Himes Reflects on Passage of Health Care Reform

Really... (4.00 / 1)

To compare the Health Care Bill with Social Security and Medicare is rather hyperbolic in my opinion. With all due respect Congressman, are we supposed to  get weepy with gratitude that absurdities like denying health care coverage for sick people or allowing monopolistic practices by the insurance companies, are done away with? These travesties never should have been allowed in the first place and were allowed to be in place for decades. I guess this is the best we can do at this time; but this country is light years away from an enlightened attitude towards health care delivery. I will grudgingly stipulate that this bill is better than nothing, but for profit health care is further ensconced. I have read that between the mandates and the subsidies, this legislation will deliver an additional 70,000,000,000 dollars to the insurance companies, ( with 31% of each dollar going to overhead, not health care), much of it from the U.S. Treasury.

I am not trying to rain on yours' or anyone elses parade here. But for someone who believes in Single Payer, or at least a strong public option, please understand why I am underwhelmed.

But let justice roll down like waters...Amos 5:24a

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by: Jake Blount @ Sun Nov 08, 2009 at 18:26:45 PM UTC

Exactly! (0.00 / 0)

We can be relieved that some of the worst practices may be prevented; but it appears that US health care will remain the most expensive, least admired in the developed world. It's a humbling win at best.

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by: Ann Galloway @ Mon Nov 09, 2009 at 19:08:34 PM UTC

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It's a disappointment, but... (0.00 / 0)

it is more important and will probably have far more impact than we think.  And once the public option is there, we can revisit it and expand it.

But this is certainly far less than we all believed was possible with President Obama, 60 Democratic senators, and no veto in the Congress.  I couldn't believe that Democrats actually negotiated for weeks with Chuck Grassley.  Was President Obama the only man in America who didn't know that Grassley was Mr. No?

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by: thomashooker @ Mon Nov 09, 2009 at 23:36:09 PM UTC

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Here's the Fallacy: (4.00 / 1)

Howard Dean's 50 State Strategy sounded good on paper -- and produced the unreliable majorities which prompted us to believe that progressive legislation was on the way. But Blue Dogs are a breed apart from most of us who blog and read here.  

There also is another problem: Last night, Rachel Maddow mentioned several Democratic legislators who happen to be part of the creepy C-Street Mafia, which wields great power and whose members hold others to a standard they themselves do not uphold. [I thought that sorry bunch were all Republicans.] Both sponsors of the Sturpak amendment are C-Streeters (big surprise). Those self-righteous SOBs have the gaul to produce a bill that forces their views of a moral position on everyone else. . . .  

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by: Ann Galloway @ Tue Nov 10, 2009 at 13:26:00 PM UTC

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