Questions from a Medical Student for President Obama regarding his Health Care plan

Some of you who know me personally might be aware that in April I graduated Cum Laude from Brigham Young University with a degree in Chemistry. My family and I are moving in a few days to Temple, TX where I will attend Texas A&M College of Medicine (pause for cheers and applause).

Since I have chosen medicine as my career, I have paid close attention to the ongoing debate on single-payer nationalized systems vs. private healthcare systems. I will have to save my personal opinions on what our health care policy should be for a later post, but I will say that Obama's plan is among the worst. At least socialized health care has the potential of cutting cost (though it furthers the advance of the nanny state and will completely and utterly stiffle inovation in the field). Obama crosses his fingers and swears up and down that his plan will cut costs, though when faced with questions on specifics, as in specifically how the plan will save money, Obama goes into 20 minute long diatribes on how Health care is important for the little guy, and how too many people can't afford health insurance, and how the greedy SOB doctors are gaming the system trying to take advantage of the people. All the while, the press and the rest of His adoring fans, their Obama T-shirts sweaty with anticipation and lustfull zeal, look up to the Dear Leader with tearfilled eyes and sing paeans of eternal love to the Sun God. Meanwhile I am left to pondering specific points of his plan. Yesterday, my Mother-in-law informed me that she would be hearing somebody (probably not Obama himself) talk up the Dear Leader's health care plan for us plain regular folks. She asked me for some questions that she could ask. I obliged and jotted down a small list, but then I realized that she would only get to ask one, if any, and so I will post them here and if anyone else gets a similar opportunity feel free to use them.

If you happen to get an answer (or a non-answer) please let us know what Obama the beloved has to say on the matter. If you have some other question, leave it for the rest of us.

1. One of the central features of this plan is the "public option" health insurance plan. You have stated that the purpose of this plan is to provide a low-cost option to the American public and to maintain a competative atmosphere with private heath insurance companies. I have 3 questions regarding this aspect of your plan: First, what types of deregulation do you propose to allow private companies (which are currently under various state and federal mandates) to compete directly with your "public option"? Second, will the "public option" be subsidized at all by tax payer dollars, or will it be funded entirely by premiums paid by policy holders? And Finally, what is your plan for keeping the "public option" in the black? Specifically, when health care costs rise, who will take the hit financially? Will policy holders see an increase in premiums, or will physicians see a decrease in reimbursements, or a combination of the two?

2. You have repeatedly called for cessation of the "pay for service" mode of compensating doctors and instead called for a "pay for performance" modality? First of all, how do you propose to measure "performance"? Second of all, will pay for performance be applied only to compensation that comes from a government source, or will it apply to all compensation. And finally, where does the government get the authority to dictate how a private citizen is renumerated for a service he or she provides?

3. It is reasonable to assume (based on the performance of other federal programs) that the "public option" will require additional subsidy from the tax payer to cover its expenses. This combined with the practice of cutting physician's compensations will enable the public option to operate at a loss, thus enabling it to undercut any other private plan. Two questions, how are private companies supposed to "compete" with a federal entity that can opperate at a loss? Second, how do you propose to handle the influx of people who will enroll in the public option once their preimiums start to rise?

4. It has been estimated that between 15 to 20 million of the oft-quoted 45 million uninsured are people who are in this country illegally. Will your public option be available to them?

It has been a while.

With school, work, and family, I have not been able to post anything in several months. That does not mean I have given up the fight, nor been silent.

Yesterday, the US House narrowly (219-212) passed a sweeping energy reform bill that republicans are calling the largest "tax hike" in history. Among other things this bill calls for higher CAFE standards, a 50 % reduction in foreign oil dependence (a good idea, but we are supposed to do it without drilling domestically or exploiting nuclear options), and a mandate to set up a cap and trade system. Now, I don't know all the details of this bill, but that's OK because the majority of the senators who voted for it don't either. That's right, fighting global warming is so important that we don't even need to read the bill before we vote for it. Of course who can blame the representatives, the bleeding thing is over 1,200 pages long for crying out loud (The democrats tacked on an additional 300 at 3AM Friday morning). Who can be expected to read that?

The most maddening thing though is that this lost by a mere 7 votes, and their were eight republicans who crossed the line. See, I know what to expect from the dems. They are going to raise taxes, increase entitlements, and sell producing members of society up the river for their pipe dream of "social equality". Republicans on the other hand, the are supposed to be the ones defending our liberty and property from the gaping black hole that is Washington. I don't blame the 211 democrats for voting for it. I can expect nothing else from them. I blame the eight sell-outs who, rather than representing the interests of those who voted them into office, rather than representing the interests of the conservative movement who is their base, crawled into bed glassy eyed and sweaty palmed with the Sun God Ra-Obama and the rest of his cronies.

Never fear however, because I happen to have the contact information of those eight representatives:

Bono Mack (CA) 202-225-5330
Castle (DE) 202-225-4165
Kirk (IL) 202-225-4835
Lance (NJ) 202-225-5361
Lobiondo (NJ) 202-225-6572
McHugh (NY) 202-225-4611
Reichart (WA) 202-225-7761
Chris Smith (NJ) 202-225-3765

If we are interested in fixing our nation, then we need to become more vigilant. In 2010 or 2012, these gentlemen need to be out of a job. Our congressmen need to learn that when they sell us up the river for a bill they can't even take the time to read, and that the majority of citizens are opposed too, then they will be looking for new jobs come election time.

Palin and the Election in general.

It has been a few months since my last post. School has started again and my classes and research are taking up a large chunk of my time. Since my last post, Palin has been selected as McCain's running mate on the Republican ticket. Despite my silence in the blogosphere, I have been following the "Palin Phenomenon" with much interest. I think it is good that I have waited a few months to form a solid opinion of her before commenting on it.

First of all, I think that McCain's choice of Gov. Palin was successful at shifting some of the attention of the race from Obama. And, I think it maybe McCain's best chance at a victory. It is no secret that McCain is not highly-regarded by the base, and much of his post-primary campaign has been trying to convince Americans that, despite his "mavrick" image, he is a raging conservative. Fortunately for him, the American public has a short memory.

Let's call this what it is folks. Palin is nothing more than an attempt to pander to the conservative vote and true conservatives should be offended at McCain's attempt to win their vote. Let's assume for a moment that Sarah Palin is a strong, capable, and principled leader (a definite possibility, but difficult to discern considering her lack of history). Can anyone honestly picture McCain including Palin in his decision making process? Does anyone really think that McCain is going to consider Palin's opinion when forming policy. We all know McCain. He has repeatedly demonstrated himself to be a bitter, contemptable, miserable, old man with a chip on his shoulder. His performance in every single debate this election has shown his contempt and intollerance of anyone who dares to question or second-guess him. If he can't tolerate being questioned by the media or his opponents, how will he take criticism from his VP? Conservatives need to accept the fact that while Palin's selection is exciting, it will not have any effect on McCain's presidency. Face it folks, she was picked to look pretty, smile for the camera, and appeal to the base.

As an example, Palin has been asked several times to name specific instances on how McCain has pushed to increase government oversight. Repeatedly, Palin has been unable to cite more than a few examples. Here is Palin's dillema. McCain has been a crappy senator! After decades in the Senate, he has done relatively little of substance that is worth bragging about. Most of his pieces of legislation have been dismal failures, for which his name has been villified by conservative pundits and talk-show hosts. Notice that despite all his talk on being tough on pork-barrel spending, he did little to speak against the pork-filled 800-billion bailout package that was passed in the house today. Another good example is McCain/Feingold. You would think that Palin would hold that one up as demonstration of McCain's commitment to governmental oversight. Just one problem...conservatives HATE McCain/Feingold...flashing that one around wouldn't do much to help win over the base now would it.

On the debate the other night, Palin demonstrated her inexperience by passing up a clear opportunity to call Sen. Biden on his various inconsistencies with respect to American military action. Biden defended his support of military action in Bosnia, Somalia, and Darfur, by saying; "When a country engages in genocide, when a country engaging in harboring terrorists and will do nothing about it, at that point that country in my view and Barack's view forfeits their right to say you have no right to intervene at all."

I seem to remember another dictator in Iraq who had been gassing is own people. Why didn't Palin call him on that. So it is ok to go to war to defeat a dictator in Bosnia, Somalia, and Darfur, but not in Iraq? Palin didn't call him on that. Rather she ended the conversation by saying essentially that they could agree to disagree. What??? This demonstrates her inexperience folks.

She also kept attacking Biden on his status as a "Washington Insider". I am sorry, but is she suggesting that McCain is not an insider? As far as I can tell, the only difference between McCain and Biden, is that Biden has better teeth.

Another thing about the debate, Palin continued to cite McCain's war record as an example of his qualifications to be our president. I am sorry, but that didn't fly for Kerry and it shouldn't fly for McCain either. I am grateful to him for his service. I realize that he suffered greatly at the hands of the Viet Cong, and that he demonstrated his bravery many times over. Despite all that, it does not qualify him to be president. Move on!

It should be obvious to anyone with an attention span longer than a two-minute commercial break that Palin is a puppet. This leaves two options. 1) either she knows that she is a puppet and is fine with that (bad). Or, she honestly thinks that she will have a say in a McCain administration, which illustrates how naive she is (also bad).

So, back to my old question; "what is a conservative to do?" Honestly, I am still leaning to the free market solution. Let it burn. If the Republican party won't step up and grow the stones necessary to defend our ideals, then we must go shopping for a new party. If conservatives abandoned McCain and the republican party, then not only would Obama definitely win, but the republican party would collapse, making room for a new conservative party.

I think that most conservatives are willing to exchange their desire for a solid leader in order to defeat Obama. I am not convinced that an Obama presidency would be much worse than a McCain one. Look at Bush, while I do not hate him with the vigor that much of the media does, I find that many of his weaknesses stem from his inability to stick to the conservative principles that got him elected. While I disagree with almost every aspect of Obama's platform, at least he is relatively honest about what he plans to do (as honest as you can expect any politician to be). I am not so sure about McCain.

I have gas.

This is written in response to an editorial which appeared in the Daily Iowan on 6/23/08 and in the Daily Universe on 7/22/08. For the original article, click here.

This is in response to the op-ed piece “Offshore drilling: Not a quick fix” from July 22^nd. This farcical essay was yet another attempt by the liberal machine to dissuade the public from believing in those pesky laws of economics.

Of course, why would drilling for more oil bring the cost of oil down? That kind of thinking will get people hurt. The guest author from Iowa rehashes the tired rhetoric that we have been hearing since the seventies. “Even if the project began today…blah, blah, blah. Notice that the amount of time that it will take for drilling to have an effect on gas prices is about the same length of time that Al Gore says it will take for the earth to burn up. The Democrats insist that we can’t wait to take action with respect to global warming, but then they tell us that it would be pointless for us to address the energy crisis because 10 years is such a long time to wait.

Let’s have a look at some facts. The latest scapegoat for high gas prices is the demonic “speculator”. Notice that the very same day Bush ended the presidential moratorium on offshore drilling (and encouraged Congress to do the same) the price of crude dropped by over $5 a barrel. Coincidence? Now, pay attention. Speculators are gambling on what they think the market will do in the future. If they get the crazy idea that oil production will increase (thus decreasing the price of oil) then they will try to sell their shares while the price is still high which will cause the price of oil to decrease, just as it did last week. So, if something else happened that would shake the market, say for example, a massive increase of domestic oil production, what do you think the speculators would do?

The Democrat-led senate is fighting tooth and nail to convince the public that it is “Bush’s failed policies” that have caused the increase in gas prices. Let us not forget that our current energy policy is the Democrat’s brainchild. Domestic oil production is minimal, no new oil refineries have been built in decades. The Republicans have been crying for years to increase drilling, while the Democrats issue the same tired rhetoric. “Stop using, stop driving, stop eating, and stop growing!” Is it any surprise that the net result of an energy policy that refuses to produce energy has resulted in exorbitantly high energy prices?

Now, how about a real solution? We remove the moratoriums, the restrictions and the red tape surrounding domestic oil production. We take advantage of new technologies like oil shale and coal gasification. We build nuclear power plants to generate cheap, clean, virtually limitless energy. Then, while the lower energy costs are busy helping to stimulate the economy, thus allowing companies to expand and create jobs (good) as opposed to downsize and eliminate jobs (bad), we can focus on implementing new technologies and solutions that will help to further decrease our dependence on fossil fuels.

The best thing about these technologies will be that they will succeed or fail based on their merits. Notice that hybrids have started to catch on, not because the government is forcing them on us, but because the technology is finally making them attractive. Notice again how ethanol, which has been subsidized by the government for decades, has yet to have any effect on our oil dependence. If anything, the government subsidy has caused the technology to stagnate. If money is coming in despite how well the product actually works, then there is no incentive to improve the product. Ha! Capitalism wins again!

No more sitting on the sidelines

If you are still reading my blog, then that must mean that you are serious about conservatism. You must realize that conservatism is the only remedy for our nation's ills. The left wants you to belive that the government can solve all of your problems if you will only hand over all of your freedoms. Liberalism is equality at the expense of freedom. Liberals spout off about free health care, free higher education, guaranteed jobs, etc. but in return you must give up your right to spend and donate your income the way you see fit, your right to oppose social measures that you do not agree with, your right to make decisions about your life, from what kind of car to drive, to what doctor you want to see, to what you want to do as a career. Equality always comes at the expense of freedom.

Sound extreme? These things are already happening in Europe, the liberal "land of equality". If the government pays for your healthcare, then shouldn't they be able to say what doctor you go to? If the government pays for your school, then shouldn't they be able to dictate what you do with that degree? See where I am going with this?

Liberals talk about things like houses, cars, jobs, as rights, rather than things that have to be earned. They think that the government should be given absolute power to ensure that everybody has exactly the same things, of course the only way to do that is to take the wealth away from those that earn it, and give it to those who do not.

The reason that they are in power is because the regular people are duped into believing that you can set up this kind of system without any lasting consequences. Ask anyone, "do you want health care for free?" What do you expect people to say? Liberals believe that they can use the government to force a utopia.

Conservatives, on the other hand, don' t necessarily disagree with the ends. Would it be nice for everyone to have free health care? Sure. What about a job? Absolutely. Money? Food? Cars? Boats? Would it be nice if everyone was rich, affluent, educated, and productive? Why not? Conservatives realize that freedom must come at the expense of equality. If you give over all the power to the government, you are no longer free. Republicans realize that you cannot have a state induced utopia without destroying the very elements of society that made this country great.

Rush Limbaugh often asks; "With all of the countries and civilizations around the globe, some of which have been around for thousands of years, how is it that America, in a mere 200 years has risen to the top, and become the dominant superpower in the world?" The answer is in one word. Freedom. People came to this country, and they worked. The knew that they were not owed anything and if they wanted to survive, they had to scratch it out with their fingernails. Imagine where we would be if the waves of immigrants that came to this country in the 1800's and early 1900's had arrived, looked around, and sat down and waited for their government check? Where would our country be now? Yet this is what the liberals want for our immigrants today.

Liberals salivate at the prospect of changing our society, government, and economy to model that of France. France? When has France been at the forefront of anything? Europe criticizes us for being a warmongering nation, but it is our warmongering that preserved their freedom in WWII and the Cold War. Do they think that the USSR stopped at the eastern bloc because they just "didn't feel like going any farther"? No, it was because Ronald Regan showed that he and the rest of America had the onions to stand up to the Evil Empire and play chicken. We won, and Europe is still free to talk about how horrible we are.

The basis of conservatism is to maintain an environment, where the individual can succeed. The government cannot (and should not) ensure success, all the government can do is set the stage. Conservatives realize that in order for people to climb out of poverty, their must be a strong economy that will provide jobs to unskilled workers. When the economy is weak, those jobs are the first to go. When poor people have jobs, and work, they are able to gradually work their way out of poverty. This process sometimes takes generations, but we know that it works. When the economy is strong, we see that poor people are gradually becoming less poor.

Lets look at the alternative. A poor person gets a government check. This check is substantial enough that this person to maintain a standard of living that he otherwise could not afford. Now, that person could go, get some job training, and get a better job, but then he would make too much to qualify for the government assistance, but not enough to maintain the lifestyle that he currently has. So what does he do? Stays where he is, not progressing, not moving forward. The tragedy is that his children learn that rather than work hard and try to be successful, you do the bare minimum and collect your check from the government. In the work that I do, I see this every day.

Liberals see a man who has his needs provided for, and they revel in the fact that this man is completely dependent on the state. Conservatives see a man who is crippled. A man who will never move past this pitiful stipend that he government has given him. A man who has sacrificed his freedom and is enslaved to the government that is paying his rent. Who will that man vote for in the election? Say that the party that supports increasing his stipend, also supports some atrocious act like say...killing unborn babies (this of course is entirely theoretical). Who will this man vote for? Thus his moral conscience is hindered by his dependence on the state. This is what the liberal wants.

Friends, this is a war. A culture war. If you think any less of it, you are deluding yourselves. The liberal movement has gotten where it is, because conservatives are too busy actually contributing to society to be much concerned with the direction society is headed. That time is past. If you agree with the things I say, then you must act. Notice that the first words in the Constitution are "WE THE PEOPLE." If you are tired of the way things are going, then you must get involved. I am not just talking about voting. I am talking about really getting involved. Write to your congressman, get involved in local elections, stay abreast of the issues, and most of all, run for office. I am coming to the realization that if I want something done right, I have to do it myself. The time is coming when you may see my name on a ballot, and even if you don't you can be sure that I will be putting my effort behind someone else who feels the way I do. The time for sitting on the sidelines is past. The coach has called us in. Is anyone going to sit this one out?

Petition to Increase Offshore Drilling

Click here to sign a petition to support the Gas Price Reduction Act which is being spear headed by Senator Mitch McConnell. It addresses the need to increase offshore drilling, as well as Oil Shale exploration, electric cars, and the stemming of speculation. For more info about this act, click here.

Read This Article:

My last few posts have been about the current oil crisis. The Senate Republican Leader, Mitch McConnell spoke on the Senate floor Tuesday and did a bang-up job of setting the record straight. Read this article, and write your local congressman, demanding that the moratorium on off-shore drilling be lifted.