On Face the Nation, Howard Dean Says Co-op Plans Are 'Political Theater'
As someone recently said, what planet do they live on? Chuck Grassley and Ken Conrad fall all over themselves praising their co-op proposal, while Howard Dean, the Last Semi-Honest Man, calls it out as the political theater it is.
I don't know about you, but I'm pretty tired of these expedient political solutions to real-life problems. After reading Matt Taibbi's latest Rolling Stone piece on health care reform (no link yet), I now understand just how thoroughly the Blue Dogs screwed us on the public option and I would cry no tears if it disappeared in its present form:
(CBS) Former Vermont Governor and doctor, Howard Dean said the health care co-operative proposal is purely for political strategy and has not worked in the past on "Face the Nation" Sunday.
"That proposal is a political compromise, not a policy compromise," Dean said. "No one knows what it would look like and when it has been tried in the past it mostly hasn’t worked."
Dean, a strong advocate for the public insurance option, said people need the choice of a government-run plan to compete with private insurers. He argued that because private insurance companies are investor-owned, they are spending less money on health services and more on equity.
Medicare, Dean said, "is by nature much more efficient" because currently seniors can move, leave their job and get sick without having their coverage discontinued.
"Everybody over 65 has it and the question is 'Why don't we open up that program,'" he said.
[...] Dean said "we are getting pretty mixed signals from Senator Grassley. … I think the Republicans owe it to this country to give us a clearer sense of what they will and will not support."
Senators Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, and Kent Conrad, D-North Dakota, appeared earlier on "Face the Nation," saying that the public option plan would not find enough support in the Senate. The co-op solution, they said, would be the only hope for a bipartisan agreement.
Dean also said the $600 billion dollar House price tag on health care is "reasonable" because it is less than we are spending in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Huh?
Hannity and Steele are now pushing a new GOP myth...A veterans' "Death Book."Read this short article on the "Death Book" myth.
We need to stop this crap before it gets out of hand like the death panel phrase did.
http://progressnotcongress.org/?p=2652
and Mr Steele the end of life decisions are to help your family make the decisions you put in place.
Boycott Tyson Foods of Arkansas who gave Mike Ross $37,000 for his campaigns. Call lobbyist for Tyson Foods Chuck Penry 202 393 3921 and tell him politely that you refuse to buy Tyson chicken until Mike Ross D-Arkansas the leader of the Blue Dogs on health care gets the entire house and senate conservative Democrats to help get HR 676 enacted into law. Tell others to call. Send me email after you call to info@democratz.org
Boycott American Express who gave Max Baucus $50,000 for his campaigns. Call Joanna Lambert at 212 640 9668 and politely tell her you will not use any American Express cards until Max Baucus gets HR 676 enacted into law. Email me after you call.
See our blog http://blog.democratz.org
industries that aree not related to healthcare because they contributed to these congresspersons. Instead, you should be addvocaating for public financing to take the lobbyists for specfial interests out of the mix. If we boycott every business that contributes to politicians we will be boycotting almost everyone that owns a business.
Why boycott these industries? They're not related to healthcare, you say? They don't look so not-related when they make these contributions to influence national policy. We are free to boycott anyone we please.
I don't think it will be necessary to boycott all businesses. Many may not make political contributions. Others may make more agreeable contributions. In these cases a boycott is not appropriate.
No one has a "right" to my business. I can make these decisions based on anything at all, as we all can.
The day Obama fired the Dr. and put Rahm in charge of his administration, was the beginning of the end for liberals.
We have seen nothing but DLC repuke-lite bullshit since.
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
.
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
First the terrorists wanted to kill me, now its the government?
Why's everyone trying to kill me? And what can I do to stop it?
Buy lots of guns.
Just don't shoot yourself!
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
I don't want a bipartisan agreement. I want real healthcare reform shoved down Republican throats. I want this to succeed, and to rub Republican noses in it. I want the public to love it, and know that Republicans were against it. I want the Republican party marginalized and villified -- that is, simply exposed -- to the point where it has to change its name.
that is, simply exposed
I totally agree.
Republicants actually agree too. (look at how many have been exposed lately.)
"...and the question is 'Why don't we open up that program..."
So does everyone sick enough to have been on Medicaid for over 2 years. Like me. I've been on Medicare since I was 50. And Guess what? Had I access to medical care when I was 46, my cancer might have been caught at a time wherein it would have been possible for me to have skipped 5 weeks in the hospital, a 10 hour op, and permanent disability and chronic illness. And all the cost it is to maintain me now. Instead it was an ER diagnosis, when I was so ill I couldn't think that what ever was wrong would clear up tout de suite.
I'd probably be a hard working TAXPAYER now. But instead, I am not.
me-oww!
That makes so much common sense, and is a story which highlights the stupidity of the oppositions position.
I really cannot believe how stupid 46% of the people are in this country; that they would support this system, just because they are hate-filled, ignorant scared losers.
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
So sorry to hear about your illness, but you have it exactly right. If we open up Medicare for all, catch illness ahead of time, it will save money in the long run and make everyone more productive, as well as happier.
I'm very sorry you have cancer and that you've had to endure what you have for this past 6+ years.
Indeed you point out the very stupidity of the "existing" system... everyone deserves the best healthcare their country provides. Everyone!!!
I don't live in the U.S. I live in Canada where this would NOT have happened to you at all and you'd still be a hard-working taxpayer as you point out.
I seriously don't understand the total lack of compassion and empathy for this topic. It totally escapes me...
and Sept 12, 2001 was my first day of treatment. Doubleplusbummer. :(
It'll be 8 years in a couple of weeks
me-oww!
i didn't know miss kitty... my heart goes out to you
You've probably seen me crabby on here. Some days are kind of bad and I should stay off line those days :)
me-oww!
I hope your illness is now under control (and in remission?)because I'd miss your wry and intelligent commentary here at C&L.
Be well.I command it.
"To me, truth is not some vague, foggy notion. Truth is real. And,
at the same time, unreal. Fiction and fact and everything in between,
plus some things I can't remember, all rolled into one big "thing."
This is truth, to me. "
-Jack Handy
there's a lot of us who feel this way, crabby days or not! (We all have our crabby days tho' don't we?)
the surgery pretty much got rid of the disease, after the chemo and radiation failed. It was the exact same as Farrah Fawcett's very rare, very treatable, and about 99.9% deadly if it recurs.
If she'd had the surgery I'd had, maybe she would have made it. But it is very radical, and not at all what you want to consider having done, and I could see, if she were offered the choice, she might have turned it down. But I had extensive damage from the radiation, so my choice was this op, or never leave the house.
When they took the stuff out, the GI surgeon told me the path lab had found atypical cells, and it was impossible to tell if they atypical because of radiation, or if they were more cancer.
I don't like what I have now, but as my surgeon said "Consider the alternative."
me-oww!
It makes you (and me) want to enjoy each and every moment of feeling good! I'm very sorry to hear about your situation... please focus on the getting completely better, as soon and as fully as you can. I believe in miracles and will do what I can from a distance. I happen to believe in Universal laws that often contain miracles.
It's pretty clear what CBS's position is on health care for all; Sheiffer refers to "this thing," health care reform, as though it were a steaming turd. Granted, it's only a shadow of what we really need - first-dollar single-payer universal health care - but it's all we've got for now. I'll bet CBS employees have kickass health insurance coverage.
IF the "CO-OP" is the ONLY path to a bipartisan Health Care Reform bill, please explain HOW your BILL would be different from the Massachusetts HC plan that Gov. Mitt Romney put into place?
Because the Mass. Plan is not Containing Costs, is not Universal Coverage, and is Going Broke, in spite of highly punitive penalties extracted from (1) Individuals who cannot / will not enroll, or (2) numerous Small Business Owners that Opt Out.
'Fess up, Grass-Ass. The RethugliKKKlan Party plan IS NOT to offer ANY Viable HC Reform, IS IT?
The RethugliKKKlan Plan is to Torpedo ANYTHING the Dems come up with, Offer something that Taxpayers will be Begging the RethugliKKKlan Party to Reverse, while Rewarding the Rethugs with that long-sought 100 years of GOPper Majority, RIGHT?
Of course, Medicare and Social Security will also be on the chopping block at that point, as well.
The RethugliKKKlan Party, not so much the "Party of NO" but the Corporatist Oligarchs' Party. How very Class Warfare of you, Chucky.
Single Payer Universal Health Care VIA HR-676 !!!
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
...should mean a NO vote in the end. Anything less, the private insurance companies will still be calling the shots and deciding what is paid for and who gets it. It is said this country has the best medical care in the world, the problem is forty some million of us have no access to it because we can't afford the premiums of the private insurance companies in the first place. If I were paying for medical insurance, I would want to know why eighty percent of that money is going to things other than medical costs. Medical care isn't broken in this country, it's the way Big Insurance is allowed to rip everyone off by artificially driving up costs.
Government + the Federal Reserve = organized crime
Keeping in mind that these are the gigantic, wealthy insurance cartels, who, along with their wealthy "investment" banker brethren, have the monopoly on our so-called elected representatives (Dick Durbin is on the senate record saying just that), it is no surprise to me that they came out highly organized, peddling fear and more death to the gullible and the greedy alike. This fellow wrote a good piece about how Obama got outflanked on his seminal issue and how to reframe it as "The American Plan" if it is to have any chance of success, if it is not too late already. Ironically, the piece calls for brevity in the presentation but itself is at least 4000 words.
http://www.truthout.org/082009B
Where are the liberal protesters? Single payer could pay for itself from the cost savings, rather than trillion dollar sham public option as proposed. Taibbi's article is the bomb. Here is a link to the RS discussion of it:
http://www.rollingstone.com/nationalaffairs/i...
will have no effect on the eventual policy.
The purpose of all the negotiations now is to figure out who gets the MONEY when 30 Million formerly un-insureds are FORCED to purchase PRIVATE insurance.
Nobody will get it because I won't be buying. Or paying Federal taxes. Fuck 'em all.
Out of network, co-pay, deductibles, denials. I'll pay my own way before I give a nickel to those cocksuckers.
Interesting article (and Comments) about cost of end stage renal treatment - and who profits. Excellent illustration/example of this whole dilemma of cost v. effectiveness:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-08-2...
Dean also said the $600 billion dollar House price tag on health care is "reasonable" because it is less than we are spending in Iraq and Afghanistan.
He was ousted for saying " The removal of Saddan don't make us safer" He was right!
This fix is in. The insurance industry will get a public forced into co-ops and forced to buy insurance from private insurance.
Your government, most of it, is bought and paid for.
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