Thursday, July 12, 2012

You Doctors!


Because -- imagine it if you can! -- it's even more brazenly false than Fox "news," I never look at The Drudge Report. So I wasn't aware that 83% of doctors hate Obamacare so much they might quit. Admittedly, other than assisting in operations, I'm no longer in practice; but I still hang around with a few docs and have never heard such an opinion expressed.* Turns out there's a reason: the headlined study was total bullshit.
Eighty-three percent of American physicians have considered leaving their practices over President Barack Obama’s health care reform law, according to a survey released by the Doctor Patient Medical Association.

Intriguing. What's the Doctor Patient Medical Association? [The author] refers to it as "a non-partisan association of doctors and patients." But lots of organizations claim to be "non-partisan." The DPMA's co-founder, quoted here, is Kathryn Serkes. She's "non-partisan" in the sense that she worked for a conservative Republican in the 2010 Washington state race for U.S. Senate, and appeared alongside Republican members of Congress at Tea Party rallies against the Affordable Care Act. Her partner at the top is Mark Schiller, M.D., who's also a fellow at the Pacific Research Institute, and the author of a classic 2009 column about how "Obamacare" would succeed by helping to kill sick people.

[...]

So, they have some opinions. But how did they get these survey results?
The survey was conducted by fax and online from April 18 to May 22, 2012. DPMAF obtained the office fax numbers of 36,000 doctors in active clinical practice, and 16, 227 faxes were successfully delivered... The response rate was 4.3% for a total of 699 completed surveys.
Impressive. Not only did the Drudge article falsely assert the study was by a "nonpartisan" group and misstate the data (it claimed 699 were surveyed), it ignored the fact that its pathetic return numbers invalidate the claim. (Had I received such a survey by fax, from an unknown organization, I'd have shit-canned it, too.) But never mind. Any peripheral lie is okay if it reinforces the central one.

Lies upon lies: for today's Republicans, it's the new truth.

Oh man, oh man, oh man, are we ever screwed...
________________________________________

* In fact, here's a letter to the editor that appeared in The Seattle Times just a day after I wrote the above. I agree with him. You'd think most reasonable people, even R politicians, would too. Come together to make it better. (Who am I kidding?)


9 comments:

  1. You "Hang around with a few Docs"????
    No wonder you're so depressed,
    that and the fact you've become one of those sad retired, I mean, retired docs who insist on going to "Grand Rounds"(Whats so Grand bout' Grand Rounds anyway?) Doctors are the World's biggest A-Holes, in fact I don't have ANY Doctor friends.
    OK, I don't have any NON Doctor friends either, thats how we Savants role...
    Give me a Rubic's cube and some S'mores and I'm good for days...
    Does get lonely at times..
    ALMOST AS LONELY AS WASHINGTON STATES ONLY BLACK ELECTED OFFICIAL!!!
    ONE! In a State of millions...
    HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
    it's called a "Talking Point" and as long as I here about Mitt's Taxes I'm gonna bring it up, You Racist.

    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  2. Not that it'll affect your repetitive notion disorder, but within twenty miles of me I know of at least five black elected officials. And Seattle had a black mayor before Atlanta did. (WA had the first Asian-American governor, too, but mentioning it would be off topic. Sort of like your entire comment, right?)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hmmm I noticed no link/footnote to your "at least five black elected officials"... but I'll take your word for it..
    Sorta strange that you know exactly how far away they are though...
    "Seattle had a black mayor before Atlanta did"???
    Must be that one nobody talks about, cause I can't find hide nor hair of him on Google/Bing/Wikipedia...
    Namenda, know it, love it, take it

    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  4. No comment on "repetitive notion disorder?" I thought it was pretty clever, possibly even original.

    Norm Rice.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Can I use "repetitive notion disorder"? I'm laughing like crazy over it.

    Another thing: a friend this week said of teabaggers that "their money is always, you know, more sweat-stained than anyone else's...."

    Thanks for great writing, Sid.

    meh

    ReplyDelete
  6. No comment on "repetitive notion disorder?" I thought it was pretty clever, possibly even original.

    I thought it was both funny an clever.

    It seems that most political guests from both parties along with talking heads suffer from that as evidenced by subjecting us to their talking points ad nauseam.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Nice to hear from you again, SS.

    ReplyDelete
  8. You MEANT to say "Repetitive Notion Disorder"??
    I thought it was just that Pre-Alzheimers, you know, Reagan circa 1987 when he mistook Michael Jackson for Billy D. Williams(they did sort of look alike)
    But hey, its funny,
    not as funny as "RepubicKKKlans"
    "Pubic Schools",
    "any thing Joe Biden says"

    Frank

    ReplyDelete
  9. Or George Bush when he waved at Stevie Wonder.

    ReplyDelete

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