"The greatest and richest nation the world has ever known," said Senator Harry Reid on the floor this morning, will now see an end of the dominance of the "greedy insurance companies."
"This is just the beginning," Reid said. "The opponents of this bill have used every trick in the book to delay this day." (It was, by then, 7:03 a.m., and the vote was already itself just a bit delayed.) "It is regrettable that they choose to view our citizen's healthcare through a political lens," he said.
Then at 7:05 the roll was called. Senator Byrd coughed up that his "aye" vote was for Teddy Kennedy. Also, one was unable to tell from C-Span 2 exactly why the Senate cracked up for like 30 seconds when Reid voted, and no one was awake on the Internet to explain.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was, quite obviously, passed. You may go read it now, if you like.
Per CNN, Reid inadvertantly, or mistakenly, or jokingly, initially cast a "No" vote for the bill. My presumption is that this arduous process has caused him to lose his mind, which, thanks to the language of the bill, is now covered for up to 80% after deductible.
"This is just the beginning." - It certainly better be.
but...
"an end of the dominance of the 'greedy insurance companies.'" - Absolutely fucking not even close. In fact, the opposite on some ways.
This is a victory and better than nothing. It is real progress. But let's not get too carried away in what a great victory this is. If anything we should be humbled by how uch was sacrificed unnecessarily.
Can you speak to the 'opposite, some ways' re: dominance? I, by no means, think that there is any end in sight, especially if there is no competing option, but is it actually working backwards?
It certainly could. Anyway, how can it end the dominance of greedy insurance companies if the mandates for healthcare (and the billions of tax dollars that will subsidize said care) will go to private insurers.
As for the rules on preventing insurers from denying care.., Not sure how this will be enforced but some of these laws ALREADY EXIST and they are poorly enforced. So, unless they are going to put a boatload of money toward enforcement, well, they get to say they made it illegal (which it already was) without having to spend more money to make sure the law is followed. They say they are going to limit profits by assuring at least 80 cents or whatever per dollar is spent on care but who knows how that will be enforced and just seems juicy for creative accounting on the Insurance side.
As far as I ca tell, there doesn't seem to be a very good cap on rates climbing. Sure, the insurance co. will have to insure some guy with a pacemaker and diabetes and AIDS and an inability to get a boner, but at what rate? $12,000 a month? More?
Zero controls on de-facto monopolies by co.s in many states.
Anyway, I;m not sure if this will make heath insurance companies wildly more dominant. But by putting all our egs in the "private insurance" basket we continue down a road of entrenchment of private (profit focused) businesses. And when private businesses don;t find something proftable anymore they don;t do it so as America gets sicker and sicker and older and more expensive, they will find ways to profit and because the Democratic politicians now take as much insurance co. contributions as the GOP it's impossible to believe they won't have help with that profiting thing.
Ok, I suppose we are on the same page. I live currently in Massachusetts, and everything keeps coming back to a parallel to Mass Health. The mandate only seemed to add insult to injury as, in my experience, the people who go without aren't gaming but actually can't afford it. Some people choose to pay the fine, which is per month uninsured, because it is less expensive than coverage.
I guess when you think about it, they can't become more or less dominant because they are the system. They will gain more customers and grow larger if there is a mandate, and surely more profitable. I am sure they wouldn't allow for anything else.
I am surprised there is not more outcry against the mandate since the public option has likely been killed from liberal dems, although perhaps I just missed that coverage.
I do think there are very positive aspects of this bill, but don't think anything will change in a tangible way for people unless insurance companies, doctors, manufacturers, and drug companies agree to make, or are made to make, less money. Yeah, no.
I had a bet gping with somebody in this site that public options would not survive. WAS THAT YOU!?!??! I"M WIN (except that we all lose)!
Anyway. Yes. The insurance co. thing is like the military industrial complex. It's self-reinforcing. I would say, re: your statement about profits for that list of players. It's not the profits it's the incentives. Nobody wants o keep anyone from profiting in a market system. And I know A LOT of doctors and almost all of them, while making really good money, would change the system in a second.
I only wish that I lacked enough cynicism to make that bet!
I agree about the incentives, and would have to know more about what aspects of the system the doctors you know would change (and how that would relate to profits) to directly opine ... but I do think that the culture of doctors can be very localized, based on the educational institution, hospital of employment, etc. Actually, I would be very interested in the sociological aspect of that .. I work in a very expensive (even comparatively) medical school, where students are taking out 200K for only the (shorter) dental program. In spite of being in a very "liberal" area, people I have spoken to are very concerned about a restructuring of the payment/profit system, and wary of reform.
If there is any one center of power in this country, it's the insurance industry. They control pretty much everything.
Like that's going to change.
--Plaintiff's Attorney
Used to be. Not any more. These guys pay the bills that pay me.
a-HA!
Objection overruled!
I'm a (damn socialist) Canadian with (sometimes mediocre) socialized medicine. And yet I still want to say I am so happy for you guys. And this is Ted Kennedy's Christmas gift from beyond the grave.
When you phrase it like that, it sounds kind of horrifying. Like it's the Kennedy version of the Monkey's Paw. "grrrr...mooooan...helathcare...mmm...brainsss"
Canadian? What? According these commercials running HEAVILY right now
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cahvnCBVXXU
yu are all going to die b/c your care sucks.
@LM: Sorry for bad phrasing.
@AS: Those ads are heavily partisan; they picked some disgruntled woman from Alberta--our version of Texas. By and large Canadian healthcare works.
Let me tell you, she is not very popular in Canada.
Although, when socialized medicine was introduced in Canada - in Saskatchewan - well, not "introduced" but rammed through by the premier - there were demonstrations in front of the Legislature. The doctors went on strike, and people blamed the government for making a Really Bad Decision. Everyone was angry!
Yes! By this guy, who was Kiefer Sutherland's grandfather, foreals!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Douglas
@The canawelshperson
I know, and now you can change the 10 commandments sooner than change the health care act.
Don't be fooled by disgruntled albertans. They are an oil fueled, righteous, right wing bunch. They are as representative of Canadians as Ronbo is of Americans.
Speaking of which did we scare him off?
@Mindpowered: If only.
He celebrated Boxing Day by leaving a message on the Guantanamo post that may be his most unhinged and violent yet.
(I say 'may' because I generally skip over anything that appears under his name.)
I did a search on the bill, and no hits for "public option." THERE'S NO PUBLIC OPTION!!! When did that happen?!?!!?! The world is over!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, hope it covers a reasonable % of my hangover.
We still need to see what sort of Frankenstein camel comes out of conference before we can start singing that 'How A Bill Becomes A Law' song.
Quite so. But according to Politico, Obama is going to "roll up his sleeves" and jump in!
Well we know that he secretly want a really awful bill, so he has to act NOW.
Also, he has subject-verb agreement issues.
When can we start shanking?
How is cutting Medicaid and Medicare as part of the way to fund this a good thing? Take from one group of people without many resources and give to other people without many resources-- why isn't controlling what insurance companies can make off people's misery the first option? I know there are a lot of 'seniors' who have money, but there are also a lot living on tiny fixed incomes, juggling paying for medicine --even with the drug benefit which doesn't cover quite a few medications--with eating. Doesn't make sense.