian friend's father had a heart attack. He saw a specialist that night and was on the table having open heart surgery the next morning. We should all have such 'long' wait times. My own father had to wait at about a week for the same surgery. If my dad was wealthy instead of just middle-class, he could have gone to the head of the line, too.)
First of all, why the “tone”. Geesh!
Secondly, how can you describe all of the Canadians that come to the US in border states?
Let me guess. They all have hangnails?
And yet no one ever jets away to Canada for that delicate surgery that only the best in the world could provide. Happens all the time in America.
But like I said (and you chose to ignore), we have excellent care here. We have to regulate it to bring the costs down. Insurance, health, drugs, and lawyers all drive the cost up. But since the beloved Congress is in the pockets of those industries, we shouldn't expect change.
Guess what? Under single payer and public option, those industries will continue to make BILLIONS. That's why it's ok for single payer, and we'll never see true reform.
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/fu…
I might ask you the same. “Oh, how terrible! People in Canada have to wait sometimes because of socialized medicine! Wah, wah, wah! We don't want their system!” And then you get defensive when people call you on your… inaccuracies.
Yes, or other conditions that won't move them to the front of the line fast enough to suit them. They come to the US because they have the money to pay for the treatment they don't feel like waiting in line for. And Americans who can't afford to get adequate treatment in the US travel out of the US to find better deals. India, Thailand and Turkey are popular destinations for American medical tourists, and South Korea wants in on the action, too. (There's an information booth for medical tourists at Incheon International Airport; I saw it the last time I came home from vacation.) Before the violence got so bad, many Americans used to go to Mexico for dental care because it was so much cheaper there, and my Canadian friends tell me that quite a few Americans used to go to Canada on forged health cards until the Canadian Government found out and tightened up the ID requirements.
“Excellent care” means exactly nothing to people who can't get it. The US system is both “excellent” and immoral.
Canada has all those things, too. Why isn't their care as expensive as ours. What regulation did they put in place to keep the costs down while treating more people? It's on the tip of my mind…
And we don't want that icky “socialized medicine”, anyway. Yeah, the insurance lobby is powerful and too much of Congress is in its pocket, but slandering the Canadian medical system doesn't help anybody but the US insurance lobbyists.
You are absolutely correct. With all that you said, socialized medicine is still not a good thing.
You are absolutely refusing to at least TRY regulation of those industries first. You absolutely must have socialized medicine NOW, no matter what the cost and debt to the nation.
That's what makes people like me suspicious. Anytime a rush is called for, someone makes billions. If you truly cared for those that do not have health insurance, you'd at least try regulation, before you raised their taxes 10%.
1. Oh sure, regulate the health industries, that's fine. But answer me this: is there a single one of the countries that have better health outcomes that the US that doesn't have some form of socialized medicine? Inquiring minds want to know.
2. “Rush?” What “rush?” Progressives have been trying to get this done since Teddy Rooseveld's day. If that's a “rush”, sloths are Kentucky Derby contenders. And I'll tell you what makes me suspicious: People who use the phrase “If you truly cared for…” In my experience, people who say that are typically selfish types hoping to guilt others into going along with them. “I really care for others, so I guess I have to agree with you. I'm so sorry I offended all those poor people I didn't really care for until you enlightened me *sob, sob, sob, boo-hoo* &c.”
No, “If you truly cared for…” doesn't move me by a micron.
The scare (emotional-appeal) tactics are befitting, in that they are associated with childish rushing that the lib Dems have been doing all year. That the appeals to emotion may succeed with some is contemptible.
Do you always have that kind of venomous attitude? Stop taking this personal.
You said, “Oh sure, regulate the health industries, that's fine…but answer me this:”
Ok. You agreed that you are willing to try regulation first. That's a start.
And I'm not a “typical conservative with which you may be used to dealing”. I even said that if the strict regulation doesn't work, then go ahead with single payer. How many conservatives have you ever heard say that?
The conservatives are correct in a few things. You are correct on a few things. I only wish for our government to try regulation first. Then try a new approach. Just like with the sweat-shops in the early 20th century. The government stepped-in and fixed the problem with massive regluation. They could have taken over the industry, but they regulated it instead.
This isn't me trying to out-debate you. This is me trying to get something done for the good of the country, and my own wallet. I already pay way too much in taxes, and I don't want to pay any more. I'm tapped.
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