M2RB: ABBA (barf bags sold separately)
(Cat-tastic!)
My, my, at Waterloo Napoleon did surrender
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way
The history book on the shelf
Is always repeating itself
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way
The history book on the shelf
Is always repeating itself
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
By
Roger Kimball
Mitt Romney has promised that one of his first acts as president
would be to dismantle ObamaCare. (“Repeal and Replace ObamaCare” is the
operative slogan.) I like to think that his imperative attention to
ObamaCare is something more than a deliberate policy program. In part, I
suspect, it is an act of expiation, for ObamaCare is to a large extent
RomneyCare — the health care reform act that Romney oversaw as governor
of Massachusetts — writ large (writ very, very large).
And since RomneyCare has been around a few years longer than
ObamaCare (it came online in 2006), it provides an excellent laboratory
for seeing what happens to health care when the government takes over.
What is happening in the great Commonwealth of Massachusetts today is
what will be happening in the U.S. of A. the day after tomorrow unless
something is done about this legislative monstrosity eftsoons and right
speedily.
This morning, a cardiologist friend of mine sent me a note that contained a link to an excellent article in the Wall Street Journal
about RomneyCare as a guide to ObamaCare. By “cardiologist” I mean
“former cardiologist,” for like many doctors I know, he has left the
practice of medicine in disgust — disgust over the government’s steady
encroachment on his income in part, but also disgust over the way
government was intruding on the doctor/patient relationship and
bureaucratizing the practice of medicine, transforming doctors into
wards of the state and patients into abstract consumers of scarce
medical “resources” that the government was set to ration. (Why do you
think that new government guidelines suggest that regular prostate tests
and other screenings are unnecessary? It’s not because those tests
don’t pick up pathologies: it’s because they cost money and the
government wants to limit its expenditures.)
As I say, he is only one of many doctors I know who have left or are
considering leaving the practice of medicine because of ObamaCare.
Indeed, a recent study by the Doctor Patient Medical Association reports
that 83 percent of doctors have considered quitting
because of ObamaCare. But you don’t need me to tell you this: you
probably know plenty of doctors who have left or shortly will leave
their practices. And the flight of doctors is only one problem: “Even if
doctors do not quit their jobs over the ruling,” a precis of the DPMA
report notes, “America will face a shortage of at least 90,000 doctors
by 2020. The new health care law increases demand for physicians by
expanding insurance coverage. This change will exacerbate the current
shortage as more Americans live past 65.”
While you’re pondering what that is going to mean for your dotage and
the health care provided for your children, have a seat and prepare to
get outside some of the facts purveyed by that Wall Street Journal story
on “RomneyCare 2.0” from a couple weeks ago. (The full story may be
available only to subscribers. What follows are highlights.)
The bottom line? “Surging costs, price controls, physican shortages” — all that and “so much else.”
The idea of RomneyCare, as with the “Affordable Care Act” (a.k.a.
ObamaCare), is that it if insurance coverage were forced on everyone,
costs would go down. More people, bigger pool, lower costs, right? Nope.
Only lower quality of care, longer waits, more bureaucracy, and more
abuse of the system.
Some stats:
– In Massachusetts, 79% of the newly insured are on public programs.
– Health costs — Medicaid, RomneyCare’s subsidies, public-employee compensation — will consume some 54% of the state budget in 2012, up from about 24% in 2001.
Let’s pause over that terrifying statistic: more than half of the state’s budget will be consumed by health care costs.
There’s more:
– Over the same period state health spending in real terms has jumped by 59%, while education has fallen 15%, police and firemen by 11% and roads and bridges by 23%.
There’s only so much dough to go around. As government-controlled
medicine gobbles up more of the available resources, there is less to go
around for other important services.
Yet more bad news:
– Massachusetts spends more per capita on health care than any other state and therefore more than anywhere else in the industrialized world.
Why? Because of the horrendous inefficiencies built into socialized medicine.
All this is bad for patients, i.e., you and me. But it is also bad, very bad, for doctors.
Consider:
– Under the plan, all Massachusetts doctors, hospitals and other providers must register with a new state bureaucracy as a condition of licensure — that is, permission to practice. They’ll be required to track and report their financial performance, price and cost trends, state-sanctioned quality measures, market share and other metrics.
Were you thinking of setting out a shingle in Massachusetts as a GP,
cardiologist, obstetrician, gastroenterologist, etc.? Bet you’ll think
twice about that.
The Journal appropriately invokes Jeremy Bentham’s totalitarian idea of the all-seeing panopticon here:
– Massachusetts takes 360-degree surveillance and converts it into a panopticon prison. An 11-member board known as the Health Policy Commission will use the data to set and enforce rules to ensure that total Massachusetts health spending, public and private, grows no more than projected gross state product through 2017, and 0.5 percentage points lower thereafter.
Got that? Your doctor is actively discouraged from spending too much
on you lest that extra test that might save your life adds too much red
ink to the bottom line.
RomneyCare is a disaster unfolding before our eyes. I’ll leave it to
others to apportion the appropriate quantum of blame to its eponymous
architect or sponsor or whatever role Mitt Romney played in the creation
of the misbegotten piece of legislation.
We all make mistakes.
The
important thing is that Mitt Romney has recognized his mistake and has
credibly outlined a plan to make amends by repealing and replacing
ObamaCare. Meanwhile, team Obama continues to tout the most unpopular
piece of legislation since Prohibition.
And people wonder why I predict
Romney/Ryan will win by a landslide.
Related Reading:
Waterloo - ABBA
My, my, at Waterloo Napoleon did surrender
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way
The history book on the shelf
Is always repeating itself
Waterloo - I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo - Promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
My, my, I tried to hold you back but you were stronger
Oh yeah, and now it seems my only chance is giving up the fight
And how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose
Waterloo - I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo - Promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
So how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose -
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way
The history book on the shelf
Is always repeating itself
Waterloo - I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo - Promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
My, my, I tried to hold you back but you were stronger
Oh yeah, and now it seems my only chance is giving up the fight
And how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose
Waterloo - I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo - Promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
So how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose -
Waterloo - Couldn't escape if I wanted to
Waterloo - Knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo - Finally facing my Waterloo
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