Reading Health Care Legislation Is No Laughing Matter

Saturday, 11 July 2009 17:42 | Written by Sandra Toth |

Today's Daily Dose

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that the health-care reform bill now pending in Congress would garner very few votes if lawmakers actually had to read the entire bill before voting on it.

Congress Daily reports the Congressional Budget Office has scored the House healthcare overhaul bill at $1.5 trillion. House Ways and Means Democrats plan to help pay for the bill by raising taxes on people earning $250,000+ and taxing sugary beverages, sources said. In addition, the House will cut Medicare about $500 billion and raise another $350 billion from an employer mandate. Raising the Medicare payroll tax also appears to be on the table.

CBO Director Doug Elmendorf testified that the Kennedy/Dodd bill "will add substantially to the long-term spending burden for health care on the Federal government."

Adding fuel to the financial fire, the Kennedy/Dodd health care bill expands the states' cost of Medicaid by $500 billion yet their HELP Committee voted down an amendment yesterday that would ensure that Medicaid expansion is not an unfunded mandate on the states.

Democratic Leader Laughs at Idea That House Members Would Actually Read Health-Care Bill Before Voting On It

Monica Gabriel and Marie Magleby - CNS News

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that the health-care reform bill now pending in Congress would garner very few votes if lawmakers actually had to read the entire bill before voting on it. "If every member pledged to not vote for it if they hadn't read it in its entirety, I think we would have very few votes," Hoyer told CNSNews.com at his regular weekly news conference. Hoyer was responding to a question from CNSNews.com on whether he supported a pledge that asks members of the Congress to read the entire bill before voting on it and also make the full text of the bill available to the public for 72 hours before a vote. In fact, Hoyer found the idea of the pledge humorous, laughing as he responded to the question. "I'm laughing because a) I don't know how long this bill is going to be, but it's going to be a very long bill," he said.

When Will the Government Decide Your Health Care is Too Expensive?

Conn Carroll - The Foundry

A Federal Reserve-like entity to control how Americans spend their health care money is not a new idea. Former Sen. Tom Daschle (D-SD), who is still advising the Obama administration on health care, proposed exactly that in his book: Critical: What We Can Do About The Health Care Crisis. Heritage fellow Bob Moffit explains: In Daschle's version of this new public agency, its "experts" would "oversee the health care industry" and have the knowledge and power to make "complicated medical decisions and the independence to resist political pressures." Additionally, these government experts would "help define evidence-based benefits and lower overall spending by determining which medicines, treatments, and procedures are most effective-and identifying those that do not justify their high price tags." This means denying payment.

Let The Unraveling Begin

James C. Capretta - National Review Online

The Obama White House and their congressional allies have built expectations among their core supporters that this is the year to pass a government-takeover of American health care. With expectations set so high, most elected Democrats have concluded they have no choice but to set out on a forced march to try to do exactly that -- despite unified Republican opposition. But a partisan bill means that Democrats own all of the messy and unattractive details too. The debate is no longer about vague concepts of "coverage" and "cost-control" but who pays and who is forced out of their job-based plans. The more people learn about these details, the less they will like them --which is why the Democratic committee chairmen are working desperately to shorten the time between a full public airing and a vote. They're hoping there won't be enough time for public opposition to put a halt to the proceedings.

Democrats Sweating the Small Stuff

David Rogers - Politico

For a party that wants to dream big, Democrats keep tripping over the small stuff. This summer's agenda is historic: health care, climate change, financial regulatory reform. So why can't the White House -- with a 60-vote majority in the Senate -- win a simple fight over a $12 million bus security program targeted for termination? The picture's no better in the House, where the Democratic leadership didn't even allow a floor vote last month on cutting the F-22 -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates's No. 1 target in revamping the Pentagon's budget. And with the highway trust fund running on fumes, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and House committee chairmen are at loggerheads with the money due to tap out Aug. 21. White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel likes to say that each legislative victory builds muscle for the next battle. But Democrats look like a team that could use a few more basic-training pushups before taking on huge sectors of the economy.

Independents Begin To Edge Away From President Obama
Ben Smith - Politico

In a potentially alarming trend for the White House, independent voters are deserting President Barack Obama nationally and especially in key swing states, recent polls suggest. Obama's job approval rating hit a -- still healthy -- low of 56 percent in the Gallup Poll on Wednesday. And pollsters are debating whether Obama's expansive and expensive policy proposals or the ground-level realities of a still-faltering economy are driving the falling numbers. But a source of the shift appears to be independent voters, who seem to be responding to Republican complaints of excessive spending and government control. "This is a huge sea change that is playing itself out in American politics," said Democratic pollster Doug Schoen. "Independents who had become effectively operational Democrats in 2006 and 2008 are now up for grabs and are trending Republican.

Huff-Po: Democrats Proving Again That Compromise is Not an Option on Health Care
Warner Todd Hudson - NewsBusters
In this report we get a nice one-two punch. Not only are we seeing Democrats once again refusing even a tiny compromise with Republicans on Obama's takeover of nearly 20% of our economy with his healthcare plans, but we also get to see another example of why Huffington Post is not journalism. I like a nice one-two punch for a Wednesday. In a HuffPo "report" by Sam Stein, we see leftists, and extreme activists getting their shorts in a wad over the proposition from Republicans that the so-called public option only be set off by a "trigger," one that would usher in that public option if insurance companies "fail to deliver" the affordable coverage that Obama is demanding. This trigger idea would exclude the public option at the outset only to have it come in later if needed. To the lefties, though, this putting off of the public option is unacceptable. Even though the public option would come later anyway because the unreal expectations and government meddling of Obamacare would set the table for the trigger to be pulled regardless of initial claims. They know this, of course, but left-wingers want a socialistic healthcare plan and they don't want to wait for any inevitable trigger mechanism to be pulled later. They want it now and that is that. It's their way or the highway.Consequently, Maine Republican Olympia Snowe has become the focus of left-wing ire because she is one senator floating the trigger idea. Absurdly, Snowe seems to be under the delusion that there is going to be some sort of "bi-partisan" bill coming from the Senate.

The Hidden Costs Of Health Care Reform

Staff - Riehl World View

If you've been reading the headlines as concerns all the industry groups appearing to sign on to Obama's health care agenda, you need to understand why and how it will only cost taxpayers in the end. They are only doing it because the administration is making sure there's something in it for them. That does not mean you! There is nothing in it in that regard except less choice and control with lower quality in health care compounded by higher taxpayer costs. The New York Times has an item up on the potential hidden costs lurking within Obama's health care reform proposals. What's important to note is who isn't at the table. And this quote by Daschle is pure political double talk. But, Mr. Daschle said, there is something in it for Congress and the White House, too: By getting on board early, groups like the drug makers and hospitals will be "owners of this process, and as owners they have to continue to defend it and support it." Yes, they might be on board and not campaign against it. But only because there will be something in it for them. For example, a Medicare reform that would cost taxpayers $250 billion to keep the doctors in line.

The Early Word: Health Care Swaps

Bernie Becker - The New York Times

It's not quite "Let's Make a Deal," but The Times's David Herszenhorn and Sheryl Gay Stolberg report on all the swaps the Obama administration has been making to try and pay for health care reform -- health industry groups vowing to slow the growth of spending by 1.5 percent, pharmaceutical companies promising savings of $80 billion over a decade and so on.The deals are at least part of the reason these sorts of groups are at the negotiating table and not loudly opposing health care reform. But some in Capitol Hill are beginning to wonder if the outside groups are driving a harder bargain than the White House. "I'm delighted to hear that people are stepping up to help reduce costs," said Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, "but I want to know what the ask is, and the ask sometimes can exceed the value of your cost savings."

The Cost of Health Care

Flyod Norris - The New York Times

David Leonhardt has a good column today on health care. But I fear even he is not willing to confront the really difficult choices. His column looks at the available treatments for prostate cancer. It is not clear which is better, and it is in no one's financial interest to finance studies to figure that out. So he thinks the government should do it. The prostate cancer test will determine whether President Obama and Congress put together a bill that begins to fix the fundamental problem with our medical system: the combination of soaring costs and mediocre results. If they don't, the medical system will remain deeply troubled, no matter what other improvements they make. Long-term health care reform has to control costs. Successful reforms will move in that direction, thus reducing the total cost for the economy. That is important whether or not health care ends up being financed by employers, taxpayers or patients.

If Obama's Political Operation Can Pressure Senators, Why Not Liberal Groups?
Greg Sargent - The Washington Post

Ever since it was reported last week that President Obama privately said he's wary of outside liberal groups pressuring Dem Senators to back a public health care option, there's been a bunch of debate about whether the President tacitly wants them to keep it up.Here's a bit of evidence that he does: Obama's outside political operation, Organizing for America, is doing the same thing, pressuring Senators to back a public option. Late yesterday, Organizing for America, or OFA, blasted out an email calling on supporters to deluge their Senators and members of Congress, Democrats included, with calls demanding that they support Obama's "three principles for real health care reform" Obama is reported to have said this about liberal groups: "We shouldn't be focusing resources on each other." If this is true, it raises the question of why his own political operation should do this, but outside groups shouldn't. But it's also possible that OFA's efforts show that the White House wants outside pressure on Senators. The groups are doing exactly what OFA is doing: Calling on constituents to demand Senators back a public plan. OFA's activities make the meme that Obama wants the groups to muzzle themselves seem pretty far fetched.

Discord on Health Care Dulls Luster Of New Pacts

Ceci Connolly and Michael D. Shear - The Washington Post

The Obama administration, hoping to boost its health-care reform effort with financial concessions from the hospital and pharmaceutical industries, is instead confronting deep dissension on several fronts within Democratic ranks and possible defections among key constituencies. Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.), lead House architect of the landmark health legislation, warned yesterday that he is not obligated to abide by deals struck recently by the White House, Senate Finance Committee, industry executives and interest groups such as AARP. "The White House is not bound. They tell us they're not bound by that agreement," Waxman, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said at a National Journal breakfast. "We're certainly not bound by that agreement. The White House was involved, and we were not." Waxman's comments came amid several other warning signs for the administration, including a slipping timetable in the Senate, internal division in the hospital industry and mounting tensions between AARP and the pharmaceutical industry that threaten a temporary detente between the two negotiated last month by the White House.

PROMISE PROMISES: Obama Tax Pledge Unrealistic

Stephen Olemacher - The Washington Post

President Barack Obama promised to fix health care and trim the federal budget deficit, all without raising taxes on anyone but the wealthiest Americans. It's a promise he's already broken and will likely have to break again. Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress have already increased tobacco taxes - which disproportionately hit the poor - to pay for extending health coverage to 4 million children in working low-income families. Now, lawmakers are looking for more revenues to help pay for providing medical insurance to millions more who lack it at a projected cost of $1 trillion over the next decade.The floated proposals include increasing taxes on alcohol, which could raise $62 billion over the next decade, and a new tax on sugary drinks such as soda, which could raise $52 billion. Senate Democrats this week pretty much rejected a proposal by Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., to tax health benefits, an idea that Obama repeatedly criticized during the presidential election campaign but has refused to take off the table.

Last Updated (Monday, 20 July 2009 14:44)