Palin views the rationing of health care as evil

Palin weighs in on one aspect of the health care debate.

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin called President Obama's health plan "downright evil" Friday in her first online comments since leaving office, saying in a Facebook posting that he would create a "death panel" that would deny care to the neediest Americans.

"Who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course," the former vice Republican presidential candidate wrote on her Facebook page, which has nearly 700,000 supporters.

"The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil," Palin wrote.

An e-mail sent to Palin's spokeswoman to confirm authorship was not immediately returned Friday.

Obama, a Democrat, campaigned on a promise of offering affordable health care to all Americans. He has proposed a system that would include government and private insurers.

Republicans say that private insurers would be unable to compete, leaving the country with only a government-run health program. They warn that could leave Americans with little control over their health care. . . .