"Blue Dog" Dems attempt to sabotage health care reform

[Force Lord]

Fucking hell...

Conservative Democrats break ranks on health care

By ERICA WERNER, Associated Press Writer Erica Werner, Associated Press Writer – 38 mins ago
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama on Friday acknowledged the tough going for his health care overhaul in Congress but rejected the notion the legislation is doomed if lawmakers fail to act by August. "I never believe anything is do or die," Obama said.

"We're closer to that significant reform than at any time in recent history," Obama told reporters at a news conference in Italy. "That doesn't make it easy. It's hard. And we are having a whole series of constant negotiations."

Conservative Democrats are demanding significant changes before they will support a sweeping health care overhaul, forcing the House to join the Senate in stalling Obama's top domestic priority.

The "Blue Dog Democrats" group released a list of demands on the eve of House Democratic leaders' planned unveiling of their final bill Friday. The bill release was pushed back to next week and Democratic leaders spent part of Friday meeting with the fiscally conservative Blue Dogs to work through their concerns.

"The message that was sent was heard loud and clear," Rep. Jason Altmire, D-Pa., a member of the group, said Friday. The group's concerns were the need for more cost containment measures, protections for small businesses and a focus on rural health care.

"We cannot support a final product that fails to" address these issues, members of the group wrote to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer. Opposition from the 52-member group could imperil House passage of a bill.

Before Thursday, delays and internal Democratic disputes over taxes and the role of government had seemed mostly confined to the Senate. A bipartisan deal emerging in the Senate Finance Committee was threatened this week when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and other top Democrats indicated displeasure with the likely payment method, a new tax on health care benefits.

That has left Finance Committee members scrambling for alternative taxes to replace the $320 billion the benefits tax would have raised over a decade. Democrats are considering raising taxes on wealthy investors instead, along with other options, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private negotiations. The proposal to extend the current 1.45 percent Medicare payroll tax to capital gains earned by high-income taxpayers would bring in an estimated $100 billion over 10 years.

In the House, Democratic leaders had hoped to release an ambitious bill Friday that would achieve Obama's goals of holding down health care costs and extending insurance to the 50 million people who lack it. Insurers would have to cover all comers, employers would be required to offer insurance and individuals would be required to purchase it, with subsidies for the poor. The tax-writing Ways and Means Committee met throughout the day Thursday to try to finalize plans on how to pay for the plan, with an income surcharge on high-earners of some 3 percent or more emerging as the leading option.

But the move by the Blue Dogs scrambled the equation. It was unclear whether Democratic leaders would be able to satisfy the group's demands since in some cases they're far apart from draft language produced by the three House committees writing health legislation.

Also unclear was whether the setbacks would amount to anything more than a brief delay for a bill of enormous complexity and controversy.

Hoyer sought to minimize the day's developments.

"Let me make it very clear that everybody in that room thinks we ought to pass health care reform," the Maryland Democrat said after he and Pelosi met for more than two hours Thursday evening with Blue Dog members.

But Hoyer said, "There's still some additional work that needs to be done."

One conservative Democrat, Rep. Mike Ross, D-Ark., said he believes no House vote should take place until September.

That is well past a midsummer informal deadline set by Pelosi, D-Calif.

"I promised the president that we would have legislation out of the House before we went on an August break," she said earlier in the day. "That is still my goal."

Among the Blue Dogs' concerns is the shape of a new public insurance plan that would compete with private insurers. House leaders envision making payment rates to providers in the plan some 5 percent higher than Medicare payment rates. Blue Dogs say they can't support any link to Medicare rates, which they say pays well below market rates and varies unfairly around the country.

That puts House leaders in a tough spot since many liberal Democrats are insistent that a new public plan be linked to Medicare.

___

Associated Press writers David Espo and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar contributed to this report.

So now the Blue Dogs came in and are a pain in the ass as always. Fuck them.

Though the health care reform Obama is trying to pass isn't what many Americans need. Where's our universal health-care, dammit!

[SirNitram]

Well, one of the Senate committees has written one, and the House Progressive Caucus, which easily outnumbers the Blue Dogs(But not enough that it's easy to pass much when the Blue Dogs join the GOP in obstructionism), demands one to vote for it.

Sooo.. There are public option pushers in the Congress. Quite a few. But with the GOP requiring 60 votes every time in their media-approved 'new rules', and solidly refusing in lockstep, it's not easy.

[Sriad]

Well, one of the Senate committees has written one, and the House Progressive Caucus, which easily outnumbers the Blue Dogs(But not enough that it's easy to pass much when the Blue Dogs join the GOP in obstructionism), demands one to vote for it.

Sooo.. There are public option pushers in the Congress. Quite a few. But with the GOP requiring 60 votes every time in their media-approved 'new rules', and solidly refusing in lockstep, it's not easy.

I hate to be a hypocrite, but I would not at all mind throwing out the filibuster at this point.

[The Spartan]

70% 70-FUCKING-% of the country wants healthcare to actually be fixed.

We have the highest infant mortality rate in the industrialized world. And among the worst mortality rates for cancer and heart disease with one of the lowest life expectancies and these assholes won't let us fix it because of their fucking ideology.

[Rahvin]

We have the highest infant mortality rate in the industrialized world. And among the worst mortality rates for cancer and heart disease with one of the lowest life expectancies

...but we have the BEST HEALTHCARE IN THE WORLD, right?

[The Spartan]

That's the thing! We theoretically do! We just have the worst system for providing it in all of the 1st world nations.

For fuck's sake Cuba, CUBA, can do a better job providing for infants and young children than we do.

[Serafina]

70% 70-FUCKING-% of the country wants healthcare to actually be fixed.

We have the highest infant mortality rate in the industrialized world. And among the worst mortality rates for cancer and heart disease with one of the lowest life expectancies and these assholes won't let us fix it because of their fucking ideology.

Who was it who said "better dead than red"? Of course, its easy to say if you are not sick.

Besides, wanting something fixed is different from supporting a particular programm.

That's the thing! We theoretically do! We just have the worst system for providing it in all of the 1st world nations./quote]
Thats like saying "i have the fastest car in the world - if only the motor would run...". Seriously, its not about having resources, but about managing them.

Anyway, how much public discussion is there about health care and insurance? Are people naming models from specific countries (i.e. "we want something similar to the french system")? Or do they just cry "we want it to be fixed" without caring about details?

[The Spartan]

Who was it who said "better dead than red"? Of course, its easy to say if you are not sick.

Besides, wanting something fixed is different from supporting a particular programm.

But since single payer is the only truly viable option...

Thats like saying "i have the fastest car in the world - if only the motor would run...". Seriously, its not about having resources, but about managing them.

That's sort of my point. We've got a Ferrari but there's not any tires on the damn thing.

Anyway, how much public discussion is there about health care and insurance? Are people naming models from specific countries (i.e. "we want something similar to the french system")? Or do they just cry "we want it to be fixed" without caring about details?

I've heard very little around here. Other's mileage may vary.

[SirNitram]

Well, one of the Senate committees has written one, and the House Progressive Caucus, which easily outnumbers the Blue Dogs(But not enough that it's easy to pass much when the Blue Dogs join the GOP in obstructionism), demands one to vote for it.

Sooo.. There are public option pushers in the Congress. Quite a few. But with the GOP requiring 60 votes every time in their media-approved 'new rules', and solidly refusing in lockstep, it's not easy.

I hate to be a hypocrite, but I would not at all mind throwing out the filibuster at this point.

Technically, there's an option prepared and stamped and finalized to prevent filibustering this, due to the fact it's one of the few ways to reconcile real outlays and intakes with the written budget. But expect the GOP to try and pull every procedural trick they can on it.

As was said in this thread: 70%. That's bipartisan to a sensible person. But the ways of the founding fathers and basic democracy are thrown out by the conservative Dems and the GOP.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Anyway, how much public discussion is there about health care and insurance? Are people naming models from specific countries (i.e. "we want something similar to the french system")? Or do they just cry "we want it to be fixed" without caring about details?

In American politics there is a serious aversion to learning anything from other countries. I think it has to do with the city on the hill mythology, the idea that we should be the one that everybody learns from, and some plain xenophobia. The place where you can see that the most strongly is in the aversion of our legal system to considering the reasoning of foreign courts; conservatives are extremely opposed to the idea of even talking about foreign rulings. Whereas we do see Op-Eds and liberal bloggers talking about how universal health care works really well in other countries, you won't see any politicians really talk about it. In fact you're more likely to see an opponent talk about Canadian health care (and how it is somehow worse than ours) than a supporter.

That said, the reform plans would obviously take pages from other systems when they were put into practice, because there's such a wealth of available examples.

[Darth Wong]

70% 70-FUCKING-% of the country wants healthcare to actually be fixed.

Yeah, but they have no idea what it should look like when it's "fixed". It's pretty hard to reach your destination when you don't know where to go.

Basically, they only know what it should not be like. They have no idea what it should be like.

[Vendetta]

70% 70-FUCKING-% of the country wants healthcare to actually be fixed.

We have the highest infant mortality rate in the industrialized world. And among the worst mortality rates for cancer and heart disease with one of the lowest life expectancies and these assholes won't let us fix it because of their fucking ideology.

Or, y'know, because they're so firmly attached to lobbyist cock that they can tell whose interests they're serving today from taste alone.