End Of Life Counseling Worms Its Way Into Bill
End of life counseling has managed to make it’s way into the health care bill, and we will more than likely hear about things like “death panels” in the near future. Now, don’t get me wrong, I disagree with the idea that the government pays for such things on an ideological level, however as I’ve said on my show, the whole “death panels” thing has been a little overblown. The idea behind end of life counseling is that it ”allows Medicare to pay for voluntary counseling to help beneficiaries deal with the complex and painful decisions families face when a loved one is approaching death.” (AP, Yahoo! News) Do I think that this is a decision that should strictly be between family members? Yes. Do I think that it is equatable to “death panels”? No.
I also don’t think that this is something that we, as tax payers, should be paying for. I couldn’t even guess what the costs would be, but at this time Medicare is damn near broke and the extra expenses that this will add to the program won’t do anything to help that. Now, as far as “death panels” go, this is where I will agree.
A public option is really just a first step to bringing about a single payer system. Liberal Democrats (most notably Harry Reid) have actually ADMITTED this fact. If a single payer system were to be implemented, that is when I’ll begin jumping on the “death panel” band wagon, because at that point our country (which is already heavily in debt) would be dead broke. The medical field would be forced to ration care and make decisions regarding who would receive the care and who wouldn’t. How long would it take before the “public option” became a “single payer system”? It’s anyone’s guess. I’d hope it wasn’t in my or my sons’ lifetime, but who knows.
However by jumping the gun and screaming “death panel” at the top of our parties collective lung hurts us in the short term. It presents us as kooks and nut jobs and doesn’t help our public image. At a time when the party needs to regroup and prove ourselves on an intellectual level, things like this dampen that image and places our brand into a negative light. There are a hundred different reasons to oppose this health care bill (and I certainly hope it doesn’t pass) however using the “death panel” analogy doesn’t help this cause.
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Good post, Travis. When the issue of health care reform first started surfacing and the issue of the “death panels” was raised, I downloaded and read every line of the pages they were using to say “death panels” were included in the legislation. It was clear that it was not true and I even went so far as to write about it on my own blog. It sounded like I was defending the plan, but I wasn’t. I feel as you do, we need to pick our battles on this and raise our voices over something that is actually in the plan, not something that sounds as bad as “death panels”, yet is non-existent. Thanks for pointing this out.
I agree Travis, making up a lie about “death panels” may rile up the base but it does not sell to those who look for truth. The problem with the right is that there are so many cranks hawking books and radio and TV shows they have no idea what good policy is or how to persuade people who are not on thier side since they preach to the choir. Whenever I ask people how informing people about living wills is the same as a “death panel” they look at me dumbfounded.