Posted on 12/02/2011 9:32:16 AM PST by Nachum
Oscar Wilde famously wrote, "I like men who have a future and women who have a past." We can thus assume that, were he with us today, he would turn up his nose at Donald Berwick and offer Marilyn Tavenner his most charming smile. This is Berwick's last day as Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and Tavenner is his replacement. If it's not obvious why Wilde would beam on the latter, it soon will be. First, however, it's necessary to recall a sentence from Obama's first address before a joint session of Congress. During that speech he talked a lot about fraud. He was particularly effusive about his intent to end the widespread bilking of government health care programs: "We will root out the waste, fraud, and abuse in our Medicare program that doesn't make our seniors any healthier."
Still confused? Well, Marilyn Tavenner is a former executive of Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), which was responsible for the largest single example of Medicare fraud in history. As the Boston Globe reports, "While Tavenner worked for HCA, the company was busily enhancing its profit margin by defrauding the Medicare, Medicaid and TRICARE systems." HCA ended up paying nearly $1.5 billion in fines before the smoke cleared. CMS falls under the aegis of HHS and, as its administrator, Tavenner would work with the Office of Inspector General in fraud cases. Thus, as the Globe points out, "It hardly seems wise to put her in charge of the government system her company helped defraud." And yet Tavenner is the President's nominee to replace Donald Berwick.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
The list, Ping
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Great appointment if you want to launder Medicare/Medicaid money into your political campaign.
We are so scr3w3d.
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