Posted on 08/27/2009 11:13:15 AM PDT by Def Conservative
Whatever else he said Wednesday evening at the town hall hosted by Rep. Jim Moran, D-VA, former Democratic National Committee chairman and presidential candidate Howard Dean let something incredibly candid slip out about President Obama's health-care reform bill in Congress.
Asked by an audience member why the legislation does nothing to cap medical malpractice class-action lawsuits against doctors and medical institutions (aka "Tort reform"), Dean responded by saying: “The reason tort reform is not in the [health care] bill is because the people who wrote it did not want to take on the trial lawyers in addition to everybody else they were taking on. And that’s the plain and simple truth,”
Dean is a former physician, so he knows about skyrocketing medical malpractice insurance rates, and the role of the trial lawyers in fueling the "defensive medicine" approach among medical personnel who order too many tests and other sometimes unneeded procedures "just to be sure" and to protect themselves against litigation.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
If the Government really wants to reduce the cost of health care, let the Government insure doctors rather than requiring private insurance.
bump
I saw it on CSPAN. I was surprised by how frank Dean was. He gave no defense at all to trial lawyers. He even proposed that malpractice complaints first have to go to non-binding arbitration before a jury trial be allowed, and that the arbitrators decision be allowed as evidence in the trial.
I doubt the DNC’s #1 source of contributions was very happy.
No thank you!
Part of the tort problem is that the gov stepped in and required malpractice insurance then stepped in and mandated increasing levels of insurance.
The gov just created more and more deep pockets making the lawyers more and more money.
What a colossal LIE!!! What the heck does tort reform have to do with trial lawyers? You pass the legislation and they have to live with it.
No, the truth is, Democrats don't want to mess with they bread and butter machine. It's how they become rich and get into politics in the first place.
“...momentary outbreak of political honesty by Dean...”
“political honesty” is not oxymoronic?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.