GOP's 'Kill Granny' Media Campaign Alarms Seniors

msn.com:

A campaign on conservative talk radio, fueled by President Obama's calls to control exorbitant medical bills, has sparked fear among senior citizens that the health-care bill moving through Congress will lead to end-of-life "rationing" and even "euthanasia."

The controversy stems from a proposal to pay physicians who counsel elderly or terminally ill patients about what medical interventions they would prefer near the end of life and how to prepare instructions such as living wills. Under the plan, Medicare would reimburse doctors for one session every five years to confer with a patient about his or her wishes and how to ensure those preferences are followed. The counseling sessions would be voluntary.

Read the whole story: msn.com

Comments

[Jack78]

Fact Check;

President Obama tried to sell his health care overhaul in prime time, mangling some facts in the process. He also strained to make the job sound easier to pay for than experts predict.
Obama promised once again that a health care overhaul “will be paid for.” But congressional budget experts say the bills they’ve seen so far would add hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit over the next decade.
He said the plan "that I put forward" would cover at least 97 percent of all Americans. Actually, the plan he campaigned on would cover far less than that, and only one of the bills now being considered in Congress would do that.
He said the "average American family is paying thousands" as part of their premiums to cover uncompensated care for the uninsured, implying that expanded coverage will slash insurance costs. But the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation puts the cost per family figure at $200.

Obama claimed his budget "reduced federal spending over the next 10 years by $2.2 trillion" compared with where it was headed before. NOT TRUE. Even figures from his own budget experts don’t support that. The Congressional Budget Office projects a $2.7 trillion increase, not a $2.2 trillion cut.


http://www.factcheck.org/2009/07/obamas-health-care-news-conference/

[Bronxdude]

Forget bipartisanship; true reform will provide affordable options that include a public offering. As it stands right now, UnitedHealthcare can deny medical care, restrict physician choice and authorize exorbitant copays and deductibles with no oversight. Real reform will end the monopolistic strangle-hold enjoyed by ruthless and morally bankrupt insurers like UnitedHealthcare. In Georgia, UnitedHealthcare colluded with corrupt republican officials to eliminate competition, with the end result being higher premiums, reduced benefits, and greater profits for UnitedHealthcare. With no real competition, UnitedHealthCare is free to bilk and rob consumers. When compared to the second quarter of 2008, profits for UnitedHealthcare increased by a whopping 155 percent, yet premiums continue to climb 3 times faster than wages. UnitedHealthcare is leading the charge to defeat healthcare reform by paying out millions in hush money to corrupt, lying, and obstructionistic republicans. The health insurance industry (and the corrupt republicans they bankroll) will not retreat quietly from billions in annual profits. Repelling the Bush tax cuts for the top 2 percent and ending the Iraq War would generate $1.8 trillion in revenue, more than enough to pay for universal healthcare over the next ten years. In comparison, the Iraq War will cost $2.4 trillion over the next ten years. I want the same affordable health insurance options enjoyed by Congress. Real choice will end the single profiteer, monopolistic health insurance system currently bilking and extorting Americans.

[Bronxdude]

Since lying and sell-out republicans sanction the looting of the middleclass by the same ruthless health insurers they deregulated, we need the government between the public and degenerate insurance profiteers. Profit at the expense of human suffering is a republican engineered abomination. True competition will lower health costs and the cost of health insurance. State employees in Georgia have no due process patient protection rights, a negotiated constraint that gives UnitedHealthcare carte blanche to deny medical care and restrict doctor choice with no oversight. Real competition will end the monopolistic stranglehold enjoyed by parasitic insurers like UnitedHealthcare. If competition is the lynchpin of free-market capitalism, then why is UnitedHealthcare afraid to compete on the open market against the feds? Limiting choice drives up cost, increasing profit for the health industry, which is why republican hacks defend extortion of the middleclass by companies like UnitedHealthcare. Through mendacious scare tactics, lying republicans curry favor and rouse baseless fear by preaching lies that reform will lead to rationed healthcare and restrictions on patient/doctor choice. Contrary to specious talking points propagated by self-serving republicans long on mindless rhetoric, as it stands right now, without real marketplace competition, insurers not only dictate the cost of healthcare, but they also get to pick and choose who gets coverage. Like degenerate street pimps, low-life republicans will not retreat quietly from millions in kickbacks paid out by their willing health industry whores. Public option now!

[Bronxdude]

The average American refuses to accept that the Republican Nation is at war with the working-class, which is why republicans support the status quo and vehemently oppose single-payor healthcare, public education, government oversight, minimum wage hikes, worker rights, access to higher education, middleclass tax relief, and, in general, any legislation that would jeopardize the continuation of a credit-dependent, employer exploited, unhealthy, downtrodden, underpaid, debt-laden, undereducated and permanent class of laborers. Similar to exploited sharecroppers, it’s in the best interest of republicans to keep the working-class hopeless, oppressed, unhealthy, undereducated and debt-laden. Republicans staunchly supported the bailout of Wall Street to protect their own assets, but opposed the bailout out the automobile industry, which employs thousands of middleclass Americans. The republican aristocracy opposes any kind of governmental oversight that will interfere with their pursuit of exploitive capitalism; republicans would like to abolish the Departments of Agriculture, Transportation, Interior, Education and The Food and Drug Administration, because these agencies advocate for workers. Just like feudal lords, the Republican Nation requires a formidable army to protect their financial interests, which is why republicans defend unrestrained military spending. According to the CBO, the Iraq War will cost $2.6 trillion over 10 years; health insurance for every American would cost $1.2 trillion over the same period. Republicans want to keep America angrily divided by class and race. Universal health insurance provides hope and would elevate the standard of living for every American, something republicans don’t want.

[Boyaca]

The rest of the industrialised world looks at the US, and shakes it's collective head over the way it is so easy to fool the American Public. Barnum had it right when he said " there was a sucker born every minute". In the case of America he might want to move that up a bit to one a second. When will you people stop listening to snake oil salesmen? Now' even you people' should see the flaw in democracy. Democracy is a form of government where the slick, the con artist, the fraudster, the manipulator is free to practice their skills with impunity.W­ho controls the free speech bullhorn in a democracy? In your case it is the banks, the oil industry,the insurance industry and the legal industry. Actually it should be called a foghorn, because these people fog up the facts to confuse a gullible american public. What mistifies the rest of the world is that americans swallow hook line and sinker every time.

[MNTom]

Its sad that people are buying this crap.

[Grunty1]

This is why Rushpublicans ONLY campaign based on fear: there are enough stupid people in America who will believe it!

[CharlieMarlowe]

But why are people so stupid? Why are they distrustful of government in the US when in the rest of the First world governments are not so vilified and expected to assume the primary role of leadership? Why are people lacking in discernment? What is it in American culture and history that led to this? What role does religion play in all this? I have my theories as to why these things hapened. So let the debate begin! Also, can anyone foresee anyway to overcome this or it it indicative of an inexorable decay?

[nellpost]

No one ever polls ME! I'm contacting my grandma!

[olmossy]

Lies , misdirection, Fear tactics, It's all the Rebublicans have ever had, IN my memory since Joe McCarthy.

[unstuffedshirt]

These people have lived on this planet a long time and seen a lot of liars and hucksters. What excuse do they have for falling for this transparent fiction?

[yemaya]

Exactly, my older relatives know what's going on. They're so insulting. They think we're as ignorant as their voters.

[JohnSawyer]

Unfortunately, I've found that age doesn't always bring wisdom--just as often, if not more, it simply serves as more time on Earth to reinforce pseudo-thoughts.

Also, many of these people live in a bubble. It's the equivalent of living behind a gated community (which many of these people do, literally, but the same can be accomplished culturally)--they don't get out to hear other opinions. Many of them, as they have for decades, have bought into the idea that the US is divided between "liberals" and "conservatives", and since they consider themselves conservatives, they think that anyone who doesn't call themselves a conservative, doesn't wear the same clothes they do, doesn't have the same haircuts, doesn't like the same dance steps, doesn't adopt exactly the kind of predictable, apple-pie mentality they do, etc., must be a furry liberal, upon whom they can heap every paranoia that their aged, yet naive brains can invent, and since they think "the liberal's" every idea must automatically be awful, the conservative finds it easy to "think", by choosing to simply adopt the opposite ideas. They get very good at cutting off their noses to spite their faces, and so they can often be taken advantage of very easily.

Many of these people think they're part of America's "greatest generation". While there are many people who look just like them who are, these particular people are not.

[popart]

seniors are not the only people who are easily "alarmed" by GOP misrepresentations of Obama's programs you just have to look at all the misdirections and out right lies that the opposition has been putting out there to see that the GOP plan is to "alarm" as many folks as possible..­.... at all ages.

[Annieke]

The fact that the elders are actually believing the GOP (after being lied to by that same party practically all their lives) tells me that their mental capacities have been diminshed to a huge extent.

The fact that there is a POSIBILITY to talk about it, does not mean it will actually HAPPEN.
And better to make sure your doctor (and family) knows what your position is on the issue.

Personally I am very happy that both my grandparents made this pretty clear long before their death.
So as a family we could act in line with their wishes and also in line with Dutch law.

[Sundialsvc4]

Oh, I don't think that too many Seniors do believe it. Talk is cheap.

Talk is also paid-for in this country by people who would spend millions of dollars scaring people to preserve the right to ... leave them bankrupt, instead of assisting them, in their hour of greatest need and peril.

[swift goat pet for truth]

Wonder what the corelation is between those seniors who believe this and those seniors who are birthers.

[slipthalo]

Or what the correlation is to FauxNews viewers and those who believe this. I would say it's really high.

[Grunty1]

[tells me that their mental capacities have been diminshed to a huge extent.]

Even more frighteningly: perhaps not!

[greenie 61]

FEAR, is all they got.

[tempting]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QwX_soZ1GI

Pass this on to anyone you think is willing to listen to a real insider of the insurance companies. Someone who is serious about finding out the truth about the Health Insurance crisis that exsist only in this country of all the developed countries in the world.

[Poorsarah]

More misinformation from the GOP. A very informative article on MSN.com dispelled the myths of the healthcare reform bill...thi­s was one of the myths mentioned. GOP fearmongering, lying, and manipulating so they can keep the "campaign contributions" coming from big pharma and heath insurance moguls. The "private sector" of healthcare is monopolizing and draining our healthcare system dry. The GOP and BlueDog Dems have difficulty admitting when they are WRONG.

[ChelseaC]

I'd like to see our President to a FIRM/dertermined stand on this fearmonger­ing.......­..........­..........­.......

[tempting]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QwX_soZ1GI

Pass this on to anyone you think is willing to listen to a real insider of the insurance companies. Someone who is serious about finding out the truth about the Health Insurance crisis that exsist only in this country of all the developed countries in the world.

[taddles]

Let's see now, a living will means that you are making decisions about your own health care in case of a situation where you are not able to make those decisions. If you don't have a living will, you have no part in the decision making process of your own life, you've left it up to others to make those decisions for you. So either the Republicans are lying or they don't want you making your own important health care decisions. Either way they are criminals.

[JohnSawyer]

The Republicans are lying AND they don't want you making your own important health care decisions.