Health care debate should hinge on insurance, tort reform Re: “Surprise! Obama wants to ration your health care,” April 18
I feel that the editorial board is missing the point when it states that President Obama wants to ration health care. I don’t think that the real debate should be centered on government-run versus private insurance. Too often, partisan wrangling over the role of government gets in the way of the real issue of why our health care delivery system is so inefficient. At one time last year, more than 50 million Americans did have insurance, yet the United States spends more money on health care than any other nation. Americans should be asking these questions instead. Why do we have employer-sponsored health insurance that makes it expensive for individuals to purchase coverage? Why do physicians get reimbursed by quantity of tests rather than quality of outcomes? Why is there no tort reform? Why do insurance companies have higher administrative costs than Medicare and Medicaid? If we solved these conundrums, our health care delivery system would be far more efficient.
Adam Hyams
Jericho, N.Y.
Planned Parenthood funding flies in the face of other budget cuts
Re: “Obama admits that budget is about values,” April 17
Star Parker proved President Obama and congressional Democrats are hypocrites. She stated they repeatedly criticized Republicans claiming they injected their ideology into budget negotiations by trying to defund Planned Parenthood, the world’s leading abortion provider, but she pointed out that Obama’s ideology took over budget negotiations when he said he would shut the government down before defunding PP.
Timothy Carney wrote Democrats would never defund Planned Parenthood and quoted Democrat leader Harry Reid: “We are not — we are not — bending on women’s health.”
However, Reid and Obama agreed to cut $600 million from Community Health Centers that don’t do abortions and provide more health care services for women than Planned Parenthood, but not a penny of PP’s $363 million.
Parker accurately stated the heart of Democrat ideology is aborting women, predominately poor black women.
Richard A. Retta
Rockville
Kane’s pronouncements unrealistic
Re: “Will the real racists please stand up?” April 18
In the span of one week, Gregory Kane has managed to publish two separate articles that excoriate Pima County Sheriff Dupnik and the National Black Church Initiative for not condemning Malik Zulu Shabazz. In doing so, Kane works from the unfair expectation that any organization with an opinion on national politics has an obligation to issue press releases criticizing fringe political figures with no national prominence. As someone who had never heard of Shabazz before reading Mr. Kane’s columns, I can empathize with those who haven’t had the foresight to proactively condemn his comments in order to fend off Kane’s criticisms. If Kane simply practiced some traditional journalism by contacting the targets of his op-eds and soliciting their reactions to Shabazz’s contemptible comments before condemning their silence, he might find himself running short on column ideas.
Jonathan Wisbey
Arlington
