The word is that President Obama is tired of no progress on health insurance reform. He's said everything is on the table to the chagrin of his Party. He's been on the circuit debunking the bull that is being spread about the 1,100 pages that is really nothing more than a few dead trees.
In September an up or down vote will supposedly be called. It will be a party line vote. A few Republicans may cross over. A few Democrats may also. Who cares. It probably isn't going anywhere anyway. This just gives both sides more nonsense to throw at each other as to why there is no health care reform.
Bipartisanship is over rated anyway. It got us into an invasion and occupation of Iraq from which there is seemingly no end. Whenever a vote comes up to stop funding the occupation Congress bipartisanly votes to keep it going.
A particularly silly example of bipartisan idiocy was the No Child Left Behind bill. Bush. Kennedy and all the rest of them stood on a stage congratulating each other on the wonderful bipartisan thing they just did to save our children. They got them tested anyway. Shock of shocks. Kids from inner city schools and broken homes didn't test as well. But bipartisanship won the day and our children continue to be tested. I don't know if any of them are doing better because Bush and Kennedy got a great photo op.
There comes a time when the bowl is full and you have to flush. Why wait until September. The Nation voted for change. The Republicans will not be part of it. At least not openly. They have to remain the loyal opposition. Get to work now on a universal health insurance bill and bring that to a vote this September. Or whenever it's ready. October. November. Who cares as long as it's right.
President Obama's poll numbers are down because he's not governing like a Democrat. He's losing many in the Party and many Independents that voted for change because he's working for the unrealistic goal of unity and bipartisanship. Bipartisanship is all well and good when the enemy is a foreign invader. The enemy now is fear of change. Millions have no health insurance and for some reason, they fear having it under a system they aren't familiar with.
We are America. We can make this system better than any other country's. We can make our businesses more competitive by removing the burden of health insurance expense from them and all of us sharing it. This is our time to stand together and show the world we care about each other. We will not be fooled by those that would cry out the word "socialism" every time a new idea is spoken. Selfishness and unchecked greed do not become our Great Nation.
22 comments:
I'm the first one to get behind President Obama but he has to sack up and drop these obstructionist losers on either side of the aisle and push some real reforms home. Bipartisanship sounds great on paper but when the other side has declared that they're against you no matter what you just have to drop them stone cold and ram your agenda home.
You people are as rational as children who refuse to grow up.
What happened to you Matt? There was a time you were thoughtful and produced intelligent comments. Did you just get lazy and decide it's easier to call people socialists?
Truth,
At the risk of being called a name caller, this plan is as well done as cash for clunkers. Here we have a giveaway that seems foolproof if you think giving away other people's money is a good thing. The government has managed to mess this one up as well.
The paperwork is, as it is with all government, unmanageable. As the dealers have tried to realize their government provided largesse, the process is prohibitive and they can't get their cash. Many ended the program early.
On top of that, the cars being bought are from the foreign companies, not those bailed out by the government. Add this fiasco to the USPS as an example of government's inability to do anything that doesn't end up in massive debt. Cash for Clunkers? Well done government.
Good day, sir.
Truth, I know your hearts in the right place, and you care about those who don't have health care. I just don't think government control is the answer. I don't like insurance companies but I also don't trust the government. Maybe if I thought that they had our best interest at heart, I'd be a little more receptive.
I still think private insurance with government regulations like accepting pre-existing conditions is a win-win. A combination of the two, working together.
The USPS has operated effectively since Ben Franklin's time LAOT. The last I saw 97% of letters and parcels were delivered on time. The People of the USPS work hard. Their jobs are not cushy. For two centuries the Postal Service has been delivering the goods.
Jennifer: I would be amenable to either your idea of a single private entity under strict government oversite running our health insurance system. Even on a state by state level as you suggested also.
What we have now are little monopolies. Smaller communities with one hospital or network of providers starts it's own HMO and excludes other companies through price gouging. Larger communities also end up with a limited number of health insurers. It's their bureaucrats that decide who and what is covered. We had to passa law so mothers could stay in the hospital overnight after childbirth for Christ sakes. The insureres have an almost endless process of paperwork and grievance procedures claimants must go through when they feel insurers unjustly denied their claims. The law makes the claimants go through the insurance companies long and drawn out process before the state insurance commissions can even send paperwork requesting review.
The insurance companies deserve no respect or accomodation Jennifer and anyone else reading this. They are motivated only by profit. Delaying the payment of medical bills serves their purpose. The CEO's of these companies care not one bit gor your financial condition. If your claim is denied and you die waiting for them to review it, to them, that's money in the bank. I stand by this statement 100 percent.
You can vote or your Congressman. Senator and President. You can vote for your state legislators, senators and governor. You cannot vote for the CEO of your health insurance provider. I'll take my chances with the people I can vote for or against.
For what it's worth, I thought the cash for clunkers program was bullshit also LAOT. It rewarded people that hung on to old cars when people like me who average buying a car every year watch our resale value go down thanks to this ill thought out program.
You know that 20% depreciation you figured when you drove your new car off the lot before the cash for clunkers program friends? Add $4,500 to that depreciation. This program buried thousands of car buyers. And I do know a little about the car business.
"The insurance companies deserve no respect or accomodation Jennifer and anyone else reading this. They are motivated only by profit. Delaying the payment of medical bills serves their purpose. The CEO's of these companies care not one bit gor your financial condition. If your claim is denied and you die waiting for them to review it, to them, that's money in the bank. I stand by this statement 100 percent."
I couldn't agree more, Truth! The insurance companies are a huge part of the problem! I think that is where government needs to step in and lay down some rules!
Jennifer,
The problem with the government "laying down rules" is that large corporations, i.e., insurance companies spend millions of dollars to lobby Congress to get rules to benefit them.
Part of our financial melt down occurred because of the successful lobbying of Congress by vested interests to allow junk mortgages and other banking irregularities to be allowed by changing the law.
TRUTH 101,
The only time you should have anything to do with a diningroom table is when you need to eat off of it.
There no use in talking to one.
Shaw, what worries me is that if Congress supports special interests, then government run insurance, will face the same thing. There will be nobody to monitor what they do.
How can things be worse than they are now Jennifer? As yuo have found out, your insurance was neither gaurenteed or portable.
Shaw: Can't a guy have a little fun?
...the 1,100 pages that is really nothing more than a few dead trees.
You're referring to the pages that the supporters of the bill haven't really read and can't honestly defend once we read the actual words (the exaggerations aside)?
It's a rarity that the anything this large and assembled this quickly can ever be a good plan (like (Taxpayer) Cash for Clunkers and the last two pork bailouts).
If there were honest and open debate instead of this current process, then we might come up with something good.
Truth - I agree with some of your points here. I agree that Obama should be honest about his agenda, that he wants single payer universal health care. Then you and I can debate it reasonably. Also, I agree with your points on NCLB. My wife is a teacher and has pointed me to the many disparities and ineptitude of this law. She worked in a low economic area of CA and frankly NCLB was a huge obstruction in her way, an obstacle to allow her any flexibility in her classroom. The kids suffered thus and Washington could care less. Stories firsthand like this from my wife make me all the more skeptical of big-government largess and one of the many reasons I am opposed to our government, medical-care or otherwise. Sorry if that sounds like a rant.....
LCR
The points made by you and Patrick are valid as usual LCR. But this is the only government we have. And I don't know any other entity that can can reform health insurance so everyone is covered and everyone shares the cost.
Governmetnis like a gun. Used wisely, it's a great tool to keep the peace. Used unwisely, it's bad news. I'd just as soon keep my right to have a gun so I can shoot the creep breaking into my house. I'd just as soon take my chances that we can elect responsible men and women to government office who will act wisely also as leave important issues that revolve around the health, safety and economic well being of our Nation to those who's first priority is profit.
101: The only problem I see with your analogy is that our government has a track record of spending like drunken sailors at the whorehouse. Add guns into the mix, and someone's getting shot after everyone gets screwed.
We both agree in that sense that the only way that health care will be fixed is through some action of the federal government. My ideas limit them to the control of a regulator (which is a role they ineptly serve now). Your ideas require that they have to regulate themselves. And while the profit motive can produce bad results, with the proper regulations, there's at least a chance to get it right.
If the government takes over and fails, however, then we have to rely on the same unwieldy process that messed things up to fix it, without any safety net.
If your proposal is a single corporation, or perhaps regional, health insurance company along the lines of Ma Bell, I would be open to that Patrick. Rigidity is also an enemy of progress.
Truth,
I posted a comment yesterday, but somehow it was not put up. So I'll try to summarize. My problem with the USPS is not with the workers. My dad was a postal employee for 38 years.
My problem is with their inept administrators. Anyone who would do the job they're doing in most sections of the private sector, obviously some idiots on Wall Street excluded, would be fired.
Instead, they are supported by the taxpayer whose money continues to be wasted by numerous inept government agencies. My problem with government running anything is that there are too many agencies that piss away money at an alarming rate.
For the most part, private companies fail when they aren't profitable. Unless they are bailed out by our money.
GM should have been allowed to fail and file for bankruptcy, as it eventually did anyway, after of course, their mult-billion dollar bailout failed. As I said, money pissed away.
Good day, sir.
Patrick M said... The only problem I see with your analogy is that our government has a track record of spending like drunken sailors at the whorehouse.
The Republican who came up with the plan called it "starving the beast". The idea was to spend so much money that when the Democrats regained control of government there would be no money to spend on social programs.
GWB spent like a drunken sailor passing out taxpayer money to his cronies (like Haliburton) and the wealthy (while raising the taxes of almost everyone else). Reaganomics, "Supply Side", "Trickle Down" -- whatever you call it -- it is a lie used by Republicans to justify funneling money upwards.
President Obama is spending taxpayer money to stimulate the economy and get us out of the bush recession.
According to a poll conducted prior to the last presidential election, 66 percent of economists planned to vote for Barack Obama. Could it possibly be because the economy does better when Democrats are in charge?
Conservative economic policies have failed miserably. It is time we go back to a system which has been proven to work. That would be Keynesian economics, which was employed by FDR to get us out of the Republican Great Depression.
Maybe I'm wrong, although it appears as though the majority of economists agree.
BTW, I'm not claiming that Democrats aren't responsible for any wasteful spending. My point is that Republicans are the only political party which has publically stated that it is their INTENTION to bankrupt the government!
If there ever was something that we could not afford, it was the Iraq war, not national healthcare!
BTW Republicans ARE in favor of socialism. The socialism favored by Republicans is otherwise known as "corporate welfare". It is bad for the economy and is far more expensive.
101: Sorry for the lateness.
As I indicated in my post on monopolies (government and private), reducing the number of players, while gaining the advantage of economies of scale, also eliminates the incentive to trim fat from budgets. I want more players than there are now, with regulations to protect the rights of the individual. Because, like the government monopoly education, a single plan doesn't address the myriad of differences in the individual.
For example, I need major medical insurance, and that's it. No health care plans. I'm so infrequent to the doctor (1993, I think) that paying for anything more wastes my money. The dental I can handle out of pocket (despite the approximately $800 I laid out for my teeth in the last year).
Others need different things. Mandating or creating a specific minimum for anything is why costs and demand get out of control.
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