Recognizing the Obvious

We learned today that a Florida ophthalmologist received more payments from Medicare than any other doctor in America last year.  This doctor was paid roughly twenty-one million dollars for services rendered to senior citizens.  Think about that!  If the doctor worked eight hours per day for five days a week and took two weeks off for vacation, he was paid $10,500 per hour from Medicare.  Of course, the doctor surely got more per hour than that for two important reasons.  First, the doctor surely saw non-Medicare patients as well as those covered by the program, so he got separate payment for those services.  Second, it is nearly impossible to believe that the doctor kept up the schedule of eight hours per day five days per week for 50 weeks.  Nevertheless, even without adding to his hourly rate, the level of payment is absurdly high.

So with such a clearly suspect level of payment for supposed Medicare services, did the government investigate this doctor?  After all, sitting here in Connecticut, I do not have access to the total number of procedures for which the doctor sought payment.  Nor do I have access to the types of services that were supposedly performed or the number of patients supposedly seen each day by the doctor.  I do not have access, BUT MEDICARE DOES!!!!  Even so, there is no indication that this Florida doctor is being investigated.

How can it be that Medicare can report the doctor receiving this obscenely high level of payment, but it has not decided to investigate to determine the validity of the charges?  This bit of information may help you to understand:  the doctor in question is a very major contributor to Democrats.  In fact, the doctor is the one on whose private plane was used by senator Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat who allegedly went to the Dominican Republic repeatedly where he allegedly met underage prostitutes.  The allegation about the prostitutes was denied by senator Menendez, but the senator admitted that he "forgot" to report that he had been given the free use of the plane on multiple occasions by the doctor.  So, we know, without a doubt, that the doctor is not just a contributor, but also a confidant of some very high ranking Democrats. 

We do not know if the free plane rides had any relation to the failure of Medicare to investigate this doctor.  It is clear, however, that all of these facts certainly give rise to the need for Medicare to undertake such an investigation.  If all the charges were proper, then this doctor will be exonerated.  On the other hand, if the charges are not proper, then the government should stop wasting the people's money in this way.