AMA Opposes Obamacare

This should make for an interesting speech on Monday:

As the health care debate heats up, the American Medical Association is letting Congress know that it will oppose creation of a government-sponsored insurance plan, which President Obama and many other Democrats see as an essential element of legislation to remake the health care system.

The opposition, which comes as Mr. Obama prepares to address the powerful doctors’ group on Monday in Chicago, could be a major hurdle for advocates of a public insurance plan. The A.M.A., with about 250,000 members, is America’s largest physician organization.

While committed to the goal of affordable health insurance for all, the association had said in a general statement of principles that health services should be “provided through private markets, as they are currently.” It is now reacting, for the first time, to specific legislative proposals being drafted by Congress.

Doctors realize that a publicly funded health care system will mean that costs will be more important than patient care, and their fees may be one of the biggest cuts, not to mention their ability to care for patients as they wish.

Here are two other items worth reading: Karl Rove on the risks of letting Democrats pass a health care plan that can never be undone, and this item from Mark Steyn on how well socialized medicine works in Canada.