Obama compares Apples to Oranges

President Obama was on George Stephanopoulos's show last night talking about Obamacare. I heard the amazing sound clip where the President actually compares mandated car insurance to mandated health insurance. There are so many things wrong with this comparison.

First of all, some people will never file an auto insurance claim, whereas almost everything is filed as a health claim, even routine checkups. Can you imagine getting a tune-up and sending the bill to your auto insurance provider? Can you imagine laughter? Enough said.

Secondly, barring the "death panels" which we've been assured will never happen under Obama care, we don't declare human beings "totaled". (They do in the UK, but I don't think it would in the Obama Administration's best interest to put forward that comparison.) However if the damage in an auto accident is great enough, the owner will decide to ditch the vehicle rather than to repair it. So policy holders have a pretty finite limit with regard to what they will ever claim against their auto-insurance policies. Compare the cost of that to someone receiving experimental AIDS treatments over an extended period.

Thirdly, I don't know if the President realizes this, but garage mechanics make less than doctors. In fact, I've been known to throw a wrench around myself, replacing side-door windows, installing new head lamps, changing oil, etc. My father insisted on my doing some of these things when I lived at home and drove the family cars, however he never let me perform any of the dental surgeries my mother needed or treat my brother for the asthma he had when he was younger. I wonder why not? He could have saved thousands of dollars... right?

All of this goes to the reason why costs aren't spinning out of control for car maintenance and collision coverage. These bad analogies just grate on me somethin' fierce; that's why I never tire of quoting Sesame Street, "One of these things is not like the others."