Palin Responds

Sarah Palin's op ed yesterday was apparently so good that several of my liberal readers claimed that it was ghost written. I don't know about all that but I thought that it was well written. My problem is that she's been haphazard on the health care issue. She will issue a statement, facebook post, or op ed from time to time, but she isn't getting forcefully into the debate. Well, it's almost as though she read my piece. On cue, she issued a new post on Face Book responding to Obama's speech.

After all the rhetoric is put aside, one principle ran through President Obama’s speech tonight: that increased government involvement in health care can solve its problems.

Many Americans fundamentally disagree with this idea. We know from long experience that the creation of a massive new bureaucracy will not provide us with “more stability and security,” but just the opposite. It's hard to believe the President when he says that this time he and his team of bureaucrats have finally figured out how to do things right if only we’ll take them at their word.

Our objections to the Democrats’ health care proposals are not mere “bickering” or “games.” They are not an attempt to “score short term political points.” And it’s hard to listen to the President lecture us not to use “scare tactics” when in the next breath he says that “more will die” if his proposals do not pass.

Palin goes on to mention that President Obama was duplicitous. On the one hand, he called for civility. On the other hand, he called her "cynical" and "full of lies". More than that, Palin continues to emphasize the Independent Medicare Advisory Council which is one of the 53 new bureaucracies created by the Democrat's bill. Here's how Palin addressed the IMAC.

In fact, after promising to “make sure that no government bureaucrat .... gets between you and the health care you need,” the President repeated his call for an Independent Medicare Advisory Council -- an unelected, largely unaccountable group of bureaucrats charged with containing Medicare costs. He did not disavow his own statement that such a group, working outside of “normal political channels,” should guide decisions regarding that “huge driver of cost ... the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives....” He did not disavow the statements of his health care advisor, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, and continuing to pay his salary with taxpayer dollars proves a commitment to his beliefs. The President can keep making unsupported assertions, but until he directly responds to the arguments I’ve made, I’m going to call him out too.

Substantively, Palin continues to stand up for small government and free markets and she continues to attack Obama's plan as a big government takeover.

That's not the key though. The key might be that Palin will now become a consistent player in the health care debate. I don't care if she posts on Facebook, shows up on Wasilla Public Access, or has her kids film her from her home. In the end, she'll attract plenty of attention because that's how Palin is.

One of the reasons she resigned was that she wanted to play a bigger role in promoting conservatism and free markets. This is the biggest stage and in my opinion, it's time for her to take center stage. She can do a major speech, do interviews, or she could simply post a lot more often on health care. Either way, she needs to make a consistent contribution to the debate if she wants to be taken more seriously.