Health care research skewed for political reasons: Kip Sullivan article

[maryf]

Celinda Lake’s “research” for the Herndon Alliance
By Kip Sullivan, JD


There was a time when Celinda Lake was more interested in the truth
than in pleasing her patrons. In the early 1990s, Lake conducted
polls and focus groups which led her to conclude that Medicare is a
very popular program and that large majorities of Americans support
a Medicare-for-all or single-payer system...

So what explains the difference in Celinda Lake’s findings and
recommendations in 1992 and 1993 and her “findings” and
recommendations post-2005? Did American support for single-payer
really head south during those years?...
What changed was Celinda Lake’s attitude about single-payer.
Apparently, Lake came to believe what Jacob Hacker believes: that
politics must be elevated above policy; that means may be justified
by the ends; that corrupt “research” may be pawned off as rigorous
research if the cause is good enough; and that the single-payer
campaign may be sabotaged for the higher good as defined by the
leaders of the “public option” movement. Lake apparently came to
believe, to quote an infamous memo, that “the facts” were going to
have to be “fixed around the policy” and that it was her job to
create the “facts.”


http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/13/two-thirds-support-5/

[fasttense]

1. Ah, creating facts one lie at a time.

Scientists like her give the entire profession a very bad name.

[maryf]

2. And damage a whole lot of people while doing so...

I am so sick of lies in society!!

[fasttense]

3. Even President Obama fell for their con job.

They went around convincing every progressive and liberal group that the public did not support single-payer and that it was politically impossible. That instead we should all jump on the public option sinking boat and do single-payer later, much, much later. The public option was a stealth single-payer.

Sounds as if they even wrote the script for Obama.

I thought it was strange that otherwise strong progressives were backing away from single-payer, the most rational and simplest fix to our health care problems. I thought perhaps we were being conned. And surprise, surprise, surprise we were ALL conned.

Now, we got neither. Good politics democrats.

[maryf]

5. I'm not sure how many were conned

and how many had their pockets lined, but as you say we got neither...the people lose..

[maryf]

4. I hope folks know the article was only an excerpt...

Its chock full!! (thanks for the recs while I was at work!)