President Obama's ambitious healthcare plans may force interest rates so high they strangle the economic recovery and push the nation into another recession, Newsmax columnist Dick Morris and No. 1-rated cable TV host Bill O'Reilly concur.
Appearing on "The O'Reilly Factor" Wednesday night, O'Reilly repeatedly praised Morris' new best-selling tome, "Catastrophe: How Obama, Congress, and the Special Interests Are Transforming a Slump into a Crash, Freedom Into Socialism, and a Disaster into a Catastrophe . . . and How to Fight Back."
O'Reilly asked Morris, who co-wrote the book with Eileen McGann, whether he thinks universal healthcare could drive the United States into bankruptcy.
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"Not bankrupt in the sense that we're in Chapter 11," Morris said. "We have the power to tax, and therefore we'll never go bankrupt. What's going to happen, if [Obama] goes through with it, is the U.S. will have to borrow the bulk of the money for this healthcare. That will drive interest rates so far up it will trigger an entire new recession."
O'Reilly's response: "That's what I'm worried about. And President Obama has not said how he'll pay for it. [Rep. Barney] Frank did, but again you say the shortfall is enormous." Frank has claimed that savings from the waning F-22 fighter program will help pay for healthcare, but Morris says it could put only a small dent in the overall price tag by even the most optimistic projections.
Morris also warned that an influx of more than 45 million Americans into the healthcare system, at a time when other Obama administration policies are likely to limit the number of doctors and nurses, will overwhelm the medical system.
"It's like sleeping with a blanket that's too small for you," Morris explained to O'Reilly. "Either your neck's going to get cold or your feet are.
"And what's going to happen is the same thing that goes on in Canada," he continued. "Because of the long wait for colonoscopies, the incidence of colon cancer in Canada is 25 percent higher than in the U.S. And because the two top drugs we use for chemotherapy for advanced stage colon cancer are not available in Canada because of cost, the death rate is 25 percent higher.
Said O'Reilly: "That's one of the most compelling things about your book: You deliver statistics that show Americans are a lot healthier than Canadians are in the vital disease category — heart disease, cancer, things like that."
"Quantify it," Morris said. "Six percent lower death rate from heart disease, and a 16 percent lower death rate from cancer in the U.S."
Despite those reservations, Democrats are working hard to come up with the legislative compromise they need to push healthcare reform through Congress. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel told reporters on Thursday that the healthcare bill will be bipartisan even if Republicans don't vote for it, because he says it will contain Republican ideas.
There was one Democratic argument for healthcare reform that O'Reilly found appealing.
"I'm sympathetic to that cost thing," O'Reilly said. "Because most working people I know, they're getting hammered by medical costs."
"What controlling costs means is denial of services," Morris said. "It means you can't have that knee replacement because you're 70 years old. It means you can't have that bypass surgery because you're 75."
"And that's what the government will do," O'Reilly interjected.
Morris added: "Just as right now the government is telling people cut back on cesarean sections, go through natural childbirth."
O'Reilly's conclusion after his session with Morris: "I see disaster ahead on this, I do. I see disaster ahead in two realms: Financial realm. I don't think he [Obama] can afford it, and I don't think he can raise the money. And that there will be waiting lists" for treatment.
O'Reilly ended the segment by predicting: "Your book's going to do very well, because there are a lot of Americans skeptical of the Obama administration."
See Video: Dick Morris discusses "Catastrophe" — Click Here Now
Get Catastrophe for Just $9.95 — Save $17 — Click Here Now [Offer not available for Newsmax magazine current and former subscribers.]
Get Catastrophe Free and Autographed with Newsmax Magazine — Click Here
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