The True Cost of Socialized Medicine

Make no mistake about it. The Obama administration and liberals in Congress are gearing up to make socialized medicine a reality. Their goal? Let the people who run the DMV and post office be in charge of your medical care. Expect liberals to begin laying the groundwork with media stories that try to distort the issues and euphemize the true costs of socialized medicine. Take this quote from an AP article (emphasis added):

The U.S. spends about $2.5 trillion a year on health care, more than any other advanced country. Experts estimate that at least one-third of that spending goes for services that provide little or no benefit to patients. So theoretically, there's enough money in the system to cover everybody, including an estimated 50 million uninsured.

But one person's wasteful spending is someone else's bread and butter.

The office visits, tests, procedures and medications that the experts question represent a lot of money for doctors, hospitals, drug companies and other service providers. Dialing them back won't be easy. Providers will resist. Patients might complain their care is getting rationed.

The clear point of this passage is to begin laying the necessary groundwork for socialism, portraying freedom as greed. The ability to choose what health care you want is now described as "wasteful spending." The message is clear, with socialized medicine you will not have the freedom to make your own choices about health care, Washington bureaucrats will be deciding for you, whether you like it or not. You will not be allowed to get the health care you want, so that the government can take your money and spend it on someone else. This is pure socialism, and it will have the same costs as any socialist program. Production and quality will decrease, costs will rise, and the system will eventually fail. The current cost analysis being publicized is a scam, because it does not include the costs from fundamentally altering the incentives that are involved.

The only hope is for conservatives to stand united and try to build a coalition with so called "blue dog" Democrats, if they really exist (emphasis added).

Economists and other experts say the $634 billion that Obama's budget sets aside for health care will pay perhaps half the cost.

Obama is hoping the Senate comes up with a bipartisan compromise that would give him political cover for disagreeable decisions to raise more money, such as taxing some health insurance benefits. In the 2008 campaign, Obama went after his Republican presidential rival, Arizona Sen. John McCain, for proposing a large-scale version of that idea.

As usual, the politically savvy Dems, will try to push through their agenda, but still maintain political coverage for the negative repercussions by pulling "Republicans" into it. This approach demonstrates why I said that it is great for the country that "Benedict" Arlen Specter became a Dem, because the less so called Republicans available to be manipulated by the Dems on these types of ploys the better. If we ever hope to repel these plans, or reverse them, we need to make it clear to the electorate who is responsible for the plans that will cause the inevitable problems that will eventually arise from systematically dismantling the best healthcare system in the world. Lets pray our Congressmen have the fortitude to stand strong on this issue, and actually represent America's best interests for once.