Wallet Biopsies

Kevin Drum joins the Legions of Righteousness as we laugh at--not with, at--the Washington Post's Ben Domenech:

The Washington Monthly: THE APOCALYPSE....I'm feeling left out of the Ben Domenech bashing, so let's take a crack at his latest post, which he mildly calls "one of the ever-growing number of signs of the apocalypse": In brief:

A group of British doctors fought in court for the right to remove a fully-conscious little boy from a ventilator, over the objections of his parents, because they judged his quality of life to not be worth living.

Damn socialists. It's a good thing that a God fearing man like George Bush would never sign legislation to allow such a thing to happen, isn't it?

In any case, I'm glad to see Ben arguing that the state should be obligated to provide medical care for sufficiently sick people. It's a start

Kevin misrepresents George W. Bush's Texas law. It allows hospitals to pull the plug not in the interest of mercy--for patients in great pain, or with no consciousness--but in the interest of $$$$$: if you can't pay, your ventilator goes.