Sometimes it's hard for us "right wingers" to keep track of the myriad ways in which we're supposed to be wrong. The arguments seem to shift from day to day:

You're a bunch of lying morons — there will be no rationing! And the free market already "rations"! And, besides, rationing is absolutely crucial so we need this now!

Today, WaPo trots out an expert who informs us that rationing is good for us. (How I learned to stop worrying and love the medical bureaucrat?)

"More is not necessarily better," said Bernard Rosof, chairman of the board of directors of New York's Huntington Hospital and a board member of the independent National Quality Forum. "In many cases, less is better."

Well, that's certainly what my relatives in Denmark get — less.

Examples?

The misuse and overuse runs from simple antibiotics to sophisticated surgeries, Rosof said. More than $58 billion is spent on inappropriate drugs, such as antibiotics for upper respiratory infections that do not respond to medication, according to the institute report. About $21 billion is spent treating non-urgent cases in the emergency department, where physicians rely more on duplicative and costly tests because they are unfamiliar with their patients' histories.

Let's think a bit about this, shall we?

Antibiotics for colds: The real problem here is increasing bacterial resistance, not lost money. But most doctors already know that antibiotics don't do anything for, say, a cold or cough. So why do they write the prescription, anyway? I'd guess they're afraid that if the patient asks for it, is refused, and then happens to get pneumonia they'll be held liable.

Aside from that, why is this a "problem"? If the consumer pays for it, then they're paying a lot of money for a useless placebo. If that's bad, beauty counters in mall stores should be outlawed immediately. (Imagine if the government decided to "save" us money in other areas using this same approach: You're wasting your money on filet mignon — this meat loaf contains just as much protein! Here, let me ration that for you... less is more!)

And if the government is picking up the tab (and they are, in many cases), then doesn't it instead demonstrate how ineffective existing government programs are in solving such problems? Why would another new program be any better? WaPo seems incurious.

Treating non-urgent cases in emergency rooms: Once again, I would guess that ERs are liable or unable, legally, to turn away anyone from care. Since this is caused by laws, a change in laws could also remedy the situation, no? But which politician wants to be the "cold hearted" one who allows ERs to turn away people who don't need urgent treatment? Better to use the backlog to argue for yet more political control, surely.

Moreover (not from the WaPo):

"It's not the uninsured who burden America's emergency rooms so much as it is people who are carrying government insurance policies," said Devon Herrick, Ph.D., a senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis. "The low reimbursement rates offered doctors by government programs means very few will accept taxpayer-funded insurance any more, leaving those on government plans to visit ERs for care instead of primary care physicians.

"People carrying taxpayer-funded insurance are far more responsible for flagrant emergency room overuse than the uninsured," said Herrick. "Emergency rooms have replaced primary care physicians for many Americans, in part because programs like SCHIP and Medicaid pay doctors so little that few will accept patients carrying those insurance policies. As a result, those patients have become accustomed to going to the ER."

Unless government compensation to doctors is increased (which would not be a cost-saving measure), any popular "public option" would increase ER abuse even further, and result in (O Canada?) even more severe GP physician shortages.

I'm just a blogger. Doesn't the Washington Post supposedly have teams of reporters, and multiple layers of fact-checkers who are supposed to be able to turn up both sides of an issue? How pathetic that any six-reader blog like Random Observations can easily trounce, factually, one of the nation's top newspapers. Pretty much any time I feel like it. (Hint: I go where they facts are, whereas they're often allergic, apparently.)

"Duplicative and costly tests": Once again: liability! Amazing, isn't it? The WaPo writes a two-page article on these mysterious medical cost overruns, and the words "lawyer" and "liability" do not appear at all. Only a passing reference to "malpractice laws", not linked in any way to the costs, and buried in a paragraph about medical record-keeping located (can you guess?) four paragraphs from the end at the bottom of the second page.

Well, I'm so glad WaPo chose to "inform" its readers about this crucial and timely issue! Having now "learned" about the issue, they will come away from this article completely ignorant of evidence showing the problems they chose to highlight are exacerbated, or even largely caused by, (a) existing government interventions, and (b) one of the Democratic Party's most powerful special interest groups — trial lawyers. (Tort reform? Fogeddaboudit!) Instead, readers will believe "the market" is somehow to blame, and if only the government would exert more control, everything will be rosy and wonderful! Money will be "saved"!

And promptly spent on some politician's summer cottage.

"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed."
- Mark Twain