by Robert Reich
I’ved poked around Washington today, talking with friends on the Hill who confirm the worst: Big Pharma and Big Insurance are gaining ground in their campaign to kill the public option in the emerging health care bill.
You know why, of course. They don’t want a public option that would compete with private insurers and use its bargaining power to negotiate better rates with drug companies. They argue that would be unfair. Unfair? Unfair to give more people better health care at lower cost? To Pharma and Insurance, “unfair” is anything that undermines their profits.
So they’re pulling out all the stops — pushing Democrats and a handful of so-called “moderate” Republicans who say they’re in favor of a public option to support legislation that would include it in name only. One of their proposals is to break up the public option into small pieces under multiple regional third-party administrators that would have little or no bargaining leverage. A second is to give the public option to the states where Big Pharma and Big Insurance can easily buy off legislators and officials, as they’ve been doing for years. A third is bind the public plan to the same rules private insurers have already wangled, thereby making it impossible for the public plan to put competitive pressure on the insurers.
Max Baucus, Chair of Senate Finance (now exactly why does the Senate Finance Committee have so much say over health care?) hasn’t shown his cards but staffers tell me he’s more than happy to sign on to any one of these. But Baucus is waiting for more support from his colleagues, and none of the three proposals has emerged as the leading candidate for those who want to kill the public option without showing they’re killing it. Meanwhile, Ted Kennedy and his staff are still pushing for a full public option, but with Kennedy ailing, he might not be able to round up the votes. (Kennedy’s health committee released a draft of a bill today, which contains the full public option.)
Enter Olympia Snowe. Her move is important, not because she’s Republican (the Senate needs only 51 votes to pass this) but because she’s well-respected and considered non-partisan, and therefore offers some cover to Democrats who may need it. Last night Snowe hosted a private meeting between members and staffers about a new proposal Pharma and Insurance are floating, and apparently she’s already gained the tentative support of several Democrats (including Ron Wyden and Thomas Carper). Under Snowe’s proposal, the public option would kick in years from now, but it would be triggered only if insurance companies fail to bring down healthcare costs and expand coverage in he meantime.
What’s the catch? … Read the rest of this article to find out.
There’s an indepth article worth reading over at TheDailyKos today called:
THE FACTS ABOUT THE HEALTH INSURANCE INDUSTRY
I just came across this article:
That is double what they spent lobbying a year ago.. The article goes on to break down what issues they were lobbying for and against.
So, how do the pharmaceuticals and the insurance companies rank in terms of lobbyists and the power and influence they wield in Washington? Who has the most power and influence, throwing the most money around, with our Senators and lawmakers?
I really am asking that question. I don’t know that answer. I am just guessing it must be either the pharmaceutical or insurance companies.. With all the profits being raked in..
If that’s the case, then it is no wonder we can’t fix the healthcare system in this country, to make it more fair, reasonable, and able to cover all Americans.
Muse, if they are willing to spend $3.6 million to lobby that is an indication of the profits they figure to protect. And worse, it shows what profits they are making when they spend that much. Our health care dollars are paying for this.
They spent $6.9 million lobbying in the first quarter alone! So does that money go directly TO the Senators and Representatives to vote their way? Oh, I’m sorry.., to support their re-election campaigns?
The $6.9 million just makes it grotesque.
Isn’t it nice to know our insurance premiums are going to a good cause? I mean, how many people get to finance the building of their own gallows?
Why are we — the left, progressives, people with health insurance, OBAMA — allowing this to happen? What can we do to stop this from happening?
Move to Canada?
I will if I have to…
Considering that, even after the last election where the progressive populist ideals finally made a showing and we still have a government willing to ignore that, Canada, maybe New Zealand.
It is that or polish off the old shotgun and be ready.
On second thought, I need to go somewhere that has less severe winters and dry heat. I don’t do humidity, and snow has lost it’s charm (unless it’s a rarity).
And if I need to polish off the shotgun to live in this country, then it doesn’t matter where I live anyway — the idea of the US would be dead.
That’s why I favor New Zealand.
But there is the the thought that if rational Americans aren’t willing to fight for their country then you are right, the US is finished.
I’m of the opinion that if we have to resort to violence at this stage of the game, we really haven’t progressed as far as we think.
One of the economic problems looming on the horizon that Republicans like to point toward as an example of bad “entitlement” programs is Medicare. They fear (there’s that word again) that as the aging baby boomers all become eligible, the program will result in increased deficits to the federal budget. Another is Medicaid, which already attempts to provide healthcare to those of low income. Medicare is federal, while Medicaid is state by state, and straining the budgets of nearly every one of them.
Keeping the system we have only continues down the same road the majority of Americans are already dissatisfied with traveling. Businesses are tired of the uncertainty of their costs, and in the recession are cutting corners even more, by switching to lower cost policies that offer only the illusion of coverage, causing unnecessary bankruptcies when families already burdened by a major medical problem, discover the true limits of their insurance. Some businesses eliminate coverage altogether.
A “hybrid” system with a public plan option would allow the insurance companies to push the higher risk Americans onto the taxpayers, while encouraging the young and healthy to buy from them. The pool becomes smaller, but the risk is reduced, and the profits go higher. We have seen this kind of system with house insurance in hurricane-prone and flood-prone areas, with the government having to provide coverage because the insurance companies don’t really want to gamble. They want a sure thing, plus, they exploit any gray area they can. Many in Louisiana and Mississippi saw their houses destroyed by wind, before the waters rose, only to have the insurance companies refuse to pay because the government provided the flood insurance.
The purpose of insurance is to share the risk of one having a catastrophe over the largest possible “pool” of policyholders. Wouldn’t the largest possible pool be all Americans? And moving everyone into a single payer system, with the overhead costs of Medicare, would spread the cost of the baby boomers over the entire population, plus ease the burden of Medicaid on the states, end the uncertainty of businesses, eliminate medical bill induced bankruptcies, and take the gray areas out of health care completely. We are going to pay higher taxes for the government-provided healthcare that already is promised, we can’t afford to be taxed again by the for-profit insurance companies. Start calling healthcare premiums what they really are, a tax on Americans by the for-profit insurance companies.
There you go again, HoR, making sense.
Let me explain it to you again. The purpose of health insurance is to make HI companies money. For providing nothing. This is the new American way, making mega bucks for providing nothing and interfering with providing something.
Can’t you get with the program? /snark
So the scum on Wall Street are SuperAmericans? They really provide nothing when they “make” money.
Don’t know about the SuperAmerican part but yeah, they ‘make’ money. Sort of mystical, they generate profits from nonexistent entities only they understand.
Evidently magic hasn’t disappeared from our world.