Health Care Regulation Will Work!

(10 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Didn’t you get the memo?  There are regulations in the health care bill!  These new regulations will make the health care industry give American families a fair deal.

There is now, absolutely, no reason to hold up this health care bill.  These new regulations will work just as they worked for credit card companies.

You don’t believe me?  Read on…

(cross-posted at Daily Kos)

USA Today is reporting that credit card companies have a new trick up their sleeve; 79.9% interest rates.

And, you want the money quote from that article?

The bloated APR is how First Premier Bank, a subprime credit card issuer, is skirting new regulations intended to curb abusive practices in the industry. It’s a strategy other subprime card issuers could start adopting to get around the new rules.

You see, when the government tries to write new regulations, these companies get their team of lawyers to find a way around them.

Every.  Single.  Time.

You want the worst of it?

The terms are eyebrow raising, but First Premier targets people with bad credit who likely can’t get approved for cards elsewhere. It’s a group that tends to lean heavily on credit too, meaning they’ll likely incur steep financing charges.

That’s right.  They are purposefully out there pushing an 80% interest rate on the people who can afford it the least.  

Today, that means the person who lost their job, who might be in foreclosure, who got sick, who was forced into bankruptcy, are now being targeted by credit card companies pushing an 80% interest rate — all because they can get around the new regulations that were supposed to stop this practice.

But, we got the memo.  The health care bill will hold insurance companies accountable by instituting new regulations!  The new regulations will ensure… ENSURE… that America gets a fair deal.  We simply had to give up a public option, medicare buy-in for those 55-64 years-old, lower cost prescription drugs, and force everyone to buy an insurance policy.

Surely, with this new boon of business, the insurance companies wouldn’t find ways around these new regulations.  Right?  RIGHT????  Because we’ve tried this before, haven’t we?  We’ve seen how it works.

That’s why Rahm Emaunel has flat said, “don’t worry about the left.”  The administration has Democratic Senator’s “in line”.  Forget the base, the election is over.  All that matters now are the votes in the Senate.

You want to know why I’m pissed off with President Obama, with Rahm Emanuel, with Harry Reid?

As I type this out, it is 40 degrees outside.  My heat pump went out today.  I am going to stay up tonight, maybe all night long, keeping a fire going in my fireplace, so that me and my family have some heat tonight.

I am still unemployed.  I live in South Carolina and our unemployment rate went up to 12.3% today.  

We had to spend $90 for a new heat strip for the heat pump today, which I can’t replace until the morning because it was raining today.  We now have little money left in the bank for anything — even food.  And, we’ve got thirteen days before my wife gets paid again.

I get to read about how these companies are still finding ways to screw over the public despite regulations being passed to stop them.

I get to read about how those like Rahm Emanuel tell us folks not to worry, really, this is REAL reform this time, just don’t look at everything they’ve given up to get this bill.

I get to read people telling those like me how killing this bill is wrong because it is better than nothing, and, really, there are new regulations that will keep the insurance companies in check.  Just like the new regulations stopped the credit industry from finding new ways to charge 80% interest rates.

Luckily, I kept enough firewood so that, if it was needed, I could heat my house for one, MAYBE, two nights if our heater went out.  It did.  What am I to do now?  Get a credit card at 80% interest so I can buy food?

Because, I’m told by many “don’t worry”, we’ve got new regulations that will keep this from happening again… really… just trust us…

10 comments

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  1. just give them your basket of goodies & move along…

  2. Are the Insurance Regulations Enforceable?

    By: David Dayen Friday December 18, 2009 10:55 am

    The California Department of Managed Care has been going after rescissions in California for several years. They have put together lawsuits, distributed fines, et al. In one case, they fined Blue Cross of California $1 million dollars for rescinding patients. Blue Cross just didn’t pay it. And the Department of Managed Care decided not to sue them over it, BECAUSE THEY KNEW THEY WOULD BE OUTGUNNED IN COURT.

    Now, keep in mind with all of this that California’s Dept. of Managed Care is the biggest entity enforcing insurance regulation in the entire country, both before and after this bill. They oversee 21 million enrollees in the state. They haven’t lost every attempt to regulate the industry – but they haven’t won all of them, either. And meanwhile illegal rescissions still occur routinely in the state of California.

    • banger on December 20, 2009 at 16:40

    which claims this bill has lots of good provisions. It’s like talking to a boyscout coming into NYC from Kansas about how things work on the street. It’s hopeless.

    In the real down and dirty world of money changing hands every single reg is there to be gamed or, written by lawyers you hire as lobbyists for Congress to sound good but have plenty of wiggle-room.

    It’s over. No more trust in a system that is now going through its worst period of corruption since the country was founded. The amounts of money that are skimmed by gangsters is spectacular. It is time to say “NO!” to anything coming out of Washington. We are better off living in the ruins than allowing the corporate/fascist state to enslave us any further. It’s the pretending I can’t stand. This absurd pretending that nothing has happened. Daddy did not fuck sister in the ass last night while she wept. Daddy did not beat the shit out of mommy, she got her black-eye walking into a door, etc., etc. If you are familiar with abuse you know what I’m talking about — everybody pretends that shit didn’t happen.

    This is not 1910 or 1960. This is Novemember of 1963 and we are being shot over and over again. This is September 2001 and we are being shown the political theatre of cruelty over and over again. We have to change the Narrative in this country — it is too far removed from reality.

    Remember before you think I’m being extreme that the bills we are forced to consider as being “reform” are square wheels and that there exists in the rest of the world round wheels. The only problem is that the majority of the American people have no idea these round wheels exist, no idea. If they did, they would be in revolt. Most Americans don’t know that in most of Europe five weeks vacation is guaranteed by law for all workers. Yes, there are families where systematic abuse does not occur, though there are incidents here and there to be sure. No family is perfect — but no family lies about everything and I do mean everything.  

    • on December 20, 2009 at 16:43

    Been askin, but nobody’s been tellin….

    • RUKind on December 21, 2009 at 04:40

    “Show me a fifty-foot fence and I’ll show you a fifty-one foot ladder” when speaking of the border fence. (How’s that coming along btw?)

    There’s a million ways to skin a cat – make that a fatcat. The best ways are slowly.

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