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In a nationally televised event at the White House, Obama said families need better information so they don’t unthinkingly approve “additional tests or additional drugs that the evidence shows is not necessarily going to improve care.

He added: “Maybe you’re better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller.”

Obama said he has personal familiarity with such a dilemma. His grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given less than nine months to live, he said.

She fell and broke her hip, “and the question was, does she get hip replacement surgery, even though she was fragile enough they were not sure how long she would last?”

That was during ABC News’ special about ObamaCare (or Infomercial). Here’s what the elderly should look forward to.

Medical decisions should be made by patients, their families, and their doctors, not by government bureaucrats, but that’s ObamaCare for you.

In the Washington Examiner, “Guillaume Vuillemey, a researcher at France’s Institut Economique Molinari, and Philip Stevens, a researcher at Britain’s International Policy Network write”:

The Obama plan is supposed to make health insurance more competitive. But heavy subsidies will give it a big advantage, pulling an estimated 118.5 million people from private insurers to the public system. This government-subsidized system will eventually dominate the market in a way that would overrule competition.

This is precisely what happened in Britain. The state provides most health care, via the National Health Service. Patients have almost no say over which physician, surgeon or hospital they can use, while professionals have to conform to government plans and targets.

After its birth in 1948, planners soon found that “free” health care multiplied demand. NHS founder Lord Beveridge predicted free health care would cut spending as health improved.

The opposite was true. Between 1949 and 1979, it tripled in real terms. The service now costs twice as much as it did 10 years ago, with productivity down 4.5 percent.

One way government tries to limit demand is to decree which new drugs can be prescribed. Many drugs, widely available in America and continental Europe, are denied to British patients.

State mismanagement has also created waiting lines for hospitals, on average causing 8.6 weeks of waiting. Once inside, budgetary cutbacks on cleaning and maintenance mean higher rates of an antibiotic-resistant variety of staph infection. This “superbug” has turned even routine surgery into a lottery of death.

Britain may be an extreme example. Many point to France as a better example of public insurance delivering high-quality, equitable care. While it’s true that French patients do enjoy better care and shorter waits than the British, this is due to a far greater reliance on independent health care and greater freedom from government for doctors and patients.

Yet this plus side is expensive. The French government is trying to control costs by increasing regulation of the private sector, meaning it will soon become more similar to Britain.

In France, there are already “medical deserts,” particularly in the suburbs and countryside. In some places, patients wait more than six months to see an ophthalmologist.

Josh Kirkendall Politics health care, obama

You may have seen this picture — it’s Obama hugging a woman named Debby Smith during a “town hall” meeting to discuss his Health Care initiative. Smith has kidney cancer. She “told Obama of her kidney cancer and her inability to obtain health insurance or hold a job.” Smith is also an active member of Organizing for America, Obama’s political wing of the Democratic National Committee. Is it right of Obama to use Smith’s aliment to further his argument that even the most liberal democrats are abandoning? Basing American policy on sympathy and emotion is a doomed prophesy. While I feel sorry for Smith, I think it’s terrible for any President to have this “staged” to further a political ideal that’s flawed, dangerous and bankrupt.

Not so surpringly, the press is eating this up. Some are calling out Obama’s pledge for transparancy. The press is upset that the town hall was completely staged — not just Mrs. Smith.

President Obama’s hug for the cancer victim, an Obama volunteer, gets the media attention, but of the seven questions he addressed, four were selected by his staff from groups supportive of his health care agenda, including  the Service Employees International Union and Health Care for America Now. One of the questioners came from a group that is a part of the Democratic National Committee.

A more relavent question however, is that if voters actually want Health Care reform. The Weekly Standard’s Gary Andres writes that while the debate is split, it really depends on who asks the question. Is the media driving opinion? Criticism is also hitting the Obama administration because questions asked at the last forum were “asked by individuals who were members of groups that supported his health care plan.”

Change to change, just because we need change and saying the word change, doesn’t make change a better option just because there’s change. Change sometimes makes things worse. When passing laws that are 1,200 pages thick without even reading a word is arguably bad change. Supporting socialized Health Care means you’re ignoring the socialized Health Care in practice around the world. Take time out, research more than an article you find with a Google News search. The details of how this is going to be paid is bare. The evidence of existing systems is overwhelming.

If you really want to help people obtain Health Care, do the things necessary to help them become independant of government. Forcing reliance on government is an early stage of socalized policy. And the beginning of the end of the best country on Earth.

Josh Kirkendall Politics obama