So goes the line of utter malarkey put forward with a straight face and Twitter finger last year by Sarah Palin, who notoriously and ridiculously coined the term "death panels" to vilify efforts to legislate paying doctors to talk with Medicare patients about their health care options if they become terminally ill. Her critique worked. The provision to pay doctors for the time involved to talk about end-of-life care for older Americans was dropped from the health reform bill.

But it has come back, this time in the form of regulations to be issued on Jan. 1 by the Department of Health and Human Services. If an elderly person is offered a chance to do advance care planning by their doctor and wants to do so, then Medicare will pay the doctor for the time involved.

Some conservatives and right-to-lifers see rationing afoot. They think encouraging these discussions is simply a way to get old folks to save the federal government money by slyly tricking them into saying that they don't want a lot of medical care if they are terminally ill. Not only are they wrong, they are dead wrong.

Talking with your doctor about what you want to happen and who you want to make decisions for you if you become terminally ill is something every American, young and old, should do.

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