Hugh Hewitt: Top Ten Questions on Obama Care

Good advice for town hall protestors when asking about Obama Care, from Hugh Hewitt, via Joshua Pundit:

Hugh Hewitt's Ten Questions To Ask Your Congressman On ObamaCare

“As congressmen filter back to their districts to meet with their constituents, best selling author, columnist and talk show host extraordinaire Hugh Hewitt provides you with questions to ask them...and the correct answers,as opposed to the bolshoi you're likely to get from them:

‘1. Do you guarantee that I get to keep the plan I have and the doctor I have? ("I know you have heard the president say this repeatedly, but expert after expert has confirmed this is simply not true. Employers pick health plans, not employees, and if the new law puts forward a cheap 'government option/public plan,' employers will dump employees into it and pocket the savings as smart business people will do when given such a choice.")

2. Will the law require Members of Congress and federal employees to be enrolled in the "government option/public plan," and if not, why not? ("No, it won't. Of course not. Because the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP) is a gold-plated, great plan that Congress will never give up for the cost-driven, tin-plated "government option/public plan.")

3. Will seniors be guaranteed joint replacements, stents, and the chemotherapy they need, or will they be forced to accept less-costly and less-effective alternatives? ("Of course they aren't going to get the best, most expensive treatments. Medicare is already nearly broke and the only way we can pay for it and the massive expansion of it to the uninsured is to ration care and take away the expensive treatment options.")

4. If seniors will be allowed the expensive but most effective treatments, how will costs be controlled? ("Like I said, the days of hip and knee replacements are gone when this plan passes. Get a cane.")

5. Will seniors have to wait longer for their treatments than they do now? ("Much longer. Doctors aren't going to want to see any 'government option' patients, and especially not time-consuming geezers.")

6. Will doctors see their payment schedules drop? ("Yes,dramatically. Some specialists, like anesthesiologists and pathologists will get creamed if Medicare rates or even slightly-higher-than-Medicare rates get adopted by the 'government option/public plan.'")

7. If their payments fall and they make less money, won't there be fewer doctors practicing medicine? ("Yes, far fewer. The job is often very hard, and even very caring people can't be expected to work that hard for much less money. Many will drop out, or open 'boutique' practices.")

8. Doesn't Canada have long lines for important surgeries? ("Yes, that is widely reported.")

9. How will making our system more like Canada's not mean longer lines and longer waits here? ("It will mean longer lines and waits, and shorter visits with the doctor when you do get in.")

10. Have you read the bill well enough to be interviewed about it on the radio by a conservative talk show host? ("C'mon. Of course I haven't and of course I won't. Have you seen even one extended interview with even one Member of Congress about the specifics of the bill with even a moderately skeptical journalist?")’


Of course, Hugh's premise assumes that you're even going to get to talk to your congressman up close and personal. The latest trend, especially among Democrats? virtual town hall meetings, where it's invitation only and they can vet the questions and attendees beforehand:


‘Members of Congress are increasingly turning to virtual townhall meetings--conducted by telephone--in an effort to reach more constituents while avoiding the potential that informational meetings might be disrupted by angry and persistent questioners or protesters.

One advantage to these telephone townhalls, whether any particular member of Congress actually has this intention, is that the Member of Congress can control the audience and the questioning.

As lawmakers head home for the August recess to meet with constituents, the contentious health care issue awaits them, and many are opting to conduct their townhall meetings over a telephone line rather than in an actual hall where their constituents can see them, speak directly to them, ask repeated followup questions--and shout unsolicited commentary from the back of the room.

Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) is using a tele-town hall meeting in her only scheduled interaction with constituents, and various other lawmakers from both parties have held the live mass teleconferences lately, focusing largely on health care.

Rep. Walt Minnick (D-Idaho), whose district encompasses nearly one-third of the large western state, held a tele-town hall meeting with reporters and constituents July 24, saying it provides him with immediate feedback while in Washington.

“These ‘virtual’ town hall meetings have been a very useful way to get immediate feedback from my constituents when my work as a Congressman keeps me from being home in Idaho,” Minnick said in a statement announcing the event.’


(hat tip, Ace)

Of course, if an actual meeting has to be held, our neo-Marxist Dear Leader and his pals have another tactic - using ACORN goons and the Unions to 'police townhall meetings' mobilized via Obama's Organizing for America, ‘a project of the Democratic National Committee.’

And Nancy Pelosi had the nerve to refer to American citizens critical of Obama care and exercising their First Amendment Rights as 'carrying swastikas'!

I think we know whom the real fascists are.”