I don’t even know what to make of this:
The problem is the “Medicare buy-in” they are talking about might not at all resemble the Medicare buy-in that Dean wants. A permanent, real Medicare buy-in for everyone between the ages of 55-64 would be a very positive development. Even if eligibility were restricted to only 55-64 year-olds on the exchange (self insured, uninsured, employees of small businesses), that would still be a step in the right direction.
My greater fear is that this “Medicare buy-in” has already been gutted or will soon be gutted of all value. Kent Conrad is pushing to decouple this Medicare buy-in from Medicare. Conrad wants to make it fake Medicare. He wants people in this fake Medicare to pay much higher reimbursement rates. and be placed in a separate risk pool. The people in fake Medicare might not even be able to use the Medicare provider network. This will make the premiums for Medicare buy-in dramatically higher, and might make the entire fake Medicare program unworkable. Already, the Federal Association of Hospitals is pushing for something like this change to gut the proposal.
Look, I know legislation is always more complicated than it sounds, but how do you “decouple” a “Medicare buy-in” from “Medicare.” That would seem to me to suggest that the “medicare buy-in” really isn’t, and instead is some sort of nonsense like “Medicare Advantage,” which was just a direct line from the treasury to insurance companies.
Either it is medicare or it isn’t, and if Jane Jon Walker is right, you shouldn’t be allowed to call it a Medicare buy-in. When businesses advertise falsely, we at least have the BBB. With Senators, we are just screwed.
Elise
Conrad may be pushing for them to go into Medicare Advantage plans instead of Original Medicare. I don’t see that happening. MA plans waste Medicare’s money.
However, if it’s coming from Jane I’m not really going to hold my breath over this one. She’s rarely right on health care related issues.
catclub
I can only assume that an age 55-64 years risk pool will be lower risk
of huge medical bills than the age 65-109+ years risk pool.
They will not be subsidized, but if they pay medicare reimbursement rates that should be less expensive than any private insurance plan. Higher than medicare reimbursement rates would be bad. Then it would be called the public option again. (Medicare is not Government healthcare, remember?
The public option is!)
Therefore, Conrad’s idea is not totally bad. Higher than medicare reimbursment rates, but paid on a pool that should on average be less sick than the 65-109+ medicare group.
TaosJohn
Just what I said earlier. This is shuck & jive. It’s not really a Medicare buy-in at all. More horseshit.
Ed Drone
And if it isn’t, then Ben Nelson is calling for another, separate and new, Socialistical Government-run insurance plan — shame on him!
Ed
Roger Moore
@catclub:
I’m not sure that’s a safe assumption. Some of the people in that 55-64 pool are presumably there because the insurance companies don’t want to touch them with a 10 foot pole. If they skew the pool far enough toward high risk, they may be more expensive to cover than the regular medicare pool.
donovong
Wouldn’t it be nice if folks like Hamsher would hold their fire until they actually have a real fucking target? I realize that would require a modicum of self-restraint and the ability to be somewhat less shrill, but she is ASSUMING things, based on nothing more than supposition – just as she has done during this whole process. “Hystrionics R Us.”
I am so sick of her and the idiots at DKOS, I no longer go to either site. They are simply not happy unless they are unhappy and stomping their feet like spoiled children.
For example, via TPM: “Public option supporter Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) said last night that the Senate deal may be stronger than the watered-down public options passed by the House and considered by the Senate.”
But, of course, he is not privy to nearly as much inside info as Jane Hamsher.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@donovong:
This.
K. Grant
“if Jane is right…”
Stop. Right. There. Ms. Hamsher is the pearl-clutchingest, defense-crouchingest, Obama-schadenfreudeingest (in the most alarming fashion) of all the bloggers out there on the vast expanse of the left. Her ability to tell the story in anything approaching objectivity is laughable, and thus anything that is published at her site is dodgy. At best.
I will wait until we actually hear the details spelled out by people who don’t have giant double-bladed axes to grind.
lamh31
OT, Watch wingnuts head explode:
“Statue of Obama as boy erected in Indonesian park”
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALe…
Zifnab
It’s shit like this that gives Medicare – and all entitlements – a bad name. Johnson sets up a program to provide elderly people with health care, and Congress spends the next 50 years punching holes in it and turning the whole thing into a wasteful corporate money balloon.
And then Republicans come crying because it’s unsustainable. Whoddathunkit?!
Of course, the really irony is if Kent Conrad’s hacked and mangled Medicare Buy-In just ends up looking like a very sad and feeble public option.
FlipYrWhig
@donovong:
Exactly. I’m fucking sick of all the fucking NOWnowNOW antics. And once again this one is based on…
Why the fuck should we be getting ourselves worked up about Jane Hamsher’s “fears”? I’m not listening to any of these dickbags anymore. I’m down to like two comments sections, this one and Benen, because the GloomTroopers took over all the rest.
Jim
@donovong:
I could add to the list of sites and comment sections that have become unreadable, but why generate a flamewar. The internet has made commentary and “activism” (in the form of clicking to sign a petition or send an e-mail) instantaneous. Legislation is still Constitutionally (and otherwise) slowed-down sausage-making process, and the American economy is still a big old steam powered barge we’re trying to turn around against the current. Therefore, according to people whose political involvement dates back to Connecticut in ’06 (or, for the real old-timers, to BlowJobGate), Obama is worse than Bush.
Ailuridae
FDL’s wrong. Not much else needs to be said.
I’m also disappointed that BJers aren’t realizing the importance of the rumored inclusion of the Franken Amendment in the bill mandating that insurance companies spend 90% of their collected premiums on health care. Its a huge deal and essentially puts us in line with the Western European countries that still have private insurance but basically treat them like utilities.
Zifnab
@donovong:
To be fair, that’s half the problem. Bernie Sanders may come out and give the deal a thumbs up, but how much does Bernie really understand about a bill cobbled together of compromises? How much does Jane Hamsher know? Can you blame people for being upset over the sheer confusion of it all?
One vice of Obama’s “Let Congress write it” health care approach is the continuously nebulous state of the legislation. Today we have to rebut tall tales of Death Panels, tomorrow we get another shitty abortion amendment, next week they’ll be compromising away another angle of the public option, and by the time it’s done – who cares! This was just the House Bill, and we’re going to be ping-ponging through the Senate Bill, so the whole House was irrelevant anyway.
catclub
FlipYrWhig @ 11
A minister I respect said, “The most common thing Jesus says in the Gospels is ‘Fear Not’.”
My hallmark moment of the day. It might even be true.
Zifnab
@Ailuridae:
Tell us when it’s not a rumor anymore.
The last Franken Amendment was all in good fun too, but the Chairman of the Defense Committee can still gut the thing right out again on a whim.
I absolutely adore Al Franken as Senator from everything I’ve seen. And he’s got some great legislation to add. But if the Conserva-Dems kill it in utero, he can be Senator Jesus and it won’t save us.
lamh31
“Dean Likes The Health Care Deal”
http://politics.theatlantic.com/2009/12/dean_likes_the_health_care_deal.php
Jim
@Ailuridae:
Damn. I spend way too much time on political blogs and I haven’t heard that. Good news!!
FlipYrWhig
@K. Grant:
More -est than John Aravosis? I think we need a playoff system to tell for sure. The Blog Caterwauling Series computer isn’t leading to a definitive result.
Ash Can
We’re screwed if and only if their bullshit actually becomes the law of the land. I recall reading, earlier this morning and somewhere on this site, a comment saying that even Jay Rockefeller, a conservative in his own right, was calling Conrad out on his bullshit. We have yet to see whether any real turds end up in the bill that gets sent to Obama, and whether he actually signs off on said turds. Until then, I need a lot more than “the bill will be awful, I just know it” before I’ll join the stampede of Chicken Littles.
@donovong:
You said a mouthful. Even Kos himself was running in circles this morning. Sure, keep up the pressure on your elected representatives, but it’s way, way too early to be wailing that it’s all over and we’ve lost. Geezus Christ, you guys. Go and have a beer and save your breath till it’s really needed.
Ella in NM
Jane Hamsher just sent me a mass email entitled: “Obama Fail.”
What do we expect at this point in the way of reasoned analysis from FDL?
valdivia
sorry but quoting Hamsher about a deal on which she has NO Details yet and she is just imaging her worst fears based on what? Rockefeller is the one who put this on the table and he is happy, plus he took Conrad to the woodshed over his proposals. I trust Rockefeller more than Hamsher on this any day, plus he was in the room.
Ailuridae
@Zifnab:
So we are commenting on the broad rumors of the plan and that’s OK but commenting on the specifics amendments linked in the same news story is premature. Um, ok.
Please turn off the comments until the legislation is released I guess.
Jim
@Ella in NM:
That’s when I finally unsubscribed.
gwangung
Then you’re part of the problem, dammit.
Given the fluidity of matters at this point, calling your Sentator’s office and talking to them WILL do a hell of a lot of good.
gwangung
@Ailuridae:
You know, I would be perfectly fine on calling your local Senator and urging them to support specific amendments that you like. That’s possible, no?
Ailuridae
@valdivia:
Sure Rockefeller is happy and yes he’s been fighting for healthcare for longer than I have been alive but, but, but, but, but …. FISA!
valdivia
Aside–Hamsher will never be happy with Obama. Period.
valdivia
@Ailuridae:
LOL. so sad but true.
DZ
Just for the record, Medicare is an open system, and people may select whatever doctor they wish. There really is no such thing as a ‘Medicare provider network’.
aimai
There’s no denying that nobody knows nothing at this point–and that goes double for “the guys in the room.” A compromise has been worked out among ten senators? But they actually need the votes of at least four (Lieberman, Nelson, Snowe, Collins, Landreiu, Lincoln, Carper, Bayh?) each of whom has rejected some part of this compromise *a priori*–that is, they “hammered out a compromise” that no one has agreed to vote for? They offered to give up the public option in exchange for a variety pack of a, b, c,d, e, f, and maybe g type accomodations, of varying costs and benefits and they *didn’t get an upfront agreement* from *any* of the votes they need that there would definitely be a cloture vote on these provisions? Fuck that for a lark.
On that, I’d say Jane was absolutely spot on prescient. Rumors of the lowering of the age of medicare and a medicare buy in quickly devolved into an offer to maybe let some small portion of the 54-65 year old’s buy into medicare if they have only one leg, can’t get insurance, won’t ask for subsidies, will pay any premium level, and have a mother in law who drinks and writes country and western songs?
And, no, whoever said it way upthread, this particular batch of 54-65 year olds will not be healthier and help the risk pool for all medicare. That’s because as far as we know the 54-65 year olds who are eligible for buy in under this limited plan will actually be sicker than the usual run of such people. Because in order to qualify they have to have been uninsured and uninsurable by regular health plans for long enough before buying in that their health has probably suffered. And they probably lost employer sponored health care for pre-existing conditions.
This entire thing is a rube goldberg formulation of unparalleled stupidity. Every sane thing that a good theoriest would want to see–from increasing buy in, building large risk pools, spreading risk, covering everyone, portability, etc..etc..etc… is stymied by insurance company shills. And we have to eat it and like it? No, we don’t have to accept that the dems who have allowed the republicans and the centrists to destroy all rational discussion and to dominate the decisionmaking process know what they are doing. They may, indeed, be doing the best they can but its piss poor.
aimai
sgwhiteinfla
I’m not all that high on the compromise but it is definitely true that anything short of a robust public option will be slagged by Hamsher. She is wedded to it and has been the whole time. She was against the opt out compromise which for me would have been the perfect compromise both politically and policy wise because it would have put all the spotlight on those Republican governors who claim they are against a public option. All I can say is take what she is ranting about today with a grain of salt. It is what it is.
Ash Can
@lamh31:
What a great little story! Thanks — I needed the smile. :)
Sly
You don’t. It’s a measure proposed by people who think Americans won’t know the difference.
@Elise
Doubtful. Medicare Advantage isn’t supplemental insurance. It’s actual Medicare, just administered by a private company (which got the contract to do so without competitive bidding) that has to offer the same or similar benefits. What Conrad is proposing is a separate risk pool that contains the biggest demographic liability for insurance companies. As a centerpiece for HCR, it would be a disaster. As side program it might cover a few million people when the subsidies start kicking in, but why use it when you have the Exchange?.
TP has a few more details on the compromise. I really need more information to say anything of substance, but I doubt the Medicare buy-in is worth talking about.
CBO did a previous study on a proposed buy-in for 62-64 year old individuals, and calculated that the premiums would have to average about $7200 a year. That certainly isn’t great, but its better than what a 55 year old with a pre-existing condition would pay in the individual market. It depends on how much they allow doctor and hospital groups to gut the thing so no one wants to use it, and as a result fewer people are paying the reduced Medicare reimbursement rates.
As for the rest of the compromise, the good things are the increase in the percentage premiums have to go toward care, and having the OPM-managed program require national plans with national standards. Non-Profit plans regulated by the OPM may not be as good as a Federally administered plan, but its a whole lot better than the status quo.
On a side note, I’m starting to really hate doctors because of all this. And people who live on farms. Move to a fucking city already. Gawd.
Ailuridae
@DZ:
But doctors don’t have to accept Medicare as a form of payment so it creates a de facto network.
Linkmeister
@aimai:
Oh, and by the way, even if you fit those criteria, you can’t buy in till 2011 at the earliest, so don’t get sick in 2010.
Abolish the
House of LordsSenate; it’s filled with a bunch of overweening egos and gives too much power to itsy-bitsy states with very small populations.Ailuridae
@Sly:
Non-Profit plans regulated by the OPM may not be as good as a Federally administered plan, but its a whole lot better than the status quo.
If this somehow allows a decent non-profit provider like KP to go nationwide more readily that would be great. I am also very skeptical of that model being scalable in anything but a market by market basis.
John S.
Health insurance is a big fat waste of money.
I do not get it through my employer and my wife has been unemployed since January, so we have an individual policy linked to an HSA. About a year ago, I started wondering what would happen when we wanted to have another child. That’s when I discovered that – at least here in Florida – there is NO SUCH THING as an individual policy that covers maternity costs.
The only options for me were to change to a non-HSA compatible plan or to get a maternity rider as a separate component. The maternity riders I looked at were all pretty similar – they cost about $100 mo. and came with a $5000 deductible. Also, in order to get the full benefit of the policy you had to be on it at least 90 days prior to conception and in most cases with the coverage for at least a year. Needless to say, I did not go with it because it was shit.
Three weeks ago, my wife discovers that we are expecting our second child. Our insurance will not cover ANY of the costs (as I already knew) and a pregnant woman is effectively uninsurable in this country, so we cannot switch our plan. So we are faced with having to pay for the entire thing out-of-pocket. I was freaking out over the whole situation, until I made two phone calls.
One was to the OBGYN to determine that if we pay cash for the pregnancy, they charge a flat rate of $4500. The second was to the hospital to find out that THEY charge a flat rate of $2500 for a 2-day hospital stay that is identical to what we got with our first child. The only extra cost is the anesthesiologist which should be in the neighborhood of $1000. And heaven forbid there are any complications, our regular insurance kicks in the moment the child is born.
So here’s the thing…on the one hand, with insurance we would have paid about $7000 between the maternity premium and the deductible, assuming we only had the coverage for the mandatory minimum length of time. On the other hand, we are likely going to pay about $7000 for the same fucking thing directly to the health providers. Most of this money will come from our HSA, which saved me thousands in taxes.
So can someone explain to me why we fucking have health insurance in this country if it costs the same as paying for shit yourself? (And yes, I realize this does not pertain to low-income families that cannot plan or afford to come up with thousands of dollars.)
Da Bomb
@donovong: This
@K. Grant: Double this.
She is the shrillest of the shrill. And she likes to fan herself dizzy with hysterics. I am not paying attention to her panty-wringing anymore.
And she is at the top of the list of whiny ass titty suckling lefty bloggers that I have stop listening to.
Mac G
Booman takes apart Hamsher’s straw man arguments.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2009/12/9/134615/705
Harley Furguson, the Tractorcycle
@Jim:
Eh, not *always*..
TARP: Proposed on Sept 19, 2008, enacted Oct 3, 2008
It all depends on whether the owners really want something or not, if they do then our esteemed legislature can move at superluminal speeds indeed.
I would also direct your attention to the PATRIOT act.
AngusTheGodOfMeat
Well, duh. Why would insurers want the highest risk groups to be in their own risk pool?
This all misses the point. Those of us who want reform and swim in the high risk pool want cheaper and more accessible coverage, and we don’t really care all that much what they call it.
What amazes me is how easily “lefties” get caught up in what amounts battles over language and symbolism. I run away from Republicans because they can’t take their eyes off symbols and semantics. If Dems really want to be smarter, they need to act, you know, smarter.
Malron
John.
Jane is never right. That is all.
Sly
@Ailuridae
While it’s been a long time since any politician has impressed me as much as Franken, being from Minnesota is what allows him to offer such an amendment. Minnesota law prohibits health insurance companies from operating on a for-profit basis. No insurer in the state pays less than 90% of premiums on care.
It’s also the state with the highest rate of coverage, and reasonable premiums when you account for per capita household income. Take from that what you will.
valdivia
@Mac G:
that Booman piece really rocks. Thanks for linking it.
Jay in Oregon
@FlipYrWhig:
Has Jane ever banned someone from FDL for defending her?
If not, then Aravosis wins.
aimai
John S.
A) dont’ take anything for granted until you have it in writing. What you are told will be the costs will not be the costs, and without the insurance company fighting with you you will have no way to hold the hospital to any promises.
B) without insurance that covers the procedure and the pregnancy and the child and the child’s costs you will be on the hook for any emergency costs if something (god forbid) should go wrong with the pregnancy and the birth.
I am totally opposed to private health insurance and think we should all have single payer/national health insurance. But the fact of the matter is that no medical procedure is risk free and a certain amount of “insurance” as in “risk pooling for the unexpected” is a good idea. I’m not sure that the kind of fee for service you are describing gives you any such confidence.
aimai
Elise
@Sly
I’m actually well aware of what MA plans do. My point was that they won’t be doing anything in this bill to push more people into MA plans when the Administration and CMS have clearly been working to limit MA plan offerings. The regulations are getting tighter and tighter and more and more companies are dropping out of their MA agreements with Medicare and saying “no thanks, not enough profit for us.”
CMS is regulating MA plans out of existence – and good riddance.
John S.
I have it in writing, from both the doctor and the hospital. The only thing it does not cover is delivery via C-section, and there are fixed costs in both agreements associated with that. I’m not sure what else I’m missing.
My point was that the maternity coverage doesn’t cost much less than paying out of pocket, because most of the riders max out at around $10,000 in total coverage. So if something does go wrong (heaven forbid), I’m on the hook anyway.
This is how the system is setup right now, and there really isn’t much else I can do about it.
I still plan on keeping my regular insurance for catastrophic medical situations, but for routine medical procedures that have a much lower potential risk, it just doesn’t seem that insurance gives you much bang for your buck.
mk3872
John – Please … I read your blog because you are much more pragmatic and reasonable than the crazy left, ala Markos & Hamsher.
Just like the more recent post here on Balloon Juice about how Kos went over the edge because the HCR bill in the Senate does not have the narrowly defined public option that he & Jane fell in love with, he thinks it -and Obama- are shit.
But you mustn’t fall into the trap of the crazy libs on Kos & FDL who hyperventilate over every little story or tidbit they hear and blog about what things MIGHT look like or he said/she said.
Remember, Jane & Kos will denegrate, destory and hate anything in HCR that is not 100% unfettered public option.
And they plus their minions on those left-wing hate sites, will continue to belittle pres Obama.
Tom Hilton
@donovong:
I don’t have anything to add. I just thought this bore repeating.
Henk
Yup, I’m with all you. Let’s just sit on our collective asses, eat our cheetos and trust that the Senators will all do the right thing. I mean with guys like Ben Nelson, Kent Conrad and their Independent Democrat friend Joe in there fighting for us, you just know its going to work out well for the little guy.
Its by sitting here bitching about other blogs that’s gotten us this far, right? Public Options are for pussies, if we’d left well enough alone we’d have had this done in August. Those busy bodies at FDL wouldn’t be hatin’ on Obama but praising him for the great job he did getting health care reform passed. Sure it was only half a loaf, sure premiums are up, sure you have to buy from one of the big boys, but we can trust them because we know the Senate will protect us from the greedy corporate bastards. Just sit back and enjoy you new found Insurance, relax, cuz if you do have that stroke, there’s a damn good chance you’re going to lose everything you have, because the half a loaf you left on the table was the one that protected you from bankruptcy.
ruemara
@donovong:
double ditto this.
Henk
Shouldn’t that be Mega-Dittos?
Maude
@aimai: We are at the very beginning of this process.
The point is to get the power away from the insurance companies.
The bill is not final and it has not been signed into law.
I find it amazing that the congress has gotten this far. Had anyone told us a year ago that we’d be talking about health care legislation, who’d believe them?
The yellers on the left want Hillary as pres. They do resent Obama.
We are watching history. Never before has general health care been on the table.
After this, the war on finace begins in earnest. These things are power struggles and are reversing what Raygun started.
Ann Rynd
Aravosis, Jane hammsher, Kos all have their nerve endings running straight through from their rectums to their brains. Talk about assholes slamming shut in panic every two minutes.
This hysterical, I can panic faster than you can, mentality among the three of them is funny to watch and yet scary to ponder on the numbers of moronic comments coming out of these sites. They have their acolytes so hardwired for projectile ejaculations that even my walls are getting slimy.
Steaming Pile
@FlipYrWhig: You got that right. I’ve started unsubscribing to people who continue to send me that alarmist BS with nothing to back it up (yet want me to send them money). I can’t read that shit anymore. It’s the same reason I stopped reading/posting at DU. I knew it wouldn’t be but a couple of months before they started their Chicken Little bit with the President they helped elect, and DUers can be the most hysterical bunch on our side of the fence.
Ruckus
@aimai:
This is my fear. That your description will be about right.
I hear a lot of folks unhappy with the far left blogs like gos and fdl but what else do you have for a strong left position voice? And who are they working against? I want them to scream and at the top of their voices. We don’t get balance by being the nice guys. The other side is playing hardball. They have the money for the msm. And they have bought most/all of that. They have money for the lobbyists and they have bought them. They have money for the politicians and have bought a lot/maybe enough of them. We have for the most part – us and those loudmouth progressives. You may not like their tactics and screaming and would like to be better than that but until the landscape changes we need the screaming lefties to counter the payola politicians and the jesus freaks dragging their crosses through the streets.
Mnemosyne
@Ruckus:
When did they become far left blogs? Prior to 2008, they were mainstream left blogs. Now all of the sudden they’ve veered sharply to the left and declared that anyone who doesn’t follow them up the hill they’re determined to die on is The Enemy.
They can scream all they want if they’re being productive. Screaming that Obama has betrayed us all based solely on their own hunches about what they think might possibly be in the bill is — surprise! — not productive. If they want to scream based on the actual details, great, but screaming about the straw-bill they’ve constructed in their heads is nothing but public masturbation.
Cerberus
Ok, I took a little break from following the ins and outs of the sausage making, but what exactly do we have now? It sounds like we’ve lost the semi-almost public option for some poor people who are uninsured, but now we might have an expansion of medicare for older people instead (which is a good thing that I support). And we still have some to many of the random reforms that’ll be bypassed and/or ignored by the insurance giants, but will at least stop some of the more blatant fraud.
Do I have this correct or am I way off?
Overall, I support it and I’ll still help where I can especially in trying to shift the Overton window back a little, but I think even if it passes this year, the Hate Crimes Bill will be the more exciting and meaningful for my life, sadly. And I’ll be coming home in less than a year to no insurance for awhile.
Oh well, nothing was ever won in a day.
Cerberus
On gos and fdl being disappointed:
Really? You don’t say.
Now, I agree they are going way overboard in the doom and gloom, but let’s be reasonable here. There was all this talk, all this excitement, all this momentum building up to the moment where we passed something historic, something game-changing, something landmark.
That isn’t going to happen. We have too many conservatives in the Senate who don’t give a shit about the country. What we will get is a decent enough bill. A modest improvement over the status quo, but not something worth stopping congress for 9-12 months over. Not something historic. Something worth passing, but not something that will go in the history books as “the beast finally conquered” as was advertised.
People are going to be disappointed about that and are going to vent and spaz out and piss themselves a little. It happens. It’s what they need to do to vent the frustration at disillusioned dreams before they can refocus themselves for the dire fight to make this good bill good enough and to put on the pressure for something else historic or at least just a bunch more good bills down the line.
Wile E. Quixote
@John S.
It doesn’t. In Seattle there’s a new clinic called Qliance that doesn’t accept insurance. You pay a flat fee per month for what amounts to regular doctors visits. The reason why the clinic doesn’t accept insurance is because the cost of filing insurance claims is a huge fraction of the amount of money to be made from regular office visits to a doctor. I think that this quote from Dr. Garrison Bliss, one of the founders of Qliance, in the story I linked to is probably is informative:
Tom Hilton
@Cerberus: but the thing is that even a bill that doesn’t come anywhere near the unicorns-and-rainbows dreams of the lefties will still be, if it passes, “something historic…something landmark.” (And, yes, something on which future reformers will be able to build.) That’s the essential perspective that people like Hamsher are completely missing.
And I could react to Hamsher’s cluelessness with merely mild annoyance if it she hadn’t vowed to (try to) kill any bill that’s merely good–that would merely help millions of people who are currently screwed under the current system–if it doesn’t contain the particular mechanism she prefers (even if it achieves the same or better results in some other way). That’s why she deserves the contempt and fury reserved for the iredeemably stupid.
Dannie22
When the bill finally passes and it will, it will be the first major step in getting healthcare for every American. Social security didn’t cover everyone when it was enacted. It became a work in progress as was Medicare/Medicaid. Do you think that when President Obama signs the bill that the fight will be over? No it will continue but we will have taken a large step finally in the right direction. As far as I’m concerned the bill will be historic just like Social Security, which I will reiterate, didn’t cover everyone. So calm down and call your senators
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
I’m not saying we don’t need productive voices as well. I’m saying we need all the voices. We will never speak as one because we don’t all have the same needs and points of view.
Do the sites yelling at Obama not have a valid point of view? I think they do. Does the right use these sites to show lack of support for Obama? Probably but I don’t read those sites because I don’t want to give them any hits and I like what little sanity I have. Without counting the gos and fdl who has left end clout in the blogosphere? BJ does but this site mostly discusses how we feel about the issues. That’s one of the major reasons I like it here. But we also need sites that discuss the issues and how those issues work. Or not. And what we need to make those issues better. We need the digby’s and Krugman and Yglesias and Ezra and Glenzilla. But we need those voices that help form and color the debate for Obama. Will they go off the deep end once in a while? I sure as hell hope so. It keeps me from ranting more often than I do now.
Just a little point. I gave money to Obama, to Act Blue even though I couldn’t afford it. I worked for Obama, even though it meant taking time off work. I think he is probably one of the best I’ve seen for pres and I was around for and remember JFK. Is he perfect? No. Is he anywhere as left as I’d like? No. But for the first time in my life I feel I voted, not for the lessor of two evils, but for the better person. But I, and everyone else needs him to be even better. And that is what I hope for.
Mnemosyne
@Ruckus:
I don’t think we need the voices urging people to stay home on Election Day, which is the kind of thing that Kos and Hamsher are starting to say. That’s been the favorite tactic of the left since 1968 — how’d that work out for us so far?
There is a difference between tactics and strategy. Kos and Hamsher are under the illusion that if they have enough tactics, that will equal a strategy, but that’s not how it works. What’s their strategy?
Tom Hilton
@Mnemosyne:
Bingo. There’s this demoralization feedback loop right now, with Hamsher and Kos and their commenters falling all over each other to say how much the (current version of the) bill sucks and how useless the Democrats are, and even when they aren’t explicitly saying stay home (or don’t donate) they’re contributing to the very thing (depressed turnout among the base) they say will happen if the bill isn’t ‘progressive’ enough.
Mnemosyne
@Tom Hilton:
Look at 1994. Liberals were pissed off at Clinton for his various waffling, they stayed home, and the Republicans took over Congress for the next 12 years. Gore wasn’t sufficiently pure in 2000, “Republicrats,” etc., so Democrats stayed home again and we got stuck with Bush.
But, hey, we sure showed those Democratic politicians, didn’t we? Sure, we screwed ourselves, our country, and most of the rest of the world, but we showed them.
Lather, rinse, repeat. I know it’s going to happen again in 2010 because we just can’t stop shooting ourselves in the foot no matter how many toes we lose each time.
oh really
The idea that we will ever get an honest bill from Harry Reid and Company is pretty unrealistic. Every step of the way there have been powerful forces (i.e., at least one reluctant, absurdly spoiled, egomaniacal Senator) that wanted to gut each proposal and pretend it is something it is not.
A “Medicare buy-in with no Medicare” is exactly what we should expect from these crooks — it’s just like Reid’s proposal for a “public” option that would be privately run. I’m afraid the vast majority of our national politicians are now so far divorced from reality (our reality, not theirs) that expecting anything that isn’t largely smoke and mirrors is just a prescription for disappointment.
We have to keep the pressure on, but anyone whose life depends on the outcome should make funeral preparations now.
gwangung
Pressure, yes. Work to improve, hell yes. But note that there are people on this thread that are quite possibly helped by this bill.
mclaren
America is built on false advertising. “Land of the free” with the three fifths clause, y’know.
What, you’re surprised that they have the gall to call it “medicare” when it isn’t really medicare? C’mon! Wake up! These are the same people who passed the “U.S.A. Patriot Act,” AKA the “destroy-the-constitution-and-abolish-your-civil-rights act.” These guys passed the “clean skies initiative,” AKA the “let the smokestacks pollute forever act.”
Just be thankful they haven’t yet passed a “Health and Long Life Act.” That would mean government troops go door to door shooting everyone in the head.
oh really
@gwangung:
Henk
Gwang:
Thank you. That Half-a-loaf crap I see so much of here was really getting old.
gwangung
This statement is not supported by actual history.
And THAT’S what’s pissing me off.
Mnemosyne
@gwangung:
It came up in the other thread, but how many people remember that the Civil Rights Bill of 1964 was full of holes that had to be filled by the Civil Rights Bill of 1968? Not too fucking many, apparently, since the 1964 bill is not referred to as Johnson FAIL.
Of course the bills currently being debated are not the be-all and end-all of health care reform. We’re going to make some reforms, see how they go, and then constantly tweak it. That’s how it works, you fucking moron purity trolls who think that any kind of healthcare reform works perfectly right out of the box. Do some fucking research if you think that any of the systems in Europe sprung up fully-formed and never required any fixes.