General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsRecord number of conservative physicians running for Congress to fight Obamacare
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/08/us/politics/doctors-confident-in-their-healing-powers-rush-for-congress.htmlIs There a Doctor in the House? Yes, 17. And 3 in the Senate.
By JEREMY W. PETERS | MARCH 7, 2014
LAKE OSWEGO, Ore. First thing on a recent Monday, Monica Wehby could be found in the operating room performing brain surgery on a child. But the Saturday before, she was shooting guns, because sometimes thats what you do when youre running for office...
With a few exceptions, these physician legislators and candidates there are three dozen of them are much alike: deeply conservative, mostly male, and practicing in the specialty fields in which costs and pay have soared in recent years. Dr. Wehby fits their profile in all but gender, though Republicans say that having a female candidate is an added advantage in Oregon.
Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky and an ophthalmologist, is seen as a serious contender for his partys presidential nomination in 2016. Candidates for the Senate this year include an obstetrician in North Carolina, a radiologist in Kansas, a liver disease specialist in Louisiana, and two other doctors in Georgia all of them Republicans.
At least 26 more physicians are running for the House, some for re-election. In all, 20 people with medical degrees serve in Congress today, 17 in the House and three in the Senate, a number that has doubled over the last decade, according to the American Medical Association. (By contrast, a Johns Hopkins University study found that from 1960 to 2004, only 25 physicians served in either the House or the Senate.)
Jeff In Milwaukee
(13,992 posts)With a few exceptions, these physician legislators and candidates there are three dozen of them are much alike: deeply conservative, mostly male, and practicing in the specialty fields in which costs and pay have soared in recent years
Translation: By ensuring everyone, you're threatening my 1% lifestyle.
EC
(12,287 posts)face-lifts and stuff.
Proud Liberal Dem
(24,437 posts)and this is because of ACA, how?
Oh and there's this directly from the article:
Medicine has so changed, and its not necessarily the Affordable Care Act, said Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, who had a family medical practice before being elected to the House and later to the Senate.
sharp_stick
(14,400 posts)doctors accept Medicare and Medicaid patients in their private practices.
jsr
(7,712 posts)Sat May 22, 2010 at 01:44 PM PDT
Is Rand Paul, M.D.'s income from "Socialized medicine"?
EC
(12,287 posts)they should be running lawyers. None of the Republicans running lately have no idea how to write law. Of course they don't have to know how to since they just take what ALEC gives them and introduces those to Congress as though they wrote the law. Their knowledge of the Constitution and laws are so sub par I don't know why people elect them to go to Washington and make laws. They've not a clue.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)But most voters are idiots, so they'll lap it up