Who knows more: MDs or 'Faux news'?

The "My Word" piece from the Humboldt-Del Norte County Medical Society in favor of HR 3200 was reasoned, cogent and rational.

[rwc]

Walt,
What flavor was that kool-aid?

[WDRussell]

The lackeys don't care what the doctors have to say about it. It is about increasing insurance company profits by letting them commit genocide on Americans.

[what doctors think]

Two of every three practicing physicians oppose the medical overhaul plan under consideration in Washington, and hundreds of thousands would think about shutting down their practices or retiring early if it were adopted, a new IBD/TIPP Poll has found.... The poll contradicts the claims of not only the White House, but also doctors' own lobby — the powerful American Medical Association — both of which suggest the medical profession is behind the proposed overhaul.

45% Of Doctors Would Consider Quitting If Congress Passes Health Care Overhaul

[Gdog]

what doctors think wrote:

Two of every three practicing physicians oppose the medical overhaul plan under consideration in Washington, and hundreds of thousands would think about shutting down their practices or retiring early if it were adopted, a new IBD/TIPP Poll has found.... The poll contradicts the claims of not only the White House, but also doctors' own lobby — the powerful American Medical Association — both of which suggest the medical profession is behind the proposed overhaul.
45% Of Doctors Would Consider Quitting If Congress Passes Health Care Overhaul

Which proposal do the doctors oppose? There are at least 5 different proposals being considered!
Nice try quoting the IBD/TIPP poll, but it has been disputed pretty comprehensively. Here's a summary from Nate Silver at 538.com :

"the Investors' Business Daily poll purporting to show widespread opposition to health care reform among doctors is simply not credible. There are five reasons why:

1. The survey was conducted by mail, which is unusual. The only other mail-based poll that I'm aware of is that conducted by the Columbus Dispatch, which was associated with an average error of about 7 percentage points -- the highest of any pollster that we tested.

2. At least one of the questions is blatantly biased: "Do you believe the government can cover 47 million more people and it will cost less money and th quality of care will be better?". Holy run-on-sentence, Batman? A pollster who asks a question like this one is not intending to be objective.

3. As we learned during the Presidntial campaign -- when, among other things, they had John McCain winning the youth vote 74-22 -- the IBD/TIPP polling operation has literally no idea what they're doing. I mean, literally none. For example, I don't trust IBD/TIPP to have competently selected anything resembling a random panel, which is harder to do than you'd think.

4. They say, somewhat ambiguously: "Responses are still coming in." This is also highly unorthodox. Professional pollsters generally do not report results before the survey period is compete.

5. There is virtually no disclosure about methodology. For example, IBD doesn't bother to define the term "practicing physician", which could mean almost anything. Nor do they explain how their randomization procedure worked, provide the entire question battery, or anything like that.

My advice would be to completely ignore this poll."

Nice try though.

[WTF]

1. The survey was conducted by mail, which is unusual. The only other mail-based poll that I'm aware of is that conducted by the Columbus Dispatch, which was associated with an average error of about 7 percentage points -- the highest of any pollster that we tested.

2. At least one of the questions is blatantly biased: "Do you believe the government can cover 47 million more people and it will cost less money and th quality of care will be better?". Holy run-on-sentence, Batman? A pollster who asks a question like this one is not intending to be objective.

3. As we learned during the Presidntial campaign -- when, among other things, they had John McCain winning the youth vote 74-22 -- the IBD/TIPP polling operation has literally no idea what they're doing. I mean, literally none. For example, I don't trust IBD/TIPP to have competently selected anything resembling a random panel, which is harder to do than you'd think.

4. They say, somewhat ambiguously: "Responses are still coming in." This is also highly unorthodox. Professional pollsters generally do not report results before the survey period is compete.

5. There is virtually no disclosure about methodology. For example, IBD doesn't bother to define the term "practicing physician", which could mean almost anything. Nor do they explain how their randomization procedure worked, provide the entire question battery, or anything like that.

Silver added: "There are pollsters out there that have an agenda but are highly competent, and there are pollsters that are nonpartisan but not particularly skilled. Rarely, however, do you find the whole package: that special pollster which is both biased and inept. IBD/TIPP is one of the few exceptions."

I used to prefer Cherry, but it's been awhile since

[WTF]

GDog beat me to it, but misinformation must be disputed.

[Jeff E]

Walt, the dirty little secret that the "Humboldt-Del Norte County Medical Society" doesn't want you to know is,(and the Times reporters would never even think to ask) is that less than 25% of doctors in those two counties are active members.

Those few physicians that belong to that group are more interested in left-wing politics than they are in us, their patients.

[Gdog]

Jeff E wrote:

Walt, the dirty little secret that the "Humboldt-Del Norte County Medical Society" doesn't want you to know is,(and the Times reporters would never even think to ask) is that less than 25% of doctors in those two counties are active members.
Those few physicians that belong to that group are more interested in left-wing politics than they are in us, their patients.

You make 2 claims but cite no sources, so we'll just assume it's your usual right-wing BS unless you come through with your sources.

[Middle-o-the-roa d]

Funny you should bring up such an observation. My doctor, dentist and optometrist all have the same opinion.

fox news, they're called "unfair and biased".

[Reform is a verb]

I heard someone at the local Eureka Reform debate who is on Medicare say they are against Health Care reform and dont want the government involved in their healthcare. Awesome!! Little more education may go a long way with helping people make decent decisions.

[Anonymous]

It would be absurd for anyone on Medicare to argue against government sponsored health care, unless millions of dollars in media ads were misinforming them.

IBD/TIPP are headed by a group of economists for the largest corporations in America. They get themselves quoted in leading newspapers, then refer back to those newspapers for credibility.

They refuse to release the methods they use in polling.