This hour of the Limbaugh Wire brought to you by doughnut holes and Tony Danza
By Simon Maloy

Steyn got the second hour rolling by saying it's a big week for health care, and that health care is a fascinating topic in how it has become the focus of the nation, even though there isn't a big health care problem. Steyn noted that The New York Times reported that Americans overwhelmingly support changing the health care system in this country, but buried in the ninth paragraph was the fact that 77 percent of Americans are satisfied with their health care. It was actually in the third paragraph, but who's counting ... Steyn said that even though people are satisfied, this is the “age of big government,” so we're going to destroy that system by implementing government-run health care, which changes the relationship between the citizen and the state and is an “assault on citizenship.”

Then Steyn noted that Obama said at his press conference this morning that he was going to plug the “doughnut hole” regarding prescription drugs for senior citizens, described by the AP as “a feature of the current drug program that requires beneficiaries to pay the entire cost of prescriptions after initial coverage is exhausted but before catastrophic coverage begins.” Steyn was having none of this -- describing senior citizens as the “wealthiest demographic” in the United States, Steyn said: “We've still got to do something to plug this little hole in the donut for the prescription drug plans for seniors. Because, heaven forbid, heaven forbid that these seniors, these seniors should have to choose between prescription drugs and Tony Danza doing South Pacific in dinner theater.” Actually, the “doughnut hole” can cost seniors thousands of dollars every year, so it's more likely that seniors have to choose between prescription medication and something other than Tony Danza. Like food. Or heat.

Anyway, Steyn said that you have to love the audacity of Obama -- he says he have to fix health care to control costs. Well, said Steyn, the costs of Medicare and Medicaid are rising far faster than the costs of health care in the private sector, due to the bureaucracy. So if you have to government taking control of everything, said Steyn, the costs are going to be out of control. The only way to control costs in a socialized health care system is by restricting access to the system, said Steyn. The essence of a government system is waiting -- waiting years for operations that in America are routine.

After the break, Steyn categorically denied that there is a “crisis” in health care, but when people call it a “crisis” they cite statistics like the life-expectancy differences between the U.K. and America. But this stat is meaningless, according to Steyn, because all life-expectancy estimates are rising. Steyn added: “You can never -- obviously, you can never spend enough on health care because the outcome is always going to be a disaster; you're still gonna die. We can spend even more trillions and trillions and trillions on health care and you are still gonna die. Even under President Obama -- even President Obama -- he can lower the rise of the oceans, but even President Obama has not found a way yet to eliminate death from the American way of life. So there is never ever going to be a perfect health care system.” As we explained with Limbaugh and the carrots of immortality, this is a fine response to an argument nobody is making. No one thinks that reforming the health care will permanently stave off death, but they do think it will help people spend what time they have before death in good health. Anyway, Steyn explained that what's at issue here is liberty -- in Britain, they deny hip replacements to the overweight because they made the choice to chow down on Twinkies, even though they've already paid for that hip with their taxes. They say it's perfectly appropriate to ration health care based on lifestyle choices -- this is the government regulating every aspect of your life.

The problem with American health care, said Steyn, is that we've allowed too many third parties to intrude in what should be a customer-client relationship. Steyn said that a doctor friend his has started a cash-only system in California, and it's very affordable. The problem with health insurance, he said, is that you're buying insurance for something that's inevitably going to happen. Steyn said that you're not likely to crash your car and roll across the median, and that's why auto insurance is comparatively affordable. The idea that we're going to insure against the inevitable is an absurd thing, said Steyn, and Obama wants to make this worse. Obama's theory, said Steyn, is that we should have preventive medicine, but there are marginal benefits to that despite the huge costs, and those costs are attractive to Obama because it means the government takes a larger role in people's lives.

After another break, Steyn took a call from a gentleman who explained that his family situation undermines the liberal opinion that socialized medicine is great -- his daughter is receiving care from top-notch doctors who emigrated to this country to make money in our private system. Steyn said that talented medical professionals are coming to the U.S. to work not only because they can make money, but also because government-run systems in other countries are too controlling. The health care system becomes a problem once the government takes it over, said Steyn, because hospitals become dirty and disease spreads. Look at China, he said. They sleep with their pigs in the rural parts of China, and SARS jumped from pigs to humans. And then it spread to Canada after a medical professional contracted it and it incubated in a Toronto hospital.

One more break and Steyn came back with a caller who said he's the only Limbaugh guest-host she listens to, but she's really mad at him because she and her husband are in the “doughnut hole,” and it's terrible because it costs $2,500 per month for their medication, which is more per month than they bring in. Faced with a real-life example of why mocking the “doughnut hole” as stripping people of their Tony Danza tickets is wildly off-base, Steyn hemmed and hawed for a few moments before saying there are there are two approaches to this. First, he said, the caller and her husband are disabled, and right from the start that puts them in an unusual category. Steyn then asked if the solution is to develop a vast universal plan for everyone that plugs that doughnut hole, or a more targeted one. Steyn thought the targeted reform is the way to go. The second way to look at it, according to Steyn, is that taking the government out of health care entirely would lower the costs of those drugs to reflect the market prices. Steyn said it would be in the caller's interest to support the “reprivatization” of the health care system. Steyn said the solution for her is not more government annexation, and he certainly didn't mean to insult her.

Lauryn Bruck and Zachary Pleat contributed to this edition of the Limbaugh Wire.

Highlights from Hour 2

Outrageous comments

STEYN: We've still got to do something to plug this little hole in the donut for the prescription drug plans for seniors. Because, heaven forbid, heaven forbid that these seniors, these seniors should have to choose between prescription drugs and Tony Danza doing South Pacific in dinner theater.

[...]

STEYN: You can never -- obviously, you can never spend enough on health care because the outcome is always going to be a disaster; you're still gonna die. We can spend even more trillions and trillions and trillions on health care and you are still gonna die. Even under President Obama -- even President Obama -- he can lower the rise of the oceans, but even President Obama has not found a way yet to eliminate death from the American way of life. So there is never ever going to be a perfect health care system.