C (10:32)

This, by the way?

B (10:33)

I normally wouldn't even be talking about it, but I talk about it because many times in public and in private. Now I'm asked, what is the deal? Like, what's the deal with Candace? What's the deal with Tucker sometimes? What's the deal with Bannon? What's the deal with Marjorie Taylor Greene? And the truth of it is, I have a lot of kind of inside information on these people, and. And I can tell you what the deal is with. With many of them. I mean, if I can give you a word on Bannon. When I was making the film 2016 Obama's America, Steve Bannon offered to produce that movie. He said, I'll do it. I'll produce it for you. And I knew nothing about films, so I was kind of very excited. I'm like, how does it all work? And Bannon was like, well, basically, Dinesh, you go out and raise all the money, and then you make the film, and then you basically sign it over to me. And I was like, what? He's like, oh, yeah, basically, I'll take care of the business side of it. And I will. You know, we will. We will. We will pay you a fee for narrating the film, but the ownership rights would go to my company, basically. I was like, no. And considering that the film ended up, you know, making tens of millions of dollars, I'm sure Bannon was like, ooh, shoot. I mean, I almost had him. You know, I almost pulled a fast one on Dinesh, but he didn't really fall for it. So Bannon is, you know, is an operator and someone whom I've been cordial with over the years, but I'm also a little Careful, because this is my. This was my actual first experience with. With Bannon. But back to Tucker. The question of what is driving Tucker? And I. When I say driving Tucker, I don't mean, oh, Tucker did a very slobbering interview of Nick Fuentes. I'm talking about a whole pattern of views that are so startling in their departures from what MAGA thinks or what conservatives think. Praising Sharia, minimizing the crimes of Hamas, praising Maduro, and, you know, we should have allied with Hitler. We won the wrong side of World War II. Churchill is the real villain. Netanyahu is the real villain. And on and on it goes. It's. It's a pattern. So what is driving that? Now? One possible explanation, which I've always rejected, is the explanation that basically, Tucker's being paid by Qatar. I don't know if he is or not, but I don't think that's his motive. I don't think it's. Tucker needs Qatar to pay his electric bill, and Tucker could easily, with his large audience, monetize it and find other ways to make money. I don't think that's the primary motive, but the other motive is supplied by Tucker himself. I was attacked by a demon. So the possibility arises, and as Christians, I don't think we can dismiss it. He's under some sort of demonic possession or demonic control. And sometimes I've seen people say, well, demonic spiritual warfare is real. And of course, I believe it's real. In fact, my question is, where's the demon? Is the demon. Did the demon run away? Is the demon still in him? At no point Did Tucker, by the way, ever say, you know, I rebuke the demon in the name of Jesus. Nothing like that. It's just that there was a physical attack back. He was mauled. It left all these marks on him, on his shoulders, apparently, also on his torso, by the way. Marks that no one has ever seen. Not. Not at any point, as Tucker said. Oh, are you sure you. Because, I mean, think about it. If a demon leaves marks on you, it would be rather interesting to see photos of those marks, a video of those marks. The marks have never been exhibited. They've never appeared in any in public at all. And so we have to sort of take his word for it. But as Tucker recently, I think, was on Megyn Kelly and was talking more about the demon. So this is a big deal for Tucker. It's not like I'm grabbing onto one thing. It's that this is like a big issue for him. And I think he wants to present himself as like he's. He's engaged in spiritual warfare. You know, he took on the demon and so on. But the more I listen to this, and by the way, Tucker's story has changed in the sense that it's always updated, new details appear. So you kind of have to go with the latest version that supposedly incorporates all the details. And when I look at it, it's, like, hard to believe. It's a little hard to take at face value. And here's why. Basically, as the story goes, Tucker was attacked in his sleep, and he was attacked so badly that he was bloodied later, we'll see. He finds blood on the sheets, but he's attacked and bloodied and he wakes up. And now it'd be one thing if Tucker, like, went back to sleep right away and then woke up later and wondered, hey, was it all a dream? But according to Tucker, according to his own account now given multiple times, he got up, his dogs were sleeping with him, he went outside. So he turned on the light, he went on out outside, and his wife, who's apparently a light sleeper, she woke up. They discussed the incident, they discuss what happened. And then, according to Tucker, he read his Bible and went back to sleep. So first of all, wait a minute. You didn't attend to your wounds, you're bleeding, but nobody thought to, like, clean your wounds or put on a band aid or a bandage? No. Tucker apparently goes right back to sleep after reading the Bible. And then he says, I woke up, and then I saw blood on the sheets, and I wondered if it was all a dream. Now, again, if something had happened, you wake up, you're startled, you fall back to sleep, later, you wonder, it's a dream, I get it. But if you have an incident where you get out of bed, you turn out the light, turn on the light, you take your dogs outside, you come back, your wife has woken up, you have a conversation about the matter. You then go back to sleep. I don't think any reasonable person is going to say, I woke up and I wondered if it was a dream. The whole thing doesn't even add up. So I'm left with three possibilities. Number one, the demonic attack was real, in which case my question persists, like, where's the demon? The second possibility is, this was all made up. It's just a lie. It's just an effort of self dramatization. Basically, you have somebody who is capable of creating this kind of scenario to make it sound like he's living in some higher realm where he's battling evil spirits. That's the second possibility, the made up possibility. And the third possibility is some sort of like psychotic episode where and this is probably what most people who were responding to this, this demon story have suggested. They're like, Tucker is sleeping with a bunch of dogs. The dogs mauled him. That's the most obvious. That's the most. That's Occam's razor. That's the shortest explanation that makes the most sense. And so Tucker is sort of reading into it something that goes way beyond what actually happened. It was nothing more than the dog scratching his shoulders and his torso. I don't know which of these three possibilities ultimately is the right one, but it's certainly one of the three. Since 1971, the year the US compared to completely abandoned the gold standard, inflation has averaged 3.98% per year. That's the official figure, but it may be far too low. In reality, the government can manipulate the figure to make inflation seem lower than it actually is. But let's go with the official number. It means that if you start out with $1 in 1971, that money keeps dropping in value in purchasing power. In fact, $1 in 1971 is now worth about 12 cents. Sounds crazy, but it's true. And how does this happen? It happens because the US government continually prints money. When more money chases the same amount of goods and services, money goes down in value. And because the money printing is not stopping, we can anticipate that our dollars are going to continue to lose value. Scary though it sounds, the dollar goes down to zero or towards zero every single time. But the government can't print gold. And gold has been money for thousands of years. Today, gold is a valuable protection against the ongoing depreciation of the dollar. Is it any surprise that an ounce of gold which was worth around $44.40 in 1971 is today worth around $4,000? I own gold. As a long term investment, you can too. Either by buying gold to keep in a safe place or by converting an old IRA or 401k into an IRA in gold. A great way to do this Gold Co. Which has the best reputation, the best customer service and the best deals. That's why Debbie and I buy our gold and precious metals from Gold Co. They are rated A plus by the Better Business Bureau. They have thousands of five star reviews. Simply go to dineshgold.com request their free 2025 gold and silver kit. No obligation, just information. As a valued partner, Gold co is offering first time buyers a rebate of up to 10% back in bonus silver or gold. Protect your savings over the long term. Get some extra gold or silver for doing it. Now go to dineshgold.com and get started. Thanksgiving holds so many memories. I'm sure it's the same for you. And right now there's a girl finding out she's pregnant and in the next couple of weeks she's going to make a decision. Whatever decision she makes will become her memory of this Thanksgiving season for the rest of her life. What will she be thankful for a year from now? I hope you shall be thankful that you introduced her to her baby by providing a free ultrasound. And she'll be thankful to that. She chose life. As she prepares for her baby's first Thanksgiving, take a stand for life by providing an ultrasound with preborn. When a young woman sees her baby on the ultrasound and hears her baby's heartbeat, she's twice as likely to choose life. Just $140 provides five ultrasounds that can save five babies. $280 saves 10 babies. A gift of $15,000 provides an ultrasound machine that can save thousands of babies for years to come. Please help. I can't think of a better cause than this. Call 833-850-2229. That's 833-850-2229 or go to preborn.com dinesh that's preborn.com dinesh Guys, a really important topic that I don't cover enough on this podcast is health care. And the health care policy of this country has been defined in the last several years by Obamacare. I think you can imagine what Obamacare has done to the subject of health care. But the question is, what do we do now? We're in it. Can we get out of it? Can we fix it? Obama talked about remaking America. Can we remake Obamacare? I have the perfect person to talk about all this, and it's Professor G. Bai, and she is a professor of accounting and Health policy at Johns Hopkins University. I'm in great luck because we had actually talked about doing this interview remotely from Washington, D.C. or from Johns Hopkins, but she happens to be here in studio. So Professor G. By thank you for joining me. It's really a pleasure. You are a new guest on the podcast and you have a very interesting story. So I thought let's just begin there. Where did you grow up? And tell us a little bit about your about your childhood.

C (23:03)

Thank you, Dinesh. This is such an honor and a blessing to be in this studio with your audience I am one of many, many immigrants pursuing an American dream. I came to states 25 years ago, almost 25 years ago from China. My family had some political persecution, especially my dad's side previous generation. So I knew what tyranny, what communism can bring to society, what kind of tragedy it can entail. After I came to the States, I got my CPA and PhD in accounting. My first job placement was at Washington University in Virginia and at wl, what you call WL Washington University. It's really an eye opening experience.

B (23:56)

So you were. Well, let me slow you down a little bit because let's start with China. What is remarkable about China is that they have achieved a measure of prosperity but at the same time while maintaining a political stranglehold over the society. And are you saying that was one of your main motives in wanting to get out?

C (24:20)

Exactly, yeah. In that kind of system you are not free no matter how successful you are. Your property, your freedom can be taken away overnight by this people you don't even know. That's how formidable and scary the state power is. And I think that's something most Americans don't really understand.

B (24:44)

You know, I remember many years ago at one point, Obama of all people, we're going to talk later about Obamacare, but Obama said something like, I envy the leadership of China. And I think what he meant was that, you know, they can just get things done without political obstructions and impediments. But I think that this impulse to tyranny is a universal temptation. And to some degree we feel those dangers even in this country with increasing censorship. Do you agree that you agree? Yeah. Right.

C (25:19)

We're only one generation away, right?

B (25:22)

Yeah. I mean we're not China and I don't mean to overstate where we are, but some of the same, well look for example at using facial recognition technology, using social credit systems, using digital censorship. I mean, China in a way has perfected all those techniques, haven't they?

C (25:41)

Absolutely. And once you pass a tipping point like in China, there's no freedom of speech, it's extremely difficult for society to change and I think we are losing that. We are seeing more and more threat of the freedom of speech. Right. Especially in previous administration.

B (25:57)

G. You find yourself in America and you are, but you're not in typical America because Washington and Lee is, well in fact was at one point almost the epitome of like a southern university. I remember maybe 20 years ago speaking there in the Robert E. Lee Chapel. It's a very solemn and beautiful setting, pretty much speaking to the entire Faculty and the student body. You made a comment a moment ago, before we started talking here, that you think that Washington and Lee has. Has lost some of its kind of ancestral conservatism. Talk a little bit about that.

C (26:36)

Absolutely. We are the Southern darkness. We have a very unique identity. But then somehow I believe some people in the administration felt that Washington D should be more mainstream, should bring more DEI or similar ideology to campus and.

B (26:58)

Maybe get away a little bit from the Southern heritage like Robert E. Lee. See, Robert E. Lee, for most of American history has been considered a hero. He might have been on the wrong side of the Civil War, but he was a great man. He was a great warrior. He was actually offered by Lincoln to be the head of the Union Army. He opposed secession. So for all these reasons, I've always had a kind of a. Not even grudging admiration for Lee. And yet there was a real effort, particularly around the George Floyd protests and to really villainize the south and make Robert E. Lee into. In fact, I think there were. Some of his statues were pulled down.

C (27:35)

Absolutely. And I think there had been some talk regarding changing the school name. I don't think it's going anywhere, but it's already alarming to see people talking about that. I don't know about the current situation, but I hope it's getting maybe to the reverse a little bit.

B (27:55)

You said G that you were on this campus and for the first time because you know, when you're an immigrant, you come from the outside. Your initial interest is not political. You just want to be successful. You want to be a professional, you want to climb up the ladder. But you said you sort of discovered the political differences while you were at Washington and Lee.

C (28:18)

How did that happen before Washington and Lee? I love the free markets, free people, but I never paid attention to the political party alignment. I really did not read newspaper. Etc. It was at wl I realized free market, free people more aligned with Republican Party and the other way around with Democrat party. So that is a reckoning for me.

B (28:44)

That the Republican Party is the party of not, just, you're saying, economic freedom, but also political and civic freedom. And the Democratic Party is the party of state control.

C (28:56)

That was actually a surprise to me. I came from China. When I got here, I thought this is heaven. It's free land, amazing world. And then I realized there are people who actually want to bring us like China. I got that kind of idea why I was in double yes.

B (29:16)

And, and. And you're saying you are a little shocked. Exactly. That anybody would want to do that?

C (29:20)

Yes.

B (29:21)

And let's. Why do you think they want to do that? In other words, as you've thought about it, as someone who has lived through it, when you see somebody else wanting to move in that direction, do you think it's because, I mean, one of the benefits in any tyrannical societies of the people at the top have a lot of power. Do you think that may be the motive?

C (29:40)

100%, yeah.

B (29:42)

Yeah.

C (29:42)

I believe a huge hunger toward power and the desire to control people, people's behavior, what people can do, cannot do that. Before I came here, I thought that is only unique in China or in Soviet right. In those communist countries. But after I came here, I realized it was universal. There's a tendency to control people, to deprive people of the freedom everywhere.

B (30:12)

Yeah. I remember years ago when I read this was Alexander Solzhenitsyn's great work called the Gulag Archipelago about the prison camps in the Soviet Union. And in the introduction he goes, this is a warning to the west and it's a warning to everyone. And we were in the Reagan years at that time and I was thinking, how can it be a warning to the West? We're not headed in that direction. But his point is that this tyrannical temptation is very universal. And I think where he's proving to.

C (30:37)

Be completely correct and it can lead to blood, I think that's something Americans, especially young Americans don't understand, don't haven't realized. So my father's side, during the communists coming to power, they own some property and the whole family is killed, more than 50 people. And then there were a young man, bring a child, a three year old. They were, you know, in winter they escaped through snow, but then he was bleeding. And then those communists followed them, found them through the, the blood, so killed them and then put them, you know, get the rock tied to them and then put them just in the river, open up the ice, crack the ice and put them in. That's how violence can be. And purely, you know, what's the reason, Sorry if I, if I sound emotional, I'm sorry, but what was the reason to kill the three year old and the whole family? Because they own the properties through their hard work and through several generations. They did not steal anyone. Right. They did not tyrannize anyone. And everything's really through a mutual agreement, mutual labor agreement, mutual transaction, volunteer transactions. But then they accumulated property. That's the reason they got killed. So that is really a cautionary tale for all the people here want to move Us to socialism.

B (32:06)

I mean, I think what you're saying, which is sobering for young people because they don't think of it this way. They think of it, you know, Mamdani in New York, it's all going to be, we're just going to equalize, our rent is going to be cheaper, the subway is going to be free, we're going to have some grocery stores that are free. I think what you're saying is these socialist and communist regimes are run by gangsters and those people have, they have full power over your life and they will smash you if they see you as a threat to their regime in any way.

C (32:37)

Correct. And I also want to add if let's say free market, these people have no marketability because for many reasons they cannot climb the ladder easily. So I think for them it makes economic sense to go through this back door to terrorize, use violence, use power, control to achieve a level of wealth and a status that they could have never obtained in a free market.

B (33:06)

It's almost like saying that they cannot compete in the race. And so they devise a new race and put themselves at the front of it. A rigged race. You know, let's come back to now. All right, here you are at Washington and Lee. And then you said that you applied for a job at Johns Hopkins. So talk about that next stage of your career.

C (33:27)

Fortunately, Johns Hopkins started a business school and then they were looking for multidisciplinary researcher doing both healthcare and the specific discipline.

B (33:37)

Right.

C (33:38)

Because Hopkins has this healthcare brand. Luckily I did not have much competition because my research has always been healthcare accounting. So I got the job. I moved to Hopkins about 10 years ago.

B (33:50)

And what's interesting about Johns Hopkins now is perhaps even much more than Washington. Lee, you have a campus that is in Baltimore and that shares with many other elite campuses. It is politically like on the left. So how does a professor like you, who is also, at least over time, pretty outspoken.

C (34:13)

Yeah.

B (34:14)

How do you, how do you as a fish survive in that water?

C (34:17)

Actually on the applaud Johns Hopkins, relatively speaking, we are quite open minded. For example, I heard some elite universities, as a faculty member you cannot accept, you cannot do an interview without a third person from the communication department sitting in.

B (34:33)

Oh, right.

C (34:34)

But in Hopkins we have total freedom. We can say anything and align with any ideology. The school's totally open to this. And remember, Martin McCurry, the FDA commissioner, is also a faculty member at Johns Hopkins.

B (34:49)

That's true. That's right. So you. But that's good. That means that you have not been tormented for expressing your views. And of course you express your views in your field of knowledge.

C (34:59)

And last year we had a conference, very much market oriented conference in our D.C. campus. We have senators, we have congressmen from the Republican party came to join us and the school.

B (35:12)

Very supportive, Very supportive. All right, let's talk about Obamacare and I want to begin with an article that you recently wrote about it. And I want you to go through the main theme of it. But as I understand it, what you're basically saying is this, that under Covid the whole bunch of people who were not previously eligible for Obamacare subsidies for their premiums were allowed in, were given these subsidies. And now that they're talking about getting rid of those subsidies, not for everybody, but for all these higher income people who had been added to the list, you're saying that there is a controversy about it. But I think what you're saying is, look, these people have other options and they should be taken off the program. They should not be given these Obamacare subsidies. Explain a little further why you think it's a good idea to take all these Covid additions to the program and get them out.

C (36:24)

First of all, this is for Covid and Covid is over, right? Second, these are higher income Americans over 400% poverty line. So we are talking about a family of two over $62,000 or February four more than $128,000. So these are not poor Americans. Why should they receive subsidies from taxpayers and many of them actually early in retirees and as you said the next day have access to employer sponsored plan.

B (36:59)

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C (40:01)

100%?

B (40:01)

Yeah.

C (40:03)

These Obamacare plans are so unpopular, therefore you have to either lure people to join Obamacare by giving them subsidies or force them compel them to join through mandate. If you don't do either of the two, nobody likes it.

B (40:21)

Oh, wow. Yes. And am I right that if in the history of Obamacare, you know, the way it was portrayed, Obama portrayed it like I'm fighting The insurance companies, I'm taking them on. But in reality, it looks like this was a backdoor deal made between Obama and the insurance companies. Because think about it, in what market would business people not like the idea, I'm going to force tens of millions of Americans to buy this product. If I was growing broccoli and the government came to me and said, I'm going to force every American to eat broccoli and I would cheer because I'd be like, that's great profits for me. Isn't this why the insurance companies really were enthusiastic about Obamacare? Because it supplied them with customers via the government?

C (41:10)

Exactly. So we know the word poverty pimp, right? This is healthcare pimp.

B (41:15)

Healthcare pimps.

C (41:16)

Basically, government is prostituting, sleeping with the industry to form this healthcare industry complex. We have a huge crony capitalism here. That's the core of this. But then on the surface is to create illusion that American people really need the government. Without government, they cannot access health care so that they can worship government. Right. They no longer worship free market, free people. Instead they love government. They cannot imagine losing government. Help them buy health care. I think this is the deception and defrauding.

B (41:53)

So gee, if you were, you know, sitting right alongside President Trump and or even if you had complete authority to redesign, remake, change this healthcare system, I mean, obviously knocking out some Covid, you know, newcomers to the system is a step in the right direction. Right. But what would a fundamental reform form look like? Don't even worry about the political possibilities of it. Like how would you design it? Like as an academic. Great.

C (42:25)

So status quo consists of four things. So defraud taxpayers, deceive patients, prostitute free industries. So then we, so let's see, deceive. Sorry, I forgot this. The last thing.

B (42:43)

That's okay.

C (42:43)

But we want to change into a four dimension new world that would be free patients, free physicians, and the free insurance companies and then be regulated to onboard. Yeah. So that is what I envision for UIC healthcare. Sorry. The first one is to enslave physicians.

B (43:03)

Oh, the physicians, of course. Right, right. So it's not just the industry, it's not just the consumer, it's the physicians. And so let's explore how that would be. How do you, how do you set up a system that frees the physicians first of all?

C (43:19)

So physicians are right now really being enslaved. They all the house policies are creating an uneven playing field in federal hospitals. So physicians are victims. So for example, if I want to, I'm a physician, I want to start a hospital, compete with a nonprofit Medical center. I cannot. Obamacare bans physician hospitals. Also, we have 340B program. All these government subsidies, property tax exemption, etc, all giving this literally channel money to hospitals, I would say undermining physicians. So that's why we're seeing fewer and fewer independent physicians to compete. That's why we're seeing higher and higher price and lower and lower efficiency.

B (44:08)

Would it make sense, Just thinking of things in a kind of fundamental or even radical way, this is kind of how I look at it. You know, we, we have people say, I have a right to health care, but that's wrong.

C (44:24)

You don't have a right to health care. Health care is a commodity. You have to pay for it. If you don't pay, someone has to pay for it.

B (44:30)

Right? Which actually, what you're getting at here is something very profound, which is this. There's no such thing as a right that involves reaching into somebody else's back pocket, right? So if you have a free speech right, it doesn't cost me anything. You're not making me pay to enable you to speak, and therefore you have a right to do it. But you're saying, on the other hand, if you want to spend money and go to a doctor and receive services, that can't be in the same sense a right, it's gotta be something where we have to decide as a society, like, how do we allocate resources? Is that what you're saying?

C (45:05)

Yes. And that's the success of the past 56 years of health policy to make people believe healthcare is a right. I be entitled to healthcare, which is wrong, because.

B (45:17)

Let's show why it's wrong, because let me put it this way. Let's say I now say I have a right to food. Nobody would disagree. Of course you have a right to food. So then I go, all right, well, why don't I just go to the grocery store and fill up my cart and then just walk right by the cashier and don't pay because I have a right to food. Right? Now, I think as an economist, as an accountant, you know, completely, that if you allowed that to happen, first of all, it's not that nobody's paying. It's just that you have a cashier, you have a consumer, and the guy who's really paying is not present in the transaction. Right? Because that's a taxpayer who's at work in the machine factory or as a plumber. That's the guy who's really paying. Right? And so what's really happening here is that the consumer is Ripping off the system. The grocery store goes, great, because you can just walk out with whatever you want. We're going to be billing that guy. And I say all this because to me that's our healthcare system.

C (46:19)

You touched the key point that the third party payment system, right, the patients, not consumers, the third party are either insurance companies or the government. So for the past six years, the government centered policies have been detaching patients from their either earned or subsidized health care dollars that create a loss of price sensitivity. And I would say that's a rule that cause of the, the mess we're in. That's why President Trump said let's fund the patients, which I think such a profound and insightful idea.

B (46:51)

We all know that when we go to a doctor, I mean the system is all so odd, right? Because you go to a doctor, let's say, and you say, I don't know, I have a pain in my right side. And the doctor will say, all right, well let's run a series of tests. Or there's a hospital will say, let's run a series of tests. Now the patient will never think of saying, what tests are you going to run? And can you explain to me why each of these tests are necessary? And the reason that the patient never dreams of saying that is typically the patient is not paying. Right. But in any other thing, if I go in, let's just say to Home Depot and I say, I want to fix my kitchen. And they go, okay, we'll give you 45 items that you should buy right now. You'd be like, wait a minute, slow, slow down, let's go down the list to see what I need and what I don't need. So this normal system of kind of accountability, I think what you're saying disappears in the healthcare process. How do you put it back?

C (47:54)

Yeah, so providers right now focus on compliance. How do I get the money from the insurance companies or from the government instead of persuading the patients, look, my value, my service is valuable, so pay me. Right? So complete, upside down. So in order to change that, we must let patients control their healthcare dollars.

B (48:15)

Now one of the objections to that is going to be you're going to have some people say, I'm just kind of imagining an objection which would be, okay, if you're fixing your kitchen or picking up food, you, the patient are knowledgeable enough to know what to eat and you may be knowledgeable enough to know how to fix your kitchen, but you are not knowledgeable when it comes to healthcare. The doctor Knows better, the hospital knows better. So we cannot let you be the decision maker because you don't actually know.

C (48:40)

I disagree. First of all, let's look at the cash pay markets. If I go to a cash pay only surgical center, before I go there, go to the website, they have very clear description of the price and they service. So they even put the pictures like are you doing a shoulder? What do you need? So they really tried hard to convey what they are doing, how they bundle the price.

B (49:07)

You mean like these urgent care centers, right where you.

C (49:10)

Surgical center. Surgical centers. So once we have a free market, patients control their money. The providers will compete to communicate to patients why the patient should get that service. That is the origin of all the transformative change.

B (49:27)

I mean, I think what we're realizing, you know, as we talk is it occurs to me that we are outlining a set of principles that's actually not unique to healthcare. Because think about it, wouldn't schools work better if they were operating on the same principle? Because right now you're born into a certain community and unless you're wealthy enough to go to a private school, you're gonna go to the public school that's like down the street or five streets down and you don't have much of a choice. You just have to go there. Whatever slop they're feeding you, you know, academically you have to have. But on the other hand, if you put the dollars in the hands of the parents or the families, then they're going to go on the website, hey, what am I going to learn over here? What am I going to learn over there? And the schools then start competing. We are going to provide this, we're going to provide that. We have sports, we have these extracurricular activities, we have the best faculty. Here are all their degrees. So aren't we actually laying out principles that are applying to healthcare but apply much more broadly?

C (50:23)

100% healthcare is just one of many personal labor services. There's nothing special about health care. The Democrats and many left leaning scholars have been using this foundational idea that the health care is different. Based on Kenny's Arrows 1965 article saying health care is different. We have information, symmetry, etc. Then we start this Soviet style government centered health care policy. Then in order to change we have to go back to the foundation. Saying that is totally wrong. Health care is just like any other services. School, lawyer, restaurant, personal service. Follow all the economic principles and will, will follow whatever incentives dictate.

B (51:10)

Interesting. So just to clarify because I think you, you said A bunch of things. So Kenneth Arrow was a Nobel prize winning economist, and you're saying in the 70s, I think it was the 1970s, when he was in his heyday or 60s or 70s, he made the claim, very much in line with expanding the size of government, that we cannot apply the normal free market principles to health care. It's a unique product.

C (51:32)

That's the origin.

B (51:33)

Yeah, right. And you're saying, no, it isn't.

C (51:36)

That's wrong. Yeah. And if you look at John Corcoran, other prominent economists, they have long recognized there should be no difference between healthcare and other personal services. Of course the level of information symmetry will be different, but the core, the nature is the same.

B (51:52)

So what is one thing? You know, we're a year away from the midterms, a couple of years away from the 28 election. What can Republicans put out there in the area of healthcare? Something that's kind of visionary, even if it involves some fairly fundamental change. How would you put a proposal out to the American people to take this Obamacare kind of monster and like redo it?

C (52:23)

Technology has been collapsing price everywhere. American people should ask why technology hasn't made health care cheaper, more affordable. So the rule, the cause is really government. The solution is not. The government solution is free market, free people. So let people control their money. That's free patients, right? And then let physicians compete fairly. That's free physicians. And then light insurance companies design and offer plans people like and want. That's free insurance. And finally deregulate unburdened. Think about the electronic health records, all the quality measurement. These are strongholds on physicians neck. So those things have to be gone. So once our voters realize that government is the root cause and they will really follow what the free market dictates. And I want to add, if you look at the cash pay market, we have a very vibrant market thriving, and the price is declining. Think about plastic surgery, right? The price has been declining, quality has been improving. So that'd be a great example. You know, I think our members and our leaders should be more forthcoming in communicating to American people that we should pursue healthcare freedom. In fact, if we don't push healthcare freedom, we'll lose our global leadership. In my opinion, our businesses, our entrepreneurs cannot live their full life because of health care. Now people are paying almost half of their take home pay to health care, and that is not a system. And we're gonna be surpassed by China if we keep doing that.

B (54:04)

So to put it slightly differently, and tell me if this is right, right now you have the US government over here and they identify all these people need health care subsidies. So they, they funnel the subsidies through the government to the hospitals. And what you're saying is don't do that. Here are the consumers and there might be some people who do need subsidies from the government, but instead funnel the money in this direction to the consumer. Let the consumer be the deciding force and let the businesses and the hospitals and the doctors all compete for those services. Right. So really a change of direction 100%.

C (54:43)

Then once patients can benefit financially from lower price and better health, then that's the starting point of every change in this market. I think we have to recognize we're at a crossroad. Either serve them through healthcare or freedom through healthcare. There's no third way.

B (55:06)

And healthcare is such a big part of our economy that I think what you're saying is this one thing, you know, normally we deal with so many different aspects of life, but this one thing is such a big part of where people's money goes that it alone determines whether the car is going to go on this fork of the road or that fork of the road.

C (55:27)

Right, Right. And don't forget that for the low income American, most vulnerable Americans, the current system really failed them, really feel them. If I'm a medicated patient, if I work hard, I, I go to gym, I eat healthy, what kind of financial benefit can I get? 0. I cannot personally directly benefit of anything from the Medicaid program. In addition to that, I'm confined in this very restrictive network of providers. Let's say I want to see a doctor in MD Anderson. I cannot do that. Right. Because my network restriction dictates that I cannot go. But if I have money in my hand, I can go there as any other consumer to get the service right, dignified away. So I think that is where we should go. We should give the money to the mean tested, more money to the mean tested population and have a state funded reinsurance program. Reinsurance means the, it's a secondary insurance to make sure everybody's premium is affordable. So even if, let's say I'm higher risk than you, my premium will not be too high, too high, but too much higher than you because there's a state funded reinsurance program. But that really taking away of this third party issue, I believe funding patient directly and the sponsor state reinsurance program would be the right way to do.

B (56:56)

Guys, I hope that this conversation has given you just a glimpse into some of the policy complexities here, but also that there's such a clear pathway And I think the reason I think it was so cool to talk about you coming from China and discovering freedom is really your work is a continuation of the same thing. It's an application of this broad principle to the particular issue of healthcare. I think you've been really enlightening. G by thank you so much for joining me guys. You can follow her on xe Very simple. Just G, E, B, A, I, D C. So ghibaidcibaidc and it's been really wonderful having you in studio.

C (57:39)

Such an honor and a blessing. I just want to say one last thing. In a freedom free health care system, everybody can save, thrive, invest and live a full life. That's really American dynamism and American dream coming true for everyone. Thank you.

B (57:56)

Thank you.

A (57:57)

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