CNN's Dana Bash does a report on the Canadian health care system, and as its center piece she features the person Mitch McConnell has been using in his Senate floor speeches as an example of what's wrong with Canadian health care. How many similar stories of people in the United States being denied coverage because they don't have any health insurance at all does anyone think CNN could be doing if they went out and looked?
In fairness, Bash does point out those that disagree with the generalizations about the system, and that the Democrats are not trying to get universal health care here in the United States. That said, seeking out the person McConnell has been citing in his Frank Luntz talking points on health care as the main portion of the segment strikes me as nothing short of Republican propoganda.
As our own Jon Perr has more on McConnell fear mongering about the Canadian health care system:
In his demagoguery regarding President Obama's health insurance proposals featuring a "public option," Senator McConnell trotted out horror stories from Canada and the UK to illustrate "health care denied" by "government-run" systems. But as the New York Times suggested, McConnell's examples of Canadian Shona Holmes and Briton Bruce Hardy in essence made his opponents' case for them:
What Mr. McConnell did not disclose was that Ms. Holmes paid for her treatment, at the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona, on her own - an option that is available to patients with financial resources all over the world regardless of their nation's health insurance system...
As for the case of Mr. Hardy, the particulars seem to make it hard to tell how his situation differed from the countless Americans who battle their private insurers every day for access to the newest, most advanced and most expensive treatments.
[....]
Despite Mitch McConnell's grandstanding, Americans' health care is frequently denied - even when they are already paying for it.
And so it goes. Back in 1993, GOP propagandist William Kristol famously mobilized his Republican colleagues, warning that Bill Clinton' success with health reform could lead to a Democratic majority for a generation. His talking point then was "no crisis." 16 years later, Mitch McConnell is frightening Americans with dark visions of a future system where health care is denied, delayed and rationed.
The future is now.
Transcript below the fold.
Continue reading »
