There’s an old proverb that says a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still getting its boots on. That’s surely true when the lie instills deep personal fears, and lies appear to be in full sprint as the nation’s health care debate goes local.

Some August town hall meetings around the country have degenerated into furious shouting matches, driven by outrageous misinformation borne of many sources.

The Internet spreads anonymous chain e-mails to a public that is both vulnerable and gullible. Groups with a financial or ideological interest give the rumors a boost. Talk radio provides an echo chamber for the demonizers. Most outrageously, political leaders who know better and could oppose legislation in a more credible way, engage in their own hyperbole or simply remain silent. One Republican senator, South Carolina’s Jim DeMint, simply bypassed the substance of the discussion, saying it was a chance to “break” a popular Democratic president. He has plenty of company that isn’t quite as blunt.

As we’ve said before in this space, there are valid reasons to oppose some of the ideas percolating in Congress — chiefly the lack of a credible financing mechanism — but the distortions have become so numerous that they’ve often won Politifact.org’s “pants on fire” award (as in “liar, liar, pants on fire”).

OLBERMANN’S SPECIAL COMMENT: ‘DEATH PANEL’ PALIN DANGEROUSLY IRRESPONSIBLE

So in the interest of correcting some of the misinformation, here are a few truths that need to get moving:

•   – Euthanasia. Critics have mastered the art of plucking a single piece of bill language and wildly distorting it. In this case it’s a section of a House bill inserted by members of both parties to allow Medicare to pay doctors for optional end-of-life counseling, something that’s already covered in a new patient’s first Medicare visit. Anyone who has struggled with the decisions patients and family members must make as death approaches knows the value of having thought this through ahead of time and having made their wishes clear. Millions already do that.

But critics have twisted this into a sinister, cost-saving plot by the government to force seniors to end their lives early. First aired on the radio show of former Tennessee GOP senator Fred Thompson, the notion was picked up by House Republican Leader John Boehner, who said the provision was a precursor to “government-encouraged euthanasia.” Former Alaska GOP governor Sarah Palin has now weighed in with a Facebook posting that claims that Obama would create a government-run “death panel.”

Neutral arbiters have rightly demolished this. FactCheck.org labels the claim “nonsense” and says calling this forced euthanasia is like saying “a bill making retirement planning easier would force Americans to quit their jobs.” Terrifying seniors over this provision is shameless.

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   | More Images of Right-Wing Terrorism in America   |   Notes   |
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•   – Socialism. It’s hard not to smile when critics warn darkly that health care reform means “socialism” or a “government takeover” of health care, since these same critics are usually staunch supporters of government-run Medicare, one of the closest things to socialism in the USA. Despite charges that President Obama and the Democrats really want the sort of single-payer, government-run systems in Canada or Britain, nothing in the legislation even comes close.

In fact, to the disgust of single-payer advocates, Obama and Democrats have all but frozen them out of the debate in an effort to build reform on top of the current employer-based system. What they have proposed that gives the fear life is a “public option,” which would indeed be a government-run health care plan very much like Medicare. But in every version of the plan, it would just be one more choice competing with private insurers.

•   – Keep what you’ve got. The president says that if you like your health coverage, you can keep it. Well, maybe. Nothing in the bills would force people to give up their coverage, but depending on how the final legislation is written, it might not be up to them.

•   – The employer-provided insurance millions of Americans have is a voluntary benefit; employers could drop it if the bill made it easier and cheaper for them to let employees move to a private plan or a public alternative. That would be less likely to happen if an employer mandate required all but the smallest businesses to cover their employees and levied a tax or a fee if they did not.

•   – Illegal immigrants will be covered. In fact, no bill says this, and a key House bill explicitly forbids it. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, claims that the Congressional Budget Office says 5.6 million illegal immigrants would be covered. FactCheck.org says King is distorting CBO’s findings, which say no such thing.

The Internet can spread misinformation like wildfire, but it can also be a powerful tool for discovering the truth, as fact-checking sites are proving. It might help dial down the fear and anger if Americans reacted to claims about health reform from either side by logging on and looking them up.

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McCain Wants Straight-Talk on Healthcare

Obama’s Death Panel?

FEAR-MONGERING GALORE!

Fox News personalities advance Palin’s “death panel” claim [ READ MORE ]

Beck says of Palin’s “death panel” claims: “I believe it to be true”

CNN’s Lewis corrects Dobbs: “the un-American part was … to shout people down, to stop the conversation is un-American”

“TOE-SUCKER” Dick Morris says it’s “[n]onsense” to “listen to the people … that you should be nice and polite” at town hall meetings

“[T]elling” us “what the nationalized health care is going to do,” OSAMA BIN O’Reilly says: “If she’s 84 — outta here!”

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References:
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1.   ‘Un-American’ attacks can’t derail health care debate — By Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer

2.   Is Palin’s Schlafly-style fear rhetoric ethical politics? — Sarah Palin’s beloved child Trig, born with Down Syndrome, is safe and so is everyone else who has been terrified by her hyperbolic “death panel” rhetoric on President Obama’s health care reform efforts.

3.   A Primer on the Details of Health Care Reform — It can be difficult to sort fact from fiction in the raucous debate over health care reform. Here is a guide to the main issues.

4.   Dreams From His Mother — What we can learn from the scholarship of anthropologist Ann Dunham Soetoro, President Obama’s late mother.

5.   Palin’s Poison — Palin should follow her own advice to the media of a few weeks ago — lay off the kids and “quit makin’ things up.” With misinformation like the former governor’s “death panel” post spreading at warp speed, anger, and even death threats, are no surprise.

6.   Is the South Ruining the GOP? — In a gaffe of truth, Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) said his “party?s being taken over by Southerners.” Lloyd Grove on the growing disconnect between Republicans and political reality.

7.   Inside Story on Town Hall Riots: Right-Wing Shock Troops Do Corporate America’s Dirty Work — How the health-care industry, the GOP and one media mogul made common cause with the anti-government fringe.

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