Mass. Rep: Health Care Bill Not Good Enough
Friday, March 19th, 2010
Massachusetts U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch says he will not vote against the health care bill that insurance and pharmaceutical companies are supporting.
Duration : 0:1:33
Posts Tagged ‘healthcare’
John Mccain’s terrible Health Care “plan” vs. Obama
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
Lost in the economic crisis, the lousy horserace numbers for McCain, and the personal attacks of the McCain camp is the ongoing health care crisis in the United States. With our current system, there remain 47 million without care and millions more who are underinsured. Cost issues exist alongside inequalities of care access. And now, with unemployment rising, the issue is becoming more acute.
Paul Krugman: Conservative Republicans still hate Medicare, and would kill it if they could — in fact, they tried to gut it during the Clinton years (thats what the 1995 shutdown of the government was all about). But so far they havent been able to pull that off.
So John McCain wants to destroy the health insurance of nonelderly Americans instead. But but Not good. Obama’s idea is different. Today, he signed on to the Health Care for America Now principles, which do not endorse specific legislation, but are compatible with single payer and other approaches. From a press release:
Today, Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) signed the Health Care for America Now statement declaring that he is on the side of quality, affordable health care for all and opposed to leaving Americans on their own with unregulated health insurance.
There’s still plenty of room to argue about the best way to get there, but with a recession looming and people in danger of losing their jobs, this is not an issue that can be ignored any more. Expect it to be brought up in the town hall debate tomorrow – unlike the phoney stuff being brought up by McCain’s campaign and his increasingly shrill VP candidate, who caters only to the shrinking Republican base, this is an issue that all Americans actually care about.
“Health Care for America Now’s goal this year is to get the next President and a majority of Congress committed to the principles of quality, affordable health care for all and opposed to policies that would tax our benefits at work and leave us on our own with the unregulated, bureaucratic private insurance industry,” said Richard Kirsch, National Campaign Manager, Health Care for America Now. “With Senator Obama’s signature, we are taking a major step towards getting the next President and Congress to make comprehensive health care reform a priority in 2009.”
John McCain’s plan is anything but acceptable. Since it’s all about saving money and nothing else, he proposes, according to the WSJ: McCain Plans Federal Health Cuts…Medicare, Medicaid Spending Would Be Reduced to Offset Proposed Tax Credit
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, Sen. McCain’s senior policy adviser, said Sunday that the campaign has always planned to fund the tax credits, in part, with savings from Medicare and Medicaid. Those government health-care programs serve seniors, poor families and the disabled. Medicare spending for the fiscal year ended Sept. 30 is estimated at $457.5 billion.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/6/124346/441/758/621648
Those of us who analyze health policy and trends for a living have struggled to follow John McCain’s health plan through its many seemingly-improvised changes. First he was taxing health benefits through both payroll and income tax. Then he said he only intended to apply income tax, which meant that his plan would create even larger deficits. Now he says there won’t be deficits, because he’s going to make up the cost of those tax credits by slashing Medicare and Medicaid.
When a candidate suddenly, almost whimsically changes the way he proposes to handle $1.3 trillion – which is the amount of money his plan puts in play over the next ten years – it’s time to get nervous.
We already knew the McCain plan was going to cost most Americans money (in at least three different ways.) Now we know it could jeopardize their medical care when they get older, too. The end result of this off-the-cuff planning could change the way Americans receive, or don’t receive, medical care in this country…at least three kinds of health “tax increases” (more accurately described as increased personal cost) under the McCain plan: a “slow bleed” for people who retain coverage as the tax credit falls behind inflation, a $,7000-plus spike for people who lose their coverage immediately, and an increase in out-of-pocket costs (and denials, etc.) for people who still have insurance. What do we get in return? According to that neutral study, three million uninsured would gain coverage – briefly. After five years the number of uncovered would go up.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rj-eskow/mccains-erratic-health-st_b_132242.html
Duration : 0:10:47
The Obama Plan in 4 Minutes
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
Learn the basic principles of President Obama’s health insurance reform plan as presented to Congress on September 9, 2009.
Duration : 0:4:1
Health Insurance Reform Right Now
Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
President Obama shares the story of Natoma Canfield, a cancer survivor who had to drop her health insurance due to excessive rate hikes only to be diagnosed with leukemia, and tells the crowd in Strongsville, Ohio that cases like Natomas make it clear that the time is now for health insurance reform. March 15, 2010.
Duration : 0:35:4
Health Savings Accounts
Monday, March 15th, 2010
A simple explanation about HSAs, FSAs,and HDHPs. -Stay Smart Stay Healthy
See more videos at: http://www.youtube.com/user/staysmartstayhealthy.com
Duration : 0:2:52
Health, Money and Fear
Monday, March 15th, 2010
Produced by an emergency physician (Paul Hochfeld), “Health, Money and Fear” answers three questions about our broken health care non-system. Why does is cost so much? What does it say about us? What can we do about it? While Congress is more focused on the symptom, lack of Universal Coverage, they are ignoring the underlying problem. COST. Unless they address the perverse incentives that drive up cost, the “reform” we are going to get will be more government subsidies so the insurance industry can continue to thrive being central to a dysfunctional health care system that is better at producing profits than health. The elements of the solution must address the elements of the problem: technology, the fear of liability, mass marketing of prescription drugs, the profit motive, chaos in medical records, unrealistic expectatiions, and the multitude of insurance companies that add substantially to cost without contributing anything to health.
Duration : 0:48:0
The Public Plan Deception – It’s Not About Choice
Thursday, March 11th, 2010
Follow us at: twitter.com/verumserum. The Democrats have been promoting a public healthcare plan “option” as being all about consumer “choice” and market “competition”. But is this really the case?
Duration : 0:2:58
THE WINNER of the 2010 Health Care Summit
Thursday, March 11th, 2010
The 2010 healthcare summit already has a winner. And they’re so psyched.
The Partisans
From Andy Cobb And The Second City
©2010 Second City Inc./Andy Cobb. All Rights Reserved.
For more video by Andy Cobb: http://www.youtube.com/user/AndyCobbonutube
While I like to imagine that CSPAN is run by a bunch of trash talking adrenaline junkies who talk smack about CSPAN2 when they don’t land a key gig, it’s probably not literally true. So we made their promo for them.
Duration : 0:1:14
Fighting for Health Insurance Reform
Thursday, March 11th, 2010
In Glenside, PA, President Obama explains why health insurance reform is a necessity and calls on Congress to put aside politics and hold a final up or down vote on reform. March 8, 2010.
Duration : 0:37:13
Moving Forward on Health Care Reform
Tuesday, March 9th, 2010
President Obama calls for the House and Senate to vote on health care reform and says he will do everything in his power to make the case for reform. March 3, 2010.
Duration : 0:19:52