House Republicans Off and Running On Healthcare Repeal

6 Responses to House Republicans Off and Running On Healthcare Repeal

1. Quentin Colgan says:

   Monday, January 3, 2011 at 8:21 pm

   So, they will work to undo a law that was just done. A law the REAL polls say 65% of Americans want. Meanwhile things that need to be done won’t get done, because they’ll be working on this.
   Since no bills can become law without the president’s signature–and there are not enough votes to override a veto, AND Obama will veto it IF it even passed.
   WHY is this new “responsive” Congress wasting time and money on this?

   Reply
2. Tina says:

   Monday, January 3, 2011 at 10:16 pm

   Oh yeah…the REAL polls…jeez I forgot, the others are only the fake polls representing all of the fake people.

   I thought for awhile you had something to teach us…now Im not so sure. Lets leave polling aside and just look at what some very smart people in a position to have some insite are saying:

   http://www.gastro.org/journals-publications/aga-edigest/2010/policy/happy-holidays-what-do-you-think-of-obamacare

   American Gastroenterology Association

   As you prepare to gather with family and friends this holiday season, you may be expecting questions about health-care reform and your thoughts on the legislation as a health-care professional. As a practicing gastroenterologist, John Allen, MD, MBA, AGAF, AGA Institute community private practice councillor, has spent a lot of time thinking about the effects of health-care reform and the four overarching trends that concern him the most: cost, chaos, consolidation and cooperation.

   Read Dr. Allen’s thought-provoking new post on the AGA Washington Insider, a policy blog for GIs, about his concerns for gastroenterology practices built over a generation ago that are now disappearing, and why he fears this trend will accelerate in the next few years and patients will lose cherished options.

   http://www.heartland.org/healthpolicy-news.org/

   Physician hospital organizations are firing back at President Obamas health care law in the press and the courts, seeking a repeal of what they argue are exclusionary and unconstitutional restrictions.

   Section 6001 of the health care law effectively bans new physician-owned hospitals (POHs) from starting up, and it keeps existing ones from expanding. It has already halted the development of 24 new physician-owned hospitals and forced an additional 47 to struggle to meet the deadline to complete construction, according to the Physician Hospitals of America (PHA).

   PHA and the Texas Spine and Joint Hospital (TSJH) filed suit against U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in June. Pretrial arguments have been completed, … (read more)

   http://www.heartland.org/healthpolicy-news.org/article/27716/Federal_Health_Care_Legislation_Adds_to_Push_for_Medical_Tourism.html

   David Boucher, president of Companion Global Health Care, saysNow that the health care reform bill has passed, we expect more employers to seriously consider medical tourism, for several reasons, said Boucher. One impact of the national reform law is that more doctors are going to be giving up their private practices.

   In 2008, 28 percent of Medicare beneficiaries looking for a primary care doctor had trouble finding one. Think about what thats going to look like in a few years, considering that the number of doctors participating in Medicare has been dropping since 1990s, he added.

   According to Boucher, Medicare recipients are eventually going to find it much easier and faster to get treatment outside the country as hospitals drop their coverage of such patients.

   This trend is becoming evident in surprising ways, Boucher said. The Mayo Clinic was named as the number one United State hospital in 2009, and just thirty days later they announced that they would be opting out of the Medicare program.

   http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11993

   Since he signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act a bit more than 100 days ago, the president has given a number of speeches and interviews in which he continues to say things that, well, just aren’t so. Just last Friday, he told MSNBC’s Chuck Todd that the law “not only makes sure everybody has access to coverage but is reducing costs.”

   Wrong on both counts.

   The bill doesn’t come close to giving “everybody” access to coverage. According to the Congressional Budget Office, 10 years from now there will still be at least 21 million uninsured Americans. That’s an improvement over today, but it’s a far cry from the universal coverage that Obama once promised.

   And nearly half of the newly covered aren’t getting access to true health insurance but are being added to the Medicaid program, with all of its attendant problems of access and quality.

   Indeed, access to health care may be about to get harder. The RAND Corporation reports that the new law may result in severe overcrowding and longer waits in emergency rooms.

   Meanwhile, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services warn that some of the mandated cuts in Medicare could result in the closing of up to 15 percent of US hospitals.

   Even further from reality is the president’s continued insistence that the new law is “reducing costs.” In fact, the administration’s own chief health-care actuary reports that the law will actually raise US health-care spending by $311 billion over 10 years. This failure to control costs means that the law will add significantly to the already crushing burden of government spending, taxes and debt.

   Accurately measured, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will cost more than $2.7 trillion over its first 10 years of full operation and add more than $352 billion to the national debt. This doesn’t even include more than $4.3 trillion in costs shifted to businesses, individuals and state governments.

   Anyone who thinks that their insurance premiums will be going down in the foreseeable future is going to be disappointed. The law does nothing to restrain the growth in insurance costs. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office says that premiums will double over the next six years, roughly the same rate of increase as would have occurred without health-care reform.

   Some workers can actually expect higher premiums. For example, according to RAND, younger and healthier Americans could see a rise of 17 percent. And the CBO says that workers who buy insurance on their own, rather than getting it via an employer, could see their premiums rise 13 percent faster than if the legislation had never passed.

   People in America read these cautions and realize the law does not deliver and is extremely expensive and harmful to the field of medicinewe reject this badly written law and will continue to demand repeal and real reforms for our medical system.

   “WHY is this new “responsive” Congress wasting time and money on this?”

   Let’s see…following through on a promise & doing what they said they would do…allowing a normal congressional process to take place & debating the issue, especially since it never really got debated first time around…giving ALL Americans, even the fake ones a chance to hear about the down side and an opportunity to decide for REAL whether this bill makes sense for America…just to pi** smug guys like you off?

   Take your pick. Passing a bill so you can find out what’s in it is pretty stupid. Passing a bill that adds trillions to an already out of this world debt was pretty stupid also. Passing a bill that raises costs for government AND in the rpivate sector solves NOTHING. Passing a bill that runs medical people out of the business and discourages new doctors and hospitals is stupid.

   Republicans may not be able to get this done but in DC anything can happen…just look at what we got in 2008! A bunch of extremist progressives who write laws in secret and bribe and threaten lawmakers to get it passed. I think we can do better than that no matter how it turns out.

   Reply
3. Joe Shaw says:

   Tuesday, January 4, 2011 at 11:36 am

   Quentin, It’s because half of what congress does these days is just for the sake of posturing and getting their positions on record. Personally, I wouldn’t care if this health care bill did get repealed, but not for the reasons the republicans want it repealed. I think the whole thing is a big gift to the insurance companies. Without a public option, any kind of health care bill is just going to be more smoke and mirrors. We need the public option to get insurance companies back in line. However, we also need tort reform as well as the option to buy drugs from out of the country. I haven’t heard a good argument yet from the republicans as to why the public option is a bad thing. “Death panels” and “A government official making decisions about my health” don’t cut it. They both sound like something that came out of a right wing think tank.

   Reply
4. Chris says:

   Wednesday, January 5, 2011 at 9:51 am

   “Lets leave polling aside”

   Why? One of the most common Tea Party arguments against the ACA was that the majority of Americans were against it, and that by passing it Congress was ignoring the will of the people. Now that polling shows this isn’t true, you want to ignore it?

   Reply
5. Tina says:

   Friday, January 7, 2011 at 8:24 pm

   Chris I was talking about this discussion…not forever, LOL. I could have cited a number of polls that had the exact opposite result showing Americans are in favor of repeal. That would lead to one of those , “no you’re a big doo doo” arguments and I was attempting to raise the level of discussion.

   By the way mmy own premiums have gone up and from what I heard in the news today they may go up even further in the next two months. My insurance costs were high before but having them go up in this lousy economy is especially lousy. That is not what Obama, Reid and Pelosi promised. Doctors are beginning to say they will refuse to take certain patients or will choose to retire early…that isn’t a very encouraging sign either. What if this is just a very badly written law? If thats the case shouldn’t we rid ourselves of it and start over? There were definite things that needed to be addressed and should have been addressed. This trio of Marxists chose instead to overreach…a very big mistake! Instead of being praised for fixing the problems that existed many of them lost their jobs doing damage to the industry and creating problems for people, business, and the healthcare industry.

   Reply
6. Tina says:

   Friday, January 7, 2011 at 8:53 pm

   Joe: “I think the whole thing is a big gift to the insurance companies.”

   There may be a few that got in bed with the central planners Reid, Pelosi and Obama, but they are finding out now the law was written in such a way it will screw them…just as planned. BIG GOVERNMENT HEALTHCARE was the plan all along. A public option would have the same result.

   If you want less expensive healthcare and HC insurance we need to get government out of the business! Look at the way the cost has gone up since 1965 when the government gave birth to Medicare. Verticle lines on the chart tell the tale. Competition, and the public paying it’s own bills, would make the insurance companies, hospitals, pharmaceuticals and the docs answerable to individual.

   Cato has a very good article:

   http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa211.html

   Hoover Institution has another:

   http://www.hoover.org/publications/hoover-digest/article/7298

   Heritage has an excellent article on fixing the government programs currently in existence:

   http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2008/03/a-guide-to-fixing-social-security-medicare-and-medicaid

   Reply