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One of the Democratic leadership’s talking points for the reconciliation bill is that it increases affordability tax credits for people on the exchange. What they aren’t saying is that the increase in subsidies in the Senate bill is only temporary. From the CBO:
An important component of the longer-term analysis is that, beginning in 2019, the reconciliation proposal would change the annual indexing provisions so that the premium subsidies offered through the exchanges would grow more slowly; over time, the spending on exchange subsidies would therefore fall back toward the level under H.R. 3590 by itself.
This means that the increase in affordability tax credits provided by the reconciliation package starting in 2014 would disappear only a few years afterwards. That is a pretty big caveat. Given that this reconciliation bill does not include a public option, Medicare buy-in, a national exchange, a higher medical loss ratio, all-payer, or direct Medicare drug price negotiations, and is unlikely to keep the National Insurance Rate Authority, and now add the fact that the much touted increases in affordability tax credits are only temporary, and it becomes apparent that this reconciliation package is a tremendous wasted opportunity.
Way to go, House Democrats! You basically get one bill a year that can’t be filibustered, and this is all you can think to do with it to “improve” the Senate health care bill?
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And does anyone have any bets on whether any of the “progressive” Veal Pen groups will point this out? Betcha Media Matters won’t. Or CAF. Or MoveOn.
Moore’s Law: microprocessors double in speed every 18 months.
Rahm’s Law: healthcare bill doubles in crappiness every 18 days.
FDL is at a pivotal point. I’d love to see you summerize (as you do so well) real benefits & real costs of the FINAL HCR Bill before the House. By publicizing it BEFORE it’s voted on, you’ll make it a lot tougher for all those wanting to pretend & hide. And, it would be a tremendous service for ALL interested in what’s going on. Let everyone know NOW how the issues you’ve pressed have been subverted for more profits for the same companies responsible for the mess we’re in. Let everyone know now before the vote’s taken. Send a copy (rtn rcpt requested) to every House Rep. that we can remind them of come election time.
This isn’t a matter of getting the best they could, this is a matter of selling out the ideals their Party stands for.
Great Idea Bailey
We all need to know how much crap is in this Bill.
can we claim political asylum in canada when this passes
If “the Devil is in the details” it must be horrible indeed because it sure is a POS on the surface.
Bait and Switch the words Obvious punk a$$ scam come to mind!
Obama job approval today.
Approve : $46%
Disapprove : 48%
http://www.gallup.com/Home.aspx
I’ve been telling my coworkers that the pulp sci fi novels I read as a teenager about evil corporations taking control are coming true.
If you missed it, Amy Goodman’s interview today on HCR is worth your time.
Dennis Kucinich and Ralph Nader: A Discussion on Healthcare, Politics and Reform
Apparently they think things are going to go so well over the next few years that we’ll all get our pay doubled.
(What are they using? It must be good stuff.)
So what are the permanent good things this bill gives us?
The Foundation series?
Dune replace oil for the spice?
Lets see those numbers after the final bill passes.
Yet another example of how this bill screws everyone who works for a living in order to make richer the already rich and powerful.
Well put.
I think it was iconoclastic journalist I.F. Stone said that the best way to read any government document is to start at the back– that’s where they try to bury stuff they hope nobody reads.
Bearing that in mind, at the end of reconciliation bill is a poison pen section that only Judd Gregg could love…
Sec. 2301 Insurance Reforms
(a) Extending certain insurance reforms to grandfathered plans
…
(b) Clarification regarding dependent coverage
This is an amendment to a Section 1251 of the Senate bill, “Preservation Of Right To Maintain Existing Coverage”.
Riddle me this, how would adding non-budgetary insurance regulations get past a Byrd Rule Point of Order?
The Syndic, Kornbouth
Farenheit 451, Bradbury
Maybe?
I agree as well. I was hoping to find somewhere a summary of what exactly is in this bill, the start dates, etc. I have been hearing conflicting stories about the preexisting condition clause starting immediately. I’m under the assumption that it only starts for children and the rest of us have to wait 4 years.
LOL, that should be “poison pill”, not “poison pen”. Note to self, don’t type while talking on the phone. :o)
Do it and run an add in the NYT. Jane has connection to wealthy progressive Hollywood types who could finance it.
Generally, all of Gibson’s work feels that way. Don’t know how you’re defining “childhood”.
Specifically, The Merchants of Venus (Advertisers rule all), Preferred Risk (Insurers rule all) and Gladiators at Law (Lawyers rule all.) Probably all three came true…
Links here:
http://www.amazon.com/Preferred-Risk-Frederik-Pohl/dp/0345285751
http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/p/frederik-pohl/merchants-of-venus.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladiator-At-Law
These would all be fantastic movies or HBO series too, by the way Jane! If you decide that you’re sick of the corrupt world of politics and yearn for the innocence of Hollywood…take me with you!
“Geithner, Orzag, Romer: “We do not expect substantial further declines in unemployment this year”"
Translation; we’re gonna own you outright, suckers!
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/03/geithner-orzag-romer-we-do-not-expect.html
I’m (very) mildly optimistic. The Thugs have run the country since Reagan took office in 1981. That’s a long run. They control the Supreme Court with consequences too obvious to mention. They control the press, and they control Washington discourse, which means they control the propaganda machine. It took the worse President in American history to blow them out of the water, but the power behind them is still present. All things considered, if the bill goes through (it’s now more like the battle of Verdun than anything resembling health care reform)and if the Dems can pick up the pieces and pass a few more reforms and get re-elected, we might be lucky enough to get a little bit out of the hole we dug for ourselves for one generation. The health care bill is now essentially symbolic. It didn’t have to be that way, but a symbolic victory is better than a symbolic loss, and in Washington that’s all that matters, since nobody there really cares about ordinary people anyway.
Subsidies to help Americans will not last in an era where Iraq, Afghanistan and the military industrial complex are of utmost importance to the ivory tower liberal pundits and DC politicians.
Not Dune …
And repeating the same actions and expecting a different outcome is what? Valid?
Wow. Turd Blossom himself couldn’t have wedged Democrats from their base as effectively as they’re doing it themselves.
And I’ve always thought that the solution was to put more progressive democrats into office — but the ones we’ve already got who retreated from one fallback position to another until they gave away everything don’t make that strategy seem very smart any longer.
I did read the Foundation series and Dune but those weren’t the ones I had in mind. I don’t consider those pulp. But there were many less well known sci fi novels with the theme of benign corporate control in the future, and of course the heroes who rebel.
Instead of donations to congress, we should be buying ad time and space.
Here is another kicker I just found out about today.
At the WH press briefing, a reporter asks Gibbs, “is what Michael Moore and Rush Limbaugh are saying true? That the rule disallowing turn downs for pre-existing conditions doesn’t start for 3 or more years??”
Gibbs confirmed it as true.
I mentioned this in another thread. I am almost certain I heard Pelosi and others say, “Once this passes there will be immediate benefits, such as you can be turned down for pre-existing conditions.” Almost certain I heard that.
Now, I find out, no, that doesn’t start for 3 or 4 years.
that was the major good thing about the bill.
Is there any damn good thing that we will get from this when it passes?? Other than a bunch of patting on the backs from one pol to another??
Presumably this is how the CBO score came in so high? So the subsidies are to act like discounted heroin – get the rubes hooked on ‘cheap’ product, then phase out the rebate at the same time prices are doubling (or more).
Such a deal!
we need a progressive remake of red dawn.
wolverines!
dune is apropos: fear is a mind killer.
people freaked by 40% rate hikes were made to scream pass the damn bill!
not realizing they were being steered into a trap.
No kidding! Those advocating passing the bill don’t realize how they are actually setting things up to be like that permanently. The 40% increase without mandates only shows that things can get even worse with a mandate and no PO…and as an extra benefit your plan gets called a “Cadillac plan” just because the insurance companies jacked up the rates by double digits and you are told that you are the problem for having such a plan!