Watching CNN’s video (via Steve Benen) of Sen. Tom Coburn’s absurd response to a woman’s desperate pleas for help for her ailing husband got me thinking.

Isn’t Coburn - a government bureacrat and practicing doctor - the epitome of everything we’re being told we should fear? How can he of all people claim the government shouldn’t run our health care?

Two months ago, Coburn rhetorically asked, “Now do you really think the bureaucrats up here, with white hair, at my age, can decide for me what the best medicine is for me?”

The implication here is that, no, the government shouldn’t decide your medicine, but Coburn himself must at times do just that.

Trust Sen. Coburn; he’s a government doctor.