Someone once observed that the problem with conservatives is that they want to ban anything that they don’t like and the problem with liberals is that they think anything good ought to be subsidized by taxpayer dollars. And so it goes with needle exchanges. Too many jurisdictions ban needles from stores. And then the liberals who fight the bans want to leap over to government funding for needle exchanges. It is as if no one has considered the idea that the government should just stay out of it altogether.

Just a few minutes ago on the wash​ing​ton​post​.com homepage, there was an example of one of my pet peeves about bias — possibly unconscious bias — in the way the major media cover issues. A homepage headline read “Price of Failure on Health Care,” and the Howard Kurtz article itself is titled “The Price of Failure.” Kurtz explores what would happen if “health care reform [goes] down in flames.”

So what does he mean by “Failure on Health Care”? He means President Obama not getting the sweeping new government programs that he seeks. But to many of us Post readers, that would actually be “Success on Health Care.” It would mean that American health care would not get worse under the burden of government regulations and restrictions.

The media tendency to refer to the defeat of a big-government scheme as “failure” reflects a possibly unconscious bias toward government action. As I’ve written before:

Does one ever hear “Congress failed today to reduce taxes”? “No Progress on Deregulation”? I don’t think so. Journalists unconsciously assume that Congress should Do the Right Thing. When it doesn’t, that’s “failure” or “no progress.” Journalists and headline writers should try to find neutral language to describe Congress’s actions.

(Kurtz’s article actually focuses on the political consequences to Obama of not passing his signature issue, and I have no quarrel with the article. But the headlines convey the sense that it would be a “failure” for Congress not to pass a government health-care plan.)

Whole Foods founder and CEO John Mackey has an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal titled, “The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare.” Let’s just say Whole Foods may not be asked to cater any Democratic Party gatherings any time soon:

While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction—toward less government control and more individual empowerment.

Mackey then lists several alternatives to ObamaCare, including broader health savings accounts, letting people purchase health insurance across state lines, giving people who purchase their own coverage the same tax status as employer-sponsored insurance, and Medicare reform.

Mackey shows little patience for those who claim we have a right to health care:

At Whole Foods we allow our team members to vote on what benefits they most want the company to fund. Our Canadian and British employees express their benefit preferences very clearly—they want supplemental health-care dollars that they can control and spend themselves without permission from their governments. Why would they want such additional health-care benefit dollars if they already have an “intrinsic right to health care”? The answer is clear—no such right truly exists in either Canada or the U.K.—or in any other country.

Man, what a neanderthal. He must be anti-reform. Except:

Health-care reform is very important. Whatever reforms are enacted it is essential that they be financially responsible, and that we have the freedom to choose doctors and the health-care services that best suit our own unique set of lifestyle choices. We are all responsible for our own lives and our own health. We should take that responsibility very seriously and use our freedom to make wise lifestyle choices that will protect our health. Doing so will enrich our lives and will help create a vibrant and sustainable American society.

How will the White House Snitch Project grapple with this one? Claim that the founder of Whole Foods is in league with the insurance companies? In thrall to Big PhRMA? No, wait, that’s the Obama administration.…

A classic health care protest:

Read about it in David Hyman’s book, Medicare Meets Mephistopheles.

At his town meeting in New Hampshire, President Obama urged people not to listen to those who seek to “scare and mislead the American people.” Meanwhile, his new White House website “Reality Check” — your tax dollars at work, folks, on political propaganda — warns supporters that “the road ahead will surely reveal more aggressive efforts from defenders of the status quo to confuse and scare Americans with half-truths and outright lies.”

I immediately thought of former Attorney General John Ashcroft’s notorious declaration in December 2001: “to those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve.”

Presidents and their teams don’t like criticism. They have total access to the media — primetime, nationally televised speeches and press conferences, weekly radio addresses, websites, massive party and political organizations, journalists at their beck and call. Their every passing comment is news. Their speeches dominate the headlines. They set the agenda, whether it’s the Patriot Act or health care bills. And yet they can’t abide criticism.

And when the criticism is effective, they lash out. They denounce their opponents for seeking to “scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberties” or “confuse and scare Americans with half-truths and outright lies.” (Quick: which one of those was 2001, and which was 2009?)

But the fact is that the Bush administration’s actions after 9/11 really did result in a loss of liberty, and the Obama administration’s plans for our health care really should scare Americans. And libertarians have been, and will continue to be, in the forefront of Americans resisting intrusions on liberty by administrations from both parties. They won’t be dissuaded by Nixonian claims that dissent and criticism are divisive and damaging to national unity.

Today’s Wall Street Journal editorializes against the price controls that President Obama would impose on health insurance, noting that such controls have proven a disaster in the states that impose them.

The Journal offers an alternative way of covering people with high-cost conditions:

University of Chicago economist John Cochrane also argues that in a more rational individual insurance market, people could insure not merely against medical expenses but also against changes in health status. This kind of insurance would cover the risk of premiums rising as you get older and your health condition changes.

In turn, that would free insurers to compete for the business of all patients, including those with pre-existing conditions, because then they could charge enough to cover the costs—instead of passing them to others.

You can read about Cochrane’s approach in his February 2009 Cato Institute policy analysis, “Health-Status Insurance: How Markets Can Provide Health Security.”

Reports the Daily Telegraph:

While British health ministers have been quick to applaud the advantages of a “national” health system to fight the swine flu outbreak, the very centralised nature of the service cuts two ways, according to a new report.

Civitas, the think tank, blames the monolithic nature of the National Health Service for “putting the patient last”.

It argues that the “customer” of the NHS business model introduced by Tony Blair and continued by Gordon Brown is the health secretary rather than the patient.

The report sees much in favour of attempting to introduce private provision within the state system and competition between NHS trusts to attract patients. But it says that all this has been stymied by incessant interference from the Department of Health.

American health care needs “reform.” But genuine reform means putting the patient first, not last–as the president and congressional Democrats would do by dramatically expanding federal controls. Sick Americans don’t need a Doctor-in-Chief in Washington.