Ken’s Take: Candidate Obama frequently said that folks can partially evaluate the kind of president that he’s be by looking at the advisers surrounding him. Usually, the statement was in the context of the economy, and the advisers were people like Warren Buffett and Paul Volcker.
What if the rule rule is applied to his health care advisers? Gives a glimpse as to how healthcare rationing will work under ObamaCare.
Some may find the principles appropriate. Some may find them scary.
I’m in the latter group.
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President Obama & His Health Care Advisors:
Last February funds were slipped into the stimulus bill to implement Obamacare by creating two England-type rationing boards. Staffing for this plan is in place already. Below are the players:
Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel
- Named to two key positions: health-policy advisor at the OMB and a member of the Federal Council on Comparative Effectiveness Research.
- In 1996, he wrote health services should not be guaranteed to persons “who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens,” specifically mentioning patients with dementia.
- On March 19, Emanuel was appointed to the Federal Coordinating Council on Comparative Effectiveness Research to begin the design of a federal system for withdrawing care from those deemed unworthy of treatment. Emanuel describes his method of “Complete Lives System” which “produces a priority curve on which individuals aged between roughly 15 and 40 years get the most substantial chance, whereas the youngest and oldest people get chances that are attenuated.”
Dr. Peter Singer
- He espouses a “quality-of-life” ethic that is contrary to the traditional Judeo-Christian “sanctity-of-life” ethic.
- He maintains that those who suffer handicaps have less quality-of-life, and are thus less deserving of healthcare.
- He argues that Individuals with an “insufficiently developed consciousness” actually fall below the plane of personhood. For example, with a Down syndrome baby parents should be free to kill the child up to 2 years after birth. He rationalizes that because newborn humans lack morally significant properties, their destruction is in no way intrinsically wrong.
- In the first edition of his Practical Ethics he stated that “not … everything the Nazis did was horrendous; we cannot condemn euthanasia just because the Nazis did it … The notion that human life is sacred just because it’s human is medieval.”
Dr. David Blumenthal
Named the national coordinator for health-information technology
He recommends slowing medical innovation and research to control health spending.
He advocates that doctors will be compelled to take “advantage of embedded clinical decision support” (a euphemism for computers instructing doctors) for “appropriate and cost effective care.”
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The Homa Files 
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