The Blue State

Hillary's health care plan is only a mandate

Hillary Clinton is attacking Barack Obama because she says her plan is the only one that covers all Americans.  That is debatable.  In reality, her plan is just a mandate, and wouldn't necessarily lower the cost of health care.  It only requires every American to purchase private health insurance.

This morning, the New York Times' Katharine Seelye compared Hillary's health plan to the mandate on auto insurance.  Even though all Americans are required to get auto insurance, 15% still lack it.  So what makes Hillary's supporters think that all Americans would get covered under her health care mandate?:

Mandates rarely achieve 100 percent compliance. In addition, they are almost impossible to enforce.

Because of those difficulties, Mrs. Clinton’s own plan would probably leave out millions.

Mandates have not worked with auto insurance. While all drivers arerequired to have it, 15 percent of the nation’s drivers have none,according to the Insurance Research Council.

Mr. Obama’s healthplan could actually have a better compliance rate. The 15 million whowould supposedly be left out equal about 5 percent of the population —a smaller portion than are going without auto insurance, said JosephAntos, a health policy expert at the American Enterprise Institute, anonpartisan group.

In other words, if the compliance rate is the same as auto insurance, Obama's plan would leave out 5% of Americans while Hillary's plan would leave out 15%.

Also, Obama's plan goes deeper than just getting Americans insured -- it focuses more on lowering costs.

Due to Bush decision, 1.8 million Veterans without health care

Now here is an issue that John Kerry could have brought up in the 2004 race, but instead chose not to get his feet wet.

At least 1.8 million veterans don't have any access to health care, even though they put their sweat and blood on the line so all of us can sit here and enjoy life:

Nearly 1.8 million U.S. veterans are withouthealth insurance, and more than half of them said they have no place togo when they are sick, Harvard Medical School researchers reportedTuesday.

The study also found that more than 25 percent of uninsured veteranssaid they could not afford prescriptions, while more than 20 percentsaid they could not afford eyeglasses.

So what seems to be the problem then?  Why aren't they on Medicaid?

The researchers said the uninsured veterans are primarily low- tomiddle-income workers, aged 44 to 64, who are too poor to affordprivate insurance coverage but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaidor VA health care.

OK, so why did the federal government let this happen?  Thank George W. Bush

The researchers said the main cause for the large number ofuninsured veterans was the narrowing of eligibility for health careprovided by the Department of Veterans Affairs. In 2003, the Bushadministration limited VA health care eligibility to veterans withcombat-related health problems or those making less than $30,000 a year.

And four years later we finally get these numbers.  Absolutely disgraceful.  Conservatives who oppose single-payer, not-for-profit health care should try looking these brave veterans in the eye and telling them that to their face, instead of hiding behind the holier than thou 'moral majority' label.

SCHIP not through even if Bush vetoes it again

I have been told by an email source that if President Bush vetoes the Democrats latest SCHIP bill, Democrats will bring the bill up again in September of 2008, making it an election year issue.

Worldwide water demand too much for supply

Climate change, extreme poverty, poor water treatment -- all signs of a growing water crisis:

Demand for water is doubling every 20 years, outpacing populationgrowth twice as fast. Currently 1.3 billion people don't have access toclean water and 2.5 billion lack proper sewage and sanitation. In lessthan 20 years, it is estimated that demand for fresh water will exceedthe world's supply by over 50 percent.

The biggest drain on ourwater sources is agriculture, which accounts for 70 percent of thewater used worldwide -- much of which is subsidized in the industrialworld, providing little incentive for agribusiness to use conservationmeasures or less water-intensive crops.

This number is alsolikely to increase as we struggle to feed a growing world. Populationis expected to rise from 6 billion to 8 billion by 2050.

Insufficient water treatment may have been the reason for the cholera outbreak in Iraq, according to Congressman Jim McDermott (D-WA).

More victims of private health insurance

Don't like the idea of free, not-for-profit health care?  Enjoy the system we have?  According to an exclusive New York Times report, our current system neglects those that are supposed to be covered:

Tens of thousands of Medicare recipients have been victims of deceptive sales tactics and had claimsimproperly denied by private insurers that run the system’s huge newdrug benefit program and offer other private insurance optionsencouraged by the Bush administration, a review of scores of federalaudits has found.

The problems, described in 91 audit reports reviewed by The New YorkTimes, include the improper termination of coverage for people withH.I.V. and AIDS, huge backlogs of claims and complaints, and a failureto answer telephone calls from consumers, doctors and drugstores.

So how about that American health care system.  I'd say that I favor a similar system to the one in Canada, eh!

Republicans pretend to care about the poor

The State Children's Health Insurance Program is up for renewal.  A bipartisan group of lawmakers want to increase the number of children covered under the program by 10 million.  So how do you argue with that?  Republicans that oppose the bill are using logic they typically aren't familiar with.

Part of the program will be paid for by increasing taxes on tobacco.  Republican lawmakers, who are all in the pockets of the tobacco industry, have found a way to argue against it.  They contend that a tobacco tax increase is bad because it would hurt the poor:

Republicans will argue that tobacco taxes fall hardest on theworking poor, the very people SCHIP was designed to help. About a thirdof adults who live in poverty are smokers.

"Under this scheme, the poorest Americans will be burdened with evenhigher federal taxes so that wealthier families and businesses canshift the cost of their health care coverage to the Americantaxpayers," said Reps. Joe Barton, R-Texas and Nathan Deal, R-Ga, in a letter to colleagues.

The GOP, the same party that wants a national sales tax, claims to be genuinely concerned about a tobacco tax because it is regressive.  Do you buy that?.  Anytime Republicans talk about poverty, there is usually some other motivation.

Bush to America: Screw the Poor!

President Bush announced Saturday that he will be vetoing a measure by Congress to expand federally funded Health Care for children. The measure, which is expected to pass the Senate and House next week, would expand Health Care for children in low-income households by $35 billion over the next five years, adding 4 million people to program; bringing the grand total up to approximately 10.6 million people. Bush referred to the Democrats pushing the bill as "irresponsible."

"Democrats in Congress have decided to pass a bill they know will bevetoed," Bush said of the measure that draws significant bipartisansupport, repeating in his weekly radio address an accusation he madeearlier in the week. "Members of Congress are risking health coveragefor poor children purely to make a political point."

Yes, giving poor children medical treatment. How "irresponsible" and partisan can you get? Congress is seriously putting these children in harms way by trying to expand their health coverage. Can't someone from the Democratic Party counter this ridiculous claim?

In the Democrat's response, also broadcast Saturday, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendellturned the tables on the president, saying that if Bush doesn't signthe bill, 15 states will have no funding left for the program by theend of the month.

There we go! Bush must sign this bill or risk being branded as negligent in protecting American citizens. But then again, after looking at his track record in protecting poor American citizens, it becomes very clear where this "man" stands.

What's the point in protecting Americans from terrorism when children will suffer and die in the United States due to inadequate health care? How can a person talk about how we're fighting a war for to protect or children's future, and then threaten to sign a death warrant for some of those very same children? Hypocrisy doesn't begin to describe it.

If President Bush vetoes this Bill, the responsibility for those children's pain will rest solely at his doorstep. The deaths of those who could not see a doctor will lie on his conscience. His negligence borders on the criminal, and he says the Democrats are the ones being "irresponsible."

Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act

There's a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act which will require Insurance Companies to cover a minimum 48-hour hospital stay for patients undergoing a mastectomy. It's about eliminating the 'drive-through mastectomy' where women are forced to go home just a few hours after surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from anesthesia and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached

Lifetime TV (I know "guys", Lifetime hates "us"...but this is a good cause) lays out this issue very well 'The Re-Introduction of The Bipartisan Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act'.

This bill has been introduced during each Congressional session since 1997 (1997, 1999, 2001, 2003, and 2005). Each time, unfortunately, the bill dies in committee. It has been submitted again during the current legislative session as "The Breast Cancer Protection Act of 2007"   

Lifetime does have an online petition (much like an email petition),   however, there is no way to verify signatures or prevent multiple   "signings". A more productive approach to getting this, or any   legislation passed would be for interested voters to contact their elected representatives   directly. Click the following links for contact information for SENATORS   and REPRESENTATIVES.

 

Those interested in tracking the progress of this latest attempt at   passage, can click HERE   for Senate action, and HERE   for the House version.

The above information came from HERE, and in my opinion does not dilute the importance or effectiveness of Lifetime's petition, it's additional "insurance" and "assurance" of getting the JOB done. Our elected officials are getting the best care available, yet when it comes to us "commoners", it's a crap shoot on the crap table of the insurance companies. 

Hillary unveils health care plan

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is unveiling a plan that would make it mandatory for all Americans to purchase private health insurance.  It would also use government subsidies to reduce the cost and pay for those who could not afford it.  She will push for this plan if she becomes president:

With a price tag of about $110 billion a year, Clinton's AmericanHealth Choices Plan represents her first major effort to achieveuniversal health coverage since 1994, when the plan she authored duringher husband's first term collapsed.

"It puts the consumer in the driver's seat by offering more choices andlowering costs," said Neera Tanden, Clinton's top policy advisor.

"If you like the plan you have, you keep it. If you're one of tens ofmillions of Americans without coverage or don't like the coverage youhave, you will have a choice of plans to pick from and you'll get taxcredits to help pay for it."

In many ways, the plan is both progressive and corporate-driven.

On one hand, when you provide preventive health care to everyone, especially those below the poverty line, you lessen the likelihood that they will require emergency surgery down the road, which you and I end up paying for.  We have an invested interest in seeing that all children are immunized and receive routine physicals, which would help lower the cost of health care in the long run.

On the other side of things, her plan is exactly what insurance companies want.  Forcing everyone to get insurance would be a blessing for the insurance companies.  During the 2006 election cycle, Hillary Clinton was the number two recipient of donations from the health care industry.  While John Edwards' health care plan also makes health insurance mandatory, Barack Obama's plan does not.

Drowning in red ink

A new nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office report released today found the deficit in 2009 and 2010 will rise, only affirming that the party that has not balanced a federal budget since 1969 has a flawed fiscal policy:

However, despite the short-termimprovement, CBO predicts that, in 2009 and 2010, the deficit will riseagain to a greater share of the gross domestic product.  

“Overthe long term, the budget remains on an unsustainable path,” CBO said.“Unless changes are made to current policies, growing demand forresources caused by rising healthcare costs and the nation’s expandingelderly population will put increasing pressure on the budget.”

HouseMajority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said the latest CBO report“reaffirms that Republican policies have created deficits as far as theeye can see.”

Yes, rising health care costs will be a huge problem, because the current system does not value preventive care.  Preventive health care would save money in the long run.