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As promised, here is more News You Can Use. To be specific, here is a column from “American Thinker” that demonstrates how to make health care choices by comparing stuff to Star Wars.

So, take notes and get out your light saber.

Sarah Palin Outs Darth Vader

By Stuart Schwartz

To quote Mel Brooks, “May the Schwartz be with you.”

Darth Vader is out of the closet…

Well, it’s not like we all didn’t already suspect.

… and we have Sarah Palin to thank.

Actually, I think he just said he was gay to spare her feelings after she invited him to a “nude helicopter hunt.”

The intrepid crusader from the north cut to the heart of Obamacare a year ago, slashing through the professor-speak and government gobbledygook with a searing summary on Facebook of its bottom line: “death panels.”

If writing untrue, snippy comments on Facebook makes you an “intrepid crusader,” then there are a lot of tween girls who also deserve the title.

With those words, the grounds for debate had shifted,

From facts and reason to made-up scary stuff.

. . . the mainstream media ideological blackout was circumvented,

The mainstream having previously refused to give Sarah any attention.

. . . and now, although it may have been Obama’s new head of Medicare, Harvard’s Dr. Donald Berwick, who stepped on the shuttle at Boston’s Logan International Airport, it is Darth Vader who has exited at Reagan National.

Darth Vader — really?

Hey, this stuff just riffs itself!

The man responsible for the death of a gazillion inhabited worlds, through whom the evil Emperor Palpatine — described as ” a middle-aged politician … who gains power through deception and treachery”…sound familiar? — sought to enslave the universe in the fictional Star Wars saga?

Stuart, honey, mixing Star Wars comics, “American Thinker,” YooHoo, and Tequila is not a good idea.

Palin’s column on death panels ignited a firestorm of elite media and beltway criticism. Once, that would have been enough to shut down debate, for the broadcast networks and newspapers controlled information — we knew only what they wanted us to know. Suddenly, the new media (including the site you’re now reading) provided reality, and the Tea Parties and Republican Party followed.

So this site provided the reality that resulted in the birth of Tea Parties and the Republican Party? Wow, trippy!

And now Darth Vader has become a metaphor, a figure of speech signifying that the coming of Harvard’s Berwick represents the same thing to the average American that the arrival of the Death Star, the spaceship used to destroy planets, meant for entire populations.

The mighty Darth Vadar, the former Jedi Knight and killer of “a gazillion” planets has now become a really strained and inept metaphor. How the mighty have fallen.

All of a sudden, life-and-death decisions are out of our hands, resting with a government determined to control every waking moment of our lives.

You know, I used to work for the government and I can promise you in all sincerity that they really don’t have a department dedicated to controlling every waking moment of Stuart’s life. Sorry, Stuart, but nobody cares, not even Darth Medicare.

The Harvard health specialist’s job is to transform Medicare, to make the primary medical insurance system for seniors into an instrument of social policy, to take wealth and years from seniors and redistribute them to favored segments of the population.

Yes, the new Medicare mission statement is “Taking Years of Life From the Old and Giving Them to Hot Chicks.”

Sarah Palin was right, stubbornly hanging in when the mainstream media — sensing “a great disturbance in the [leftist] force” — trained its batteries on her. She was ridiculed on network newscasts, in the White House briefing room, by the media “stormtroopers [who] represented the most visible extension of Imperial [Obama] might.” Darth Vader and Star Wars serve as metaphor, Palin as Princess Leia, while network anchors, commentator after commentator, all the president’s men showered ridicule on her. “Downright evil,” screamed Keith Olbermann; “stupid as s**t,” proclaimed a popular Democratic blog.

Okay, let me see if I get all the metaphors:

Sarah Palin = Princess Leia

President Obama = Emperor Palpatine

A heath care administrator from Harvard = Darth Vadar

Mainstream Media = Imperial Stormtroopers

Medicare = Death Star

Keith Olbermann = Yoda

Rush Limbaugh = Jabba the Hutt

Popular Democratic Blog = midichlorians

John McCain = Jar Jar Binks

Barbara Bush = Count Dooku

Etc.

Hey, this is fun. You should play too!

In the end, it is about power. Donald Berwick and Barack Obama, Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine want to dictate the care you can and can’t have. Berwick, for example, calls ultrasounds and cesarean sections a “form of assault and battery.”

And Stuart says they aren’t. So, if some storm troopers grabbed Stuart off the street, gave him an unneeded ultrasound followed by a convenient cesarean, he’d be totally okay with it.

Under Obamacare, he (through his rationing bureaucracy), not you or your doctor, decides whether you have a procedure. This is nothing new –

HMOs have been around for decades.

. . . the political systems and policy bureaucracies Berwick and Obama seek to emulate have been doing it with disastrous results for individuals for years (e.g., England, Cuba, the old Soviet Union, Hitler’s Germany).

Hitler’s Germany = the Planet Endor

As one senior staff member at Berwick’s base in the Harvard School of Public Health has put it so eloquently in his blogs and books, we will do away with a Constitution and government that are the “enemy of the working class.”

And who is this unnamed guy who worked at Harvard at the same time as Berwick? Grand Moff Tarkin.

Darth Vader is out of the closet,

And he looks FABulous!

, , , and the Death Star has entered orbit.

So, unless Luke Skywalker (Glenn Beck) can shoot it in the exhaust vent with a precise blast of craziness, then we are all doomed, DOOMED!

Stuart Schwartz, a former retail and media executive, is on the faculty at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Because Liberty University, unlike Harvard University, offers faculty positions to guys with life experience in watching Star Wars movies in lieu of, you know, academic degrees or wisdom or such.

21 Responses to “Star Wars 7: A Rogue Intrepid Crusader Vs. the Death Panels”

a middle-aged politician … who gains power through deception and treachery

This is, like, ninety percent of congress, isn’t it? Talk about missing the forest for the trees.

I predict “nude helicopter hunts” will quickly replace those NRO Cruises to Nowhere as the top wingnut welfare fundraising gimmick (I picture a screaming, naked Jonah dangling from the skid of a Bell Jetranger as bait, while a flirty Derb serves the donors Yoo Hoo and Sauza.)

“…to take wealth and years from seniors and redistribute them to favored segments of the population…”

How does One redistribute “years”?

God, this man is stupid.

From Wikipedia bio of Berwick:

“…Berwick’s vision for health care is an adaptation from the Institute of Medicine’s six improvement aims for the health care system – care that is safe, effective, patient-centered, timely, efficient, and equitable:

* No Needless Deaths
* No Needless Pain or Suffering
* No Helplessness in Those Served or Serving
* No Unwanted Waiting
* No Waste
* No One Left Out

Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels = Ewok

Berwick, for example, calls ultrasounds and cesarean sections a “form of assault and battery.”

I believe these are the two most common medicare procedures.

Under Obamacare, he (through his rationing bureaucracy), not you or your doctor, decides whether you have a procedure. This is nothing new –

HMOs have been around for decades.

Yeah.

I’m not convinced that this guy’s column isn’t an intentional joke, but this was always the line they fed us and I seriously want to know who it’s supposed to fool. Especially now, with the form Obamacare has actually taken.

Oh no, under the new system, my health care would be determined by a bureaucrat more interested in saving money then improving lives, a bureaucrat who could just refuse outright to pay for my care and leave me to fend for myself if I became too sick?

How could Americans live with a system like that!?!?!!?

Liberty University = Chalmun’s Cantina.

Jar Jar was/is too annoying to be emulated by the wizened dust of Jon Jon McCain.

Jon Jon = one of those sand creatures, with sand in delicate places, making them always irritable. and I’m not nearly geeky enough to know who I’m talking about…

Jar Jar = O’Reilly: the instant urge to stomp on the creature’s face, to kill its whiny voice… it’s all there.

Uh. Context is important. C-sections women are railroaded or talked into for reasons other than that woman’s health, those actually do sort of seem like a form of assault. Ultrasounds the woman doesn’t want but is talked into for reasons other than health, that too sounds like a form of assault. He’s being hyperbolic, but his point actually fucking is that we do a lot of medical procedures on people for reasons other than their health–and that they tend to be the expensive ones. MRIs are a case in point. We do a lot of MRIs for a lot of reasons–doctors wanting to avoid lawsuits or disciplinary action if they miss something however unlikely, doctors who own MRI equipment and thus get more cash if they do more tests, doctors wanting to get patients out of their offices fast so they can keep up with their schedule (you’d be amazed how many doctors can say “I think we need some tests” in the minute before they even sit down because they’re three hours behind because their clinic makes them schedule everybody for ten minute appointments or your insurance won’t pay for anything longer than that.), doctors humoring panicky patients, doctors who have run out of other ideas so let’s try the MRI again because otherwise I don’t know what else to do with you.

The whole system is broken, and the profit motive is largely to blame, and the insurance system is largely to blame for *that*. Without the health care delivery system slicing a percentage off the top of the health care dollar, we might get better results. And when doctors feel they have to do unnecessary tests and write unnecessary prescriptions because they don’t have time to actually talk to a patient and get an idea what might be wrong, yeah, it could be argued that sending a claustrophobe for his fifth MRI in as many years or prescribing arthritis drugs because there’s no time to sit down and discuss lifestyle changes that might work instead, these things could be considered assaults on patients by the medical establishment.

*That* was Berwick’s context. That we should allow doctors and patients to make decisions in the best interests of the patients, rather than allowing profit motives to interfere. He’s not talking about telling you you can’t have the test or the treatment you want. He’s telling you we should look at why we make the health care delivery decisions we make, and see if we can’t cut out some of what makes us pay more per capita for worse health care outcomes than other countries.

Me, I’m kind of tired of shelling out a thousand a month for mental health care because my health care insurer, not me or my doctor, decides what’s a necessary treatment. You want to know how much deep thought and personal evaluation goes into determining how much care I need? The insurance company bureaucrat looks at a handbook and says that everybody gets twenty appointments a year, from the suicidal hallucinating schizophrenics to the bored househusbands. I haven’t sought pre-natal care, but I’m guessing their handbook is similarly thoughtful and individualized on the subject of which tests they’ll cover and whether they’d rather pay for a C-section or a prolonged vaginal delivery.

For the record, there is something BEYOND fuckwitted about the people who want to LEGISLATE ultrasounds for women seeking abortions arguing that it’s silly to consider ultrasounds a form of assault.

Bring on the death panels, okay? I’m so tired of having my life dictated by assholes who can’t make it through a 800-word NewsBusters item without bookmarking it.

Yes, it’s much better to have my medical treatment decided by an insurance company worker whose job security (and bosses’ bonuses) depends on denying enough people treatment !

Harvard’s Dr. Donald Berwick, who stepped on the shuttle at Boston’s Logan International Airport, it is Darth Vader who has exited at Reagan National.

I’m reminded of the country bumpkin who visited a large city and encountered his first elevator. He watched in amazement as a matronly lady stepped in and moreso a few minutes later when a gorgeous ingenue in miniskirt stepped out….and then pushed his wife inside.

Palin’s column on death panels ignited a firestorm of elite media and beltway criticism.

And made most of America pause and wonder how the fuck she got on a national ticket in the first place.

“a great disturbance in the [leftist] force”

Well, at least she’s acknowledging the left is the Jedi…

Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels = Ewok

At the risk of disagreeing with my esteemed and distinguished colleague…

Congressman Dennis Kucinich = Ewok

“Stuart Schwartz, a former retail and media executive”.

Right, and I got my coffee this morning from a barista executive.

And only Palin is right, the entire marching band is out of step with Palin….

Isn’t using Star Wars metaphors for policy discussions cutting into DoughBob Loadpants’ assigned area of expertise?

What is it with these assholes always comparing stuff from real life with action/adventure movies? Is it actually supposed to prove something?

It think it proves they don’t waste a lot of time at the local art house.

I think a “cesarian section” (as opposed to a Caesarian section) is a fruit compote named after Cesar Chavez.

Wait..who’s Chewbacca?

So Sarah Palin’s real dad is a Harvard professor? Guess intelligence isn’t inherited.

this idiot wouldn’t know a real metaphor if it was … shoved down his throat. Or recognize a subtle metaphor in a quality movie. A lamebrain cartoon movie like Star Wars is actually above his intellectual level, but I think the guy enjoys a challenge.

The intrepid crusader from the north cut to the heart of Obamacare a year ago, slashing through the professor-speak and government gobbledygook with a searing summary on Facebook of its bottom line: “death panels.”

Facebook’s bottom line is “death panels”?

described as ” a middle-aged politician … who gains power through deception and treachery”…sound familiar?

Yup. Sounds like Bush v. Gore to me.

Harvard’s Berwick represents the same thing to the average American that the arrival of the Death Star, the spaceship used to destroy planets, meant for entire populations.

Berwick:average American::Death Star:entire populations.

So Berwick is Death Star-lite?

Sarah Palin was right, stubbornly hanging in when the mainstream media — sensing “a great disturbance in the [leftist] force” — trained its batteries on her.

Damn that Energizer Bunny!

Palin as Princess Leia

I’m pretty sure Warren Beatty wouldn’t fuck Sarah Palin with somebody else’s dick.

Mr. Schwartz brings to mind Bob Dylan:

Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your mouth
Blowing down the backroads headin’ south
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth
You’re an idiot, babe
It’s a wonder that you still know how to breathe

Something to say?