Facts vs. Myths

Analysis …

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There seems to be a lot of hype and rhetoric flying around about what shape health care reform will take if (when?) it passes, whether it’s single-payer or the public option that’s the true sign of evil, and who’s the real culprit behind its alleged demise. (Of course it’s all hype and rhetoric, else it wouldn’t be politics!) Several bloggers and experts have penned their takes on what they like and hate about the current bills that Congress won’t be getting to until after their August recess.

Also, the Huffington Post has a rundown of the facts and myths about  health care reform here.

The New Republic |  “Obama has never said that he favors a British-style health care system. Britain does not have a single-payer system. It has a socialized system, where the government directly employs all health care providers. Indeed, if you follow the link in Feldstein’s own column, it says, “A single-payer system would eliminate private insurance companies and put a Medicare-like system into place where the government pays all health-care bills with tax dollars.” Does Medicare own hospitals and pay doctors government salaries? No.”

Megan McArdle @The Atlantic |  “I know, most of you have already figured out why I oppose national health care.  In a nutshell, I hate the poor and want them to die so that all my rich friends can use their bodies as mulch for their diamond ranches.  But y’all keep asking, so here goes the longer explanation. Basically, for me, it all boils down to public choice theory.  Once we’ve got a comprehensive national health care plan, what are the government’s incentives?  I think they’re bad, for the same reason the TSA is bad.  I’m afraid that instead of Security Theater, we’ll get Health Care Theater, where the government goes to elaborate lengths to convince us that we’re getting the best possible health care, without actually providing it.”

FiveThirtyEight |  “”Single-payer” has to do with who pays for health care (in the case of single-payer, the federal government does). It has absolutely nothing to do with who provides health care. It’s the difference between the Canadian system, in which private doctors and hospitals are paid by the Canadian government (and indirectly, Canadian taxpayers) to provide health care to its citizenry, and the British system, in which the providers themselves — doctors, nurses, hospital administrators — are actually in the employ of Her Majesty’s Government. For that matter, it’s the difference between Medicare — a single-payer system for American seniors — and the British system. The Canadian system is nationalized health insurance. The British system is nationalized health care — or if you prefer, socialized medicine.”

Ezra Klein @The Washington Post |  “The public option is not now, and has not ever, been the core of the argument for heath-care reform. It is the core of the fight in Washington, D.C. It is an important policy experiment. But it was not in Howard Dean or John Kerry or Dick Gephardt’s plans, and reformers supported those. It was not in Bill Clinton’s proposal, and most lament the death of that. It is not what politicians were using in their speeches five years ago. It is a recent addition to the debate, and a good one. But it is not the reason were are having this debate. Rather, what has kept health-care reform at the forefront of liberal politics for decades is moral outrage that 47 million of our friends and neighbors are uninsured.”

The American Prospect |  “As the latest iteration of our once-every-generation-or-so effort to reform our disaster of a health-care system reaches its climax, we find ourselves at one of those times. The opponents of reform are getting serious now, and they’ve turned the volume on their megaphones of mendacity up to 11. Herewith, then, we have the 10 dumbest arguments currently circulating against health-care reform.”

Two interesting and under-reported takes on health care reform: GetReligion asks why the religious angle to health care reform has been absent from media coverage (Texas Faith, meanwhile, flat out asks Texas religious leaders whether health care is a moral imperative), and the comics blog Ecocomics looks at how comic book science could become a reality in the fight to lower health care costs.

News …

• Most self-proclaimed independent voters actually have a party preference (Read more).
• Your IQ isn’t an innate and static, but part of a complex system of learning that can change over time (Read more).
• What happens when soliders bring the hell of the battlefield back home; a gripping article series by the Colorado Springs Gazette (Read more).
• What $1 trillion looks like: