Insurance Anti-Trust First, Then The HCR Bill... Could I Get Some Input On This ???

[WillyT]

I posted this the other day, in a somewhat humorous way, but I really think this could be a winning (somewhat) way forward. Or at least salvage one victory out of this mess.

IF... they (the House) are gonna pass this significantly flawed Senate version of HCR first, before any reconciliation to fix the various flaws inherent in that bill...

AND... the House doesn't trust the Senate to come back later and actually do said fixes...

THEN... shouldn't we/the President/the House insist on the Senate FIRST passing the House's Bill stripping the Anti-Trust Exemption from the Insurance Industry BEFORE we take the vote on HCR???

It has already passed the House, and could be used as an article of good faith by the Senate passing it, and the President signing it. Right there would be something, and would be there and enforceable no matter what happens to HCR coming up.

I'd love to see Republican Senators try and defend keeping the exemption, and who knows...

maybe this could be the start of the Democrats putting a little fear into Corporate America, instead of the other way around.

Thoughts???

:shrug:

[Donnachaidh]

1. not *just* anti-trust - heavy regulation as well

The insurance companies are foaming at the mouth over the mandate. They KNOW that they are being handed a license to STEAL. And here we are, watching as the chains are being forged to take 10 per cent of our incomes and hand it over to the insurance industry, with the IRS working as the collection agency. And our representatives cannot (or more likely WILL NOT) do a damned thing about putting some iron clad protections in for us?

Uh uh.

CHAINS we can believe in.

[DCKit]

2. Both ^ excellent ideas.

It's time to get serious.

[WillyT]

3. Thank You...

I was also wondering if there was some order of bills that has to be preserved.

We keep hearing about how many bills the House has passed that are "bottled up" in the Senate.

So... does HCR have to go first, or can Reid put whatever he wants on the floor any time he wants?

:shrug:

:hi:

[Go2Peace]

4. Totally in agreement. At this point it woudl be better to break out the regulatory components

Including making it illegal to consider pre-existing conditions.

[WillyT]

5. Anybody Else ???

Is there any reason we couldn't do this?

Or wouldn't want to do this?

:shrug:

[WillyT]

6. Last Kick From Me...

:kick:

[amborin]

7. no excise tax: it's slamming the middle class:

http://files.cwa-union.org/healthcarevoices/CWAExciseTaxReport.pdf