Michael F. Cannon 🇮🇪 🇺🇸

For evidence that government does not hold itself to the same standards it holds you and me, look no further than Medicare and Medicaid.

www.wsj.com/opinion/...

The guy literally said Ireland invented being a tax haven.

Man Admits to Medicaid Fraud. That's Not the Worst Part. Impartial journalism by default must explore whether government is creating the need it hopes to subsidize.

"Valjean" is committing a crime, and that’s wrong. Yet the government is committing more crimes against him than he is against it.

I say free Valjean.

mfcannon.substack.co...

The Left: our society is racist.

Also the Left: let’s give the government of this racist society lots of information about members of minority groups.

I agree.

But does it really help the Left to say they merely created the architecture for a greater evil?

The Left gives the state payer access to individuals’ medical records.

The Right uses that access to hunt, terrorize, and imprison peaceful people.

Both consider themselves virtuous.

I don’t know how anyone can regard a Congress that increases compulsory taxpayer funding of walls, surveillance, masked body snatchers, and concentration camps by $171 billion as anything but a complete disaster for liberty.

As a libertarian, I am glad that Congress has ended compulsory taxpayer funding of certain media.

I am glad, I suppose, that Congress *may* increase compulsory taxpayer funding of certain health care subsidies at an annual rate of 2.7% rather than 4.5%.

Medicare's Obesity Problem Medicare doesn’t need to cover Ozempic. It needs to take Ozempic.

LAW: Don't subsidize weight-loss drugs for 100 million patients.

MEDICARE/MEDICAID: Hey, let's subsidize weight-loss drugs for 100m patients! It only costs $6 billion/year!

EVERYONE: Why, O why, is US health care uniquely expensive?

www.cato.org/comment...

Medicare's Obesity Problem Medicare doesn’t need to cover Ozempic. It needs to take Ozempic.

Congress lets Medicare subsidize #GLP1s for some medical conditions, but explicitly prohibits subsidizing them for weight loss, and has rejected every such proposal.

Congress often lets #Medicare choose when to subsidize new treatments. But not here.

www.cato.org/comment...

Medicare already boosts health spending more than the rest of the US health sector.

Medicare covering Ozempic, Wegovy, and other GLP-1s for weight loss will send US health spending even higher.

www.cato.org/comment...

Medicare's Obesity Problem Medicare doesn’t need to cover Ozempic. It needs to take Ozempic.

Medicare is the main reason federal deficits are growing faster than GDP & why the federal debt will surpass annual GDP this year.

Medicare covering Wegovy, Ozempic & other GLP-1s for weight loss would cause federal deficits & debt to grow even faster.

www.cato.org/comment...

Medicare's Obesity Problem Medicare doesn’t need to cover Ozempic. It needs to take Ozempic.

"Medicare, Medicaid plan to experiment with covering weight loss drugs" - Washington Post

Medicare doesn’t need to cover Ozempic. It needs to take Ozempic.

www.cato.org/comment...

Unnecessary Relics Neither entity is necessary. Eliminating them and reassigning legitimate public health activities to other agencies would improve public health and the federal budget outlook.

The @Surgeon_General oversees the 6,000-member Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.

One government report estimates that converting Corps personnel to civilian federal employees could reduce federal spending on those roles by 22 percent.

www.cato.org/policy-...

Man Admits to Medicaid Fraud. That's Not the Worst Part. Impartial journalism by default must explore whether government is creating the need it hopes to subsidize.

Obamacare's supposedly most popular provision is in fact causing gaps in addiction-treatment coverage—which may be why "Valjean" fears an #Obamacare plan would be a death sentence.

mfcannon.substack.co...

Opinion | Medicare and Medicaid Fail a Basic Scientific Test The programs don’t do what they claim to. If they were drugs, regulators would pull them from the market.

Government’s tolerance for snake oil is never higher than when politicians are brewing the elixir.

www.wsj.com/opinion/...

How else would socialists read at night?

Unnecessary Relics Neither entity is necessary. Eliminating them and reassigning legitimate public health activities to other agencies would improve public health and the federal budget outlook.

The more that prominent public health officials advocate divisive non–public health policies, the more people will distrust or disregard government officials when they offer valuable public health advice.

Abolish the US @Surgeon_General.

www.cato.org/policy-...

Man Admits to Medicaid Fraud. That's Not the Worst Part. Impartial journalism by default must explore whether government is creating the need it hopes to subsidize.

The government appears to be doing everything in its power to increase the prices for "Valjean's" medical and addiction treatment. The government then does the same thing to prices for health insurance.

mfcannon.substack.co...

Opinion | Medicare and Medicaid Fail a Basic Scientific Test The programs don’t do what they claim to. If they were drugs, regulators would pull them from the market.

Congress has never held government programs to the same high standard as new medicines.

www.wsj.com/opinion/...

Happy birthday, Milton Friedman.

By whom, @BudgetHawks?

#BanThePassiveVoice

"chief science officer at FDA had the temerity to tell Sarepta Therapeutics to stop shipping patients its gene therapy "

Science doesn't tell people what to do.

Going on @cbseveningnews.bsky.social @ 7:15pm ET to discuss the 60th anniversary of #Medicare & #Medicaid. Join us.

Unnecessary Relics Neither entity is necessary. Eliminating them and reassigning legitimate public health activities to other agencies would improve public health and the federal budget outlook.

The @Surgeon_General's office has advocated labor regulations, tax credits, housing and nutrition subsidies, and gun control. It opines on private, non-public health matters including drug use, diet, exercise, obesity, mental health, and health literacy.

www.cato.org/policy-...

🚨🚨🚨 NEW: WARNING: the cost of #Obamacare regulations will become even more transparent than I thought

(FIFY😘)

Yet #Medicare & #Medicaid keep chugging along, wasting trillions and reducing quality.

Why? Because they serve the people who matter:

- High-cost/low-quality providers & insurers on whom they rain money
- Policymakers on whom they confer power, status & income

Fin.

11/11

#Medicare is such a disaster of a program and encourages so many bad behaviors, it inspired a (fantastic!) satire about how it is in fact a tool of the devil.

www.amazon.com/Medic...

10/11

#Medicare reduces quality.

It pays "more when quality is worse." - @medicarepayment

It pays quality bonuses to low-quality hospitals & mediocre insurers.

Even its quality-improvement efforts pay low-quality providers more than high-quality ones.

www.cato.org/outside...

9/11