-Caveat Lector- NewsMax.com: Commentmax Archives The Hoax That Keeps On Hoaxing John L. Perry March 29, 2001 Bill Clinton's regulation purporting to protect everyone's medical privacy may well be his crowning masterpiece of political legerdemain, the ultimate hoaxer's ultimate hoax. It was signed just before the disgraced president's second term of office mercifully expired. If allowed to go into effect it will take on a life of its own that extends years beyond his eight in power. It has the ability to attach itself like a leech to every American now living – or even those deceased. It awaits every child yet to be born, following them all the days of their lives like a flashing neon sign in the form of an identifying pointed finger. Its language is larded with eloquence in behalf of one's right to privacy: "The bottom line is clear. If we continually, gratuitously, reveal other people's privacies, we harm them and ourselves, we undermine the richness of personal life and we fuel a social atmosphere of mutual exploitation. "The right to privacy, it seems, is what makes us civilized." Now who couldn't buy into that? Just wait. The regulation-writer begins to let one paw of the cat out of the bag: "The [medical-information privacy] rule seeks to balance the needs of the individual with the needs of the society." Ah-ha, so the individual is not the sole interest of the bureaucrats drafting this "protection." All of a sudden, there is "the society," whose interests at least equal those of one individual. And who is to define and decide what those interests of society are? Ten guesses. History shows what a mess governments make when they arrogate unto themselves this role of depicting and fashioning what society and its needs must be. But the people to whom government is supposed to be responsible are asked to be good guys and go along peaceably: "In this regulation, we are asking health providers and institutions to add privacy into the balance, and we are asking individuals to add social goals into the balance." If you haven't guessed by now that this whole scheme is to give the federal bureaucracy the mechanism it needs to take your individual health information and do with it as it damn well pleases, then you need to goose your guesser. The word you're looking for is "disclosures," as in: "The only disclosures of health information required under this rule are to the individual who is the subject of the information or to the secretary [of Health and Human Services] for enforcement of the rule. "We expect [health providers and institutions] to rely on their professional ethics and use their own best judgment in deciding which of these permissions they will use." Well, it just so happens that the way this reg is written the deck is stacked against anyone who opts in your favor and in favor of everyone who bows to the HHS secretary's requirements. Lest anyone think for a moment that the politicians drafting this regulation don't have a far-away gleam in their eyes, here is an almost-subliminal tip-off that they intend for this health scheme to be around for a nice, long time and for it to grow bigger and meaner: "It creates a framework of protection that can be strengthened by both the federal government and by states as health-information systems continue to evolve." Clinton's health-privacy regulation is the political equivalent of baseball's fork-finger fast ball. What the batter – that would be you – sees as the pitcher – that would be the federal bureaucracy – winds up and fires the baseball at the plate is a pitch so fast it . . . well, what else could it be but a fast ball right down the pipe? Only trouble is, it's not at all what it seems to be advertised. At the last moment, the ball sinks like a rock and scoots off to one side. The catcher is lucky to block the ball with his body. By the time your eye picks that up it's too late. You're already committed. Your bat's flying around. Your feet are about out of your shoes. Strike three! Whoever drafted this Clinton regulation is a Cy Young Award pitcher. Take this on faith from one who has written his share of federal regs and had to wade through more than he ever wants to remember: This one is a masterpiece – of obfuscation, sleight-of-hand, semantic trickery. Just listen to this: "This rule includes standards to protect the privacy of individually identifiable health information." False. It does the opposite. "The use of these standards will improve the efficiency and effectiveness of public and private health programs and health-care services by providing enhanced protections for individually identifiable health information." A lie. It does the opposite. "These protections will begin to address growing public concerns that advances in electronic technology and evolution in the health-care industry are resulting, or may result, in a substantial erosion of the privacy . . . " and on and on and on. Baloney. Just the opposite will happen. It took an entire evening, the next day and the better part of another evening just to read through the hundreds upon hundreds of pages of this gobbledegook. If you don't read the key portions at least twice, you miss the "except as otherwise provided in Section this, that or the other" escape hatches. It's easier to navigate amid the mirrors in the Fun House at the county carnival. So arcane and convoluted, so double-speak and cross-gartered are the passages in this regulation that every patient will need to go to the doctor's office accompanied by an attorney. You may thank President Bush that he put a 60-day hold on this Bill Clinton nightmare of a hoax – the hoax that keeps on hoaxing. It now clutters the desk of Tommy Thompson, the new secretary of HHS, who has until April 14 to decide what in the hell to do with it. Maybe Thompson is just trying to deke out the Democrats who are having a cow unless he lets their hero's regulation go into effect untouched by human hand. Maybe he's listening more to the health industry – which has a large, legitimate gripe about all the extra staff and paperwork it must add on – than he is to those who see this as the privacy-protection hoax it is. If Thompson hasn't done so, he'd be well advised to read every word of this endless babble of regulation himself, rather than rely on a one-page summary drafted by some left-over Clinton bureaucrat. If he will but read it, there is a better-than-even bet he will feed every ream into the office shredder. The medical-information system this country is struggling with is ghastly enough. Giving it a dose of Clintonism will make matters worse many times over. It is nothing less than a shameless attempt to resurrect the necessary data base to support the former first lady's ill-famed HillaryCare. As the late Lewis Grizzard liked to say, "Stomp that sucker flat!" John L. Perry, a prize-winning newspaper editor and writer who served on White House staffs of two presidents, is senior editor and a regular columnist for NewsMax.com. Other Columns by John L. 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