The Woodward Report

Looking Past the Bait

Breaking Down the House Health Care Bill

September 22, 2009

by Jack Curtis - A Woodward Report Columnist

Contemplate for a moment, the anglerfish. He is mostly a head and huge jaws with seaweedy bits growing out of him here and there. A short stalk grows out of his forehead, with a little wiggly piece on the end of it that looks like food to small neighbors. He just lies there, wiggling that little piece of bait until a small neighbor swims too close to escape the suddenly opening jaws. ObamaCare seems to resemble the anglerfish; universal health care is bait. There is much, much more lurking there.

The Administration has used the financial collapse that government brought us very well: It gave Congress a “Stimulus” bill that provided more pork than Congress itself might have had the nerve to include while effectively repealing the Clinton/Gingrich reform of federal welfare; it budgeted spending in numbers only computers can handle and it took command of the major banks, a huge chunk of insurance and the U.S. auto industry; to that, it is preparing to add a takeover of the student loan business and wage control of banking and possibly others. Not bad for less than a year’s work!

But the year isn’t done yet and while the obvious contradictions in ObamaCare would be better handled by more time and thought, the program is receiving just the opposite: more and more public and private pressure, costly selling, outright lying, obvious backroom deals with major players like the AMA, drug and hospital groups and more public appearances by the Salesman-in-Chief than we were used to when he was running for office. Why?

Well, reading all those pages in the House Bill offers some ideas about that. Just now, all the fuss seems to be about the public option and cost. Cost isn’t arguable, the cost just doesn’t compute; that leaves the public option for discussion and it is getting plenty. Not much else in the Bill is, however.

There’s more to ObamaCare than the Public Option though, just as there’s more to the anglerfish than his little wiggling bait. Liberty Counsel analyzed a listing that Peter Fleckenstein published via FreeRepublic.com and found the following in the House Bill along with a number of other potentially life-altering additions to government power over citizens:

 

- Sec. 113 of the Health Care Bill mandates a government audit of the books of all employers that self-insure. I wonder what will come of government rummaging through private businesses…

 

- Sec 163 provides government real-time access to all individuals’ financial information and a national health ID card will be issued. (Ve vill know vair you leeve!)

 

- Sec 163 provides government direct access to your bank accounts for electronic funds transfer.

 

- Sec 223 No company can sue government for price-fixing. (There goes competition!)

 

- Sec 225 Government will set doctor’s incomes from the program.

 

- Sec 431 Government will have access to all financial and personal records of all Americans.

 

- Sec 1121 Doctors will be paid the same regardless of specialty. (Why struggle to be a specialist?)

 

- Sec 1156 Prohibits physicians owning or investing in hospitals, etc.

 

- Sec 1156 Prohibits expansion of existing doctor-owned hospitals, etc.

- Sec 1401 Government will build a database of personal electronic records, public and private. It will have access to all records of government and health care providers. Government will decide which records it may make public.

 

- Sec 1501 Government will tell doctors where they will serve their residencies.

- Sec 1503 Government will regulate hospitals’ residency programs.

- Sec 1632 Government has broad powers to deny health care providers and suppliers admittance to the exchange, putting them out of business.

- Sec 1711 Government will require preventative services, including vaccinations.

- Sec 1733 Government drug price control

- Sec 1744 Sets payments for graduate medical education.

 

- Sec 2201 Government will mandate a National Health Service Corps where doctors can work off their loans.

 

- Sec 2212 Government controls medical education through loans.

 

- Sec 2251 Government mandates cultural and linguistic training for health care professionals.

 

- Sec 2511 Government will set up school-based health clinics.

Those are just a sample of things Liberty Counsel sees in the House ObamaCare bill; there are many more to enjoy. Sticking with these, I think they say that the Administration wants some very interesting things besides health:

1. Access to and control of all individual personal, medical and financial data.

2. Access to and control of individual financial accounts.

3. National registration and I.D. of all citizens.

4. Control of the medical profession (which won’t be a profession anymore).5.

5. Control of U.S. health care (Many other applicable provisions are not on this list)

6. Control of your kids’ related education and an opportunity to supervise your care of “your” kids.

Maybe ObamaCare appeals to you, like the little wiggling bait appeals to the anglerfish’s prey. Maybe the hulking shape I see behind the bait is just a harmless rock. You can visit: www.lc.org/index.cfm?PID=19319  and decide for yourself. Eternal vigilance you may remember, is a price, not an option, if we wish freedom.