Posted in: Health Care
Sunday Apr 4, 2010
Do conservatives understand the Constitution they say they love?
Several states banded together and filed a lawsuit stating that healthcare reform was unconstitutional. They seem to be using a two-pronged argument: First, healthcare reform "infringes on state powers under the Constitution's Bill of Rights." Secondly, according to the...
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emailSaturday Mar 20, 2010
Tackling The Right-Wing Health Care Spin: The Bill Dwight Show Podcast
Yesterday on The Bill Dwight Show, airing on WHMP-AM in Western MA I faced off with local GOP operative Isaac Mass about the pending health care. And I was able to put some persistent right-wing myths to rest about "government...
Saturday Mar 13, 2010
Do you remember Morris Day, the lead singer of one of the ultimate party groups, The Time? From the darkness, Morris Day would shout, "What Time Is It?" The music would start blaring and the party was on. It is...
Tuesday Mar 9, 2010
Nothing from nothing leaves healthcare reform?
The great pianist and songwriter Billy Preston once sang, "nothing from nothing leaves nothing." Although as 15 to 16 months, I've seen the promise of health care reform start with single-payer then morph into some sort of public option which,...
Thursday Dec 3, 2009
A couple of things on healthcare
Is there anybody who believes that America is about competition? If you believe that America and business love competition, please email me because I have some swamp land ocean-front property to sell you out in Idaho. Think about that period...
Monday Nov 30, 2009
Okay, I'm just gonna have to go all Doctor on you now
No, it doesn't mean that I'm going to charge you for reading this. :-) I've talked about healthcare reform over and over again (I don't see how Joan does it every day without going insane). I've talked about healthcare from...
Friday Nov 6, 2009
There are two things I know very little about: medicine, cars, and the Law. (I am also not great at math.) So, like many people, I am sort of at the mercy of my doctor when I have medical decisions...
Monday Oct 26, 2009
Senator Reid has added the public option to the Senate version of the health care bill
Yay, there is much rejoicing. Unfortunately I'm not really sure what I'm rejoicing about. We've had all this nebulous terminology that is been bouncing around the airwaves. I don't know what a public option is? I guess, more precisely, I...
Wednesday Sep 23, 2009
Tort Reform, Misdirection, and The Lesser of Two Evils
Before their 2008 meltdown, the hit on the Republican Party was simple: great at campaigning, bad at governing. Republicans were able to whip up populist fervor in ways that Democrats hadn’t in a generation, and had so successfully honed their...
Thursday Sep 10, 2009
Congressman Joe Wilson is an example of something... I just don't know what
Tonight, President Barack Obama, in front of a joint session of Congress, spoke with conviction on healthcare. He beat down the lies and pledged his support to Medicare and seniors. He told his progressive colleagues that the public option is...
Monday Aug 24, 2009
Interview with McJoan of the Daily Kos - Politics and Healthcare
We discuss the current healthcare debate. This is an excellent discussion with a premier liberal blogger Joan McCarter (McJoan), who has really been all over this healthcare debate. click here for the audio. Last week, the Democrats and specifically those...
Monday Aug 24, 2009
John Mackey of Whole Foods and the Republicanism of healthcare reform
If John Mackey came up to me in the grocery store, I wouldn't know who he was. He wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal entitled The Whole Food's Alternative to ObamaCare. Why? Why is the CEO of a...
Tuesday Aug 4, 2009
Single-payer questions and answers (updated)
I posted a little something on my Facebook page which stated if we went with single-payer would you save anywhere between $3 - 4 trillion over 10 years. Some of my friends began to seize when they saw that number....
Friday Jul 31, 2009
Your Call Radio: Health Care & The Media
Earlier today I participated in a roundtable discussion of the week's media coverage of the health care debate, on Your Call Radio, which aired on KALW in San Francisco. You can hear the full show at this link....
Thursday Jul 30, 2009
Secretary Kathleen Sebelius speaks out on health care reform
Former Kansas Governor and now Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius wrote an op-ed that appears in Yahoo! News. The sentiment of the article is correct. The current system is not sustainable. She then mentions a degree of consensus...
Wednesday Jul 29, 2009
Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid: We need leadership on healthcare.
Several years ago, when the Democrats took over the House, they elected Nancy Pelosi to be Speaker. I thought that was an interesting choice. (Interesting, in this context, is not really a compliment.) When Harry Reid was chosen to lead...
Monday Jul 13, 2009
CNN's State of the Union - where is Congress on health care reform?
I get so frustrated listening to the health care debate that I can only listen to it in small bits. So, Republican Senator Lamar Alexander is talking about taxing something if you are ready have the "Cadillac" of health insurance...
Thursday Jul 9, 2009
Universal Healthcare Is Our Best Option
I spent a good deal of time over the last year or so reading up on healthcare and healthcare policy. I came to the conclusion that the best way to reform healthcare is to have the government pay for it:...
Monday Jun 29, 2009
Gov. Romney was wrong on health care
On Meet the Press, former Gov. Mitt Romney was asked about health care. The former Massachusetts governor, who is credited with getting health care in Massachusetts, is somehow seen as an expert on health care reform. Gov. Romney, when asked...
Tuesday Jun 23, 2009
On healthcare, Riddle me this Batman, why do we need trillions more for healthcare?
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy Everyone is talking about throwing trillions of dollars at healthcare. Look, as a trauma surgeon, I am happy to make more money. You can throw as much money...
Monday Jun 15, 2009
Serious health-care reform: consumer health cooperatives are not serious
Maybe I've missed something, that's possible I've been working very hard lately (I'm a trauma surgeon). Could it be possible that the goals of healthcare reform have changed? I thought the purpose of healthcare reform was twofold -- first, to...
Thursday Jun 11, 2009
Serious Health Care Reform -- Roadblocks
It's time that everybody realizes that there is a reason that we don't have universal health care already. There are powerful forces that like healthcare just the way it is. Everybody has been talking about insurance and how they've been...
Thursday Jun 4, 2009
Serious Healthcare Reform - Starting from Scratch
When the world was young, life was simple. Marcus Welby was our prototype physician. He seemed to be wise, practical, compassionate and infinitely knowledgeable. He could handle everything from a splinter in your foot to ovarian cancer and he could...
Wednesday Apr 29, 2009
What's up with the Swine Flu? It seems every time I turn around there is something out there that is really, really bad and it is going to kill me. Eight students from NY have swine flu. From CNNHealth.com: The...
Wednesday Apr 22, 2009
Serious Healthcare Reform - Part Two (Goals)
So, what are the goals of health care reform? Some believe that the goals are just to rearrange the deck chairs. In my mind, we're sailing on the Titanic; therefore, rearranging the deck chairs is not going to fix the...
Tuesday Mar 31, 2009
Serious Healthcare reform (part 1) - Where to start?
I'm still waiting for the debate to start. When are we, as Americans, going to get this debate started? Dem From CT has tried. He has posted some thoughtful information and questions on healthcare. Yet he has not drawn the...
Saturday May 17, 2008
Senator Kennedy who is 76 years old and very overweight was airlifted to Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). As far as I can tell no one really has a handle on what is going on. The news media is reporting that...
Friday Feb 8, 2008
Obama-Clinton on Health Care: Little Difference
The notion that Clinton's health care plan is decidedly more progressive and inclusive that Obama's plan has really taken hold in some corners, to the point where it's become commonplace to treat Obama's as less than universal health care. But...
Tuesday Sep 25, 2007
Critical Vote Today on Children's Health Insurance
The House is expected to vote today on expanding the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). There already is enough support in the Senate to override Bush's threatened veto. While there is certainly majority support in the House, it's not...
Tuesday Apr 17, 2007
I'm not particularly inclined to steer discussion about the Virginia Tech tragedy in a political direction. Not that I consider it exploitive to do so. Politics at its best is about solving real-life problems. It is sensible to try to...
Thursday Dec 14, 2006
Yesterday, Dem Sen. Ron Wyden proposed a universal health insurance plan, flanked by the head of the Service Employees International Union and the CEO of Safeway. For first reaction analyses, check out The Agonist, The Carpetbagger Report, D-Day. Ezra Klein...
Thursday Jun 22, 2006
Condoms reduce HPV risk (much to the chagrin of religious conservatives)
A new study published in The New England Journal of Medicine reports that consistent condom use reduces women's HPV risk. [The study] followed 82 female college undergraduates who reported their first intercourse with a male partner during the study or...
