Dec 15 2009

Thanks for nothing.

Darcy Burner: The Senate bill is a recipe for national disaster. If it’s that bill or nothing, I prefer nothing.

by Joe Sudbay (DC) on 12/15/2009 08:10:00 AM

The fundamental failing of the newest Senate proposal is that it requires individuals to purchase health insurance, but does nothing to rein in what insurance companies charge. There is nothing to stop spiraling health costs from eating up an ever-increasing percentage of our national productivity.

Democratic leaders are going to have to explain how forcing a mandate on people to buy private health insurance, without controlling the insurance industry, makes sense. That concept might appeal to Joe Lieberman, but it doesn’t sit well with everyone else.

The fire this time

By: TBogg Monday December 14, 2009 10:28 pm

If Rahm Emmanuel is all he was supposed to be, we can safely assume that the Obama White House either never gave a shit about health care reform, or they managed health care reform so horrifically and incompetently that they are now willing to settle for a “win”, no matter how meager.

I hope they enjoy their Pyrrhic victory because they just burned the base.

Where We’re At On The Lieberman Health Care Industry Profit Protection Act Of 2009

By: David Dayen Tuesday December 15, 2009 5:00 am

Another major addition in the mystery “deal” on the public option, the extension of the medical loss ratio to 90% (meaning that insurance companies would have to spend at least 90% of premiums on medical care), took a major hit from the CBO, and an ideological one at that. Doug Elmendorf basically said that such a medical loss ratio would make the private insurance industry into a government entity, “so that all payments related to health insurance policies should be recorded as cash flows in the federal budget.” This would make the health care bill cost several trillion dollars in CBO’s eyes despite the fact that nothing would have materially changed, and so this arbitrary decision basically killed the medical loss ratio, at least at 90% (it’s unclear what the magic MLR number is that turns the private insurance market into a government entity; Elmendorf didn’t explain it, just saying that it was somewhere between 85% and 90%).

One question for those who argued that liberals could easily bargain away the public option for something really valuable and good – how does “nothing” sound to you?

51 comments

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    • TMC on December 15, 2009 at 15:35
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    no Republican will vote for it and they will beat Democrats with it for the next 10 years. Kill This Bill

  3. what happened to this country that we are willing to just ‘settle’ for this hammered dogshit anymore? we used to do great things in times of crises. politicians use to stand up for the people in times much like this historically. we have record unemployment, an economy in shambles, WARS on two fronts and escalation for geopolitical gamesmanship, health care extortion by insurance and pharma, media propaganda, CLIMATICIDE, glbt ignorance and derision, erosion of women’s rights, erosion of civil liberties, suspension of habeus corpus, torture of captured prisoners, a corporate owned government, destruction of our manufacturing sector…this list is just the tip and it could get much longer.

    WTF? How long till we find a backbone to go after these motherfu*kers. This is sickening in so many ways, on so many levels…

  4. Surely political survival is important to the Obama administration and the Democrats in Congress?  Do they truly think a piece of shit that enriches insurance companies, solves few if any problems, the bulk of which doesn’t even take effect until 2014, will fly in a reelection sense?

    How are we supposed to gauge Obama’s true performance in 2012 if most of the bill doesn’t take effect until after that?  How are they supposed to fix the bill after the fact if they don’t even win reelection?  And what about all the other priorities that have been left dead on the side of the road so far on account of health care?  Even if they go back and spend the rest of this sorry ass excuse for a Democratic majority fixing it, that says nothing about the time required, the time that absolutely needs to be spent on other things.

    Do they think browbeating the base will work on the basis of the words of a blackmailer or extortionist to stay in office?  How does that work?  If I decide (just to use a hypothetical example) to stay home on election day and say I didn’t what are they gonna do?  As far as I know (I’m such a fool about these things!) voting is still a private act when the curtain is pulled.

    I know there’s such a thing as spin but what is coming out of the Senate would seem to require the mother of all spin jobs, and it’s impossible for me to see how this spin would even work.

    I can understand many things, no matter how crazy it seems to me .. I can put myself in other people’s shoes and understand a crazy-ass perspective, but I’m sorry, mass self-immolation isn’t one of those things.

    • TMC on December 15, 2009 at 17:04
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    Lieberman Gets Ex-Party to Shift on Health Plan

    Mr. Lieberman could not be happier. He is right where he wants to be – at the center of the political aisle, the center of the Democrats’ efforts to win 60 votes for their sweeping health care legislation. For the moment, he is at the center of everything – and he loves it.

    “My wife said to me, ‘Why do you always end up being the point person here?’ ” he said, flashing a broad grin in an interview on Monday.

    Just hours after his televised threat to kill the bill, Mr. Lieberman said, he left a meeting with Senate leaders and top White House officials in the office of the majority leader, Harry Reid, more certain than ever that he held all the cards.

    Lieberman gloats and people die.

  6. In regards to Joe Lieberman:

    And the final thing I’d say is, if he does retain his chairmanship, we still exert oversight over him and control over him. He doesn’t have the ability to just do whatever he wants. The caucus still has the right to remove him from that position at any time if he starts going off on some kind of tangent.

    So all we can assume is that the Democrats choose not to control him, since he has gone off on a tangent and is now openly blowing up the Democratic Agenda as stated.

    By going along, they aren’t controlling him.  The only possible conclusion consistent with Evan Bayh’s statement is that Lieberman is doing exactly what the Democratic Senate wants.

    (video and transcript on Huffpo)

    • TMC on December 15, 2009 at 17:34
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    Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

    • banger on December 15, 2009 at 18:04
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    anything coming out of Congress this year. This is not “our” Congress. I belongs completely and almost without exception to the corporate oligarchy. A broken system is better than an a clearly oppressive system that will (and I mean this almost literally) put us all (the non-very rich) in chains within the decade.

  9. Posted this on TMC’s diary “Lieberman Lies Again”

    Part of Lieberman’s response is out of sheer spite, as well as much “involvement” with Hartford, Connecticut, health care insurance companies.

    Some Dems have been asked, “Why not dump Lieberman?” And, the response is:  “We need him for the 60th vote — he does vote positive on some occasions!,” or some such (paraphrasing).

    Lieberman’s actions on health care reform warrant removal from Democratic caucus

    As the Democratic caucus in the Senate works to pass a health care reform bill, one principle character stands in the way of creating a bill that would actually protect consumers.  It appears that he would rather work towards a bill which would give private insurance companies all of the customers and terms on coverage that they desire, without holding them accountable through any sort of competition.  

    That person is of course the Independent Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, who is presently a member of the Democratic caucus. He is successfully doing what the 40 Republican Senators have all but failed to do time and time again over the course of the year…slow down the health care debate and water the bill down into a huge gift for his insurance industry pals in Hartford, Connecticut, amongst other places. . . .

    This so-called health care reform bill, at this point, is an utter waste or our time, money and energy — it is a complete sham and has served well to distract us from the issue of accountability over the months.  We need to do everything to “kill this bill,” IMHO, even if the bill gets shelved for 15 more years, or whatever!  Otherwise, it now means that people who really need health care insurance, won’t be able to afford it and, they will be subject to fines, harassment and gawd knows what all!  And, the same number of people will likely die, as if there were no health care reform bill.

  10. How is life treating you here?

    Glad I finally got around to reading your posts here.

    I see you’re still doing a fine job of bringing the news.

  11. If you’re gonna front page an occ, would you mind in the future FP’ing the latest one (new).

    Otherwise it just creates confusion and kills the comment momentum.

    Thanks.

    • Miep on December 16, 2009 at 08:12
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    or anyone…from a correspondent.

    well, read ezra klein.

    http://voices.washingtonpost.c…

    there is some sense in what he says.  but the larger issue for me is that the system as it stands, even with everyone in, is unsustainable.

    you can spend a lot of money on health care, but you can’t spend everything on it, and that’s where we’re heading and that’s not possible.  donald berwick and atul gawande were in the news somewhere today saying that the only thing that will change that is a cultural change in which everybody starts to understand that more healthcare for everyone is worse healthcare.  

    that doesn’t argue against everyone getting into the crappy system as a starting point, though.  i’m pretty discouraged, though.  this is a wonky policy issue…it isn’t like freeing the slaves or ending the south’s version of apartheid.

    it is some kind of craziness that so much public animosity has been generated.  it won’t mean zip to the public at large how reform works, as a matter of fact.  who it will mean a lot to, though, are the people who make a lot of money from healthcare, which is the executives, the physicians, the nurses (even icu nurses, e.g., are paid very well), the drug makers, the medical equipment makers.  

    the fact is, though, that by passing this version of ‘reform’ the congress is saying ‘it’s unsustainable, but we won’t have to pay the bill for it because it isn’t a government system.’  

    but, when it all begins to topple, it is the government that will be saying, human healthcare system is too big to fail; we have to rescue them, i suppose.

    Not a common perspective, I realize. But to understand things best, I would assume any thoughtful perspective would be valuable.

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