Can Barack Obama's viability as a 2012 presidential candidate, or as 2012 Democratic nominee, survive failure to include a public-plan option part of health care reform?
My moderate Republican-turned-Democrat husband says YES. I'm not so sure, for several reasons.
Health Care Reform Is Neutered Without Public Option
A Medicare-like public plan alternative to plans presently offered by private insurers is the only way to gain some modicum of control over obscenely spiraling insurance premiums costs. As candidate Barack Obama explained:
"The insurance business today is dominated by a small group of large companies that has been gobbling up their rivals. There have been over 400 health care mergers in the last 10 years, and just two companies dominate a full third of the national market.
"These changes were supposed to make the industry more efficient, but instead premiums have skyrocketed by over 87 percent."
Without a public option, private insurers can, and most assuredly will, continue along their greedy way unchecked and unbothered from their goals of profits at any cost to public health.
Dr. Howard Dean accurately observes, "You can't really do health care reform without it."
And economist Robert Reich blogged, "Without a public, Medicare-like option, health care reform is a bandaid for a system in critical condition."
Problem is that Obama made health care reform, with a Medicare-like public plan option, a cornerstone of his campaign. Millions of Americans voted for candidate Obama because of his solemn health care pledges.
(See Obama Campaign Promises: Health Care which was taken verbatim from candidate Obama's campaign website, and which is no longer online.)
The public-plan health care option has become to President Obama what "Read my lips. No new taxes," became to President Geroge H.W. Bush: a litmus test to gauge success or failure.
Bush 1 failed to live up to his pledge, and he was not reelected in 1992. I contend that failure to pass some form of public option may have the same effect on Obama's White House tenure.
Obama Appears Weak Despite Democratic Majority
Democrats hold huge majorities in both House of Congress, yet the Obama team apparently isn't able to muster enough votes for the Democratic president's cornerstone issue, health care reform.
Obama looks weak. He looks superfluous to legislative negotiations. And he looks disregarded and disrespected by Congressional Democrats.
Regardless of the reasons, President Obama does not look like a leader. Obama certainly doesn't look or sound or appear like the bold, fresh, visionary candidate for "change" that we voted for.
Instead, the President looks like a timid, unprepared pol who badly botched the health care reform message, and may blow the historic chance for the U.S to finally achieve a measure of desperately-needed health care parity for Americans.
Timid, moderate pols never get reelected to the White House. Never.
Back to Hillary?
A great deal of good has already been accomplished by the Obama administration, and more good will undoubtedly be done.
But health care reform, with a Medicare-like option, is key to the perceived success of this administration... because, like Bush 1 and his "no new taxes" pledge, this administration made it key.
Candidate Obama promised a lot to our country. Liberals are starting to wonder if Obama over-promised. Or if he didn't really understand what he was promising. And starting to quietly wonder if he was ready for the presidency.
A thread on my Facebook wall last night between two African-American men, a demographic that voted almost unanimously for Mr. Obama, sums up liberal sentiments perfectly:
- Michael Wharton: "If Obama cannot make the public option pass, then he is too pretty and too weak for the position. I didn't fight for him for the great speeches and photos of his fam. I didn't even do it because of the color thing. I thought he was best. But he needs to get that option. Seriously. Or I'm back to Hillary."
- Mark W. Henry: "I am with you Mike. He has to get this done or he has lost my confidence."
(Photo: Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Comments
Ms. White, I continue to believe you are an extremely good voice for human compassion, omnibus common sense/decency, and dignity/ethics, as it should be presented by the liberal side…that is, you’re not a reactionary or emotionalist.
I don’t need a reply or posting of within comment, but just thought I’d pass around how a number of we conservatives are looking back on Obama’s first year-to-date.
Congress.org sent me a link to make commentary on public option healthcare; with said link they also informed me that 79% of their respondents said nobody should care how terrorism suspects are treated, and that another poll said 54% felt that way so screw all else…it definitely is sad when anybody at all whoops up that even law or evidence should trump reactionary instincts. One wonders how those same alleged respondents would feel if, say, police could stop anybody at all and especially them, horsewhip and pistol whip them , then lock them in a dungeon for a long time, all because police only need to say they thought somebody MIGHT be a terrorist…whenever folks get “uppity” over mundane taxation and similar issues, by chance, or a politician “just can’t believe” any worthwhile person even questions them.
No, I can’t endorse anybody’s opinion that whatever’s apparently in rage-venting vogue and could harm the least likely to be a rage causation, is the way to go, in defiance of the Constitution or even sanity. Period. Dumb under Bush, ditto anyone else.
As to healthcare, I can only reiterate my earlier perceptions:
I saw a few PSAs from assorted mainstream USA groups today, apprising me that Good Morning America portrayed all opposition to Obama’s healthcare (really, just more of what Bush started in 2003 with Medicare as jobs and commerce slid) as racism.
Hmmm. Well, neither I nor any other “white folks” I talk with seem at all interested in holding race or any other incidental trait against ANYONE on ANYTHING; we don’t seem to be saying “folks abroad, your governments treat you like cattle, but don’t come to America where you can be truly free and have boundless $$$$, well-built houses that can withstand anything and political opportunities for you and your children…because of your skin color or national origin”.
No, indeed. What we DO seem to be constantly articulating is constant questioning of why, whether under Bush or Obama, the NEED for absolute, total government control of everything in everyone’s life is “necessary”….yes, “people need help!”, but what if anything, WHEN, are we going to do about transcending the causes of NEED for a society mirroring the Soviet and other failed social structures? My kind of person WANTS all reasonable people on earth to get along, and further with their own achievements and diversity…and true freedoms and abilities to be the best candles for the world they can possibly be…even when they come here or some of us go there.
But speaking of “racist to dare question Obama”, if we sieg heil to GMA, then indeed it is racist against Latinos already in America to question why THEY are included in the “you knew what you were doing!” non-bailout of personal mortgages; back in Lake County Illinois alone, this year I spoke with hundreds of Latino families as out in the cold on their foreclosures as any “good ol’ boys” (so-called by GMA types) in the South or Wyoming.
To reiterate, it’s not racist to ask anyone WHY we keep “needing” mass government healthcare under Obama executive order to not use conscience in adminsitering anything to anyone, keep “needing” HUD to not bail out people but own evermore housing on easy toss-out terms, and keep “needing” to just stop wanting to be anything and at least have a roof over our native or hereto immigrant heads on whatever subsistences government will give us.
As usual, I conclude with that part of the April 2009 DHS report which identifies on page one, Topic: “Scope”, sentence three thereof, that DHS will use all public and private NICC powers at its disposal to influence public opinion for the government’s favor: http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/rightwing.pdf (see, even if you’re a Democrat or immigrant, you must be a “conservative dissident” if you’re alienated through unemployment, and think more than eternal DHS spying on you and cootie-calling on you is needed for you to have dignity or social inclusion…plus DHS suspects you then might be recruited by the same Qaedans in Pakistan receiving USA aid from YOUR public money…even if you’re an Iraq War vet, and even as the Obama administration puts India on a religious freedom “watch list” because they resist Taliban annexing Indian regions to Pakistan).
And no, it’s no comfort to know even left-wing types could be called “hacktivists” for supporting anything from PETA to Obama policies…that too was dumb under Bush, ditto anyone else.
Please keep up your good and necessary efforts!
Many reformers recognized roughly 30 percent of all health-care spending in the U.S. -some $700 billion a year- might be wasted on unnecessary tests and treatments, and payment reform could solve this problem. Is this claim overstatement ? Please not to fear quitting drug !
Provided the American people pay around double the amount of efficient systems, the result is still well below them, the ratio of waste might be estimated to far more than 50% in the U.S.
Let’s be conservative regarding the ratio. If 10% of savings apply to the combined Medicare and Medicaid cost of $923.5bn per year, as of July, the savings of $923.5bn over the next decade are possible.
And when these savings add to the already allocated $583 billion, the savings of wastes involving so called “doughnut hole” , the unnecessary subsidies for insurers, abuse, exorbitant costs by the tragic ER visits etc, the concern over revenue might be a thing of the past.
As a matter of fact, with the promising redesign in the pipeline, some patient-focused clinics in 10 regions have already achieved 16% of savings in Medicare while their quality scores are well above average.
Please be ’sure’ to visit http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/13/opinion/13gawande.html?hp for credible evidences !
Thankfully, the provisions in the reform include more expansive, systematic policies including ‘a patient’s outcome-based payment system’ than they have. I for one firmly believe this American innovation, ‘a patient’s outcome-based payment system’ , is capable of turning profit-oriented practices into patient-focused system / value.
Dr. Armadio at Mayo clinic says, “If we got rid of that stuff (waste), we save a third of all that we spend and that is 2.5 trillion dollars on health care. A third of that and that is 700 billion dollars a year. That covers a lot of uninsured people.”
Please visit http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=820455&catid=391 for detailed infos
Thank You !
Folks I need your help. If we are going to get a government option we must turn the tide. Instead of complaining about those dirty tricks the conservatives are playing we must go on the offensive. How you ask? My idea is to use scare tatics just like they do. See My Answer To Sarah Palin on facebook and get the word out. flood the internet with insurance companies rejections, turning down common proceedures as experimental, post every law suite you can find they yhey lost. Print their ceo and upper management salaries and bonuses and corp profits. Expose which hospitals they own. Go on the offensive the other side expects us to just sit back and cry. Lets let them know what they are standing for. The public wanted a government option before they started to scare them it won’t be as hard as it looks to scare them back to our side. Then once the ball is rolling our way (after Labor day and we must pound once twice a day till then) we start exposing the liars and the techniques like bring conservative forieners to host the Limbaugh radio show and tell horror stories. One more thing the government option is more like Blue Cross Blue Sheild than it is like medicare or medicade people just don’t understand the it is just a competitive plan to Cigna and United Health etc that will make them streemline their plans and actually pay for something. Please help start today
What it boils down to is that the insurance companies are there to make a profit, that profit comes at the expense of the workers of America. You work hard all your life, lose your job and coverage you get cancer (1 in 3 people will) you go bankrupt.
Even those who are still working get denied any coverage seemed too expensive, these companies delay, and stall and all to often doctors and nurses don’t get paid.
So the focus has to be how to get the insurance companies to act more responsibly, a public option is one way of doing that which is why I support it.
However there could be other ways to do the same thing, and the people who don’t want health reform should start suggesting some alternatives.
Heres some ideas:
In the event of a claim denial, or slow pre-approval for claims from an insurance company the claim can be sent to a government or state run independent body by the doctor or other service provider (a patient can request this happen).
If the insurance agency is abusing their position they have to pay for the service(treatment) and pay the patient $5K in damages and refund all their insurance payments since they started coverage. In the event that a false pre-existing condition was used as reason for a denial they will pay back all insurance the patient has ever paid since the time of that claimed false event to present, even if the patient paid a different insurer.
So long as the insurance companies are punished for bad decisions they will be more cautious and careful with them.
This a
How about creating a agency that pre-approves
Obama has an Executive Order pen. Let him give Medicaid to everyone (idea of Medicaid expansion to everyone from thiscantbehappening.com after I looked up ‘Executive Order for Single Payor’…so it was a meeting of the minds) and be done with it. He’s done now anyway for all of the folks who voted for him. Oh, and Congress should get theirs soon too. Like next year.