Nothing like saying something stupid and false to get your day start,huh, Barry?
The American College of Surgeons is deeply disturbed over the uninformed public comments President Obama continues to make about the high-quality care provided by surgeons in the United States. When the President makes statements that are incorrect or not based in fact, we think he does a disservice to the American people at a time when they want clear, understandable facts about health care reform. We want to set the record straight.
— Yesterday during a town hall meeting, President Obama got his
facts completely wrong. He stated that a surgeon gets paid
$50,000 for a leg amputation when, in fact, Medicare pays a
surgeon between $740 and $1,140 for a leg amputation. This
payment also includes the evaluation of the patient on the day
of the operation plus patient follow-up care that is provided
for 90 days after the operation. Private insurers pay some
variation of the Medicare reimbursement for this service.
— Three weeks ago, the President suggested that a surgeon’s
decision to remove a child’s tonsils is based on the desire to
make a lot of money. That remark was ill-informed and
dangerous, and we were dismayed by this characterization of the
work surgeons do. Surgeons make decisions about recommending
operations based on what’s right for the patient.
We agree with the President that the best thing for patients with diabetes is to manage the disease proactively to avoid the bad consequences that can occur, including blindness, stroke, and amputation. But as is the case for a person who has been treated for cancer and still needs to have a tumor removed, or a person who is in a terrible car crash and needs access to a trauma surgeon, there are times when even a perfectly managed diabetic patient needs a surgeon. The President’s remarks are truly alarming and run the risk of damaging the all-important trust between surgeons and their patients.
The man is just making stuff up as he goes along – we thought this was just a Biden thing but it seems that Obama, too, will just make up “facts” to fit the statement of the moment. More and more, its getting impossible to trust anything the President says because we don’t know right off the bat whether he’s (a) lying or (b) directly contravening a previous statement. Dishonest Presidents are the worst sort – better an idiot than a liar. You can eventually work out ways to keep an idiot up on the rails, but a liar will continually undercut everything you do.
This long four years gets longer by the day.
Blogs For Victory 