I can’t tell whether Politico’s Mike Allen is just shilling for Republicans or unwittingly exposing their duplicity. But Allen’s column on the advice Republican strategist Frank Luntz recently gave Republicans about how to talk about health care reform is a stunning example of the Republicans having nothing to say about how to fix the nation’s disgraceful health care system.

Allen’s column is mostly a summary of the report by Luntz insisting that Republicans embrace the rhetoric of public health concerns without identifying the underlying problem or actually proposing a single solution. Instead, Luntz tells Republicans to frighten Americans about any proposal that involves having "Washington bureaucrats control" your health care. Then lie about Canada and other countries while scaring folks about rationing, lines, waits, and denial of care.

Shorter Frank Luntz: Be empathetic, but lie and scare them; and never define a problem that actually requires a solution.

But that’s not the end of Luntz’ duplicity. Read through the whole Luntz spiel and you’ll not find a single mention of insurance companies. For-profit health insurance companies. Companies that deny coverage, deny payments, hassle patients, doctors, hospitals, drive many into bankruptcy and cause America’s health care costs to be double what they are in other countries. They apparently don’t exist.

We get 1000 words of advice on how to empathize with Americans about the health care "crisis" and not a single word about the insurance industry whose massive failure to serve the public interest is the major health care problem Americans are facing.

So expect newly re-branded Republicans (same as old-brand Republicans) to stoke your fears and then empathize with the concerns that some bureaucrat and not your doctor will decide what’s best for you. But don’t expect the Republicans to explain they’re describing today’s system and those bureaucrats work for the health insurance companies.

You’ll hear about rationing by bureaucrats, but you won’t hear that the way insurance companies profit is precisely by rationing care. The for-profit insurance company model is based on rationing. The company makes money by deciding which patients not to cover, what treatments not to pay for, how much not to pay, and how long to hassle you and your doctors/hospital before they pay them. And 47 million of you have been rationed out of the system.

Maybe Mike Allen meant to tell you that, but I guess he forgot.

Remedial reading/viewing for Republicans who’ve been Luntz’d:
On other countries, see PBS Frontline: Sick Around the World
On the horrors of the US system, see PBS Frontline: Sick Around America
For comparative statistics, see Commonwealth Fund Charts, such as this one.