Schrader and Wu Push for a Public Option
Nick Wirth
The Public Option may have suffered a (temporary) setback yesterday in the Senate Finance Committee, but Congressmen Kurt Schrader and David Wu are still advocating on its behalf. Along with 49 other Representatives, Wu and Schrader signed onto a letter sent to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer today voicing the group's continued support for a public health insurance program. The letter [pdf] is straightforward:
The public option is not a pathway to government-run health care for everyone, it is simply another choice for people who need health insurance. We fail to see any reason why we should not seek to increase Americans' health insurance options.
When weighed against other ideas, the public option remains the most effective tool to bring about competititon, choice, efficiency, transparency, and cost reduction in the marketplace.
Good for them. It's reassuring to see that all four Democratic members of Oregon's house delegation are strongly and openly pushing for a Public Option.
Today incidentally happens to be the last day of the fundraising quarter. For all of the money that insurance companies are pouring into Congress, it's important to let our Representatives know when they're doing the right thing. Plus, Schrader is bound to face a serious race in a swing district this year. So, if you can, consider sending a donation their way to thank them for fighting for real, progressive health reform.
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Sep 30, '09
Good for Schrader (my rep) and Wu, (my former rep.).
Looks like the House is the place to look for some conviction these days. Here Rep. Alan Grayson (D) Florida tells us why he's not apologizing to the Republicans for opposition to health care, but apologizing to the dead, the 44,000 who die every year according to Harvard Medical School study. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuCFhpc_q-Q&feature=player_embedded
Sep 30, '09
That's nice, but my private, for-profit health insurer raised its rates again, and so there won't likely be any more political contributions until the public option actually passes.
Sep 30, '09
Yah: my company just announced that our rates are going to be raised. They have to do it in the current climate, along with further cutting and flat salaries. I already pay a hefty copay for each visit and relatively high cost sharing. Darn. And I am committed to covering my son no matter what it takes while he continues on in school. It just doesn't let up!
Sep 30, '09
Thankfully my employer recently informed us that they would not be increasing employee contributions to health premiums or copay's. Better still, employee contributions were reduced for anyone who enrolled in a wellness program. I'd have to say that I'm one of those who is largely satisfied with the coverage & quality of care I receive. At the same time I also realize the tremendous expense involved. My employers health care costs jumped another 12% this year. Grateful as I am to be steadily employed with a good health plan in 2009, these snowballing expenses on my employers balance sheet are cause for concern. When those costs begin to rival my mortgage payment just to cover a healthy, non-smoking, not terribly overweight individual, we got problems. I'm not saying single payer is the answer, but most of us will all be screwed without some major fundamental changes in the near future.
Sep 30, '09
I'm so sick of that bot-machine up there: about to list out all the spammers, search out their webs (including those like, it looks like, Stand for Children or Oregon or someone or other, who are propagating spare emails/TwitProfiles to increase the noise.....) and ... I don't know!
It's a cloud of empty bullshit! Egad! Kari! I know! You can use it to drive off the pests! Me first! Sigh.
Oct 1, '09
Rate hikes were announced for all Oregonian health care in order to enact the 1% tax WE ALL WILL PAY because the democrat controlled legislature passed the law allowing this tax in order to fund healthcare children in Oregon not previously covered. The cost will be bourne 100% by the policy holder.
The tax also applies to long term care coverage and any medical rider on homeowners, G&L, auto, truck, motorcycle or recreational vehicle policy. This is a representative republic and our representatives made it happen.
5:29 a.m.
Oct 1, '09
Florida's Representative Grayson got gutsy yesterday and exposed congressional Republicans' health care plan. The plan consists of: (1) Don't get sick, (2) Die quickly if you do get sick.
My Republican friends (in Trumpeters, a Portland Republican political junkies group) often used to say stuff like that in ordinary passing conversations about the elderly. Indeed, that is Republicans' solution for what they view as overly costly government programs such as Social Security, medicare, and medicaid. They harbor similar sentiments about private pension programs.
The Republican National Committee is the original "death panel." Thus it is no surprise that Republican spokesbitch Palin came up with the term and, like the protagonist in The Fountainhead, turned it into a critique of the opposition. Remember, in the book, Ayn Rand wrote that we will make people think that war is peace, black is white, and right is wrong -- it was a tactic that Karl Rove adopted and to great but tragic effect.
Grayson was quite right to go back to the floor after exposing the Republican death panel mentality. But rather than apologize to Congress, he did the right thing. He apologized to those Americans who die daily for lack of insurance and thus for the lack of ability to pay for decent medical care.
These premature deaths are an abomination -- a blot on American political culture. This abomination is, however, a hallmark of all that is wrong about today's Republican party. Teddy Roosevelt would never have countenanced such an abomination.
Lee Coleman
======================================================== Apology?: Dem said GOP wants sick to just 'die quickly'
A.P. Oct 1, 2009 - Ben Evans/Jim Abrams
WASHINGTON—House Republicans say it's payback time for the recent reprimand of one of their own for heckling President Barack Obama. They want a Democratic lawmaker to apologize or face a reprimand for saying the GOP wants Americans to "die quickly" if they get sick.
Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla. -- a first-term congressman known for a provocative style -- refused to back down on Wednesday.
As Republicans threatened to introduce a resolution disapproving of his remarks, he returned to the House floor and mocked their outrage by citing research showing that nearly 45,000 people die each year for lack of health insurance.
"I would like to apologize ... I apologize to the dead and their families that we haven't voted sooner to end this holocaust in America," he said, citing a study being published in the American Journal of Public Health.
5:33 a.m.
Oct 1, '09
Kurt Chapman wrote: "Rate hikes were announced for all Oregonian health care in order to enact the 1% tax WE ALL WILL PAY because the democrat controlled legislature passed the law allowing this tax in order to fund healthcare children in Oregon not previously covered. The cost will be bourne 100% by the policy holder."
Chapman obviously belongs to the Republican death panel mentality. For him, it is much more desirable for children to go untreated than for him to pay a paltry 1% tax.
Truly this is an abomination.
And if we had competition for health care insurance in this state, including a public option system of health insurance, this tax hike would not be passed on but rather absorbed as a business expense as it should be.
10:38 a.m.
Oct 1, '09
Good for Wu.
I'm critical of Wu (who is my Congressman) a lot of the time--so when he steps up like this, he deserves to get some kudos.
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