Fox’s Shephard Smith Defends the Public Option
By Anthony Gregory • Tuesday October 6, 2009 3:08 PM PDT • 5 Comments
A fascinating and frustrating exchange. Smith is exactly right that mandatory insurance without a public option is hardly a victory for the American people:
Over the last ten years health care costs in America have skyrocketed. Regular folks cannot afford it. So, they tax the system by not getting preventative medicine. They go to the emergency room in the last case and we all wind up paying for it. As the costs have gone up, the insurance industry’s profits, on average, have gone up more than 350%. And it is the insurance companies which have paid, and who have contributed to Senators and Congressmen on both sides of the aisle to the point where now we cannot get what all concerned on Capitol Hill seem to believe and more 60% of Americans say they would support, which is a public option. This has been an enormous win for the health-care industry, that is an unquestioned fact. But I wonder, what happens to the American people when we come out with legislation now which requires everyone to have health care insurance — or many more people — but does not give a public option? Therefore millions more people will have to buy insurance from the very corporations that are overcharging us, and whose profits have gone up 350 percent in the last ten years. It seems like we the people are the ones getting the shaft here.
And yet, mandatory insurance with a public option is also a disaster. A “public option,” subsidized by the general population, may indeed crowd out and destroy what’s left of market insurance, as some people fear. Why would he defend such a plan? He, like his liberal counterparts at MSNBC, are right to note that mandatory insurance is pure corporatism if there’s no public plan; but it’s socialism with such a plan and that’s also bad. The only true solution is the free market, which we don’t have. I must admit, I find it bizarre to see Smith take this position, although it does fall in line with Fox News’s generally pro-state bias. Perhaps this is a way of criticizing Obama in what he will likely sign — from the left — while still supporting more government intervention?
Tags: Fascism, Healthcare, Insurance, Personal Liberty, The State 
Government run health care – the so-called “public option” – presents serious challenges for us. The private sector and competitive market forces are the best means to meeting health care needs. Watch this video from the U.S. Chamber.
dana | Oct 7, 2009 | Reply
Harvard researchers say 62% of all personal bankruptcies in the U.S. in 2007 were caused by health problems—and 78% of those filers had insurance
On top of that by refusing care to patients and reimbursement to doctors over typos everyone is ticked off but good.
They can buy all the Senators they want but those Senators read the polls and the real anger is towards the insurance companies and their monopoly and its devastation to our economy—across the board.
A friend of mine recently laid off without children—just he and his spouse are paying $2,500.00 dollars a month for his COBRA—that is outrageous. Health insurance costs more than his mortgage—unbelievable.
The “public option” using the bureaucracy of medicare that is already set up and running processing a billion claims a year is the smart way to go. Open Medicare up to everyone NOW!
The system is beyond broke and well heavily stacked in the insurance industry’s favor—with no incentive except global economic melt down to fix it.
Oh wait a minute didn’t that just happen....
Paul Burke - Author Journey Home | Oct 7, 2009 | Reply
I am curious about Paul’s comments on bankruptcy. If you Google “Health Care Reform: Do Other Countries Have the Answers?”, there’s a critique of some of such claims.
And have you seen the American Medical Association’s 2008 Health Insurance Report Card? It shows that Medicare denies claims at the highest rate. Google “Denial of claims: Medicare does it most”.
I agree that “well heavily stacked in the insurance industry’s favor.” That’s why government should (1) allow people to buy plans available in other states and (2) stop punishing people for buying insurance directly from insurers when their employer offers a plan. (Tax code). Both coddle insurance companies.
Brian T. Schwartz | Oct 12, 2009 | Reply
Paul Burke, are you serious? Medicare is broke for the very reason that it was destined to become so... it cannot work. There is no incentive to be efficient, and therefore it cannot be, and now you want us all into that system? Are you serious?... really?
Also, I will tell you what I have been screaming, but the “news” talking heard refuse to whisper. It is insulting to point the finger at the tens of thousands (possibly hundreds of thousands) of Americans like myself who do not have health insurance and make the claim that “something must be done to get these people insurance”—insulting indeed! I have no health insurance because it is not worth the costs. My doctor charges me about half what he charges his other patients for the same visits because I pay cash, and they pay with insurance. He saves money by not having to deal with insurance (which is VERY costly for him) and he passes the savings along to me. I also save money by not having to pay outrageous premiums. I save thousands of dollars a year because I am capable of doing basic math, pure and simple. Stop and think for one moment (it should only take one moment for a rational human being), if insurance companies can make money selling insurance, doesn’t it stand to reason that a person can save money by being “self-insured”? There is money being made selling us something that we do not need. We have the best health system in the world, and it is affordable if you comparison shop—just like everything else in a free-market system (hint, insurance itself removes the “free-market” element, which is why costs have been driven up). Prior to health-insurance, our healthcare in this country was on par with other expenses. What do you suppose caused the change?
And now the government (and ignorant Americans that buy into their propaganda) say it’s time to “do something” and their “solution” is to add more of what caused this problem, and force thinking Americans into a compulsory system that has failed!
If others want to be on a sinking ship, fine, but it is a disgrace to force me onto that same ship with a compulsory insurance and a compulsory Public “option” (some “option”). This will do to my health care what was done in my Grandfather’s generation to my prospects for retirement. I have to pay into the failed Social Security system, all the while I have to put money away for my retirement because we all know I cannot retire on Social Security (if I could have ½ of what I have paid into Social Security back in one lump sum, I could invest it and retire early in fine financial shape—instead I will have to work well beyond 65 just to make ends meet—all the while continuing to dump more good money after bad into that money sink-hole). Now it appears that I will have to pay for this damned “public Option, as well as forced health insurance, all the while I will still have to save to pay the doctor out-of-pocket because this new system will fail as all government programs before it has (and it’s STILL cheaper to pay cash).
If you have no faith in the free-market, what is wrong with a voluntary system? Those who failed basic math can have this “new” system, and those of us who are capable of rational intelligent thought can be left alone to do what free people have done for millenia. Either sign up now (and pay into it, or refuse and be allowed to fend for ourselves)... oh that’s right, the moochers are dependent on the producers, and so we must pay for the system so that others can use it at a huge cost savings to yourself.
The definition of forcing people into a compulsory system is—slavery. Somehow I think that all of our mothers taught us better “don’t take other people’s stuff.” It’s wrong, we know it’s wrong, and it doesn’t become less so because we have government officials doing our stealing for us. No ponder one last thing; if this is a good idea, why are the politicians exempting themselves (and why are more people not up in arms about that simple prospect)? They exempted themselves from the failure that is Social Security, and they are exemption themselves from the failure that is about to become the health insurance leviathan.
joe4liberty | Oct 13, 2009 | Reply
Shep please go to CNN. Fake news is not worthy.
KD | Dec 4, 2009 | Reply