Over the last five weeks, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has featured in her campaign stump speeches the story of a health care horror: an uninsured pregnant woman who lost her baby and died herself after being denied care by an Ohio hospital because she could not come up with a $100 fee.
The woman, Trina Bachtel, did die last August, two weeks after her baby boy was stillborn at O’Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens, Ohio. But hospital administrators said Friday that Ms. Bachtel was under the care of an obstetrics practice affiliated with the hospital, that she was never refused treatment and that she was, in fact, insured.
“We implore the Clinton campaign to immediately desist from repeating this story,” said Rick Castrop, chief executive officer of the O’Bleness Health System.
SNIP
Indeed, saying that the story haunted her, Mrs. Clinton repeatedly offered it as a dire example of a broken health care system. At one March rally in Wyoming, for instance, she referred to Ms. Bachtel, a 35-year-old who managed a Pizza Hut, as a young, uninsured minimum-wage worker, saying, “It hurts me that in our country, as rich and good of a country as we are, this young woman and her baby died because she couldn’t come up with $100 to see the doctor.”
Mrs. Clinton does not name Ms. Bachtel or the hospital in her speeches. As she tells it, the woman was turned away twice by a local hospital when she was experiencing difficulty with her pregnancy. “The hospital said, ‘Well, you don’t have insurance.’ She said, ‘No, I don’t.’ They said, ‘Well, we can’t see you until you give $100.’ She said, ‘Where am I going to get $100?’
“The next time she came back to the hospital, she came in an ambulance,” Mrs. Clinton continued. “She was in distress. The doctors and the nurses worked on her and couldn’t save the baby.”
The Democratic Party has turned out to be fortunate that Senator Obama will be its presidential nominee instead of Senator Clinton. He could very well finish her campaign off in the Pennsylvania primary.
Our nation is involved in two major wars, our economy is in the tank, gas prices are sky high, and people are losing their jobs right and left. Yet some people still can't let go of their anti-Clinton hatred. It is not the '90s and that stuff will no longer work. So a politician lied, well knock me down with a feather. Please name me a politician that does not lie to make themselves look good.
It is time to have a serious discussion about the important issues of our day. If we can do that, we can get a man of experience and maturity in the White House. If we continue to focus on this type things Hillary in the White House or, even worse, Obama will get in the White House. We have had eight long years of an inexperienced president. We can't afford four more. We need an experienced conservative.
Experienced at what? McCain has been on the hill while all this took place... "Our nation is involved in two major wars, our economy is in the tank, gas prices are sky high, and people are losing their jobs right and left."
He voted for the wars and wants to invade Iran...
Experience in failure is not good on a resume.
==McCain has been very critical of the Bush administration's execution of the war in Iraq. People tend to forget that just a few years ago there was active talk that he might become a democrat. Let's also remember that Hillary voted for Iraq and supported it until it became unpopular. Obama is just a left-wing radical. So it only makes sense that he would oppose the war in Iraq.
==So you jumped over to a big government, left-wing, liberal? Makes no sense. It would look like McCain or Barr, if he runs, would be more in agreement with your views than big government Obama.
Yeah, it is rather interesting watching the same conservative folks who used to accuse Senator McCain of being a closet Democrat now embracing him as the standardbearer of their party. :)
Look, Obama is closer to me on foreign policy as well. However the larger picture prevents me from supporting a pro-abortion, pro-homosexual, big government, left-wing, liberal, like Obama.
Correct, but these are the people you say we should elect because they have experience. Many of people have done many great things with no experience. Jesus had no experience with being a Saviour but He still did a mighty fine job.