However, there has been plenty of opportunity for members of congress to get an idea of what is going on.

Democrats in the House have already held 10 Caucus meetings on health care, 79 hearings on health care reform, 550 town hall events in their districts about health care, and three House Committees have heard 45 hours of debate and amendments on health care reform legislation.

This is far too narrow a definition of healthcare reform and what is being attempted. It is not only about cutting costs. Healthcare reform has always been about three things: (1) coverage, (2) level of service, and (3) cost.

The bill that is being worked on will mean that 97% of Americans will be covered by health insurance. The extra cost required to do this will be covered by taxes on the wealthy, surcharges on businesses who do not participate, and strategic medicaid and Medicare cuts, making it deficit neutral. Krauthammer seems to admit this. The CBO also actually agrees that it will be deficit neutral. That seems like a pretty good outcome to me. At minimum you get everyone covered in the U.S. without increasing the deficit.

The “investor class” is a code word for the rich or top 1%. Under this plan if you as an individual earn $80,000 or more you will pay 1% more in taxes. Hardly a sum to that will kill the “investor class”. If you earn $1 million or more you will pay 5.4% more in taxes. The “investor class” did very well over the past 8 years.

Krauthammer’s argument about small business is complete BS. Most small business will be exempt from the surtax and many will be given a public option that may reduce their healthcare expenses. Here is a comment from a small business owner that paints a very different picture:

“Along with my wife, I am a small biotech business owner that provides health insurance to its two employees. We rent laboratory space from another small technology-based business, with six employees. Our health premiums went up by 17% and 20%, respectively, this year. Both of us strongly support every aspect of the President’s health plan, including the public option, and would happily contribute 8% of our respective payrolls to buy into affordable plans. We pay much more than that, and within the next few years, will have trouble meeting the cost of insuring ourselves and our employees.” R. Star, San Francisco, July 27th, 2009

The second part of this is can you also cut overall costs from healthcare reform. It is very debatable whether the system that is being set-up does this? Does it provide pressures that will force cost cuts in the future? One part of the thinking on this is the public option may create enough new competition that private insurance companies will have to learn to do things more efficiently or with less profits to compete. This could reduce prices and costs in the system. Both Kruthammer and CBO do not deal with this point. The CBO does not even include new system incentives or new potential pressures that could force costs down in their analysis.

See this:
http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2009/07/jonathan-cohn-on-the-congressional-budget-office-and-health-care-reform.html

Krauthammer harps on the malpractice costs. Not sure what this exactly has to do with what is being proposed. It is a side issue that will likely be dealt with separately in the future. I think the Democrats understand that there may have to be a better balance with malpractice insurance costs. I am not sure Tort reform will get one single additional person insured.

Passing a new healthcare bill is an important first step. Healthcare reform will evolve over years. What is immediately important is to get everyone covered and begin the process of reform.

If Kruthammer thinks “Democratic health plans are collapsing under their own weight…” then he is really delusional. Momentum seems to be building to get something done and get something meaningful done. There may be a “Waterloo”, but the real question is who’s Waterloo?

WTF???

And if bills are too complicated to be understood by those voting on them, maybe the solution is to write the damn bills in plain english, NOT to just give up on reading or understanding the bills?

These people are criminal. They really are.

now let’s compare this to demint’s plan, which offers health care vouchers to individuals and families (2,000 a year, 5,000 a year). how does the plan pay for this giveaway? with tarp paybacks. what happens in 5 years when the payback tarp money is dry? uh… the country stops growing and no one will ever need heath insurance again? nope. there is no plan. also, wouldn’t a voucher program take pressure off business from providing coverage, because their employees would have another option? and without having to then pay a subsidy – like in the house plan – wouldn’t this drain the gov’t even further as they have to cover the cost of the vouchers?

http://www.breitbart.tv/ethicsgate-see-the-video-anti-palin-alaskan-bloggers-fought-to-have-removed-from-youtube/

Oh, maybe you didn’t see this…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZQLxVO-qjM

Who is the one physician that says there should be a autopsy after every death, even if the death occurred in the hosp? He is on our side.

And you are also right on about not trusting the insurance co to lower the rates.