Ignoring healthcare reality at our peril

I'm starting to wonder why so many people are going to such great lengths to ignore healthcare policy issues these days.

Take, for example, The Boston Globe. The paper has to earn Wednesday's prize for greatest effort to ignore the impact of healthcare in a news story:

"Massachusetts, which earlier this decade had the lowest percentage of eligible residents using food stamps, now has the fastest-growing food-stamp program in the country, a dramatic turnaround that state officials attribute to soaring food prices and a simplified application process."

"As food and fuel costs continue to rise, the officials say, people who would not normally use food stamps are turning to the federal program to make ends meet."

""I think low-income families are faced and will be faced this winter with the difficult choice of eating or heating a home," said Patricia Baker, senior policy analyst for the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, a nonprofit organization that advocates for the poor."

So we are supposed to be prostrate with grief because of rising food prices (maybe) and a massively liberalized food stamp application process (definitely) preceded a huge increase in new food stamp recipients in a state that is running itself to ground passing out "free" health insurance to all comers, regardless of how sick they are?

It's folly to ignore the role of socialized medicine, which is attracting and insuring low income people to the state who then sign up for food stamps.

Good thing Gov. Steve Beshear had to back up on his health insurance giveaway campaign promises. Of course, though, here comes Barack Obama.