Wages Of Obamacare
By Mitch Berg
They said that if I voted for John McCain, the government would trash our property rights like John Bonham trashing a hotel room.
Sheriffs in North Carolina want access to state computer records identifying anyone with prescriptions for powerful painkillers and other controlled substances.
The state sheriff’s association pushed the idea Tuesday, saying the move would help them make drug arrests and curb a growing problem of prescription drug abuse. But patient advocates say opening up people’s medicine cabinets to law enforcement would deal a devastating blow to privacy rights.
One of the purported cost savers in Obamacare is electronic medical records kept – eventually – in a national database.
And when the government controls your data, your data is only as safe as the least power-hungry or dishonest government official wants it to be.
September 10th, 2010 at 7:55 am
Same logic as giving lists of gun owners to police – so the officer will know when he’s approaching an armed person and will be careful.
Because, of course, nobody who’s not on the list owns a gun.
Just as nobody has drugs without a prescription.
If the cops sincerely believe that, they are idiots who should be relieved of duty. If the cops are insincere because they know better but are deceiving the lawmakers, they are liars who should be relieved of duty.
.
September 10th, 2010 at 9:05 am
Think about Hillary and Bill Clinton with thousands of raw FBI files on political opponents. Naw, that could never happen.
September 10th, 2010 at 9:13 am
Why, yes! After all, we have to keep track of the useful idiots, so that we can continue to oppress them!
September 10th, 2010 at 10:01 am
Wasn’t Joe the Plumber’s data safe?
September 10th, 2010 at 10:17 am
Or Crystal Bowersox, Farra Faucet or the thousands of other records that have been snooped into and shared.
September 10th, 2010 at 10:59 am
Yet, they can’t find either Obumbler’s REAL birth certificate nor his college transcripts. Funny!
I wonder why Julian Assange hasn’t Wikileaked those?
September 10th, 2010 at 2:06 pm
Bosshoss, I have a copy of my birth certificate from the MN dept. of health. It is all official and everything. At the bottom it says: THIS IS A TRUE AND OFFICIAL RECORD OF THE BIRTH REGISTERED IN THE OFFICE OF THE STATE REGISTRAR. and then it gives the date.
It has my mother’s name wrong. In the original my mother’s name is correct.
Obviously it is impossible for the new, electronic version mailed to me by the state of Minnesota to be wrong, just as it is impossible for the new, electronic version of Obama’s birth certificate to be wrong.
Any journalist would have to agree with that.
September 10th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
In order to get a passport you must send the US State Dept. a cerified embossed copy of your birth certificate. I guess being elected a Democrat President of the US has a lower level of criteria.
September 10th, 2010 at 3:11 pm
According to the story, these sheriffs have been unsuccessfully trying to do this for years. It doesn’t sound like anyone’s buying into it this time. Why is it a story today?
It’s a bad idea anyway. Having a prescription for a drug has nothing to do with drug abuse. If you have evidence of a crime, you can get a warrant.
And when the government controls your data, your data is only as safe as the least power-hungry or dishonest government official wants it to be.
Yeah, private entities never sell your personal information for profit.
It was smart of you not to point out you’re on the side of the ACLU on this. It might cause the Mitchkateers to go nutty and start talking like birthers or something.
September 10th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
DiscordianStooj said:
“you’re on the side of the ACLU on this”
Stopped clock, right twice a day, yadda yadda …
“Yeah, private entities never sell your personal information for profit”
Under rules set and managed by government. Government entities also share your data (for a lot of less predictable reasons than profit), under rules set and managed by government.
September 10th, 2010 at 4:10 pm
Terry said:
“Obviously it is impossible for the new, electronic version mailed to me by the state of Minnesota to be wrong”
*covers mouth and unplugs keyboard*
September 11th, 2010 at 8:04 am
Information is power. I admit, I was surprised when the state of Minnesota developed an electronic database for physicians and pharmacists to identify doctor shoppers. But the system is up and running and helps immeasureably in sorting out people with legitimate medical needs from scammers who either want prescription drugs for personal recreational use or to sell. If anyone thinks this isn’t a huge problem, first Google “purple drank” and then “Dick Beardsley”. Beardsley was a world class marathoner from Minnesota who became addicted to prescription drugs and went to extreme measures to obtain them before he finally got caught, got sober and now takes his message to the world. Purple drank is a ghetto “soft” drink with cough medicine, seven up and Jolly Ranchers. It is amazing how far people with intractable coughs will travel to find a physician who will prescribe codeine based cough syrup.
September 11th, 2010 at 8:05 am
I should add that I don’t want law enforcement to have ANY access to the database.