Sarah Palin jumps into the health care debate
Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is a last-second entrant into the health care debate, after reviving her 2009 claims that President Obama’s health care plan will kill senior citizens.
On Monday, Palin made a lengthy post on her public Facebook page defending her statements that the Affordable Care Act would set up a 15-person panel that would cut Medicare costs, with potential deadly consequences.
By Tuesday, several political blogs picked up on the post. It had about 238 comments and 1,400 Likes, which aren’t huge numbers in the Facebook world.
“Though I was called a liar for calling it like it is, many of these accusers finally saw that Obamacare did in fact create a panel of faceless bureaucrats who have the power to make life and death decisions about health care funding,” Palin said.
Palin defended her criticism of the Independent Payment Advisory Board, an agency set up to contain Medicare costs.
The Los Angeles Times pointed out that Palin’s original death panel claims dealt with the provision of the health care plan that was long since abandoned.
“Originally, she coined the term based on a component of the healthcare reform bill that would have allowed Medicare to cover end-of-life counseling by physicians, though that regulation was abandoned by the Obama administration in January 2011,” the Times said.
The Times also points out that although Palin’s claims were widely debunked, the idea still resonates with some Obama opponents.
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