More Health Care Reforms Needed

One health care reform that we badly need is tort reform, so that doctors won't be chased out of practice by ruinous lawsuits and over-the-top malpractice insurance rates. The Democrats won't do this because the trial lawyers are their biggest source of campaign contributions.

The left has started a nasty attack against John Mackey, founder and CEO of Whole Foods Market, because he wrote an article in the Wall Street Journal endorsing these common-sense reforms. He practices what he preaches; his company provides popular Health Savings Accounts for its employees.

The left is attacking Mackey because he not only supports practical reforms but also explained the folly of making health care a new massive, costly entitlement that would create trillions of dollars of unfunded deficits and empower government instead of people. The left is venting its rage on Twitter, Facebook and the blogosphere and even organizing a boycott against Whole Foods.

Here are two more health-care reforms that I would add to the list. The Democrats craftily built two loopholes into their 1,000-page bill that must be closed. Nancy Pelosi's bill deceitfully covers abortion at taxpayer expense by refusing to exclude it. The Democrats and the feminists consider abortion merely routine health care like appendectomies. The bill does mention excluding illegal aliens but provides no verification mechanism. Therefore, illegal aliens will be covered by the Democrats' health care bill unless proof of citizenship is specified as a requirement.

Don't let anybody tell you that "co-ops" are an acceptable alternative to "public option." Co-op is just a code word for the government to mandate the benefits that private insurance must provide, so co-ops will rapidly move us to socialist control of the health-care industry just as fast as the public option.

Audio version of this commentary.