The 'Death Panels' and Betsy McCaughey are Back at Fox News
From our friends at Newshounds, the death panels and Betsy McCaughey are back fearmongering over end-of-life counseling. Sweet Jesus, these people make my head hurt. I thought we had seen the last of this shyster once the health care bill passed, but apparently I was wrong.
Fox News Tries To Rehabilitate Palin’s Discredited “Death Panels” Smear:
As The New York Times reported yesterday, the Obama administration has enacted Medicare regulations to include an end-of-life planning provision similar to one struck out of the health care reform bill after Sarah Palin “touched off a political storm over ‘death panels.’” Palin’s “death panels” accusation wasn’t just a lie, it was PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year for 2009. But good ol’ Fox News resuscitated the lie and gave it new life by just “asking” if the new regulations mark the return of death panels. Fortunately, Democratic Fox News contributor Kirsten Powers and liberal pundit Caroline Heldman forcefully rebutted the suggestion.
The possible return of “death panels” was all over Fox News today with segments with such FoxNews.com titles as, ‘Death Panel’ Comeback? Return of Death Panels? and ‘Death Panel’ Deception? The ‘Death Panel’ Comeback? segment, on The O’Reilly Factor, featured Media Matters 2009 Health Care Misinformer of the Year: Betsy McCaughey. [...]
But substitute host Eric Bolling distorted those details in his introduction to the O’Reilly Factor segment (the first video below). Bolling said, “Now the reports that President Obama is bringing back end of life planning with the Medicare regulation set to go into effect next week. The White House says, ‘No, that’s not true,’ issued a statement blaming a law signed by President Bush. So what’s really going on?” Bolling later said, “Whether or not this was brought up in the Bush Administration, who cares?”
Bolling made no pretense of independence, supposedly a hallmark of The Factor. “I thought we were done with this (death panels)… but they’re back.” Bolling offered no challenge to McCaughey’s misinformation (government will be scripting end-of-life decisions, the Obama administration is enacting via regulation what it could not enact via legislation) but asked her to “take our viewer exactly what this regulation says… It incentives them to discuss end-of-life decisions.” To Heldman, he asked, “Do we really need to incentivize doctors to ask Grandma whether she wants to pull the plug year after year after year? Isn’t once enough?”
Heldman, already a News Hounds Top Dog, was in especially good form in the segment.
Yeah, heaven forbid the government might pay to help you take the burden off of your family about what to do with you if they don't feel it's worth keeping you alive and longer and you would have agreed if given the chance. The horror!
This discussion feels like stepping in shit time and time again.. This Betsy clown say's... "That's your opinion" .. guess what, so is yours. Oh but you are the expert cause you wrote a book. This shit makes my head explode... somewhat like being subject to a DEATH PANEL !!!
My partner has met Betsy McCaughey twice, I found out when watching John Stewart's "Teh AAAWESOME!!1!" interview with her. He watched for a few minutes (he, sadly, avoids politics), scrunched up his face, and asked what was going on. I briefly explained. He listened another minute and said, "That's not her idea. She may have overheard it, but more likely someone explained it to her." He went on to explain his two interactions with her, and conversations had with people who worked with her. He very quickly surmised, and then was told is true, that she's not very bright, and she doesn't understand complex things. Where her talent lies is in re-selling ideas and being persuasive. He also said she tends to eavesdrop and steal ideas as her own without fully understanding them. He said Betsy would not have come up with anything so complicated, and one of two things occurred. Either she overheard executives saying something like this and thought she could make some cash, or was told to do this. She is pretty and charismatic, and will use those to latch on to and promote anything she thinks she can make money from. He said Betsy is not bright enough to come up with complex ideas on her own, and after a couple interviews, I'm inclined to agree.
You didn't reveal what your partner does for a living, the context of his interactions with McCaughey, or who originally told him she was dull or how they'd be in a position to say she 'tends to eavesdrop and steal ideas'.
I think we've all surmised from her public appearances that she's a nitwit, but buying into vague third-hand accounts from something somebody posted on a blog is about as stupid as believing in death panels because the internet says so.
Let's have Betsy go on a real news show and have Stewart make her look like an idiot AGAIN. This woman looked like a fool on Stewart, so I'm doubting she'll be back.
is intended to be a factual statement
Fox uses all 7 Propaganda Techniques that were first developed in the 1930s by the Institute for Propaganda Analysis:
# Name calling -- giving something a bad label to make the audience reject it without examining the evidence;
# Glittering generalities -- the opposite of name calling;
# Card stacking -- the selective use of facts and half-truths;
# Bandwagon -- appeals to the desire, common to most of us, to follow the crowd;
# Plain folks -- an attempt to convince an audience that they, and their ideas, are "of the people";
# Transfer -- carries over the authority, sanction and prestige of something we respect or dispute to something the speaker would want us to accept;
and
# Testimonials -- involving a respected (or disrespected) person endorsing or rejecting an idea or person.
You might want to keep those techniques in mind the next time you are listening and/or watching Fox. And know, too, that opinions and news are not 1 and the same. Nor is critical thinking one-sided.
Thanks for the info.
"Let's talk dirty to the animals"
Annie Hall: "What's the difference, it's all mental masturbation?"
wem
This would be a non issue if we had single payer. Instead, we have the real death panels, insurance companies, determining who gets treatment and who doesn't.
....and why was that not brought into the "conversation"?
I guess it would have been too "fair and balanced", to allow it.
'Talk to the hand'
Fox Opinion Network is predictable and boring.
so is a blow up doll to some people, probably about the same content.
to any of us that have dealt with dying relatives, we know the importance of knowing what your loved one wants.
The fact that Dr.s will be reimbursed is a blessing.
The unchristian actions, the lies, the fear mongering that goes on at Fox news is astounding. That people listen and believe them is sad.
I don't like to wish people ill. But to lie to people about something so important, well that deserves a certain place in hell.
Don't put off those discussions and talk with your MD, let your family know.
You hopefully will die according to your own wishes and/or you will sleep better at night if you have to make that decision for others.
Diane
Guess the lesson they took from Terri Schiavo is that advance directives are bad. Funny how those of us with brains took the exact opposite lesson.
Here's a thought experiment: what if a gay person wanted to continue life support for their partner and the other members of the partner's family wanted to terminate support? Which would win - the "right to life" or the hostility to any recognition of gay partnerships as having any validity? I suspect the latter - after all, the spousal relationship is sacred up until they need to make political hay from a brain-dead woman in a vegetative coma, and the parent-child relationship is sacred unless the parent happens to live in Cuba. Similarly, life is sacred unless the life in question happens to be gay.
Eh, don't you have to have Death Panels ONCE in order to have them back?
BTW: that was excruciating to sit through.
Please Please... GO AWAY !!!!
how these fear-mongering people take a quality of life procedure already done, day after day, by physicians everywhere, and make it out to be something "new, different and scary". At least, she gives the comedians more material to help us laugh at the situation.
Fox is deplorable for taking advantage of the vulnerablities of their viewers.
Wait a minute.....wasn't Betsy McCaughey completely discredited a year ago on her claim of "death panels"
.................oh, wait,........was this on Fox News................ah,yes, Fox News....the home for discredited conservative ideas.
What's the difference between Fox News and a nursing home?
People in a nursing home can still claim their dignity. And with any luck they will be able to maintain their dignity by keeping religio-fascist like McCaughey, Palin, Jeb Bush, Bill Frist, etal, out of their personal end of life decisions.
'Talk to the hand'
All over the country. Every day 1,500 people die of cancer. Prior to death there were discussions of treatment options and end of life issues. And financial issues. If one is unfortunate enough to be diagnosed with pancreatic, liver, lung, or any of several fatal sites, those issues come into play. The bottom line is reagardless you are more than likely going to be dead in one year and the chances of five-year survival are very, very, remote. And what kind of quality will that life be with heavy surgery, chemo, and radiation? (Google "Whipple Procedure.") And that is just for cancer - 1,500.
My college roommate's 33 year-old brother was diagnosed with late stage esophageal cancer. They gave him six, maybe ten months with treatment, three without. The picture presented of heavy chemotherapy was not a good one, and he would have to travel three hours to Houston. He chose the latter, mainly to avoid prolonging his own pain and suffering, but also to reduce the burden, both emotional and financial, on his family. Who could argue with that? (Other than the pharmaceutical companies - chemo drugs are their biggest money makers, especially new offerings.)
But having an honest discussion with an elderly person on such matters is somehow outrageous? Trying to maximize both lessening pain and suffering and the efficiency and delivery of medicine?
No, it's not outrageous. But the Right just can't come out and say they want to keep healthcare a for-profit entity and don't want to give poor people (mainly minorities) more handouts.
I've seen some stuff, man. And some thangs...
I have had many end of life discussions with family members when it was too late for the patient to make an informed proactive decision. It's a terrible burden to put on family members. I have been on both sides, having had to make the decision for my own father who was incapacitated by sepsis, stroke and respiratory failure.
It's really too bad people don't realize how much Fox News and this incredibly arrogant woman are insulting our intelligence.
"Someday somebody related to some of these sufferers, these victims, these collaterally damaged souls, may try to kill you. And I have to tell you, I think you’ll have it coming." - Christopher Cooper
Basically, what McCaughey and Fox News are saying is that the terminally ill should be prevented from talking to a doctor. How can any human being be so cruel?
These people are incorrigible semantic criminals. Someone needs to throw them in juvie until the learn to live in a way that respects others.
I agree; Fox staffers are "semantic criminals" and worse. They're often flat out liars. There is an excellent article on Altnet about why Fox programming of their viewers makes them close minded about the actual facts. I strongly recommend "Are We Too Dumb for Democracy? The Logic Behind Self-Delusion" especially for bloggers or other political writers. This explains why the facts backfire for ideologues, and not just those on the right.
"The antidote to bad speech is more speech." ~~J.S. Mill
This one is on President Obama's public relations staff's inability to articulate "end of life" discussions so that even low information people understand what it means.
Anyone who has had a friend or relative die of cancer has had some form of "end of life" discussion with the doctors and hospital staff. It is the saddest of all discussions one can have. It isn't evil. It isn't cruel. The last thing those in charge of patient care want to see is their patient dying. But at some point, the cancer takes over. At what point do you stop treatment?
THAT'S the essence of an end of life discussion. The President's PR staff should have gone on the attack, 24/7, bludgeoning those who tried to pervert, demonize and misinform the obvious intention of end of life discussions by calling them death panels.
The administration's inability to frame the issue properly allows the Right Wing noise machine to reanimate Betsy McCaughey again and again.
Good God, when will the media step up and take some responsibility for being the megaphone that SHOULD provide these "explanations"...the president's staff could be standing on the WH steps shouting this 24/7 and our media would still misrepresent the facts...
we will have finally eliminated the real"Death Panels" of the actuaries within the insurance corporations.
Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Let the insurance companies sort 'em out.
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
I hope this has already been noted but every bit as disgusting as having Repugs bring up this issue is the fact that blogs AND newspapers AND news programs all use the phrase "death panels" rather than provide the proper terminology...thereby cementing in the minds of the ignorant that it IS about "pulling the plug on grandma" rather than explaining that is providing the option of end of life counseling which, believe me, given the over all intelligence of a huge majority of our citizens is very much needed!!!!!
made an ass of herself on back to back occasions--first on Jon Stewart's show, then a couple days later while debating Antony Wiener on Dylan Ratigan's show.
Then....she disappeared.
Now she's back and actually taken seriously???? God, most Americans have short political memories.
The moronic imbecile is still carrying around her notebook with the OMFGZ, 2,000 page HC bill like numbers of pages make legislation good or evil.....Betsy is a SHRILL SHILL and paid handsomely to LIE.
The third-stringers subbing on Faux Noise this week are WEAKER THAN WEAK TEABAGGERS - Bolling is as ignorant as a box of rocks - they PRETEND nobody ever dies......I heard him say TWICE, "why do doctors need to talk about end-of-life issues more than ONCE to a patient"?
The one thing Faux Noise and other 'death panel' proponents DO NOT SAY:
"This provision PAYS for you to have this discussion with your HC advisor - otherwise, you, the patient would have to PAY FOR IT YOURSELF".
Fortunately, my father-in-law had all of this in place in May when he was admitted to ICU - when the time came - after 3 days - it was a decision that was already in place - it GAVE my mother-in-law PERMISSION (not only legally, but more importantly, EMOTIONALLY) to be able to put him in hospice at the hospital. It TOOK the BURDEN of "pulling the plug" off of her - they had been married 59 years and that MADE IT EASIER for her - EVERYONE DIES - make it with dignity.
... Jan Brewer (neé Drinkwine) and she decides in Arizona.
Maybe Drinkwine imbibed too much and too frequently?
If you need funds to pay for essentials, you have a revenue problem
If you need funds to pay for frivolity, you have a spending problem
Has this slug been to Arizonie lately?? Hummm..?? Does she KNOW that Guv. Brewski has already implemented absolutely the WORST Death Panel, that Betsy can make up!! Brewski has implemented the "NO Organ Transplants" for people that the state already PROMISED THEM to previously.... So, until Betsy-the-bag-Lady has gone out to Arizonie; done extensive research on the FACTS - not her own hot breath - FACTS; written up what Brewski is doing; WHY are we even wasting ANYONE's time on this subject.???
Death Panels are real and being implemented as we speak in Arizonie..... BY THE CRACKER GOVERNOR!!!
Any real journalist would have laughed spittle in her face and asked her to define what that crazed cow in Arizona has done to people who'd been promised transplants.
America is, without question, one of the stupidest Countries on the planet -- and it's all because of dunces like this lying sack of pillow fluff and the people who view Fox dragging down the average.
many people.
when an entire network continues to push the Biggest Lie of 2009, they can no longer call themselves a news organization. Call it Fox2 or Fox Whatever, because this ain't news.
NOBODY 2012
the gop and teabaggers are like shit thrown at a fan.
I'm usually all for more voices, more opinions, get everyone out there talking, yelling, writing, arguing their viewpoint. I think that's usually the way people can become better informed.
But after watching this clip, I think Fox News subtracts from the discussion by airing this kind of "conversation." They beat the story into their frame, and then only allow discussion that meets their narrow aperture.
Nowhere here does anyone ask where any "death panel" is, or what would constitute a "death panel." Here you have one guest who is opposed to anything the Obama administration would propose (even if it is a "health care" plan introduced by Republicans) and another guest who supports doctors discussing end of life plans with their patients. This shouldn't be controversial.
It's the job of the host, or moderator, or MC, to ask where the "death panel" is, and not only doesn't he do it, he refers to the "death panel" repeatedly, as if it is a real thing.
Fox News does not contribute to intelligent debate.
' ... the most deplorable case of Washington knows best. This isn't supposed to be the job of our federal government ...'
Right you are b...!
This is the job of the Arizona government - Jan Brewer to be exact.
If you need funds to pay for essentials, you have a revenue problem
If you need funds to pay for frivolity, you have a spending problem
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