None of the Democrats\u2019 current health care \u201creform\u201d bills will meet President Barack Obama\u2019s stated goal of slowing the ruinous rise of medical costs, Congress\u2019 budget umpire warned last Thursday. In fact, they could break the bank.<\/p>\n
The sobering assessment from Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf came as House Democrats pushed to pass a partisan bill through committees, while in the Senate a small group of lawmakers continued to seek a deal that could win support from both political parties.<\/p>\n
From the beginning Mr. Obama has insisted that any overhaul must \u201cbend the curve\u201d of rapidly rising costs that threaten to swamp the budget of a government that unwisely started treating medical costs as an \u201centitlement\u201d for the elderly and poor 45 years ago.<\/p>\n
Asked by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., if the evolving legislation would bend the cost curve, the budget director responded that — as things stand now — \u201cthe curve is being raised.\u201d<\/p>\n
Explained Mr. Elmendorf: \u201cIn the legislation that has been reported, we do not see the sort of fundamental changes that would be necessary to reduce the trajectory of federal health spending by a significant amount. And on the contrary, the legislation significantly expands the federal responsibility for health care costs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said the budget director\u2019s warning should be \u201ca wake-up call,\u201d adding, \u201cinstead of rushing through one expensive proposal after another, we should take the time we need to get things right.\u201d<\/p>\n
The insurance industry opposes key elements of the bill, saying a government plan \u201cwill cause millions of patients to lose their current coverage,\u201d as private insurance carriers could find it uneconomical to provide expanded, govenrment-mandated coverage at the reduced rates required.<\/p>\n
Rep. Mike Ross, D-Ark., chairman of the Blue Dog Democrats\u2019 health care task force, said his group would need to see significant changes to protect small businesses and rural providers and contain costs before it could sign on. \u201cWe cannot support the current bill,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
President Obama was doing all he could last week to encourage Congress to act quickly, before the deal falls apart. He met Thursday morning with two potential Senate swing votes, Sens. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine.<\/p>\n
After that meeting Sen. Nelson released a statement that \u201cFor my part, I suggested we not impose an arbitrary deadline to get something done. I also assured (the president) that I am working to be constructive and to move the process forward, so we can develop bipartisan reform that reduces the cost of health care, raises the quality, expands choices and extends coverage to those who cannot attain it today.\u201d<\/p>\n
But, Sen. Nelson added when he was done with the happy talk, \u201cWhile we pursue those goals we must not detrimentally impact those with health insurance or worsen the national debt. I don\u2019t know if all of that\u2019s possible. …\u201d<\/p>\n
Uh-oh.<\/p>\n
Since Democrats have enough votes to shove almost anything they want through the Senate, why suddenly all this talk about seeking \u201cbipartisan reform\u201d?<\/p>\n
Because Democrats can\u2019t tell the truth. They know socialized medicine will cost enough billions to lower the standard of living for millions of Americans, but they have to pretend they believe otherwise, that it will somehow \u201csave money.\u201d<\/p>\n
They can\u2019t run for re-election in 2010 — any more than they could run in 2008 — on an honest platform of \u201cWe\u2019ll raise your taxes to the sky and borrow the nation into bankruptcy to get to our real goal, which is socialized medicine, a \u2018single-payer\u2019 system that tells old people they may just have to die waiting in line, because it turns out tax-funded medicine always creates more demand than we can pay for, and we\u2019ve had to start rationing to cut our costs.\u201d<\/p>\n
They know they can\u2019t win again in 2010 after enacting such a monster unless Republicans sell out, neutering their own ability to tell that straight story on the campaign trail with an added \u201cWe told you so.\u201d Democrats need at least a token number of Republicans on board their bandwagon.<\/p>\n
So why do Republicans go along?<\/p>\n
The loyal opposition is not there to get invited to the right cocktail parties, or to enjoy favorable puff pieces in The Washington Post. They\u2019re there to vote \u201cNo\u201d on socialism, restore the competitive free market wherever they can, call a spade a spade, and dump the freedom-hating redistributionists (now rapidly and unwisely casting aside their sheep\u2019s clothing) as soon as possible.<\/p>\n
Time to find a spine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
None of the Democrats\u2019 current health care \u201creform\u201d bills will meet President Barack Obama\u2019s stated goal of slowing the ruinous rise of medical costs, Congress\u2019 budget umpire warned last Thursday. In fact, they could break the bank. The sobering assessment from Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf came as House Democrats pushed to pass a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-medicine"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pWqFl-4s","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=276"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":278,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276\/revisions\/278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinsuprynowicz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}