So Enzi and the GOP believe the intrusion of the for-profit insurance industry between a patient and their doctor is a-ok? Would somebody ask these clowns this question already.

They're bought and paid for - they're making an issue of this that is so nonsensical, but the Dems won't call them on this because it would be seen as attacking the insurance industry and their big political donor pockets.

So the big bad government will ration care, but the pure insurance industry will pay whatever is necessary, their profit margins be damned. Insurance industries answer to their share holders, and their sole purpose is to get more money to their share holders, not to those they insure.

It's a damn joke.

"The bills would expand comparative effectiveness research...

And if there's anything Republicans are scared to death of, it's science and facts. Those things can be DAMNED inconvenient.

...that would be used to limit or deny care based on age or disability of patients.

And you base that assertion on ... what exactly?

Sick Senators Anonymous has a new member.

Enzi: "This intrusion of a Washington bureaucrat in the relationship between a doctor and a patient is not the kind of reform that Americans are seeking."

Dear President Obama,

This is called bad faith. Cut. Them. Loose.

It doesn't matter whether Enzi has a cogent argument or not. He happens not to, but the real point is that he's not speaking as a representative of the voters who put him in office, he's speaking as a representative of the people who supplied the money that allowed him to convince the voters to put him in office. That's the way our system works, but it makes every word out of his mouth totally worthless to anyone but his true employers.

Let's see if I can explain the problem so that even you folks can understand it.
* Essentially, the people whose taxes you want to raise get no benefit from this plan.
* Obama has already stated giving pills, is a cost effective procedure.
* Nobody believes the positive claims about saving money.
* Nobody believes Government will do a better job than what we have now, witness Medicare.
* Essentially Obama failed to make his case to the people who matter most, voters with money.
Any questions?

Nice glasses. He either is a white trash prole or he is trying to relate to them. Ugh.

Since when did Republicans care so much about people having all the healthcare they want?

The same people who railed against Medicaid and Medicare are now upset at the possibility that a 85 year-old woman with terminal cancer might not be able to have laser eye surgery?

Puhleeze! Your compassion and concern are killing me!

"The bills would expand comparative effectiveness research that would be used to limit or deny care based on age or disability of patients..."

hopefully this will re-focus everyone's attention back on comparative effectiveness instead of the whole bit about covering end-of-life counseling. although end-of-life counseling/living wills were always entwined in the demagogy, the 'death panel' canard has always been primarily about comparative effectiveness.

sure, the schiavo-fringe was made to get all rabid at the thought of someone being able to forego respirators and feeding tubes but those who spread the fertilizer for the astroturf are worried about comparative effectiveness.

happy to confuse easy marks like our friend shooter here into thinking research into eliminating procedures and treatments and pharmaceuticals that are ineffective (or less effective) somehow means eliminating treatment for old people because it isn't cost effective, the parasitic hucksters who make billions of dollars in our health care system are worried that their snake oil medicine show is gonna get shut down.

Oh you silly naive fool. You actually think an obviously effective treatment like laser eye surgery is going be granted to anyone over 60? How about quintuple bypasses? Why should anyone over 65 rely on the opinion of a bureaucracy rather than their own doctor?
Considering that there is no "official" bill, the speed at which positions on provisions are changed, and promises broken, trusting Democrats is a very bad bet.
If you want to have effectiveness research, be my guest. We may all benefit by it. But there is no way we would accept it as the blueprint for who gets what in a healthcare plan.

This issue of comparative effectiveness research is huge. By that I mean that roughly a third of the $2.3 trillion the U.S. spends every year for health care goes to drugs and procedures for which there is little or no evidence that:

-- they work at all; or
-- they work any better than existing, cheaper drugs/procedures.

Not only do we need comparative-effectiveness research to improve treatment, we also need it if we are ever to get a handle on rising health-care costs. Moreover, the taxpayers need not be the only ones to pay for this research; drug manufacturers and others in the industry, along with nonprofits, could be enticed to contribute as well.

More background: http://www.news-record.com/content/2008/08/16/article/some_drugs_are_ineffective_research_finds