Progressives are sounding the alarm ahead of President Obama’s upcoming speech on deficit reduction and entitlement reform. No one knows exactly what argument Obama will make in response to Paul Ryan’s 2012 budget proposal unveiled last week, but Jonathan Cohn foresees an opening negotiating stance too close to the center for his …
Health Care
Is This Really All About Abortion?
This morning Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid called the networks together and gave them an update on the negotiations (as I type this Reid is starting another press conference in the Senate). He said the issues have narrowed to one: abortion. Reid said House Speaker John Boehner is pushing a rider that would make Title X into block …
The Nitty-Gritty Details of Paul Ryan’s Medicare Plan – CORRECTION
(An earlier version of this post said that Paul Ryan’s plan for post-2022 Medicare spending would be indexed to GDP. In fact, it would be indexed to inflation. The earlier post also implied that Ryan’s plan would spend about $400 less on Medicare over the next ten years due to his premiums support/voucher plan for the program. This is …
Why Mess With Medicare?
Republican Paul Ryan’s budget mark proposes deep cuts to Medicare, the popular government program that funds health care for seniors. Polls show Americans are overwhelmingly against cuts to entitlement programs generally, and Medicare in particular, and Ryan himself admits that he is handing Democrats a potential weapon. So why would …
Paul Ryan and the Politics of Debt
For months, Washington has talked with growing alarm about the storm clouds of debt gathering over America’s fiscal horizon. Last fall, a bipartisan commission offered its plan for solving the debt crisis. But its recommendations went nowhere, and the talk has gone on ad nauseam. Nobody with any real authority, including President Obama, …
The GOP vs. The AARP
There’s a fascinating hearing going on right now on Capitol Hill where the CEO of AARP Barry Rand is testifying before the House Ways and Means subcommittees on Oversight and health. Republicans this week released a report accusing AARP of profiting from health care reform to the tune of $1 billion over a decade at the expense of their …
How the Affordable Care Act Paved the Way for GOP Medicare Reform
Some time in the next few weeks, Paul Ryan, chairman of the House budget committee, is expected to unveil a plan to significantly cut the federal budget for the fiscal year 2012. It will be the centerpiece of a political fight that could eclipse most everything else in Washington.
A linchpin of Ryan’s plan will be a proposal to make …
Health Reform Turns 1. So What?
In case you happened to have avoided seeing the hundreds of articles and press releases announcing the one-year anniversary of the Affordable Care Act/Obamacare: FYI, it’s today.
Both sides of this issue have been working hard over the past week to guide the news narrative around this momentous occasion. See here, here, here, here, …
“Fixing” the Health Reform Law or Sanding it Down?
Reps. Steve King and Michele Bachmann are among those who are really, really, really hoping health reform will be defunded by Congress this year. They’re hoping against hope. The real threat to Democratic health care reform – aside from the court challenges mounted against it – isn’t wholesale defunding. (Democrats in the Senate and …
Obama Defends His Record on Gas Prices, Budget Talks and Libya
President Obama today rejected GOP criticisms that he has not done enough to address the rising price of oil and that his Administration had helped cause the spike by limiting domestic oil and gas production.
“Last year, American oil production reached its highest level since 2003,” Obama told reporters in a wide-ranging press …
Already Angling for Berwick’s Replacement
The New York Times reports today that some members of Congress have offered an early seal of approval to a health care administrator who could succeed Medicare/Medicaid chief Don Berwick. According to the Times, Berwick’s deputy Marliyn Tavenner has emerged as a leading candidate to fill the post before or once Berwick recess appointment …
Things You Might Not Know About the Health Care Lawsuits
1. Yes, a bunch of states have banded together to sue the federal government over the individual mandate in Florida, but in addition, there are more than 20 other Affordable Care Act lawsuits winding their way through the federal court system.
2. The Obama Department of Justice has assigned a team of about a dozen lawyers and …
Health Reform Implementation Continues – For At Least 7 More Days – UPDATE
Roger Vinson, the federal judge in Florida who said in January that the entire Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional, today issued a “clarification” of his earlier ruling. (The Obama Administration had asked the judge to specify what he meant in his original decision – that the law could continue while the issue makes its way through …
