Health Care

Healthcare: The Supply Side

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Here’s a thought experiment. Suppose the year is 1902. Automobiles exist, but they are rare and expensive. The assembly line has not yet been invented, and car manufacturing, such as it is, is done entirely by craft methods.

Now imagine that our politicians decide that every American family, as a matter of national policy, should have its own automobile. (Let’s also stipulate that the trades involved in automobile-building–machining, welding, carpentry, etc–are tightly controlled by guilds.)

What would happen?

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Pride in You Tube Voices

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I’m tired of students who sit in my class for no better reason than that only “students” can remain on their parents’ insurance. I sympathize – I, too, want my children covered. But that’s a lousy reason to stay in school. I ran a small business and couldn’t cover my full-time employees – or at least cover them well. Hot Air links to a small businesswoman protesting. She argues for opened competition and tort reform. In a longer discussion on television, she explains she’d like catastrophic insurance. Portability, cross-state competition, tort reform, catastrophic insurance options – these appear real (direct, market-oriented, constitutional) solutions to real problems. Our system can be improved, but it seems to be righting itself – in the time since I sold my business, our local hmo has opened more options. Why shouldn’t they? We were potential customers.

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So, Fox reports – but Not Nearly as Well as Iowahawk.

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Iowahawk allusion (if you don’t want to entangle yourself in the rest).

Today Fox News discussed “Your Life, Your Choices” , an “end of life” booklet developed by the VA and recommended for use in counseling. The segment appears to have been prompted by Jim Towey’s piece in WSJ, “The Death Book for Veterans.” To counter Towey, the VA’s spokesperson was Tammi Duckworth, VA Assistant Secretary. The exchange was lively, if frustrating.

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Cotton Candy – the Pink Fog of Cloying Sensitivity

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And paternalism.

Chet Edwards phoned tonight, his taped voice inviting us to a telephone “conference” already half through when they got to our number. I listened – I didn’t want to clean the kitchen.

The Democrats seem to be perfecting cotton candy speechifying. When given a captive audience that can’t speak back, they lean back, tell us they have our best interests at heart, and pontificate.

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