Obama Care: Lost Freedom for the Health of It!

Fascinating article on that Conservative (???) website, CNN (otherwise known as the Clinton-Communist News Network). Not sure how this slipped through, so I'll give the link, and highlight main points before they realize their mistake (something actually questioning health care through the Obama administration). The article is "The 5 Freedoms You'd Lose in Health Care Reform," by Shawn Tully, Editor at large (though probably not for long, if CNN wants access for the 100th interview with administration staffers about why Obama is so dreamy - you know, the hard hitting questions - my comments will be in parentheses):
http://money.cnn.com/2009/07/24/news/economy/health_care_reform_obama.fortune/

"Let's explore the five freedoms that Americans would lose under Obamacare:

1. Freedom to choose what's in your plan
The bills in both houses require that Americans purchase insurance through "qualified" plans offered by health-care "exchanges" that would be set up in each state. The rub is that the plans can't really compete based on what they offer. The reason: The federal government will impose a minimum list of benefits that each plan is required to offer."

(I'd like to believe the government will have our best interests at heart, but after seeing this in action with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the Federal Reserve, Education, Amtrak, the Postal Service, and the current bailouts and TARP programs, I'm not holding my breath)

"2. Freedom to be rewarded for healthy living, or pay your real costs
As with the previous example, the Obama plan enshrines into federal law one of the worst features of state legislation: community rating. Eleven states, ranging from New York to Oregon, have some form of community rating. In its purest form, community rating requires that all patients pay the same rates for their level of coverage regardless of their age or medical condition."

(And who determines that rating - is it the community, or the same politicians that determined the stress tests on the banks, or rankings on education, or political operatives and cronies of the politicians themselves - I know who won't be involved in these decisions - you and I)

"3. Freedom to choose high-deductible coverage
The bills threaten to eliminate the one part of the market truly driven by consumers spending their own money. That's what makes a market, and health care needs more of it, not less."

(Fortunately, the politicians know the system better then us, so they know us better than us - simples causal relationship, through fuzzy math - just another situation where government knows what best for us)

"4. Freedom to keep your existing plan
This is the freedom that the President keeps emphasizing. Yet the bills appear to say otherwise. It's worth diving into the weeds -- the territory where most pundits and politicians don't seem to have ventured."

(Obama actually stated that we shouldn't worry about government competing with private concerns using the Postal Service as an example, when FEDEX and American Express are competitive - the Postal Service lost $7 billion in 2007 and another $7 billion in 2008 - so is he saying that we want government to lose money in this venture as well since it won't be competitive, just look at the Postal Service???)

"5. Freedom to choose your doctors
The Senate bill requires that Americans buying through the exchanges -- and as we've seen, that will soon be most Americans -- must get their care through something called "medical home." Medical home is similar to an HMO. You're assigned a primary care doctor, and the doctor controls your access to specialists. The primary care physicians will decide which services, like MRIs and other diagnostic scans, are best for you, and will decide when you really need to see a cardiologists or orthopedists."

(As I've talked to many doctors, HMOs are part of the problem not the solution. And since when is being assigned a primary care doctor (hopefully not just one who contributed to the democratic candidates) doesn't sound like we can choose who we want - and shouldn't we have the choice to decide what we want and what we don't want - what happened to any free-market system, that we all knew and loved?)

And then Shawn Tully closes with: "The best solution is to move to a let-freedom-ring regime of high deductibles, no community rating, no standard benefits, and cross-state shopping for bargains (another market-based reform that's strictly taboo in the bills). I'll propose my own solution in another piece soon on Fortune.com. For now, we suffer with a flawed health-care system, but we still have our Five Freedoms. Call them the Five Endangered Freedoms."

(I am curious as to what plan we are patterning ourselves after, while costing the American people anywhere from $1 - 23 trillion depending which bill would pass, as stated by the Congressional Budget Office - as we ration care (and don't let them tell you differently) as we've been told Massachusetts (which isn't working), or California (with the greatest budget deficits in the country), the Canadian system (which has waits of 8 months compared to weeks on major procedures), etc. - can you see how none of this can be possibly "budget-neutral" no matter what our "Commander-in-Thief" says. )

So don't worry Shawn, you make far too much sense for CNN, I'm sure I'll see you with the CATO Institute soon (perhaps not soon enough).

And isn't it amazing, through all this secrecy on the bills, that we supposedly have time to read these bills - weren't they trying to pass this in two weeks? I've read the bill, and unfortunately we can't say the same of our elected officials - and I do appreciate the name-calling from those same officials, rather than actually reading what they are attempting to ram down our throats - the next election won't come soon enough. But my question is: will it be too late?