Early Word on the Senate Health Care Bill

The DLC Democrats will have to make up new excuses why they are doing the bidding of their corporate masters.

Hmph ! Time travel on that post, KT. I knew you were good, but…

Alas, whatever I was thinking about enterting as I logged in was wiped out when the radio came up with Lieberman lying pontificating about something.

Karen, do you agree that Republicans who have sworn up and down that the CBO needed time to “score the bill” pretty much have to accept these numbers?

§ Cuts the budget deficit by $127 billion (over 10 years) – going further than any other bill

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HOW?, and don’t give me the bull-crap they are going to cut Medicare or find money in fraud and abuse. It simply is nothing but a LIE
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§ Cuts the budget deficit by as much as $650 billion in the second decade

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HOW?, and don’t give me the bull-crap that by passing this bill we will see our health care insurance go down. ALL other studies show a dramatic INCREASE in health care insurance costs to those who have insurance now.
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§ Achieves almost a trillion dollars in cost savings

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This is nothing but one big fat LIE from our Democrats in Congress. LIES LIES and MORE LIES!!

KT:
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Wow, I can’t wait to find out more about this!
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Your source mentions:

§ Achieves almost a trillion dollars in cost savings

…that would be incredible!
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Just think…saving almost a trillion dollars a year in costs would put us in line with what every other developed country in the world pays for health care! Americans wouldn’t pay over twice the cost for mediocre health care anymore!
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I mean…that’s impressive!
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Look what the US Dept of Health and Human Services says about the exorbitant price of health care in the US (link to HHS report telling us we’re going bankrupt over health care prices ):

Health spending in the United States grew 6.1 percent in 2007, to $2.2 trillion or $7,421 per person.
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health spending share of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) continued to climb, reaching 16.2 percent in 2007, up by 0.2 percentage point from 2006.

If we were to save on American health care spending by almost a trillion dollars per year, that would be…well, miraculous, given that there’s nothing I can see in the current legislation that even attempts to set prices for health care!
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What fantastic news, KT!
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So…how do they do it?
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How do they manage to save almost half of our country’s 2.2 trillion dollars per year health care spending?!?!?
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Your source did mean “Achieves almost a trillion dollars in cost savings” per year, correct?
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I mean, if they meant savings over, like 10 or 20 years, that would be a sad, sad joke of an obvious sales pitch to savvy journos like you…right, KT?
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…Right, KT?

Umm…riiiiiight.

SZ and Rusty: CBO scores over 10 years. I will be most interested to see how they get to that number.

@Karen: not trying to trap you it’s just that… the opponents of the bill have been constantly stalling for the CBO score, perhaps in the hopes that it would turn out badly for bill supporters. But it hasn’t. And now a bunch of those people will attack the CB) and when that happens it’d be neat if the people reporting on it would point things out like this:

“The CBO numbers are just way off,” said Senator Whathisname, who previously said that we should “not rush this bill in order to give the CBO time to do its job.”

rusty, you seem angry.
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The Senate Republicans have always said that the CBO can be trusted.
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You better get on the horn with your GOP senators, pronto.
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Sounds like you and they trust the CBO… Until you don’t.

KT

CBO scores over 10 years

Umm…”10 years”?
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But that’s…wait a second, here:
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10 years times $2.2 trillion a year (assuming for the sake of simple math that the cost doesn’t go up over ten years, har-dee-har!)…that makes…
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$22 trillion in US health care spending over 10 years.
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“almost a trillion dollars in cost savings” out of $22 trillion?
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They call that an achievement? That’s like a savings of 4%. That won’t keep Medicare out of bankruptcy!
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If “Health spending in the United States grew 6.1 percent in 2007″ as HHS reports, and the whole amount saved by this reform package is only 4 percent, then we’re still in the red.
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Your source claims:

“These findings will please all members of our caucus who have made fiscal discipline a priority in this debate as well as all members of our caucus who have made affordable care a priority”

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, but how would these findings please either group?
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If fiscal discipline is the issue, we’re still in the red. If affordable care is the issue, we’re still up around $7500 per person a year. Who would be “pleased” by that?
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Is this person essentially just a shameless sales clerk for a policy that fails to extract health care in the US from its costly morass, KT, or do they really not know what they’re saying?

can someone get stuart a “how to add and subtract” book for dummies? please? maybe a calculator while you’re at it too. thanks!

reid’s folks are promising a briefing by conference call tonight. i will post as soon as i get it.

1) 10 years times $2.2 trillion a year = $22 trillion
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2) 22 trillion dollars minus “almost a trillion dollars” = 21 trillion dollars
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Help me out, professor…how is that mistaken?
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Believe me, I’d love to be wrong…

OT but related – Does the DHHS response to the US Preventive Services Task Force recommendation regarding mammogram testing (http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/11/18/mammogram.guidelines/index.html) foreshadow any of the challenges which the government may have in actually “bending the cost curve” for health care?
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We have a federally authorized scientific panel (the “gold standard” according to the DHHS webpage)making a recommendation to reduce the utilization of a diagnostic service (and thereby reduce health care expenditures) and the political leaders and cancer lobbies cry “No!, we still want that benefit!”
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I understand that this issue is politically charged, but wouldn’t it be better in the long run to acknowledge that hard choices will need to be made and that health care benefits under health care reform will need to follow the science, even if politically unpopular?

Of course, the CBO mandate is only to score the impact on the federal fiscal position. And to ignore all of the silly games that the Dems play like taxing right away so they score 10 years of revenue and starting the coverage in 2013 so they only have 7 years of expenses. And counting as savings all that they say they will save, which is all pie in the sky and will turn out to be increased spending for 1% kickbacked in campaign contributions. And shifting billions in Medicaid to the states’ expenditures.
Other than that, the CBO analysis is right on. What a fiscally prudent piece of work, Senator Reid.
Expect quite a ruckus from the Republican Governors Association. I don’t know what the Democartic Governors plan to do publicly but they won’t be governors after the next election, continuing a recent trend.

The expert panel, science based, correctly weighs the benefits and the costs to the patient, ignoring economic considerations.
For the small benefits of possibly discovering a malignant tumor at an early stage, the costs are exposure to radiation and false positives, resulting in further unnecessary testing and considerable anxiety for the patient.
And the politicians immediately bailed and ignored the scientific experts.
This is not an issue for the Sec of Health; this is an issue between a patient and her physician, said physician relying on the best available scientific evidence. Ignore the Sec of Health – she is simply pandering to the vast majority that have less than zero understanding of science.
Less than zero knowledge arises in that a person knows nothing and the little that they think they know is incorrect.

It is not really a “hard choice.” The facts and evidence demonstrate that these mammograms and even self-exams do not reduce breast cancer deaths at all. If people were sane, rational creatures then they should be capable of wrapping their heads around the idea that “better safe than sorry” does not work in this (and probably other) instances.
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I will admit I had difficulty grokking the assertion at first. After all, it’s not like self-exams could possibly cause cancer, right? But that line of thinking misses the point, which is: self-exams don’t show a corresponding increase in survival. These early mammograms and government subsidies to show breast exam films in high school all amount to snake oil and placebos. Expensive placebos.

“Expect quite a ruckus from the Republican Governors Association.”

oh sure steve, that will scare uhm….no one. a ruckus? wow. had me spooked. lol

If mammograms cost more in the United States than every other OECD nation, then why shouldn’t the government regulate the price of mammograms downward, as it does with Medicare reimbursement rates, but for the entire population?

“Expect quite a ruckus from the Republican Governors”
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Did you ever notice how “ruckus” rhymes with …..?
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Which is something Republicans are also very good at doing.

” .. self-exams don’t show a corresponding increase in survival. These early mammograms and government subsidies to show breast exam films in high school all amount to snake oil and placebos. Expensive placebos. “

If you are going to die in two years time, then it doesn’t matter whether you find out about it now or one year from now? [Is it more neighbourly to be less of a burden to the insurance companies by spend a few more days oblivious of the impending doom?]

My understanding is that the earlier the tumours are detected then the more effective the regimen of treatments (in postponing the eventual rendezvous with the Grim Reaper.)

” .. Extends guaranteed coverage to more than 94% of Americans ..”

Mission NOT accomplished!

Wish we could pass a regulation that lawmakers will get insured only after all (100% of) the citizens – the we the people – get insured.
Who really wants to be among the 6% left out among the nasty viruses and wide-awake bacteria?

I would cut money to belligerent Israel and cut defence spending to cover that 6% of “we, the people”. After, it was said (probably outdated) that we spend more on “defence” than the combined spending by the next 3 top militarized spenders – whose citizens have better coverage!

The supporters of the Stupak amendment are at best misled and misunderstanding, and at worst misleading the rest of us.
The claim is that Stupak represents the status quo. The status quo is the Hyde amendment which has been the law for 50 years, which legislates that there will be no FEDERAL funds used for abortions (except in cases of rape, incest or danger to life of the mother). Period.
The Stupak amendment uses the provision of federal subsidies for insurance, that would enable low income women to be able to purchase health insurance to deny those women access to insurance that covers abortion even if they are paying for the insurance themselves.
This is NOT status quo – this is expansion of restriction of access to safe legal abortions.

Stuartzechman,
You fact ignorant Republican.
I don’t see anywhere that KT claimed a trillion dollars in savings PER YEAR as you claim. The article clearly voices a savings of one trillion dollars. Honestly. Get hooked on phonics before you attempt at touting yourself as an expert on economics.

That thunderous, rustling sound you are now hearing in the background is the sound of Republicons scrambling over each other to invent new lies about why they are continuing to say no to any health care bill. Not to worry, even though some of the best lies have already been used — death panels, government takeovers, higher taxes, rationing, unfair competition, increased premiums, second rate service, socialism, costs too much, et al, they will find new ones. Their real reasons of course have to do with the 2010 elections. If they can foul up the Democrats, the Democrats look bad; thus the Republicons pick up seats from the fallout.

I’m particularly looking forward to new justifications from Senator Lieberman [“Insurance Boy”]. One of the most fecund prevaricators in the history of the sport, he has now surpassed even the late and often lamented [compared to Dumbya] Richard Nixon [pbuh] in the originality of his inventions and has nearly perfected the craft of smiling out of all sides of his mouth at the same time.

[...] the original post: Early Word on the Senate Health Care Bill – Swampland – TIME.com Uncategorized a-pretty-favorable, bill, budget-office-, floor-has, from-the, [...]

Hahahaha, the troll immediately confirmed KT’s sarcasm.

While I am sure we are all Pleased, I just do not know why. I still do not know what is covered, what the Co-Pay is and what the premiums are.

Get me the facts in simple English, If I pay this I get this. I’ll leave the legal terms to the lawyers. Still don’t have the facts from the houise bill. How do they expect to sell it?

[...] Karen Tumulty at Swampland at Time [...]

“The Senate Republicans have always said that the CBO can be trusted.”

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Yes this would be perhaps true, but ever since Obambi called Elmendorf into the Oval Office early in the year, we have seen not a fair and impartial CBO, but one that is controlled by the Democrats.
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All the arm twisting and out and out LIES that they are all now required to tell in order for it to “look good”.
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Just like the supposed, “Job Numbers” from the stimulus. It is all LIES. So much for transparency. The only transparent thing I can see is a bunch of Democrats with a Democrat President who are lying yet again to the People.
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And to my little friend pafro. Please have the driver of the short yellow bus you ride in everyday, put your muzzle back on. The stupidity which exudes from you on a regular basis is nothing but a TROLL extraordinaire.

You’re too stupid to be scared, but your dem reps are in a real tizzy. Faced with the choice of serving the people(finally) or losing their jobs come 2010. This was supposed to be so easy. Y’all took Washington by storm. Senate, house, presidency, the whole enchilada. “wow, here’s our chance to put all our liberal hippie commie policies in place, our day has finally come”. “Never let a crisis go to waste” our good buddie Rahm “dead fish” Emanuel said.

What have they done, my dear lib friends? Nothing, except awaken “we the people”. Pelosi and friends have done everything in their power to minimize, and degrade us with the help of the MSM, but check the ratings. No ones watching. You’re sitting back laughing and calling us playground names, but they’re watching, and the’re very afraid. I say keep it up. You’re playing right into our hands.

And it’s working. haha

[...] Early Word on the Senate Health Care Bill – Swampland – TIME.com [...]

With a rate of 15.3% of Americans still without insurance that is a very solid signifier that the system has not improved in 15 years. This bill needs to contain a public option and it needs balance. There is no reason that big business should get any special treatment and small business bear any great burden.
Our nation needs a change but many are afraid, be it personal investment at stake or simply fear of something different, to look at possibilities outside of what they already know works “just well enough.” Just well enough however, isn’t good enough for everyone. Not at a time when we are slipping down the world charts. There was an article I found written by several doctors and medical professionals and in the article there was a statistic that the World Health Organization has ranked the US as the 37th best country in health care, ( http://www.ourblook.com/component/option,com_sectionex/Itemid,200076/id,8/view,category/#catid107 ) this is very unacceptable considering at this point in time.