In light of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's decision to give in to demands from Sen. Joe Lieberman, a few blue dogs and every Republican in the Senate that the Senate must scrap the Medicare compromise, in addition to the public option that was scraped last week, many ardent supporters of health care reform have now giving up on the current version of the Senate's reform legislation.
Former presidential candidate Howard Dean said in a radio interview Tuesday that he agreed,
"This is essentially the collapse of health care reform in the United States Senate," Dean said. "Honestly the best thing to do right now is kill the Senate bill, go back to the House, start the reconciliation process, where you only need 51 votes and it would be a much simpler bill.""Insurance companies win. Time to kill this monstrosity coming out of the Senate," wrote DailyKos founder Markos Moulitas on his Twitter feed.
Updated December 14, 2009 @ 6:58 PM
Senate Democrats have apparently agreed to axe the "Medicare buy-in down to age 55" proposal, as well as any "public option" proposal. The Senate health care plan is now essentially the bill proposed by Sen. Max Baucus last September -- a mandate for all Americans to buy health insurance, primarily from private health insurance companies, or face a civil penalty. [Bloomberg]
As this blog has been posting since mid-2009 this is what private health insurance companies have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying money to buy. [see Insurance Industry Pushing For "Private, For Profit" Mandate In Reform]
This would force up to 40 million people to buy health insurance from private for profit health insurance companies, an unprecedented mandate -- long sought by insurance companies -- that would mark the first time the federal government has compelled consumers to buy a single industry's product, effectively creating a captive market.
Originally posted on September 25, 2009
Via FDL - The Los Angeles Times has a must-read piece today on the problems of an individual mandate without cost controls attached:
In the drive to bring health coverage to almost every American, lawmakers have largely rejected restrictions on how much insurers can charge, sparking fears that consumers will continue to face the skyrocketing premium increases of recent years.The Baucus bill is a mandate with no price controls, because it lacks a public health insurance option to increase competition with private insurance.
The legislators' reluctance to control premium costs comes despite the fact that they intend to require virtually all Americans to get health insurance, an unprecedented mandate -- long sought by insurance companies -- that would mark the first time the federal government has compelled consumers to buy a single industry's product, effectively creating a captive market.
"We are about to force at least 30 million people into an insurance market where the sharks are circling," said California Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, a Democrat who served as the state's insurance commissioner for eight years. "Without effective protections, they will be eaten alive."
Soaring premiums coupled with millions of new customers forced to buy policies would likely mean higher costs for taxpayers to cover government subsidies for lower-income families and individuals...
..."If the government is going to require people to buy an insurance policy, they have to guarantee it is affordable," said Jamie Court, president of Consumer Watchdog. "It is unconscionable not to."
First read the article at Fire Dog Lake and then read the Los Angeles Times article.
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