Ron Paul on Obamacare w/ David Scheiner and Dean Ornish, CNN
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Stumble ThisWolf Blitzer: Joining us now, Dr. David Scheiner of Chicago. He’s a member of Physicians for a National Health Program, which supports a single payer national health insurance program. He was Barack Obama’s personal physician in Chicago for more than two decades.
Also joining us, Dr. Dean Ornish, he’s the founder and president of Preventive Medicine Research Institute. He’s the medical editor of HuffingtonPost.com, and Congressman Ron Paul, Republican of Texas, former Republican presidential candidate. He himself is an MD. He was a flight surgeon in the US Air Force and later an OB/GYN in civilian practice.
Also joining us, Dr. Dean Ornish, he’s the founder and president of Preventive Medicine Research Institute. He’s the medical editor of HuffingtonPost.com, and Congressman Ron Paul, Republican of Texas, former Republican presidential candidate. He himself is an MD. He was a flight surgeon in the US Air Force and later an OB/GYN in civilian practice.
I thought this was a fairly good debate, although I wish the news would have longer debates. I'd like to hear these three go in a bit deeper into the subject.
The only other argument I hear from Paul in this is that Medicare costs too much. The counterpoint to that argument was given (Medicare focuses only on the elderly), but the other thing to look at is that Medicare cost inflation has been slower than private insurance inflation for nearly 40 years.
Really though, I think the House plan (summarized here and here) incorporates aspects of what all three of them talked about.
The part Paul would like is that the "exchange" is national, and effectively allows cross-state competition for individual private insurers.
The public option is meant to appease single-payer folk, since it will look a lot like single-payer except for the eponymous part -- it won't be the only payer.
The summaries I linked don't mention anything Dr. Ornish wants, but the bill does include incentives for preventative care (a mandated $0 deductable for checkups/preventative medicine, IIRC).
*long