Federal Money in Health Care Plan From McCain

[RamboLiberal]

Source: NY Times

TAMPA, Fla. — Senator John McCain detailed his plan to solve the nation’s health care crisis in a speech here Tuesday, calling for the federal government to give some money to states to help them cover people with illnesses who have been denied health insurance.

Mr. McCain’s health care plan would shift the emphasis from insurance provided by employers to insurance bought by individuals, to foster competition and drive down prices. To do so he is calling for eliminating the tax breaks that currently encourage employers to provide health insurance for their workers, and replacing them with $5,000 tax credits for families to buy their own insurance.

His proposal to move away from employer-based coverage was similar to one that President Bush pushed for last year, to little effect. And his call for expanding coverage through market-based competition is in stark contrast to the Democrats’ proposals to move toward universal health care coverage, with government subsidies to help lower-income people afford their premiums.

Mr. McCain had previously described aspects of his health care plan but on Tuesday offered new details on how to cover people with existing health problems, in a nod to the growing concerns about the difficulties that many sick, older and low-income people have getting insurance. Democrats had said that his market-driven plan, by not compelling insurance companies to cover people with health problems, would ignore the plight of people who have trouble getting coverage.

Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of former Senator John Edwards, recently pointed out that both she and Mr. McCain could be left uncovered by Mr. McCain’s plan because she has cancer and he has had melanoma. Stung by such criticism, Mr. McCain is trying to develop a way to cover people with health problems while still taking a generally market-based approach to solving the health care crisis.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/30/us/politics/30mccain.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

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Under McCain - if you're lucky enough to have employer based health care, kiss it goodbye.

[PSPS]

1. "$5,000 tax credits for families to buy their own insurance"

To do so (McSame) is calling for eliminating the tax breaks that currently encourage employers to provide health insurance for their workers, and replacing them with $5,000 tax credits for families to buy their own insurance.

Sure, just funnel badly needed taxpayer dollars to ... insurance companies, where they have a bloated "overhead" (CEO's who get paid hundreds of millions of dollars -- some of which is laundered right back to the RNC as "campaign contributions.")

William McGuire, of UnitedHealth Group, the nation's leading insurer, was paid $124.8 million -- enough to cover the average health-insurance premiums of nearly 34,000 people.

Just put everyone on Medicare and be done with it. It has a miniscule overhead because it isn't a de-facto money laundering operation for the republican party.

[Doctor Panacea]

2. McCain the Idiot

I am a physician. McCain is a total fool and liar. His idea of coverage is absurd. It will not work. Tax breaks are not the answer to the healthcare problem for people who do not make much money in the first place; and, what is more, the insurance companies are going to ration out what you can actually buy, even if you can afford a fairly high premium. I know. I pay $523 a month to BCBS of Tennessee and get virtually nothing for it. That is just coverage on myself.

Absolutely nothing is going to work except universal coverage. Don't let anyone fool you on that. Hillary's plan is a fraud, too, and she knows it. She has just put something forward to enhance her chances of being elected, by conning the people and not offending the health insurance industry.

Barack does not have an acceptable plan, either, but I believe that if Congress were to push for universal care, he would go along with it. At least, I hope he would, and not be a disappointment to those of us who see him as offering something different from the process that we know all too well. We deserve some kind of quantum leap in our political life after the spiritual morass of the Bush years.

[and-justice-for-all]

3. NHC. nothing else will do.nt