The Health Care Irony

Sarah in Skagway, Alaska

Oh, the irony. That's right, irony. I'll say it slowly so that the liberals can understand, "I-R-O-N-Y."

So, back in the day, a young Sarah Heath and her family lived in Skagway until she was about five years old. Skagway was a pretty nifty distance from any good medical facilities.

The AP talked to Chuck Heath and Tom Cochran, an old neighbor about it:

"There was no road out of there at that time," said retired teacher Chuck Heath, reached by phone in Wasilla. "The ferry schedule was very erratic. We had no doctor in Skagway. The plane schedule was very erratic. The winds dictated whether the planes could come in or not."

So if they couldn't get to a hospital in Alaska, they hopped on a train to Whitehorse, Canada. But they only did it if they had to:

"We much preferred to use our facilities because my insurance didn't cover anything in Whitehorse. And even though they have socialized medicine, I still had to pay the bill, being an American citizen," Heath said.

Uh-oh, did you catch that? They had to pay the bill anyway. So much for that whole "grifter" thing.

To this day people still travel to Whitehorse when they can't get to Juneau:

"If you can't fly to Juneau — and a lot of times you can't, especially in the winter — they're going to get you to a medical treatment facility if it's an emergency, and that's normally where Whitehorse comes into play," Cochran said.

"It was probably 10 years ago, anyway, two of my kids were in a four-wheeler accident, and one of them was hurt pretty badly, so we medevaced them to Whitehorse via ambulance," he said. "It's usually emergency situations when people go up there."

So this wasn't a case of Canadian health care being so much more wonderful or even free, it was a matter of necessity. Sarah wasn't saying that Canada's healthcare is better or that socialized medicine is the cat's pajamas - she was pointing out an irony while trying to forge a connection between herself and the Canadian audience. Period. End of story.

Now I would like to address the matter of the contradiction.

Some are pointing to an old article from 2007 where Sarah said that they took her brother to Juneau on the ferry instead of Whitehorse. So, which was it? Juneau or Whitehorse? My guess would be Whitehorse, since her dad confirms it:

Palin's father said his family probably boarded the train for the Whitehorse hospital only twice — once when a daughter had rheumatic fever, and once when his son, also named Chuck, severely burned his leg and an infection set in.

So was Palin knowingly lying in 2007 when she said that they took him to Juneau on the ferry? I don't know. I can only speculate, and here's my speculation:

First off, it's clear from the AP article that the Heath family only went to Whitehorse a couple of times for emergencies when they couldn't get to Juneau. This would mean that they did hop on a ferry or a plane down to Juneau when they could, so that route was regularly used by their family. Why would she knowingly lie about the particular incident involving her brother when she obviously had many other examples to choose from?

But Sarah was five when the family moved away from Skagway. My guess is that she got her medical incidents mixed up. I've done the same thing. There are times I'll be reminiscing about my childhood and my mom will look at me funny and go, "That's not the way it happened..." Which brings me to part two of my speculation -

Why did she get the story right this time?

Sarah always tries to relate something of herself or of Alaska to every audience that she addresses. She did the same thing at the Wisconsin Right to Life event. I was there. She said that she talked to her Dad before the event and asked him if he knew of any connections with Wisconsin. Those connections she then shared with us.

My guess is that she did the same thing here. "Dad, do you know of any connections with Canada?"

"Well, we used to go over to Whitehorse for medical treatment when we couldn't get to Juneau. Remember that time your brother burned his leg? We had to put him on a train into Whitehorse for that."

There ya go. Dad straightened out a childhood memory. And what, you think she remembered any time that she had recounted the story wrong? What was she supposed to say? "Back in 2007 I gave an interview and I got this story wrong. Here's what actually happened...."

To sum up Juneau vs. Whitehorse:

A. Sarah was five years old. When I was five, I could have sworn I touched the moon. Turned out it was a dream.

B. It's clear from the AP article that they only went to Whitehorse once or twice for emergencies. Other times they did take the ferry to Juneau.

C. My guess is that Sarah got her medical incidents mixed up.

D. Before she spoke in Wisconsin, she asked her Dad if he knew of any connections to Wisconsin. He gave her a few stories. No doubt she did the same thing here, and Chuck told her about the trip to Whitehorse. So this time she wasn't relying on her memory from 40 years ago, but rather her dad's accurate account.

Put her in jail. It's all over.

The Rundown

First up, hold the phone! The NY-23 race is not final after all:

Though Conservative candidate Doug Hoffman conceded and Democrat Bill Owens was sworn into Congress last week, the routine recanvassing of votes shows Owens' lead has narrowed to 3,026 votes, with about 5,800 absentee ballots received so far that have yet to be counted. The final outcome rests on uncounted absentee ballots, and more than 10,000 were sent out.

The county Boards of Election are still recanvassing votes and it could be the end of November before a final count is certified. If the count overturns the election, Owens could be removed from office.

I'm not getting my hopes up. Hoffman could very well still come up short, but if nothing else it looks like the margin will be closer than anyone thought. If Owens does turn out to be the loser....I don't know. We'll just have to wait and see.

The LOTUS had a busy day. Two posts. I'll put them at the bottom since they're pretty long. But here's a video Sarah linked to her Facebook a couple days ago:



In other news, Sarah reportedly threw Levi an olive branch in her interview with Oprah. Most likely she would rather the kid not destroy himself. Will he listen? It's up to him. I think he'll live to rue the day he ever listened to Rex and Tank.

That was part of the discussion in this Oprah interview preview:



And Palin was a topic of discussion for a good twelve minutes on Hannity tonight:





And O'Reilly is finally going to get her on his show. He's only been trying for over a year:



As for the stuff coming out on what's in Palin's book, I prefer to just wait for the real thing. Until November 17th, it's all gossip.

And someone made a video tribute called Palin Democrats Applaud the Last of the Great Democrats in the House:



Well, that's the Rundown. Now here's those LOTUS posts:

LOTUS #1: Pelosi "Health Plan" Should Be DOA:

We need to be vigilant in investigating the ramifications of the Pelosi Health Care Bill. Some provisions sound so outrageous as to be considered impossible to fathom, but they’re right there in the bill in black and white. For instance, page 297 of the bill explains the punishment for not purchasing government mandated health insurance. If you don’t buy what the government considers “acceptable health care coverage,” you’re going to be hit with a tax of at least 2.5% of your income. And if you don’t pay that new tax, you could be fined as much as $250,000 and sentenced to up to five years in prison.

But here’s the thing: they have to make the penalty for opting out very harsh in order to force us to buy coverage. The only way to keep this government run health care plan afloat is for everyone to buy into it – especially young and healthy people. That means that they will have to penalize citizens if we choose not to buy a plan that will cost a minimum of about $15,000 per family per year.

The bill that came out of the Senate last month – the Baucus Bill – does just the opposite. It calls for a much lighter penalty ($750 maximum) for people who don’t buy government approved health coverage, making it cheaper to pay the fine than to pay for the coverage. (And with a recession on, who can blame families for not wanting to pay $15,000 for a government mandated health care plan?)

But here’s the kicker: the bill also forces insurance companies to cover everyone, regardless of pre-existing conditions. Think about what that means. A lot of people – especially young and healthy people – will just pay the penalty instead of purchasing coverage because they’ll figure that it’ll always be there if they get sick, as government has promised. That’s what will happen, and when it does it will totally undermine the very concept of “insurance” – which is basically a group of people pooling their resources over time to cover themselves for a rainy day, paying while they’re healthy so that they’re covered when they’re sick. Those who are healthy now pay for those who are sick. If your insurance pool only contains sick people, it’s a bust. And that’s what this government plan will be. Without all of those young and healthy people paying into the pool and defraying the costs, the government will have to pony up more and more money, and who knows how long the whole crazy plan will last before it goes broke – and our country with it!

That’s where we are with this bureaucratic mess: either the government penalizes people so harshly that they could be hit with huge taxes and even possible jail time, or the government makes the penalty a slap on the wrist and undermines the plan from the get-go. Forcing individuals to buy health insurance seems unconstitutional, yet Congress wants to foist it on us anyway. Proponents of government controlled health care will say, “But we’re made to buy car insurance and home insurance, what’s the difference with health insurance?” It’s apples and oranges. Auto insurance is a state law requirement, and people can always choose not to drive. Banks might require you to have home owner’s insurance, but again, you choose to own a home, just as you choose to drive. You have no choice at all when it comes to this federal government health care insurance mandate.

There are other ways to reform health care without violating our Constitution and our personal liberties. Let’s get back to discussing market-driven, patient-centered, result-driven solutions, like, for example, allowing people to purchase insurance across state lines, tackling existing government waste and fraud, and reforming medical malpractice laws (tort reform) to stop unwarranted lawsuits that force doctors to order unnecessary procedures just to cover themselves.

Please let your Senators know that the Pelosi Bill should be dead on arrival. Once we go down this big government path, it will be virtually impossible to reverse course. Let’s fight for the reform that makes sense for Americans before it’s too late.

- Sarah Palin



LOTUS #2: Thank you, Washington, for Requesting a Demonstrably Good Idea:

I commend the president for acknowledging today that “there are limits to what government can and should do” to ease our 10.2% unemployment rate – the highest it’s been since 1983. I also applaud his call for suggestions and expression of openness to considering “any demonstrably good idea.” Taking him at his word, I’d like to suggest this one: let’s learn from history and follow the example of the man who occupied the White House in 1983 and was able to transform an even worse recession than the one we’re currently experiencing into the largest peacetime economic expansion in American history.

When you realize the magnitude of President Reagan’s achievements, there is absolutely no reason why anyone would ignore his “demonstrably good” example. If you want real job growth, cut taxes – including capital gains taxes and small business payroll taxes – and slay the death tax once and for all. If you want to stimulate the economy and help poor and middle class families, cut payroll taxes so that more Americans can keep and invest more of what they earn.

If you want lasting economic expansion and prosperity, get the federal government’s budget under control. Instead of more pork-laden stimulus plans, let the free market correct itself. That’s what Reagan did, and history proves it worked.

In his comments today, the president honorably suggested that he welcomes our ideas on how to put America’s economy on the right track. But, there also seemed to be a suggested chastisement of the private sector’s efforts to right some economic wrongs when he said, “...small businesses and large firms...have not yet been willing to take the steps necessary to hire again.”

As business owners seek to expand, or just to keep doors open today, it’s not as if they are refusing to hire out of spite. Given a pro-private sector environment they will be only too happy to hire more people and grow their businesses. Perhaps if leadership in Washington reassured them by, for example, cutting tax burdens and making government more efficient, it would send our businesses a message that it’s safe and smart to expand today.

These are difficult times for so many Americans who are out of work. I implore our leaders to not threaten our economy’s job creators with increased taxes and job-killing schemes like cap-and-tax and the government health care takeover. Government needs to get out of their way and off their backs so that they can grow and hire again.

The lessons of history are clear. We’re blessed to have so many lessons from which to learn, and we’d be smart to emulate successes in America’s past. Our economic recovery decisions should be based on the same free market principles that Reagan employed. They work, history proves it, and I thank our president for asking for this input.

- Sarah Palin

Random Thoughts on the Health Care Bill - Pt. 1: The Death Panels

Here's just some random things that have been floating around my brain lately. There's no real rhyme or reason:

Take a moment to think about this: Nobody had a clue who this woman was a year ago. Now she writes a note on her Facebook page, the media loses its mind, and the President of the United States feels like he has to respond.

Of course Obama doesn't WANT death panels. He didn't WANT to bail out the banks. He didn't WANT to get into the car business. When Obama says he doesn't want something, that pretty much means it's going to happen.

And can I just say, Obama is using this "pulling the plug on old people" thing as a strawman. Palin's point was what could happen based on the philosophy of those around him in the event of rationing. "Death panels" is just a term for government bureaucracy deciding who gets care and who doesn't in the event of a shortage, or rationing. The real question is: Will government intrusion lead to rationing? Um... based on the past and pretty simple extrapolation I would say, yes.

It's not about the death panels. RATIONING is the key, which will lead to things where we decide who gets health care and who doesn't, which is the definition of a death panel. It's not like the government will officially sentence people to die, but if there's not enough to go around, they'll just simply fail to keep people alive. This kind of thing already goes on in countries that have socialized medicine and therefore shortages.

The question isn't "will there be 'death panels'?" It is "will government intrusion to this extent create a shortage of care which will mandate a need to ration that care?" If so, then the "death panel" situation is a natural consequence of this health care bill. The actual wording for it doesn't even have to be in there. We're talking about unintended consequences here. If you think that something like this can't happen, you're being naive.

This healthcare bill is the first step toward socialized medicine. All you have to do is look at other countries that already have socialized medicine and how the elderly are seen as a burden on the system and often neglected because they just don't have that much to offer society. I don't have a problem with individuals making choices about when to pull the plug, but if we centralize this thing it will take it out of the realm of personal choice and, because of the shortages it will create, put it in the hands of government bureaucracy. "Death panel" is Palin's term for this kind of thing. It's not like there will actually be Obama sitting up there saying, "No more chemo for you!" But the result will be the same. It is the media and the White House who are spinning Palin's statement out of control. But they're losing anyway.

And also, they focus only on her "death panel" statement and ignore her other statements about the growth of government, etc.... They're using that one thing to try and discredit Palin (which they won't succeed in doing).

We want to avoid what Europe has, period. This health care bill is the first step down a road we really don't want to even go near. Sarah's telling us what the end state will be, not the immediate effect. But of course it will take time, and we'll get used to it little by little. By the time we get there, it probably won't even matter anymore. We will officially be mindless drones, completely dependent upon the government for our very survival, and we will cease to be free. Call it fear-mongering, call it crazy, but if it means avoiding becoming Britain, I'm all for it.

I love all these media moguls saying the bill doesn't set up that panel. Well no kidding. Bravo, media, give yourself a pat on the back for being so smart. It's a term, idiots, coined by Palin for the inevitable outcome, not language from the actual bill itself. Don't get me wrong, the framework for such a thing is in the bill.

The brilliant liberals who are so much smarter than we are cannot grasp the concept of a....."term." That's right boys and girls, today we learn about the word "term!" Maybe they'll learn another use for the word after they find out they're not getting another one.

The important thing isn't whether or not people like her or that she becomes Prez or whatever, the important thing is that stuff like Obamacare is stopped. If that means sacrificing a little popularity, so be it. This is a fight: she's going to get scratched up and bloody. Expect it. The ride will not be smooth and without mishaps. Nothing easy is worth doing.