Missing The Point

Ed Henry of CNN points out that Barack Obama is facing a tough sell for his ObamaCare out in Big Sky Country. Montanans are very suspicious of letting the Federal government into their most private decisions.

LIVINGSTON, Montana (CNN) — Spend a day in this tiny town about 23 miles or so from where President Obama will be holding a town hall meeting on Friday, and it’s easy to see why his health-care push is facing big problems in Big Sky country — even from the people he’s trying to help.

I arrived here a couple of days ahead of the president in order to get a better read on his reform effort by talking to people like Sonja McDonald, who told me her husband’s job as a diesel mechanic doesn’t provide health insurance for them and their two children.

So I found McDonald at a remarkable local clinic getting a low-cost tooth extraction because she has not been able to afford a trip to the dentist in a couple of years. She voted for Obama and agrees with him that reform is needed, but said she’s worried about the details.

“I believe that there is a health care crisis, I really do,” she told me from a dentist chair in the clinic. “Do I believe that the government needs to be more involved? No! Because I think that they just — whenever they get their fingers in the pot it just kind of turns black.”

Henry points out that the clinic McDonald was attending does what it does with Federal funding.

But here’s the twist: The folks at the local clinic where I found McDonald in the dentist chair — known as “Community Health Partners” — are actually quite comfortable with the federal government. That’s because it turns out that taxpayers pick up 50 percent of the clinic’s $4 million annual budget.

“We’re able to provide health care to someone who walks through the door regardless of their ability to pay,” Dr. Mark Schulein, who runs the clinic, told me.

But here’s the twist Henry misses: If this clinic is indeed working, why in the world do we need to totally change the entire health care system? Why not expand what is working rather than tearing it all down to erect an edifice to Obama and big government? The Mayo Clinic – which, I would think everyone agrees, works very, very well, has slammed all of the plans being touted by the politicians. Why? Because the plans do not work. 

So, end this partisan hack job by the Democrats and start looking at what works and improve it. That is what we need. Not bigger government and bureaucrats deciding who gets that hip replacement and who gets the handful of pills. 

Keep up the pressure, folks. Make them stop this and start looking at what really works instead of what they allow you to have after they take all the best for themselves. And make sure it applies across the board – politicians and Federal employees must be subjected to exactly the same program they want for the rest of us.