When Is A Benefit Not Really A Benefit?

Is it me, or am I the only one embarrased by the President? Here's a look at another fumbled attept at humor as he tries to catapult the propaganda related to his new, bigger government Medicare drug benefit:

Q I find there's a dearth of literature about the new program. I just don't see any pamphlets or books around, which there should be.

THE PRESIDENT: True.

Q Secondly, I want to ask, if you do sign up, and I don't know what it's all about, truthfully, computer fearful, and so I'm not -- I'm computer-illiterate. And I'd like to know, when -- if I do sign up, can I quit, can I get out of it?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, you can. (Laughter.) I think if you sign -- first of all, that's a great question. Literature -- there's all kind of literature. I can't answer the question as to why --

Q I haven't seen it --

THE PRESIDENT: No, I know, there's not any -- you haven't seen it yet, I know. But I will try to find out why you haven't seen any here. Secondly, you're not alone when it comes to saying, I'm a little frightened about getting on the computer. You're not the only person I've heard say that. And therefore, one of the things that centers such as this do is provide help with people who are computer-illiterate. And it's -- with somebody explaining how it works and what you're watching, I think you'll find it to be a lot less intimidating than you think.

And thirdly, I wouldn't sign up, if I were you, unless you were comfortable that it saves you money. This is an add-on to Medicare. It is a part of Medicare. It's called Medicare Part D. In other words, the rest of Medicare exists, but what this does is it provides an additional benefit. And as I said, across the country, people are saving half on their prescription drug bills. People say to me, well, I'm feeling pretty healthy, and I'm not taking a lot of prescription drugs, I'm not going to sign up. My advice is, sign up, because you don't know when you're going to have to start taking prescription drugs.

But at the very minimum, take a look. You seem like an inquisitive person, somebody who wants to know the facts, and there should be people here at this center that will help you find the facts out front. And there's going to be some literature, I hope -- there is? Brother said there's literature. Now, there had better be literature, because the man -- (laughter) -- the man in the hat is going to walk out there, and if he doesn't see any literature, I'm cooked. (Laughter.) Good looking hat, too.

Well, not only that, but we have some smarter people than the president thinking this benefit really is no benefit:

Q Thank you. First, let me say, I think a lot of people will be helped by this program.

THE PRESIDENT: They will --

Q A lot of people will be helped by the Medicare Part D program.

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, thank you.

Q But I think there's major deficiencies in it that I think we'd like to hear some comments from you on. The first major issue, I think the program is going to be a lot more expensive both to the user and to the taxpayer than it needs to be, because we don't allow Medicare to negotiate directly with the pharmaceutical companies. This could wind up costing the taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars over the next 10 years.

Another thing, the insurance companies are allowed to change their formulary once a person is in the program; a person is not allowed to get out until the end of the year. This is a legalized bate-and-switch operation by the insurance companies. How many of them are doing it, I don't know, but it's a danger for our seniors.

Third, I have a report here from Families USA indicating that the poorest people that are affected by this program are not being helped.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I just --

Q Not helped -- either they're not signed up, they're not being helped compared to the benefits they were getting under a combination of Medicare and Medicaid.

So, finally, I think there are several major changes that should be made in the program. Number one, let Medicare negotiate with the pharmaceutical companies. Number two, stop the formulary switch. If we do that, by reducing the costs, I think we can possibly reduce the size or even eliminate the doughnut hole that people are exposed to.

THE PRESIDENT: Okay, thanks.

Q And I think -- (laughter.) One last thing -- okay. If we don't bring our costs down this way, we're never going to control health care costs in the U.S. And we're subsidizing the pharmaceutical companies, and we're subsidizing health costs in every other country around the world because every other country negotiates directly with the pharmaceutical companies. (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I'll be glad to give you some comments. First of all, if a senior takes a look at the program and doesn't think it saves his or her money, they shouldn't sign up.

Secondly, in terms of the low-income seniors, I don't know what the report is that you cite -- people cite reports all the time. I will tell you this, that a lot of people are working hard to find the low-income seniors to give them the chance to sign up for an incredibly beneficial program -- including AARP, the NAACP, as I mentioned. I've met with their representatives. They realize this is a good deal for low-income seniors. But if you're premise is right that the low-income senior won't benefit from the program, they shouldn't sign up to it. I just strongly disagree that this isn't good for low-income seniors.

Thirdly, one of the reasons why -- we're trying to make individual choice available for seniors, as opposed to having the federal government making The decisions on behalf of seniors. And so the idea of having the federal government negotiate price keeps the federal government squarely in the middle of the program. There's a philosophical difference, evidently, between me and you. All I can tell you is, is that the program is costing less than anticipated and this program is going to benefit a lot of seniors because there is more choice for seniors.

Now, the idea of -- this won't help us control health care costs, one, I disagree with that. I think more choices for consumers, the better off we are. Secondly, health care costs are on the rise. A lot of it has to do with these lawsuits that are driving good doctors out of practice that are causing people to practice defensive medicine and running up the premiums for consumers. We need to modernize health care, as well, by introducing information technology so that kind of the system of writing files by hand, which leads to errors and inefficiency, is replaced by a modern system of information technology. Thirdly, we need transparency in pricing. People need to know that which they're purchasing and the quality of that which they purchase so that consumers are able to make more rational decisions.

Fourthly, the center of the health care needs to be the doctor-patient relationship -- not bureaucracy, either government or private bureaucracy. And that's why I'm such a strong believer in health savings account, which are now being -- now available for a lot of folks in America.

So I think you and I may have a different vision of health care. I thank you for bringing it up, but, look, if people don't like it, they don't have to sign up for it. People have got the right to pick what they want to pick. And therefore, I know you would agree with me in saying that seniors ought to take a look and see whether or not it meets their needs.

Thank you, sir, very much. I appreciate that.

Yes, ma'am.

One last stab at humor leaves me with more embarrasment, but now for him, not us:

Q You mentioned gas prices, and I think everybody understands that this is being driven by economic imperatives. What I don't understand, what seems to violate common sense, is why the oil companies are also reporting record profits. It doesn't seem like people should get rich on somebody else's -- our misery.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, my attitude is, is that I believe in the markets, I believe in the private enterprise, but I also believe people ought to reinvest. You know, we haven't built a refinery in this country since the early 1970s, not one refinery. And guess what -- when you have shortage of supply, and demand stays strong, price goes up. So part of the reasons why we've got high gasoline prices is because the price of crude oil has gone up.

Part of it also is because we're not increasing the supplies of gasoline for the consumers. And so my call to the energy companies is, reinvest in America; expand refinery capacity; build new ones. Part of the problem, though, is our own fault. We've got a lot of rules and regulations that prevent there to be -- that stop people from investing capital in refinery expansion. So one of the things I'm working with Congress is to relax these regulations.

I mean, if we've got a problem, let's address it square on and figure out where the problem is. And there is a bottleneck when it comes to this paperwork. And we've got to be less regulatory in America to increase the supply of gasoline for our people.

We've got another problem, in that in a lot of states they require different kind of fuel blends, which means that it's hard -- when you have to change your gasoline supply on a seasonal basis to have specialized blends, it causes supply disruptions. And disruption in supply causes prices to go up.

And so I don't believe the federal government ought to be taking over businesses, I don't believe that. But I do believe that the federal government ought to be encouraging people to spend profits here in America, to build pipeline and expand capacity for the sake of consumers. (Applause.)

Yes, ma'am. We're kind of running out of air time, here, because I've got to go to Orlando. Brother, you need to get back to work. They're paying you a lot of money, and you're just sitting there. (Laughter.)