Senate Health Bill Uses Federal Enforcement Against Individuals, but Not Private Insurers

[slipslidingaway]

http://firedoglake.com/

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2010/01/04/federal-enforcement-to-be-used-against-you-but-not-to-protect-you-from-the-insurance-companies/


"There is no better proof that the Senate bill is a massive giveaway to the health care industry than the radically different enforcement mechanism for the individual mandate and the new insurance regulations. This Senate bill will force you to buy insurance from only private insurance companies. It will use the power of the federal government in the form of the IRS to make sure you buy private health insurance.

While the Senate bill will technically put some new regulations on the books, it will not use the power of the federal government to make sure the health insurance companies are following them. Enforcement of new regulations is left completely up to the states, which, for the most part, have an extremely poor track record at this function...

...It is both immoral and financially reckless to do what the Senate bill does. It uses the power of the federal government to force people to buy private insurance and gives the private insurance companies hundreds of billions in federal funds. Yet it does not use the power of the federal government to police the insurance companies to make sure they are not wasting the billions in federal funds they receive, or abusing their millions of federally mandated customers.

No one left, right, or center should accept this system which puts regular people in such a weak position compared to the private corporations with which they are force to do business. Attempts to justify the individual mandate by comparing it to Swiss, Dutch, or Belgian health care ignores the reality of those systems. Not other country forces people into such a powerless, subservient position compared to private companies. The Senate bill does not create social contract guaranteeing quality, affordable health care for everyone in exchange for mandating the buying of health insurance. It just forces people to buy a poor-quality product from an extremely wasteful, predatory, and poorly regulated industry."

[atreides1]

1. But.

It's the best bill that they can come up with, besides the Congress will improve it as soon as possible.

At least, that's what the pro-HCR people will say.

[slipslidingaway]

2. And others believe this will only strengthen the for profit companies ...

who are losing customers.

:)


http://pnhp.org/news/2009/december/pro-single-payer-physicians-call-for-defeat-of-senate-health-bill

"...Some paint the Senate bill as a flawed first step to reform that will be improved over time, citing historical examples such as Social Security. But where Social Security established the nidus of a public institution that grew over time, the Senate bill proscribes any such new public institution. Instead, it channels vast new resources – including funds diverted from Medicare – into the very private insurers who caused today’s health care crisis. Social Security’s first step was not a mandate that payroll taxes which fund pensions be turned over to Goldman Sachs!"

[mmonk]

5. That's what bothers me to no end.

[slipslidingaway]

8. Me too, this was the perfect moment to challenge the for profit ...

companies, they know the number of boomers who will begin retiring in the next two years and the impact it will have on their business.

Instead we prop them up.

:(

[terrell9584]

52. Boomers retire?

How do people retire when their retirement is wiped out?

[coti]

11. No, we can't improve it. That would just draw attention to it.

Apparently, that's why we're skipping conference:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=7392656&mesg_id=7392656



The issues surrounding this healthcare legislation are only going to get progressively worse because people are unwilling to deal with them directly and properly.

[bvar22]

3. The statement that DAMNS the Democratic Party:

"THIS is the BEST we could do!"

In 2008, the American People gave The Democrats:

*The House

*The Senate

*The White House

*An overwhelming MANDATE for CHANGE

And they tells us "This is the best we could do."

Compare the Senate Bill with ANY Health Care System from ANY other civilized nation in the WORLD!

and "This is the best we could do."

A "Uniquely American Solution"....INDEED!

[slipslidingaway]

4. So true ...

"Compare the Senate Bill with ANY Health Care System from ANY other civilized nation in the WORLD!"

:thumbsup:


IMO we need to acknowledge what the Dems have actually accomplished - which was to take a not for profit, national health care sysytem, such as SP, off the table, both in the early 90's and now. And this was done when polls showed that the majority of Americans supported the idea. Great job!


:puke:


Two-thirds of Americans support Medicare-for-all (#1 of 6)

http://pnhp.org/blog/2009/12/06/two-thirds-support-1/

"...Horn went on to assert that single-payer had been taken off the table because Americans want it off the table. He claimed polling data supported him, but he cited no particular poll. The truth is that the Campaign for America’s Future (CAF) and other groups in Health Care for America Now (HCAN) had decided years earlier they would push Democratic candidates and officeholders to substitute the “option” for single-payer, and they would tell both Democrats and progressive activists that Americans “like the insurance they have” and that Americans oppose single-payer.

The argument that single-payer is “politically infeasible” is not new. That argument is as old as the modern single-payer movement (which emerged in the late 1980s). It is an argument made exclusively by Democrats who don’t want to support single-payer legislation – a group Merton Bernstein and Ted Marmor have called “yes buts.”

The traditional version of the “yes but” excuse has been that the insurance industry is too powerful to beat or, more simply, that “there just aren’t 60 votes in the Senate for single-payer.” But the leaders of the “option” movement felt they needed a more persuasive version of the traditional “yes but” excuse. The version they invented was much more insidious. They decided to say that American “values,” not American insurance companies, are the major impediment to single-payer..."

[Goldstein1984]

28. The best they can do is pathetic

and we're expected to support them anyway because they are the lesser of two evils.

[Faryn Balyncd]

6. k and r. thanks for post.

[slipslidingaway]

9. You're welcome and thank you! n/t

[highplainsdem]

7. K&R

[slipslidingaway]

10. Thanks :) n/t

[shadesofgray]

12. K&R

[slipslidingaway]

13. Thanks and welcome to DU :) n/t

[slipslidingaway]

14. kick n/t

[Romulox]

15. Don't be ridiculous. It will all be fixed in "side" agreements. Just like NAFTA was.

Er, I mean will be. :shrug:

[slipslidingaway]

16. Silly me for not believing that will be done :) n/t

[slipslidingaway]

17. I'm the Guy Who Cut Your Health Benefits. Trust Me. - related article

Thread
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=103&topic_id=507829&mesg_id=507829

Direct link
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/im-the-guy-who-cut-your-h_b_410999.html

"Over twenty years ago I sat in the office of one of the most famous CEOs in the world. He had gathered a group together to redesign the health benefits for 100,000 employees. A lot of ideas were being thrown around: cafeteria plans, increased out-of-pocket costs offset by savings accounts, multiple plan options. He was famous for both his brilliance and his nastiness, which may be why I was the only one who asked exactly what he was trying to accomplish.

"Simple," he said. "I want to give them less and make them think it's more.


Which gets me to another aspect of my old job: If we made a change and people didn't like it, we got a lot of angry phone calls and insurers lost customers. So we developed a very good sense of what people will and won't accept. I see a lot of ideas, especially in the Senate bill, that may look good on paper in Washington but will be very unpopular out there in the real world. (Surveys confirm that suspicion.)

Then there's the "to catch a thief" principle: If you don't know how insurance companies can work around regulatory obstacles, you have no idea how fragile or even counterproductive some ideas can be. Take the Senate proposal to hold insurance company profits to 15 cents on every dollar collected. It sounds great, but as I told David Dayen of Firedoglake , it wasn't hard to come up with five ways the insurance companies could get around it.

...I see something else that reminds me of the old days, too: I see the footprints of people wanting to "give them less and make them think that it's more..."

[laughingliberal]

22. Some of the exact points I've attempted to warn people about

"Take the Senate proposal to hold insurance company profits to 15 cents on every dollar collected. It sounds great, but as I told David Dayen of Firedoglake , it wasn't hard to come up with five ways the insurance companies could get around it. " <snip?>

Exactly what I've been saying and confirmed by Wendall Potter. MLR of 85% was exactly where he said the insurance companies were most confident they could work the numbers to their advantage. An earlier proposal had it set to be 90% and Obama's director of OMB put the cabash on it saying it amounted to a nationalization of the system. WTF? MLR were consistently 90-93% before the 80's and I don't think we had a 'nationalized' system.


""Simple," he said. "I want to give them less and make them think it's more."" <snip>

The Senate bill in a nutshell.

[slipslidingaway]

25. Well it is better than nothing, can always be improved and could be ...

another generation before anything is done, that is what is said over and over.

:(

Also many of these points have been made in various articles and posts by PNHP which, for the most part, were ignored by many people because they did not support the public option. What a clever marketing ploy the public option was to divert attention from a national HC system.

[laughingliberal]

27. Yep! nt

[MisterP]

54. "[PNHP was] ignored by many people because they did not support the public option"

this is another problem with American discourse: Orwell-style blind spots, a sort of reverse "dog-whistle" that terminates thought and makes the eyes slide right over the text (sounds like something from Grant Morrison's Invisibles). Anything tied to a condemned doctrine or group can thus be dismissed: class struggle and government is "socialist" (up go the blinkers); animal rights is "loony" or "radical" (up go the blinkers); discussing a shooting spree is "freedum-hatin' gun-grabber" (up go the blinders). This process is not tied to the "reptilian brain" (and, frankly, the triune-brain model has less value than phrenology), but is extremely socialized, tied to humanity's skill of language.

Many say that we have to "drop" any association with the condemned groups so as to bring those ideas to the reflexive masses--but that is wholly dishonest, as it puts McCarthy, Richard Berman, and John Lott's words in our mouths! We declare that those lunatics and professional liars are correct and honest in their criticisms of "radical positions," which is both false and undermines any case we can make for our own positions. It makes us part of the great PR octopus that constricts discourse in this country, just as Ella Baker and Eleanor Roosevelt's joining in anticommunist purges while denouncing McCarthy for giving a bad name to otherwise-respectable anticommunism "proved" to Americans that the Reds were wrong and unamerican all along, and even strong liberals agreed. This made socialism a dirty word and gave us the Cold-War liberals that went into Vietnam and the Dominican Republic, and nodded behind Reagan when he lied about Sandinista and FMLN evil. In 1988-92 the DLC took full reign: when conservative policies weren't being enacted, neoliberal ones were--and no nation can remain healthy with that. If we do nothing, this state of affairs will continue until everybody is making $2/hour and evading Blue Cross organ harvesters.

[liberal_at_heart]

18. K&R

[slipslidingaway]

20. thanks n/t

[amborin]

19. K$R outrageous!

[slipslidingaway]

21. makes sense to look at whose feet will be held to fire, thanks n/t

[amborin]

49. yes n/t

[laughingliberal]

23. Once again, corporations have more rights as 'persons' than people nt

[slipslidingaway]

26. Sadly, some things do not change. n/t

[ProSense]

24. Of course, there is the good mandate

How To Build The Best Health Reform Bill In Conference:

5.Real employer mandate (Senate bill has only a weak “free rider” provision which will result in a net decrease in employer provided health insurance).

FDL is all over the place.

[slipslidingaway]

31. Just your interpretation ...

"FDL is all over the place."

[leftstreet]

29. K&R

[slipslidingaway]

32. :) n/t

[Greyhound]

30. State insurance commissioners are typically insurance company employees/executives

that are available for purchase at bargain basement prices.

Of course the Senate has set this up to fail us while robbing the working class.

[slipslidingaway]

33. Yes and this will fail once the Dems are no longer in charge and

then they will blame the Republicans - what a game.

:(

[debbierlus]

34. Thanks for posting. Outrageous!

Kick!

[slipslidingaway]

38. You're welcome :) n/t

[LooseWilly]

35. I just called my Progressive Caucus Congresswoman to tell her to kill a mandate with no PO (again)

My name must be on file by now... the staffer didn't even need any other information.

:)

[slipslidingaway]

39. Thanks, I've sent them emails, my Republican House member

will vote no anyway.

:)

[Jamastiene]

36. K&R

As usual, our government hi fives it with corporations and punishes the middle class and the poor.

[slipslidingaway]

40. Yes they do. n/t

[LibDemAlways]

37. So far I haven't much discussion of this in the corporate media. Could be

the r's are all for the mandate while pretending to be against it. Then when it gets enacted and people start loudly squealing, those same r's can say "we didn't vote for it. Put us in charge next time and we'll repeal it." I fear if this mandate is signed, the Dems will lose the House and Senate in November.

[slipslidingaway]

41. I fear this will come back to haunt the Dems as well, but then again ...

people have short memmories.

:(

[EndElectoral]

42. Got a letter from Congressman Holden today. Claims Senate bill better

He voted against House bill, and I asked him to detail why. Here are his reasons below.

1. Imposes a drastic 502 billion in gross cuts to Medicare
2. Shifts more people onto Medicaid by lowering qualifications which strains State budgets.
3. Drastic cuts to nursing homes cutting 32 billion in Medicare payments
4. Cuts to visting nurses programs.
5. Not fiscally responsible in lieu of deficits
6. No language to limit purchase of coverage by lillegal immigrants
7. No tort reform

Frankly, it's a lot of BS. The House bill is vastly superior to the Senate disaster, but I'd be interested in others responses to Holden's reasons.

[avaistheone1]

43. Health care reform is beginning to feel like when Dems help bring us NAFTA

We are about to get screwed again.

[slipslidingaway]

44. Agreed, I've questioned for awhile whether or not people here at ...

DU would support this mandate if it was proposed by the Republicans.

:(

[avaistheone1]

45. Nope.

I don't think there is anyway DU would support this health reform mandate as it stands today, if it were brought by Republicans.

[slipslidingaway]

47. I doubt they would as well, thanks. n/t

[chimpymustgo]

46. Oh hell no. That would make a great OP. Mandates, no public option, abortion restrictions.

If it came from Rethugs, we'd be marching in the streets.

Yet we have relentless cheerleaders telling us this shit sandwich is caviar.

[slipslidingaway]

48. Thanks, hard to believe the things that are not only accepted, but ...

endorsed.

[madrchsod]

50. what? no firedoglake haters?......

the "healthcare reform" is a cruel joke on the american people. that was the intent of the process.

[slipslidingaway]

51. Shhh :) n/t

[nightrain]

53. kick. missed your good post until it showed up on the front page.

It IS curious/planned about this dichotomous enforcement.

I think Obama/Rahm etc. think they've got some great third way of governing going, but isn't it curious that there are critiques from both L and R?

Also on FDL is a great interview with Drew Westin, psychology prof in Ohio as I remember, concerning Obama's governing style and it's pitfalls. If you haven't read it, I think it's very worthwhile....

http://firedoglake.com/2010/01/06/fdl-welcomes-drew-westen-leadership-obama-style-and-the-looming-losses-in-2010/#comments

[slipslidingaway]

55. Thanks as I had missed that article and looks interesting, and yes the ...

avenues of enforcement are interesting.

[winyanstaz]

56. Kill this bill!!

[inna]

57. Damn, it's too late to rec!

:KICK:


This is just fucking infuriating. I seriously think that people would be up in arms and probably out in the streets already if this monstrosity of a Deform was authored by the Republicans. :grr: