WASHINGTON -- Senate Democrats last night dropped a key Medicare expansion plan from the proposed health-care bill in a major last-minute concession to save the legislation from going under.
The plan would have allowed people as young as 55 to enroll in Medicare.
The decision to scrap the idea -- which would have considerably expanded health-care coverage, a key promise made by Democrats in last year's elections -- came as President Obama put heavy pressure on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his fellow Democrats to reach a compromise that they could still call "health-care reform."
Health Dems drop Medicare option - NYPOST.com
Let me see if I understand this, with no public option to speak of and no medicare option that leaves a 1900 plus page bill that strips 500 billion from medicare and allows for pre-existing condition and raises premiums 10 to 13% according to the CBO and also places 20 plus billion in unfunded medicaid mandates on the states as well as mandates the purcahse of healthcare insurance. That is a new definition of healthcare reform. If the democrats pass this legislation they may find that many people will be very disappointed and so much so that in their efforts to get this legislative win for President Obama they have sacrificed not only the needs of those that really wanted healthcare reform , but also the political ambitions of many within their own party the President included. I've said it for a while now, that this bill represents nothing of what the democrats set out to accomplish and even though I may not have agreed with the public option they could have claimed it to be reform in some manner, but lacking that is has become what I have suspected and that is nothing but a bill to give a legislative win for the President and nothing more.
The plan would have allowed people as young as 55 to enroll in Medicare.
The decision to scrap the idea -- which would have considerably expanded health-care coverage, a key promise made by Democrats in last year's elections -- came as President Obama put heavy pressure on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and his fellow Democrats to reach a compromise that they could still call "health-care reform."
Health Dems drop Medicare option - NYPOST.com
Let me see if I understand this, with no public option to speak of and no medicare option that leaves a 1900 plus page bill that strips 500 billion from medicare and allows for pre-existing condition and raises premiums 10 to 13% according to the CBO and also places 20 plus billion in unfunded medicaid mandates on the states as well as mandates the purcahse of healthcare insurance. That is a new definition of healthcare reform. If the democrats pass this legislation they may find that many people will be very disappointed and so much so that in their efforts to get this legislative win for President Obama they have sacrificed not only the needs of those that really wanted healthcare reform , but also the political ambitions of many within their own party the President included. I've said it for a while now, that this bill represents nothing of what the democrats set out to accomplish and even though I may not have agreed with the public option they could have claimed it to be reform in some manner, but lacking that is has become what I have suspected and that is nothing but a bill to give a legislative win for the President and nothing more.
