Here’s the part of Gore’s reply where he mentioned—and named—Dingell-Norwood:
GORE: Mr. Hankins, I think that the situation that you describe has gotten completely out of hand. Doctors are giving prescriptions, they're recommending treatments, and then their—their recommendations are being overruled by HMOs and insurance companies. That is unacceptable.
I support a strong national patients' bill of rights. It is actually a disagreement between us [gesturing at Bush]. The national law that is pending on this—the Dingell-Norwood bill, a bipartisan bill—is one that I support and that the governor does not.
JIM LEHRER: Time is up, Mr. Vice President. Two minutes response, Governor Bush.
Instantly, Bush did what he did all through these debates—he began obscuring Gore’s distinction. Here’s the kind of rank dissembling journalists once felt they should clarify:
BUSH: Actually, Mr. Vice President, it’s not true. I—I do support a national patients bill of rights. As a matter of fact, I brought Republicans and Democrats together to do just that in the state of Texas, to get a patients bill of rights through. It requires a different kind of leadership style to do it, though. You see, in order to get something done on behalf of the people, you have to put partisanship aside. And that's what we did in my state. We've got one of the most advanced patients bill of rights. It says, for example, that a woman can—doesn't have to go through a gatekeeper to go to her gynecologist. It says that you can't gag a doctor. A doctor can advise you. The HMO, the insurance company can't gag that doctor from giving you full advice. In this particular bill, it allows patients to choose a doctor, their own doctor if they want to...
Bush was grossly misstating his role in the enactment of that Texas bill. (He vetoed a tougher bill of rights in 1995; two years later, he allowed a weaker bill to become law without his signature.) Beyond that, his answer obscured the distinction Gore was making. Gore hadn’t said that Bush didn’t support any bill of rights at all. He had said that Bush didn’t support a strong bill of rights—the bipartisan bill, Dingell-Norwood. After Bush’s attempt to fudge, Gore again attempted to draw the distinction. In the process, he again named the bill which Bush declined to support:
GORE: Jim, we have a direct disagreement on this... I referred to the Dingell-Norwood bill. It is the bipartisan bill that is now pending in the Congress. The HMOs and the insurance companies support the other bill that's pending, the one that the Republican majority has put forward. They like it because it doesn't accomplish what I think really needs to be accomplished... I specifically would like to know whether Governor Bush will support the Dingell-Norwood bill, which is the main one pending.
. . . There you see the kind of exchange which ought to define a presidential debate. In a rational world, journalists would rush to clarify such a disagreement; they would explain the competing bills to the public, helping voters see what each candidate was supporting. But as you may recall, your “press corps” took a somewhat different approach; they chose to mock ridiculous Gore for saying the funny words “Dingell” and “Norwood.” Sam Donaldson especially embarrassed himself on the October 22 This Week. But this clowning, insulting behavior was common. It was the press corps’ final “fuck you” to the public in this campaign—the campaign which has changed the world’s history.
That in a nutshell, explain our incompetent irresponisble Media. Either from ignorance, laziness, or malice, Margaret Carlson cannot state a fact correctly, cannot understand the signifcance, and can not serve the public. Her incompetence is patent. And Carlson is not unique or below average. This is our Media. This is what they serve.
It is why we do not trust them and have decided to find out for ourselves. Margaret Carlson is the poster child for what is wrong with the Media. Not charlatans like Limbaugh, O'Reilly, and Hannity, but those so-called respectable MSM, whose prominent feature is utter incompetence.
