If Democrats ignore health-care polls, midterms will be costly

[Oldandtired]

I am personally against the bill as I understand it...but I am also against pre-exisiting clauses....and I am also against a mandate to own insurance....

So all that being said, a government plan may be the only answer...and only the most naive should think that Obama is not aware of this...especially with all of his advisors around him.

 

[Murf76]

Not passing costs them Democratic votes for failing to accomplish what they had promised.

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

See the link above for all the new bureacracies which affect nearly every aspect of healthcare. In addition, if Obama's "price control" measures are worked into the reconciliation bill... the federal government will be dictating to private insurers, who must be covered, what services will be offered, and what the policies will cost. Isn't it just quicker to make a list of what the government is NOT going to be involved in?

Oh... and I love how you folks have nothing whatsoever to say about Obama's broken promises about cleaning up corruption, transparency, and working in a bipartisan manner. And how you didn't notice that it wasn't Obama who insisted on compulsory coverage, it was Hillary. Obamacare today, isn't what Barry said it was going to be during the campaign.

 

[driveby]

Not passing costs them Democratic votes for failing to accomplish what they had promised.

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

It will drive insurance companies out of business and once they're out of business, guess who steps in ? Which was the intent all along .....

 

[Oldandtired]

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Interesting...after I answered the question with this post, the left disappeared.

Alas...logic scares off the best of them.

 

[The Rabbi]

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Interesting...after I answered the question with this post, the left disappeared.

Alas...logic scares off the best of them.

It's like the "death panels" thing. It doesn't actually say in the bill anything about death panels. But logically if you set unlimited demand on top of limited supply then you have to ration the limited supply some way. Currently we do it with the market. But with gov't outlawing that there will be no other way to do it than have a bureaucrat decide what is worthy to spend money on, what isn't. And that basically is a death panel.

If I tell you I'm going to drop a rock over my foot I don't have to say it's going to hit it. It is implicit in the original statement. Pretending otherwise is fantasy.

 

[MaggieMae]

"This isn't 1994; it's 2010."

Democrats know they're going to take a midterm hit. I think they even understand that "comprehensive healthcare" is a loser either way they go. What they haven't figured out.... is that Barack Obama is no Bill Clinton.

They think they'll come back in 2012. They won't.

Bill Clinton had his success by working with a Republican Congress. He's smarter than Barack. More pragmatic. We didn't call him "Slick Willie" for nothing. Bill knew how to 'live to fight another day'. Bill had nearly 12 years of executive experience of compromising with a legislative body.

Barry, on the other hand, has no compromise or bipartisanship in him. He's got no experience to draw on. He's a hopeless ideologue who has made extravagant promises to his base and is so emotionally insecure that he doesn't understand that it's the MIDDLE he needs to be worrying about.

Both these men are narcissistic in their tendencies, but Bill had self-confidence which reflected in his actions. Both are partisan, but Bill understood that executive leadership doesn't lend itself to uncompromising partisan policy, that in order to get a win, he had to let the other guy win too.

This is NOT 1994.. and these House Democrats who are sacrificing themselves for "The Cause", are going to have done it for NOTHING.

Of course you forget that Barack Obama has no Newt Gingrich to work with either. Find me one Republican who isn't afraid to compromise. Lindsey Graham comes closest, yet he's immediately labeled a RHINO and thus has to worry about his own chances of reelection. When it's this bad, there IS no compromise, period. Obama recognizes that.

Maggie, Obama could have walked out of that "Healthcare Summit" with the outline of a new bill in hand. All he had to do was drop the attitude and start fresh.

Bottom line, there ARE a few things that both sides agree on. But starting with those wouldn't get the Big Insurance companies all the young, warm bodies they were promised, would it?

You make no sense. If the health care industry were so eager to have Obamacare installed, then why have their armies of lobbyists spent $6 million to lobby AGAINST it?

As for Obama's "attitude," when he invited bipartisanship way last February, he had no sooner announced that he thought it was a real possibility than Boehner and Grassley started grandstanding on nationwide television grumbling about it. Any attitude adjustment needs to be on the right side of the aisle.

 

[MaggieMae]

Doesn't matter what he says, no congress can create binding legislation, its unconstitutional.

WHOT? Once a bill is signed, it becomes an Act and until challenged before the USSC is binding legislation.

Wrong, any house and senate can change any law that is not part of the constitution by the normal procedure, which is a house and senate vote pass followed by a POTUS signature.


Its astounding how many of you don't understand basic civics of your own country.

The legislative body cannot just "change" an enacted bill just because they THINK it violates some constitutional provision. They can bring a resolution to the floor to overturn an existing bill, but that process would need to go through the same cycle as any other bill.

 

[MaggieMae]

Not passing costs them Democratic votes for failing to accomplish what they had promised.

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

For one thing, the bill is hardly a "takeover of our entire healthcare industry" (straight from the mouth of John Boehner...). A single-payer plan, or "public option" would be a takeover of health care, but neither are in the bill and won't be. Private insurance companies will remain free to screw you next year just like they do this year!

 

[driveby]

Of course you forget that Barack Obama has no Newt Gingrich to work with either. Find me one Republican who isn't afraid to compromise. Lindsey Graham comes closest, yet he's immediately labeled a RHINO and thus has to worry about his own chances of reelection. When it's this bad, there IS no compromise, period. Obama recognizes that.

Maggie, Obama could have walked out of that "Healthcare Summit" with the outline of a new bill in hand. All he had to do was drop the attitude and start fresh.

Bottom line, there ARE a few things that both sides agree on. But starting with those wouldn't get the Big Insurance companies all the young, warm bodies they were promised, would it?

You make no sense. If the health care industry were so eager to have Obamacare installed, then why have their armies of lobbyists spent $6 million to lobby AGAINST it?

As for Obama's "attitude," when he invited bipartisanship way last February, he had no sooner announced that he thought it was a real possibility than Boehner and Grassley started grandstanding on nationwide television grumbling about it. Any attitude adjustment needs to be on the right side of the aisle.

Of course they're not eager to have Obamacare installed, it will put them out of business........

 

[Murf76]

You make no sense. If the health care industry were so eager to have Obamacare installed, then why have their armies of lobbyists spent $6 million to lobby AGAINST it?

As for Obama's "attitude," when he invited bipartisanship way last February, he had no sooner announced that he thought it was a real possibility than Boehner and Grassley started grandstanding on nationwide television grumbling about it. Any attitude adjustment needs to be on the right side of the aisle.

Weird how for the first time since 1990, they're giving more in campaign contributions to Democrats than Republicans...
Insurance: Long-Term Contribution Trends | OpenSecrets

Even weirder that we've barely heard a squeak from them with the exception being when they found out that the fine on the individual mandate wasn't going to be high enough to force young people into the insurance pools.

You understand, don't you, that these companies would not simply end up under the government's thumb... they'd end up under its wing? Protected. Like Fannie and Freddie were protected. Too big to fail.

 

[Murf76]

Of course they're not eager to have Obamacare installed, it will put them out of business........

In the long run.. yes. It will. Right now though, they're a fox giving a scorpion a ride across the river, trusting its promise that they won't get stung.

 

[rightwinger]

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Absolute nonsense. The pre-existing condition clause allows insurance companies to deny insurance to those who need it most. Insurance companies will not go out of business. There is no government plan to be forced into, but there should be

 

[MaggieMae]

Doesn't matter what he says, no congress can create binding legislation, its unconstitutional.

WHOT? Once a bill is signed, it becomes an Act and until challenged before the USSC is binding legislation.

Huh?
Maggie? You sue you want to keep this post on here?
Are you aware of the process of reconciliation?
Changes can be made AFTER the POTUS signs it into law.

"Changes" will still go through the lengthy debate process. The original comment that I was refuting I believe referred to the incorrect statement that the entire bill could be overturned by Congress. Has that ever been done? Where was the legal precedent? If it has, and there is one, I will admit that I'm wrong.

But I'm recalling in 1996 Congress passed and Clinton signed, the Line Item Veto Act. The newly enacted law was challenged by members of Congress who disagreed with it, and a year or so later the Supreme Court declared that the line-item veto was unconstitutional.

So, based on that recollection, a bill as enacted must by some clause therein be proven unconstitutional in order for it to be reversed. If an enacted bill is only valid until someone successfully, finally, argues against it and then has the power to remove it, then why even bother with the grueling process to begin with?

 

[rightwinger]

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

See the link above for all the new bureacracies which affect nearly every aspect of healthcare. In addition, if Obama's "price control" measures are worked into the reconciliation bill... the federal government will be dictating to private insurers, who must be covered, what services will be offered, and what the policies will cost. Isn't it just quicker to make a list of what the government is NOT going to be involved in?

Oh... and I love how you folks have nothing whatsoever to say about Obama's broken promises about cleaning up corruption, transparency, and working in a bipartisan manner. And how you didn't notice that it wasn't Obama who insisted on compulsory coverage, it was Hillary. Obamacare today, isn't what Barry said it was going to be during the campaign.

Sorry pal....pure propaganda

Not even CLOSE to a "Goverment Takeover"

 

[MaggieMae]

The Democrats have nothing to gain by not passing healthcare reform.

Not passing costs them Democratic votes for failing to accomplish what they had promised.

If they pass it the Republicans can no longer run against the bill. They have to run on a "I want to take back your healthcare" platform

Reconciliation NOW

They pass the bill, then use reconciliation to take some of the less agreeable portions out of it, and they'll be in fairly good shape. Most people won't even be affected in any significant way by the bill.

Agreed. Amendments are common.

 

[The Rabbi]

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Absolute nonsense. The pre-existing condition clause allows insurance companies to deny insurance to those who need it most. Insurance companies will not go out of business. There is no government plan to be forced into, but there should be

Why is "need" a criterion for a business to supply service? You don't take out homeowner's insurance when your house is on fire. No one would write it since the cost is fairly well defined. Insisting on eliminating pre existing conditions is telling insurance companies to write unprofitable policies since people will wait until they get sick to get insurance. Eventually that will drive insurers out of business. Leaving the gov't as the insurer of last resoirt.
Just what has been stated in previous posts.

 

[The Rabbi]

Not passing costs them Democratic votes for failing to accomplish what they had promised.

If they pass it the Republicans can no longer run against the bill. They have to run on a "I want to take back your healthcare" platform

Reconciliation NOW

They pass the bill, then use reconciliation to take some of the less agreeable portions out of it, and they'll be in fairly good shape. Most people won't even be affected in any significant way by the bill.

Agreed. Amendments are common.

The "less agreeable portions" are precisely those put in to buy the votes to get it passed in the first place.

 

[MaggieMae]

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Then why does Boehner support the pre-existing mandate for insurers?

Quality health coverage must exist for every American, regardless of pre-existing health conditions. And every person who likes their current health plan should be able to keep it especially if they switch jobs. Families should not have to wonder if a plan offered by a new employer will meet their specific health needs. What’s more, health coverage should not just focus on making people better – we need to improve lives through effective prevention, wellness and disease management programs while at the same time developing new treatments and cures for life-threatening diseases.

John Boehner - 8th District of Ohio

High risk people would be placed in high risk insurance pools with higher premiums and deductibles. I seriously have no doubt that insurers will figure it out.

 

[rightwinger]

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

Absolute nonsense. The pre-existing condition clause allows insurance companies to deny insurance to those who need it most. Insurance companies will not go out of business. There is no government plan to be forced into, but there should be

Why is "need" a criterion for a business to supply service? You don't take out homeowner's insurance when your house is on fire. No one would write it since the cost is fairly well defined. Insisting on eliminating pre existing conditions is telling insurance companies to write unprofitable policies since people will wait until they get sick to get insurance. Eventually that will drive insurers out of business. Leaving the gov't as the insurer of last resoirt.
Just what has been stated in previous posts.

Hence mandatory coverage

 

[NYcarbineer]

A government takeover of our entire healthcare industry is NOT what Democrats ran on. Obama campaigned for allowing Americans access to the same policies Congress has. It was Hillary who ran on compulsory coverage, not Obama.

These people have missed their supposed "mandate". Obama promised to "change the way Washington does business", to clean up the corruption and the partisanship. Instead, he's given us MORE of everything we already hated about Washington politics.

OK Murph

I'm calling you on it. Show me where the Bill is a "Government Takeover"

Quite simple....

Take out "pre-existing conditions" clauses and not a single insurer will survive. It will be impossible.

And all will be forced into a government plan.

I suggest the congress and the administration call it what it is and explain why....and people may support it.

It is a long term government takeover of healthcare...and for good or bad, it will cost all of us a fortune.

This is directly from the REPUBLICAN healthcare plan summary, from gop.gov

Establishing Universal Access Programs to guarantee access to affordable health care for those with pre-existing conditions. The GOP plan creates Universal Access Programs that expand and reform high-risk pools and reinsurance programs to guarantee that all Americans, regardless of pre-existing conditions or past illnesses, have access to affordable care – while lowering costs for all Americans.

So I guess the Republicans don't want a single insurance company to survive either.

lol, oops.

Don't try to bullshit us, children, lololololol