Skewing the Health Care Debate - Democratic Underground

WilliamPitt

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Thu Jul-30-09 08:55 AM
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Skewing the Health Care Debate

Edited on Thu Jul-30-09 09:04 AM by WilliamPitt

Skewing the Health Care Debate
By William Rivers Pitt

Thursday 30 July 2009

So everyone is talking about health care nowadays, and that's a good thing. Costs are too expensive, the system is too convoluted, the wrong people are getting richer, the right people are getting poorer, and almost 50 million Americans don't get any health care at all outside of emergency rooms and cut-rate mortuary parlors.

President Obama hit the prime-time airwaves last Wednesday night to defend his health care reform proposals, goad congress into action, and slap down some of the more absurd criticisms of his proposed program. "This is not just about the 47 million Americans who don't have any health insurance at all," said Obama. "Reform is about every American who has ever feared that they may lose their coverage, if they become too sick or lose their job or change their job. It's about every small business that has been forced to lay off employees or cut back on their coverage, because it became too expensive. It's about the fact that the biggest driving force behind our federal deficit is the skyrocketing cost of Medicare and Medicaid."

"So let me be clear," he continued. "If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficit. If we do not reform health care, your premiums and out-of-pocket costs will continue to skyrocket. If we don't act, 14,000 Americans will continue to lose their health insurance every single day. These are the consequences of inaction. These are the stakes of the debate that we're having right now."

Issues of Harvard professors and Cambridge cops aside, what we have is a national debate of signal importance happening at the highest levels, which is exactly what the issue deserves and requires. As the primary caregiver for someone with Multiple Sclerosis, it is a deeply personal issue for me, as well as for millions of other Americans. It is, simply put, a deadly serious thing we're talking about.

Not everyone participating in this debate has come to it with clean hands, however, a fact that has been all too evident on the cable news networks. There are plenty of arguments against many aspects of Obama's proposed health care reform, any number of which are entirely valid and worthy of deep and serious consideration, but that is not the treatment this issue has been receiving by quite a number of TV talking heads.

Broadcasters on MSNBC, in particular, seem bound and determined to kill the whole concept. It's too expensive, it's socialism, it won't work, it'll bankrupt the country - like a verbal drumbeat, these accusations have been coming and coming from MSNBC on an hourly basis, but without any real substance, and certainly with little counterpoint. They just don't like it, and have made no bones whatsoever about saying so ad nauseam.

After watching this on MSNBC for days now, a memory resurfaced of a personal experience I had with that particular network. It was the winter of 2003, and the Bush administration's hard push for war in Iraq was well underway. My book, "War on Iraq," had been out since the previous Fall, making the argument (correctly, as it turns out) that there were no WMD in Iraq, no connections to al Qaeda or 9/11, and so there was no reason to invade.

One crisp winter day, my telephone rang. A producer for MSNBC was on the other line; she told me she had read my book and really enjoyed it, and was inviting me to come on the network to talk about Iraq. Specifically, she wanted me to come on and talk about Hans Blix and his weapons inspectors, who at that point had been in Iraq for less than 100 hours. They hadn't found anything yet, but were still looking.

Very specifically, she wanted me to come on MSNBC and say that Blix and his inspectors were doing a terrible job, that Iraq definitely had WMD and 9/11 connections, and that Bush should blow off Blix and do whatever the hell he wants.

Needless to say, I was flabbergasted. You didn't really read my book, I said to the MSNBC producer, because if you had, you'd know that the very last thing in the world I would ever say on television or anywhere else was the inspectors were not doing their jobs and that war in Iraq was a necessity. Let's allow Blix and the inspectors to do their jobs, I said, so maybe we can avoid a costly and unnecessary war that would certainly kill thousands and thousands of people.

The MSNBC chortled - literally, a deep, throaty too-many-cigarettes chortle - and hung up on me.

In retrospect, there was nothing at all surprising about that incident. MSNBC is owned by General Electric, one of the largest defense contractors on the face of the Earth. They made billions off the invasion and occupation, with their pet network MSNBC cheerleading the war from the beginning. Once public opinion turned against the war, MSNBC swung away from their support and started acting like they'd been on the right side of the issue from the start. Why not? GE had already made their money off the war, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future, so their flip-flop didn't really matter a damn.

What does this have to do with the current health care debate and MSNBC's constant attacks on Obama's health care reform plan?

Money. Again.

General Electric is deeply invested in the health care industry, specifically in the manufacture and sale of very expensive equipment for the performance of very expensive medical tests. The proper, more cost-conscious application of these tests was specifically discussed by President Obama during last Wednesday night's press conference.

"Our proposals," said Obama, "would change incentives so that doctors and nurses are free to give patients the best care, just not the most expensive care. We've got to change how health care is delivered to -- the health-care delivery system works, so that doctors are being paid for the quality of care and not the quantity of care. Right now, doctors, a lot of times, are forced to make decisions based on the fee payment schedule that's out there. So if they're looking and -- and you come in and you've got a bad sore throat, or your child has a bad sore throat, or has repeated sore throats, the doctor may look at the reimbursement system and say to himself, 'You know what? I make a lot more money if I take this kid's tonsils out.' So part of what we want to do is to free doctors, patients, hospitals to make decisions based on what's best for patient care."

So here is General Electric, confronted with a health care reform proposal that specifically seeks to cut the prices of the very expensive tests GE wants to get paid for. Add to this the fact that GE has been losing money hand over fist, specifically in their health care sector.

The last thing General Electric wants is to see Obama's health care reform become a reality, because it would cost them money. Just as they did when they wanted to make money off Bush's war in Iraq, GE is using MSNBC to skew the debate in their favor. That's just how they roll. I've seen it with my own two eyes, and again, in retrospect, it should surprise absolutely nobody.

Bear it in mind the next time you turn on your television to watch the news.