POLI 311 Fall 2009 Prof. Basu Due: Thu Oct 8	ASSIGNMENT 2: Develop a satirical public interest group web-site around a Modest Proposal on Health-care in the US of your own devising.

The Website

The website, with two secondary pages of your own making (amounting to 500-700 words in total), should emulate as realistically as possible actual relevant web-sites, e.g.

on the center-left:

National Coalition on Healthcare

http://www.nchc.org/about/index.shtml

from the Whitehouse: http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/health_care/
Pres. Obama’s Plan for Health Insurance Reform
Frequently Asked Questions on Health Insurance Reform

on the center-right:

Healthcare Freedom Coalition

http://www.healthcarefreedomcoalition.org/agenda.asp

staking out a particular position in the current US healthcare debate but in your case do so by affirming a solution that is at once plausibly deliverable yet patently morally absurd/reprehensible.

§ Your solution should be pitched as a satire of the health-care approach you oppose (through some combination of dimunition/inflation, juxtaposition, and parody).

§ Your handling of the solution should effectively affirm your own stance on the health care debate and the crucial issues that separate disputants.

§ Your website should be articulated realistically by referring to accurate statistics, with appropriate cited sources and authorities.

§ Your website should be funny in the absurdities that you project along the way and ultimately aggregate in order to arrive at your reductio ad absurdum.

The Rationale

The comic rationale should be a 500-word formal discussion relating your own effort, and discursive uses of one or more of the four sorts of humor dynamics to Swift’s Modest Proposal and comic techniques.

For a sampling of the US healthcare controversy, see:

“What you need to know about health care reform.” CNN

“10 Health Care Reform Myths.” CBS

Polls on “Health Care Reform.” Rasmussen Reports.

Hunt, Albert R. “Canards Infest Health Care Debate.” NYT (09/27/2009).

“Conservative media's culture of "death" poisons health care debate.” MediaMatters

NYT Health Care Reform Navigator	A list of resources from around the Web about Health Care Reform as selected by researchers and editors of The New York Times.
	Major Health Care Reform Proposals: a Comparison Kaiser Family Foundation Making Sense of Health Care Reform WebMD Proposed State-by-State Effects of Health Reform HealthReform.gov Health Reform News Kaiser Family Foundation
DRAFT LEGISLATION	Chairman Max Baucus Draft: America's Healthy Future Act Senate Finance Committee House Bill: FAQs about America’s Affordable Health Choices Act House Committee on Ways and Means Summary of America’s Affordable Health Choices Act House Committee on Ways and Means America`s Affordable Health Choices Act: Complete Bill Text House Committee on Ways and Means Senate Bill: Summary of Affordable Health Choices Act Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Senate Bill: Full Text of Affordable Health Choices Act Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Senate Republican Proposal: Patients’ Choice Act Office of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) Senate Republican Proposal: Health Care Freedom Act Office of Jim DeMint (R-SC)
COST	Preliminary Analysis of America’s Healthy Future Act [Baucus bill] Congressional Budget Office, Sept 16, 2009 Supplemental Information of Potential Effects of the Affordable Health Choices Act Congressional Budget Office, Sept 10, 2009 Preliminary Cost Estimates of Health Care Reform Legislation Congressional Budget Office, July 17, 2009 Additional Cost Estimates of Health Care Reform Legislation Congressional Budget Office, July 26, 2009
GENERAL INFORMATION	U.S. Health Care Spending Totals Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services U.S. Health Care Spending by Type, 2007 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services U.S. Health Care Spending, 1960-2007 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services U.S. Health Care Spending Projections, 2008-2018 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services State-by-State Health Insurance Coverage Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Glossary of Health Care Reform Terms ReformPlans.com