On Monday the Obama administration featured a gaggle of white-coated doctors rallying in support of Obamacare but it appears that Obama’s team was a bit out of its depth in arranging the handpicked cadre of physicians. As it happened, the president’s advance team accidentally invited a doctor that has long been opposed to Obamacare.
Obama’s office contacted Doctor Eric Novack to appear beside him in Washington during his rally/photo op even though Novack is a vocal opponent of the president’s policy prescriptions.
“They had 16 hours to Google me, but I guess no one bothered,” Dr. Novack told Kathryn Serkes, Director of Policy and Public Affairs for the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) in a video interview available at TakeBackMedicine.com.
Due to his stance against the president’s policy ideas, Dr. Novack turned down this invitation to go to the White House in support of the president but he wonders what this invitation says about the other doctors that did attend.
Dr. Novack says that it was very tempting to accept the “once-in-a-lifetime” invitation, but in the end, he had to say no. But it also makes him question whether the doctors who will be there today actually support the President, or even understand all of the details of the bills.
Doctor Novack, who once co-authored a paper for the conservative Goldwater Institute, is an Orthopedic Surgeon from Arizona.
According the the AAPS, Obama’s claim that Doctors overwhelmingly supports his extreme policy ideas is a false one.
Serkes also rebuts the White House claims that doctors overwhelmingly support the public plan. A recent poll on the AAPS web site, TakeBackMedicine.com shows that 93% of the doctors polled are even more adamantly against the President’s plans after his national address to Congress and the country on Sept. 9.
Further, pre-publication results of an AAPS survey show that about 80% of doctors would refuse to VOLUNTARILY take part in a public plan.
It seems obvious that Obama is flying by the seat of his pants with this whole thing and that is a dangerous thing, indeed.
On a related story, Representative Tom Price (R, Ga.) told The Hill that Obama’s handpicked doctors did not accurately represent physician’s views.
“I’m kind of surprised that a hand-picked group of physicians that were brought to the White House today were applauding a government takeover of healthcare,” Price said during a conference call organized by the Republican National Committee (RNC).
“I would suggest that a real cross-section of doctors would not be applauding a government takeover of healthcare,” he added.
And, as is evident by the doctors of TakeBackMedicine.com, not all doctors are lining up behind Obamacare.
(See story UPDATE)
Tags: dailydose, The Winning Line
Contrary to popular opinion in the media, the Individual Mandate, not the so-called public option is the key to stopping Obamcare in its tracks. Stop the Individual Mandate and the whole bill will unravel for lack of funding and mandatory participation in the scheme!
This is a very dangerous period because Nationalization will still occur even without an overt government run insurance plan like this “public option” provision everyone keeps fixating on - Wyden/Bennett and the Bacus bill are prime examples of this.
Here are the core elements what will be contained in the “health care reform compromise” after the so-called “public option” is in all likelihood dropped:
(a) Federal Regulation aka HEALTH CZAR/DEATH PANELS
(b) Employer/Individual Mandates aka NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE
(c) Government Subsidies aka MIDDLE CLASS MEDICAL WELFARE
With the Federal Government setting the rules, forcing everyone to participate, and is paying the bills for most of the middle class through subsidies how is this anything other than Nationalization?
CATO Inst. Health Care Expert Michael F. Cannon on the how the Individual Mandate is Government Run Health Care:
“The most hazardous health reform measure before Congress is not the so-called “public option,” but proposals to make health insurance compulsory via an individual or employer mandate.
Compulsory health insurance could require nearly 100 million Americans to switch to a more expensive health plan and would therefore violate President Barack Obama’s pledge to let people keep their current health insurance. In particular, the legislation before Congress could eliminate many or all health savings account plans. Making health insurance compulsory would also spark an unnecessary fight over abortion and would enable government to ration care to those with private health insurance.
Obama adviser Larry Summers writes that mandates “are like public programs financed by benefit taxes,” meaning that compulsory health insurance would also violate President Obama’s promise not to increase taxes on the middle class. Under the House Democrats’ legislation, some middle-income earners would face marginal tax rates over 50 percent (before state taxes).
The experience in Massachusetts belies the claim that compulsory health insurance brings down health care costs. The “shared responsibility” ruse allows Massachusetts politicians to declare success for a compulsory health insurance scheme whose actual costs reveal it to be a failure. Massachusetts also demonstrates that compulsory health insurance enables, and ultimately requires, politicians and government bureaus to control nearly all aspects of health care and medical practice.
Rather than make health insurance compulsory, Congress should make it more affordable by letting individuals control their earnings and choose their own health plan from any state in the Union.”
[...] posted at HealthcareHorseRace.com.) Possibly related posts: (automatically generated)Pants On Fire? Counting the lies in Obama [...]
[...] (Cross posted at HealthcareHorseRace.com.) [...]
[...] posted at HealthcareHorseRace.com.) ____________ Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer, has been writing opinion [...]