Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Why they should kill the Senate health bill

Top 10 Reasons to Kill Senate Health Care Bill from FireDogLake (h/t to Charles in the comments):

1. Forces you to pay up to 8% of your income to private insurance corporations — whether you want to or not.
2. If you refuse to buy the insurance, you’ll have to pay penalties of up to 2% of your annual income to the IRS.
3. Many will be forced to buy poor-quality insurance they can’t afford to use, with $11,900 in annual out-of-pocket expenses over and above their annual premiums.
4. Massive restriction on a woman’s right to choose, designed to trigger a challenge to Roe v. Wade in the Supreme Court.
5. Paid for by taxes on the middle class insurance plan you have right now through your employer, causing them to cut back benefits and increase co-pays.
6. Many of the taxes to pay for the bill start now, but most Americans won’t see any benefits — like an end to discrimination against those with preexisting conditions — until 2014 when the program begins.
7. Allows insurance companies to charge people who are older 300% more than others.
8. Grants monopolies to drug companies that will keep generic versions of expensive biotech drugs from ever coming to market.
9. No re-importation of prescription drugs, which would save consumers $100 billion over 10 years.
10. The cost of medical care will continue to rise, and insurance premiums for a family of four will rise an average of $1,000 a year — meaning in 10 years, your family’s insurance premium will be $10,000 more annually than it is right now.

Links for each bullet point is on FDL in the rest of the article.

It's much worse to get BAD legislation than NO legislation, because we can always start over next session. Once this thing is on the books, it'll be very difficult to fix.

18 comments:

West Haven Bob said...

Bob - email me:

westhavenbob@live.com

Lucy said...

This is the legislation we got from:

*Dodd
*Murphy
*Courtney
*DeLauro
*Larson

ALL members of the party in power.

Will CT progressives have the guts to hold them accountable at the polls?????

oldswede said...

Gee Lucy,
What do you think we should do? Elect repubs, probably. That'll work. Oh yeah.
We'll call a mutiny and sink this ship we're on far out at sea and let the repub sea serpents feast.
oldswede

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

For entirely different reasons, we totally agree; the bill sucks.

When the right & left agree something's a lousy idea; the whole thing should be scraped.

This thing doesn't even put a leash on the FDA (Why do you think our own drugs cost less outside our borders?)

Still no interstate competition either.

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

>>What do you think we should do? Elect repubs, probably. That'll work. Oh yeah.

That's the problem, the left doesn't have the balls to cross vote.

How do you think Lieberman wound up in the Senate in the first place?

We couldn't get that bastard Weicker to go away, so we took a stiff drink, held our breath and intentionally and overtly threw him under the bus in 1988.

It was wonderful; Republican headquarters went wild, we had been handing out Lieberman bumper stickers and lawn signs that year too; watching that weasel go under was the biggest victory of the year for many of us.

(In hind sight we now realize we should have backed the bus up and run over him a few more times; heaven only knows we didn't expect to see the rascal back in 90 on the job market. (It was like "Night of the Living Dead")

oldswede said...

WTF is wrong with you, ace?
We are trying to get an improved health care bill. The repugs don't want one at all. How is putting the neo-confederates in charge going improve anything, ever?
This struggle is about getting legislation in place that will provide something to help the American people, not the corporate corpulents. This is contrary to the repug job-description.
Do you think it would show real balls to burn down our house just to get rid of some roaches?
oldswede

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

>>The repugs don't want one at all.

Try calling me a "repug" to my face sometime.

Merry Christmas you effing douche bag.

Lucy said...

oldswede,

One option is third-party candidates (very common in Sweden, BTW), and once CT's campaign finance law is made constitutional, they'll have a much better shot.... No reason we have to buy into the dogma of a "two-party system," especially given the awful results.

CT Jim said...

Obama trashes Obama health care plan, at:

http://iblogwesthartford.blogspot.com/

Obareidpelof said...

Fellas! Please! Let's not let the perfect be the enemy of the truly awful!

Charles said...

Well I see that it passed, 60-39. Meanwhile, can't you feel the love? The progressive left in alliance with Tea Party people in opposition to it...who'd a thunk that?

Nopartisan said...

Everyone should calm down and actually research the bill before jumping over it. Is it perfect? no. But it is not the nightmare that both extremes claim it to be.

The hard left wants single payer government only healthcare. The hard right wants the status quo even as it worsens.

There are a number of websites that evenhandedly break down the senates version. Again while not perfect it is much better than what we have now. The FACTS easily disprove most if not all of Ms. Hamsher's (I'll be polite) misunderstandings about the bill.

Ms. Hamsher should be careful as she is starting to morph into the hard lefts Sarah Palin with her views on the bill meant to gin up her readers passions ala Palin and her base.

Anonymous said...

Nonpartisan,

Actually, just about everything you say about health care reform is wrong and cannot be substantiated (so naturally, you didn't).

I don't know exactly what the "hard left" is (unless it's that turn I take of Main Street to get to Blockbusters...) Nor do I know what "single payer government only health care" is. I know that I have NEVER seen an argument for single-payer that precludes any individual from buying as much private health insurance as she or he likes (as is the case throughout the non-U.S. civilized world… )

Ms. Hamsher is right on target and her points remain unchallenged (in any post-adolescent way).

So, from the "easy" left,

Happy Holidays!

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

>>The hard right wants the status quo even as it worsens.

Hardly.
Mostly we'd like the government to get out of everything as we don't believe those that have created the problem are in any position to correct that same problem.
It's like hiring a drug gang to clean up the neighborhood.

Some controls on the FDA would be a nice start, as would malpractice caps and interstate competition without state mandates, so cafeteria plans could be offered.
(IE: Some states insist such nonsense as hair transplants be included in all policies - no wonder the rates go up.)

Instead we're witnessing little more than the Trial Lawyers Enrichment Act.

ralph in saugerties said...

Hey Lucy, Nice to read a level headed intelligent comment in this snarling thread. Hey ACR, The boys that made this mess are the greedy boys that got rid of government controls and created the health insurance middlemen - Republican values. They are not the ones trying to fix the problems now. Reality bites, when you are on the wrong side.

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

Hey Ralph -- Merry Christmas now run the hoover hose in from the exhaust and kill yourself okay?

How about the asthma inhaler was all over the planet *except* the US for a full 12 years?

FDA

Right now more Diabetics in Europe live another year than in the US

FDA

How about putting up 12K a year in meds and still realizing the bozos that want to control medicine really just to control everything?

How about putting a gun to your head and pulling the trigger for us won't you Ralph because in truth no one wants you alive anyway because you're a rude piece of shit and a non-entity.

Authentic Connecticut Republican said...

>>>and once CT's campaign finance law is made constitutional


Re-writing the Constitution are you?

CT Bob said...

Jesus, Ebenezer, lighten up a bit; it's Christmas! You can go back to suggesting suicide on Boxing Day.