House narrowly passes landmark health care bill »

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• BrianBenenhaleyComment removed: Hard Banned1 Reply

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    ybdogsct1 week, 5 days ago

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    BRIANBENENHALEY:
    "Hardly the Bi-Partisan stand taken only a year ago."
    
    Compromise occurs when multiple parties come to a mutual agreement, usually when each party accepts concessions in order to achieve consensus.
    
    What concessions have the Democrats made?
    
    1) Consider that most liberals prefer a single-payer system as the most effective means to provide universal coverage while curbing rising health costs.
    
    In fact, there have been a number of posted threads and circulating emails that show Democratic leaders speaking in favor of a single-payer system. (I believe even Obama has been on video voicing his support.) But conservatives rejected this idea, citing an objection to a "government takeover of health care."
    
    2) Fine.
    
    Democrats compromised with the counter-offer of a public option . Again conservatives rejected the idea, citing skyrocketing increases in the federal deficit. But that's precisely why a single-payer system was introduced first -- to keep costs low and conservatives rejected that plan to control costs! Secondly, the accusation of a "government takeover of health care" never ceased despite the fact that this public OPTION in itself is a compromise to the single-payer system conservatives objected to before on the same grounds. Thirdly, the projected $1 trillion in costs will be distributed over 10 years so it really only adds $140 billion to the annual budget, making it less expensive than funding the war in Iraq. Apparently, conservatives would rather spend money killing people in foreign countries rather than using that money to help Americans here at home.
    
    3) Fine.
    
    Again, Democrats show a willingness to compromise by floating the idea of an optional public option which states could opt-out of if they so chose. Unfortunately, this compromise had the opposite effect -- Reid actually lost the lone Republican (Olympia Snowe R-Maine) who had supported the previous version of the Senate bill in an earlier vote.
    
    http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/health/policy/27...
    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., who is working behind the scenes to ready a health care bill for floor debate this fall, said he will advance legislation that includes a "public option" but will give individual states a choice to opt out of the program.
    
    But Mr. Reid lost the one Republican who had given Democratic efforts a tinge of bipartisanship, Senator Olympia J. Snowe of Maine. She has proposed a different approach, in which a government plan would become available only if states did not make progress in reducing insurance premiums and covering more of their residents.
    
    “I am deeply disappointed with the majority leader’s decision to include a public option as the focus of the legislation,” Ms. Snowe said. “I still believe that a fallback, safety-net plan, to be triggered and available immediately in states where insurance companies fail to offer plans that meet the standards of affordability, could have been the road toward achieving a broader bipartisan consensus in the Senate.”
    
    4) There are a number of committees in which Republicans have been allowed to shape health care legislation, particularly the bipartisan Senate Finance Committee which has been specifically charged with exploring a bipartisan solution. Max Baucus (D-Montana) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) proposed a Senate Finance Committee bill featuring co-op, owned and run by the public instead of by the government. But this idea failed to receive support from Republicans too.
    
    http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21937.ht...
    "The American health care system needs reform. We spend twice as much on health care as do other developed countries. But even with all this spending, our health outcomes are often half as good.
    
    In March, Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus and I joined other members of Congress and the president at a White House forum on health care. That day, Baucus and I announced an ambitious schedule for developing a bipartisan health reform proposal." -- Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa)
    
    http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124753237840035999...
    Democrats now have a supermajority in the Senate. But their top priority, a health-care overhaul, may well need the blessing of a veteran Republican, Iowa's Chuck Grassley, if it has any hope of becoming law.
    
    Key Democrats are seeking the Republican's sign-off on which taxes might be raised to pay for covering the uninsured. In closed-door negotiations, a bipartisan group that includes Mr. Grassley is pondering proposed levies on pharmaceutical companies and insurers.
    
    Because the Iowan opposes creating a government plan to compete with private insurers, Democrats are running by him compromise approaches to expanding coverage. He is open to the creation of a nonprofit cooperative that would compete with private insurers.
    
    The White House and top Democrats think a bipartisan bill would give the public added confidence in the legislation, which partly explains Mr. Grassley's clout. "It's more durable...more lasting," Mr. Baucus says of legislation that attracts bipartisan support.
    
    5) Additionally, Republican claims that this legislation has been rushed to a vote are unfounded. There have been a number of town hall meetings and Congressional hearings during which Republicans have been allowed to voice their opinions.
    
    http://www.californiachronicle.com/articles/view/1...
    Since 2007, the House Democrats have held 100 health reform-related hearings. Furthermore, the Democratic Congress has kept its promise to provide an unprecedented amount of transparency and respect for the legislative process, providing Members and stakeholders the ability to weigh in, ask questions and offer constructive ideas.
    
    In the 111th Congress, the Committees responsible for drafting legislation, Ways and Means, Energy and Commerce, and Education and Labor have:
    
    >> Spent nearly 100 hours in hearings on health reform.
    
    >> Heard from 181 witnesses (both Democratic and Republican).
    
    >> Spent 83 hours in Committee markups.
    
    >> Considered a total of 239 amendments; approved 121.
    
    Since the spring of this year, House Democrats have held 3,000 health care town halls and public events in their districts, giving Members the opportunity to hear directly from their constituents and discuss the impact that health reform will have on their communities. Tens of thousands of e-mails, calls, and letters have been logged in Congressional offices to also register public comment.
    
    Materials publicly available:
    
    >> Draft bill was available online for 25 days before H.R. 3200 was introduced.
    
    >> H.R. 3200 was posted online for 30 days before the first Committee markup.
    
    >> H.R. 3200 was posted online for 107 days before introducing the merged bill.
    
    >> Text of the reintroduced bill, H.R. 3962 was posted on October 29, 2009.
    
    >> The Democratic leadership is making the Manager´s Amendment (introduced November 3, 2009) available for a full 72 hours before a Floor vote.
    
    This leads me to think that there are many conservatives out there who are simply incapable of compromising, as evidenced by 6 years of GW Bush rule without a single veto. Here are Democrats willing to compromise with Republicans, despite a veto-proof majority. And yet Republicans showed no willingness to reciprocate when they held the White House, Senate, and House from 2001 to 2006.
    
    Contrast the multiple Democratic compromises with the manner in which Republicans ran the government from 2001-2006, as illustrated in the examples below.
    
    REPUBLICANS REFUSING DEMOCRATIC INPUT ON MEDICARE & ENERGY BILLS
    http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/10...
    On two of the most critical bills this Congress has considered -- the Medicare and energy bills -- Republican committee members met in private, refusing to allow entry to Democrats by claiming that the meetings were not official conference sessions.
    
    While Republican leaders claimed to obey congressional rules by allowing Democrats to attend the opening and closing sessions, the actual writing of the bills was done in secret and exclusively by Republicans; in some cases, Democrats didn't even know in which room their committee colleagues were holed up writing the bill. Democrats were not permitted entry into the closed-door talks to write the complicated bill.
    
    EXCLUSION OF DEMOCRATS FROM BUDGET RESOLUTIONS, TAX CUTS, TRADE, MEDICARE, FAMILY PLANNING AND MOST MAJOR BILLS
    http://www.spa.american.edu/ccps/getpdf.php?table=...
    Bush chose to govern from the 'right-in' rather than the 'center-out.' This pattern held on budget resolutions, tax cuts, energy, Medicare prescription drugs, family planning and abortion, trade, and most other major bills. This tended to leave Democrats out of the equation and to put great pressure on Republican moderates to acquiesce in positions formulated by the conservative 'majority within the majority.'
    
    The exclusion of Democrats from conference committees reached a new high in 2003, facilitated by unified Republican control of the House, Senate, and Presidency. The extraordinary lengths to which the Republicans went to win roll-call votes represented a further shutting out of Democrats, for the idea was to win with as little bipartisan accommodation as possible.
    
    "The Republicans had better hope that the Democrats never regain the majority," Sen. John McCain warned in late 2003.
    
    ILLEGAL EXCLUSION OF DEMOCRATS AND PUBLIC INTEREST GROUPS FROM CHENEY'S ENERGY MEETINGS
    http://www.thenation.com/doc/20020415/nichols
    Vice President Dick Cheney cleared his calendar for an April 17 private meeting with Lay regarding what aides described as 'energy policy matters' and 'the energy crisis in California.' Cheney and his aides met at least six times with Lay and other Enron officials while preparing the National Energy Policy Development Group's report, which is the basis for the Administration's energy policy proposals. When Cheney and Lay met in April 2001, Lay handed Cheney a three-page "wish list" of corporate recommendations.
    
    Under the Federal Advisory Committee Act of 1972, task forces like Cheney's must conduct public meetings, must allow interested parties to attend and must keep publicly available records. But arguing "executive privilege," Cheney, his aides and Cabinet departments have refused requests for records, despite legal challenges from the General Accounting Office and private groups.
    
    When oil execs were questioned about the existence of this PRIVATE meeting, they LIED about it before Congress with the help of Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), who refused to swear them under oath:
    
    CHAIRMAN TED STEVENS: The question whether Senator Domenici and I should administer oaths to these witnesses. I shall not administer an oath today.
    
    CANTWELL: Mr. Chairman, I did send you a letter cosigned by eight of my colleagues asking that the witnesses be sworn in. This rare joint hearing--
    
    STEVENS: I did not yield to make a statement.
    BOXER: Mr. Chairman, I would like the committee to vote on whether we swear--
    
    STEVENS: There will be no vote. It is not in order at all.
    
    BOXER: Mr. Chairman, I move that we swear in the witnesses.
    
    STEVENS: And I rule that out of order.
    
    CANTWELL: I second the motion.
    
    STEVENS: Thank you very much. That is the last we are going to hear about that because it is out of order.
    
    BILL THOMAS (R-CA) TEARFULLY CONFESSES TO PLOT TO EXCLUDE DEMOCRATS FROM LEGISLATIVE PROCESS
    http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0...
    Bill Thomas (R-CA) broke down in tears on the House floor today as he confessed to a hushed assemblage that he summoned the Capitol police to break up a meeting of Democrats. Late in the evening of July 17, Republican committee staffers substantially rewrote the Portman-Cardin bill and Thomas introduced the new 90-page bill as a substitute the next day, demanding a vote before any congressmen of either party had a chance to read it. The legislation is both complex and controversial. The Democrats objected and adjourned to a nearby library to review their options, leaving behind a single member, Pete Stark of California, to delay action by the committee by exercising his prerogative to have the bill read line-by-line. Thomas summoned the Capitol police to eject the Democrats from their impromptu meeting room, claiming they were engaging in disorderly conduct.
    
    So please, before you lump the Democrats in with the Republicans with a blanket-accusation of hyper-partisanship, exercise a little perspective, and study the differences between how Republicans ran the government from 2001-2006 and how Democrats are running it today.

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  b-happy1 week, 5 days ago

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  Funny how they call it a victory when we haven't seen if this new legislation is going to work or not. I guess when you don't have very much to ride on then anything is a victory.
  
  Besides that, when you are completely in charge in the house and presidency then it is hardly a victory since they would have voted for it in the first place.
  
  I love the part about how having no bill is worse than having something. Really? So theorectically it could get worse because of this bill and that is better than keeping it how it is?
  
  The double speak and lies are astounding especially coming from the "Messiah".

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