On occasion I will check out CNN for a different perspective.  Usually I don’t find much that I would want to comment on or it’s just not that surprising what their take is on an issue.  However I recently read an article called “Rumors influencing health care debate” and, even expecting CNN’s slant, I was still shocked by what I read.  There was no attempt to even appear balanced in the reporting and the use of a “CNN Truth Squad” to question the honesty of health care reform critics was particularly appalling.  Yes, they have a truth squad.  That sounds scary all by itself.  Not willing to trust the “CNN Truth Squad” I downloaded a copy of the plan and read the applicable sections for myself (you can simply Google “HR 3200” to find it or read it here.

The very first claim they “debunk” is that the current House plan forces people to let the government have access to their bank accounts.  In fact, pages 58 and 59 of the bill specifically address real-time electronic handling of a variety of financial-related aspects of the health care plan.  Specifically it says “the real-time (or near real-time) determination of an individual’s financial responsibility at the point of service” (emphasis added).  In reading these pages I frankly admit they could mean a lot of things and certainly could be interpreted that they can require access to your individual finances to determine what you can pay.  It also could mean something more akin to the electronic insurance checks that already routinely occur today.  The problem is that the language is just written so vaguely that it really could mean just about anything and it’s fair to question just where will a bureaucrat take this vaguely worded language in the future – into your own bank account doesn’t sound so farfetched to me.

The next thing they “debunk” is the “death panel” claim.  While it’s true that a politician would be insane to write legislation that uses the term “death panel”, there is a “Health Benefits Advisory Committee” that will be created to determine what benefits are appropriate.  This is on page 30.  Ultimately this panel will be setting standards of care and coverage in the government plan (and remember the goal is single payer so this is what they want for all of us).  Based on individuals the President has appointed to other roles and their publicly stated views on rationing and taking a person’s age and future contributions to society into account when determining the level of care they receive, is it so hard to envision this committee determining that additional costs just aren’t justified for grandma?

Even our local liberal newspaper, the Isthmus is jumping on the lies being spread.  In an article just posted just today they point out that Tammy’s claim (and the President has said this too for what seems like a million times) that you can keep your current coverage if you like it is “not entirely true”.  That’s a polite way to say they are lying.  They even quote the New York Times to back this up!   Although the New York Times says the statement "may not be literally true".  No wonder the President has changed his tune to you’ll “more than likely” be able to keep it – Tammy must have missed that memo.    

I could go on (after all, the bill is over 1,000 pages long) but the point is that CNN is clearly aligning itself as a propaganda machine for one political viewpoint over another.  It’s events like this that scare me even more than the government proposing to take over our healthcare.  If, after open and honest debate that is what the American people really want then so be it.  However when our media begins to repeat lies and propaganda vilifying honest Americans who disagree with the plan – that reminds me more of the propaganda machines in the old Soviet Union than the United States of America.