Go For The Jugular!

For the last few weeks the GOP echo chamber has been churning out lies a mile a minute about health care reform. One of the lies that has been circulating which is picking up steam on that side of the aisle and is now being used to fearmonger the elderly is that the health care reform bills will institute mandated euthanasia. As ludicrous a that sounds the fact remains that the elderly are easily spooked when it comes to these kinds of rumors and its not just some wacko on a street corner repeating this, members of Congress have taken to saying it over and over again.

This particular lie has its origins with a woman by the name of Betsy McCaughey, who helped kill health care reform back in the early 90s. The thing of it is, she has been making up shit all year fear mongering about health care provisions in the stimulus as well. And each time she comes up with another out and out lie she gets debunked like she was recently but she never admits she made it all up and the lie continues own in both Houses of Congress out of the mouths of Republicans who know they can get on TV and say whatever they damn well please and hardly if ever get push back.

But here is the thing, the Democrats have an OBVIOUS line or attack on this lie. The truth is this provision is all about providing optional consultations to the elderly about how they want to set up their own end of life care. Here is how Politifact characterized it.

For our ruling on this one, there's really no gray area here. McCaughey incorrectly states that the bill would require Medicare patients to have these counseling sessions and she is suggesting that the government is somehow trying to interfere with a very personal decision. And her claim that the sessions would "tell [seniors] how to end their life sooner" is an outright distortion. Rather, the sessions are an option for elderly patients who want to learn more about living wills, health care proxies and other forms of end-of-life planning. McCaughey isn't just wrong, she's spreading a ridiculous falsehood. That's a Pants on Fire.

Now what case in recent years having to do with end of life care might be one that the GOP doesn't want to revisit?

The Terry Schiavo case.

Unless you were on another planet for this debacle the Republican Party showed themselves to be fully prepared to use the government involved in what should be a personal family decision about end of life care. As much as anything else, it exposed their hypocrisy durinig the Bush years with respect to big government versus little government. Not only did this do great damage to their brand when it was all said and done, but it also inspired many people across the political spectrum to start having conversations with their loved ones about the need for living wills and other mechanisms to convey their wishes if something unforseen was to happen to them. For that reason associating the Terry Schiavo case with consultations for the elderly about living wills would not only resonate with most of America, it would also bring back the bad feelings that the GOP inspired from back during that debacle.

I would bet you any amount of money that once a few Democrats used that line of attack to push back on the lie, you wouldn't have to hear about it anymore.

Here is Rachel Maddow doing a segment on this very subject last night.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy