Name that Scapegoat!

The Washington Times -- A proposal to tax health insurance companies who offer the most expensive coverage plans is gathering support in a key Senate panel as a way to pay for a portion of the health care reform bill.

Sen. John Kerry, Massachusetts Democrat, has put together a proposal to tax the companies that offer so-called "gold-plated" insurance plans...

The idea from Mr. Kerry would tax the insurer instead of the purchaser, which so far seems to be the key to acquiring more political support...

"We're interested in it, not for the sole reason of raising money, although it would do that," Sen. Charles E. Grassley, Iowa Republican and chief GOP negotiator on health care, told Bloomberg. "We're interested in it as a discipline within health care."

Health care analysts say the proposal is politically viable in part because it gives lawmakers a way around the House's proposal to apply a surtax on wealthy Americans.

"There's a certain appeal to it," said Lewis J. Hoch, partner at Blank Rome LLP in Philadelphia. "I think a proposal which has the benefit of generating revenue and furthering the ends of health care reform is a win-win."

The idea is that the most expensive insurance plans drive up health care costs because consumers don't realize the true cost of the health care services they use.

So when all else fails, call your opponents names, pull out the pejoratives, and demonize the minority. It's incredible how politicians are extolled for serving the public good, and yet, the aforementioned is exactly how they operate. You know you're dealing with a bad argument if it refers to health care plans tailored to the needs of different people as 'Cadillac plans' or 'gold-plated.' The whole notion of 'taxing the insurer' is fallacious, because an insurance company is not a living, breathing entity, but instead is composed of individuals who must turn to the market for insurance, too; 'punishing the insurer' is just a nice way of saying punishing a particular group of people for political purposes.

Notice when the free market, composed of the nonviolent, autonomous decisions of free people, fails to tell them what they want to hear, our 'public servants' decide to enforce 'discipline' and 'restraint.'

Last time I checked, a restraint on liberty is called tyranny.