Sunday, August 16, 2009

Are Lawyers Calling The Shots On Health Care Reform?

Via Memeorandum:

In a New York Times op-ed, our Cheerleader in Chief once again sings the praises of a government takeover of our health care. Actually, a better analogy for Obama might be the circus barker. “Come on in folks! Get your seat to THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH! Just as the barker promises that the audience will experience amazing feats the president is making promises that sound too good to be true.

The president says that we are going to cover an additional 46 million people and cut costs without rationing. Now that is an amazing feat! Funny, not everything that would result in savings is on the table. Nowhere in any of the proposed bills are there provisions that would cap payouts on malpractice suits or put an end to frivolous lawsuits that cost billions in legal fees, lost productivity and increased tests and procedures that are performed defensively. According to Dr. Marc Siegel, forty percent of all malpractice suits are illegitimate, yet these “costs” have been completely ignored.

The American Thinker wrote in March of 2008 that the Democratic Party has become The Lawyer’s Party. There can not be meaningful health care reform without addressing the problem of frivolous malpractice suits. In turn, there will not be a meaningful discussion on frivolous malpractice suits so long as the president and his party are riding around in the pocket of the lawyers who bankroll their every move and if health care is any indication, influence their every decision.

If the president and his party really care about reform, and are not just using this as a power grab, then they should put everything on the table.

1 comment:

the Other Ken said...

I posted this question on a local forum, so far I haven't gotten any useful responses:


I have a question:

I haven't seen this discussed and I’m too lazy to do the research. Let’s say, for the sake of argument, we eventually get a single payer system like the one that they have in Canada that, not indecently, is imploding.

So, as I understand it, a single payer system as dreamed about by Obama would put the federal government in charge of insurance for everyone and, essentially, payment to medical practitioners for services rendered.

Now, here’s the tricky part. Does this then mean that tort lawyers would then have to sue the federal government for malpractice? Would the government allow this? I know that it’s pretty tricky for military personnel to sue the government for medical malpractice; wouldn’t it be similar under a single payer system? Has anyone told the lawyers about this?

Has anyone seen any discussion of this anywhere?