I've got to give credit where credit is due. My nephew was right. Although I have called him a jerk in the past, Mark Haines has shown himself willing to play the crusty old curmudgeon from both sides of the aisle in the past few days in the debate over health care reform. Today he took on the Harvard Professor Martin Feldstein who wrote an op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal titled "ObamaCare Is All About Rationing." The Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under Ronald Reagan did not get the warm embrace that members of that administration have come to expect on CNBC with Haines repeatedly pointing out "Your argument is a very easy one to make by someone who has money."
The best part was when Feldstein tried to make a boogeyman out of cost-effectiveness research.
Feldstein: What do you think the cost-effectiveness research is for?
Haines: For the government to decide what it thinks the money is best spent on.
Feldstein: That's right. That's right.
Haines: That's simply rational sir. That's simply rational to make the decision based on what history has shown is the effectiveness of a therapy.
Feldstein: Yes, but you and I may have a different tastes. On whether I want to get a different test.
Haines: But if you have the money, you will still be able to get that.
Posts
Haines has been critical of many right wing-nuts on this health care debate. He called Palin a total crackpot for her death panel comments a week ago, wishfully asking for an sane discussion of the issues. I like him because if someone he's interviewing is full of it he'll let them know, like this woman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_iQobCNGas&NR=1
ReplyDelete