Healthcare: Americans wary of Congress

The more I read about O'Bama's rush to pass healthcare legistation the more I realize he has no idea about it. This also applies to Pelosi. What is the rush? Let's do it right the first time rather than having to go back and try and fix it which could take years. But O'Bama and Pelosi really don't care since they have their own healthcare coverage. I encourage everyone to contact their Senators and Representative asking them to not vote until they ( and us ) know what's really in O'Bama's bill.

> 44,230 more people are losing health coverage each week.

> 191,670 more people are losing health coverage each month.

> 2.3 million more people are losing health coverage each year

Republicans know that a successful health care reform that achieves universal coverage will bury them electorally for a generation. Health Insurers and their Lobbyists and Big Pharma know that a powerful public option and a Medicare bargaining for prices will kick them off the gravy train permanently. Republicans and Big Insurance Company propagandists know their scare tactics aren't nearly as scary as reality for the large majority of Americans.

With the Republican smear-the-public-option campaign---designed by Wingnut mouth-breather Frank Luntz---in full swing, here's a handy, crystal-clear rebuttal you can print out and leave on windshields and utility poles (and even in emergency rooms!) across America:

5 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT PRESIDENT OBAMA'S PUBLIC HEALTH INSURANCE OPTION

1. Choice, choice, choice. If the public health insurance option passes, Americans will be able to choose between their current insurance and a high-quality, government-run plan similar to Medicare. If you like your current care, you can keep it. If you don't—or don't have any—you can get the public insurance plan.

2. It will be high-quality coverage with a choice of doctors. Government-run plans have a track record of innovating to improve quality, because they're not just focused on short-term profits. And if you choose the public plan, you'll still get to choose your doctor and hospital.

3. We'll all save a bunch of money. The public health insurance option won't have to spend money on things like CEO bonuses, shareholder dividends, or excessive advertising, so it'll cost a lot less. Plus, the private plans will have to lower their rates and provide better value to compete, so people who keep their current insurance will save, too.

4. It will always be there for you and your family. A for-profit insurer can close, move out of the area, or just kick you off their insurance rolls. The public health insurance option will always be available to provide you with the health security you need.

5. And it's a key part of universal health care. No longer will sick people or folks in rural communities, or low-income Americans be forced to go without coverage. The public health insurance plan will be available and accessible to everyone. And for those struggling to make ends meet, the premiums will be subsidized by the government.

It might not hurt to give your senators a jingle and ask 'em which they embrace more: campaign contributions from the big insurance lobby and Frank Luntz's Republican propaganda, or historic legislation that will enhance their legacy and make them heroes among their constituents for improving the health and well-being of all Americans. Be patient---sadly, it could take some of 'em a while to decide.

We all remember the commercials that were made by Republicans and their pals at the Big Insurance Industry to trick Americans into thinking that health care reform would hurt average working families. We now see what has happened to the health-care system. CEOs rake in the big bucks from the huge profits they take in as health-insurance costs have skyrocketed.

FierceHealthcare reports the following top 10 CEO salaries for 2008:
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* Ron Williams - Aetna - Total Compensation: $24,300,112.
* H. Edward Hanway - CIGNA - Total Compensation: $12,236,740.
* Angela Braly - WellPoint - Total Compensation: $9,844,212.
* Dale Wolf - Coventry Health Care - Total Compensation: $9,047,469.
* Michael Neidorff - Centene - Total Compensation: $8,774,483.
* James Carlson - AMERIGROUP - Total Compensation: $5,292,546.
* Michael McCallister - Humana - Total Compensation: $4,764,309.
* Jay Gellert - Health Net - Total Compensation: $4,425,355.
* Richard Barasch - Universal American - Total Compensation: $3,503,702.
* Stephen Hemsley - UnitedHealth Group - Total Compensation: $3,241,042.

My rates go up and coverage goes down every time I turn around. And then they just decide not to cover certain medications without an explanation. Even scumbag criminals are resurfacing like Rick Scott to try and con America for a second time -- and the corporate media does nothing about it.
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http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/dont-let-third-way-ben-nelsons-or-repub

Republicans are right about healthcare in America. Who cares if some people don't have access to healthcare?!?!

We don't need to concern ourselves with that. Poor and Middle-Class people simply do not matter. Forget about them.

We should only be concerned about what is best for the wealthy business owner. If 15% of the population don't have health insurance it only makes things better for the wealthy old Republican white guys, that's a small price to pay. I'm sure Rush Limbaugh is with me in saying that if the number of uninsured went up to 30% or even 50% that simply is nothing any of us should be bothered by. It is, in fact probably a goal we pasty white Republican rich guys should be working toward. Why should your employer pay for you to have health insurance? The big business CEO's would do better if they didn't, and that's all that matters. I'm sure those guys, like me, have demanded that their employer terminate their health insurance coverage, for the good of the company. We must all join with them in our sacred goal: healthcare for the few white rich guys, sacrifice for everyone else.

WaPo/ABC poll:

54% of Americans support a government run option paid for by taxes on the rich (the very same rich people whom the BushCo Republicans gave tax cuts to the last eight years while everyone else was left to drown in debt).
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/polls/postpoll_072009.html

That's a damning statistic and indictment against any claim that the Republican party is a national party. They only act in the narrow interests of their own small, local electorate, never what's in the best interests of the national party.

And the interests of the national party and the interests of those rigid, ideologue, conservative Republicans are opposed to each other.

The only Republicans left are extremists in extremely Republican states (excepting perhaps Maine) and their extremely Republican, conservative electorate doesn't line up with the American electorate.

Republican Congressman who oppose universal health insurance should immediately relinquish their federal health insurance. After all, these members of Congress have long enjoyed taxpayer-subsidized health insurance, a privilege that they apparently believe tens of millions of working, uninsured Americans and their families don't deserve.

If Republicans don't think being uninsured is a big deal, then they should go right ahead and try it out. And if they really believe a public plan is such a bad option, maybe they can persuade their parents to give up Medicare too.

On this healthcare I say Congress, you try it out first along with your families.

The size scope and variations of reform before Congress lead one to believe that our representatives (such as Pelosi) can't talk this thing into being even if they wanted to, yesterday or today. Looking back, it was always akin to an empty campaign promise and political posturing. How long did it take from it being a pipe dream to a camping promise alone? It's easier to say, "everyone must have healthcare," than pining down what that entails. Did we honestly think that the Democrats would just ram it through? Impossible if we consider first and foremost any bill is about your ability to keep your own seat warm come re-election. A reform this size? No way. Did it work for Hillarycare? Don't be fooled. We are no more receptive to the idea than before when the details begin to iron out. We can spend money at the drop of a hat to help out big business (people lose faith in Congress) or authorize war on someone else's soil (people lose faith in Congress), but when it comes to changing the way our country operates, concerns the people who pay for everything in the end (people lose faith in Congress)... I think it is quite accurate to point out how long we have talked about reform in the past, and how complex the issue really is in general. There is no way that things like like taxing the rich, mandating the poor or else, a pubic option (feared by private sector), or a cut off point at 88,000/4 (for subsidizing) will just zap into reality. Something is bound to run into something else. Someone will have a bone to pick with someone else. Particularly how much the public is willing to give inorder to get. I guess we will see in "September."

Mark Silva,

You could have stppoed at "Are the people smarter than Congress ...?"

Terri,

What about democratic congressman that oppose universal health insurance, should they have to relinquish their health insurance also?

All those Congressman that vote for universal health care should give up their gold-plated health insurance and use the universal health care that Congress wants to subjuect the masses to. For example, that would mean when Teddy Kennedy had his brain tumor a while back, he wouldn't have got medical care at Duke University, he would have been put in line at the Boston public hospital.

Lucifer,

Try again on that polling:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/business/healthcare/july_2009/53_now_oppose_congressional_health_care_reform

101,000 Americans die UNNECESSARILY each year because of lack of access to basic medical care that they would get in most other industrialized nations.
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http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/Publications/In-the-Literature/2008/Jan/Measuring-the-Health-of-Nations--Updating-an-Earlier-Analysis.aspx

I keep asking my "Canada bashing" kool-aid drinking Wingnut friends to find me just ONE comprehensive poll in Canada showing that Canadians would swap their health care system, warts and all, for ours...Haven't seen any yet.

And believe me, if there were any polls favorable to the Republican cause of denying healthcare to everyone, the Republican minions would be linking to them all day long. Instead, all they have is a handfull of anecdotes that they got from Druggy Limbaugh and Glenn Beck etc.

Republicans know that a successful health care reform that achieves universal coverage will bury them electorally for a generation. Health insurers and Big Pharma know that a powerful public option and a Medicare bargaining for prices will kick them off the gravy train permanently. Republicans and Big Insurance Company propagandists know their scare tactics aren't nearly as scary as reality for the large majority of Americans.

Ask yourself this:

If your employer announced that you were going to be laid off tomorrow because of the economy, and that if you wanted to continue your insurance coverage by COBRA, it would cost of $915 a month (the average cost), how long would you be able to keep yourself and your family covered? Nationally, COBRA coverage costs around 83% of the average unemployment benefit....and that's just fine with the angry old rich white guys who make up the Republican party, but the rest of us here in the real world can't afford it.
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http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09010/940941-28.stm

The insurance crisis could be your problem, tomorrow, through no fault of your own, as it has for millions of hard working americans in the last few months.

Republican Corporate-Sponsored "Patients United Now" - A Big Insurance Industry Lobbying Group, Funded With GOP Dollars, Is Trying To Kill The National Healthcare Plan For Poor And Middle-Class Americans:

After orchestrating and funding the so-called "Tea Parties" movement, "Americans for Prosperity" — a nationwide front group founded and funded by the right-wing polluter Koch Industries — is launching an ad campaign characterizing President Obama’s effort to reform the health care system as a government take-over that will ration care and care and deny treatments.

"Americans for Prosperity" is notorious for its fake Republican grassroots efforts, funneling millions of dollars into conservative campaigns designed to undermine public initiatives. As Lee Fang put it, “AFP is a professional Republican AstroTurf machine”:

~ They Hosted ‘Drill Baby, Drill’ rallies around the country.

~ They Financed Joe the Plumber’s tour against the Employees’ Free Choice Act and other anti-EFCA rallies.

~ They Started NoStimulus.com, “a grassroots website that we hope will be a focal point for the widespread frustration ordinary Americans feel at the runaway government growth that we see during good economic times and bad.”

Now, they're operating under the name "Patients United Now, Americans for Prosperity", (which is mostly funded by large multinational corporations) and they're masquerading as an organic grassroots movement pretending to be "outraged" over the Presidents health care proposals.

The effort provides cover or ‘grassroots clout’ for conservative politicians and activists to oppose the President’s health care initiative. But this collection of trumped-up charges, outright lies and complete fabrications makes little headway in critiquing the President’s actual proposal." Just like all other peddlers of the “government take-over” critique — Frank Luntz, Conservatives for Patients Rights, Betsy McCaughey, Rick Scott and Sally Pipes — the goal is to define Obama’s proposal in their terms rather than to engage in a debate about health care or offer real solutions to the crisis. As Frank Luntz admitted to the New York Times, “we don’t know what he is proposing".
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http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2009/05/27/pun/

I'm sick of listening to Republicans lie about our healthcare system in Canada.

Our system is excellent, NO rationing like in USA, no one sells their house if they get cancer, you don't lose your life savings if you get sick, companies don't go broke paying for employees health care. Our country is prosperous, citizens are happy, and we have lots and lots of millionaires and billionaires as well, and they are also quite happy to pay their taxes in exchange for healthcare for everyone.

"former republican," awhile ago I provided a few links about Canadians and health care. As usual for the loons on the left, yuo ignored it. I also included a link that said Americans who live in Canada prefer U.S. health care.

Anyway, even though the AP is part of the state-run media, it is still more honest than the Tribune and Mark Silva. Silva still hasn't written about the Democrats holding up health care reform. After all, the Democrats have supermajoriteis in the House and the Senate, so Republican votes aren't necessary.
Anyway, from AP:
In the House, the Democratic leadership sought to allay concerns among the rank and file, holding a five-hour briefing on the House version of the legislation, which was written without Republican support. Democratic leaders are still holding out hope of floor passage before the summer break, and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is looking at keeping the House in session some days past its scheduled Friday adjournment date.

A group of seven fiscally conservative House Democrats who have held up action in the Energy and Commerce Committee by demanding more cost savings and other changes negotiated late into the night Monday with the committee's chairman, Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif. Waxman's is the only one of three House panels with jurisdiction on the health bill that has yet to act.

Waxman made the so-called Blue Dog Democrats an offer intended to address their concerns, and they planned to meet Tuesday to decide how to answer, they said. Neither Waxman nor the leader of the rebel Democrats, Rep. Mike Ross, D-Ark., would give details on the offer. They said it touched on the 10 items in a list of demands the Blue Dogs have given Waxman, including increasing an exemption for small businesses from a requirement to provide insurance coverage, and decreasing the size of subsidies offered to poor people to help them buy care.

"We're going to review it and decide whether we feel it's something that we can accept, or whether we want to counter, or whether we believe that we should simply keep talking," Ross said.

The Blue Dogs have enough votes in the Energy and Commerce Committee to potentially block passage there, but time is running out for their negotiations with Waxman. The talks nearly broke down Friday after Waxman threatened to bypass his own committee and move the health bill straight to the floor, circumventing the Blue Dogs.

A voting session in Waxman's committee that has been on hold for a week must resume quickly, probably by Wednesday at latest, if there's any chance for the committee to pass a bill and send it to the full House for action before the summer recess. Bypassing the committee remains a last-ditch option if agreement can't be reached.

"If we're going to do the bill out of committee, this is the week," Waxman said.

In the Senate, officials stressed that no agreement has been reached on a bipartisan measure, and said there is no guarantee of one, with numerous key issues remaining to be settled.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to discuss matters under private negotiations.

They said any legislation that emerges from the talks is expected to provide for a nonprofit cooperative to sell insurance in competition with private industry, rather than giving the federal government a role in the marketplace.

Obama and numerous Democrats in Congress have called for a government option to provide competition to private companies and hold down costs, and the House bill includes one — another concern for the Blue Dogs. But one of the senators involved in the talks, Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, confirmed that co-ops are the preferred approach of the Senate Finance Committee negotiators.

Officials also said a bipartisan compromise in the Senate would not subject large companies to a penalty if they declined to offer coverage to their workers. Instead, these businesses would be required to reimburse the government for part or all of any federal subsidies designed to help lower-income employees obtain insurance on their own.

The legislation in the House includes both a penalty and a requirement for large companies to share in the cost of covering employees.

I know this would never get "Swamp Post of the Day" because it tells the true story. Something Mark Silva and his boss David Axelrod don't want known.

Congress could start with just two basic points to address the major factors in the unnecessary costs in healthcare and thus we could afford the most needed coverage for Americans (not non-citizens) and that is "catastrophic" insurance against major illness or injury. We could also afford a modest program to assist the poor, who can always receive care, so can the BS that it is not available (just not the same as those with coverage or money, but why should one expect something a responsible individual strives to achieve on their own instead of a nanny state entitlement that is gold plated as liberals believe everyone should have without any personal responsibility). By addressing medical liability (estimated at additional costs of up to 100B/yr.) and waste and fraud (estimated in Medicare alone at 32B/yr. and probably double or triple that amount if one accounts for all healthcare) one could see nearly a trillion dollars reduction in costs over 10 yrs. But that is too simple for the liberal, lefty Congress or the "redistribute the wealth" Obama. No, they want to gut our current system and dream of a gov't. run healthcare nirvana with coverage for all, better care and reduced costs and that is just impossible with our massive debt and our Federal gov't's. dismal track record of fiscal responsibility or the ability to perform without becoming a massive boondoggle of red tape and poor results. As we witness the tremendous success of Obama's and the liberal Dems. well thought out, funded, and implemented "stimulus" bill is there any wonder to distrust the disingenuous rhetoric of the Pelosi, Reid, and the Prez. on healthcare? The facts speak for themselves. There are many other fine points of reform that could be addressed but they are not in any of the Dems. bills which are in essence is nothing more than a shady, special interest, give away (yes, that is the reason for the big rush to pass one) of our private healthcare which may not be perfect but it happens to be the best in the world!

So if I have this right, congress would rather do nothing than pass something that is a start. The only thing I'd like to make sure of is that there is nothing in the bill that does not address health care; like concealed weapons or a study on lichen on the Appalachian Trail.

Congress is typified by veteran Democrat John Conyers, who stumbled into telling the truth when he vowed that he had no intention of reading the thousand-page ObamaCare Bill, or any thousand-page bill.

Conyers is at least honest about his not reading the bill. Most Democrats will vote for it without ever reading it--but won't admit it.

"Healthcare: Americans wary of Congress"


And well they should be wary. Congress no longer represents the people. They represent whoever ponies up the most campaign cash in exchange for legislated kickbacks.

Nesssie, good luck on that. Congress never passes anything without a lot of other stuff that's just along for the ride, like remoras on a shark.

The American Medical Association (AMA) knows firsthand the devastating effects of our broken health care system. As the nation's largest physician organization, we feel it is imperative to take this opportunity to formally reiterate to you our commitment to meaningful health system reform. Progress has been made and common ground exists, but there are still difficult issues that must be resolved. We believe it is time for results, not rhetoric. America's patients and physicians deserve better. More information can be found at our health system reform resources community at www.ama-assn.org/go/reform.

Too bad the real solution is not even on the table;
Single payer.