The real cost of government controlled health care – human lives.

An article from National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) has a devastating list of figures revealing the true cost of government run health care. This is a must read for everyone no matter where they stand on the issue.

Look for the chart: 10 Most Important Medical Innovations (with country of origin). A lot of people are alive today because of these innovations and we should be careful not to destroy the incentive system that made all of them possible in our attempt to improve health care services in the United States.

Rather than expanding the already large government presence in health care, I suggest a reduction in government control to allow free markets to function. Free market capitalism is a proven way to spur development of new and better services, lower costs, and increase availability of supply. There is no reason to think it wouldn't do the same for health care.

AMA Opposes Government Takeover of Health Insurance UPDATED! AMA Now Endorses Dem Plan

“As the health care debate heats up, the American Medical Association is letting Congress know that it will oppose creation of a government-sponsored insurance plan, which President Obama and many other Democrats see as an essential element of legislation to remake the health care system.”

Our system isn’t perfect, but it seems to work better than most and helps spur innovation. If cost and availability are the main concerns then I suggest reducing government intervention in the health care industry. Free markets help lower costs and increase availability of supply as where government meddling and price controls have only ever decreased supply while doing nothing to lower costs.

Take the mobile phone for example. Free markets have taken the mobile phone from a bulky, expensive, and featureless toy for the very rich and made it ubiquitous, inexpensive, and feature packed. Heck, phones are even available in grocery stores for $10.

Update: Well, that didn't last long. AMA endorses House Democrats' health care bill

Read the bill for yourself and decide if it will clobber private insurance or not. It seems clear to me that it will. Heck, Sec.111 alone should be enough incentive for most insurance companies to simply drop health insurance altogether. If buying insurance would cost me more per year than paying the fine for not having it, why bother. They can't turn folks away if they get sick so why bother.

This is a very bad idea.

New Posts Soon

Hello everyone! I’m back! Although I doubt anyone missed me as almost no one, aside from search robots, ever visits here. Heh heh - Anyway, I should have some new posts up today or tomorrow.

Where is the video?

Where is the video of the Obama/Cowen teleprompter snafu?

Links to original story:

• Teleprompter meltdown: Irish PM repeats Obama's speech... and president thanks himself


• Irish PM Brian Cowen left red faced after delivering Obama speech at White House


• Obama's speech recycled by Cowen

Where is it? Just curious.

New Software Dramatically Speeds Enzyme Design

This sounds great if it works as advertised. As so many others have said - Faster please! :)

ScienceDaily (Feb. 26, 2009) — A Duke University-led team has brought powerful software to the never-ending arms race between antibiotics and germs. Working together, computer scientists and biochemists have developed and laboratory-tested a computer program that can show experimentalists how to change the machinery that bacteria use to make natural antibiotics.
...
"It really excites us that we can redesign enzymes on a computer, make them in the laboratory and have them work as planned,"

Legislative Transparency

Too bad the promise won't be kept. We could certainly use a bit of transparency at the moment.

The Obama Stimulus Plan

I fear the Obama stimulus plan will prove to be disastrous. It wastes money, expands government and thus takes freedoms away from the people. Additionally, it is being rushed through congress in the hopes that lawmakers and the general public won't have a chance to learn how much of a stinker this bill really is.

We may be in for a bumpy ride.

A Surreal Scientific Blunder

This makes me wonder how many other, smaller, less noticeable errors exist in the data.

A surreal scientific blunder last week raised a huge question mark about the temperature records that underpin the worldwide alarm over global warming. On Monday, Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), which is run by Al Gore's chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, and is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures, announced that last month was the hottest October on record.

Silence is agreement, so "Speak Up!"

Dr Helen frickin' kicks ass, in my opinion. :)

Too often I have been silent when I should have spoken up. I often prefer to keep the peace because I don't like a bunch of hollerin', but sometimes it is necessary to speak our minds, to make ourselves known.

Work demons got me!

Work is once again consuming all of my time. Sadly, I expect it to consume much of my time through December. Folks always want a lot of big changes done to their web sites before the end of the year. I can't complain though - it pays the bills. :)