By: Jane Hamsher Monday July 13, 2009 10:08 am

Rep. John Boccieri (OH-16) tells Mike Stark he "likes to consider himself progressive." He refers to a public plan a "patients’ option," but when Mike asks him if he’ll vote against a plan that doesn’t have one, all he’ll say is that he’ll "look at the bill," and that we’ve "got to address health care now."

Boccieri walked the plank over the ACES bill, and is now getting slammed for it by the NRCC. According to The Hill, Boccieri says there’s "a little fear" among his coinstituents of a government-run plan. And he says that his feeling is that "there’s enough money in the system already."

I wonder if there is a lot of trust among people in his district for private insurance companies? Because that’s what they’re going to be stuck with without a public plan. And it looks like Boccierri will vote for something that is under-funded and won’t really do anything to help middle class people.

Boccieri Ohio office: (330) 754-0534. DC office: (202) 225-3876.

11 Comments

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11 Responses to “Boccieri Won’t Say What He Thinks About Bailing Out Insurance Companies”

tejanarusa July 13th, 2009 at 10:24 am

Morning, Jane!

I am getting pretty sick of these idjits who weasel on public option, then go on to say “we’ve got to address health care now.” !!!!

How do they get this mentality that passing something, no matter how bad and useless, is better than passing something that will actually work? I just don’t get it. Grrr.

btw, I love this project, tracking them down one by one!

dakine01 July 13th, 2009 at 11:38 am

In response to tejanarusa @ 1

It allows them to pretend to do something so they won’t be tagged as a “do-nothing” Congress.

Then they can take their camapaign contributions and go home.

fatster July 13th, 2009 at 12:05 pm

Neat interview synopsis with Howard Dean, including (of course) info on the public option, etc.

http://tinyurl.com/mtlv37

ratfood July 13th, 2009 at 12:12 pm

Boccieri says there’s “a little fear” among his constituents of a government-run plan.

More than a little fear if as I suspect he counts private insurance companies as his “constituents.”

sporkovat July 13th, 2009 at 12:25 pm

In response to ratfood @ 4

yes, and those “constituents”, the private insurance companies. are capable of withdrawing support and working for his opponent, and they fork over lots of cash.

the progressive netroots, on the other hand, does not have that much cash, and can be taken for granted as never supporting a party other than the Democrats!!

so, what is a self-interested, devoid of principle Democratic politician to do, hmmmm?

booyah July 13th, 2009 at 12:29 pm

Hi Jane… I have a suggestion… your site is the “go-to” place for healthcare updates for me… I also check kos as well and just helped out with filling out the Tricommittee Spreadsheet…

Could you have permanent place for the healthcare posts? One place where all the healthcare updates are kept?

That would really be great. Thanks if you can do that.

Also, could you explain a little bit about the Tricommittee… what they will be doing? I’m inferring that three committees will be marking up the House healthcare legislation. What’s the schedule? How will it work?

And, finally, I’m wondering how the House version and the two Senate versions (assuming they actually COME UP with a version) will be combined… how does that work?

Thanks so much for being the boots on the ground for this movement… I held a moveon rally (about 70 people attended! lots of signs, honking horns, etc) at Sen Bingaman’s office in Santa Fe last week… he says he supports the public option but I have seen no firm details from him. He seems to dance around the issue. But it felt good to call him to task publically with lots o’ other folks.

Jane Hamsher July 13th, 2009 at 12:49 pm

In response to tejanarusa @ 1

Thanks, I love this project too. Very excited about it and really appreciate your support.

Jane Hamsher July 13th, 2009 at 12:51 pm

In response to booyah @ 6

Thank you. I think you’re right, we need a “healthcare” tag or something that people can access — not sure how to do it.

TriCommittee — three committees marking up the bill. Education & Labor, Ways & Means, Transportation & Commerce. We think it will start on Wednesday but don’t know how long it will go for, could be two weeks.

Got any pictures of the MoveOn rally? You should totally post those on The Seminal and send me a link.

Elliott July 13th, 2009 at 12:52 pm

In response to Jane Hamsher @ 8