Washington Post Claims about Donald Berwick Nomination
The Post carries an editorial this morning endorsing Don Berwick’s nomination to head the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services this morning, and in the process included several misleading statements about the confirmation debate. While the Post’s editorial board is entitled to its own opinion of Dr. Berwick, it is not entitled to its own facts, so it’s worth making three points in response:
- The editorial accuses Republicans of taking “an opportunity to re-litigate the health care debate.” On that count, it’s worth pointing out the process by which the majority used a series of backroom deals to ram through a massive 2,700 page piece of legislation on a party-line vote, and the public outcry it caused. More to the point, multiple polls taken in recent weeks show majorities favoring a repeal of the health care law – and a poll released just yesterday shows a majority of the country disapproving of President Obama’s handling of health care. In other words, it’s not Republicans that want to “re-litigate the health care debate” – the American people as a whole do.
- The editorial claims that Republicans are “latching on to a few of Dr. Berwick’s statements to wage their campaign.” But the New York Times – no bastion of conservatism – rebutted that very notion last week: “Administration officials say they are confident that Dr. Berwick will be confirmed, and they say Republicans have taken his comments out of context. In fact, many of the comments have been repeated, with slight variations, in Dr. Berwick’s articles and lectures over the years.” In other words, it’s not just a “few” statements that have sparked concerns – it’s Dr. Berwick’s decades of writings. The New York Times piece also pointed out that Dr. Berwick “has championed efforts to ‘reduce the total supply of high-technology medical and surgical care’” and has supported “a cap on total health spending…on more than one occasion” – both positions that could adversely affect millions of Americans, and which Dr. Berwick has yet to publicly explain, or defend, since his nomination.
- The editorial notes that “the Senate Finance Committee has not scheduled a hearing on the Berwick nomination; that may not even happen before the August recess.” The implication in that statement is that Republicans have prevented a hearing from being called – when in reality nothing could be further from the truth. The majority has not requested a hearing on Dr. Berwick’s nomination, and the nominee himself has yet to respond to all the due diligence requests made of him. If the Administration wishes faster action on this nomination, it should start by having its nominee respond to the Finance Committee’s requests for information – because claiming that Republicans have prevented a hearing on the nomination is inaccurate, and a false partisan attack.