The Health Insurance Reform Bill is a monstrously bad bill
A good segment of the population have hoped that the health care reform process would do something about the three major problems of health care, spiraling out of control costs, lack of availability of insurance to much of the population, and a bureaucratic indifference that seems to have permeated the health care field.
There was a good deal of hope originally for ordinary people who needed health care at a fair price. The hope was that health reforms would expand the availability of health insurance to some of the uninsured and do something to control price increases and some growing issues like a shortage of primary care providers.
But, then we looked at a bill that was the product of dozens of compromises and actually ends up spinning its wheels in place. The bill is being touted as increasing insurance availability to 30
million uninsured, but experts say we are actually likely to see an increase in the number of uninsured fashion forcing many Americans to drop their present coverage. Premiums, deductibles, and co-payments will continue to soar, even though we initially believed that these controls were the purpose of the reform. Ther are no guarantees that the uninsured will be able to afford new private coverage even with the promised subsidies, which will be more than three years down the road. as the expansion of Medicaid will not take place until 2013 and many states are already pushing back with concerns that the their recession-strained budgets will not allow them to pay their share in adding to their Medicaid programs, potentially leaving millions of the poorest Americans uninsured.
The bill has no cost containment mechanisms for the costs of health insurance or for health care itself. In fact the insurance industy is warning that sharp premium increases will result, and these are likely to come quickly.
The bill will set up a Health Benefits Advisory Committee to recommend a minimal essential benefits package that includes four tiers, insurance industry lobbyists will argue for the most minimal levels of coverage, and we can anticipate an huge number of people who are underinsured.
The public option has been debated a great deal in the news, but as presently constituted it will have a minimal and a negligible role in health care reform. The Congressional Budget Office concluded it would cover only about 6 million people, which will be a very small segment of the population. By 2013, the public option will cost more than private programs, mostly due to covering sicker individuals and its inability to set reimbursement rates for physicians and hospitals as is done by Medicare. Moreover, middle-income families may be required to spend 15 to 18 percent of their income on insurance premiums and co-payments.
The mega 1 trillon dollar health care bill is a potential disaster that all Americans should fear. It appearrs likely to escalate costs, limit availability of care, and do essentially all the things the political leaders promised to protect us from.
More cost, less coverage, higher taxes, and a bigger burden on employers appear to be in the works.
Watch the video related to health care reform bill
December 30, 2008 3:12 am 
By TomStar81, December 30, 2008 @ 4:33 am
Yes you are talking about TORT reform. the Democrats do not want to touch the Lawyers. it seems the Lawyers are in the democrats pocket.*
By Tracy Turnblad, December 30, 2008 @ 4:38 am
First of all, Obama wants to make insurance more available to all and change the system so that it is cheaper. He also wants change so that the insurance companies find it harder to get out of paying for treatment. The system he is proposing looks similar to that which works in Holland and Switzerland where private companies are involved in providing insurance.
Second, of course universal health-cover sucks. That is why we in Western Europe have it. We think, hmm, our healthcare system sucks. I know, lets keep it. I guess that is the same with Japan and Canada as well.
Third, Obama campaigned on reforming the healthcare system. He said he wanted to make insurance more available and he was elected by the American people to do this.
FACT – the US has higher death rates for kids both for kids aged under one and those under five than western European countries with universal health coverage.
FACT – American insurance companies push up prices and work to stop paying out claims on those they cover.
FACT – the USA spends more on healthcare PER PERSON than any other nation on the planet.
That means that a dead American four year old would have had a better chance of life if they were born in Canada, France, Cuba, Germany, Japan etc, all of which have universal health coverage.
Last of all if you do not like the policies that Obama was elected to bring in, he can always be voted out of office in 2012.
By The Conservative Resistance, January 1, 2009 @ 2:17 pm
Under any Democrat President in history, the same M.O. emerges.
The Democrats "identify" a "crisis" and whip the people up into a frenzy about it. They proclaim themselves the carriers of the elixir that will heroically save all mankind from this "crisis.'' When Republicans seek to oppose the spending it will take for this elixir, they are automatically called hate mongers and obstructionists.
Clinton tried it with school lunch menus. He whipped that whole thing into some kind of "crisis." The Democrats wanted to raise the program by 10% and the Republicans wanted to raise it by 7%. That got reported in the media as a 3% CUT by Republicans. Only when a Democrat is President could an INCREASE be reported as a CUT. Just to make Republicans look bad, but too many people buy into the bullshit.
Al Gore, who wasn't even President, tried it with global warming and it didn't work. Today, it's health care. What'll it be tomorrow? The whole "world is ending in 2012" thing, or what?
By Short, Fast, and Loud, January 1, 2009 @ 3:24 pm
Obama does not have a bill. He has only given guidelines to what he wants. His last address made it more specific.
The bills in congress are not healthcare bills. They are health coverage bills. The government is trying to take control of a large portion of our economy. They are trying to make it so the government is a single payer source (I know i will get thumbs down for this, but follow hr3200 to its logical conclusion).
The current bills want to cover everybody in the US (Illegals too, there is nothing in these bills to prevent illegals from being covered. Amendments to ensure citizenship were tabled)
The federal government wants to punish you for not having insurance (they will get your money one way or another)
The government wants to regulate what care you will get. (When the system becomes overblaoted as any government system does, they will have 2 options increase taxes or ration care)
I know that there are a lot of people that will disagree with this. If they actually read the bills, and follow to there logical conclusions, in 10 years we will be a whole lot worse of than we are now. So doing nothing would actually be cheaper.
Reform must actually deal with the underlaying problems. HR 320o does not. Obama gave lip service to 1 of them.
By skinnyblink7, January 1, 2009 @ 7:36 pm
the new york times has an interactive feature which is actually very clear to understand. check it out.