Drudge Report: More Misleading Headlines; Their Bread and Butter

Matt Drudge doesn’t have a chance when he reports the facts as they are.  A frequent abuser of headlines and false stories, The Drudge Report has become synonymous with bottom-of-the-barrel news.  Fox News, The Drudge Report, Rush Limbaugh, and the GOP have got themselves a fine operation of misinformation going between them.

As we’ve shown ad nauseum here on Left Agenda here, here, here, here, here, and here, The Drudge Report makes a special effort to give misleading headlines, false no-link headlines, spread obvious lies as truths, etc., etc.  Basically, if it’s in the name of conservatism they are willing to lie and fraud their readers.

Well, here’s another example.  Assisting the false rhetoric of ‘Canada’s healthcare system is just awful’ even though Canadians wouldn’t want our system at all, The Drudge Report puts these misleading headlines on their page today:

That is as misleading as you can get once you read the article.  But, Matt Drudge relies on the fact that many readers do not read past the headlines.  Especially when the headline only supports something they’ve know all along, or think they’ve known.

Let’s look beyond this headline.  While it’s true that in the third paragraph, it states:

“We all agree that the system is imploding, we all agree that things are more precarious than perhaps Canadians realize,” Doing said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

It is important to get a few facts straightened out.  For one, it is the “incoming president of the Canadian Medical Association,” Dr. Anne Doig, that says these comments.  Calling her Canada’s “top doctor” is false and misleading.  We wouldn’t refer to the president of the American Medical Association as America’s “top doctor”.  But more importantly are further comments made by the currect president of the CMA, Dr. Robert Ouellet, which Drudge didn’t read, because it’s a whole two paragraphs further in the article, or doesn’t want you to notice:

The pitch for change at the conference is to start with a presentation from Dr. Robert Ouellet, the current president of the CMA, who has said there’s a critical need to make Canada’s health-care system patient-centred. He will present details from his fact-finding trip to Europe in January, where he met with health groups in England, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands and France.

His thoughts on the issue are already clear. Ouellet has been saying since his return that “a health-care revolution has passed us by,” that it’s possible to make wait lists disappear while maintaining universal coverage and “that competition should be welcomed, not feared.”

It’s interesting, for one, that on their “fact finding trip” they aren’t bothering to come to America.  It’s also interesting that they are in fact talking about adding competition which is exactly what the Obama administration has been trying to do with healthcare reform this entire time.   Dr. Ouellet also says, very specifically, “maintaining universal coverage,” is the primary concern.

As she continues, she explains what changes can be made more quickly to accelerate the patient centered healthcare,

“A short-term achievable goal would be to accelerate the process of getting electronic medical records into physicians’ offices,” she said. “That’s one I think ought to be a priority and ought to be achievable.”

A long-term goal would be getting health systems “talking to each other,” so information can be quickly shared to help patients.

Simply astounding, he wants healthcare records to be updated and electronically kept, and he wants health systems to communicate with each other, another aspect of the Congressional plans here in America.

So while The Drudge Report readers and bloggers will surely glue onto this headline and say, ‘See, here’s more proof that Canada’s healthcare system is just awful,’ don’t believe the hype and lies.  There is no perfect system, and there’s always room for improvement.  In Canada, no one is left out in the cold without healthcare; can America say the same?

And while you think about those lies, notice, if you will, how poorly America rates in healthcare.