Dr. Nick Riviera is better qualified to opine on economics than any of these clowns. If the quality of thought in these letters is any indication, Dr. Nick Riviera’s also a more competent physician.

Doctors are the worst.*

‘Puter concluded doctors can suck his big, fat prickly pear after reading the New York Times letters to the editor yesterday.

About eleventy gajillion** doctors wrote in to comment on the New York Times’ article “Medicare and Medicaid at 50.” We are treated to brilliant commentary, insightful analysis, and thoughtful prescriptions*** for America’s healthcare system from the medical profession’s best and brightest.

Dr. Marcia Angell, a “senior lecturer in social medicine at Harvard Medical School and a former editor in chief of The New England Journal of Medicine” from notoriously Right-leaning Cambridge, Massachusetts writes:

Isn’t it time to accede to the wishes of the “consistent majorities” and begin dropping the qualifying age for Medicare one decade at a time? It would probably be less costly for consumers, since any increase in payroll taxes would be more than offset by lower premiums and out-of-pocket costs, it would provide truly universal care to those in the covered age groups and it would certainly be less inflationary.

Excuse me, ma’am? THE. UNITED. STATES. IS. NOT. A. DEMOCRACY. “Consistent majorities” hate ObamaCare and would like to see it scaled back or repealed. So you must be good with that, right, Dr. Angell? Further, “consistent majorities” hold abortion should be severely restricted. ‘Puter assumes you’re on board with that. Heck, if we’re letting majorities rule, let’s put doctors’ compensation up for a vote. ‘Puter’s fairly certain the 99% won’t see your compensation to be quite as fair and reasonable as you do, Dr. Angell.

Not to be outdone, Dr. Ann Troy, a pediatrician hailing from the conservative redoubt of San Rafael, California, shares her special genius with us mere mortals:

“Equal protection” has been used, with some success, to improve access to education and, now, to allow same-sex couples to marry. It seems that an even stronger case can be made regarding access to health care — which is considered a right in every other developed nation.

‘Puter can’t even.**** This specimen cup swizzle stick of an intellect thinks “ZOMG! SOSHULIZED MEDUHSIN BCUZ GHEY MARRIJ N TEH EKWAL PRUTEKSHUN!!1!one!!!” Look, genius, health care is not a right. It’s not a right if someone else has to pay in order for you to exercise it. Here’s an analogy even your low-wattage brain may grok. If healthcare is a right others must pay for you to exercise, then the Second Amendment is a right you must pay for ‘Puter to exercise. If ‘Puter has to pay for your healthcare, Dr. Troy, then you must pay for ‘Puter’s new firearms and ammunition.

Next up is Dr. Samuel Metz, an anesthesiologist and a member of Physicians for a National Health Program. Dr. Metz hails from the birthplace of conservatism, Portland, Oregon, and pithily sums up his deeply conservative vision for American healthcare:

Medicare for some is good. Medicare for all is better.

‘Puter would put it another way, mimicking the phrasing of Dr. Metz’s fellow Democrat George Wallace: “Single-payer now, single-payer tomorrow, single-payer forever!”

Last but by no means least, Will J. Arnone, chairman of the board of directors of the National Academy of Social Insurance,***** pens a letter that positively radiates brilliance:

Even without a unified health insurance mechanism, we need to find ways to facilitate continuity in health plan coverage and provider relationships for people, separate from the question of who is paying the bills. Ideally, our goal as a nation should be to enable individuals and their families to remain in the same health plan with the same team of providers throughout our lives.

To be fair to Mr. Arnone, his letter is the least crappy turd in the punchbowl. If you had to drink a cup of punch from a turdy punchbowl, you’d prefer to dip your cup into this one. But the tune hasn’t changed, it’s just better hidden. Mr. Arnone is arguing for single-payer healthcare just as surely as the rest.

Well, fine. If neo-Communist doctors think socialized healthcare is the way to go, let’s do it. But let’s add one little twist. Let’s socialize all medical professional degrees. No doctor, surgeon, researcher or any other medical professional shall make more than a GS-13 on the government pay scale. Currently, that would cap doctors’ pay at $95,048. That seems fair to ‘Puter.

After all, a government run, socialized, single-payer healthcare system deserves government mandated, socialized, single-payer salaries.

To the extent doctors earned more than a GS 13 salary in any prior year, the excess earnings must be turned over to the federal government. The doctors’ disgorged prior years’ overpayments will be used to improve the newly socialized healthcare system for the good of all. Why should doctors profit at the expense of their patients?

After all, we’re in this together, and we must sacrifice for the common good. Is it a deal, good doctors?

‘Puter thought not.

* Except for your Gormogons’ own Dr. J, of course, who is the archetype of doctor-ness, the ne plus ultra of caring professionalism.

** The actual number of physicians who wrote letters was four or five (‘Puter couldn’t determine whether the “chairman of the National Academy of Social Insurance” was a doctor or not), but the soul-deadening stupidity of these highly educated professionals is sufficient to create eleventy gajillion individuals of average levels of stupidity. Hence, ‘Puter’s chose number. Quod erat demonstrandum.

*** See what ‘Puter did there? That’s funny, because it says “prescriptions,” and ‘Puter’s talking about doctors. And doctors write prescriptions. You should make a note of that, so when you’re writing, you know how to do it, too.

**** ‘Puter figured he’d show he’s hep to the kids’ lingo, so as to increase our readership among the quasi-literate youth. On reflection, ‘Puter’d have done better to have written a listicle, since the Millennial generation can’t process anything longer than a one sentence blurb full of snark.

***** What in the holy Hell is a National Academy of Social Insurance? Is that like a liability policy for Twitter users, like Chuck C. Johnson, the frequently banned (alleged) floor pooper? ‘Puter thinks Mr. Arnone made up his organization. Next time ‘Puter writes a letter to the New York Times editors, instead of either (1) cutting out each individual letter from various magazines or (2) writing it in every color present in his Crayola 64 pack (with built-in sharpener, bitches!), ‘Puter will sign it “’Puter Gormogon, chairman of the National Academy of Ethanol Metabolism. That’ll get ‘Puter published for sure, because it sounds like a fancy credential. Liberal pantywaists like the New York Times editors worship meaningless credentials.

'Puter

Always right, unless he isn’t, the infallible Ghettoputer F. X. Gormogons claims to be an in-law of the Volgi, although no one really believes this.

’Puter carefully follows economic and financial trends, legal affairs, and serves as the Gormogons’ financial and legal advisor. He successfully defended us against a lawsuit from a liquor distributor worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid deliveries of bootleg shandies.

The Geep has an IQ so high it is untestable and attempts to measure it have resulted in dangerously unstable results as well as injuries to researchers. Coincidentally, he publishes intelligence tests as a side gig.

His sarcasm is so highly developed it borders on the psychic, and he is often able to insult a person even before meeting them. ’Puter enjoys hunting small game with 000 slugs and punt guns, correcting homilies in real time at Mass, and undermining unions. ’Puter likes to wear a hockey mask and carry an axe into public campgrounds, where he bursts into people’s tents and screams. As you might expect, he has been shot several times but remains completely undeterred.

He assures us that his obsessive fawning over news stories involving women teachers sleeping with young students is not Freudian in any way, although he admits something similar once happened to him. Uniquely, ’Puter is unable to speak, read, or write Russian, but he is able to sing it fluently.

Geep joined the order in the mid-1980s. He arrived at the Castle door with dozens of steamer trunks and an inarticulate hissing creature of astonishingly low intelligence he calls “Sleestak.” Ghettoputer appears to make his wishes known to Sleestak, although no one is sure whether this is the result of complex sign language, expert body posture reading, or simply beating Sleestak with a rubber mallet.

‘Puter suggests the Czar suck it.