Dear Mr. President,



Wednesday evening we heard you address the nation on health care and the economy. I was hoping to hear some tough answers to tough questions. Instead we were treated to one hour of tap dancing on eggshells where it seemed your primary intent was not to break any eggs.



You spoke of the need for sacrifices but failed to mention any. You said Medicare benefits would not be reduced and everyone would be covered.



Mr. President where are the sacrifices? By who?



The press seemed concerned with a fear of rationed health care. Some republicans have raised the issue as well.



Mr. President I am concerned there will be no rationing of health care. It is axiomatic that there is unlimited demand for free services.



Here are some tougher questions I am sure everyone would like to know.





Will the plan cover a transplant procedure with a $50,000 cost for someone who is 80 years old with a life expectancy of two years? One year? Who decides? Or is everything free for everyone regardless of the odds of success?



Will the plan cover fertility treatments? Abortion?

Will the plan address issues that arose in the Terri Schiavo case?

To what extent must doctors provide generics instead of prescription drugs?



Notes and Sources:

Robert Laszewski, a former insurance company executive who's now a consultant to industry, contended doctors were "paid off" to support the House bill.



"The AMA would not have endorsed the House bill without the doc fix," Laszewski said. "The fact that the CBO has said the doc fix would add hundreds of billions of dollars to the cost of the bill makes clear how much it is worth to the docs."





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As you'll see, we leaned on the conservative side here by only counting money that's directly related to military activities. We didn't, for instance, add in money for the Department of Veterans Affairs ($55.9 billion), which would take the total to $836.3 billion; or the rest of the Department of Homeland Security ($54.5 billion), which would take it to $890.8. (The wider national security apparatus isn't included either—budgets for the intelligence services are classified.) If we did include these extras, here’s what the difference between the official budget and the real one would look like:







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