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Rahm dictates a story to David Kirkpatrick in the New York Times about the deal with the hospitals. While Obama is taking an "active role" in pushing through health care — wouldn’t want people to think he wasn’t Commander in Chief stuff — the current pickle is really all Max Baucus’s fault:
Early last month, for example, hospital officials were poised to appear at the White House to announce a deal limiting their industry’s share of the costs of the overhaul proposal when a wave of jitters swept through the group. Senator Max Baucus, the Finance Committee chairman and a party to the deal, had abruptly pulled out of the event. Was he backing away from his end of the deal?
Got that? It was "his end of the deal." Nothing to do with the White House.
Not to worry, Jim Messina, the deputy White House chief of staff, told the hospital lobbyists, according to White House officials and lobbyists briefed on the call. The White House was standing behind the deal, Mr. Messina told them, capping the industry’s costs at a maximum of $155 billion over 10 years in exchange for its political support.
Ever wonder why Messina suddenly crawled out of relative media obscurity to confirm the deal with PhRMA when Billy Tauzin was blackmailing the White House leaking to the New York Times? Now it’s Messina who reassured "lobbyists on the call." Messina is Baucus’s former Chief of Staff.
Some Democrats and industry lobbyists now argue that, in negotiating deals through Mr. Baucus’s committee with powerful health care interests, the White House was tacitly signaling as early as last spring that it might end up accepting something more modest than the government insurer the president has said he prefers.
See, the White House negotiated deals "through" Baucus.
Lobbyists for both the drug and hospital industries say that, as early as June, White House officials directed them to work out cost-saving deals with Mr. Baucus’s committee.
Are you getting it yet? Just in case it’s not crystal clear:
Drug industry lobbyists said they negotiated a deal to contribute $80 billion over 10 years toward the cost of an overhaul with Mr. Baucus, under White House supervision, before taking it to the president for final approval.
And now, pay close attention. On July 8, Biden announced that there was a deal with the hospitals — just like the one with PhRMA — where they agreed to $155 billion in cost reductions over 10 years. According to the NYT:
Several hospital lobbyists involved in the White House deals said it was understood as a condition of their support that the final legislation would not include a government-run health plan paying Medicare rates — generally 80 percent of private sector rates — or controlled by the secretary of health and human services.
Got that? The deal between the White House and the hospital lobbyists meant that a public plan could not pay medicare rates. So what happens on July 15? The Blue Dogs pitch a shit fit, because they — wait for it — don’t want a government run pay to play Medicare rates!
Quelle coincidence, wouldn’t you say? But it gets better. How does Rahm respond to the charge that the White House is bigfooting the work of the committees?
Mr. Emanuel and liberal Democrats argued that the White House had worked more closely with the Senate Finance Committee because it was stepping in to break up legislative logjams. In the same way, they said, Mr. Obama and Mr. Emanuel had personally interceded to resolve a last-minute revolt by conservative House Democrats that threatened to derail a bill in the House Energy and Commerce Committee at the end of July.
Yes and how exactly did Mr. Emanuel "resolve" that last-minute dispute in the House? By making sure the Blue Dogs got what they wanted, and that a government run plan wouldn’t be tied to Medicare rates! Why, miraculously just what Rahm Emanuel Max Baucus had negotiated with the hospitals!
[I]ndustry lobbyists say they are not worried. “We trust the White House,” Mr. Kahn said. “We are confident that the Senate Finance Committee will produce a bill we fully can endorse.”
Well I guess they feel they have reason to be confident. They no doubt have memos of their own.
And what should our takeaway be from all of this?
- When the Justice Department starts looking into pay-for-play ($150 million for $220 billion is a damn good deal) because the reckless Billy Tauzin just can’t help himself, Baucus will be cannon fodder.
- If there’s blowback onto the White House, it’s all Messina’s fault.
- Rahm is working through the Blue Dogs to get the House bill to conform to the Senate Finance bill.
- Anyone who thinks the White House is going to bring all these people to the table and cut all these deals, just to fuck everybody over in conference needs to be in rehab.
Is Messina going to be a good soldier and take one for the team? Well Rahm’s definitely setting him up. We may well find out.
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We’ll make it all better in conference!
1 payah 4 evah!
Jane – I think this may be your best post ever. We were talking over on KOS about who was going to take the fall because we knew President Obama had already chewed Rahm a new ass. Also, how long was it going to take before the set-up started – well now we know. Rahm ain’t going down without taking a few with him.
Also, of note Axelrod is going on vacation starting Friday so he will be out of the way as the shit begins to strike the rotating blades.
dr.fatman, I think you may be a bit too optimistic on that because I don’t think Rahm went off on the reservation on the PHRMA deal, and that President Obama knew about the PHRMA deal. If he didn’t want the PHRMA deal to happen, or didn’t want the Blue Dogs to weaken health reform, then he would’ve done something about it.
Well, Rahm can “say” who owns it all he wants, but if Health Care Reform turns out to be Insurance Company Bailout, in the minds of the American people who are going to get el foctado, Obama is going to own it. Most of us don’t understand and don’t care about Rahm’s DC inside baseball. We care about results. If Obama and his team don’t deliver the results they promised, the albatross is around their necks. If Obama can chew Rahm a new one, then he can certainly put his boot in Rahm’s a$$ and tell him to whip the Senate to deliver the bill Obama keeps talking about. This is nonsense, it makes me sick. I call my reps every day. I’m driving them crazy. I think my Sen. Brown gets it. He promises a strong public option. I just don’t understand why we have to bow and scrape and beg.
If I was on one of the other 4 committees that have voted out legislation, I would be livid. Obviously all of those efforts were window dressing, never intended to be taken seriously by the WH or the Congressional Leadership. I would be making some irate phone calls right about now. I sincerely hope that getting walked on by the WH leads to some Dem members of Congress to finally find their backbone and stand up to being used as a photo op. They have been humiliated. The question is, what will they do about it?
“If he didn’t want the PHRMA deal to happen, or didn’t want the Blue Dogs to weaken health reform, then he would’ve done something about it.”
That’s my sentiment. That BO allows all this shit to happen on his watch says much about the president (and the man) that he is. A chief executive with the kind of clout he had coming into office can do pretty much what he wants…and apparently, that’s precisely what he’s doing.
Mmmm…a tasty shit sangwich…
Sadly Obama’s failure is America’s failure. Just like Clinton’s abandoning of the working-class base led directly to W (well along with vote rigging), Obama’s shenanigans could lead to another dark age for America.
Now I understand why my local congressman has not been selling the House bill.
the minds of the American people
that’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in a while!
Medicare Part D will still appear junk for the middle class. According to this deal it will take 14 years to close the coverage gap.
I say, why do elderly and disabled people have to pay 2 sets of monthly premiums and 2 sets of yearly deductibles for one drug benefit that should have gone in Medicare Part B, an outpatient benefit in the first place.
Sign this petition http://bit.ly/drug_benefit
Join our new progressive political party
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/…..cpartyusa/
“Obama’s shenanigans could lead to another dark age for America.”
Yup. I would take exception to the word “shenanigans”, however. To me, it would appear that we’re talking about wholesale selling out of all the principles articulated during the campaign.
Does the healthcare plan include Vaseline? Oh. It’s extra? I understand…
Hear, hear. If Americans interpret this as “insurance/pharma/migMed bailout”, it will cost us dearly in 2010.
IIRC, portions of this won’t go into effect until 2013, correct?
Well yeah, I was trying not to get too worked up because ultimately it’s up to us to make the change happen.
We can whine all we want about Obama, but that’s not going to change anything. We need to do the work to affect a cultural shift that makes rational, progressive vision the norm rather than the exception.
The right has wrapped up their form of Feudalism into a nice little package and been selling it to America for years — and sadly it appears a good chunk of America has been buying.
Our job is a little easier because we don’t have to polish up a Republican turd to put into the nice packaging, but it’s still going to take a sustained, long-term marketing campaign.
These folks are too fucking cute by half and their arrogance about their abilities will screw up the entire situation. But have no fear, every one of these clowns have health insurance and if they fail it will not affect them in the least that others don’t.
drfatman @ 2,
I guess I am trying to put this statement into the context of Axelrod’s friendship with Rahm. Rahm and Axelrod are extremely close friends.
Progressives have been played. Obama and the WH have every intention of dropping the ‘public option’.
The President and Emmanuel play politics the ‘Chicago Way.’ Are you really surprised?
Did Obama actually ever promise single payer in the general election? NO.
The ‘public option’ has been exposed as nothing less than a transition to single payer and Blue Dogs will not support it. Their constituents are overwhelmingly opposed to it. It is too expensive, and too intrusive.
Obama has been giving lip service to progressives in order to get elected. Now he has joined forces with big business and strike a deal that is best for HIM and best for BIG BUSINESS. The President is ultimate consolidator of power for the monied interests in DC/Wall Street.
Blue Dogs are the key to Obama’s congressional majority, and he will not ‘bite the hand that feeds’ him.
He puts on a good show for progressives though, demonizing the insurance companies (as they have yet to ‘play’) and the doctors. He allows the ‘out of touch’ elites in Congress demonize the opposition in any and every manner possible. But it is NOT playing well with the majority of Americans who see nothing new in the corrupt politics of Chicago now entrenched in the White House.
When will progressives realize that they have more in common with the anti-big government protesters than they do with the man in the White House who fanicies himself more a “Daley on steroids” than ‘man of the people’?
BO stinks. This is the proof.
Congress writes the laws, not the White House. We can continue to concentrate our efforts to pressure the lawmakers.
Apparently, Rahm never heard that the buck stops on the President’s desk. Someone should give him the memo. The President himself owns this bill; good, bad or indifferent.
Bmaz has a brand new post ready for our consumption: “21st Century Hate”
The issue, IMO, isn’t that Rahm, et. al. were blaming others (successfully). The problem is that their idea of reform is half-assed insurance reform.
Is it not clear to the President that real healthcare reform would place them next to Roosevelt in history books? Not to mention that it would make them wildly popular.
DEATH WARS PART IV
It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire and its leader, Darth Bama. During the battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR (aka Health Care Reform), an armored space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet. Darth Bama plans to test the DEATH STAR on the peaceful planet of Elderon in less than 24 hours.
Pursued by the Empire’s sinister agents, Princess Sarah races home aboard her starship, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her old people and restore freedom to the galaxy….
How can you possibly have single “1payah” when the
whitehouse has “o” control over the pharma’s and hospitals
If you can’t control cost, your lost
You cannot make a persuasive, rational argument for a progressive vision by demonizing and seeking to marginalize the anti-big government/anti-big business bailout taxpayers who are raising their voices in protest over the Washington/Wall Street axis that is bleeding taxpayers dry.
Taxpayers are slowly being robbed of their economic and personal liberty. When the entrepreneurs, the creators of wealth and jobs are taxed into the mediocrity, the needy will not be ‘elevated’. The once successful will join the ranks of those dependent on a central government in collusion with business, for their ‘general welfare.’
Congress must limit the size and scope of the federal government, not expand it.
Czars in every cabinet post, unaccountable to Congress. Presidential signing statements. Closed door deals, pay to play, quid pro quo with big business paying for advertising that promotes a plan favorable to their interests.
The ‘Chicago Way’ is NOT the ‘American Way.’
Geez, wildly popular with whom? Obama payed all the scenarios out long before he thought about running for office; it just ain’t happening. What gets me is that “progressives” regergitate that you’re so intelligent (self-proclaimed), but what, it’s hard to see the forest for the trees?
Eventually everything swings back to the norm.
People angry over the housing, and bank debacle,
due to congress’s ineptness, wanted major
change, any change, it didn’t matter.
Now they have come to realize
that they still don’t trust the government and do not
want it intervening in our lives.
“Progressives have been
playedass raped.”Fixed it for ya.
I still don’t get it….wait a minute I think I’m gettin’ it now, umm it just doesn’t feel like I thought it would.
It is now clear why congressional leadership and the WH enabled Baucus to totally control the legislative process, leaving the House and the other Senate committees looking like saps. Allowing Baucus/Grassley to hijack (delay) the process and sending members of Congress to their districts with no specific plan to sell was a coup for the insurance industry and the wingnuts. Thanks for making it all crystal clear.
This comes as Richard Holbrooke brilliantly defines “success” in Afghanistan: “We’ll know it when we see it.”
And Elizabeth Warren announces publicly what most of us already know: The “recovery” is a mirage. The bad assets are still there, lurking on bank balance sheets. They’ve just been papered over with creative accounting. Meanwhile, on the ground, big bonuses are back on Wall Street while people continue to lose their jobs and their homes.
Now we have clarity on both foreign domestic policy. There’s change you can believe in.
Running for office takes one set of skills (and cojones). Governing effectively calls for a different set. When political operatives dictate policy and process you just get endless cycles of high-minded rhetoric and political gridlock.
Obama now says he’ll pass health care reform even if it means a one-term Presidency (TPM today). Ironically, his staff is leading him toward a failed heath-care program and a failed Presidency. His own instincts toward moderation don’t help. But his apparent belief that his personal awesomeness will transcend the bitter partisanship of the right, and bring everyone to the table to reason together seems to be his tragic flaw. (see Krugman on that)
Hunh?
…Popular with the 76% of the country that wants real healthcare reform that brings the United States in line with the rest of the developed world.
As for the forest and trees part of your comment, I really don’t even understand what your point is.
“And Elizabeth Warren announces publicly what most of us already know: The “recovery” is a mirage. The bad assets are still there, lurking on bank balance sheets. They’ve just been papered over with creative accounting. Meanwhile, on the ground, big bonuses are back on Wall Street while people continue to lose their jobs and their homes.”
Elizabeth Warren for President – 2012
It’s still the Congress that writes the bill.
Do you think Obama would veto a single-payer bill like HR 676?
It’s nice to be all insidey about all of this inside the Beltway stuff, but we still have the task of building support far outside DC. Those folks in 35% D and 40% D districts who supported Obama can be mobilized if we only have the personal networks to do it. And some of those folks are on blogs in the lefty blogosphere in order to keep connected.
It’s important to have open eyes about how Washington works, but we must find a way for that not to put a wet blanket on action. And what we’ve seen from FDL is significant push for action.
Actually while you where focused on the insurance industry,
thanks to Pelosi, the hospital and pharma industries have been working their
deals with the White House. Any kind of reform will be totally
watered down
Clever…and true. Just remember, the Empires loses in this morality tale.
Libertarians are like everyone else. They don’t want government in their lives, except when they do. It is not the size of government that is important. It is big and it will stay big. It is its effectiveness that counts.
I am interested in solutions that work. That is why hooking up with teabaggers and libertarians is such a bad idea. Yes, they are against what we are seeing but either they have no solutions or the ones they propose are even more insane than the current machinations in Congress.
It is because I favor effective practical solutions that I have been a consistent critic of both Bush and Obama. What Obama is doing now in healthcare is what he has done on every other major policy initiative. He makes a speech invoking change. He then immediately starts pulling back and the end product is not Democratic, liberal, or progressive, but essentially a conservative one. Not perhaps something as conservative as what Bush would have done, but something that even Bush could have lived with.
I couldn’t agree more.
Exactly.
Are we there yet?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S…..ig_project
1. Enthusiasm,
2. Disillusionment,
3. Panic and hysteria,
4. Search for the guilty,
5. Punishment of the innocent, and
6. Praise and honor for the nonparticipants.
I suspect this is not the reason:
“own instincts toward moderation don’t help”
my perception is Obama knows if he’s perceived as “an angry black man” hell loose all effectiveness immediately. His moderation looks to me like a learned or practiced response.
Obama, like all presidents is retired. The job, or the race he won, is running for President. Being president is the prize, and he is done. His career is over. The rest of his life can be spent at ease.
Then repeal the 16th amendment to the constitution.
Nothing new. Tell the people what they think they want to hear to get
elected. Than govern from the middle. You have to realize
the country is about 50% conservative.
from Matt Tabibi, on July 28:
yep! and the clear takeaway is, Vote Democratic No Matter What, ’cause it’s working so well!
Baucus scheduled 20 townhalls back in June when the Senate was on break. He personally attended none of them – just his staff with a video message from him.
Well, did did he personally any meetings on this break??
You betcha’! He went straight to a private wine and appetizer laden ballroom at a Holiday Inn, to speak to “members of Missoula’s medical community.”
What did they want to talk about? Tort reform and “government intrusion”.
The Left wants to solve the entire health care problem, while Baucus and Co. want only their interests looked to. Period
Fuck Baucus and the Finance Comittee and let’s move on. Who really cares about them?
Rahm knows damn well that if this fails – it’s Obama who will pay.
And Rahm, the appointment we were most worried about, will be blamed for that.
We do not have the money to pay for single payer. The ’stimulus bill’, TARP II, corporate bailouts and takeovers, current unfunded liabilities, and shrinking tax revenues make any other reform that requires even more taxation and debt has become intolerable to the American people.
Higher taxes are an anathema to Americans. Spending more than you bring in in income flies in the face of common sense. It is part of our national character. ‘Intolerable acts’ that place too much burden on the overall population for the benefit of a few is now being roundly opposed.
The entrenched ‘elites’ in Washington who have put their own interests ahead of the people they represent are headed for a rude awakening come 2010.
Jefferson, speaking in support of the French Revolution said, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
Thank God Americans have the ballot box in place of a guillotine.
As we have seen, downsizing, streamlining increase efficiency in business. The same hold true for government. Corporate profits (those NOT bailed out by the federal government)are up and productivity has increased recently. Why? Because in order for those businesses to stay viable and compete, they have restructured to adapt to the current economic reality. Our government is collapsing under its own weight, just like AIG, GM, etc.
Big government must be allowed to fail. The American people must put an end to runaway spending and entitlements it can no longer afford.
I think you misunderstand the anger among libertarians and conservative, as well as moderates and independents. Their anger is directed at big government intervention at the expense of taxpaying citizens. No on believes that they are immune from the heavy taxation is coming this way. The ‘rich’ are a finite resource and they alone cannot sate the appetite of the behemoth that has become the federal government.
The President is doing what he is always done, he is a ‘blank slate’, an enigma, he does this as a means to advance himself. How else do you account for the fact that progressives believed him to be ‘one of them’, while moderates proclaimed him to be one of their own?
Obama is not ‘an angry black man’. He has no passion beyond his own ambition.
Where in his experience and record point to any passion, any conviction, any core? Or were you looking at a mirage?
An overwhelming majority of Americans want to see unspent ’stimulus’ money returned to them. I’d be happy with THAT. The ’stimulus’ was nothing more than a payoff to states and supporters.
Pay for play is the modus operandi of the Obama administration.
#6 comes in 2010. Those who voted against the ’stimulus’, corporate bailouts, cap and trade, and health insurance reform will survive the election in 2010.
Never letting a ‘crisis go to waste’ the Machiavellian Rahm Emmanuel at the right hand of PBO has overplayed his hand.
Interesting take. I agree on the moderation, that it is a learned behavior which, given his gifts, has been very successful. Until now he has operated primarily in arenas where rational thought could get at least a toehold. But his law review days are over. Time now for street basketball skills and unyielding toughness. Enough pop psych.
Your take on the Presidency is stunningly cynical. If it was really all over after the election, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know it. Like the fly that continues to struggle vainly while the spider spins its death-web? Or more like Robert Redford in “The Candidate”?
I’m sticking with the tragic flaw, though.
I’m getting a little tired of righties quoting Jefferson out of context in the effort to thinly cloak in patriotism their threats of violence. The guy with the gun in the thigh holster outside Obama’s NH town hall had a poster with the same quote. It’s time for you folks to turn down the heat on your rhetoric. You are going to incite some nut to go McVeigh.
How Americans self-identify is misleading. I would think half would call themselves moderate. If you look at what policies they support, they come out more liberal.
In any case, even if we accepted the statement that 50% of Americans are conservative, that does not mean that a policy that is 50% conservative or policies that are conservative 50% of the time will actually work. The problem with modern conservatism today is that most of their solutions don’t work, and not just that, but fail catastrophically.
American want reform that will cover the uninsured, protect those with pre-exisiting conditions, while lowering cost and preserving what they have now. This is an unattainable goal. The rest of the developed world has shown that there is a trade off to be made. Universal coverage, consumer protections and price controls mean HIGHER TAXES FOR ALL and or cuts in benefits and coverage. The President and Congress are trying to ‘hide the ball’ on these facts but NO ONE is buying it.
If 74% want single payer, how do you reconcile that number with the 85% to like their current plan?
You really don’t know anything about economics and you tend to speak, a la David Brooks, for the American people without backing up your assertions with, you know, evidence. Glenn Greenwald has done posts where he debunks these ideas that taxes are anathema to Americans. His research found that Americans are willing to pay taxes, even higher taxes, if they feel their money is being well spent or for something they want.
Robert Redford in “The Candidate” is an excellent analogy, however, Redford’s character displayed passion and compassion. Can the same be said for Obama?
I’ll gladly pay higher taxes to drastically reduce the insurance premiums that will sink my new business–and double its overhead–if there is no public option that I can use.
85 percent of the people who like their plan are perfectly healthy and have not had to go up against the insurance companies. Further, just because someone is satisfied with their insurance plan does not mean that they do not support lower cost and better service.
Because many do not understand what their current plan is. Some are just grateful that they have a plan. But why they would want something else is probably because we all understand how easily we could lose current health coverage, through a move, a loss of a job, a death, or a divorce.
And I would submit that a lot of people who like their plan will watch and see what happens with a public plan and want to switch if it saves them money and they receive the same care. Why is it that anyone would not consider value for money for health care. The insurance and medical industry has brainwashed us that more expensive means better.
the rest of Tabibi’s piece is perhaps worth a reread, considering some still profess to be surprised at the Democrats approach to healthcare reform:
one great functions parts of the progressive blogosphere serves is to validate the charade, and pretend that the Democrats do care, oh so very much, but they ‘don’t have the votes’ or ‘don’t have the spines’ and they really want what is best for us, but they just can;t seem to do it right now, the poor little feebles, because of those meanie blue dogs, or the ‘political climate’ or whatever.
the Blue Dog faction owns and operates the Democratic Party – voting (D) means voting for them.
We are not as far apart as you think. I would agree, that higher taxes, if well spent, are widely supported by taxpayers. Taxation that provides for the ‘general welfare’ of the citizenry is tolerated, be even lauded.
But I think that PBO and Congress have overreached and we have reached a tipping point with regards to higher taxes.
To be sure, growing federal deficits due to the entitlement expansion and TARP under Bush (as well as the cost of the ongoing wars) started the march towards intolerable levels of taxation, but TARP II, corporate bailouts, the ’stimulus’ and cap and trade have only heightened anxiety.
Americans want Congress and the administration to focus on the economy and promote private sector job creation. If savings are to be found in reforming Medicare…do it now. The rest can wait.
As plenty of people already pointed out, the deal, whatever it actually specifically contained, is unfortunately a continuation of more of the same. The singularly misguided initial choice of continuing Bush’s too-big-to-fail™ protection of banks, including putting in Rubinites into controlling positions, has lead to decisions to negotiate private deals that we passive participants are simply supposed to hope are good enough.
The current deal if true, is a classic example of poor negotiating skills. A promise made by an loose amalgamation of big Pharma to cut future profits by some number between $0 and $80 billion is equal to at best zero. The promise is kept by simply inflating the price that occurred by an inflated differential. “Yeah we were going to raise the cost of aspirin by $20 billion but we didn’t. So that’s one deal. How much more do we owe?” The number might has well be $80 trillion since the value is self-determined and unverifiable. Any deal that trades away externally verified cost-cutting based on verifiable current versus future costs is a complete waste of time. All the worse if it means giving up even trying to reign in spiraling costs.
Either a real public option, unlike the ones being floated which simply seemed designed to put even more money into the hands of the insurance companies, including serious attempts to reduce across the board costs or a single-payer scheme based on Medicare with opt out provisions for those who can afford more. The current stew of half-thought out ways to increase the covered pool and not control costs is pretty much worse than no deal at all unless you make your money from other people’s illnesses.
My sense is that those who think that a bunch of bad decisions attempting to make health care more affordable will be fixed with enough future scrutiny have not been watching the bank bailouts very closely.
Yes. Some reform is needed to protect small businesses and individuals, and a ‘public option’ seeks to first cull them into the ’single payer’ snare, offering only ‘qualified plans’. No one knows what will or will not be included in these plans. And I doubt we will know until AFTER a bill is passed. If you do not want to buy the ‘public option’ sight unseen, you should be cautious.
If you want to compete in the largest possible market, demand that small businesses and individuals be allowed to pool resources to negotiate with ALL insurers, in all parts of the country.
Single payer proponenets will howl at this free market notion, but companies are always looking for new customers. How do they attract new customers? With affordability, quality and service.
If you trust the federal government to give you a better deal. Take it. But, buyer beware.
I think I understand some of the conservative and libertarian anger at big government. I agree that the Obama administration has handled the bank bailouts badly, and that we’ll all pay for it. But if it’s mainly about $$, I don’t understand why some of their anger is not directed at the private sector buccaneers who are raping the middle class on health care and in financial markets. Only big government can moderate the rapaciousness of big business. I’d go the other way on the bailout and say that the government should have taken control of the banks, liquidated the bad assets, recapitalized them, passed meaningful limits on what institutions can do with other peoples’ money, and re-privatized. When there’s a shitpile in the toilet you need to flush.
Similarly with health care in this country, which is inefficient, ineffective, and inequitable. Other advanced countries do a much better job at a much lower cost. There are various models which involve various levels of government participation, but they’re almost all better than our system. That’s pathetic. We need to fix it. A functional health care system will mean healthier citizens, less cost, more competitive small businesses, and more resources and energy available to resolve our many other important issues.
Obama is not a cipher, but it has always been clear that he is not an idealogue or “true believer.” He is exceptionally bright and talented and brings a unique perspective to the office he holds. My take is that he is in over his head (who wouldn’t be?) and has surrounded himself with advisors who are incapable of conceiving, let alone implementing, his vision for change.
I’m sticking with the tragic flaw, though. If he doesn’t abandon the idea that he can transform the American political environment and bring all sides to the table to reason together, his Presidency is doomed. This is hardball, Barry, and I don’t mean tweetie’s version.
Well the upside to this is that Rahm may be recognizing this “reform” canard is fast approaching stillborn.
Higher taxes for all! If you add the amount of money you and/or your employer (and if you don’t think how much your employer pays for insurance for you effects the amount in your pay check, you’re dreaming!) pay to a “for profit” insurance company for insurance that may be yanked away at the very time you need it most for any number of reasons, you would still be paying less if you had single payer and everyone had to pay into the system, half and half with employers. Even the public plan would be a better deal; it’s obvious that if you take the profit motive out, you’d pay less and serve less as prey to some of the less scrupulous.
And some are seniors who do understand all too well that if more customers are allowed to flood the subsidized federal program without expanding resources, demand will out weigh supply. What happens then?
Medicare Advantage will be cut, and seniors who are willing to pay more, out of their OWN POCKETS for additional coverages and quality care for chronic conditions, will see that benefit disappear.
While there are risks, the obstacles of life, the scenarios you suggest are not imminent. Many Americans are not so fearful as to trade freedom for government promises of security, especially if they know that it will COST MORE. Look only to the CBO re: the costs of the ‘public option’ and the promise of savings via ‘taxing the rich’ and ‘preventative care.’
Also, why is tort reform NOT on the table?
It’s easy to pick on the big bad ol’ federal government isn’t it? How dare it charge you taxes, you say??
“The best ideas never come from Washington, D.C. They come out of the states and are driven by Republican governors.” From the RGA’sa own website.
So tell me then, why has not one state led by so many Federalist lovin’ Republican governors repealed it’s own state sales taxes. And only those few loaded with valuable natural have repealed their state income tax.
And did you also notice how many had their hands out for the free stimulus dollars?
Your ‘no taxes’ argument is a physical impossibility, that’s why they take the money. Try a library instead of Fox someday.
When has he ever demonstrated an ability or willingness to play hardball? He was my Senator in IL and he was barely in office before he started running for the Presidency. He is a go along to get along guy who will say anything and use anyone to achieve personal power.
His ‘vision’ as it was sold to the American voters, would NOT involve such statements like “I won” and “I don’t want those who made the mess to do a lot of the talking.” It would NOT involve pay for play. What we have here is the ultimate machine pol looking out for himself and his own.
Indie, actually I do think that the Federal government does a fairly good job of controlling costs. Witness Medicare. What I personally find abhorrent is that health insurance in this country belongs to the employer. The employee must hope that the employer feels magnanimous in their choice of coverage. In this reality, people do not have insurance employees do. If you are not an employee you probably cannot afford to get good coverage. Thus existing pre-conditions or other ailments easily lead to a form of indentured employment for those lucky enough to keep their jobs.
The ability to be insured at a reasonable cost should not be a stick forcing people to work for a specific employer. Centralized negotiation of cost, as a single-payer system like Medicare does, provides a bottom that employers can improve upon if they wish to make their employees more satisfied.
I am not arguing for no taxes.
States are more directly accountable to their constituents and when people demand services, taxes go up, and up and up unless budget cuts are made or the state governments run huge deficits. Who funds police, firefighters, teachers and the like? The States. All of our states, save a few, are running budget deficits. Real reform will and does come from the state level.
Medicare is IN THE RED!
Why should we have employer based or government based health insurance. Why not individual health insurance coverage ala car insurance? Buying across state lines, mandated coverage with for basic services and coverages, subsidizies for the needy and protections for those with pre-existing conditions. Healthy Americans who practice preventative care and maintain a healthy lifestyles are rewarded with discounts ala ‘good driver’ or ‘good student’ discounts.
OH NO. God forbid we should give INDIVIDUALS the TRUE power to choose. Where would that leave the federal government? As a regulator, that it it’s proper role.
you got a great, thoughtful response from Adams there, respect.
gotta slow the rpms down a little, though, maybe.
Will do.
Again, I advocate removing health care coverage decisions from both the employer and federal government. Of course that would leave consumer/patients and not special interests/unions in control. GASP!
Excuse me, when did you and your ilk stop believing in state’s rights, because it is the state’s right and responsibility to their citizens to regulate and insure that insurance companies comply with the state’s rules, laws and regulations. This is an argument that has bugged me since I first heard it. Just like the states control who can sell real estate or other things, the state determines who can sell insurance within their boundries. I, for one, do not want the Federal gov’t to supercede or usurp that particular right.
It seems an odd argument to make that a single payer plan would increase costs or take away elders Medicare Advantage. If we had single payer, they wouldn’t need Medicare Advantage, and as shown by the experiences of most of the rest of the industrialized world, we would be saving money over what we currently spend.
Even within the context of a public option, the argument remains weak. Currently it looks like not that many are going to be eligible for the public plan given that there will even be a public plan. OTOH if the original plan that would have had about 130 million included then together with Medicare market share would have allowed these plans to negotiate prices down. Medicare Advantage btw is often a scam which funnels subsidies to insurance companies without giving policy holders much.
Again a statement that is based on all kinds of misunderstandings. If wealthier Americans paid more into the system, this would help alleviate cost burdens. Medicare has also been hamstrung by not having the power to negotiate down drug prices. Finally, Medicare represents an older, sicker segment of the population. Just as Medicaid represents a poorer one. This effectively results in a cherrypicking situation for insurance companies since they can offer plans to a population that is consequently younger, healthier, and wealthier. Yet even with these advantages, they are overpriced and spend enormous resources on how not to deliver healthcare to those enrolled in their plans.
We have a ballot box. No need for violent revolution. Crazies exist on the left and right. But cooler heads prevail in this forum and in the minds and hearts of the vast majority of Americans. Step away from MSNBC and cable news, and talk radio.
Great. Take the federal government out of it entirely. You will get no quarrel from me.
I want to buy my health insurance like I buy car insurance.
Slinkerwink – I am fairly certain that President Obama knew about the deal and encouraged the deal. What I was saying was that he will not take the fall – old military logic dictates to always keep someone between you and the problem or stated more bluntly shit rolls down hill.
Again, the blue dogs didn’t start barking until rahm took some shit when he said that the white house would back a healthcare plan that didn’t have a public option. Then all of a sudden, out of the BLUE, here comes the blue dogs barking in unison.
Who let the blue dogs out? The rahmbama team!!!!
Z
this is obama’s non-deal. he’s the “bipartisan” guy who will talk to chuck grassley, but has no place for howard dean at the table.
Well, I’d hate to see the bill, considering what insurance companies are charging individuals as opposed to group rates. Okay, then maybe you can explain to me why you are so into having a profit motive involved with making decisions about your health care, when we’ve already seen the kind of horrendous decisions that Insurance company bean counters are willing to make to cut cost and increase profit margins?
How MUCH more? You treat the wealthy like some infinite resource. They are not. Taxing the wealthy will not pay for all of our spending. Tax revenues are down 18%, and the CBO clearly states that a ‘public option’ will cost TRILLIONS.
If ‘reform’ is what you truly seek, why not implement tort reform, medicare/medicaid reform to streamline the system, eliminate waste and inefficiency?
Reform is generally distinguished from revolution. The latter means basic or radical change; whereas reform may be no more than fine tuning, or at most redressing serious wrongs without altering the fundamentals of the system. Reform seeks to improve the system as it stands, never to overthrow it wholesale.
I do not see all profit as bad. I see free enterprise as a catalyst for quality, innovation and affordability. It is only when business interests intersect with the centralized power of the federal government that we see corruption and greed. Pay for play. Those who hold the keys to the treasury dole out the spoils to the favored few.
Open the market, allow the corrupt and the mismanaged to fail. To be sure, more efficient, creative, responsive businesses and institutions will rise from their ashes.
Medicare advantage also helps a great many Americans with chronic illness.
Bottom line is I simply do not trust the federal government to run a single payer system. Obama recently called out the Post Office for waste and inefficiency, unable to compete in the private sector without running at a loss. We spend billions on public education with little or no support for vouchers, competition and choice. Now we seek to create yet another government administered, government subsidized program?
No thank you.
We must simply agree to disagree. Until my trust in the federal government is restored, I will oppose any expansion of the federal government.
So you’re for private insurance, which of course already exists but is not affordable, as a solution. You think that Medicare is a failure because it doesn’t make money. Bad news is it could not possibly make money, that is not its purpose. It’s purpose is to extend and protect the lives of the eldrly.
Later you say you want to improve the current, massively expensive system that effectively only covers the employed but offer only the idea of refining a broken system as a solution. If refining the current system were enough to fix it then the current Congressional hodgepodge would be well on its way. Even the currently described approach to a public option is a minor refinement to buying private personal insurance with the addition of a government subsidy.
As for your fear that the wealthy could be taxed out of existence. Reagan built the framework that has lead to the most inequitable economic system in history so I wouldn’t get to worried about the poor rich just yet.
When your car requires a couple of hundred dollars a month in repairs to keep it on the road its time to get rid of it and get a new one. The current health care clunker has cost thousands of lives. Refining this process would address this only on the cost cutting side.
Wrong problem, wrong solution. The best way to save a lot of money is to let the weak and helpless die. Everything else is a compromise based upon the belief that people are more important than greed.
OMG! That’s certainly a broad assertion! I would remind you that it wasn’t until certain gov’t restrictions that were touted to be too inhibiting on business by the likes of Phil Graham and others, and the overly lax policies of Alan Greenspan took effect, that our economy crashed. Most economists point to those factors as being a large part of the cause. Yes I’m talking about the repeal of Glass-Steagall.
Still, I also do not see all profit as bad. However, I do see what many of the insurance companies have done to be, in some cases, pathetic and almost criminal. However, I think it’s due to self-interest (normally a good thing) gone awry (in the extreme, greed, which is very bad). Still, self-interest, and it’s extreme, greed, is part of human nature, not a biproduct of self-government.
I fear that too many of our citizens have either been scared into believing that all gov’t is bad, or have forgotten that “we, the people” are the gov’t. We elect the various branches of the federal gov’t, as well as our local and state officials, ourselves. If they are corrupt, it’s our own fault. We need to be more observant and throw the bums out. But I don’t want to throw the baby out with the bath water.
What I find interesting is the near universal implicit consensus that Pelosi and Kennedy simply have no clout at all, that they will just let Rahm and Obama walk all over them. For that matter it is not clear to me that Baucus really has that firm of control even over Senate Finance, especially since he is currently spitting in the face of Rockefeller, the Chairman of the relevant Sub-Committee.
We have entered this weird Bizarro World where it is just self-evident that six Blue Dogs held the whip hand over House Energy and Commerce but that Senate Liberals are just helpless bystanders on Senate Finance. Baucus can cut whatever deals he wants but in the end he needs 12 votes to get that deal out of Committee and he will be lucky to get more than 2 Republicans, and even if he could he can’t afford to have this look like a Republican bill when it gets to the floor. So by my count he can’t lose anymore than 4 Dems from the following list: Baucus, Rockefeller, Conrad, Bingaman, Kerry, Lincoln, Wyden, Schumer, Stabenow, Cantwell, Nelson, Menendez, Carper. Granted that is a pretty moderate group at best by why not a scenario where Rockefeller, Kerry, Wyden, and Schumer just tell Baucus to fuck off and demand changes just like Ross and the Blue Dogs did on the other side. These guys are not shrinking violets, plus I would not want to be in Kerry’s shoes when he has to tell Kennedy he had no choice but to bend over for the Insurance companies.
Reporting I see suggests that Rockefeller is well and thoroughly pissed at being frozen out, is he just going to sit and whimper like a whipped puppy when Baucus has to take this to the full Committee for markup? And if so why? More importantly is Dodd really prepared to back-stab Kennedy and go along with this when it gets to the Senate Floor? And does Rahm really have the whip hand over Pelosi, Waxman, Dingel and Brown when this gets to Conference? I mean you got some pretty big egos in play. Dingel is 83 and has introduced a universal health care bill every year since he first got to Congress – in 1955. He was in the Chair when Medicare was passed. He allowed himself to be eased out of the Chair of Energy and Commerce with the promise that he would be the lead on Health Care, this bill if passed will be known in the future as Kennedy-Dingell. Are people like these just going to yield to a couple of guys from Chicago who were either in diapers or not even born when they first took office?
I find it hard to believe that Kennedy wants his epitaph to be “Tried to reform health care but was told no by an undersize former ballet dancer/political fixer named Rahm”. In retrospect maybe they should have held HELP up until Finance actually completed its work, in which case I don’t think we would be having this same conversation, but either way I don’t see the reason why Baucus’s stubborness should be allowed to magically transform him into the King of the Mountain. Because he is the last guy standing?
medicare can not even pay it’s own way. physicians cost shift to private insurance. That’s why private insurance is so expensive.
At Obama’s town hall today, it we sighted that hospitals charge 134% of
charges to private insurance to make up for what medicare underpays.
Obama said he is going to pay for part of his plan by disallowing the deduction that wealthy get for donations to their church. What?
Tax revenues are down 18%, and the CBO clearly states that a ‘public option’ will cost TRILLIONS.
No they don’t. You just made that number up out of nowhere. The CBO scores the ten year cost of getting to 97% coverage at $1.042 trillion, but scores savings in the House Tri-Committee bill at $219 billion plus additional revenues of $563 billion for a total net cost of $239 billion over ten years. Numbers you can see from this table from the July 17th CBO score:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_fjW7…..+score.jpg
Why should anyone take you seriously if you are just going to make shit up? Plus even this score doesn’t include private sector savings (e.g. hospitals saving billions not providing charitable care, or having their bills written off in bankruptcy). Nor does it include scoring changes from changing certain budget rules about payments to Medicare providers, changes which CBO scores at $245 billion. Meaning that the entire package of reforms will end up being scored by CBO as a $6 billion surplus. http://speaker.house.gov/blog/?p=1872
CBO Scores Confirm Deficit Neutrality of Health Insurance Reform Bill
Strangely this story got ZERO coverage by the MSM, probably because it wasn’t convenient for the narrative of the Just Make Shit Up and See if It Sticks crowd.
Killing people?? How many people has our system saved thanks to
innovation and technology.
How many new life saving technologies come out of Canada?
Another member of the Just Make Shit Up Crowd
Obama’s proposal does not prevent anyone from donating to a church and then deducting that from taxable income. It just caps the AMOUNT of that deduction at the level that the only kind of wealthy people get to deduct as opposed to the higher limits that the really wealthy people pay.
I suppose there are people out there who generously support their churches because they can deduct 37% of that from their taxable income who would simply stop if that deduction was lowered to 33%. But they would show themselves to be not so good Christians. Why should the ultra wealthy get a discount on their giving?
You’re splitting hairs. Correct . . . the deduction cannot exceed a certain amount. Taxing the wealthy will not create enough enough income to expand coverage.
BeeGeezer . . . talk about making s… up. the second report was generated in house. I guess you think that if you write enough, all will get lost in the mix.
The bottom line is $239 billion deficit according to CBO scores
and this assumes that people start taking care of
themselves
Taxing the wealthy is like robbing banks:
That’s where most of the money is.
Now, if you think that they wealthy are going to be taxed out of existence: it didn’t happen in earlier years, when the marginal tax rates were much higher than they are now, so why would it happen if they’re raised only a little?