House Offends Democracy With Process On Healthcare

[JimofPennsylvan]

As the Democrat House leadership conducts its legislative scheming to force their healthcare reform bill down the American peoples’ throats, one aspect of the legislative process on this bill which has been especially egregious and which crossed the line is that there is not a “full and fair” amendment process in the House Chamber taking place on this bill. The Democrat House Leadership here is trashing America’s Democracy for their own partisan ends. Members of the House chamber should have an opportunity to remove bad provisions of a bill and add good provisions to a bill if they can get the majority of their fellow members to agree with them. Ordinary Americans want their voices heard in Washington on legislation and it is our representatives who by having the power to offer amendments to a bill achieve this want. If the Democrat Leadership can get away with this disempowerment of rank and file House members on this bill then future majority House leaders can get away with this discarding of a full amendment process on any bill that ever again goes through the House, it doesn’t get much more important than healthcare reform being healthcare involves one-sixth of the American economy. This is an historic scandal the Democrat leadership’s gutting of the process on how Congress enacts laws which is taking place with this bill. It is really disheartening how more in the media, Democrat politicians and Democrat leaders aren’t calling the Democrat leadership out on this. One would have hoped that more Democrat leaders across the nation would be Americans first before being Democrats.

The legislative process that faithfulness to American Democracy calls for doesn’t require no restrictions on the amendment process. There could be a leadership restriction that all amendments be budget neutral – for that would reflect the will of the majority of members of the House chamber and be consistent with prior House actions. Due to the monumental importance of this legislation and considering the amendment processes on past bill’s, the Democrat leadership could limit the number of amendments permitted to fifty and take thirty for the Democrat caucus and give twenty to the Republican caucus. What the American people learned this past Tuesday in the Governorship races in New Jersey and Virginia is that there is a large portion of American voters that are independants they voted Republican this past Tuesday even though they voted Democrat last November, America learned these voters are fiscally conservative they want their government to be very restrained in spending taxpayer money and they don’t support high taxes. These independent Americans’ voices as well as other groups of Americans’ voices demand that a full amendment process take place on this bill whether one believes the House bill will cost $894 billion over ten years or $1.2 trillion, the financial stakes demand such an amendment process.

This House bill presents so many legitimate issues on government spending and whether or not it is appropriate it is mind boggling. This bill sets up an external government review process for denied medical claims from insurance companies this will create a needless expensive government bureaucracy - America has a court system. The bill sets up a government run health insurance exchange which unless a person is buying an individual health insurance plan that is a grandfathered plan a person has to buy through the exchange meaning a lot of Americans are going to be buying through the exchange; the real kicker is that this bill will create an enormous and expensive government bureaucracy to act as administration informing and signing-up people for exchange offered health insurance; why not scrap a large portion of this bureaucracy and just have the government exchange certify the private insurance companies health insurance plans as exchange qualified and let the private insurance companies inform and sign-up people for the exchange certified plans thus having the private insurance companies absorb this cost. This bill sets mandates on insurance companies for the health insurance plans they offer that act as consumer protections, why doesn’t Congress phase in some of these mandates over eight to ten years, like the out of pocket limits and the no cost sharing for preventive care, because these mandates are going to jack-up health insurance premiums –if it is phased in that will give Congress another chance to do another health care reform bill that focuses on cost cutting like tort reform and changing the system so American consumers don’t pay more than other consumers in developed countries throughout the world for pharmaceuticals and medical technology.

The “Reinsurance Program For Retirees” to help employer health insurance plans with costs associated with retirees is an unnecessary expense (Fortune 100 companies that make enormous amounts of money will be eligible for this program, Right?) and will be a significant expense running into the billions of dollars over ten years. The “Wellness Grant Program” is an unnecessary expense. This bill provides an abundance of scholarships and loan forgiveness for people seeking or working in health professional fields; America can’t afford this spending right now it is unnecessary spending.

 

[kyzr]

I may be wrong. But IMHO anything that congress does can be un-done via future legislation. Even if the DC clowns pass a god-awful UHC Bill I'm pretty sure that the GOP could run against it, and when they get a majority, kill it. Correct?