Friday, August 14, 2009

Euthanized On the Bridge to Nowhere

Sarah Palin on April 16, 2008

WHEREAS, one of the principal goals of Healthcare Decisions Day is to encourage hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, continuing care retirement communities, and hospices to participate in a statewide effort to provide clear and consistent information to the public about advance directives, as well as to encourage medical professionals and lawyers to volunteer their time and efforts to improve public knowledge and increase the number of Alaska’s citizens with advance directives.

WHEREAS, the Foundation for End of Life Care in Juneau, Alaska, and other organizations throughout the United States have endorsed this event and are committed to educating the public about the importance of discussing healthcare choices and executing advance directives.

WHEREAS, as a result of April 16, 2008, being recognized as Healthcare Decisions Day in Alaska, more citizens will have conversations about their healthcare decisions; more citizens will execute advance directives to make their wishes known; and fewer families and healthcare providers will have to struggle with making difficult healthcare decisions in the absence of guidance from the patient.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, Sarah Palin, Governor of the state of Alaska, do hereby proclaim April 16, 2008, as:

Healthcare Decisions Day in Alaska, and I call this observance to the attention of all our citizens.


Sarah Palin on August 14, 2009

Gotcha!! That's not what I meant at all!!

Last year, I issued a proclamation for “Healthcare Decisions Day.” [6] The proclamation sought to increase the public’s knowledge about creating living wills and establishing powers of attorney. There was no incentive to choose one option over another. There was certainly no financial incentive for physicians to push anything. In fact, the proclamation explicitly called on medical professionals and lawyers “to volunteer their time and efforts” to provide information to the public.

Comparing the “Healthcare Decisions Day” proclamation to Section 1233 of HR 3200 is ridiculous. The two are like apples and oranges. The attempt to link the two shows how desperate the proponents of nationalized health care are to shift the debate away from the disturbing details of their bill.


http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=116979483434&ref=nf

Does she even know what she means? Does anyone?

4 comments:

Allan said...

Lo,

I finally clicked on your name link over from a post at Alan's blog.

I salute your tenacity in continuing to swim upstream by leaving thoughtful, non-right-wingnut posts on his blog.

I quit commenting after losing my cool on his comment about disabled Indians.

Keep up the good work. I'm looking forward to catching up on your blog.

Allan (aldog)

http://aldog1.blogspot.com/

David Duff said...

Lo, I, too, appreciated your comments over at 'Fresh Bilge' even though I am to your Right politically. Ron does need a bucket of cold water poured over him from time to time.

hank_F_M said...

Lo

Perhaps she is the mother of a special needs child who does not see anything in the various bills (at least in very large bold print type) that specifically guarantees special needs children (including her child) will have the medical care they need.

Lo said...

Perhaps not - or perhaps she's only reading what she wants to read.

While my children were not special needs they were medically challenged for many years. In spite of having two health insurances my out of pocket health expenses ate us alive. Had I lost either one of my two jobs I am sure that one or both of my sons would have died.

I don't think Sarah understands what it's like when a parent has to decide whether to feed her special child (and the rest of the family) or to buy his medicine. I've been there, I know what it's like. I don't want anyone else to be there.

There is nothing in the proposed bill which even suggests that Sarah's children or anyone else's children will be denied medical care.

And honestly, there are no "guarentees" that they will get it now. As it is now the health insurers decide who gets what and what gets denied.

There is an investigation going on in California now. The Nurses Asssociation there has completed a study which says 21% of all claims are being denied by the three largest carriers in the state.


I work in a physician's office, I file those claims, I have no doubt that they're understating the problem.

Sarah may have a special needs child but Sarah knows nothing of reality - middle class reality. She knows nothing of watching a child go hungry because his brother needs medicine that the insurance won't pay for. She knows nothing of how many times a claim for treatment is denied - leaving the patient to be responsible for the bill when he was under the impression that his $13,000.00 a year policy was going to pay for it.

She talks a good game - but she's never really played it.