Mommy Life: Sarah Palin on Obamacare and rationing

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September 11, 2009 6:15 PM

Sarah Palin on Obamacare and rationing

Sarah Palin and I share something in common: the responsibility of raising children with Down syndrome. I have said from the beginning that families of individuals with disabilities should be very, very concerned about their loved ones' futures under Obamacare.

With four sons with Down syndrome (3 adopted), we have been blessed to have had their medical needs met with the same professionalism and concern as our more typical children. With a system strained by government interference and burdened with bureaucracy, I know that kind of security would be gone.

The Left can skewer Palin all they want, but she has done us all a great service by drawing attention to this danger and thinking through the consequences of Obama's rash and rushed plan:

OPINION
SEPTEMBER 8, 2009, 7:45 P.M. ET

Obama and the Bureaucratization of Health Care
The president's proposals would give unelected officials life-and-death rationing powers.
By SARAH PALIN
Writing in the New York Times last month, President Barack Obama asked that Americans "talk with one another, and not over one another" as our health-care debate moves forward.
I couldn't agree more. Let's engage the other side's arguments, and let's allow Americans to decide for themselves whether the Democrats' health-care proposals should become governing law.
Some 45 years ago Ronald Reagan said that "no one in this country should be denied medical care because of a lack of funds." Each of us knows that we have an obligation to care for the old, the young and the sick. We stand strongest when we stand with the weakest among us.
We also know that our current health-care system too often burdens individuals and businesses--particularly small businesses--with crippling expenses. And we know that allowing government health-care spending to continue at current rates will only add to our ever-expanding deficit.
How can we ensure that those who need medical care receive it while also reducing health-care costs? The answers offered by Democrats in Washington all rest on one principle: that increased government involvement can solve the problem. I fundamentally disagree.

Common sense tells us that the government's attempts to solve large problems more often create new ones. Common sense also tells us that a top-down, one-size-fits-all plan will not improve the workings of a nationwide health-care system that accounts for one-sixth of our economy. And common sense tells us to be skeptical when President Obama promises that the Democrats' proposals "will provide more stability and security to every American."
With all due respect, Americans are used to this kind of sweeping promise from Washington. And we know from long experience that it's a promise Washington can't keep.
Let's talk about specifics. In his Times op-ed, the president argues that the Democrats' proposals "will finally bring skyrocketing health-care costs under control" by "cutting . . . waste and inefficiency in federal health programs like Medicare and Medicaid and in unwarranted subsidies to insurance companies . . . ."
First, ask yourself whether the government that brought us such "waste and inefficiency" and "unwarranted subsidies" in the first place can be believed when it says that this time it will get things right. The nonpartistan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) doesn't think so: Its director, Douglas Elmendorf, told the Senate Budget Committee in July that "in the legislation that has been reported we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount."
Read entire column at The Wall Street Journal