Health Care BS

Harry Reid has been braying again. This time he’s demagoguing Medicare. According to this AP article, Reid has decided to substitute conspiracy theories for reasoned argument about whether Medicare should negotiate with drug companies:

Senate Republicans aligned with big pharmaceutical and insurance companies are standing in the way of the government negotiating cheaper drug prices for Medicare recipients, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday.

The senator apparently hasn’t considered the possibility that reasonable people can disagree on this issue. Anyone who doesn’t want to license the federal government to meddle (even further) in health care is a tool of “big pharma” or (even worse) the insurance companies.

Reid doesn’t care how many policy wonks prove that Medicare Part-D has been quite effective in holding down costs precisely because it utilizes market competition. Nor is he concerned that the CBO doesn’t support the main justification for his legislation:

Reid said he was irritated by opponents who refer to a study by the Congressional Budget Office that shows drug prices wouldn’t be lowered if the government negotiated them.

Someone needs to muzzle this jackass.