Death Panels and Demagogues

The debate on the health care issue has gotten pretty nasty as of late, with fights breaking out in town halls, prominent politicians spreading misinformation, and lobbyists trying to force their hands on an already destabilized Congress.
Reforming health care in this country is as important as an issue can be right now, especially for the future of this country. We trail most industrialized nations in many aspects regarding health and health care, including our dismal 29th place in infant mortality.
But never has the opposition been stronger and more uninformed than it is now, regurgitating fears about 'death panels' and rationed health care. The fear is the main problem, people are scared and ignorant of what is really going on with a huge bill that is hard to grasp the complexity of. The government has set up a site to set the facts straight about this bill, but I doubt many check it before they head out to a town meeting filled with anger and false facts supplied to them by conservative mouthpieces like Hannity and Limbaugh.
Former Vice Pres. nominee Sarah Palin (involuntary shudder) decided to add some unneeded fuel to the fire when she shot off her mouth about 'death panels' checking off the elderly and mentally handicapped for death since they had no more use in society, when the bill actually sets up nothing of the sort, and intends to change the current practice. She then backpedaled a few days later, calling for civility in the matter, but she might as well have put the shotgun down after the wolves were already dead.
This type of thing already goes on behind the gleaming glass facades of many insurance companies, who routinely deny coverage, often on necessary or critical things, just to save a few bucks just because they can, and it increases their profits at the expense of the health and lives of their customers.
If all this seems pretty obvious to the rational American, then from whence comes all this misinformation and for what purpose? Don't the Republicans want to stay healthy too? Yes, but their religious integrity always comes first. Groups like the Liberty Counsel are leading the fight against this bill, setting up a list of talking points that sounds like something criticizing Nazi Germany or Communist Russia, not America. But these conservative tools seem to read from it almost verbatim.
Far-Right groups like this seem to have a lot of sway in the fearful, more ignorant parts of our society, leading them about by the nose like a horse to water. But why? What benefit from this could religious groups receive from a lack in proper health care? My working theory is that they want to keep these people poor, sick and generally unhealthy, such miserable states make for better flocks looking for something better. Healthy, happy people don't make for better flocks, as demonstrated by the fact that the healthiest, most peaceful countries are also the most atheistic.
Case in point: one of our one American astronauts declines to participate in scientific experiments while in space, fearful that it will jeopardize his health insurance standing. Meanwhile, English scientist and famous physicist Stephen Hawking declared that the 'socialist' medicine of England actually saved his life, much to the annoyance of the conservative Right, I'm sure. A scientist and proof that public health care works? Must piss Jerry Falwell right the hell off.