Background Briefing: October 10, 2018
Trump’s Torrent of Lies in His Op-Ed Against Medicare-for-All
We begin with the op-ed in today’s USA Today by President Trump attacking the Democrats for wanting to expand Medicare to Medicare-for-all, using the familiar tropes of “socialism”, “big government takeover!” and “bureaucrats making decisions for you instead of your doctor”. Dr. John Geyman, a professor emeritus of family medicine at the Washington School of Medicine in Seattle whose latest book, just out is, “Trumpcare: “Lies, Broken Promises, How It is Failing, and What Should Be Done”, joins us. We will discuss how many lies Trump piled into such a short space which prompted the fact-checker Glenn Kessler to write “almost every sentence contained a misleading statement or a falsehood”. And since it appears that the Republicans are afraid that Medicare and its expansion is popular, and that single-payer healthcare is becoming increasingly popular among younger voters, we look into the extent to which the Republican sabotage of Medicare and Obamacare is working. With the Republicans being both the arsonists and the fire brigade as they undermine what is working for the American people so that they will be forced to go back to the model that has never worked. A model which has made American healthcare the most expensive in the world with some of the worst results. We will look into the Trump Administration’s plans to take the Healthcare.gov website offline for hours at a time for “maintenance” during the upcoming Obamacare enrollment season.