Obama’s Slap Chop Infomercial
10:00:21 PM: I find it odd that the show before is I survived a Japanese gameshow. The Obamashow should be called I survived a Japanese lost decade
10:01:08 PM: Big promises ABC. “Real Answers” really? You’re gonna fix it. Tonight?
10:01:58 PM: ABC has decreed healthcare will be topic of the summer. Not Iran, NK, Iraq, Afghanistan, or anything else.
10:03:40 PM: I will be disappointed if ABC does not, at least, mention tort reform as a huge cost reduction effort.
10:04:38 PM: Nope. Nothing about lawyers driving doctors out of business.
10:05:23 PM: [Hands poll on who wants "changes"] Would love to see how many people in that room disagree with Obamacare
10:05:34 PM: Not much of a control group
10:06:21 PM: Dukakis death penalty question.
10:06:32 PM: First one out of the gate.
10:08:21 PM: First question, first strawman. “Oftentimes, we do know.” “Status quo is untenable, so lets roll the dice.”
10:10:45 PM: Here he goes. Obama is literally waiving his hand, restating the problem, doing his underpants gnome trick.
10:11:30 PM: …cover everyone, provide good care, drive down costs, take care of patients…voila!
10:12:23 PM: …step 2…?….step 3 ….Profit!
10:13:05 PM: The reason the Mayo clinic is able to do treat people so inexpensively is that only an idiot would sue them for malpractice. You’d lose
10:13:40 PM: Dr. Gooberman in Kinosha has no hope of avoiding a lawsuit the way the Mayo clinic does.
10:14:59 PM: If somebody doesn’t mention tort reform soon, I’m gonna need a new TV. This one’s going thru the window.
10:17:59 PM: 1st commercial. Obama 3, Reality 0.
10:18:36 PM: This debate on healthcare brought to you by the Trial Lawyers Association. Remember where you bread is buttered, Change-boy.
10:19:45 PM: Predict new Johnny Depp movie will flop. Hat he’s wearing is not silly enough.
10:20:56 PM: Quick commercial tweet quiz, better tongue in cheek reference for Barney Frank: Barney Rubble or Barney Bubble? Tweet your reply.
10:21:55 PM: Gee, I wonder why primary care physicians are disappearing. Lawsuits! (Hershaw is a NURSE!)
10:26:21 PM: Obama: “MA hasn’t gotten there yet.” The MA state healthcare system is in collapse. It’s a joke.
10:27:50 PM: President of AMA. Q: how can you guaranty medical decisions left to doctors, not bureaucrats? Gibson bails out Obama w/commercial break.
10:28:28 PM: Quick quiz: how likely is it that Gibson would go to commercial break if someone asked Sarah Palin a difficult question in a town hall?
10:31:50 PM: I wonder if Obama will again threaten to swat the AMA like a fly again.
10:32:25 PM: Here he goes again. Mixing issues. Talking about not switching plans and doctors. Avoiding the question. The real question is
10:32:47 PM: …who gets to decide care, the doctor or the government bureaucrat.
10:34:00 PM: Incentivising by reducing readmission rate. Great idea. I’m sure hospitals won’t find a way to game that system.
10:34:29 PM: You’ll have people lingering in ER or not admitted b/c admitting them means a hit to stats
10:35:43 PM: [Competing vignettes one a doctor saying end of life care is too expensive and drains resources, the other a family with a terminal matriarch] Interesting tact by ABC. Making Obama literally play God.
10:36:40 PM: This is why gov’t can’t be in healthcare. If it’s your $, it’s your business. If you want to spent it on end of life care, do so.
10:37:16 PM: If you rely on gov’t, you will, no matter what, at some point get a bureaucrat deciding who lives and who dies.
10:38:17 PM: Obama should have played football. He can’t run, he can’t block, he can’t pass. But man, can he punt.
10:39:11 PM: How long will this hypothetical/philosopher king shtick keep playing with people?
10:39:51 PM: “Maybe this, maybe that. What if this. We need to look at this. ”
10:41:17 PM: @angelagamalski exactly the point. The fact that Medicare is there at all raises the issue…..
10:44:44 PM: oh dear, we’re running late
10:44:55 PM: I’ve only booked twitter through 11:00 pm
10:46:27 PM: Preexisting conditions? Where did that come from? The Q was about big brother. Does O not know what big brother means?
10:47:09 PM: Doing something does not necessarily mean you solve the problem.
10:48:17 PM: Wow, Captain Naive flying the flag.
10:48:35 PM: Taking a subsidy away from insurers, guess what will happen to premiums.
10:50:11 PM: I don’t know where Obama is getting his numbers from, but no plan that has been publicly discussed has paid for itself.
10:51:17 PM: If I understood his comment, he suggested we take $277B in insurer subsidies and give it to doctors for training. …
10:51:51 PM: …First, insurers would nearly instantly increase their premiums to offset the loss in revenue…
10:52:21 PM: …second, how would training doctors pay for healthcare for the “46 million” uninsured Americans?
10:55:20 PM: This whole evening has been a complete waste. There is no plan. It’s all sunshine, rainbows and unicorn farts.
10:55:56 PM: It’s not like there is a solid plan that we can probe and he can defend. Any Q he can deflect with vague generalities.
10:57:00 PM: As one law prof said (about another topic), it’s like nailing a jellyfish to a wall. Once you think you have it, squish.
10:58:23 PM: Of course, the whole exercise is a fraud if you don’t even mention tort reform.
10:59:07 PM: I do find it funny that one of the advertisers is that exemplar of efficiency, the US Postal Service.
11:00:01 PM: Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em. 30 minute break.
11:28:39 PM: Smoke break is almost over. Back to class. And lets not always see the same hands.
11:36:04 PM: Question of the night: Will ABC allow this to continue through to Jimmy Kimmel?
11:37:09 PM: Is it a sign of the end of the honeymoon that “primetime” no longer means 8:00 for Obama, but 10:00 on East Coast?
11:38:02 PM: I love how Obama calls this an “exchange”; a “market.” Just like the USSR had “elections” and “candidates”
11:38:11 PM: Just like Iran does now.
11:38:49 PM: Can someone in the room shout out Fannie Mae!
11:39:50 PM: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are GSAs and have grown enormous b/c of the *implicit* gov’t guaranty. Give an insurer a real gty and all over
11:40:39 PM: HOW DARE YOU MAKE MONEY SIR!
11:42:26 PM: Major point is Kennedy/Dodd cost is $1.6 T for 16M over 10 years. That’s $10,000 per person per year. That’s 5x what normal ins. costs.
11:42:54 PM: You could literally give money away to have people buy their own insurance and do better than a gov’t plan.
11:43:26 PM: Does Obama think the healthy folks are the ones who do or don’t have insurance?
11:45:16 PM: Sorry, that was $8333 per person per year. Average per person, single insurance premium is less than $4K per year.
11:46:56 PM: If it’s not a better deal, COngress will subsidize it. Obama has to be the CEO of fantasyland. That or he never met Barney Frank
11:51:27 PM: What the heck was that Q? That was A Christmas Story, when the kid gets to see Santa.
11:51:41 PM: He forgets he wants a red rider bb gun and flubs the moment.
11:54:14 PM: Wow, McCain’s plan was to tax and credit. Obama’s plan is just to tax.
11:55:22 PM: Oh, I see what you did there. McCain said tax. You said only tax “above a certain level.” Of course, some in Congress set that level @ $0
11:55:45 PM: Distinction without a difference.
12:01:09 AM: Still no questions on tort reform. Do these people not know about malpractice, or was there an agreement on no tort reform Qs.
12:07:11 AM: Doesn’t the president have better things to do than spend 2 hours dodging questions about a vague plan?
12:07:57 AM: My verdict stands. No substance tonight, all sunshine, rainbows, and unicorn farts.