{"id":37383,"date":"2011-05-19T00:07:40","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T00:07:40","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T00:07:40","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T00:07:40","slug":"apocalyptic_dems_call_obamacare_repeal_a_matter_of_life_and_death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2011\/05\/19\/apocalyptic_dems_call_obamacare_repeal_a_matter_of_life_and_death\/","title":{"rendered":"Apocalyptic Dems Call Obamacare Repeal a Matter of “Life and Death”"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: Speaking of this, there\u2019s a new mantra out there, it got started yesterday. Obamacare now is a matter of life or death. There are no limits on the extremes to which these people will go. (interruption) No, Snerdley, Headline News is CNN, but Maude Behar is not John King. You know, John King apologized, some guest said ‘in the crosshairs.\u2019 (imitating King) ‘We\u2019re really trying, we\u2019re really trying,\u2019 but Maude Behar, she\u2019s not bound by any of that, propriety. It\u2019s the same umbrella network, CNN, but two different networks, two different philosophies. So last night and yesterday we have a montage Bobby Scott, Democrat, Virginia, George Miller, Democrat, California, Frank Pallone, Democrat, New Jersey, Nancy Pelosi, Anna Eshoo, Democrat, California talking about the possibility of the repeal of health care reform.<\/p>\n

SCOTT: Health care reform is a matter of life and death.<\/p>\n

MILLER: This is life and death.<\/p>\n

ESHOO: An issue of life or death.<\/p>\n

PALLONE: The issue of having health coverage is a matter of life and death.<\/p>\n

PELOSI: A choice between life and death.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Not only is this absurd, it is — I don\u2019t know the word for it — it\u2019s just patently wrong. It\u2019s not a matter of life or death. You mean if we repeal Obamacare we\u2019re gonna start dropping like flies? The absurdity of every argument the left makes is mitigated only by its utter disastrous impact on our culture and society. These people are single-handedly doing what they can to tear it down. Remember this? All these Democrats, a matter of life and death, last Sunday, Meet the Press, David Gregory during a discussion about civility in politics.<\/p>\n

GREGORY: Is that the real problem? Is a description of political discourse and political disagreement as being apocalyptic, having such huge consequence for the direction of the country?<\/p>\n

RUSH: Is he gonna have these people on to talk about that? You think he will? You think he\u2019ll go get Bobby Scott, Frank Pallone, George Miller, Anna Eshoo, and Nancy Pelosi to come on and answer his question about this? Ask them to defend their apocalyptic life-and-death rhetoric? You can\u2019t get more apocalyptic than life and death. How about it, Mr. Gregory? Have the invitations gone out to these people to come on and explain themselves to you? <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Terry, Arcata, California, hi, and welcome to the EIB Network.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yeah, hi, Rush. Thanks. Listen, it\u2019s life or death because everyone would have insurance and that means preventative medicine would be practiced. And that\u2019s what saved my life. I had colon cancer five years ago and because I had insurance —<\/p>\n

RUSH: Wait, wait, wait just a second. I need to start again. You\u2019re calling to suggest that the repeal of Obamacare is a matter of life and death?<\/p>\n

CALLER: Yes, \u2019cause I\u2019m saying if people don\u2019t have insurance they won\u2019t get preventative medicine, and that\u2019s what saved my life. <\/p>\n

RUSH: Wait a second. I hate to tell you here, but Obamacare isn\u2019t even kicked in yet. Obamacare doesn\u2019t really kick in \u2019til 2014. Most of the so-called benefit provisions haven\u2019t even started. It doesn\u2019t kick in \u2019til 2014. So people are gonna be dropping like flies between now and then if you\u2019re right, because —<\/p>\n

CALLER: Well, let me tell you something. I have what you would call a preexisting condition, and my insurance agent told me, she said, ‘You can\u2019t get insurance because you had cancer in the past.\u2019 I can\u2019t get insurance. She said, ‘After five years you might get it, but it\u2019s gonna be extremely expensive.\u2019 So that\u2019s what a preexisting condition means.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Okay. Were you able to go out and get insurance?<\/p>\n

CALLER: No, luckily I\u2019m able to handle — <\/p>\n

RUSH: Well that\u2019s good because you can\u2019t yet. You\u2019re not gonna be able to \u2019til 2014 and by that time — preexisting condition, it\u2019s not even insurance. <\/p>\n

CALLER: No, no —<\/p>\n

RUSH: We\u2019re talking welfare, not even talking insurance.<\/p>\n

CALLER: People with preexisting conditions, such as myself, can get insurance after it kicks in in 2014. But the main thing is right now, because I had insurance, I went and got a colonoscopy —<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah, but look, I live in Literalville. You are agreeing with the notion it\u2019s a matter of life and death. That means the life expectancy ought to be plummeting, because Obamacare doesn\u2019t kick in until 2014. I live in Literalville. I don\u2019t live in platitude land. If you\u2019re gonna tell me that you agree with the fallacious concept that Obamacare, repealing it\u2019s a matter of life and death, I\u2019m sorry, I\u2019m gonna disagree with you no matter what circumstance anecdotally or individually you give me. If people with preexisting conditions are destined to die and have been destined to die for hundreds of years because it\u2019s been that many years since we\u2019ve not had Obamacare, then somebody\u2019s gonna have to show me the statistics where the number one cause of death in America is people dying because insurance companies don\u2019t sell preexisting condition insurance. And you can\u2019t because it doesn\u2019t exist. <\/p>\n

I hate to see people falling for this. I don\u2019t care if it\u2019s individual anecdotal stories. It matters. Words mean things. This stuff matters. The talk about this being a matter of life and death is absolutely irresponsible. It\u2019s not factual. The life expectancy in this country has done nothing but increase. Nobody is signing up. The way this is happening out there, Terry, is they\u2019ve got these things called high-risk pools. High risk is preexisting condition. So there is an advance system set up, and nobody is signing up for them. Denying preexisting condition only means you have to pay higher rates. It doesn\u2019t mean that you can\u2019t get it. It just means you have to pay higher rates. That\u2019s insurance. It\u2019s the world. It\u2019s life. It\u2019s how it exists. <\/p>\n

Now, nobody is signing up for higher risk pools. Nobody is. If it is such a matter of life or death, you would think more than a thousand or so people woulda signed up by now, you woulda thought millions would have signed up for it if it\u2019s a matter of life and death, but it isn\u2019t. But I know I don\u2019t win any points here. This is the problem living in Literalville. You score no points with the truth. You get somebody emotionally connected to the idea, I don\u2019t even know how it happens, repealing Obamacare is gonna cause death, if they get emotionally connected to that there\u2019s no untying them, no amount of fact, logic, nothing. Truth will do it. And that is frustrating.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Folks, do you remember all during the debate on Obamacare, every day we were told X-number of people were dying — every day — because they lacked health insurance. It was absurd. It wasn\u2019t this 43 million people don\u2019t have insurance. There are people dying every day. They were trying to attribute daily deaths to a lack of health insurance, preexisting conditions. Has that number gone down since last March? We don\u2019t hear about it anymore, ever since Obamacare was passed. Here\u2019s a Reuters story from September 18th, 2009: ‘Study Links 45,000 US Deaths to Lack of Insurance,\u2019 by Susan Heavey. <\/p>\n

‘Nearly 45,000 people die in the United States each year — one every 12 minutes — in large part because they lack health insurance and can not get good care, Harvard Medical School researchers found in an analysis released on Thursday. ‘We\u2019re losing more Americans every day because of inaction … than drunk driving and homicide combined,\u2019 Dr. David Himmelstein, a co-author of the study and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard…\u2019 So according to this study, 123 people die in the US every day because they don\u2019t have insurance. <\/p>\n

Now, we haven\u2019t heard that number since March when Obamacare was passed. We don\u2019t know what the number is. We don\u2019t know if that number has gone down. Shouldn\u2019t that be showing up by now? We got the health care law. We got Obamacare! Shouldn\u2019t the number of people dying every day be going down? It\u2019s been almost a year since Obamacare was signed into law. We should have 45,000 more people alive and walking around that we didn\u2019t have before. Has anybody seen a death certificate that says, ‘Cause of Death: No health insurance\u2019? I haven\u2019t. Maybe you in the leftist blogosphere have, but I haven\u2019t. <\/p>\n

So what we have here is a guy who had colon cancer, got treatment, recovered from the disease (as best I can tell) and he\u2019s complaining about the system that saved his life. He calls here to complain about it. So he says, ‘If I didn\u2019t have insurance, well, what then? What then?\u2019 It\u2019s called Medicaid. It\u2019s called state pools. It\u2019s called high-risk pools. It is absurd. It offends me as an American to have people believe that this nation\u2019s health care system, and that our own cultural morality, sits around and lets people die. We do more to save lives in emergency rooms every year than most nations do in their normal scope of daily medical care! <\/p>\n

We spend a fortune — it\u2019s a literal fortune, folks — on people who don\u2019t have insurance, including illegal aliens. And we continue to get these stories, these hypotheticals about ‘What if?\u2019 and ‘What if? What if that? What if this?\u2019 Now, if we didn\u2019t have Medicaid, if we didn\u2019t have state pools and high-risk pools, if we didn\u2019t have laws that cover the poor and preexisting conditions then they could make arguments like this. But we have all this. We have all of these redundant systems, plans, programs that handle and accommodate people; and yet they still make these arguments. The truth of the matter is President Obama\u2019s health care system destroys our health care system. <\/p>\n

President Obama\u2019s health care legislation, his law destroys the health care system ultimately for all of us, including those of us who pay for it — and for those of you who pay for everybody else, too. It isn\u2019t aimed at preexisting conditions. It\u2019s aimed at all of us. Health care quality is going to suffer proportionately to the percentage of this plan that gets implemented over the years. And, yeah, it is extremely frustrating to have to sit here and know that there are gullible people who accept these out-and-out lies, and it\u2019s all political based. They accept it \u2019cause they\u2019re liberal Democrats. <\/p>\n

Liberal Democrats run out there and claim that the repeal of health care is a matter of life and death, and they believe it, and they start calling radio talk show hosts with anecdotal evidence of how it\u2019s true. Maybe what we ought to do is take a page from the ChiComs and their wonderful health care system : Give the patient an aspirin, and then when you run outta aspirin shoot the patient in the head, and then harvest their organs for transplants. Solvy-solvy. Everybody in this country has access to health care. Everybody does not have health insurance. Still, everybody can get health care. Somehow that always seems to get lost in the discussion when Democrats start talking. These people are shameless, folks. These leftists are absolutely shameless. <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Would we all agree that Canada has their own version of Obamacare? Absolutely, it\u2019s unquestionable. I looked it up here, ladies and gentlemen, the wait time for colonoscopies in Canada in 2009 was 147 days, just shy of six months. Prolonged wait times for colonoscopies in Canada, according to the Canadian Association of Gastroenterology, 147 days. We\u2019re coming to that. Add to it ‘as the secretary shall determine.\u2019 Obamacare will destroy the great health care system that is the United States of America. Mitch McConnell was unequivocal yesterday. He said, ‘We will repeal it.\u2019 A lot of people on the line here. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: Speaking of this, there\u2019s a new mantra out there, it got started yesterday. Obamacare now is a matter of life or death. There are no limits on the extremes to which these people will go. (interruption) No, Snerdley, Headline News is CNN, but Maude Behar is not John King. 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