Thirty million people without health insurance stand to gain coverage under a deal announced on Saturday by Senate Democrats.
To get the 60 votes needed to pass their bill, Democrats scrapped the idea of a government-run public insurance plan, cherished by liberals, and replaced it with a proposal for nationwide health plans, which would be offered by private insurers under contract with the government.
The legislation also includes a proposal that would limit insurance coverage of abortion. The provision, which was the last piece of the puzzle to fall into place, was negotiated by the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, Democrat of Nevada, to win the support of Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, who is an opponent of abortion.
Under the agreement, states could choose to prohibit abortion coverage in the insurance markets, or exchanges, where most health plans would be sold.
Ben Nelson is getting absolutely ripped in the Nebraska papers. The Omaha World Herald officially pulled their endorsement of him because it appears he sold out his centrist legacy and got bought off.
And well he deserves it, regardless of one’s stand on the health bill.
“Compromise to compromise”? Payoff to payoff, might be a more accurate description.
That should be “by,” rather than “to,” obviously.
You’re right, David Fischler – “payoff to payoff” is correct. Any Democratic senator who hasn’t gotten a payoff for his/her state must be feeling a little foolish by now – all it takes is a little hesitation and the Senate leadership uses taxpayer money to buy that senator’s vote. And no one has actually seen the bill yet – Sen. Reid still has it behind closed doors – the most transparent congress ever!
Anybody remember the old Rube Goldberg cartoons? I suspect if the same folks that wrote this bill had to come up with a government approved and subsidized way for the American public to wipe its behind, this would be it – [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iIZpnBpTfU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iIZpnBpTfU[/url]
David, I was thinking more “sellout to sellout” 🙁
The corruption and deceit of our present government is just breathtaking. I suspect the Nelson payoff is just one of many sweetheart deals that the Democrats have made among themselves. For example, my state, which is heavily Democrat, is going to be exempted from the legislation entirely, on the grounds that our local insurance laws would be better than the national law.
So what’s the practical result? “Red States” will disproportionately pay the costs of this legislation to subsidize the sweetheart deals that the “Blue States” have made with each other to get the bill passed.
There has to be something unconstitutional about all this.
Chris, that’s another fair way of putting it.
Jim: I suspect that at the very least the individual mandate will be found unconstitutional. The problem, of course, is that the mandate is the linchpin of the entire scheme. Without it, the rest becomes a complete mess that will wreck havoc on the economy as a whole, as well as the health sector. That’s not to say that with it this is any jewel–there are still more than enough problems that would justify killing it. But take away the mandate, and leave the rest in place, and this becomes a total disaster (except perhaps from the point of view of single-payer advocates, who might get what they want after the collapse of the insurance industry).