ObamaCares Death March

Problems with Health Care Reform
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) allows federal Tax Dollars to directly subsidize Insurance plans that cover Abortions. This contravenes existing law.  The most well-known examples of the prohibition on the use of federal Tax Dollars to subsidize Insurance plans that cover abortions are the Hyde Amendment which applies to programs funded through the Labor, Health and Human Services (LHHS) appropriations bill and the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program (FEHBP). The...

Why Not Monopolize the Term for Prevention?
Eight years ago I went to a conference for young Breast Cancer survivors. It was pretty useful to be around a bunch of other women who, like me, had been diagnosed with Breast Cancer in their twenties and thirties. It was also useful to hear doctors who had actually thought about things like long term survival and fertility. But the most memorable-and creepy-part of the conference was the way they referred to us, the survivors, as “customers.” They explained they did it...

Abortion Advocates Bemoan Repeal Vote, Abortion De-Funding
The head one of the leading Abortion Advocacy Groups is already complaining about House Republicans and the vote they scheduled for next week to overturn abortion-funding ObamaCare. NARAL president Nancy Keenan doesn’t like that effort and is upset that GOP lawmakers will follow that vote with one on Legislation to ensure the ObamaCare law does not allow for any funding of abortions with Taxpayer money. “In addition to next week’s vote to Repeal the health-reform law, Boehner a...

They're not above lying
THEY'RE NOT ABOVE LYING.... When it comes to the fight over Health Care, the political world could have had a great debate. Serious people had an opportunity to explore in detail how to improve a dysfunctional system, what should be expected of the government and the electorate, what reform could mean to The Economy and the nation's global competitiveness, etc. That never happened, of course. Opponents instead brought frequent, shameless, and practically pathological lies to the table. It's ha...

What Paul Ryan hopes to do
In honor of the Congress, the good folks over at e21 have republished a column by Rep. Paul Ryan on what he wants to accomplish. This is good stuff: Let me be specific: I propose to modernize Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security so these critical programs can meet their mission in the 21st century; secure access to universal health coverage where patients and doctors - not government or Insurance company Bureaucrats - are the nucleus of the system; restructure Federal job training program...

A Physician's Take on the "Death Panel" Revelation
Over the Christmas holiday weekend, The New York Times revealed that the Obama Administration's Medicare Regulators have enacted new regulatory guidelines, in complete defiance of Congress, that will result in Health Care providers receiving payment to give annual “end-of-life counseling” to their patients. As a physician, I can tell you that we doctors do routinely have end-of-life discussions with our patients. This is a necessary part of our job. But we do it when it is appropriate and in...

EUSA Pharma Announces Priority Review Status for ERWINAZE(R) BLA
EUSA Pharma completed the rolling submission of its ERWINAZE BLA on 1 November 2010, after receiving Fast Track designation from the FDA. Priority Review reduces the target regulatory assessment period to six months from the date of submission. EUSA Pharma is seeking marketing approval for ERWINAZE for use in the treatment of acute lymphoblastic Leukemia in patients with hypersensitivity to E. coli-derived asparaginase. The product is currently approved in a number of countries, including Canada...

Earl Blumenauer's kiss of death
Follow the way of LOVE and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially the gift of prophecy. 1 Cor 14:1 Old Earl Blumenauer gets caught with his hand in the casket. He secretly manages to get his Assisted Suicide provision back in ObamaCare. After provision 1233 was eliminated from the original bill he goes around Congress to have it reinstated in the dead of night like a vampire in search of a neck. The Party of Death does what it does best and that is open the door to have mass murders for thos...

Time to grab the third rail, Madame Governor
Soon, Governor Martinez sends the 2011 Legislature her Budget for fiscal 2012. At last count, she is looking to plug a $400 million gap. She campaigned on the promise that she would not make Spending Cuts to education or Medicaid. Read my lips: ‘Where are you going to find $400 million to plug the gap, Madame Governor?’ The “Third Rail” of politics refers to extremely Controversial issues in which it is observed that, when acting unilaterally, “touch it, and you die...

At Medicaid signing, Dayton lends mic to tea party
On Wednesday morning, Gov. Mark Dayton signed an Executive Order allowing Minnesota to accept early Medicaid funding under the Affordable Care Act amid hundreds of Tea Party Protesters at the Capitol. As the Tea Party booed Dayton, he handed over the microphone and allowed opponents to have their say. Among those speaking was Jake McMillian of Bradlee Dean‘s Controversial hard rock ministry You Can Run But You Cannot Hide. Dayton began the event by addressing the crowd of tea partiers who...

What You Need to Know About Berwick's "Orwellian Wellness Visit"
In their rush to defend Donald Berwick's Orwellian dead of night inclusion of advanced directive and end of life planning into what is called the Annual "Wellness Visit" ... Democrats have claimed it's purely voluntary and that Medicare already covers advanced directive discussions. However, as Robert M. Goldberg points out at The American Spectator, the inclusion of the advanced directive and end of life planning is not voluntary, only the patient's discussion is. Doctors are required to bring ...

Daily Links, January 4
Here’s what one second of National Debt looks like - Andrew Malcolm Here’s why we mention June 1. On that day the National Debt was “only” $13 Trillion. It’s 214 days from June 1 through last Friday, Dec. 31. That’s 5,136 hours or 308,160 minutes or 18,489,600 seconds. In those seven short months the National Debt increased by $1,000,000,000,000. That works out to be a growth in National Debt of $54,084 borrowed during every single one of those 18,489,600 se...

Another Day, Another Death Panel Smear
This column is a collaboration between KHN and The New Republic. I respect honest disagreements about policy. You think Health Care reform is a bad idea? That it will run up the Deficit or make it harder to find a doctor? I think you're wrong, but that's a reasonable debate and I'm happy to have it, just as long as you're truthful about what you are arguing and make some good faith effort to learn the facts. Often, though, the noisiest voices in the Health Care reform debate don't do those thin...

Outcry over FDA withdrawal of anti-cancer drug Avastin
Christie Bowen awoke early one morning and couldn't figure out how to walk or get dressed. She began having seizures as her husband helped her downstairs so they could drive to a Hospital near their Windsor, Vt., home. Doctors there told her husband the Breast Cancer she had been diagnosed with three years earlier might have spread to her brain. She went by ambulance to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, a half-hour away in Lebanon, N.H., where a neurologist quickly diagnosed her. Cancer hadn't...

Democrat Hoyer: So, Tea Partier, How Long Have You Hated Your Mother?
Steny Hoyer (D, MD) is now leaving his spot as the House Majority Leader to take his back seat job as House Minority Whip because the people of America spoke to fire him and his boss, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D, CA). Steny wants you Tea Party folks to know something, too. You are all from unhappy families. Yes, that is why you got so mad during this recent election. Oh, it isn’t because the Democrats stopped being an American Party and took up the banner of European-styled Socialist Democr...

Reading the Constitution: Will familiarity lead to fidelity?
The best place to begin, a wise man once said, is at the beginning - which is where the new Congress will begin, with a public reading of the U.S. Constitution. Critics have condemned the move, along with a new provision in the House rules that requires all proposed Legislation to identify its constitutional antecedent, as a shopworn political gimmick designed to appeal to the Tea Party Movement. In fact it is much more. For far too long members of congress and presidents of both parties hav...

The New Congress Bears a Lot of Watching
Are we going to pay attention? “Americans ousted Democrats in droves because they want the status quo changed and power over their lives transferred from Washington to themselves. That means fighting to reform relics like the Clean Air Act without fear of being caricatured as against clean air. It doesn’t mean sitting safely on the sidelines while the Left sees what it can get done in the courts. Before the Midterm Elections, Republicans talked a good game about fighting the predicam...

Simple Two Page Bill
From The Washington Examiner Cantor’s ObamaCare Repeal bill goes online   112TH Congress 1ST SESSION H. R. __ To Repeal the job-killing Health Care law and health care-related provisions in the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. IN THE House of Representatives Mr. CANTOR (for himself and [see ATTACHED LIST of cosponsors]) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on ____________ A BILL To Repeal the job-killing Health Care law and health carer...

Bayer AG seeks EU approval for new blood thinner
Germany's Bayer AG says it has submitted an application seeking authorization to sell its new anti-clotting drug Rivaroxaban within the European Union. The company said Wednesday it is seeking approval from the European Medicines Agency to sell the blood thinner to prevent strokes in people with a common heart rhythm problem and treat deep vein thrombosis. Rivaroxaban is being developed by Bayer Healthcare and U.S. pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson, based in New Brunswick, New Jersey....

GOP House Member Says He Doesnt Need To Opt Out Of Congressional Health Plan Because Hes On Medicare
GOP House Member Says He Doesn’t Need To Opt Out Of Congressional Health Plan Because He’s On Medicare Last night, during a debate on the GOP’s plans to Repeal the Affordable Care Act with Rep. Phil Roe (R-TN), MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell asked Roe if he would be following the example of some of his colleagues and opt out of his own government-sponsored Health Care Insurance. Roe responded that he is not enrolled in the Congressional Health Care plan, called the F...

This Week's Health Industry News
The 112th Congress convenes on Wednesday. Republicans who took control of the House of Representatives in the Midterm Election are shortly expected to introduce a measure to Repeal and replace the Health Care Legislation passed in March. But with the Senate and White House controlled by Democrats, the move is not really expected to go anywhere. When the measure is brought to a vote - possibly later this month - even its supporters are predicting it will be ignored by the Senate, leaving bot...

Citing the Constitution
A few responses to my mention yesterday of the new House rule requiring each introduced bill to cite a specific constitutional provision for Congress’s authority to pass it asked me to elaborate on what this would mean in practice. Well, this is apparently a new thing so nobody knows exactly, but the Republican leadership has provided a fascinating memo providing guidance to all (not just GOP) lawmakers. First of all, the Constitution has to be cited “as...

What Makes a Government More Effective?
Ruy Texeira argues for something near and dear to my heart, more effective government: Make no mistake: a more effective government is the public’s priority, not a smaller government. In a survey I helped conduct for the Center for American Progress’s Doing What Works government reform project, we found that, by a decisive 62 to 36 margin, the public said their priority for improving the Federal Government was increasing its efficiency and effectiveness, not reducing its cost and size. Sig...

Prohibitionists: Leave Us Alone!
Sometimes I drink Scotch and then, to wake myself up, I drink coffee. So what? Many people consume mixtures of caffeine and Alcohol in drinks like rum and Coke. Again, so what? But recently some college kids started drinking pre-mixed combos of Alcohol and caffeine with names like Four Loko and Moonshot '69. Moonshot '69 is a pilsner Beer with less than a coffee cup's worth of caffeine. Until recently, Four Loko contained 12 percent Alcohol -- about the same as wine -- and as much caffeine as ...

Prohibitionists:Leave us alone!
Sometimes I drink Scotch, and then, to wake myself up, I drink coffee. So what? Many people consume mixtures of caffeine and Alcohol in drinks like rum and Coke. Again, so what? But recently, some college kids started drinking pre-mixed combos of Alcohol and caffeine with names like Four Loko and Moonshot '69. Moonshot '69 is a pilsner Beer with less than a coffee cup's worth of caffeine. Until recently, Four Loko contained 12 percent Alcohol – about the same as wine – and as much...