When political forces take control of health care, as they have done in Oregon, what gets treated gets politicized. The best lobbying groups with the most effective lobbying efforts can get their pet treatment pushed to the top, along with other flavor of the month, politically popular treatments and diseases. Because Oregon Health Plan officials refuse to let price ration care, they must use another mechanism, and in this case it is a “priority list.” Below is their revised priority list for 2009, with 2002’s priorities for comparison:

It’s difficult to look at something like this and not be disgusted. Someone’s tobacco addiction is a more pressing need than Type 1 diabetes or AIDS?  Lactose intolerance is more urgent than a ruptured spleen or even TB?  Health Care Policy Center director Linda Gorman’s newest article (the PDF is found here) concerns Oregon’s new priority list.

To our knowledge, the Oregon Health Plan is the first government health care program anywhere in the world that has drawn up a formal procedure for rationing. After comment from interested parties, this state health program for low-income people ranks treatment for various diseases and conditions, currently from 1 to 680, in order of priority. The health care dollars available determine which priorities are met. As program costs have grown, the list of covered procedures has become shorter. In 2009, the state will pay only for the first 503 procedures.

Amy Oliver had to hear more about this dry run for nationalized, “single-payer” health care, so she phoned Linda for our latest iVoices.org podcast. Read Linda’s report and listen to the podcast, you will not believe what you discover.

One week from today, the Justice Policy Initiative is holding a star studded event down at the University Club titled, Prison Spending, Recidivism, and the Colorado Budget: How many more prison beds can we afford?

Panelists include Mike Krause, Director of the Independence Institute’s Justice Policy Initiative; Christie Donner of the Colorado Criminal justice Reform Coalition; State Representative Ellen Roberts; State Senator Morgan Carroll; Richard Jerome from the Pew Center on the State’s Public Safety Performance Project and Weld County Sheriff John Cooke. More info:

Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009, 5:00pm-7:00 pm
5:00 PM reception and 5:30 PM program
The University Club
1673 Sherman Street
Denver, CO 80203

Admission is free with RSVP
Cash bar and light food served

Since I have absolutely no idea what the word recidivism means, I’m going to let center director Mike Krause explain,

Twenty years ago, prison spending was less than 3 percent of the state budget. Last year, prison spending was nearly 9 percent of general fund spending in Colorado, and still growing. Recidivism is a major factor in that growth. Please join us for a panel discussion on the impact of recidivism on Colorado’s prison population and on the Colorado budget, and the recent recommendations of the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice (CCCJJ) to reduce recidivism in Colorado.

The event is FREE with RSVP, so sign up now before it’s too late, or call us at 303.279.6536. And because this topic is a bit over my head, Amy Oliver sat down with Mike to discuss this issue and explain some more about his event on our latest iVoices.org podcast.

In addition to the great work that Linda Gorman does on health care policy, we’ve got another fantastic policy analyst in Brian Schwartz. Brian posts daily on our health care blog Patient Power and his articles can be found frequently in the Rocky, Daily Camera, and other major newspapers.  So I was thinking the other day that it was about time we get Brian on wax so to speak about the current state of health care policy in Colorado.  He agreed, so I set him up with my underpaid and overworked minion Justin Longo to do a podcast.  In this iVoices.org podcast, Brian and Justin go into some common misconceptions about health care, some policies that hinder the market for health care, and finally some policy prescriptions that would help free up the over-regulated system.  I’ve also collected some of Brian’s finer works as an overview of his take on health care policy.

Operation get smart about health care, GO:

An actual budget cut or a scaling back on a scheduled budget increase?  That was really the heart of what I wanted to get out of our Fiscal Policy Center Director Penn Pfiffner during our latest iVoices.org podcast. My initial thoughts about the supposed $600 million budget “cuts” were pretty much validated.  Not to spoil Penn’s thunder or anything but if you don’t have the 8 minutes to listen to our conversation, here is the bottom line: the general assembly is not actually cutting $600 million plus from the budget, they really are only cutting $234 million…. which amounts to around 3.1% of the entire budget.  Armageddon?  Nope.  But honestly, what would you do without us?  Heeding the threats from the media, you may have been out buying rations for the coming apocalypse.

Unemployment is up and revenues are down. What does 2009 hold in store for Colorado’s economy? How does Colorado’s economy compare with other states? For perspectives and predictions, tune in to Independent Thinking as I discuss the state of Colorado’s economy with guests Rob Rueteman, Rocky Mountain News business editor, and Neil Westergaard, editor of the Denver Business Journal. That’s this Friday night at 8:30 p.m. on KBDI Channel 12; repeated the following Tuesday evening at 5 p.m.

When senior fellow Barry Poulson phoned into the Whitehouse conference call concerning the auto bailouts, he expected to be greeted with the usual respect and reverence his comments usually receive. However this time was different. This time his comments were met with the same resistance and rejection requests for raises receive in my office. It’s hardly surprising the President did not want to hear any dissent regarding the bailouts, because after all, his mind was already made up. Barry tells us in his latest op-ed that, quite simply, the Whitehouse is unwilling to tell Detroit to suck it up (Barry’s words). It’s the same suck it up Barry heard from his coach when swim practice got tough, and the same suck it up I heard when I contested Ann Coulter’s restraining order against me (It won’t happen again, promise). For those with an aversion to reading like myself, take a listen to Barry’s podcast with Amy Oliver where he discusses the far reaching consequences of setting this type of precedent.

Remember all those Sheriffs standing up for Amendment 49? Weld County Sheriff John Cooke goes on record again to dispell the myths surrounding Amendment 49.  After all, he is Sheriff of one of the twelve counties that have already adopted 49 language.  Thus, he speaks from first hand experience and reveals that his men are not “under-equipped” or “voiceless” as the opposition to 49 would have you believe.  In fact, just a day before the podcast John explains, he received another order for safety equipment…. without any trouble at all.  Take a few minutes and hear how disingenuous and misleading the ads against 49 are on this latest ivoices.org podcast.

There seems to be two opposing modes of attaining the “new energy economy.” One, we’ll call the Ritter plan, utilizes Soviet style command and control measures while the other, we’ll call the Lundberg plan, relies on market forces. Representative Lundberg discussed his ideas versus Ritter’s on a podcast he did with Amy Oliver a few weeks back. In the podcast Rep. Lundberg briefly talks about the upcoming hearing on Colorado’s energy crisis. Well, the day is coming quickly and I just got my hands on the press release. Here are the details.

Turning up the Heat on the Energy Debate:Why are energy prices so high, and what can we do about it?

Statehouse Republicans are conducting an ad hoc hearing on the energy issue at the Capitol on Thursday, Aug. 21, to address that question.

The event is hosted by the Republican Study Committee of Colorado, and will be from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the Old Supreme Court Chambers.

Speakers from several major think tanks, academia, the public sector and energy industries will be a part of the hearing.

The event will examine the advantages and drawbacks of different energy sources, including oil and gas, coal, nuclear, ethanol, solar, wind and oil shale. Participants also will examine Colorado’s policies toward those sources, and the reasons for the high cost of energy.

WHO: Reps. Kent Lambert, R-Colorado Springs, Kevin Lundberg, R-Berthoud, Frank McNulty, R-Highlands Ranch, Cory Gardner, R-Yuma, and Sen. Josh Penry, R-Grand Junction, James Taylor, Heartland Institute, and other experts (see attached for complete list of speakers)

WHAT: Forum entitled: “Colorado’s Energy Crisis: New Energy Economy or No Energy Economy?”

WHERE: Old Supreme Court Chambers on the second floor of the Colorado State Capitol Building 200 East Colfax, Denver

WHEN: Thursday, Aug. 21, 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Amy Oliver will be speaking on the think tank panel with James “Fire and Rain” Taylor of the Heartland Institute and Mark Kelly of the Heritage Institute. The forum is open to the public, so if you can sneak out of work that day, definitely go check it out.

We’ve been cranking out podcasts here on all sorts of different topics. We’ve got a couple with our well-traveled senior fellow Wendel Cox. One that addresses government manipulation of the housing market and the other concerning RTD’s lies and deception. I also interviewed Justin Longo about his research on the explosion in the growth in the number of governments here in Colorado. The new data is sure to surprise, and possibly scare you. Finally, Amy Oliver sat down with State Representative Kevin Lundberg to discuss Ritter’s scheme for renewable energy. I was shocked to find out that it is much different than Representative Lundberg’s plan! In addition, Rep. Lundberg will be hosting a hearing down at the State Capitol on August 21st to talk about the alternatives to Governor Ritter’s command and control style energy plan.

So if you’ve got a minute, or eight, tune into ivoices.org to soak up some knowledge on today’s most important issues.