Let's talk about Hillary's health care plan.

When asked on O'Reilly's show about any new government programs, she said no. She said keep your plan, or choose the plan congress uses.

"So here's what I say. Everybody who has health insurance who's happy with it, you keep it. No changes. But what I am going to do is take an already existing plan, it's not government run, it's not a new bureaucracy, it's the way Congress and federal employees get their health care. And we're going to open it up to every American. Because I think it's about time..."


But on her site, there is this:

The Same Choice of Health Plan Options that Members of Congress Receive: Americans can keep their existing coverage or access the same menu of quality private insurance options that their Members of Congress receive through a new Health Choices Menu, established without any new bureaucracy as part of the Federal Employee Health Benefit Program (FEHBP). In addition to the broad array of private options that Americans can choose from, they will be offered the choice of a public plan option similar to Medicare.



Which is it? Was she lying to O'Reilly, or is she lying on her website?

and I thought she spelled it out pretty clearly that you could keep your current health program or opt into the Congressional one. She also said that people that can afford to pay would be required to pay. I didn't know anything about this "public plan option similar to Medicare". Could someone kindly give details?

BTW--I am for Kucinich, not Obama or Clinton. Right now, I'm trying to garner information.

http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/

All those claims that Hillary was so much more detailed in her plans? Bull.

and make 60k a year, who says you can afford to spend 2k a month in health insurance a month, providing you can even find someone to cover you.

No health plan is universal unless it is a single payer system.

Another thing that bothers me is that insurance companies can choose not to pay for certain treatments because they term them "experimental", even when they are not and have been proven to be a real help. When I did have insurance, they would not cover chiropractic adjustments. They would pay for a spinal fusion operation or drugs to kill the pain, but not an adjustment, which took care of the problem. Just another reason NOT to like insurance companies.

Hillary's multi-faceted all-encompassing approach has both private insurance as choices, and public plans similar to Medicare for the poor and low income.

Hillary has long worked for insurance for children, with her vital assistance in getting S-chips passed, to her campaigning to not only defeat the Bush attempts to slash S-chips, but also to extend its coverage to more and more children of the working poor that cannot afford insurance.

Hillary's plan will be the first implementation of universal health for all Americans.

http://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/healthcare/


My reasons for choosing Hillary's plan over obama's plan are also multi-faceted. In the area where I live, our emergency rooms are maxed out from the uninsured using them as primary care providers. This serious issue has led to deaths. Additionally, the costs of these not-paid-for expensive emergency room treatments are spread across the premiums of those that have insurance in the area. My $1,2000/month 80% coverage plan just jumped to $1,400/month on April 1st, the jump being directly related to the soring number of uninsured in my area. My insurance has gone up by double-digits each year for so long I cannot tell you the last time it hasn't. Why on earth should I have to pay for other's medical treatments if they can afford to buy insurance but for whatever reason they don't.

There is only one way to return any sense of equity to this mess, and that is to make sure all are insured. Period.

obama's plan allows some to still game the system.

They aren't going to "open it up", they'r going to FORCE you to pay who knows how much for some plan that has who knows how much in deductibles and co-pays. I don't give a crap what she calls it, the point is that nobody has any "choice" in the matter at all.

Mandate systems work in other countries, but those nations appear to be less overtly corrupt and beshackled by free-market fundamentalism than we are.

A mandate system that defines coverage requirements that make the standard program comprehensive and up to world standards for developed industrial democracies, requires non-discrimination non-exclusion, and offers a non-profit public system that meets all the requirements, might just work. I would mandate employer contributions as well (50% at minimum), plus an inflation indexed subsidy system that guaranteed everyone could afford that mandate.

What I don't like about either Clinton's or Obama's plan is that they both rely on insurance companies rather than non-profit insurance organizations. So that means the motive to cut care and increase profits is still there. I know that right now insurance companies dictate to doctors what drugs they can prescribe, all based on their bottom line rather than what is best for the patient. Know of one lady who was denied a drug for a heart condition that her MD recommended because another one was cheaper. Didn't matter that that medicine would interfere negatively with other prescriptions the lady was taking. Lady couldn't afford the scrip on her own, and wound up taking nothing. That is not right.

That's where it starts in other countries. Then it goes to regulation of prices. Then it goes to different styles of delivery. Hillary is not offering everybody coverage, she's forcing people to buy insurance. Hugely different.

I would be hard pressed to find anyone who calls it universal.

of insurance companies - is that it won't be instituted until the end of her second term. Funny how the timeline doesn't make it into her stump speech. The people who are desperate for medical care hang on her every word and then vote for her, but basically it's bull shit.

Q: Many experts project that it would cost between $90 billion and $120 billion to actually achieve universal health care for everyone in America. Is comprehensive reform achievable financially?
A: We already spend more money than anybody else in the world, by about $800 billion, and we have 47 million uninsured. We're also at a competitive disadvantage because other countries either provide health care or don't, and our companies are trying to be competing in a global economy. So I want to figure out how we provide universal health care without putting billions more into the system. Let's get prescription drug prices down by negotiating with the drug companies, for example. I am going around the country, and I'm asking people's advice, then I'm going to be proposing a specific plan. You know, President Kennedy said in his inauguration that he wanted to have a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Well, I want to have universal health care coverage by the end of my second term.

Source: 2007 AFSCME Democratic primary debate in Carson City Nevada Feb 21, 2007

UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE which she hopes to achieve by the end of her second term.

While her current proposal covers far more people, at a much lower cost, than Obama's proposal, it is NOT universal health care.

:think:

A mere technicality, I'm sure. In any case, the other guy's got a crazy, black ex-pastor so his plan is most certainly not universal.

How about, BOTH.

There you go again, asking questions 'n shit. Only elitests ask questions.

Have another latte.

She said it would rain in Washington today.

It's almost 8 AM, and not a single drop has fallen.

LIER!

How can America ever trust Hillery?

--p!
Where's my coffee, damn it?

urge your candidate to support HR 676, Universal single-payer health care. America needs a Health Care plan and not windfall profits for Insurance Companies courtesy of your tax dollars.

We've already got one in Congress. If health care is important, why not talk about HR 676?

Neither of the two potential nominees get any points on health care.