Ann Coulter's Health Care Series

This is a summary of Ann Coulter's series on Health Care. It lists the Administration's main talking points on this issue and her rebuttals thereto. I liked this serics because of the pointed and sharp nature of the responses as well as the summary of the supporters' reasons.

Some of her talking points were redundant and some were covered in multiple installments. I edited these points so that we can have a good summary of the health care debate.

TALKING POINTS	INSTALLMENT	DATE
The New National Health Care Plan will: 1. Punish the insurance companies. 2. Increase competition and keep insurance companies honest. 3. Stop insurance companies denying legitimate claims. 4. Give Americans "basic consumer protections that will finally hold insurance companies accountable." 5. Be the only way to provide coverage for pre-existing conditions.	Part 1	8/19/2009
6. Have no rationing. 7. Reduce costs. 8. Not cover abortions	Part 2 Part 4 (abortions)	8/28/2009 10/01/09
9. Be like Medicare. 10. Not cover illegal aliens. 11. Not have the "Public Option".	Part 3 Part 4 (immigrants)	9/15/2009 10/01/09
Other Topics:
12. Only a government run plan can provide "coverage that will stay with you whether you move, change your job or lose your job." 13. The "public option" trigger is something other than a national takeover of health care.	Part 4	10/01/2009
14. Democrats lost Congress in 1994 because President Clinton failed to pass national health care. 15. America's relatively low life expectancy compared to countries with socialist health care proves welfare-state health care is better.	Part 5	10/8/2009
17. America's low ranking on international comparisons of infant mortality proves other countries' socialist health care systems are better than ours.	Part 6	10/15/2009
18. America's lower life expectancy compared to countries with socialist health care proves that their medical systems are superior.	Part 7	10/22/2009

Welcome!

Subscribe to the feed to get a little chunk of politics each day.

Coulter 10/22/09

Left's Healthcare Lies - Part 7

My take on Ann Coulter's latest. Her column was published on Townhall.com.

Summary: This installment covers life expectancy.

(18) America's lower life expectancy compared to countries with socialist health care proves that their medical systems are superior.

Like the infant-mortality ranking installment, here she cites different life-style choices and different reporting standards as the cause of the difference instead of the differences in access to medical care. In addition:

Quote:

These Democrats are all over the map on where precisely Americans place in the life-expectancy rankings. We're 24th, according to Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Barbara Boxer; 42nd, according to Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell; 35th, according to Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson; and 47th, according to Rep. Dennis Kucinich. So the U.S. may have less of a "life expectancy" problem than a "Democratic math competency" problem.

My Views:

This concludes the series as far as I'm concerned. I gather she wants to continue it for commercial reasons, but she's starting to repeat herself. I like the fact-based information contained in this series.

Among the life-style choices she cites is obesity. This does seem to be a problem in our American culture. One continually reads of the problems with rationing in other countries and one wonders if the doctors will be better under a government program.

Overall, I think that we need to attend to the doctor shortage in our country. We need more medical schools and less law schools. Lawyers have too great a role in our medical system and doctors too little.

The Democrats do have some good ideas. Mandating Health Insurance is one. Uninsured people still get health care; the government gets stuck with the bill. That gives government the right to demand some kind of payment. Everyone ought to get the same benefit from their tax dollars: the insured and the uninsured, alike.

Finally, the portability problem ought to be addressed. That means that we keep our insurance policies when we leave our jobs and when we move to another state.

Part 6

Series Summary

---

Anybody who is as hated as Ann Coulter is must be doing something right. She is very right-wing but every left-wing blogger would love to write like her. I hate rants; opinion pieces must argue from the facts. Pay attention to how she uses facts and draws politically incorrect connections among them. People would do well to think and not just be outraged.

Here's her Wiki bio. Her latest book is at the right.

Coulter 10/20/09

"Necessary Wars" Versus "Wars of Choice"

My take on Ann Coulter's latest. Her column was published on Townhall.com.

Summary: Obama is having difficulty deciding on the new strategy in the Afganistan War. Should he try to win it? Should he accept a status-quo quagmire? Should he cut and run?

Quote:

The difficult choice Obama faces in Afghanistan is entirely of his own making, not his generals' and certainly not Bush's. It was Obama's meaningless blather about Afghanistan being a "war of necessity" during the campaign that has moved the central front in the war on terrorism from Iraq -- a good battleground for the U.S. -- to Afghanistan -- a lousy battlefront for the U.S.

My Views: There's a lot of reasons for leaving. A winning strategy does not appear to be in sight.

I am surprised that Obama has got to this point without knowing what to do. He's had a lot of time to learn about this issue. Certainly, when he ran for President last year, he gave the impression he knew what to do. There's been no real changes there in the last few years, so why's he having such a problem coming to grips with this?

---

Anybody who is as hated as Ann Coulter is must be doing something right. She is very right-wing but every left-wing blogger would love to write like her. I hate rants; opinion pieces must argue from the facts. Pay attention to how she uses facts and draws politically incorrect connections among them. People would do well to think and not just be outraged.

Here's her Wiki bio. Her latest book is at the right.

Coulter 10/15/09

Left's Healthcare Lies - Part 6

My take on Ann Coulter's latest. Her column was published on Townhall.com.

Summary: This installment covers claims comparing US infant mortality rates to those of other countries. It's comparing apples to oranges. The main causes are life-style choices such as smoking and teen births, rather than a lack of medical care. Also, other countries don't count premature births while ours do.

(17) America's low ranking on international comparisons of infant mortality proves other countries' socialist health care systems are better than ours.

Quote:

Apart from the fact that we count -- and try to save -- all our babies, infant mortality is among the worst measures of a nation's medical care because so much of it is tied to lifestyle choices, such as the choice to have children out of wedlock, as teenagers or while addicted to crack.

My Views: She makes some good points. The major causes of infant mortality are premature births and low birth weight. In addition from from life-style choices, another major reason for the higher reported rate in the US is the reporting criteria. She cites examples of countries which classify all infant deaths in the first 24 hours as "miscarrage" rather than "death". 1/3 of all infant deaths in the US occur in the fist 24 hours. Adopting a single measurement of counting deaths would dramatically change the US ranking.

Part 5

Series Summary

Part 7

---

Anybody who is as hated as Ann Coulter is must be doing something right. She is very right-wing but every left-wing blogger would love to write like her. I hate rants; opinion pieces must argue from the facts. Pay attention to how she uses facts and draws politically incorrect connections among them. People would do well to think and not just be outraged.

Here's her Wiki bio. Her latest book is at the right.

Coulter 10/8/09

Left's Healthcare Lies - Part 5

My take on Ann Coulter's latest. Her column was published on Townhall.com.

Summary: This installment covers:

15. Democrats lost Congress in 1994 because President Clinton failed to pass national health care.

16. America's relatively low life expectancy compared to countries with socialist health care proves welfare-state health care is better.

Quote:

Republicans swept Congress in 1994 not because Clinton failed to nationalize health care, but because he tried to nationalize health care.

My Views:
One of the oddest things about this whole controversy is that the supporters think that if they only passed this thing, then the public will change from hating it to loving it. The problem is that they've got to pass it and it has to work. That means that defit does not increase deficit spending. It is difficult to see this happening.

Part 4

Series Summary

Part 6

---

Anybody who is as hated as Ann Coulter is must be doing something right. She is very right-wing but every left-wing blogger would love to write like her. I hate rants; opinion pieces must argue from the facts. Pay attention to how she uses facts and draws politically incorrect connections among them. People would do well to think and not just be outraged.

Here's her Wiki bio. Her latest book is at the right.

Chicago Looses Olympics: What Went Wrong?

Was this really so important? The fact that the US has hosted lots of Olympics and other entire continents haven't hosted any would have bben a powerful factor if I had had vote. At the end of the day, I think that the Olympic Officials made the right choice. South America ought to get their just due.

Now as to what went wrong: one idea is that it wasn't Obama's fault. Chicago had such a corrupt reputation, that this caused people to be against this. I don't buy this. Rio has big problems, too.

No, I think that the significance of this news story is that Obama did screw up. This is not to diss him (okay, a little.) Rather, it demonstrates some important attributes to good salesmanship. This is a good case study in basic principles of sales. This article says that 3 basic principles were violated in O's presentation:
1) Believe in the product
2) Stress benefits to buyer, not to the seller
3) Talk about the customer, not the sales force

Given the drive to bring the Olympics to a new area of the world, it is doubtful that anything the Obamas could have said would have changed anything, but all the talk about what sacrifices they were making to be there was the wrong approach.

Coulter 10/1/09

Left's Healthcare Lies - Part 4

My take on Ann Coulter's latest. Her column was published on Townhall.com.

Summary: This installment covers portability and "the trigger". The trigger is the term for government insurance only if the commercial insurance companies don't meet certain targets.

List:

12. Only a government run plan can provide "coverage that will stay with you whether you move, change your job or lose your job."
13. The "public option" trigger is something other than a national takeover of health care.
14. National health care will not cover abortions or illegal immigrants.

Quote:

Then why did Democrats vote down amendments that would prohibit coverage for illegals and abortion?

My Views: There's been a lot of talk about right-wing "lies" - particularly regarding statements from folks like Glen Beck and Sarah Palin. The left seems to be overstating their case, too. Both sides have exagerated the pros and cons of this issue. This series' value exposes the exagerations of the supporters of the Democrats' Bill. It also breaks down the issue into handy talking points.

Part 3

Series Summary

Part 5

---

Anybody who is as hated as Ann Coulter is must be doing something right. She is very right-wing but every left-wing blogger would love to write like her. I hate rants; opinion pieces must argue from the facts. Pay attention to how she uses facts and draws politically incorrect connections among them. People would do well to think and not just be outraged.

Here's her Wiki bio. Her latest book is at the right.