Dems' parade of health-care lies

Michelle Malkin

Is there a health-insurance horror story disseminated by the White House and its allies that ever turned out to be true? Now, a sob story shilled by President Obama himself about his mother is in doubt.

Obama cited mom Stanley Ann Dunham's deathbed fight with her insurer several times over the years to support his successful push to ban pre-existing condition exclusions by insurers.

Obama shared his trauma during a 2008 debate: "For my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they're saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don't have to pay her treatment, there's something fundamentally wrong about that."

But there was something fundamentally wrong with Obama's story. In a new biography of Obama's mother, author Janny Scott reveals that Dunham's health insurer had in fact reimbursed her medical expenses with nary an objection. The actual coverage dispute centered on a separate disability-insurance policy.

Democrats have dragged every available human shield into the contentious debate over Obama's federal takeover of health care. Obama's Dunham anecdote is just the latest entry in an ever-expanding catalogue of ObamaCare fables:

* Otto Raddatz. In 2009, Obama publicized the plight of this Illinois cancer patient, who supposedly died after he was dropped from his Fortis/Assurant Health plan when his insurer discovered an unreported gallstone the patient hadn't known about.

The truth? He got the treatment he needed in 2005 and lived for nearly four more years.

* Robin Beaton. Also in 2009, Obama claimed Beaton, a breast cancer patient, lost her insurance after "she forgot to declare a case of acne."

In fact, she failed to disclose a previous heart condition and did not list her weight accurately, but had her insurance restored anyway after intense public lobbying.

* John Brodniak. A 23-year-old unemployed Oregon sawmill worker, Brodniak's health woes were spotlighted by New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof as a textbook argument for ObamaCare. Brodniak was reportedly diagnosed with cavernous hemangioma, a neurological condition, and was allegedly turned away by emergency-room doctors.

The truth? Brodniak not only had coverage through Oregon's Medicaid program, but was also a neurology patient at the prestigious Oregon Health and Science University in Portland (a safety-net institution that accepts all Medicaid patients). Kristof never retracted the legend.

* Marcelas Owens. An 11-year-old boy from Seattle, Owens took a coveted spot next to the president in March 2010 when ObamaCare was signed into law. Owens' mother, Tiffany, 27, died of pulmonary hypertension. The family said the single mother of three lost her job as a fast-food manager and lost her insurance. She died in 2007 after receiving emergency care and treatment throughout her illness.

Progressive groups dubbed Marcelas an "insurance-abuse survivor." But there wasn't any evidence that any insurer had "abused" the boy or his mom. Further, Washington State already offered a plethora of existing government assistance programs to laid-off and unemployed workers like Marcelas' mom. The family and its p.r. agents never explained why she didn't enroll.

* Natoma Canfield. The White House made the Ohio cancer patient a poster child for ObamaCare in 2010 after she wrote a letter complaining about skyrocketing premiums and the prospect of losing her home. After Obama gave Canfield a shout-out at a rally in Strongsville, Ohio, and promised to control costs, officials at the Cleveland Clinic, which is treating her, made clear that they would "not put a lien on her home" and that she was eligible for a wide variety of state aid and private-charity care.

Since ObamaCare passed, the amount workers pay in health care premiums has soared an average of nearly 14 percent; thousands of businesses have sought waivers in search of relief from the law's onerous mandates; and the private individual health-insurance market is in critical condition. Post-ObamaCare, truth is bloodier than pro-ObamaCare fiction.