Hometown hijinks!

My hometown newspaper sends out a daily e-mail summary of the local news. I get the e-mail mostly to keep an eye on the obituaries (man, I’m getting old) but also to see how things are going where most of my family lives. Unfortunately, Northern Indiana is a very conservative area, so if I delve deeper into the stories, I’m often exposed to a lot of, shall we say, less than enlightened opinions.

Today they had a couple of local reactions to the Constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act. One guy was horrified, of course, and the other guy just wanted the controversy to be over and to move forward. This first quote is from the guy who hates the socialist, don’t give my money to other people, legislation:

“I’m confident the price will go up,” he said of insurance costs. “There will be some form of rationing.”

Of course, the whole point of the legislation is that prices for healthcare will go down. That’s the point of the exchanges and the mandate. Rationing is also strictly forbidden. So, this guy has it exactly wrong. Not surprising, really. The other guy also seemed completely unaware of the actual provisions of the law, meaning the paper interviewed two clueless dudes.

This is also about the first guy: 

To reduce costs, he advocates tort reform and re-evaluating the basis of the health care system that enables everyone to get treated. He proposed ending the requirement that emergency rooms are obligated to help all who come through their doors.

“There should be a basic level of care that all Americans have access to but that level of care should stop when we start to get into extra level of care when you’re not contributing to society,” he said.

Tort reform is one of only two healthcare ideas the Republicans have offered over the past fifteen years. Of course, since the cost of healthcare isn’t primarily tort-related, tort reform will have a minimal impact on reducing costs. What it will do is insulate doctors, hospitals and insurance companies from some legitimate malpractice claims. In short, it protects the rich against those they wrong, which is why Republicans love it. Texas has had tort reform for years and guess what? It hasn’t improved the quality of healthcare or lowered its cost. In fact, both are terrible in Texas.

But his second point is more what caught my eye. Let’s see it again:

“There should be a basic level of care that all Americans have access to but that level of care should stop when we start to get into extra level of care when you’re not contributing to society,” he said.

He is advocating the position that emergency rooms/hospitals/doctors should be able to refuse to treat those who come through their doors who don’t have cash on hand. That they should make a determination about your contribution to society when determining whether or not to treat you. So if you’re in an accident and don’t have insurance, the emergency room can (and presumably should) refuse to treat you because you only make minimum wage working for McDonald’s. Of course, the rich will always get treatment, but if you’re not rich, let’s hope you’re deemed “contributing to society”. (This also directly contradicts his complaint about rationing healthcare. That’s what he’s arguing for here.)

It’s statistically a good assumption that this guy is a Christian. Is that a Christian attitude? It’s certainly a conservative attitude.

And I thought these guys were against “death panels”? Or is that only if they apply to people they like?