The Americans Who Can’t Wait for a Better Bill

[babylonsister]

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_americans_who_cant_wait_for_a_better_bill_20100316/

The Americans Who Can’t Wait for a Better Bill

Posted on Mar 16, 2010

AP / Wade Payne

Patients wait to receive medical attention at a facility organized by Remote Area Medical, a nonprofit organization, whose volunteers offer free health care to the uninsured, the underinsured and the desperate.

By Bill Boyarsky


snip//

Visit such a place anywhere in America and you can see why the health care reform bill—as limited as it is—must be passed. The twin evils of unemployment and a weak medical care system have reached deep into the country, leaving working people uninsured and unemployed and lengthening the lines in front of places such as St. John’s. “I think {the problem} has expanded 20 percent this past month,” said Ingrid Hernandez, a staff member.

That’s why President Barack Obama deserves support as he tries to persuade enough Democrats in the Senate and the House to pass the health reform bill. Obama is doing all he can. He lobbied Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, now a “no” vote, when they flew on Air Force One to Ohio for a presidential health care campaign speech. “Vote yes,” said a man in the crowd when Obama introduced Kucinich. “Did you hear that, Dennis?” asked Obama.

The bill would immediately benefit St. John’s Well Child and Family Center and more than 7,500 similar facilities around the country, which provide medical, dental, mental health, parenting instruction and other services to more than 17 million urban and rural poor. The centers are financed by a combination of government and nonprofit foundation funds, plus private donations.

The bill would provide the centers $700 million in the coming year, with annual appropriations eventually increasing to $2.9 billion, according to the National Association of Community Health Centers. The centers would also receive $1.5 billion over five years for construction and renovation.

Jim Mangia told me that the number of clinics around the country would double. St. John’s would get $11 million from the reform bill, permitting more treatment sites and a reduction or an end to lines. “We have to put clinics in the neighborhoods where people live,” Mangia told me. “It’s very difficult to put the kids on a bus and schlep across town.”

snip//

Nobody in America should have to live like this, without medical care that other industrial nations take for granted. The health reform bill is a start to ending this evil. Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Bill Clinton—even Richard Nixon—tried to do something about health care and were beaten by the powerful special interests profiting from the present system. The interests, led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the insurance industry and others, are at it again in the final days before the House vote, targeting the members who fear a “yes” vote will cost them their jobs.

I hope they have the guts to resist. “We need courage, that’s what we need,” President Obama said in Ohio. This bill, as imperfect it is, will begin the process of reforming a health care system that is unfair to the middle class and the poor alike. Health care, as Roosevelt said, is a human right. Passage of the bill would be a great legacy for this Congress.

[Oregone]

1. What a bullshit line:

"even Richard Nixon—tried to do something about health care and were beaten by the powerful special interests profiting from the present system"

Nixon didn't try and do anything but mandate and subsidize private insurance (much like this is). And he wasn't beaten down by special interests. He was beaten down by the Democratic Party, led by Ted Kennedy. Kennedy offered up a series of bills, and settled on the Kennedy-Mills compromise bill, which was entirely viable and would of instituted universal insurance paid for with a payroll tax.

And it wasn't the industry that stopped Kennedy. It was the unions

[babylonsister]

2. Good morning to you, too! Are both sides of your bed the wrong side?

:hi:

[Oregone]

3. Nope. Just setting the record straight

There used to be a real liberal Democratic Party, and thats what stopped Nixon's corporate give-away (not special interests)

If someone wants to write an article, they should do some leg work.

[elocs]

5. Generally here at DU the burden is on the one who brings up an article to provide a link

and not simply tell others to go look it up. Bad form.

[winston61]

7. Bad form? What the matter? Fingers too tired to type a few

characters into a search engine? Bad form? Hows about lazy ass?

[elocs]

13. You know the great thing for me?

I won't have to see any of your dumb ass posts anymore. :nuke: You do understand what I am telling you that you can do?

[winston61]

22. Oh cry me a river-

I guess redneck conservatives are not the only ones with no sense of humor.

[Oregone]

21. Excuse me...I figured it was common knowledge

http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1499&dat=19760517&id=ph8qAAAAIBAJ&sjid=KSkEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6942,4322069

http://books.google.ca/books?id=rIvM9Tk0mqUC&lpg=PA92&ots=_4AdKkfCRb&dq=kennedy-mills%20compromise%20afl%20cio&pg=PA93#v=onepage&q=kennedy-mills%20compromise%20afl%20cio&f=false

[SkyDaddy7]

10. You are wrong!

However, since someone has already shown just how wrong you are I am done here.

[Oregone]

19. Why am I wrong?

[FrenchieCat]

4. I was told they were merely props....trump cards....

people who don't really count.... :sarcasm:

by those who know exactly how this bill will work because they are so darn smart....
certainly smarter than that guy in the White House,
you know, those who think if they yell loud enough and someone hears them,
the country will melt away and look just like sweden....poof, just like that! Magically.....
and who are the same one who are predicting that the economy will fall apart again anyday soon,
...same one who weren't sure Obama couldn't even win the election,
and to date don't believe he can govern.

[vaberella]

8. DU is always a wealth of knowledge, by those who know best.

Screw the 40 million props...we need to start over. Or one better...we need to open up medicare and screw all it's problems...it will work.

[elocs]

6. "Ted Kennedy, Richard Nixon and Universal Health Care"

I could talk about the article and then tell people to look it up, but here's a link:

http://www.everydaycitizen.com/2009/09/ted_kennedy_richard_nixon_and.html

Over 35 years ago, Senator Ted Kennedy tried to collaborate with President Richard Nixon to achieve a goal that both dearly desired: universal health care insurance for all Americans. It was an odd partnership, as Kennedy and Nixon were political rivals, and Nixon was fearful of running against Kennedy in the 1972 Presidential election. After Nixon won the elections, Kennedy began secret negotiations with the White House that almost led to an agreement on a health care plan. Nixon introduced his Comprehensive Health Insurance Act on Feb. 6, 1974. It would've built upon existing employer-sponsored insurance plans and would've provided government subsidies to the self-employed and small businesses to ensure universal access to health insurance. Sadly, the Watergate scandal derailed Nixon and Kennedy's efforts at health care reform.

Kennedy's regret:

"Asked about his greatest regret as a legislator, Ted Kennedy would usually cite his refusal to cut a deal with Richard Nixon on health care.

...At first, Kennedy rejected Nixon's proposal as nothing more than a bonanza for the insurance industry that would create a two-class system of health care in America. But after Nixon won reelection, Kennedy began a series of secret negotiations with the White House that almost led to a public agreement. In the end, Nixon backed out after receiving pressure from small-business owners and the American Medical Association. And Kennedy himself decided to back off after receiving heavy pressure from labor leaders, who urged him to hold out for a single-payer system once Democrats recaptured the White House in the wake of the Watergate scandal.

Thirty-five year later, the single-payer dream of Democratic liberals still remains politically out of reach. But it should tell you how far the country has moved to the right that the various proposals put forward by a Democratic president and Congress bear an eerie resemblance to the deal cooked up between Kennedy and Nixon, while Nixon's political heirs vilify it as nothing less than a socialist plot."

So when a Democratic president proposes something like Nixon did it is somehow a "socialist plot".

[zipplewrath]

9. And supposedly a progressive victory.

"So when a Democratic president proposes something like Nixon did it is somehow a "socialist plot".

And it's being sold around here as some sort of progressive/democrat victory.

[elocs]

14. It sure seemed like Kennedy, in hindsight, had wished he had taken the Nixon deal.

Here it is over 35 years later and we still have not had any good HCR while we have those who would reject the current bill and maybe wait many years for something more perfect.

I think we had better take what we can get now because who knows how many more decades it would take until something more perfect comes along?

[zipplewrath]

16. I would agree except

The problem with that approach is that this bill does what no other has done. It basically encodes insurance companies into the law, and the regulatory structure. I'm actually concerned this bill could lead to GOP efforts to privatize medicare, along the line of the insurance based system this bill is creating. And by creating a regulatory structure to manage the health insurance industry, it actually will make any form of single payer even MORE difficult to create than it is now.

[Oregone]

18. Uhh. Why should Kennedy have compromised? Why shouldn't the unions of propped up Kennedy-Mills?

This is such an absurd point of contention. Why do people on the left blame Kennedy for not folding when he had quite a viable bill (that cost the exact same), but OTHERS didn't compromise and support his bill? Huh?


Kennedy DID compromise from his original pure single-payer bill anyway. Kennedy-Mills met everyone in the middle. Thats why it was called a compromise bill! Kennedy isn't at fault here, and he did the proper liberal thing

[zipplewrath]

11. This good can be done without mandates for the insurance company

If this is all folks want to do, it can be done without mandating 30+ million extra customers for the insurance industry.

[damonm]

23. Aside from single payer, how?

[NJmaverick]

12. K & R for compassion

[Dappleganger]

15. k&r

[Peacetrain]

17. Lives literally are depending on this.. K&R

[kjackson227]

20. Yep, this is sooo true.