On February 23, Bob Goldberg blogged on the half-truths Liberally sprinkled throughout a report issued by the Democrat minority staff of the House Government Reform Committee. Dr. Goldberg’s argument was based 100% on fact. The report by the minority staff was based on politics, sound bites, and fuzzy math. As my grandmother used to say, a half truth is a whole lie.
Now it seems that Democrats in Congress are taking the same half-truth strategy, customizing its fallacies to fit local constituencies and taking it on the road. Consider the case of Northern California.
Here’s how the San Francisco Chronicle reported it …
Bay Area Democrats in Congress released a survey earlier this week concluding that prices for 10 top-selling drugs purchased through Medicare were higher than those paid by Canadian consumers or Costco customers … For its part, the study by Bay Area Democrats found the average costs of 10 common brand-name drugs offered by 10 plans in the Bay Area were 75 percent higher than prices negotiated by the federal government for agencies such as the Veterans’ Administration, 60 percent higher than prices in Canada, nearly 5 percent higher than prices available online through Drugstore.com and almost 2 percent higher than those at warehouse club retailer Costco.
Yep — it’s the exact same story that ran in the national press in late February. How soon the media forgets. And I fear it is selective memory loss.
So let me repeat what Bob said only a few short weeks ago — the Bay Area Dems deliberately omitted drug plans that allow patients to pay a fixed low price for all the drugs they survey. There are many drug plans that allow consumers to pay $30 for a month’s supply of each drug (or $25 a month if purchased through mail order). All these prices are substantially lower than any of the average prices cited by the Democrat staff. Not decimal dust.
Maybe we should call these representatives the new Bay City Rollers.
