RUSH: The Club for Growth has highlighted an interview of David Axelrod by Wolf Blitzer in which the CNN correspondent presses Axelrod on why not to allow health insurance to be sold across state lines. We have two sound bites on this. This is from September 9th, twelve days or so ago. Blitzer said, ‘The cooperative option, a series of health insurance cooperatives that wouldn’t be the public option, but would be something in between? Is he going to get into a detail like that and say he likes that idea?’
AXELROD: He will acknowledge the fact that there is that idea. There’s the idea of putting a trigger on the public option so it goes into effect at some date when it’s clear that the — that a market is uncompetitive. There are a number of ideas, but what is very important is that we have the kind of competition and choice that will help consumers.
RUSH: Okay. That’s the key. That’s the money portion of the sound bite: ‘very important we have the kind of competition and choice that will help consumers.’ ‘Cause the next bite he stumbles and bumbles and gets all blown to hell, even though Wolf Blitzer bombed out on Celebrity Jeopardy. He came up with a good question here. Blitzer says, ‘Why not break down these state barriers and let all these insurance companies compete nationally without having to simply focus in on a state by state basis?’
AXELROD: Because we are trying to do this in a way that advances the interests of consumers without creating such disruption that it makes it difficult to —
BLITZER: Why would that be disruptive if Blue Cross and Blue Shield or United Health Care or all these big insurance companies, they don’t have to worry about just working in a state, they could just have the opportunity to compete in all 50 states.
AXELROD: But insurance is regulated at this time —
BLITZER: But you could change that —
AXELROD: State by state.
BLITZER: The president could propose a law changing that.
AXELROD: That is not endemic to the kind of reforms that we are proposing or that —
BLITZER: Why not, why not?
AXELROD: We’re proposing a package that we believe will bring that stability and security to people, will help people get insurance, and will lower the cost impact and pass the Congress. And that has to be the test. We’re not into symbolic expedition here.
RUSH: Well, this is just great. So Axelrod says in answer to the first question, what is very important is that we have the kind of competition and choice that will help consumers. Okay, Blitzer amazingly stumbles into the truth. Get rid of the state barriers so people can buy insurance from anywhere in the country they want. You talk about competition, ‘Oh, no, no, no, can’t do that. No, and we’re not going to go that route, we’re going to simonize our watches out there, we’re not going to do this.’ Why? ‘Well, because it doesn’t fit the reform package.’ So what this illustrates is they use the language that reflects the experience of their audience. They know that Americans respond to the whole concept of competition. They know that Americans understand that in business, competition lowers price and increases supply of a product or of a service. So they run around and say that their health care plan has a lot of competition. The public option, or these health care exchanges, that’s where the competition’s gonna come. There is no competition because these health care exchanges or the public option, the government, they don’t have to make a profit.
You can’t, if you’re in business to make a profit and thus survive, you cannot compete against somebody who doesn’t have to make a profit and who also can print their own money. This is what they know. They want the government running it. Axelrod is just disingenuous, he got caught and he stumbled and bumbled through the answer. What it illustrates is that you should not listen to what they say in terms of what their plan is gonna end up providing you. There will not be any competition. You are not going to have anywhere else to go once they fully implement their plan. But they’re telling you it’s going to be full of competition ’cause that’s what they think you’ll buy and that you’ll believe and that, well, of course competition. They know the doofuses on the left, the amount of their brains that understand economics would not even equal an amoeba. They’ll believe any trash the left says. Oh, yeah, competition, federal government, yeah, that will keep the insurance companies honest. No, it won’t, put ’em out of business. So great bunch of sound bites there because it’s just like Obama saying at this climate thing today in New York that we’ve reduced carbon emissions the last eight months more than at any time in our history. Just happens to coincide with his immaculation.
We have done nothing policy wise to reduce carbon emissions, not one thing, there is no piece of legislation limiting carbon emissions. All there is is a trashed economy which is lowering carbon output because there’s less economic activity going on. Almost 10% unemployment. And that’s how you lower carbon emissions. You wreck people’s lives. You wreck the economy. You cannot have an economic circumstance where there is growth — and that’s what the experience of this country has always been, the expectation parents have for their kids, live a better life than they did, that requires economic growth, that requires an expansion of prosperity and opportunities for it, and when that happens, you’re going to have more output of everything, and it’s all woven into this elaborate hoax that carbon dioxide is causing the climate to be destroyed. That’s the big lie that props up all these other lies. But I mean we haven’t done one thing to lower carbon emissions, and yet Obama is taking credit for something that hasn’t happened, just to give it to himself, the credit to himself. And now, oh, yeah, competition out there, government option, health exchanges, lots of competition. Keep the insurance companies honest. The only way you keep ’em honest is to let ’em compete with each other. This will put ’em out of business. And that’s the objective.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Ernest in Atlanta. Nice to have you on the EIB Network. Hello, sir.
CALLER: Pleasure to be here, Rush. I wanted to refer back to your conversation between Axelrod and Wolf Blitzer, particularly relative to this question of breaking down the estate boundaries on the insurance plans and coverage. It occurred to me in listening to that that I’m on Medicare now, and I have Medicare supplemental, which as you know is designed to cover the gaps that Medicare doesn’t provide for. And the way that works is that there are about five or six different descriptions of insurance coverage and once a year for a period of about three months these are open for competition. I receive descriptions, the plan has a standard description of each of the five or six plans in terms of what it covers. And then the insurance companies compete on the basis of a price and service for me to subscribe to their insurance coverage for the next year. So this occurs nationwide, and it’s uniform, and it serves is an excellent prototype for doing exactly what Axelrod says really doesn’t fit or couldn’t be done.
RUSH: Oh, it’s not that it can’t be done. He knows it can be done, it’s that it’s not what they want. Let’s go back and repeat these two sound bites because these are incredible and they’re instructive. Maybe I’m making too big a deal about it. I don’t think so. Obama saying today that we have done more in the last eight months to lower carbon emissions than at any time in our history, is so patently, transparently absurd. There hasn’t been one policy, not one carbon emissions reduction policy implemented, and yet he’s out there. I don’t know how you document that. The Financial Times has got a story saying worldwide carbon emissions are down. But, you know, that’s as silly as that story we got on 45,000 deaths because people don’t have health insurance. They just make this stuff up. You know, measuring worldwide carbon emissions? I don’t know how precise that can be done. We can’t even precisely measure the temperature everywhere on the planet, and carbon emissions? Look how easily we got roped into buying all these false premises. And then you add to it, ‘Well, we’ve done more to lower carbon emissions last eight months than at any time in the world’s history.’ It’s just absurd. It’s a patent lie.
Obama is trying to take credit for something that has not happened and that shows everybody exactly how they’re doing it on everything else. ‘The economy is roaring back,’ as unemployment approaches 10%. ‘We’re going to have competition in our new health care plan,’ when they’re going to shut down private insurance. Here’s Axelrod. This is back on September 9th, Wolf Blitzer, ‘Why don’t you just do the cooperative option, the health insurance cooperatives, you gonna get into detail like that?’
(replaying of sound bites)
RUSH: Competition, choice, to help consumers. Blitzer says, ‘Well, then why not let insurance companies sell across state lines?’
(replaying of sound bite)
RUSH: All right. So, no, competition and choice that will help consumers. But, no, no, no, no, not that much competition, not that kind of choice, no, no, no. Because we have to come up with something that can pass the Congress. That’s what matters. They’re building monuments to themselves. Gotta come up with something that will pass Congress and that won’t pass the Congress. But we’re going to say it’s full of competition and choice because that’s what you want. And we’re going to tell you we’re giving it to you, but we’re lying to you. That’s Axelrod.