Americans correctly believe that the most critical issue facing our nation is job creation. You would think the Republican-run House of Representatives, in its first major policy vote of the 112th Congress, would be focused on putting Americans to work. Instead, House Republicans have decided their number one priority is repealing the Patient's Bill of Rights, legislation that is creating 250,000 to 400,000 jobs a year.
The Republican repeal would return America to the dark days when insurance companies told patients and doctors what treatments to pursue, a time when insurers routinely discriminated against Americans to maximize their profits.
When Democrats in Congress passed health care reform - the Patient's Bill of Rights - last year, we put a stop to the worst abuses of the insurance industry. We told the insurance companies they can no longer drop coverage for women who become pregnant or get cancer. We told the insurance companies they can no longer deny care to children with pre-existing conditions, and by 2014, no American will be turned away from insurance because they have the misfortune of falling ill. We told the insurance companies they must allow young people under the age of 26 to be covered under their parents' plan. We've replaced the Insurance Industry's Right to Discriminate with the Patient's Bill of Rights.
After Blue Shield shocked the nation with 59% premium hikes in California last week, the company just refused a request from the elected insurance commissioner to stop the increases for 60 days.
Obama's mad about insurers blaming his health care plan for big rate hikes, but he doesn't have to take it anymore. He can and should issue an executive order to stop the rate hikes immediately.Obama's mad about insurers blaming his health care plan for big rate hikes, but he doesn't have to take it anymore. He can and should issue an executive order to stop the rate hikes immediately.
If you tuned into the Rachel Maddow Show last night, you know that major health care provisions in the Patient's Bill of Rights take effect today. You also know Gail, the woman in this video. She's an amazing person whose life was immensely improved because President Obama and the Democratic Majority in this Congress fought tooth and nail for health care reform that puts patients first.
Gail was told by her doctor, "Either you dip into your retirement fund, or you're going to die." Because of health care reform, she can now choose to live and keep her retirement. Gail, previously denied coverage because she has a pre-existing condition, was able to enroll in a temporary high-risk pool to receive the cancer treatment she needs and deserves because of the Patient's Bill of Rights. By 2014, no insurance company in the nation will be allowed to deny her care.
Gail is one of millions of Americans who know firsthand that the need for health care reform was and continues to be a life and death priority.
I recently met Violet, a gregarious two-year old girl born at Contra Costa County Regional Medical Center near my district. She was born with a rare - and costly - form of epilepsy. Under the old system, she was at risk of reaching her plan's lifetime and annual coverage limits by the age of four, and there was little stopping her insurance company from finding trivial excuses to kick her off her coverage. As of today, the Patient's Bill of Rights guarantees that lifetime coverage limits and rescissions are banned in all new plans, and annual limits are being stretched over a three-year flexible period until they are completely eliminated by 2014.
In the wake of the passage of the Affordable Choices Act into law, there are a lot of questions about how we go on from here. Obviously, one line of activism focuses on ways to improve the health care reform act. To some progressives so morally outraged at the defeat of the public option that they’ve given up on the Congress as hopelessly wedded to corporate interests, obviously, this isn’t so appealing.
However, if the progressive movement can be clever and strategic for a second, and is willing to work from within rather than to cry defeat, we can actually work on the state level to move the goalposts of the health care debate in the direction of single-payer before we even get to the next round of national legislation.
The current state of California politics can be summed up in a simple comparison: in the Republican gubernatorial primaries, we see one candidate promising that their first action upon becoming governor is to put 40,000 people out of work and the other complaining that this isn’t enough; in the Democratic convention, we see a party divided over whether to fight for majority rule for budgets or for budgets and taxes.
As a state, California seems caught between the scissors of an increasing need for public services to provide a basic level of social protection for the sick, the elderly and the poor and to restore our high-road, high-wage economy based on superior public education and green technology, and a paralyzed, undemocratic, and irrational political structure that is unwilling and unable to take the necessary actions to meet those needs.
We know that the strategies proposed by the GOP’s gubernatorial candidates won’t work because they are essentially a retreat of the last seven years of failed policies – Schwarzeneggerism without a human face.
Yet Democrats lack a forceful message about what we want to do beyond the immediate issue of the budget.
Woo-hoo. The healthcare bill is done. People will see many of the provisions go into place immediately and then they can decide how they feel about these reforms based on reality instead of frenzied, uninformed rhetoric. Let's just take a moment to recognize this historic occasion.
(This is a slightly different kind of diary post. Below are Rep. George Miller's (D-CA) remarks, as prepared for delivery, during floor debate on the health insurance and student loan reform legislation. Miller is the House author of both pieces of reform.)
Madame Speaker, I rise in support of this truly historic legislation that addresses two of America's greatest troubles - the crushing costs and high obstacles of obtaining both quality health care and a college education.
Our nation and its economy have suffered from our longstanding failure to make health care and college accessible and affordable to all of the American people.
Americans have waited a long time for health insurance reform - nearly 100 years.
Today, Congress and President Obama will deliver on a central promise, on a dream deferred, on a crucial demand.
NOTE: Congressman Garamendi, California's first elected Insurance Commissioner, will be leading an hour long discussion on the merits of health care reform sometime this evening on the House floor. It will be broadcast on C-SPAN. This post will be updated when he appears, and staff will live-Tweet it on the Congressman's Twitter page.
It's a beautiful Saturday spring day in Washington. I'm walking west on East Capitol Street. Before me the Capitol is glowing white in the bright morning sun. My thoughts are on the health care debate, and the one hour opportunity that I will have to argue the issue on the floor of the House today. As I enter the East plaza I pause and look at the Capitol dome and realize how special this moment is.
It's special for the 32 million Americans about to receive health care. It's special for our economy about to see the largest deficit reduction in 20 years. And it's special for me to be able to represent the people of Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano and Sacramento Counties.
My thoughts are crystallized at this moment by an elderly couple who walk past me towards the Supreme Court building. They were holding a hand painted sign, "WE THE PEOPLE," one of the ever present signs around the Capitol.
(These are the prepared remarks of Education and Committee Chairman George Miller from today's press conference on the urgent need to include student loan reform as part of the reconciliation.)
Senate Democrats have a very simple choice to make in the next few weeks.
This choice speaks to the true character of our country and of our Congress.
It speaks to what America's priorities will be for the next generation.
It speaks to fiscal responsibility and fairness.
Here's the choice. We can continue a student loan program that the Congressional Budget office has documented will waste tens of billions of dollars over the next 10 years on a titanic boondoggle in excess subsidies to some of the nation's rich and most powerful banks.
Or we can do what President Obama suggested in his budget, and what the Congress voted last year to do in its budget resolution. We can reform the student loan program by taking these wasteful subsides to banks, and redeem the savings for millions of families and students who want a shot at attending college, go to a community college, and attend a school that is crumbling around them.
A lot of things may have changed in light of the Massachusetts special election upset Tuesday, but one thing that hasn’t changed is the health insurance crisis in America. We must address this crisis.
Health care costs are unsustainable; they’re still crushing families, small businesses and large companies. When people lose their jobs they lose their health insurance. People with jobs and who want coverage but find out they have a pre-existing condition still can’t get coverage. Businesses large and small come before Congress every day and tell us how they’re going to have to drop coverage for their employees or go out of business.
All of these problems remain, and so does our need to address them.
There's been a lot of analysis about why Democrats lost the Massachusetts Senate race, because it was so obvious. Failing to accomplish what you campaigned on depresses your base, emboldens the enemy and convinces independents that you're a loser. The lesson is not that Democrats went "too far" - but that they didn't go far enough. If I had faith in President Obama and the Democratic Party, I would be hopeful that they learned that lesson. But only one person seems to get it - former DNC Chair Howard Dean - who was unceremoniously kicked to the curb last January. It was Dean who gave Democrats a backbone in the run-up to the Iraq War. It was Howard Dean's "Fifty State Strategy" (as opposed to Rahm Emanuel's recruitment of Blue Dogs) that won Congress in 2006. And it was Dean's playbook that Barack Obama used to beat Hillary Clinton in an historic campaign. Beltway Democrats resent Dean, because he cares more about helping progressives win than stroking their ego. And - what's most unforgivable - he's been proven right.
There's been a lot of analysis about why Democrats lost the Massachusetts Senate race, because it was so obvious. Failing to accomplish what you campaigned on depresses your base, emboldens the enemy and convinces independents that you're a loser. The lesson is not that Democrats went "too far" - but that they didn't go far enough. If I had faith in President Obama and the Democratic Party, I would be hopeful that they learned that lesson. But only one person seems to get it - former DNC Chair Howard Dean - who was unceremoniously kicked to the curb last January. It was Dean who gave Democrats a backbone in the run-up to the Iraq War. It was Howard Dean's "Fifty State Strategy" (as opposed to Rahm Emanuel's recruitment of Blue Dogs) that won Congress in 2006. And it was Dean's playbook that Barack Obama used to beat Hillary Clinton in an historic campaign. Beltway Democrats resent Dean, because he cares more about helping progressives win than stroking their ego. And - what's most unforgivable - he's been proven right.
Here are the FDL Action health care reform highlights for Friday, December 18.
1. Jon Walker is concerned that Ben Nelson could get his way and gut "the single best remaining piece of reform, Medicaid expansion." Walker concludes that "If using reconciliation is the only way to protect the Medicaid expansion, the decision to use it should be a no-brainer for every real Democrat."
2. Jon Walker suggests that "if you are are going to tax 'Cadillac' plans, you need to index it to make sure it only ever taxes actual 'Cadillac' plans." To accomplish this goal, Walker suggests "index[ing] the cap to roughly 165% of the average premium on the Federal employer health benefit (FEHB) exchange."
3. Jane Hamsher points to a new poll indicating that 38% of Americans favor the individual mandate to buy insurance, while 51% oppose it. Hamsher adds, "When it appears in the ads of a Republican challenger who notes that the IRS will act as Aetna's collection agency, I bet those numbers get dramatically worse."
4. Jon Walker calls Ben Nelson's latest idea - to make states "opt in" to health reform - "literally and completely insane." C'mon, tell us how you really fell about Ben Nelon's stupid idea, Jon. :)
5. Jon Walker writes that "Ezra Klein has a new, strange, and incorrect defense of the individual mandate in the Senate bill." Walker argues that "[t]he argument that removing the individual mandate would price unemployed people, like the reader, out of the individual market is not true."
6. Jane Hamsher discusses "the impoverished left/right dialectic that dominates the media coverage of politics, and its inadequacy when it comes to discussing the dynamics of the health care debate." It's a fascinating discussion; here's a sampling. "With unemployment at 10%, the idea that you can pass a bill whose only merit is that 'liberals hate it' just because the media will eat it up and print your talking points in the process is so cynical and short-sighted it's hard to comprehend anyone would pursue it. It reflects a total insensitivity to the rage that is brewing on the popular front, which is manifest in every single poll out there." Good stuff.
7. Jon Walker goes after Ezra Klein again, this time for "[doing] the discussion on health reform a big disservice by making false claims about what could, in fact, start a race to the bottom in the insurance market."
8. Jon Walker argues that the fact there is a "hardship waiver," as well as restrictions on undocumented immigrants to buy insurance on the new exchange ("even if they were willing to pay full price with no tax credits") both "undercut arguments for an individual mandate."
9. Finally, I've got a state blog roundup, including lots of discussion about "Liebercare," "Loserman," and Jane Hamsher taking "a corporate conman to the woodshed."
This was a fascinating, sometimes infuriating, occasionally highly entertaining week in health care reform. Next week promises to be more of the same. Stay tuned!
"I'm going to have all the [health care] negotiations around a big table. And it will be televised on C-SPAN, so that people can see who is making arguments on behalf of their constituents and who are making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies." - Barack Obama, 2008
2008 was the Year of Change - when voters ushered in a new progressive era. But a year later, health care has been hijacked by extortionists - just so we can "cut a deal" to get 60 U.S. Senators. In Sacramento, a back-room state budget deal likewise sold progressives down the river. And in San Francisco, the City and Muni budgets were also made behind closed doors - letting the powerful still call the shots. We can't elect candidates who promise "change" - unless it also comes with a public and transparent decision-making process.
Here are the FDL Action health care reform highlights for Thursday, December 17.
1. Jon Walker discusses "The Unholy Trilogy For Insurance Profits: Individual Mandate, Broad Age Rating, And Hardship Exemption." According to Walker, "Forcing the young to buy coverage with huge government subsidies, but having a way to price the old out of the market, is in fact the health insurance companies' dream." Is that the way to keep them from running a 2009 version of "Harry and Louise," to make their "dream" come true? Hmmmm.
2. Jane Hamsher reports on her MSNBC appearance this morning with Dylan Ratigan, at which time he made her argument for her, that "40 million new customers forced to buy your product with no competition and no regulatory body to oversee it is a pretty sweet deal." For more, see item #1, above, on the "health insurance companies' dream."
3. Jon Walker continues his back-and-forth on whether or not to "kill the bill" with Nate Silver of 538.com. In this installment, Walker accuses Silver of responding to his answers, "but only to a straw man, crib notes version of my answers." Who knew that dueling, wonky, blogger diaries on the intricate details of health care reform legislation could be so enthralling? :)
4. Speaking of exciting, I definitely recommend that you check out the heated exchange between Mary Landrieu and Howard Dean last night on Hardball. Jane Hamsher transcribes it, which is particularly cool given that it's not easy to transcribe spittle flying around a TV studio. Heh.
5. Jon Walker responds to an article by Jonathan Cohn, which tries to "defend the individual mandate in this bill by claiming the Netherlands also has an individual mandate." According to Walker, "The problem is the health care system produced by the Senate bill would be nothing at all like the health system in the Netherlands," and he lays out exactly why that is the case.
6. Jon Walker reports that Ben Nelson "has rejected Harry Reid's latest compromise on the abortion language," and that Nelson "is trying to go for the full Stupak amendment." Walker adds that "[w]e wouldn't need to be worrying about Ben Nelson's mountain of demands right now if they would just go with reconciliation." So true.
7. Jon Walker rebuts one of the "better-sounding arguments for passing the Senate bill", that "we can fix it later." The problem with that argument, of course, is that Walker "can't imagine there being a time anytime soon where the Democrats have more power." Neither can anyone else, which is why they need to get as much done now as possible, on health care reform and on a whole host of other issues. But they won't get those things done if they keep letting John McCain's Best Friend Forever pull a "Liebercare" on everything. Once again, if this hasn't been stressed enough, it's time to go to reconciliation and pass strong, progressive health care reform legislation now, not "later."
8. Last but not least, do NOT miss Scarecrow's post on the confrontation between Lanny Davis and Jane Hamsher on the Ed Show this evening. According to Scarecrow, "After just one round with Jane on the Ed Show, Lanny's credibility was in need of a waaaambulance. He was last seen being wheeled out on Joe Lieberman's gurney, on the way to the emergency ward." Ouch!
Here are the FDL Action health care reform highlights for Wednesday, December 16. We'll call this the "Joe must go" edition.
1. Jon Walker writes about the "sad defeat of Dorgan's drug re-importation amendment, which would have saved American consumers billions on their prescription drugs." Walker notes that "[a]llowing Americans to buy cheaper drugs from Canada or Europe was one of Obama's campaign promise on health care," and also that this is a "very popular, bipartisan idea that would actually help 'bend the cost curve' on our health care spending." But now, it looks like it's not going to happen, and that's extremely unfortunate.
2. Jane Hamsher comments on the story that the White House is "very not pleased...with Dr. Dean speaking out about health care reform and this plan." The amazing thing is that the White House isn't upset with Joe Lieberman for all the bad stuff he's been doing, but is upset with Howard Dean for saying that we should scrap the current Senate bill, go to reconciliation and get a much stronger bill with public option, Medicare buy-in, etc. It's surreal.
3. Jane Hamsher reports on remarks by Sen. Russ Feingold, who said, "This bill appears to be legislation that the president wanted in the first place, so I don't think focusing it on Lieberman really hits the truth."
4. Jon Walker demolishes the "great big myth that reconciliation would not work for health care reform." According to Walker, "That is pure nonsense," as "reconciliation would still protect the guts of reform." In addition, "provisions [not related to the budget] will only be removed if they fail to get 60 votes to wave the Byrd rule for those provisions." So why aren't they doing this?
5. Jon Walker argues that the health care "bills could easily be redesigned to increase insurance coverage by roughly 30 million Americans at a fraction of the cost if we drop the massive giveaway to the insurance companies, and the individual mandate." A new, revamped bill would contain "insurance market reforms," "the House's employer mandate and slightly increased small business tax credits," "Medicaid expansion to 150%-200% FPL," "Maintaining or expanding CHIP program," and a "permanent COBRA expansion with subsidies." According to Walker, such a bill, "depending on design, should cover close to 30 million more Americans, and for less than a net cost of $500 billion" - "a fraction of the cost to the government (with a bill done through reconciliation), and without enriching the health insurance companies trying to kill real reform." Again, why aren't they doing this?
7. Michael Whitney comments on "Jello Jay Rockefeller's rant against Howard Dean on MSNBC this afternoon," in which he asked, "So what do I do? do I take my football and run home and sulk?" Whitney's punchline: "No, you're going to kick it!" Heh.
8. Jane Hamsher notes that Robert Gibbs never called Joe Lieberman "irrational," as he essentially did about Howard Dean earlier today.
10. Jon Walker explains "How CBO Director Doug Elmendorf Wrote The Health Care Bill." In brief, Elmendorf put together a memo last May which "basically put the absolute limits on what Democrats would even attempt in health care reform." According to Walker, "There is no real logic to it, he simply decided what he thought was enough regulation to make something part of the budget." Somehow, given where we are right now, ending today's health care update with the words "no real logic" seems highly appropriate.
Here are the FDL Action health care reform highlights for Tuesday, December 15. We'll call this the "Joe must go" edition.
1. Jane Hamsher writes about the "manufactured outrage of Joe Lieberman" regarding criticism over "money paid to his wife Hadassah by the Susan B. Komen 'Race for the Cure.'" Hamsher adds that "if Senator Lieberman is 'deeply offended' by the suggestion that his wife is a lobbyist, one has to wonder what he did for all those years when she was working for the biggest lobbying firms in Washington DC."
2. Jon Walker comments angrily on the message from the White House that Democratic Senators should "do anything to pass a bill with the title of "health care reform," even if that "health care reform...helps almost no one for four years, will not lower drug prices, will not slow down the out-of-control growth of health care costs, will make most Americans health insurance worse, will leave millions uninsured, provide no competition for the insurance companies, and not end medical bankruptcy in this country." Getting excited yet?
4. Jon Walker argues that "Without the option of a government-run insurance entity or extremely tight regulations to guarantee everyone has access to quality, cost effective health insurance, an individual mandate is both immoral and bad policy." Other than that, it totally rocks! (snark)
6. Jon Walker points out that "Joe Lieberman has never made a secret about his desire to bring down the public option," and that "Harry Reid must have known this whole time that he would never get Joe Lieberman's magical 60th vote on a bill with a public option." The bottom line is that if "Reid had gone with reconciliation, Joe Lieberman would not be writing the bill as we speak." So why didn't he? Did he actually trust Joe Lieberman to do the right thing here? If so, all I can say is "wow, just wow."
7. Jane Hamsher says she agrees with Howard Dean's call to kill the Senate health care bill. Hamsher concludes: "If I wanted Joe Lieberman writing a health care bill, I would've voted for John McCain. Howard Dean is right. Kill LieberCare."
8. Jon Walker notes that "While everyone has been fretting about Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson has remained an equally big hurdle to get 60 votes for cloture." Believe it or not, even though Nelson "has already played a big role in removing the public option, preventing the bill from ending the anti-trust exemption for health insurance companies, and possibly killing the CLASS long term insurance program," he also wants abortion language that "will likely end up one of the biggest rollbacks of women's reproductive rights in a generation." In short, with Democrats like these, who needs Republicans?
9. Jane Hamsher reports that even though Byron Dorgan "had the votes to pass his drug reimportation amendment, which would have saved the public over $100 billion and the government $19 billion," it's not going to happen because...you guessed it, "Joe Lieberman says it can't be part of LieberCare!" So here's the bottom line choice for the White House and Harry Reid: either tell Joe Lieberman to take a hike and go to reconciliation, or pass a watered-down health care "reform" bill without its best, and also most popular, elements. I believe this is what's known in the vernacular as a "no brainer," but why does something tell me the great brains in Washington, DC won't be able to figure it out? On second thought, maybe it's not their brains as much as it's their spines, specifically their willingness to stand up to bullies like Joe Lieberman?
Here are the FDL Action health care reform highlights for Friday, December 11.
1. Jon Walker says that the "'Medicare buy-in' idea might not really be Medicare at all, it might in fact be fake Medicare, one which "would lack almost all the benefits of Medicare." Walker adds, "A Medicare buy-in program that does not actually allow people to fully buy into real Medicare is a farce."
2. Jane Hamsher writes that Harry Reid, "who is solely responsible for crafting the bill that he introduced in the Senate, decided that there should be a limit on lifetime benefits." Meanwhile, "Reid is also manipulating procedure to keep the Dorgan drug reimportation amendment, which would save both the government and consumers hundreds of millions of dollars, from coming to a vote." Hamsher wonders why "Reid never uses the powers he has against Joe Lieberman."
3. Jon Walker believes that, "For the past few days, Obama and Reid have rather publicly fought against bringing down America's health care costs."
5. Jon Walker writes that Harry Reid has "quietly gutted one of the most important consumer protections in the bill, the ban on annual limits." Walker argues that by adding the "'unreasonable' qualifier {Reid} added is a loophole you can drive a school bus through." Jane Hamsher adds that the Department of Health and Human Services knew about this and even has been "quietly promoting" it for a while now.
6. Jon Walker reports that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has concluded that the "new excise tax on employer-provided health insurance will result in most people getting worse health insurance from their employer, insurance that covers less." Walker adds that if "this excise tax is the core of the plan to 'bend the cost curve,' it is a failure."
7. Jon Walker argues that the "reason Reid dropped the annual limit from the Senate bill was to make his bill appear cheaper in the CBO score, and make insurance premiums appear lower." "Of course," Walker points out, "eliminating the ban on annual caps makes a mockery of the entire idea of 'insurance.'"
8. Finally, Jon Walker has highlights of CMS' analysis of the Senate health care bill. Overall, Walker concludes, "the report is a mixed bag," with "very slightly higher" national health expenditures in 2019, but on the other hand it "shows a bad bill can still greatly expand insurance coverage without noticeably increasing our national health care spending." Ergo, Walker concludes, "Imagine what could be done with a good bill that is not full of massive corporate give aways."
Here are the