He should feel at least a little guilt here....I am willing to bet she broke that hip when being thrown under a bus.  Sheesh/

And people wonder where all the "disinformation" comes from. Maybe they should look to the man running the show

 

 

Obama Says Grandmothers Hip Replacement Raises Cost Questions

Share | Email | Print | A A A

 

By Hans Nichols

 

April 29 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama said his grandmothers hip-replacement surgery during the final weeks of her life made him wonder whether expensive procedures for the terminally ill reflect a sustainable model for health care.

The presidents grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, had a hip replaced after she was diagnosed with cancer, Obama said in an interview with the New York Times magazine that was published today. Dunham, who lived in Honolulu, died at the age of 86 on Nov. 2, 2008, two days before her grandsons election victory.

I dont know how much that hip replacement cost, Obama said in the interview. I would have paid out of pocket for that hip replacement just because shes my grandmother.

Obama said you just get into some very difficult moral issues when considering whether to give my grandmother, or everybody elses aging grandparents or parents, a hip replacement when theyre terminally ill.

Thats where I think you just get into some very difficult moral issues, he said in the April 14 interview. The chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health- care bill out here.

Obama promised during his presidential campaign that a health-care overhaul would be a top priority, and he said at a Missouri town hall meeting today that he hopes Congress will pass health-care legislation this year.

The issue has been divisive, and finding an answer that will keep costs down while extending coverage to the estimated 46 million Americans without health insurance has eluded past presidents.

Ruthless Pragmatism

Obama also said his economic advisers arent constrained by ideology or connections to former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. What Ive been constantly searching for is a ruthless pragmatism when it comes to economic policy, he said, in the interview.

Obama also pointed to Canada as an example of a country that has effectively regulated commercial and investment banking without requiring legal separation of those activities.

When it comes to something like investment banking versus commercial banking, the experience in a country like Canada would indicate that good, strong regulation that focuses less on the legal form of the institution and more on the functions that theyre carrying out is probably the right approach to take, he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Hans Nichols in Washington at hnichols2@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: April 29, 2009 18:00 EDT

~~life isn't about how to survive the storm but how to dance in the rain~~

Only dead fish go with the flow - Sarah Palin

Was that the "typical white woman"?

That explains it.

Jay

"I would have paid out of pocket for that hip replacement just because shes my grandmother". "\

 

Doesn't sound like he had anything but total concern for his grandmother and it is nasty to suggest otherwise.

These decisions do raise questions and he is right to point that out.

Doesn't sound like he had anything but total concern for his grandmother and it is nasty to suggest otherwise.

Well, look at who started this thread.  

Nuff said.

 

Well what about his sole living

Grand ... she says she was there

when he dropped out of his mother ,,,,,,,,,,, in East Africa

 

(Dims bann term Birth)

birther is the Kool hate term for liberal use today !!!

AB

"I would have paid out of pocket for that hip replacement just because shes my grandmother". "\

 

Oh....well good for him.  I am sure he would have paid out of pocket...but that sure as hell doesn't help all the other grannies out there, now does it?  That was even more of an insult, as he was simply saying those old folks who need hip replacements are a DRAIN on the system....but woo hoo for him, he has the money to PAY for his grandmother...what a weasel  he is. I dislike this man more every time he opens his mouth. 

~~life isn't about how to survive the storm but how to dance in the rain~~

Only dead fish go with the flow - Sarah Palin

You better stop listening or you might implode with another 3 1/2 or maybe 7 1/2 years to go.

I love the guy....

***********************************

I've learned that the people you care most about in life are taken from you too soon and
all the less important ones just never go away.
And the real pains in the ass are permanent.

I wonder if that is considered as cold as serving divorce papers on your wife when she is the hospital recovering.

And people wonder where all the "disinformation" comes from.

*****************

I don't wonder where all of the disinformation is coming from. It's coming from people who hate Obama and want his policies to fail. The same fear monger who lost the election in 2008.

I would have paid out of pocket for that hip replacement just because shes my grandmother.

------------

Then, why didn't he do just that?

You've gotten "misrepresentation" down to a fine art. He questioned a hip replacement for someone DIEING of cancer. That would not apply to an otherwise healthy elderly person. Hip replacement is an extremely painful surgery and combined with the pain of cancer, must have been dreadful. It's similar to a neighbor's grandmother, in an irreversible coma, with no hope of recovery, who developed gangrene in her toes. Surgery was planned to amputate her foot when the family said "enough"!

He questioned a hip replacement for someone DIEING of cancer. That would not apply to an otherwise healthy elderly person. Hip replacement is an extremely painful surgery and combined with the pain of cancer, must have been dreadful.

--------------

His grandmother's time left couldn't really be accurately determined, like most dying from cancer, or any terminal situation.  The doc said it could be 3-9 months.  So, do you think his grandmother, had she lasted another 9+ months, should have just rejected the surgery and taking painkillers for the remainder of her time, lying there with a broken hip, while suffering the cancer, too?

Obama said:

"Maybe you're better off not having the surgery, but taking the painkiller."

 He questioned a hip replacement for someone DIEING of cancer.

I don't give a flying flip if she had the swine flu.  Have you ever had hip problems and needed a replacement?  It is excruciating.  She has every right to be treated as anyone else.  That woman worked when many didn't.  She paid into that system.  Where is the cutoff line and who has the RIGHT to decide what it is?  Certainly not the government.

Where are the people who cry "a woman's medical treatment is between her and her doctor"???

~~life isn't about how to survive the storm but how to dance in the rain~~

Only dead fish go with the flow - Sarah Palin