Congress’s most notable First Amendment warrior, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, is a little steamed about Democrats’ latest efforts to squelch opposition to government health care.
You may have seen that Humana, a health insurance company and provider of Medicare services under the Medicare Advantage plan, sent a letter to its customers letting them know that if Senator Baucus’s health framework passes, it would likely mean cuts to their Medicare benefits.
“Oh, no, sister,” Baucus replied. Humana can’t be expressing its political opinion. Humana should keep its mouth shut about how pending legislation may or may not affect its customers. And besides, as we’ve all heard, the Democratic health reform bills won’t interfere with anyone’s Medicare benefits – they’ll only eliminate “waste” from the system.
To enforce Baucus’s mandate, the Department of Health and Human Services sent a letter to Humana and other insurance companies warning them not to communicate with their Medicare customers and to remove any “misleading” and “confusing” information from their web site. Of course, “misleading” is really in the eye of the beholder.
The problem here is the First Amendment, which gives private entities the right to communicate pretty much however they damn well please. It’s the same law that allowed protestors to camp outside George Bush’s house and call him a war criminal – which one might consider to be a “misleading” statement if one weren’t insane.
Senator McConnell, who has fought against campaign finance reform and against anti-flag burning amendments because he takes his First Amendment seriously, doesn’t think the government should be gagging companies simply because it’s convenient for Democrats. On the Senate floor yesterday he asked:
Is this what we believe as a Senate — that this body should debate a trillion-dollar health care bill that affects every single American while using the powerful arm of the government to shut down speech? … Shut up, the government says. Don’t communicate with your customers. Be quiet and get in line.
Of course Democrats will highlight Humana’s politicking as further evidence that private companies shouldn’t be involved in health care at all. Why should we be paying insurance companies to provide Medicare services, Dems will say, when they turn around and use that money to make false claims about efforts to extend health coverage to every single American?
And then Republicans will respond that Democrats have no problem with government-funded artists using their tax dollars to support the Obama Administration’s priorities.
And then Ron Paul’s head will explode from the shear cluelessness of it all.
In an interesting corollary, Congressional Budget Office director Douglas Elmendorf testified to Senator Baucus’s Finance Committee yesterday that, yes, in fact, cuts in Medicare Advantage will result in cuts to Medicare benefits.
No word yet on whether Baucus and HHS will seek to gag him.
