Looking through the internets this morning two items caught my eye.
First, the NYT has a nice interactive look at the proposed 2011 Federal Budget. It is a good tool to get an idea of where and how the Federal Government spends money–and how the Obama Administration sets its priorities for that spending. Clicking the “Hide Mandatory Spending” button gives you a good idea of how little discretionary spending there is to work with.
The other was a great post from Ezra Klein about the Republican Ideas that are already in the HCR Legislation. Ezra looked at the Republican ideas for Health Care Reform offered in the GOP’s “Solutions for America” homepage, and found that ALL OF THEIR IDEAS are already included in the legislation that passed the House and the Senate. This exposes the hypocrisy of their opposition to getting a HCR Bill enacted into law. Their only goal is to say NO, regardless of the cost. The meeting that President Obama will have on February 25 to go over these HCR Bills with Democrats and Republicans should be interesting television.
Have you called your House Member and Senators today to remind them to PTDB? This would be a good week to do so.
Cheers
dengre
and yes, this can be used as a lunchtime open thread…
BTD
Ezra’s piece caught my eye too. But perhaps for different reasons. The concessions to the GOP garnered zero votes.
And one of the concessions, the excise tax, will kill the bill if the Senate does not agree to a reconciliation fix.
It seems hard evidence that the bi[artisan approach was not only not effective, it could very well kill the chances for a health bill.
KDP
Received a Northern California Organizing For America email this weekend asking for virtual phone bankers to contact constituents asking that said constituents contact their representatives to push for passage of HCR. I’ll make my own calls later today, but may also make some time to do some phone banking. Has anyone else received similar emails? And where were the emails 6 months ago?
Notorious P.A.T.
So all the Republican ideas are already in the bill, but Obama wants to “hit the reset button” so he can listen to them for more ideas? SHeesh.
Pasquinade
Taking the open thread option….
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201002080011
http://twitter.com/ewerickson
justinb
Saw something this morning calling Obama a liar because all the HCR negotiations weren’t televised like he promised. I’m unclear because this actually seems to be true, at least with respect to the talks with pharma. Is that the only thing that wasn’t televised – I’m pretty sure the sessions of Congress were on CSPAN.
Kryptik
@Notorious P.A.T.:
That’s because Obama just wasn’t bipartisan enough, dammit, haven’t you heard folks like McConnell lament the President refusing to REALLY work with Republicans?
On an OT Note….amazing how that Shelby Shakedown got so much media attention over the weekend, huh? Not like that Cornhusker Kickback that they just plain ignored. Damned partisan liberal media.
Zifnab
@BTD:
To be fair, that wasn’t necessarily a concession to the Republicans so much as it was to the conservatives, and there are a fair number of conservative Dems in the Senate.
Even that aside, if the excise tax is what kills this entire piece of legislation, I am going to be very pissed for a whole host of reasons. Not the least of which is the fucking unions that can’t think past the next five years when considering that an exponential increase in health care costs will cost them their insurance plans anyway, whether or not their employers are forced to pay taxes on the difference above $8500.
Joey Maloney
For your Safari web viewing pleasure: http://clicktoflash.com/
Safari plugin that blocks Flash except by request.
BTD
@Zifnab:
Be pissed at who you choose to be pissed at. Hell, be pissed at everyone for not supporting single payer if you like.
But if you want the Senate bill passed, the political reality is the excise tax must be fixed.
BTW, I would add that taking out the Cornhusker Kickback sounds pretty necessary as well.
Alex S.
Paul Ryan’s idea of a GOP budget is at least honest, but a political deathwish. The House leadership doesn’t support him.
This budget and the health-care debate show that if you want centrist, bipartisan and conservative (in the sense of not radical) policies, you go with the Democrats.
Napoleon
@Zifnab:
This goes back to a point I made earlier this morning in another thread that what you are seeing with unions and others taking positions like this is the harvest of 30 years of bait and switch with the left, best exemplified by stuff like Clinton and NAFTA where unions and the working class were told that they had nothing to worry about with NAFTA because Clinton was going to see to it that a jobs retraining program, etc, etc was going to be instituted to offset the ill effects, except it never happened.
Now we have a HCR proposal on the table that in many ways it the first major voluntary legislation from this administration that just like NAFTA sticks it to a core Democratic constituency. I understand your point, and in a lot of ways agree with it, but all the same I can not say I blame the Unions.
This is what happens when you spend 30 years sticking it to your base.
Max
I guess I’m in the minority, but I think the televised schedule with the GOP is a good idea.
I appreciate Obama’s attemps to pull the GOP in. They are responsible for governing, just like dems.
This event will allow the viewing public to see them as obstructionists. We can’t rely on the media to point things out, see above re: Shelby.
If we continue to exclude them, they can continue to rest on rhetoric and not offer anything substantive. Like a Sarah Palin speech, no ideas, just slogans. I did agree with her “lamestream media” line. That’s a keeper.
Ana Gama
I’m using Ezra’s piece to fax a letter to my GOP congress critter. I doubt it will help, but I will use whatever ammunition is available.
The Republic of Stupidity
That Rick Son of Erick…
Allus talking ’bout t’ings he knows nuttin’ ’bout…
Why do I suspect Erick is a HUGE fan of ‘300‘ and ‘old Steve Reeves movies‘?
Ash Can
@Notorious P.A.T.: So Michael Shear says it and all of a sudden it’s gospel? Who the hell is Michael Shear that his word is better than that of the White House itself? You give the WaPo way too much credit.
jon
I wonder if, when speaking in front of a group of parents of disabled children, Ms. Palin will ever be confronted by someone who is against tort reform? I imagine all such parents are carefully screened from asking questions, if she answers little people’s questions anyway. But I know that if my child was harmed by a medical error and required constant and expensive care, the option of suing shouldn’t be entirely off the table.
Ailuridae
@Zifnab:
Actually it wasn’t a concession to, well, anybody. If you preserve the private insurance market (even if there is a public option or massive Medicare expansion) there has to be an excise tax to limit the amount of untaxed money that can go from employer to insurer. Its not liberals or conservatives that this matters to; its simply every serious health care economist except one.
Ana Gama
@Notorious P.A.T.: I kinda think that Obama could use the teevee sessions to show the Goopers and the rest of the country that their ideas are IN THERE.
Ailuridae
@Alex S.:
The Democratic Party: the closest thing to a center-right American political party.
That’s a slogan that can win some elections.
Ash Can
@Pasquinade: That guy’s never gonna get laid at this rate.
The Republic of Stupidity
@Ash Can:
And it’s prolly a safe bet to wager he’s never gotten any in the first place…
BTD
@Ailuridae:
I hope you find that comforting when the health bill dies.
Napoleon
@Ailuridae:
There doesn’t “have” to be that tax. It could operate perfectly well without that tax.
Now it may be that reform is more effective with the tax, and if they want to cover the cost of reform they have to come up with another revenue source, like the house did by raising taxes on the rich which started getting cut back in the days of the biggest bait and switch pulled on working people in the last 30 years, the raising of FICA taxes on the working class in exchange for a commitment to bank the taxes to use in the days when the SS trust fund went into negative cash flow. But no, the Senate decided to pile a new tax on someone other then those that have seen their taxes cut repeatedly in the last 30 years.
That is why I think what you are seeing is the result of 30 years of being told “we will take care of you next” without it ever happening.
El Cid
It’s not that the Republicans want their ideas “included”. They don’t want there to be any other ideas.
Invite them to write the bill completely, and they might say no anyway, but it’s probably as much ‘cooperation’ and ‘input’ as they’d be willing to do.
Ash Can
@The Republic of Stupidity: Actually, come to think of it, he probably doesn’t really want any.
Corner Stone
@Napoleon:
Since Dennis has kindly left this as Open Thread, I thought I’d follow along your comment with an article I found very interesting, IMO. One can feel I am endorsing it or not, as you like.
Born Poor?
H/T thru Corrente thru Avedon. But I suggest everyone take 5 minutes and read the whole thing for themselves.
Alex S.
@Ailuridae:
America proves that Duverger’s law isn’t always correct ;-).
The Republic of Stupidity
@Max:
And if only the GOP would understand this concept. Whilst I admire Obama’s endless attempts to reach out, I’m beginning to think it would be more efficacious to resort to some buckets of ice-cold water and a cattle prod…
Max
@BTD: Can I ask, without snark, why you come here?
Every post you write at your blog drips with such contempt for the types of people that are regulars here.
I don’t understand why, if we are all such O-bots, who don’t understand politics like only you do, and are wrong at every step we take, you choose to come over here.
Martin
@Notorious P.A.T.: He never said that. And what makes you think this meeting is to do anything for anyone other than the public? The GOP demands that individuals buy insurance across state lines and Obama reads back the provision that allows that to happen and explains why it would be wrong for the Federal government to infringe on state’s rights to regulate their market, and points out that none of them voted for either buying across state lines or respecting states rights. Repeat until the point is made clear to all.
The Republic of Stupidity
@Ash Can:
Indeed… so much easier to just hang out w/ the boys all the time…
Ailuridae
@BTD:
I hope you and yours that walked the unions and other progressives out on that branch that the excise tax and lack of a public option were a bridge too far sleep well at night when the most progressive piece of legislation since 1965 dies because you didn’t get your pony. I hope you and Jon Walker sleep well with whatever health care you are provided as millions more lose their insurance and millions who would have had medicaid never have that chance.
See, look: I can be an asshole too. I have the added benefit of knowing wtf I am talking about. Your attempts at exposition in this thread, like your attempts at exposition on HCR in other BJ threads is severely lacking.
Notorious P.A.T.
@Ash Can:
You are right. I quoted the reporter, not the president. Thanks for catching that. [edit: you too, Martin]
I still think that trying to get the Republicans to work with us in good faith is a stupid idea, especially after all that has happened in the past year.
Ailuridae
@Max:
He comes here to get demolished in arguments that he forgets he already lost. Its like if Ned was the main character in Groundhog Day.
BTD
@Max:
Contempt? I think what I wrote is substantive. Do you want to talk about what I wrote? No? No problem.
If John wants to ban me, or ask me not to comment, I’ll respect that. It’s his place. But I won’t because you perceive contempt from me.
Ailuridae
@Max:
Why am I the only person who has no idea who BTD is?
BTD
@Ailuridae:
That’s a view I suppose.
But it is at least an open question whether the Senate bill will pass the House without an excise tax fix.
Pelosi has said it can’t. Today E.J Dionne wrote the same. Maybe you can demolish them with your arguments as well.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Wait up. You think ANYONE walked the unions to their position? You REALLY think that?
Let me be clear, I am no fan of the excise tax, but it is not a deal breaker for me.
It is a deal breaker for the unions, and it is just ridiculous to think anyone walked the unions anywhere on this.
If you really believe what you wrote, you are not at all attuned to the political realities.
To wit, the unions means a lot more to Dems than you, me, Markos, Hamsher and anyone you can name.
There is no more powerful Dem constituency.
People like to bring up NAFTA a lot. what they do not realize is that the unions whipped over 80% of the Dem vote in the House to vote against it.
NAFTA was passed by a minority of Dems and unanimous GOP support. and of course the support of the President.
Now you ask that House Dems defy the unions on the excise tax. It is not going to happen.
And since the health bill has ZERO GOP support, it will not pass the House without a fix.
It simply will not.
That is political reality.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
But it is at least an open question whether the Senate bill will pass the House without an excise tax fix.
No, its a counterfactual. It seems pretty obvious to me that the Senate bill could pass the house if the likes of FDL and you (and many others) on the far left didn’t engage in right-wing frames and arguments to demagogue the Senate bill. So the Senate bill can’t pass the House given the events that took place from within the Democratic caucus but those events were entirely unnecessary and also dishonest.
I don’t have to sleep with denying 40B a year in Medicaid to the poor (also much needed stimulus the next two years), preventing Medicare from being on sound financial footing for another decade. I didn’t write hit pieces that were outright lies about community rating and pre-exisiting conditions. That’s on you and yours. Sleep well.
Notorious P.A.T.
I wish he’d instead spend his time rounding up Democratic votes for the bill so we can pass it.
soonergrunt
Off topic for a moment–
Sometimes, I wonder if we as a society are really worth the effort…
4-year-old waterboarded for not reciting alphabet.
I’ll say this once and for the record–this isn’t something this asshole learned in the Army as something to do to other people.
Max
@BTD: I didn’t say there was contempt in your posts here, what I said was that the majority of your blog is centered around anti-Obama supporter sentiment, while at the same time verbally fellating anything Clinton.
It seems an odd position for you to come over to one of the “Obama Blogs” you so often ridicule. I’m just wondering what your objective is in visiting.
I find it curious that you choose to come over here, when you have a stable of commenters over at your blog that support your views on all things.
I am hardly saying you shouldn’t comment. I’d ask Erick son of Erick why he was here, if he started showing up too.
Wouldn’t your commenters be curious if some blogger who does not nothing but rail against them started commenting over at your place?
KCinDC
@Max, I missed the “lamestream media” line. Is Palin going to issue an apology to people with ambulatory disabilities, or just go with IOKIYAR?
WereBear
@soonergrunt: Yes, teabaggers and torture apologists… this is what we were trying to warn you about.
Just shut up now.
aimai
I have to disagree with this:
Are you arguing that the progressive Dems, who include Pelosi, are holding up the House passage because they are “dishonest?” or because they are responding to what Balloon Juice always insists is a tiny fringe of people at FDL? Because I’m not seeing it. My house rep, Capuano, is a really good guy. I called his office and have called right along asking that he and others just PTDB and he and other *perfectly good* house dems have been insistent that the Senate Bill needs to be fixed. They have their reasons. I really don’t think Capuano is influenced in the slightest by FDL or any blog commentary.
I don’t get the notion that the Senate and the House are geniuses if they agree with (some) blog commenters (myself among them) that they should just pass the damn bill and fix it later but morons when some of them say “that’s what we are trying to do but we don’t trust the Senate and we want to see them step forward and work a little harder to make this happen.” Apparently they see things differently from the way some blog commenters do. I can assure you its not because they read some real or imaginary hit pieces about community rating and pre-existing conditions.
aimai
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Would that I has such power. But alas, Richard Trumka is the person you are thinking of.
But I am curious about your use of the word “counterfactual.” What do you see as the condition precedent, if any, to passage of the Senate health bill by the House? 218 members voting for it? Obviously that’s true.
But I could argue the same point regarding say, single payer. If 218 House members vote for it and 60 Senatos vote for it and the President signs it, we could have it.
The point of course is 218 House members will NOT vote for it. Much less 60 Senators. I doubt the President would sign it if they did.
My comments are not about what I would want, they are about what I believe is politically possible. And I think the evidence stacks up in my favor on the point.
Similarly, the public option is dead. There is no chance for it.
Perhaps the entire bill is dead. But I believe that if the Senate passes an excise tax fix, then the Senate bill would be passed.
It seems to me that what I write, if true, would be a ray of hope. Unless of course you would oppose the Senate bill if the excise tax is modified or eliminated.
Legalize
I don’t know if the president’s goal is to get GOPers to work with him, so much as it may be his goal to force the GOPers to be in a room with him while the cameras are rolling again. He pwns them every time he does this and the political winds swing a little but back in his direction as a result. Let them air their stupid ideas and let them continue to lie about Obama’s process. Maybe they’ve learned from previous smack-downs and will come to the table with something sane. If not, he smacks them down again.
If nothing else, he keeps reform alive by keeping the discussion on tv. And this way, he controls the debate by putting the game on his home turf. At this point, aint nothin’ gonna happen with the 41-59 majority the GOPers have in the Senate. His hope (and ours) for the rest of his presidency is grounded in his ability to make the GOPers and members of his own party look like the craven idiots they are by being firm but genial. This is the best way to do it. It might not work, but this is how Obama fights.
aimai
Oh, I see I’m going to walk into a buzz saw here. I read backwards through the thread and I discover that a host of people have some kind of online relationship with commenter BTD. Let me hasten to add before I get sucked into the vortex that I don’t know what/where BTD’s blog is nor am I responding to any arguments that he/she may have made elsewhere about any tax, public option, or political figure.
aimai
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Its only a political reality given the actions of the people who demagogued the Senate bill. You claim is that unions had an intractable line in the sand about having their health care benefits taxed. Given that they aren’t going to have their health care benefits taxed its tough to understand how that is the case unless people deliberately, unapologetically misled them. The concessions the unions won with the president are almost wholly symbolic but they had to have something as the narrative of the bill as it existed is that it was a gigantic insurance giveaway.
Here’s a simple question: if anybody trusted the White House that there were simply not 60 votes in the Senate for the public option what could have been gained in negotiations with a different focus? Certainly better subsidies. Just as certainly a better medical loss ratio (the pocketbook difference between an 80% and 85% MLR is enormous). Likely a higher percentage of the FPL covered under Medicare.
And, if someone had actually been advocating for the unions rather than hiding behind them they might have realized that there were far better avenues to pursue in terms of making this bill better for unionized workers.
BTD
@Max:
Well, you clearly know from contempt based on that comment.
To answer your question, I do not know what the commenters would write in response to say, John Cole commenting there.
And frankly, it would not interest me much, so long as everyone followed the blog rules.
I think I am complying with them here. Someone can give me the heads up if I am violating any site rules.
Ash Can
@Notorious P.A.T.: And I still don’t think that’s the real objective of this meeting. Obama’s telling them that they have to put their money where their mouths are. They keep carrying on about how they have a plan, but Obama’s ignoring them, blah blah blah. Obama’s saying, “Fine, let’s see it.” He’s giving them time to supposedly get their shit together, and on the 25th they’re going to have to show both him and all the folks watching while the cameras roll that 1) they actually do have something to contribute, and that 2) it’s something that the average reasonable person wouldn’t immediately laugh out loud at. The onus is on them.
Obama’s in the catbird seat on this. If they actually do come up with something halfway decent, then great. If (as is vastly more likely) they don’t, Obama can say, on the spot and in front of all those live cameras and microphones, that he gave them every fucking opportunity to be a part of the solution, and they pissed it away. And everyone watching (who isn’t a hopeless dead-ender) will believe him, because that’s exactly what they’ll be seeing themselves.
WereBear
On a lighter note, karaoke can get you murdered in the Philippines.
I mean, we have our problems. But we don’t have these problems.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
The primary “demagoguers,” to use your word, are named Richard Trumka, Andy Stern, etc.
You REALLY believe Jane Hamsher is the center of the anti-excise tax movement, such as it is? Really? All righty then.
Tom Hilton
Good god, Hugh Hewitt is stupid. His talking points for Republicans at the HCR summit:
1) is painfully easy to refute; 2) is, as Ezra points out, actually in the bill (but not in the race-to-the-bottom way Republicans want); and focusing on the Ryan plan would be the biggest gift possible for Democrats running in 2010.
Boy, I hope they take poor Hugh’s advice…
Max
@BTD: Obviously, you are refusing to answer my somewhat anecdotal question about why you elect to come here and make it some nonsense about blog rules or banning.
I should have known better than to even ask in the first place.
Ailuridae
@aimai:
Are you arguing that the progressive Dems, who include Pelosi, are holding up the House passage because they are “dishonest?” or because they are responding to what Balloon Juice always insists is a tiny fringe of people at FDL? Because I’m not seeing it. My house rep, Capuano, is a really good guy. I called his office and have called right along asking that he and others just PTDB and he and other perfectly good house dems have been insistent that the Senate Bill needs to be fixed.
I don’t think its a perfect bill. I think the progressive caucus specifically has a very difficult time supporting the Senate bill as is, despite it being a huge legislative achievement, because its base from FDL to openleft to GOS has engaged in a loathsome smear campaign against the Senate bill. Passing the Senate bill as is fits them into a narrative of corporate hacks who believe in insurance company giveaways and possibly an unconstitutional individual mandate. Its tough to sort out all of the misrepresentations that the FDL types cast on the Senate bill but they definitely shaped the debate.
The Moar You Know
Speaking as an employer where quite a few of my employees’ policies are above that $8500 threshold, if you make me pay extra taxes on top of that I’ll simply make sure that no one gets health coverage that goes above it, and if some shit doesn’t get covered that’s too fucking bad. Health insurance is the single largest expense I have; more than building rents, more than utilities, more than anything save for employee salaries. I don’t have the margin to keep paying more.
The Moar You Know
@WereBear: That’s not murder, that’s doing society a service.
BTD
@aimai:
The question I am discussing is a simple one. I have discussed it previously in comments here – to wit, the excise tax is anathema to the unions and thus to many, if not most of the Dem caucus in the House.
If the Senate does not agree to a fix, I do not think the Senate bill will pass the House. This seems a fairly unremarkable proposition to me.
I do not think my not saying it, or Jane Hamsher not saying it, or anyone not saying it will change that reality, because I believe Richard Trumka will continue to say and do what he is doing.
Others disagree.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Trumka and Stern agreed to a revised excise tax that, while improved, didn’t fundamentally change anything. They had to get the excise tax changed because it had been demagogued to death. Stern’s no fool. He was playing politics in hopes of getting a better bill for labor when he realized that wasn’t going to happen he started pushing hard to pass the Senate bill.
Still I have read everything Andy Stern has written publicly for the better part of a decade. He has, to my knowledge, never argued in the kind of bad faith that was typical of FDL, OpenLeft and GOS about the Senate bill.
KCinDC
@aimai, BTD is (at least assumed to be) Big Tent Democrat of Talk Left (aka Armando).
Notorious P.A.T.
@Corner Stone:
“Born Poor” was fascinating. I want to read that guy’s books now. Thanks for linking that.
Tom Hilton
@The Moar You Know: kind of missing the point, which is that (in Ailuridae’s words) “an exponential increase in health care costs will cost them their insurance plans anyway”. Which strikes me as a proposition that isn’t even particularly controversial.
BTD
@Max:
Yes, you should have refrained from asking the question. You seriously did not expect some type of heart to heart between us did you?
Come now. Your question was framed as an insult and in a later comment it became an express insult.
There was no good faith in your queries. More of a “why is a prick like you here?” question.
Of course I did not take it seriously.
Comrade Kevin
@Max:
Such a person would be banned from TalkLeft so fast, it would make your head spin.
BTD
@KCinDC:
I confirm it. But my words in my comments really do not require any context.
They can be judged for themselves. Or not. As people wish.
Tom Hilton
@aimai:
Nobody’s talking about Pelosi, who would in fact vote for the Senate bill as it currently stands (if necessary).
The pseudo-progressive douchebags people are talking about are people like Anthony Weiner, who has absolutely ruled out voting for a bill Bernie Sanders supported even if it’s the only option, apparently because it just isn’t ‘progressive’ enough.
WereBear
@The Moar You Know: I once read a sociological monograph that dissected the pre-Civil War attitudes towards dueling.
In the North, men felt more “woven into the fabric” of their society, and thus, more able to shrug off random insults from strangers.
In the South, men felt like “lone men,” and had a much greater rate of dueling.
It’s one of those machismo things that makes no freakin’ sense to the opposite sex: women learn to shrug off comments from total asshole strangers starting with puberty.
If I took such comments seriously, I probably would have committed grievous bodily harm by now.
‘Cause I’ve been tempted.
BTD
@Comrade Kevin:
If they railed against them in the comments, this is true.
I assume that if I did the same here I would be banned as well.
That is why I try to comment in a civil, respectful fashion at this site.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
But I am curious about your use of the word “counterfactual.” What do you see as the condition precedent, if any, to passage of the Senate health bill by the House? 218 members voting for it? Obviously that’s true.
Oh its likely dead. It almost certainly wouldn’t be dead if not for an entirely dishonest smear campaign from within the Democratic caucus that was run non-stop from its passage until Scott Brown’s election. So, yeah, that’s on you and Jane and Jon Walker.
It would be great if anyone who was so cravenly dishonest about the bill would come forward now and let people know they were just playing politics to get what they deemed a better bill and that the Senate bill wasn’t after all a huge corporate giveaway, a huge infringement on individual liberty (just ask Grover Norquist), a huge scam that didn’t do any of the things it was supposed to in the individual market. Just one of you all coming forward and admitting you demagogued the shit out of a hugely progressive piece of legislation because it wasn’t exactly what you, personally, wanted. We are all waiting.
BTD
@Tom Hilton:
Your list of “douchebags” will need to be longer than that.
Weiner is one of 256 Democrats. who are the other (at least) 37? Frankly, I think it is closer to 137.
Now here is a question, how many Senators are you prepared to label a “douchebag” for not voting for a reconciliation fix to the excise tax? the Senate only needs 50 votes for that. that means 10 Dem Senators would have to oppose it. Would they “douchebags” by your reckoning?
freelancer
@Pasquinade:
presented without comment.
Mnemosyne
@The Moar You Know:
Then it’s a good thing that it’s the insurance company that’s taxed under the excise tax and not you, isn’t it?
I really don’t think there’s any aspect of the healthcare bill that’s been more misunderstood than the excise tax. People think that it applies to their private health insurance when it only applies to employer-provided policies. People think the tax applies to the employer when it actually applies to the insurance company.
You know why the unions are pissed off about the excise tax? It’s because most of them self-insure. They are the insurance company for their members. So while Cigna and Healthnet get hit with the tax, so will the UAW, because they pay their members’ medical bills directly and don’t go through an insurance company.
Unless you, yourself, directly pay the hospitals and/or doctors that your employees visit, you will not be taxed. And, no, the insurance companies can’t pass the cost of the tax along to you, because that additional amount they add onto the bill will also be taxed, so they’ll end up paying even more in taxes than if they’d offered you a less expensive plan.
Ailuridae
@The Moar You Know:
The tax would be on the insurer not the employer or employee. As it stands someone in your situation is going to be cutting off health insurance benefits in a couple of years anyway if the reasoning is the same (ie. 10% per annum compounded is worse than 40% of anything over 8500 pretty quickly, right?)
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Waiting for what? I have been urging an excise tax fix via reconciliation to gain the necessary votes in the House to pass the Stand alone bill.
I am pretty confident, as E.J. Dionne wrote today, that if the Senate agrees to that, the Senate bill can be passed in the House (I do not discount the threat of Stupak, but I think he can be overcome.)
What I am saying to you is I believe I am supporting the only viable path to passage.
Not that it matters one way or the other.
I am not sure what you would have me do.
Ailuridae
@Tom Hilton:
I may pay you in the future to argue in my stead. You’re a lot more clear and a lot more calm.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
No, what we are waiting for is just one of you people who posted incredibly dishonest stuff about the Senate bill (and you certainly did here in the comments) to admit you were being dishonest. And that’s you or jane or Jon Walker or Chris Bowers. Just a single one of you to just admit that while its not the bill you would have written (oddly, me either) that its a perfectly good piece of progressive legislation that any Democrat should have no problem voting for.
That’s what we’re waiting. An apology for dishonest, juvenile Rovian tactics that you hoped would win a more progressive bill in the conference report but now have left a huge portion of the Democratic caucus out on a limb where they simply can’t vote for the Senate bill as is.
BTD
@Mnemosyne:
Would you not agree that whomever is taxed, the price increase will be passed along? And that in fact the intent is to limit the cost of such plans?
I mean that is the whole point isn’t it? Isn’t the policy designed lead to cheaper plans that offer less generous insurance, and that the open question is whether the decrease in insurance benefits will be translated into increased (but taxable) wages?
The policy is what it is and is designed to do just that.
You can favor or oppose it, but it seems silly to deny what the policy is intended to do.
aimai
OK, Tom, I’m all for passing the bill as is and trying to fix it later. I’m disappointed in Weiner. I thought he was smarter than that. But as far as I know other progressive dems, like Capuano, are playing an elaborate game of chicken with the Senate–and that includes Pelosi who has said she will pass the bill *if necessary* but is still trying to negotiate a better deal with the Senate like getting the Senate Fixes through first/at the same time. I guess I don’t see the advantage in putting a huge amount of stock in accusing FDL etc… of having vast amounts of power. I don’t think they do. Or if they do its the power of martialling phone calls and fundraising. That’s something any of us can do. Instead of complaining that they have miraculously managed to move a largely disinterested electorate into flooding particular house dems with phone calls we ought to just go out and out phone call them ourselves.
Also: wow, BTD is Armando? I have not been keeping up with the multi player rpg that the internet has become.
aimai
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Dishonest about what? That the unions opposed and oppose it? That is true. What in heaven’s name are you talking about?
BTD
@aimai:
Pelosi has said flatly she can not pass it. Period.
Corner Stone
@WereBear:
I want to say Anne Laurie posted a link to this study some months ago, but it could’ve been another site and I have misremembered. In any event:
Insult in the Culture of Honor
Study published in 1996 so it seems some of the same attitudes have survived through the 150 or so years.
John S.
Yup.
And a lot of that action happened recently where companies like GM shifted the burden onto the union. It boils down to the fact that 30 million Americans may not receive health care because Richard Trumka got butt hurt.
Tom Hilton
@BTD:
I presented Anthony Weiner as an example, not as the entirety of the pseudo-progressive douchebag contingent. Which the phrase “people like” should have made painfully fucking obvious.
Ailuridae
@Mnemosyne:
I really don’t think there’s any aspect of the healthcare bill that’s been more misunderstood than the excise tax. People think that it applies to their private health insurance when it only applies to employer-provided policies. People think the tax applies to the employer when it actually applies to the insurance company.
Its not a misunderstanding. Its an oft repeated lie from both the right and, unfortunately, many on the left. This isn’t an accident. You’ve been in most of the HCR threads and someone innocently talks about their escalating private insurance costs and that they already pay more than 8500 etc. At this point to think thats an accident especially when the same poster will then talk about how there is no community rating and that you can still be subject to recission or be denied because of pre-existing conditions is naive.
BTD
@Tom Hilton:
I got that. That’s my point. You chose Weiner to mean something unique when the sentiment you deplore in Weiner covers, I believe, a majority of the House Dem Caucus.
In other words, the problem is bigger than a few “douchebags.” at least in the House.
It probably is a few “douchebags” in the Senate though. Maybe just 1 or 2.
Tim Chambers
I like this take:
http://xpostfactoid.blogspot.com/2010/02/as-in-afghanistan-obama-picks-none-of.html
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Would you not agree that whomever is taxed, the price increase will be passed along? And that in fact the intent is to limit the cost of such plans?
Are you now arguing that a supplier of services who is taxed above a certain dollar amount on those services can pass the cost onto the consumer in its entirety? Say I can sell a widget at cost X but have to pay 40% above cost X – doesn’t that give me a huge incentive to supply that service at some cost below X? And if i can’t do it doesn’t it encourage a competitor to find a way to do it (hopefully by squeezing the shit out of providers who are the actual “problem” in all this)? Or are you arguing that the sellers of goods in a competitive market place can pass costs along perfectly to consumers? If you believe that I suppose you are also opposed to raising the any additional funds through taxing corporations right? I mean, they’ll just pass the costs on to the consumers, amiright?
Corner Stone
@Notorious P.A.T.: I thought it was fascinating as well.
Of course, I already believed class warfare was alive and well but to have some really interesting data points to back it up is always helpful.
It’s also interesting to me to see that most, if not all, of Congress on both sides fits in the top 10% category. Their children will remain in that category (most likely) and I think this further insulates them (Congress) from the rest of us as they decide on policy.
IOW, ISTM we’re more and more fighting for the crumbs around the edges and this is a feature of the system, not a bug.
While the HCR debate is vital, and life or death for a whole lot of people (and I do not mean to diminish that in any way), it also seems to me that no matter what the outcome it’s just a time-limited stopgap in the acceleration of our nation’s inequality.
Tim Chambers
Also: note the effort at driving 1,000,000 calls during the HCR summit that is strarting at DailyKos and Facebook… might dovetail very cleanly with the work done here…
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/2/8/835056/-Organizing-1,000,000-HCR-calls-to-Capitol-Hill-on-February-2425-#c197
and:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=293900809037
Mnemosyne
@BTD:
No, because if the insurance company increases the price, they will also have to pay tax on that price increase. I’m not sure why you think that Cigna will be so upset at having to pay a tax on $9,000 worth of insurance that they will immediately raise the price to $10,000 just so they can also pay tax on that extra $1,000.
Of course the intent is to limit the cost. But here’s the dirty little secret of health insurance: cost is based on geography, not quality. People in high-cost areas pay a lot for crappy plans. People in low-cost areas pay a lot less for much better quality plans. Cost and quality have no relation to one another.
I’m not denying what the policy is intended to do. I’m denying that cost and quality have the inverse relationship that you seem to think that they do, and I have statistics to back it up. See my link above.
Please present your statistics to prove that higher-cost plans are automatically higher-quality plans and then you would have a case for arguing that reducing healthcare costs in this way is not reasonable.
Mnemosyne
Hm. I tried to post a reply and it’s not showing up. It doesn’t seem to be in moderation, but when I tried to re-post, it told me it was a duplicate. I may wait a few more minutes and take the risk of posting it three times.
Why does WordPress suck so much?
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Your writing here in the comments to other posts about the provisions in the Senate bill was cravenly dishonest; I would assume that is true on your blog as well. If you want to provide a helpful link that contains all of your writing on your blog about the substance of the Senate bill I can point it out.
Simple question: Do you think that the Senate bill as is would be a progressive achievement that did the country a lot of good? If so, please explain the content and tone of your posts about the Senate bill from the time period following its passing until Scott Brown’s election. And what will it take for you to realize that engaging in the kind of dishonest, Rovian, scorched earth tactics you did about the Senate bill is going to result in very real human suffering?
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Actually, I am mostly arguing the opposite. Because the cost of the tax is not to be fully passed on, under the design of the tax, the intent is to create a de facto cap on the price of the plan.
The idea then is to control the cost of health insurance and have the resultant “savings” be transferred to wages.
If the plan works perfectly then, workers will have lower cost plans (than they would have had otherwise) and higher wages.
This is likely to have 2 effects – less health care coverage and higher wages. This tradeoff is one where a non-taxed benefit is translated into a taxable wage.
And that is if it works as designed.
But what if it doesn’t? What if wages are “sticky” and employers pocket the reduction in cost increase and do not increase wages?
Then the result is less benefits and less than a 1:1 tradeoff for taxable wages.
Look, you can support this policy, but you need to be honest about what it is.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
“Cravenly dishonest?” Like what exactly? Name one thing that I wrote that was “dishonest.”
I mean I think you are writing some rather ridiculous things in this comment thread about how the unions came to their anti-excise tax position, but I assume you are honestly mistaken, not being deliberately dishonest.
aimai
BTD:
The excise tax is one part, and a very small one, of the entire bill. Even if what BTD argues about the tax were true, and its only very tendentiously true, it still wouldn’t have anything to say to whether we should fight hard to pass the bill right now. Its pretty clear that’s the tack people at Kos are taking, and Organizing for America, and everybody else. Continuing to argue about how many excise taxes can dance on the head of a pin is totally beside the point. We have to pass Health Care Reform–whether we do it by embarrassing the Republicans publicly on Feb 25, or by forcing the Democrats in both houses to wake up to their historic duty to get shit done, is irrelevant. The bill, such as it is, has to be passed.
aimai
Napoleon
@Mnemosyne:
So what, every economist opinion is that it gets past through in its entirety to whoever pays the premium. Check Ezra K’s site.
Mnemosyne
@BTD:
You are operating on the assumption that healthcare cost and healthcare quality have an inverse relationship: higher-cost care is always better quality care. That assumption is not correct. That’s why the downward pressure of the excise tax will function correctly.
(If my other comment ever appears, it will have a different link to a different study that shows the same thing, so look at that one as well.)
Sly
Partially. I think their position is not that their ideas should be incorporated, but that ONLY their ideas are necessary. I haven’t read their manifesto (in large part because I don’t want to damage any inanimate objects in my immediate surroundings), but I doubt their goals are the same as the Democrats. “We’re spending too much money on people who don’t deserve it” is usually their motivating principle, so I don’t think they’re at all interested in universal coverage, which all the items they’re pissing and moaning about deal with.
If thats the case, then they are being logically consistent. In the ever-present debate over whether Republicans are malicious or just inept, I tend to fall on the malicious side. But I think its a waste of time to get caught up in that discussion because, in the end, the reason why they put forward bad ideas doesn’t change the fact that their ideas are bad. If I were an employer I’d just as soon fire an employee who was stealing from me as someone who was losing me money because they sucked at their job.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
This is likely to have 2 effects – less health care coverage and higher wages. This tradeoff is one where a non-taxed benefit is translated into a taxable wage.
Someone will link you to something demonstrating that your assumption that lower cost health = less health care is incorrect. I know this as I have linked it personally to you twice in the past and, well, I know how other posters work here.
This, right here, is an example of being cravenly dishonest. You’ve already been in threads where its been demonstrated that cost and care have a very spotty correlation yet you posit as if it were a given that less cost means less care.
Now, if you were arguing with someone and they tried that same tactic you would describe that as dishonest, right?
Ailuridae
@BTD
But what if it doesn’t? What if wages are “sticky” and employers pocket the reduction in cost increase and do not increase wages?
Anywhere that there isn’t only one employer would have a tough time doing that at the risk of losing employees to their competitor who realized they would have a hiring advantage by passing those savings on as wages to current or new employees? You know, like a market and stuff.
Ailuridae
@Mnemosyne:
Right on cue. Although as I pointed out above I have linked these studies for BTD before.
BTD
@Mnemosyne:
I think downward pressure on prices is not really the issue.
Rather, the increase in uncovered treatments and higher deductibles leading to higher out of pocket costs.
In any event, if there is going to be downward pressure on costs, clearly not all of it will come from efficiencies, some it will come from less health care.
This could be the right policy. But it is part of the policy.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
I think downward pressure on prices is not really the issue.
Rather, the increase in uncovered treatments and higher deductibles leading to higher out of pocket costs.
In any event, if there is going to be downward pressure on costs, clearly not all of it will come from efficiencies, some it will come from less health care.
This could be the right policy. But it is part of the policy.
Thats not what the study she linked demonstrates. It plainly demonstrates that there isn’t much of a correlation between cost and the quality of care within a region. So lesser costs would not, indeed mean uncovered treatments or higher deductibles. But I am not sure what, exactly, would get you to stop repeating this as if it were fact.
Mnemosyne
@Napoleon:
So you’re arguing that Cigna or another insurance company will be able to raise your rate to a level where it will be more profitable for them to pay a 40% tax on that rate than it would be for them to offer you a plan that would not be subject to the tax. Not only will they be able to do that, but every other insurance company in your area will do the same and not, say, try to undercut Cigna by offering a lower-cost plan.
BTD
@aimai:
Small for you (and me too believe it or not), apparently not so small for the unions.
And as I have stated repeatedly, in my view, one Richard Trumka carries 1000 times more weight than 1000 Jane Hamshers.
If they satisfy Trumka, the bill will pass the House.
Imo of course.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
“Much of a correlation” clearly is not the same as NONE.
That’s my point.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Again, that assumes a perfect employment market. Labor economists simply disagree with you (and Jon Gruber, not a labor economist) on this point.
Mnemosyne
@BTD:
Huh? We’re talking about healthcare costs and you’re claiming that prices are not germane to the discussion? What are we supposed to be discussing, how many unicorns will magically spring up from the ground if the excise tax is removed from the bill?
If the only cost control measure in the entire bill was the excise tax, you might be right. However, it is not. There are about a dozen pilot programs that are meant to tackle cost-cutting from the provider side, which is where the majority of the cost increases have been.
This is why pulling one or two items out of the bill and pretending that they’re the entire bill is so dishonest. In isolation, sure, you can make a case that the excise tax is bad. But it doesn’t exist in isolation, and claiming otherwise is incredibly dishonest.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Again, it is not incorrect. There is no study that says that there is NO correlation between health care spending and health care results.
There is a correlation, but obviously not a 1:1 correlation.
Similarly, there is not a 1:1 correlation between the tradeoff between health benefits and wages. For one thing, we know wages are taxed and health benefits are not taxed.
Look, the excise tax is a defensible policy. As is Wyden Bennett. But let’s look at it honestly.
As Ezra Klein says, there are “losers” in every policy choice.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
So, what’s the correlation coefficient? And what’s the correlation coefficient where it matters. I’ll just clue you in: its a lot closer to 0 than 1 but yes, it is positive.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Again, that assumes a perfect employment market. Labor economists simply disagree with you (and Jon Gruber, not a labor economist) on this point.
No, no, no. A labor economist (and a very good one) thinks that employers will not pass savings on. The economic consensus of, well everyone else says they will.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
There is a correlation, but obviously not a 1:1 correlation.
Similarly, there is not a 1:1 correlation between the tradeoff between health benefits and wages. For one thing, we know wages are taxed and health benefits are not taxed.
You’re not even talking about the relevant kind or correlation. C’mon.
BTD
@Mnemosyne:
Please do not rip my sentences from their context. I was referring to the effect of the excise tax on the benefits and wages for workers.
The rest of your comment is not to the point. We are discussing the effects of the excise tax.
Indeed, this entire discussion is off kilter in that you do not need to convince me on the excise tax.
It’s not a deal breaker for me. It is a deal breaker for people that actually matter – the unions.
the question you have to ask yourself is this – is the excise tax something you are willing to let the bill die over?
Because that is where we are.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Relevant to whom? You think those correlations are not relevant to the unions? Really?
BTD
@Ailuridae:
A labor economist? No, every labor economist.
In fact, the ONE economist who claimed otherwise has conceded he was wrong. That was Jon Gruber.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
I accept that. But it is more than 0 is the point.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
No. The wrong kind of correlation; I’m arguing thats its not a statistically significant correlation between cost and quality in health care withing a given region. That’s why I am talking about correlation coefficients. And that’s why you are either pretending not to know what I am talking about or hand-waving to get past the problem that cost and health care don’t show a statistically significant positive correlation (within a given geographic area again)
Mnemosyne
@BTD:
Actually, the studies say that the correlation is inverse: higher-cost areas have worse outcomes than lower-cost areas, at least with Medicare. This is not something that is in dispute.
I’m angry that something that people have repeatedly lied about in order to get people to turn against it is going to be killed on the basis of those lies but, no, I’m not willing to kill the entire bill over it. Just don’t expect me to swallow lies and pretend that OMG everyone is going to be taxed 40 percent!
Ailuridae
@BTD:
No Jon Gruber never “concluded he was wrong”. You could easily dispute this by showing where Gruber wrote this?
And, every labor economist isn’t Larry Mishel. Larry Mishel is well, Larry Mishel and he’s out on an island on this one.
Sly
@BTD:
I think Ezra’s whole point was that the purpose of good policy was to mitigate the extent to which losers actually lose. Further, the unions were holding out for a transition period in which contracts could be renegotiated. The dollar aspect of the negotiated settlement on the tax threshold amounted to around a 5% increase over what was already in the Senate bill. In other words, they were more concerned about how implementing the tax would affect them, not so much the tax itself.
But I’ll let the others handle all this stuff. Arguing HCR with Firebaggers and Teabaggers over the past few weeks has seriously dimmed my view on policy discourses and the extent to which people can actually have arguments in good faith.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
Wait, you can’t “accept” something that is totally different from what you were arguing.
Read this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_and_dependence
I’m getting tired of constantly having arguments with other leftists and then realizing they are almost invariably innumerate.
BTD
@Mnemosyne:
Medicare is not at issue with regard to the excise tax. Moreover, there obviously is not a control for the differing COL in different regions.
But come now, are you REALLY arguing that the less spent on health care, the better the outcome per similarly situated patient? You’re not are you? Actually you are arguing that the MORE money spent the WORSE the outcome? And you claim there is a study that says that? Is it the link you provided?
Do you have a quote for that? I know that there are studies that show extra spending provides declining marginal value. But the inverse relationship is new to me. If true, I learned something.
But if true, it also argues for a cap on health care spending. Now I understood the economic argument for this, but never I have I heard it made as a health argument.
I am willing to learn. Please teach me.
Ash Can
We interrupt this
dunk tankdiscussion to bring you word that John Murtha has passed.Carry on.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Hmm. I always thought I understood those concepts. Are you arguing there is no causation associated with the correlations we have been discussing?
Sly
@Ash Can:
Damn. My view has been further dimmed.
BTD
@Sly:
I think his point was pretty clear – that there are people who “lose” when policies are changed.
for example, when Bush’s tax cuts lapse, rich folks are going to lose.
In any event, upon hearing of Murtha’s passing, I’ll retire from this thread now. a sad day.
BTD
@Ailuridae:
Ok. You must know Mishel reported that Gruber admitted that to him.
But I suppose Mishel is a liar.
Anyway, John Murtha, RIP.
Mnemosyne
@BTD:
I’m arguing that higher-cost healthcare is not automatically better healthcare and, yes, in the links I provided, there is some evidence that higher-cost healthcare actually leads to worse outcomes, at least for Medicare patients. Think of it this way: what led to better outcomes, patients taking NSAID drugs that were available as generics like ibuprofen or patients taking the expensive new Vioxx?
Hey, here’s a thought — maybe you could actually, you know, look at the links and studies before you decide I’m lying to you because what I’m saying doesn’t conform to your expectations?
Ailuridae
@BTD:
I’m arguing that there isn’t enough correlation to strongly argue for causation. If I had to hazard a guess from everything I have ever read about cost versus quality of care I would say that it probably somewhere between 0.3 and -0.2 but thats just eyeballing it. In short costs within a region are largely being driven outside of the quality of care provided. Now, if you are asking whether within a single Kaiser network which of three programs has the best outcomes I would likely pick the most expensive one.
Ailuridae
@BTD:
I don’t know anything about Larry Mishel except that he’s a great economist. I find it amazing that someone like Gruber or any other economist would walk back something thats incredibly orthodox (a decrease in one source of compensation to workers would be made up in another or the other area) and never comment on it. What I think is far more likely is that Gruber clarified that by increased wages he meant a slowing of the decrease in wage growth. Economically the same thing but in laymen’s terms his initial point (slowing health care cost will lead to increased wages) may seem too strong.
Ruckus
@Tom Hilton:
As evidenced by some of the comments in this thread
painfully fucking obvious is a phrase that needs to be used much more often.
J
test…hoping comment lets me see site