When will Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison stop lying to her constituents?

In today’s constituent email she claims: “The President and the Democratic leadership have pursued a radical approach to health care reform that will not only result in higher taxes and penalties, but will also increase premiums and reduce patient choices.” The fact is that nothing in the legislation will reduce patient choice, in fact it will expand the choices of many of the six million Texans who now must rely on emergency rooms for treatment.

In her next sentence she claims: “In fact, under the bill, Americans will be taxed for four years before they will see any benefit of insurance reform.” But it’s not a fact the reality is that according to CNN “some benefits would start immediately, including provisions that would require private insurers to provide a minimum level of coverage, Medicare improvements, provisions to decrease administrative costs and targeted assistance for certain people ages 55-64.” In addition wholesale reform of something as large and complex as health care can not logistically occur overnight, after all Medicare Part B took two years to fully implement and this is even bigger.

A few paragraphs later she claims: “The bill passed by the Senate, with only Democrat support, represents a massive government expansion and federal takeover of our health care system.” That’s a lie, there is no takeover, as outlined in the Senate bill there is no government run health insurance program nor is there an expansion of Medicare.