Rupert Murdoch needs to pay a visit to Rupert Murdoch to make sure the two are on the same page about Death Panels. Because while Murdoch’s Fox News Channel is firing away at a new Medicare regulation allowing doctors to be reimbursed for providing end-of-life counseling, Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal thinks it’s a great idea!
“[T]he substance is more than defensible,” the Journal’s editors opined yesterday. “Certain quarters on the political right are following the media’s imagination and blasting Dr. Berwick’s decision as the tangible institution of death panels. But the rule-making is not coercive and gives seniors more autonomy, not less…. Advance care planning lays out the options and allows patients, in consultation with their providers and family members, to ensure that their future treatment is consistent with their wishes and moral values should they become too sick to decide for themselves.”
They go on to do some hand-waving to exonerate Sarah Palin and other provocateurs from the charge that they equated this policy with Death Panels. But that’s what they did.
The question is: Now that the Wall Street Journal has given this new regulation the thumbs up, will other conservatives and Republicans quiet down about it? I didn’t think so.
Brian Beutler
Brian Beutler is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight, and the debt limit fight. He can be reached at brian@talkingpointsmemo.com.
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