Unproductive closed door meeting on health care today? Have we forgotten who has the majority?

It sounds like there was a lot of conflict and little agreement. Those few with so many obligations to the insurance industry are behind closed doors bickering and ignoring too many other voices.

From a health care website this evening after the daylong closed door session:

A lot of questions, few answers, Baucus says after all-day session



I thought they were going to try to get away from requiring employers to carry insurance for their employees. Somewhere I got the idea that would be a goal.

More from the WSJ tonight.

US Sen Finance Panel Takes On Health Coverage In Closed Meeting



In late April Baucus said they were not talking about the public option for now..would deal with it later.



Baucus has also said that we need to keep our powder dry.



There will be sparks, Mr. Baucus. Count on it.

We have a majority now that we may never have again for years. There has to be a way to hold back the insurance industry long enough to get a government run option that could develop into a true single payer perhaps.

When they came out of that meeting, our Democrats did not sound like the majority. Not in my mind.

I think Howard Dean was right the other night when he was on the Rachel Maddow show. They agreed that the health care discussions must not move to the right.

They said if the discussion moved right



I was reading the introduction of David Brock's Republican Noise Machine again this week.



This was written in 2004, and they are still doing it. Nancy Pelosi spoke out today while the reporters hammered her. They are using her to make themselves look less guilty on torture.

They are doing the same thing on health care. The only mentions of single payer or public options come from our blogs and our bloggers, it doesn't make it into the main media what those options really are.

The elite get to decide.

its about writing legislation that will make donors happy.

Not what we need.

it's the special moneyed interests who have the majority.
Public funding of campaigns should be all of our first priority.

""I don't want to say it's a problem when you've got three or four different ways of compromising it," Grassley said. "We might be able to find a consensus.""

I feel certain that he's not the only one who wants to compromise the process. There are all those "high powered lobbyists".

I'd love to know exactly what "high powered" means, and why these people are allowed special access to Congress. There ought to be a law that says that anytime a Congressman meets with a paid lobbyist, there needs to be a video recording of it that is available to the public.

"There ought to be a law that says that anytime a Congressman meets with a paid lobbyist, there needs to be a video recording of it that is available to the public."

I think that's a great idea. Even better if it includes all communications (email, phone calls, etc.) and is expanded to include congressional staff.

We'd need legislation or an executive order or even a judicial ruling that asserts the public's right to full disclosure of all lobbying activities. Sunlight. Congress-critters and their staff are, literally, public servants, our employees, and we should have the right to view their work, as our employers have the right to view our work.

Give us this, and we can have a whole lot of fun, and take back the country. Since I'm dreaming...

How about a dedicated public viewing channel/website, like C-SPAN. Call it, I don't know, C-PIGS? We could watch them at work, see which lobbyists actually submit proposed legislation and amendments, read any emails from lobbyists, listen to their phone calls, everything.

Of course we'd have to be creative to get people to watch. I suggest fun programming that repackages this info in entertaining ways. I'm going to regret this: Green Acres, Amurkin Ahole, Leave It To Thiever, Cayman for Laymen (ok sure someone else gets to be programming director.)

I keep hoping for a defining principle that lets us get our government back. Something like the right to full disclosure of all job-related activities of our public servants, at least where it involves paid lobbyists' efforts to influence them in ways that may not serve the public interest, could have world-changing ramifications if it is backed by the law.

This approach isn't the only way to go, but it has been used effectively by the corporations against us, maybe it could work for us.

The supreme court's ruling that spending money on campaigns is protected speech was a shot that changed everything. It's one of the obstacles to campaign finance reform, and is therefore one of the pillars upon which corporate dominance of government is built. Another such pillar is corporate personhood. Perhaps establishing our right to full sunlight on all lobbying activities could be an effective counter-punch.

And it's not us. Party majority is meaningless.

:shrug:

http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090515/NEWS/905150329/1018/OPINION

"WASHINGTON — House Democrats are crafting a plan that would require all Americans to carry health insurance and would help families making less than $88,000 pay the premiums. Employers, too, would have to help foot the bill.

It's the latest development in President Barack Obama's push to fix the ailing U.S. health care system by getting the government more deeply involved.

Obama has said the final legislation must rein in costs, guarantee choice of health plans and medical providers, and ensure that all Americans have access to affordable coverage. But he's leaving it to Congress to work out the details.

Responding to a question at a town hall-style meeting in New Mexico on Thursday, Obama said he expects a plan from Congress that will be a "vast improvement" over the current system."

I don't want my tax dollars going to pay some asshat CEO's next multi million bonus.

I don't want "cost savings" which mean even less coverage.

The only vast improvement is if you own health insurance stock.

Individuals and employers would face new obligations to help pay for coverage. Insurers would operate under stricter consumer protections. And the government would take added responsibilities for setting insurance rules and providing financial help to low- and middle-income families.

"It's a sensible, mainstream proposal," said Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn, a member of the fiscally conservative group of Democrats known as the Blue Dogs. "If we do something along those lines we will be in the right ball park."

Why does it seem to me that individuals will be forced to buy the same crap with new obligations to boot? :mad:

I very much disagree with Jim Cooper.

I went out dug up a rose and moved it. I haven't worked my mad off yet so I'm headed out to move some perennials. Still :mad:

Thanks for the info.

INS donates millions to congress, gets billions in return.

Wash rinse and repeate.

And I hate to say that this is the truth.

They won't matter as long as Muricans are not willing to do little things like oh National strikes, the last one was in 1952, irrc,

That is when we started to loose our power

it could be worse if it were President McCain, or President Romney, or ....President Giuliani... or President Thompson?......:scared:

No comfort there anymore.

Corporate whores are corporate whores, no matter what the letter is after their name.

And they'll do so to deliberately to make it a non-viable option to for-profit private plans -- IF they even SERIOUSLY consider it AT ALL.

Watch...

Bunch of corprat-pwned scumbags.

i don't understand what they disagreed on. maybe they couldn't agree on how to curtail a real public option? "do we start a war?" " nah! let's talk about Nancy Pelosi" " what else can we call Pres Obama beside socialist and fascist?"

what in the world can big pharma, insurance industry, the republicans, and our conserva-dems really disagree on?

..........the hammering went like this..........(begin magically seeing through doors)............

"Our careers as politicians and executives and general all round bad asses will come to a crashing end if the system is simplified. If we, in our positions of power, can not put a stop to this 'alternate plan', this 'public option', we may as well pound salt. Our path forward is clear. After much deliberation we will emerge united and as one body tell the public, "there's nothing we can do. It's too complex." If the public still wants progress from us we simply initiate some additional regulation to further complicate the issue while providing a better climate for our mutual interests. It's good being powerful, don't you think? So, labor union man, how do you like it here? More ambrosia? Kerry, get the man more ambrosia."

....(emerging from meeting room, magically).....and so, behind closed doors, that's how public policy gets made. For example, I give you "the US tax code".

in the Senate.

-Hilary Clinton


I think Hilary's vision is all but a done deal.

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They should be discouraged from it. But I'm living in a dream world called 'single payer'.

for healthcare all these years, it might be viable. I thought if the cost of providing insurance harmed the corporations, we might actually have a shot at single payer . . . or at least a path to it over time. Doesn't look good.

would free employers from having to provide healthcare. It has always been almost an unendurable burden to small businesses due to the relative costs on smaller grosses.

If a company CHOSE to provide healthcare or had a private plan that was competitive or better than the public option, than that would be a good employee benefit and it would give them an edge in recruiting and retaining the best employees. There's nothing wrong with that.

The key word is CHOICE. An employer should be able to choose whether to offer healthcare or not. An employee should be able to choose the employer plan or go with the public option.

Bear in mind that the insurance industry is fighting tooth and nail to destroy any real workable affordable public plan. That is why in the back rooms, closed to our prying eyes, everyone is attempting to design something that will look and sound like a public plan but which will be loaded with fundamental flaws so that it will fail quickly. I seriously believe this.

Remember that these are the same people who were entirely capable of unloading onto the public without shame a Medicare drug plan that FORBADE negotiating prices with the drug companies like the VA does. Result - crushing costs of drugs which threatens to sink Medicare. But Pharma got their money, didn't they?

I learn something new each day. I thought we were moving away from that.

Requiring employers to furnish medical benefits is another thing that pleases insurance companies. More of their wares they get to peddle, yay!

My expectation is that we will end up with individual mandate shoved up our asses, which should make any insurance company lobbyist happy. Industry promises to hold down cost increases will be strictly optional, and initially achieved mostly at the expense of claimants (CLAIM DENIED!). These assurances will be quickly forgotten as soon as the dust settles.

They are in the minority number wise but they have all the power.

The Republican-Democrat split is just an illusion (yes, there are some difference between them).

Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle -- with a couple of exceptions -- are owned lock, stock, and barrel by the corporations.

Understand that -- and everything becomes clear.

.

:kick:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/15/should-health-benefits-be-taxed/?hp

"There are many third rails in the politics of health reform, but probably none with quite the high voltage of one proposal: the idea of taxing part, or all, of the health-insurance premiums paid by employers on behalf of their employees.

Some members of Congress — notably the Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Max Baucus — are now stretching their hands gingerly toward that third rail, and sparks are flying even before the rail has been touched.

Under current law, employers can treat the contributions they make to the premiums for their employees’ health insurance as a tax-deductible business expense. On the other hand, employees do not pay income taxes or payroll taxes on this contribution, though it clearly is part of the employees’ total compensation."

Please tell me no. I see these things we fought so hard for against Bush being mentioned now.

Ask yourself, why would they require employers to provide health insurance, and at the same time start taxing employees for the benefits they receive? This is a scheme to end employer-paid health insurance. By taxing employees for benefits received, workers will be encouraged to opt for bare bones, catastrophic-only plans that include health savings accounts. Employers will then stop paying any portion of the premiums, shifting all costs to workers. This will be easier to do once workers have been encouraged or forced onto these low cost plans by this and other means. Employers will then act only as middlemen to offer group insurance that employees pay for themselves. A thick fog of corporate-speak will be employed to conceal this change from workers.

So what's the point of requiring employers to furnish health insurance? It would be just another form of individual mandate if corporations get their way, and it looks like that's just the way this is playing out.

It seems my party doesn't like me or care about me either.

for a dem unless he/she has a proven liberal record. This shit is making progressives and liberals much more powerful than these arrogant dipshit DLCers realize.

Profit Care comes ahead of Patient Care in East Tennessee and southwest Virginia, see for yourself what is deemed, defended and supported as "THE ACCEPTABLE STANDARDS OF HEALTH CARE" http://www.wisecountyissues.com/?p=62 It's nothing at all like the health care system is allowed to advertise.

to stand tall and do what is right, but he malingers. Baucus and all are no better than GOPers. He should have never excluded single payer from the discussion. Now they are concerned that the public will rise up for what is due us. And we should!!!!!!!!!!!!!!