Obama's "Death Panel"

[Pens1566]

/facepalm

 

[SP33Demon]

CNN says Death Panel = false.

A shame when you have to dumb it down for the masses, but at least it takes away Palin's ammo now and she'll stfu.

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: SP33Demon

Originally posted by: Specop 007

Originally posted by: sandorski
Fail. There were no "Death Panels" which were going to arbitrarily decide Who Lives/Dies. It seems you and Palin fail at comprehension.

Then why remove the provision? Why remove something that wasnt there to begin with.

You know rationed health care HAS to occur, because its the only reasonable way to control costs.

Even Obama knows this.

Click

THE PRESIDENT: So that?s where I think you just get into some very difficult moral issues. But that?s also a huge driver of cost, right?

I mean, the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill out here.

So how do you ? how do we deal with it?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think that there is going to have to be a conversation that is guided by doctors, scientists, ethicists. And then there is going to have to be a very difficult democratic conversation that takes place. It is very difficult to imagine the country making those decisions just through the normal political channels. And that?s part of why you have to have some independent group that can give you guidance. It?s not determinative, but I think has to be able to give you some guidance. And that?s part of what I suspect you?ll see emerging out of the various health care conversations that are taking place on the Hill right now.



Ok, we just wont call them Death Panels. Gotchya.



Click

So Obama "suspects" that the legislative process will produce some sort of independent group that can give non-determinative "guidance" on end-of-life care for the chronically ill, with an eye towards saving money. Just don't call them death panels!



Why remove what wasnt there. Oh wait. It must have been there, because they removed it! Of course they wont admit thats what it was and of course the fools running around will of course support the claims made by the political criminals. No suprises here so far.

They took it out because they overestimated the IQ level of America, including you. You can't pass something the morons can't understand unless it has a free side of extra fries or a coloring book.

Pretty much.

 

[JSt0rm]

lets assume that death panels were real. Now lets assume that the death panels have been removed from the legislation. Have any of you changed your minds about uhc now that death panels are out?

 

[Fingolfin269]

This should be included in any UHC reform bill. Call it a "sunset panel" if it maes people feel better.

 

[Pens1566]

I think its pretty clear he's saying that a razor thin margin has been called "mandate" previously, making this look like a grand canyon of a mandate.

 

[Harvey]

Originally posted by: rudder

Originally posted by: sandorski

Fail. There were no "Death Panels" which were going to arbitrarily decide Who Lives/Dies. It seems you and Palin fail at comprehension.

The problem is that the legislation is open ended. You are a fool to think that UHC will not be rationed. It is the very real possibility that that is what we can end up with.

The problem is, you are a fool to think that including funding to pay for counselling regarding the choices available to those nearing the end of their lives is in any way the same as "death panels" deciding who lives and who dies.

Excluding this provision will cost patients money because, if they want such information from their own doctors, they will now have to pay for it. It will cost lives because fewer people will be informed that they can donate healthy organs, cornea, etc. that could save other lives after they expire.

This "death panel" the worst kind of fear mongering by the ethically challenged right wingnuts, bought and paid for by big overpaid, greedy execs from pharma and the health insurance industry at the expense of the health and well being of the American people and pimped by political whores like Sarah Palin.

PA-fucking-THETIC! :thumbsdown: :|

 

[JSt0rm]

Originally posted by: Harvey
PA-fucking-THETIC! :thumbsdown: :|

I expect nothing more from these people.

 

[Athena]

Originally posted by: rudder
The problem is that the legislation is open ended.

Did you actually read the provision in question )? There is nothing "open ended" there. You'll notice that it updates existing provisions of the Social Security Act -- provisions that were added in 1990 -- to be more specific about what services should be available to the patient.

For some reason, Sarah Palin had no problem with the concept of end of life counseling last year when she declared April 16 as "Health Decisions Day" for Alaska. And just last month, Newt Gringrich praised a Hospital in Wisconsin for ensuring that 90% of its patients had "advanced directives". In fact, Gingrich has frequently highlighted the need for end of life counseling in cost containment.

There was nothing open ended about the provision (nserted by Republican Congressman Isakson and considered by all sides to be non-partisan). What we had, was intentional fear mongering by people who knew full well what they were doing.

You are a fool to think that UHC will not be rationed. It is the very real possibility that that is what we can end up with.

Ask the 1500 people a day who turn up at Remote Area Medicine clinics about rationing. In any case, this specific provision had ZERO to do with rationing and Sarah Palin knew it.

 

[Pens1566]

Athena, I'm guessing a vast majority of those complaining about the legislation haven't even looked at it. Thats not as bad as those that have spent time looking at it and apparently just can't comprehend it and still spout all this bs.

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: Pens1566
Athena, I'm guessing a vast majority of those complaining about the legislation haven't even looked at it. Thats not as bad as those that have spent time looking at it and apparently just can't comprehend it and still spout all this bs.

Propaganda over Substance. Always a great policy with no negative consequences, ever.

 

[fskimospy]

I'm guessing Specop won't be returning to this thread.


Keep in mind that I merged his thread into an existing thread already discussing the topic of "Death Panels". Unfortunately FT doesn't have a feature to notify members when their posts and threads have been merged so his absence might be due to him being unaware of the merge.

Anandtech Senior Moderator
Red Dawn

 

[Athena]

Originally posted by: Specop 007
Then why remove the provision? Why remove something that wasnt there to begin with.

Because as Winston Churchill said: "A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can get its pants on".

The hypocritical flip-flops by Palin and Gingrich won't receive even one-one hundredth of the amount of coverage that the original claims did.

On the other hand, the fact that the Democrats folded in the face of overwhelming ignorance makes headline news everywhere.

I think the Democrats were intellectual cowards.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: WhipperSnapper

Did they remove the end-of-life counseling part that confused Americans who suffer from low IQs? I think it was a good move on their part and something I had thought they would need to do. Hopefully this will defuse some of the bogus claims about government "death panels".

Of course, the morons complaining about the fictitious government death panels conveniently ignore the very real death panels at the private insurance companies. One can only assume that they support and back the private insurance death panels wholeheartedly.

Your post above serves to prove that 'death panels' are real. It's not a bogus claim.

Yes, private insurers have 'death panels' and that's precisely why a gov spons plan would them too.

The point many of you seem to be missing is that while people seem to have accepted these death panels with their own private insurers, they simply do want that power in the hands of the federal government.

Now, one can argue with their reluctance to have the fed gov having this death panel 'power', but one can't fairly claim it's bogus issue.

Edit: It ocurrs to me that many who were decrying expanded government power over our lives in the name of 'terrorism' now argue for it in the name 'UHC'.

Fern

 

[DealMonkey]

As Fern's post above serves to illustrate: corporate death panels = just dandy; gov't death panels = OMG Revolution! Blood in the streets! And while corporate death panels will decide your fate based on how expensive your treatment is, at least the gov't could be expected to have some compassion considering there's no profit motive on their part.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
As Fern's post above serves to illustrate: corporate death panels = just dandy; gov't death panels = OMG Revolution! Blood in the streets! And while corporate death panels will decide your fate based on how expensive your treatment is, at least the gov't could be expected to have some compassion considering there's no profit motive on their part.

See bolded part - I suspect that's where these people disagree.

While there's no profit motive for the government, there is a cost reduction motive. And no real difference between for the person requesting a life-extending proceedure.

Fern

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally posted by: alchemize

Originally posted by: WhipperSnapper

Originally posted by: spidey07The FACTS are that you and others cling to those three isolated stories and then use that broad brush to curse "the evil corporations" to push your agenda of lies. It's old, it's tired and that's all you have.

These stories are not extreme nor isolated. The media is full of reports about similar stories happening to many people. There are also reports of people who worked in the industry and whose jobs were to rescind coverage for people, etc. Do you think they're making this all up?

So if they aren't extreme or isolated, what percentage of policies do you think are rescinded each year? Just a guess would be great...oh, and I'm looking for three numbers:

1) what percentage of individual purchased insurance is rescinded
2) what percentages of employer provided coverage is rescinded
3) What is the total number based on 1+2

I don't know, but based on the news reports it sure does sound like you have a significant chance of suffering rescission if you are diagnosed with a serious ailment. The relevant percentages here should be the percentage of people diagnosed with a serious ailment and not the percentage of insurance holders since most of them will never test the system.

Anyway, what is your point? That death panels at private insurance companies do not exist?

And now a question for you. Could you please explain why the American system is better than other systems when it spends 17% of its GDP on health care while leaving tens of millions uninsured or under-insured with the rest living in terror of losing their insurance when other nations are able to cover everyone with for a much lower percentage of GDP, often having a higher number of doctors per capita?

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: Fern

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
As Fern's post above serves to illustrate: corporate death panels = just dandy; gov't death panels = OMG Revolution! Blood in the streets! And while corporate death panels will decide your fate based on how expensive your treatment is, at least the gov't could be expected to have some compassion considering there's no profit motive on their part.

See bolded part - I suspect that's where these people disagree.

While there's no profit motive for the government, there is a cost reduction motive. And no real difference between for the person requesting a life-extending proceedure.

Fern

There were no "Death Panels". The idea of Private "Death Panels" was born merely to point out the ridiculousness of the whole "Death Panel" issue when what was really being proposed already existed in the Status Quo. The implication was that the Reform was adding something New that was insidious, not that Private Corps were more trustworthy than Government. The Trustworthiness angle is merely backtracking, trying to cover up ones' embarrassment of falling for the "Death Panel" propaganda. Sorry.

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: Fern

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
As Fern's post above serves to illustrate: corporate death panels = just dandy; gov't death panels = OMG Revolution! Blood in the streets! And while corporate death panels will decide your fate based on how expensive your treatment is, at least the gov't could be expected to have some compassion considering there's no profit motive on their part.

See bolded part - I suspect that's where these people disagree.

While there's no profit motive for the government, there is a cost reduction motive. And no real difference between for the person requesting a life-extending proceedure.

Fern

Well, at least you admit there's no practical difference between some faceless corporation making life choices for you and some gov't bureaucracy making that same decision. So *ahem* what's all the fuss about again?

 

[Pens1566]

So can someone quote the section of the proposed bill that creates the govt. death panel? Thx.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally posted by: Fern

Originally posted by: WhipperSnapper

Did they remove the end-of-life counseling part that confused Americans who suffer from low IQs? I think it was a good move on their part and something I had thought they would need to do. Hopefully this will defuse some of the bogus claims about government "death panels".

Of course, the morons complaining about the fictitious government death panels conveniently ignore the very real death panels at the private insurance companies. One can only assume that they support and back the private insurance death panels wholeheartedly.

Your post above serves to prove that 'death panels' are real. It's not a bogus claim.

Yes, private insurers have 'death panels' and that's precisely why a gov spons plan would them too.

The point many of you seem to be missing is that while people seem to have accepted these death panels with their own private insurers, they simply do want that power in the hands of the federal government.

The death panels at private insurance companies rescind your insurance when you are diagnosed with cancer and other treatable ailments. Are you saying that a national healthcare system would deny people cancer treatment? (Is this how it works in the other nations? I suspect that a horde of angry Brits would say otherwise.)

Now...remember...our government is the same government that wanted to keep a brain-dead woman, Terry Shiavo, alive. It also opposes legalized assisted suicide. Now it's going to do a 180, turn around, and create death panels? Maybe it will allow doctors to decide that spending millions of dollars to keep terminally ill people plugged into machines "alive" for a couple extra months (with very low or non-existent quality of life) doesn't make sense, but that seems very different from what the private insurance companies are doing.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: sandorski

Originally posted by: Fern

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
As Fern's post above serves to illustrate: corporate death panels = just dandy; gov't death panels = OMG Revolution! Blood in the streets! And while corporate death panels will decide your fate based on how expensive your treatment is, at least the gov't could be expected to have some compassion considering there's no profit motive on their part.

See bolded part - I suspect that's where these people disagree.

While there's no profit motive for the government, there is a cost reduction motive. And no real difference between for the person requesting a life-extending proceedure.

Fern

There were no "Death Panels". The idea of Private "Death Panels" was born merely to point out the ridiculousness of the whole "Death Panel" issue when what was really being proposed already existed in the Status Quo. The implication was that the Reform was adding something New that was insidious, not that Private Corps were more trustworthy than Government. The Trustworthiness angle is merely backtracking, trying to cover up ones' embarrassment of falling for the "Death Panel" propaganda. Sorry.

Of course there are.

Proponents of UHC have dragged out anecdotal stories of someone being denied a possible life-extending procedure by their private insurer because it was ruled not worthy of a try. Surely you cannot have forgotten all these stories back when UHC proponents were in the 'demonize private insureres' phase of this debate?

To first have elevated this issue in the selling of UHC and now deny it exists because it has boomeranged against you isn't going to fly IMO.

Fern

 

[jonks]

Originally posted by: Fern

Originally posted by: WhipperSnapper

Did they remove the end-of-life counseling part that confused Americans who suffer from low IQs? I think it was a good move on their part and something I had thought they would need to do. Hopefully this will defuse some of the bogus claims about government "death panels".

Of course, the morons complaining about the fictitious government death panels conveniently ignore the very real death panels at the private insurance companies. One can only assume that they support and back the private insurance death panels wholeheartedly.

Your post above serves to prove that 'death panels' are real. It's not a bogus claim.

It's an entirely bogus claim. Voluntary end-of-life counseling sessions are not what Palin is really complaining about. She seems to be worried about rationed care, which does go on in private insurance, but she's conflated the voluntary end-of-life counseling together with rationed care because it's a great lie. She has no beef with living wills, hell, Alaska passed a Living Will Day or something last year. She could only gin up fear however by repeating and insinuating the false claim that the gov't requires grandma to submit to an exam every 5 years to see whether or not she needs to be sent to the farm upstate.

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: Fern

Of course there are.

Proponents of UHC have dragged out anecdotal stories of someone being denied a possible life-extending procedure by their private insurer because it was ruled not worthy of a try. Surely you cannot have forgotten all these stories back when UHC proponents were in the 'demonize private insureres' phase of this debate?

To first have elevated this issue in the selling of UHC and now deny it exists because it has boomeranged against you isn't going to fly IMO.

Fern

A panel making nonbinding recommendations is nowhere close to the same thing and you know it.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey

Originally posted by: Fern
-snip-

Well, at least you admit there's no practical difference between some faceless corporation making life choices for you and some gov't bureaucracy making that same decision. So *ahem* what's all the fuss about again?

Personally, I accept the existence of death panels. I suppose some are willing to push for every possible proceedure that may extend their life (or one of a loved one etc). But I wouldn't choose to put myself through that.

So, for me the whole 'death panel' issue lacks interest.

However, I can image whether for ideological reasons (they simply don't want the gov having that power) or some practical reasons (you might be able to threaten a private insurer with litigation or bad publicity etc, but not the US gov) some have strong opposition to this. As hard as it is to fight the decision of a big private insurance company, it's much harder to fight the US gov.

Fern