Kyl: Conservatives Believe in Free Market Health Care and Intend to Get it by Lying
Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) gets a little too candid in an interview with National Review, and concedes that the Luntz-prescribed methods for talking about the health care issue are aimed at misleading people about the conservative movement’s real views:
JON KYL: We of course believe the free market can provide the incentives for everyone to be covered with good insurance but to talk about it in terms of the free market is not to be persuasive with the people we have to convince. We have to describe this in terms that people really do understand and care about and that is patient centered. They don’t want to get between themselves and their doctor. They don’t want to have long waiting lines, possibly even denying care that they feel is important. They don’t want to lose insurance they like already. Those are all things we need to address in our alternatives and I think that’s the best way to talk about it rather than the free market.
This stuff is all red herrings. The main health reform ideas will not cause anyone to lose the insurance they already have and will not do anything to change people’s relationships with their doctors. Its about changing people’s relationships with their insurance companies, and about providing some subsidies so that everyone can afford insurance. Free market health care is about letting people die of treatable ailments if they don’t happen to have the money to pay. As Kyl says, it’s not a very compelling message.
33 Responses to “Kyl: Conservatives Believe in Free Market Health Care and Intend to Get it by Lying”
Register
RSSLogin
Topic Cloud
ArchivesBlog RollAbout Matt YglesiasContact Me
Donate
May 22nd, 2009 at 4:48 pm
Free market health care is about letting people die of treatable ailments if they don’t happen to have the money to pay.
And government health care is about letting people die of treatable ailments if the government doesn’t feel like paying.
Jeebus, what an asinine post.
May 22nd, 2009 at 4:52 pm
Everything is a marketing issue with these clowns – EVERYTHING! To them, honesty is NOT the best policy.
May 22nd, 2009 at 4:55 pm
They don’t want to get between themselves and their doctor. They don’t want to have long waiting lines, possibly even denying care that they feel is important. They don’t want to lose insurance they like already.
Okay, I can understand why a senator might say this, because they probably get the best health care possible. But how does this nonsense work on voters, who presumably realize that most people’s health care already involves an unfriendly bureaucracy that gets between them and their doctor, waiting lines and denial of care?
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:05 pm
This article is rich coming from a blogger who *ALWAYS* call himself and his political beliefs “progressive”, and never “liberal”
Why don’t you use the L-word sometimes if you’re so unconcerned with the negative connotations that hte general public associates with certain words and terms?
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:06 pm
That same free market healthcare added 11 million people to the ranks of the uninsured since George W. Bush took office.
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:14 pm
Free market is just code for corporations that have profited enough donate heavily to me and my re-election fund.
And Al, stick to basketball.
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:29 pm
To Ike:
I’m pretty sure that the difference between Matt using progressive vs. liberal and Kyl lying about health care is that progressive and liberal are really used as synonyms for the same thing (one demonized, while the other is not) whereas Kyl was lying about health care.
These things aren’t really the same.
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:36 pm
“Free market health care is about letting people die of treatable ailments if they don’t happen to have the money to pay.”
Boy, talk about red herrings. That’s like saying that free market car insurance means letting new cars die when repairs would otherwise be possible. Somehow, we manage, by not assuming that car insurance should cover everything down to windshield washer refills.
If we removed health insurance from companies, assumed that people would mostly buy catastrophic level coverage, and let them buy the rest out of pocket – as they somehow manage to do with things like car care – we would end up with a system where the people receiving care would decide what care to get, and what they were willing to pay for it.
As I’ve said before, the liberal theory on this is to replace one set of uncaring bureaucrats (insurance) with another (govt). It will work just about as well, with pretty much the same set of cost problems.
May 22nd, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Roberson, your attempt to analogize cars with human beings discredits your entire post. You so obviously don’t get it.
However, I do hope your fellow wingnuts pick up and repeat this loser meme.
May 22nd, 2009 at 6:22 pm
Joel,
It’s not a nutty analogy. Don’t give your car an oil change regularly, and it’ll break down way faster than you will without regular checkups. And yet somehow, most people manage to take care of their cars well enough that we don’t have tons of new-ish cars in the junkyard due to lack of maintenance.
What’s unclear to me is why you think a bunch of govt bureaucrats will be any better at deciding what medication and procedures you’ll be allowed to have than the insurance bureaucrats have been. Their motivations will be pretty much the same: here’s your annual budget, make sure you stay within it.
I’m not taken in by the alarmist rhetoric from some on the right about how much worse this will be than what we have now; I expect it will be about the same as what we have now, just with a different set of gatekeepers we’ll have to deal with over what sort of medicines and procedures will be allowable.
That’s what I find so frustrating about this entire debate. What the left wants is a govt run version of what we have now. Yay. There’s some real change. What the right should be doing is asking people how well they like insurance adjusters now, and whether they’ll be happy having a scaled up version of the same thing.
May 22nd, 2009 at 6:51 pm
I don’t think the guy is encouraging dishonesty. In his mind, a free market is good because it creates tangible advantages. (I’m not sure I agree with him in the health care industry, but let’s run with his assumption since we’re trying to get inside his head.) All he is saying is that instead of screaming “Free markets good! Socialism bad!” the GOP should try articulating the concrete advantages that they think the free market can provide to consumers.
Not a bad point, I think, and not an unfair one either. Probably won’t ultimately be successful, and that’s probably for the best, but certainly it couldn’t work any worse for them than their current strategy.
May 22nd, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Pender,
Close, but mostly I’d like the silly talking point that we have a free market in health care now die. We don’t have a free market in health now; we have a bureaucratic nightmare.
Again, what I see here is the left asking for more of that, only on steroids. It’s an awful lot like what Bush did with TARP. We’ve gotten the same thing, only more so.
May 22nd, 2009 at 7:16 pm
That’s like saying that free market car insurance means letting new cars die when repairs would otherwise be possible.
That’s exactly what car insurance does: if the cost of repair after an accident exceeds the worth of the car, the insurance company declares it a total loss and gets rid of the car. I’m not really sure I want insurance companies doing that to me. Or, more to the point, my next of kin.
May 22nd, 2009 at 7:17 pm
This is the truth: if we could wave a magic wand and get us a health care system like France’s in 3 months, it would be political suicide for Republicans to even hint of going back.
May 22nd, 2009 at 7:22 pm
Tyro – and in the UK, there has recently been exactly that kind of talk about triage. A govt run system doesn’t differ from an insurance based one, except insofar as the piles of money are larger. All that really means is that it takes a bit longer to run into the brick wall of limits.
Put a group of N people into a pool of insured, and I don’t care what entity backs it – at some level, there are going to be triage decisions.
The left likes to pretend that won’t happen, but that seems like the same “no one told me there would be math” problem that crops up around social security.
May 22nd, 2009 at 8:03 pm
I am of the opinion that the kind of perfect-world reform of the health care system that most people are envisioning would ultimately require rationing. And any system that incorporates rationing means that eventually most people will have the experience of watching as a government man drives up to the hospital in a government car and pulls the plug on their dying mother. I think that’s the right result; I think plugs do need to get pulled, often when the person would very much prefer that they not be; and I still think it will instill in nearly everyone who sees it happen a lifelong and intense aversion to whatever system causes it to happen.
Right now the insurance company pulls the plug, which works in a sense because the bereaved cannot vote the insurance company out of office. (One might argue that many of the health care problems we have today are caused by the angry bereaved voting into effect regulations that force insurance companies not to offer plans that will result in plugs being pulled before a certain time — in other words, voting to eliminate cheaper insurance plans.) But I shudder to think how it will work when the entire plan is conducted by the government and at the command of the piecemeal decisions of the voter.
This isn’t to say that substantial reforms can’t be made without going to rationing — but we’ll still be left with a system necessarily run by the insurance companies.
May 22nd, 2009 at 8:08 pm
All that really means is that it takes a bit longer to run into the brick wall of limits.
Well, James, for everyone with a pre-existing condition, the brick wall is right in front of them at this very moment. Too bad for them, I suppose, but making the pool N as large as possible is the goal here where the system serves the public interest, rather than shutting someone out because maybe they have a history of depression.
What’s sort of strange is that you sarcastically dismissed the parallel between health insurance and car insurance and then, when it was pointed out that this parallel is actually quite apt in a bad way, conceded, “well, yes, that’s just the way it is.” Is your entire shtick a bunch of glib argumentative responses because you get riled up when someone attacks your precious (demonstrably failed) worldview.
May 22nd, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Jon Kyl lied to the Supreme Court during the Rumsfeld v Hamdan case, so for him to say Republicans now have to lie some more is no surprise.
I wish in the midst of the whole non-ordeal of whether Pelosi was lying, someone would have brought up Kyl’s (and Graham’s) lies to the highest court of the land.
May 22nd, 2009 at 9:39 pm
The free market doesn’t really work well in medicine. In free markets, everyone involved has an incentive to lower prices to gain market share. The reason is that consumers tend to act fairly intelligently when given time to do research and make a decision. But medicine doesn’t work that way. If you have a heart attack, are you going to get on the phone and get price quotes from the various hospitals? Of course not, you are probably not conscious, anyway. Instead, you will go to the nearest hospital, because you want to live. And that’s the fundamental issue in medicine, it doesn’t operate on the principle that both sides of a financial transaction are well informed and acting with free will. On the contrary, medicine is extortion. The only question a consumer asks is “do I want to live or not?” The only question the supplier asks is “how much money can we get out of this person?” It’s ultimately a mafia economy model, not a free market. Trying to force the system into free markets won’t work. There’s no real competition, only extortion, and free markets don’t work that way.
May 22nd, 2009 at 10:14 pm
On the idea that Kyl’s free-market healthcare are unrealistically optimistic, it seems to me that the sad reality of politics is that it would be irresponsible for advocates of any large-scale health reform project to do anything other than present unrealistically optimistic measures. For better or for worse, that’s politics.
May 22nd, 2009 at 10:18 pm
Talk about a red herring. Boy, you’re really hitting on all cylinders tonight. Who is talking about new cars? We are talking about denied coverage on doctor’s visits. Has your car insurance ever denied your coverage after an accident because your car has a “pre-existing condition”? The one thing you seem to be good at is lying.
May 22nd, 2009 at 10:19 pm
Jeebus, what an ass. Better trolls please! Seriously, is all you can do these days is lie and cry like a baby about being called a racist?
May 22nd, 2009 at 10:39 pm
“it seems to me that the sad reality of politics is that it would be irresponsible for advocates of any large-scale health reform project to do anything other than present unrealistically optimistic measures”
You are probably right, but the Japanese system offers hope. It is fully privatized, and then heavily regulated. The insurance companies in Japan can make money under a system that guarantees coverage. Now, the Japanese system obviously has it’s flaws, just like any other system. But it still gets pretty good ratings from its consumers. That’s a model we really need to look at. We cannot create a system that eliminates the insurance companies. We have the best Congress money can buy, and guess what? You didn’t buy it. But maybe we can create a system where our insurance companies actually have to provide insurance. Right now, our insurance companies are great at collecting money, but when it comes time to pay it out, they’re going to court against their policyholders. The Japanese model would be an improvement, it maintains the current bosses in the system, but it puts those bosses under a boss who faces election.
May 22nd, 2009 at 11:27 pm
Ever try to call a hospital and ask how much it charges for a fairly common procedure?
May 23rd, 2009 at 12:25 am
“Ever try to call a hospital and ask how much it charges for a fairly common procedure?”
Yes I have! But guess what? They don’t give out such information. I did it when I was bleeding from my ears from a massive internal skull fracture. And everyone I talked to assured me of two things: I am crazy for asking, and I will get no such information until they can verify my insurance. And I was like: wait a minute, I’m paying cash. You don’t need to verify anything. I you want to verify someone, verify the name of my lawyer, because I already called him before I talked to you. We’ll be negotiating the price. And I’m the real extreme capitalist in the medical system. I pay every bill with cash and have no insurance. I call my lawyer before I call the hospital. And I don’t sign any form until after the treatment is done. And if you charge me more than $5000, then you’ll be dealing with my lawyer, not me That’s how private enterprise works, but hospitals get all freaked out when they actually have to face private enterprise. But if they don’t like it, fine, stabilize me, and I’ll get the next flight to Thailand to get real treatment. That’s private enterprise, and that will bring down our current system when people realize they can get they same treatment they get in America, only it costs less than their dedecutible if they can pay cash. The real concept in the free market is simple: the cost of your treatment in America is so much higher that you would be ridiculously stupid to even consider doing so. Even if you have insurance, it’s still cheaper to pay cash in Thailand for equal treatment. It will be less than your co-pay And we need to call the industry on this. We should say this: “we’ll let you extort us for any situation that can’t wait for three days. And anything else, we’ll fly to another country that can give us a better deal.” Does anyone realistically think that our medical industry would want to face that competition? Surely not. I get my medical treatment in Thailand, and you should too. Great treatment, great service, and super hot nurses. Give me that in America, and I might use your services. I already have a health care plan, and it’s in Thailand. So any plan you want, just don’t make me buy into it unless you will provide me Thailand’s level of service. And that will never happen in America. So let us opt out and go where the real medical treatment happens.
May 23rd, 2009 at 12:36 am
They can tell how long you’ll be in the “shop,” but they won’t know how much it’ll cost until they find out how many medicare reimbursements they’ll get stiffed on that month.
Even if they told you, you’d have to live somewhere were there are 3 or 4 places that offer the same kind and quality of service, which is almost impossible. And then, particularly if the procedure is elective or palliative, you have to weight the benefit of the procedure against the cost, which means eventually you’ll be discounting the value of your own life and having to rationally decide how much money you’re likely to make for the rest of your life, how much the quality of that life is worth. And if you conclude the economic benefit of living doesn’t outwiegh the cost, you’ll have to rationally decide that you’d rather save your money, at the expense of dying sooner.
The problem with free market healthcare will always be that you can tell someone that a drug only has a 1% chace of extending their life one year and will cost every penny they have, and they will gladly pay it, because people are incapable of rationally valuing their own life. Thank God.
May 23rd, 2009 at 1:45 am
“because people are incapable of rationally valuing their own life. Thank God.”
That was a great post, and then you did that. And that last comment just freaks me out. What should I thank God for? Our dysfunctional medical system? Or do you want God to make medical decisions like the Christian Scientists do? Or are you claiming that God wants the current system? Thank God for nothing, follow your own path and recognize that the paths of others are often defined by their desires for money and sex. Women want money, and men want sex. Thus, the prostitution trade that redistributes that money properly. And I still think we men are really stupid for thinking we could ever get satisfaction from sex, because what whatever we get, it’s just a fleeting shot. And our women always take our money, and we usually give it to them. Sadly, we don’t always give it to them. So who’s really smart in this transaction? It ain’t us men for sure. The only people who have a chance at winning from this bargain are our children. A man will always enjoy his male child, and most times he even likes the girl child. The woman will always love both. However fucked up this historical agreement may be, the woman will usually win when she seeks her independence. In some cultures, she’ll get killed if she tries to leave, but in most she’ll win. Good for them. I’d like to think we live in a beautiful time, but we don’t. And I have deep respect for those women who really will face death to assert their who they are. They are our true heroes because they assert the belief that they can be free. Anyone can be free in a cage, but to say the cage should not be there is quite a bit different. And many of those women will die saying that. I wish it weren’t so, but nothing happens without people dying to make a belief true. And those women will die too. They have to, as bad as it might seem. But we must remember them. And when the changes occur, we must remember the female pioneers better than how we have in the past. And when we do, we should understand that when anyone wants their rights, it’s always been the women who made it happen. Even when there has been male leader in any human rights movement, there’s always been an army of women who wanted to do the right thing.
May 23rd, 2009 at 1:57 am
What’s missing with the pro-private option proponents is captured nicely in this paragraph from James Robertson:
What’s unclear to me is why you think a bunch of govt bureaucrats will be any better at deciding what medication and procedures you’ll be allowed to have than the insurance bureaucrats have been. Their motivations will be pretty much the same: here’s your annual budget, make sure you stay within it.
I don’t know why it’s not clear. The for profit companies have the incentive to actively engage in obfuscation since, well, they are in the end looking for profit not people’s health. So, naturally, they’ve set up massive bureaucratic obstacles to patients getting proper care since the more difficult they make the path to their responsibility the more they don’t end up footing the bill.
The evil guvment has no such motivation. The push is for efficiency, not profit. Maybe it’s a subtle point but a crucial one.
A major hospital in the US employs hundreds of people engaged in the daunting task of working through the maze of paperwork created by the heath insurance industry. A similar size hospital in Canada employs three to do the same job (yes, I can find the link but am much too far into my vino right now to bother). It’s a major factor in the huge costs we have associated with healthcare in this country — and even more of a factor in the lack of quality of care.
It’s funny because this is a case where the “free market” has created added levels of bureaucracy to maximize profit. So much for pure ideology.
May 23rd, 2009 at 9:50 am
How about a discussion on rigging the game Senator Kyl? The house always wins in the the health insurance game. I would hope that my senator would be an advocate for the people. Unfortunately, my senator is a Republican who advocates for industry over consumer.
May 23rd, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Women want money, and men want sex.
A man will always enjoy his male child, and most times he even likes the girl child.
I’d love to depart Earth a little while too, so please give me some of what you’ve been smoking.
May 23rd, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Government run Medicare is about to go bankrupt so why is President Obama trying to impose another government run health care boondoggle? President Obama and the Democrats provide two main reasons: 1) To provide health insurance to the uninsured and 2) to increase the quality of health care at a reduced cost.
As to:
1) The fact is that the bulk of the people without insurance are either choosing not to have insurance or in between jobs and thus eligible for government assistance. The fact is no one in this Nation goes without access to health care. Even if you are uninsured you can go to a Government run hospital or a free clinic and get health care.
2) The quality of health care in the US is among the best in the world Read http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba649 10 Surprising Facts about American Health Care and you will find that what President Obama and the Democrats are saying about the poor quality of health care in the US is just plain untrue. As to the costs, again, government run Medicare is going bankrupt. Anyone who believes that a government run health care program as proposed by President Obama will bring down costs must be smoking something.
So why is President Obama and the Democrats trying to impose a government run health care system that will most certainly result in higher health care costs at a much lower quality of health care? Just follow the money and you will see that the main beneficiaries of a government run health care program would be government union workers, who are among President Obama’s and the Democrats greatest supporters.
May 23rd, 2009 at 2:58 pm
If you think President Obama’s proposed government run health care system is so great I suggest you read The Ugly Truth About Canadian Health Care David Gratzer http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_3_canadian_healthcare.htm City Journal Summer 2007 before signing on to President Obama’s June 6 big push to pass his plan. The reality is President Obama’s proposed government run health care system will result in higher costs and lower quality of health care. The only winners will be President Obama’s biggest supporters, union workers, everyone else will get the shaft. So don’t be a sucker and call your Congressman to vote NO on President Obama’s proposed health care plan.
May 23rd, 2009 at 4:43 pm
James Robertson: Private insurance exists entirely to provide the least amount of care it feasibly can. Public health providers exist solely to provide the /most care possible. Given that their reasons for existence are utterly opposite, on what grounds are you comparing them?