Let's Look It Up (Since David Brooks Didn't Bother To)

As David Brooks notes in "Buckle Up for Round 2" (New York Times, 1/7/2011), Right now about 53 percent of Americans oppose the health care law and 43 percent support it, according to an average of the recent polls. Complaints are especially high among doctors. According to a survey by the Physicians Foundation, 60 percent of private practice doctors say the law will force them to close their practices or to restrict them to certain categories of patients.

Let's take a look at the bigger picture.

This train left the station at least 9 years ago.

The number of doctors in private practice has declined from 70% in 2002 to 47% in 2008, all while George Bush was still President.   And the trend has accelerated since 2005.

David, don't you read your own newspaper?

"More Doctors Giving Up Private Practice", New York Times, 3/25/2010.

Excerpt:   A quiet revolution is transforming how medical care is delivered in this country, and it has very little to do with the sweeping health care legislation that President Obama just signed into law.