Politico is reporting that Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE) has a brand spanking new “alternative” to the public option that he has been secretly shopping around the senate.
Carper suggests giving states the option of creating a competitor to private insurers, which could include a government plan, a network of co-ops, or a large purchasing pool modeled after the revered Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan.
First, a “large purchasing pool modeled after the revered Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan” is what the new exchanges in health care reform are suppose to be. The is not a new idea. This is not an alternative to a public option. This is what the system would be similar to without the public option.
State-based public plans are unlikely to have much of an effect on the health insurance market. Because they would likely be restricted to the new exchanges, state-based public plans in less populated states would have extremely small risk pools. They would also lack the size need to negotiate the best rates possible. Finally the CBO has already looked into Conrad’s idea of co-ops and found them to be basically worthless. Restricting them even further will not help the matter.
Progressives should take heart, though, that Carper is floating a new “compromise.” It is a sign that progressive grassroots organizations and members of Congress have been successful in rejecting previous fake compromises, like trigger and co-ops. Carper’s plan is just one more in a long line of worthless fig leafs, trying to masquerade as real reform.
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What is wrong with an insurance pool of 310,000,000 American Citizens?? Corporations can’t be cherry-pickers like the cheaters on the afternoon pick up soccer hoop football game! They want to save their balls and run like chickenshits…….
No federal funds for abortions? Discrimination based on sex!!!
These (small D,democrats remind me of roaches when walk into a room and turn on the light, they all scatter.
Very upset with their actions.
No more compromise!
HR 676 – Medicare for all. Single payer HR 676 medicare for all with 50 votes.
I agree, but we’ll have to do something about the patchwork of differing regulations and enforcement mechanisms found in the different states as well. Some states have much tougher regulations/regulators than others.
allow me to go all intellectual
fuck these tone deaf bitches !
They could vote against helping all Americans get affordable health care but Conrad and Lincoln found it in their DINO little hearts to vote, along with every single Republican, for restoring federal funds for abstinence-only programs.
Basta!!
http://www.google.com/hostedne…..wD9B1D2580
They keep floating the same old ideas as if they were something new. How many times do we have to swat down the same old “won’t work” ideas before these fools realize that the only real solutions are either:
1. a public option, or
2. single payer if we want to keep insurance, or
3. Nat’l Health Service/Administration if we want to go with an actual comprehensive “health care as a right” fix.
There really aren’t any other options that will address the root of the problem. Oh, there are other things that need to be done (revoke the exemption from anti-trust laws, create & enforce regulations that will make reform actually work, etc.), but one of these three choices is required if we really want to address the out-of-control cost spiral that we are currently in!
Yeah this plan is dead on arrival I’ve seen used car salesmen make better pitches about clunkers. Although none has ever tried to sell me a worse clunker.
yesterday’s Help Us Stop Republican Obstruction ! fundraising emails are a perfect example.
really guys ? you think we’re gonna fall for that banana in our tailpipe again ???
not only was it insulting, it bespoke a cluelessness about the current political realities I found unbelievable at this stage of the game
Citizen Jon Walker:
Is it possible that Obama comes out of the closet today and makes Rahm Trumpka’s bitch?
State by state works out so well for us in Texas where BCBS runs the state’s high risk pool. It costs almost $1000 per month per person, and might cover 65% of your needs, if you are lucky.
(CBL2 – you are en fuego today, I notice!)
Citizen cbl2:
ROFLMAO!!! I can’t hear you Brother…say it again with FEELIN’!!
Cash for programs that Don’t work! No cash for programs that take money from corporations and help people.
Lets add up the number of uninsured Americans and the number of Fox News viewers/Tea Baggers which is bigger both have a lot at stake here and will vote for one side or another.
Then figure Lefty vs Righty blog which is bigger and you just know both groups will vote but which is bigger.
Then lets factor in voter interest in this issue will the next election be a low turnout or high turnout election?
High turnout election we win low turnout the GOP might win at 20% approval the GOP only might win.
Can’t Jay Rock get through to these morons that people need genuine help, not more games? The lack of integrity is enough to make you physically ill!
Yep a rep in Seattle used Texas as an example of a bad plan at a Town Hall.
Logically he did fine but the Blue Dogs had Dollar bills in their ears.
By the way, RE: Jane’s earlier post on Trumka’s meeting with (and likely caving to) Rahm on triggers –
If Trumka fears that not passing even a garbage bill will hurt the Dems next year, here’s what he needs to be told:
We need a real Dem to sponsor a bill the Senate and House can only get the median amount of healthcare for themselves and their family that the people in their state have.
I reminded Trumka in my tweet:
you lie down with dogs, you get up with
PATCOfleasAgreed pass a garbage bill and Dems go down in defeat so push for a better bill. If the Dems drop the ball thats their choice we will stay home and Rahm can deal with a GOP Senate and maybe a GOP House that sees not dealing with Obama the best path to the WH.
Give the GOP an inch they will take a mile.
rep. peter defazio of oregon already has; paraphrasing, “regulate the hell out of them and include them in anti-trust laws.” in other words, make life so miserable for them, they are going to wish for the choice of a public option. this can be done in the house; and as for the senate, get another majority leader who will push for passage with 51 votes!
Theoretically, some of the other provisions in the various health care bills would help with coverage, but I don’t see anything that will help with costs or accessibility. Currently in Texas it is almost impossible to get on Medicaid. Even teenagers with jobs make more than the maximum the state sets, which is $188 per month, I want to say, but that seems too draconian, even for Texas, so it must be per week? Yes? (Anybody here know?) And of course we have a lunatic for a governor who is just fine with having the most people uninsured and the poorest of the poor in his state, because they either don’t vote or don’t vote for his kind, anyway.
The only good I can see coming out of the current healthcare fiasco and corporate giveaway is that it will make most progressives and even some Democrats realize that the Democrats are not our friends or our allies. Any money or support given to any of them serves merely to strengthen the party as a whole and perpetuate the same corrupt system.
We need to break with the Democrats. We do not need to elect more and better Democrats. Been there, done that, and the results are right there for all to see. Yes, the Republicans are crazy, but the Democrats are just as irredeemable.
We need to work for candidates who are of us and and committed to us. If there are some Democratic officeholders who want to join us, fine. But we should stop working with Democrats, they are a waste of time and effort. They will always work against our interests, always. We should get used to this fact and move on. What we should be doing instead is electing more and better progressives, period.
I like this guy we should invite him to talk at the Lake!
This sounds like a healthcare ad for Texas.
What is the ratio of Progressives to regular Dems that should be an interesting number but how do you define Progressive?
Jon any insight into this bills chances of passing? I’m afraid sooner or later the GOP will back the Blue Dogs in the Senate and pass something like this.
At this point, it’s safe to say that the Congressional and Senate committees who are running interference for the health insurance industry are treating the health care reform effort supposedly spearheaded by the White House — tho, one’s hard put to prove this — only as an opportunity to enrich their constituents in said industry. That would be the people who seem to be in control of the debate, by and large.
People have noted that election reform is the higher goal, but I’d say the whole structure of the legislature needs to be realigned with the Constitution and Bill of Rights established by the more wizened of the founding fathers.
For instance, how the hell did Baucus get into the position of power he’s been abusing these past several months?
apparently, polls show lincoln losing to a generic republican.
i say let her lose. In fact, i say keep running those ads against her, and make sure to RE-run them as the election gets closer.
Seriously: if she’s going to vote like a republican anyway, what’s the point of lifting a finger to help her keep her seat. better the enemy you know than the false friend who stabs you in the back.
Rahm has been working very hard from the start to only pass a weak bill. They did not negotiate down from something they start out with the hope of something bad. Expect something like this to happen unless the progressive block in the House or Senate holds.
It also might open some other Dems eyes about what can happen if they ignore the will of the people and ignore us, the Progressives.
Why they keep going back to states. Insurance companies in many states have the insurance commissioner wrapped around their little finger. Which is why having the National Association of Insurance Commissioners write the regulations (as the Baucus bill specifies) is a recipe for disaster.
If there are any Delaware folks around, it would be good for the locals to hound Carper about his not supporting a strong public option with a national pool.
We need to Primary her obviously we can make a case to regular Dems that she can’t win if a generic GOPer is beating her. If the regular Dems withdraw their support in the Primary she’s toast.
If not we can assume Rahm talked to them and place her defeat directly on Rahm.
Ok now you got me worried. That and looking for names to ad to my list.
for immediate gratification: her twitter page
you be nice now :D
For me, a progressive is for improving the lives of ordinary Americans by giving them good stable jobs, good education, good healthcare, and good retirement. We are fact-based and solution-oriented. We believe in social tolerance and fairness. We do not believe in extremes of wealth or poverty. We are for the rights of the individual and privacy. And we think that government can play a useful and beneficial role in securing these goods for all Americans.
It says a lot about twisted and distorted our political discourse and system has become that any of this sounds to the “left”.
Anthony Tarricone is currently doing a live chat with Marcy at FDL: “Fool Me Once: The Insurance Industry Looks to Tort Reform to Pad Profits”
Bet Viagra is funded and probably an essential ingredient in K street cocktails.
Who appointed this guy? We need him like a 45 year old prostitute needs another screw.
I’m taking the liberty of posting this twice in this blog because I believe it could be important.
Schumer voting no?
I just called up Schumer’s office asking whether he had decided whether or not to vote the Baucus bill out of committee. I was pretty sure I would simply be told that Schumer wouldn’t decide until the amendment process was over.
Instead, I was told that “he can’t vote for it as it is now!”
If this guy was correct, I think this is very encouraging news. It means that we are one vote away from preventing the Baucus outrage from ever being reported out. If we can get one more no vote from the Democratic side, this would mean that all Harry Reid has to take to the Senate floor next month is the Kennedy/Dodd bill from HELP, with its rich and juicy public option!
Which means that the financing for the bill would have to be offered as an amendment on the floor from — whoever (hopefully not Baucus!).
I figured this news was important enough that I should share it with the community. Obviously this is not confirmed.
The Republicans seem to hate gov’t until it’s their goose getting skewered. They might fight the public option to the death, but they’re just as likely to want to protect the anti-trust exemption for health care because they’re lying stupid hypocrites.
Don’t expect logic to work with crud like that.
A Progressive can be either conservative or liberal, but they are energetic idea factories in response to perceived problems in the world and they want to get on with solving problems and enabling people to live better lives.
The difference between a conservative and liberal are the same as always except that within the Democratic party that difference is more narrow than across the broader political spectrum.
For example, many Lib are happy with mandates (in this health reform debate), but I don’t like the gov’t forcing people’s hands. I’d rather have a public option with no mandates to enable people and to achieve more of the free market Competition. A Lib tends not to worry about the competition so much and focuses instead on the outcome of more healthcare for people. That’s why they’re happy with the simpler idea of single-payer. However, both want to get on with solving this huge financial, moral, health problem for the nation.
ymmv
Forget the Rahm factor. It’s on Lincoln and the other Blue Dogs to come through for the party or be prepared to get primaried.
Of course, in this case it’s people like Ben Nelson who are the final brick in the wall of opposition. It’s very hard to stop someone like that.
Excellent answer and clearly not a ‘lefty’ thing at all.