Finance Committee passes Cantwell's state-based plan

[ProSense]

Senate Finance Committee approve state-based public options

By Jeffrey Young

The Senate Finance Committee adopted a quasi-public option to the healthcare reform bill Thursday.

Two days after Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and a few other Democrats joined Republicans to defeat amendments to create a national government-run public option health insurance program, the committee voted in favor of a proposal by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) to enable states to form their own public options.

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All Democrats except Sen. Blanche Lincoln (Ark.) voted to support the Cantwell amendment and all Republicans voted against it. Baucus, who has resisted adding a public option of any kind to his bill based on the argument that there is not enough support in the Senate, was enthusiastic about Cantwell's proposal. "This is a great amendment," he said.

Under the Cantwell amendment, people with incomes between 133 percent and 200 percent of the federal poverty level who do not get insurance at work would enroll in these state-based programs. The federal tax credits that would otherwise have been given to those individuals would instead be paid to states to finance the plan. Cantwell based her amendment on a program in Washington state.

States could choose to set up their plans, which would negotiate with medical providers on payment rates rather than base them on Medicare's fees, which other public option plans would do. Cantwell and Baucus said the amendment would save money "We are putting someone in charge, finally, of negotiating rates," Cantwell said.

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On edit: This is all fine and good for the Finance Committee, but people shouldn't kid themselves that this is anywhere near the public option in the HELP bill, and certainly will not have the same effect in terms of driving competition and bringing down cost.


The language alone, "a quasi-public option," says it all.

[joeybee12]

1. Blanche Lincoln is toast...

...yeah, I know it's a conservative state, but she will be getting no support from the Democratic base...she fires up no one. What an incompetent fool.

[iceman66]

13. Maybe she intends to lose.

Probably has some cushy 7-figure job lined up with the insurance lobby as a reward for her 'services'.

[GrantDem]

16. +1

The repubs aren't going to vote for her anyway and she is eating away at the Dem base with her pandering.

[lamp_shade]

2. I watched the whole debate. Boy - timing is everything. The repubs are PISSED.

They've been pwned.

[ProSense]

5. The Repubs just discovered

they're irrelevant.

[thunder rising]

3. I don't see this as a real good thing. State governments are easy pickings for big health.

[ProSense]

4. States are given a choice and the FPL is way too low. n/t

[liberalpragmatist]

7. It's better than co-ops or triggers

Still kinda crap, but better than the alternatives. And maybe it can be replaced with a real public option in conference committee.

If that fails, then at least by having state-based plans, maybe it can be shifted to require state-created plans and allow them to pool their plans together to negotiate rates on a broader scale.

[ProSense]

11. Co-op don't work, but if they settle on the OP option in the full Senate,

then they should revise down the cap to $8,000 (Snowe has it at a ridiculous $13,000) and include a one-year trigger for Medicare for all. That's the only incentive and time frame that makes sense. The state-base alternative is just as bad as watering down a public option until it's ineffective.

What they really need to do is pass a public option by reconciliation. One thing that everyone overlooks is that the HELP bill can pass with 51 votes barring a filibuster.

Unless the Democrats sabotage the HELP and House bills, a public option should be in the bill coming out of conference.

[MarjorieG]

6. Do we have equivalent of Kucinch amendment allowing states to do single-payer it they choose?

[Thrill]

8. I would rather have a Republican than a fake Democrat like Lincoln

.

[Thrill]

9. Did they ever vote on Wyden's Amendment?

[Engineer4Obama]

10. Meh I see this as getting the bill as liberal as possible so as

to not drag down the help bill anymore than absolutely necessary.

[dave29]

12. Forgive me if I am incorrect, but the big picture here is we passed a public option

in all 5 committees in the senate... is it not? Is this not huge news?

[HughMoran]

17. I think we will just tuck our foot in the door on this one

The one thing that the Republicans are correct about however, once we get this "option" going, it will be expanded in the future. Why wouldn't the public - conservative or liberal - want an option that forces the insurance companies to compete against an organization that doesn't waste billions or our health dollars lobbying Congress?

[TheKentuckian]

14. I think it will help the combining with Senate bill and the conference

Worse case scenario has improved somewhat in my opinion and they also made some substantial headway on emasculating the mandates and it sounds like in the end it will be pretty toothless. We are continuing to do better than usual.

[brightertomorrow]

15. Why won't the plan be available to everyone then?

the rest of us still will have to keep our lousy "deny,deny deny" insurance and pay fines if we don't. I am not impressed. If it drives rates down for only a select group of people, the insurance companies will make sure to drive the rates up for the rest of us to make up for it. No wonder Baucus voted for this one. Sorry but we need a public option that is available for everyone to join. They are only talking about negotiating rates for a few..... What stops the insurance companies from goughing the rest of us??

[HughMoran]

18. ...give it time

We will have to start small, but eventually the plan will have to be expanded - insurance will soon be just too expensive for anybody to afford if nothing changes.