Sebelius Indicates Willingness To Compromise On Public Plan, Offers Support For Co-Op Proposal

[madfloridian]

Run time: 02:15 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0a_-mTZ104   Posted on YouTube: June 29, 2009 By YouTube Member: fshakir1 Views on YouTube: 367   Posted on DU: June 29, 2009 By DU Member: madfloridian Views on DU: 954

 
Think Progress covers this thoroughly.

Sebelius Indicates Willingness To Compromise On Public Plan, Offers Support For Co-Op Proposal

In an emailed statement to Bloomberg News, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said she’s open to the idea of dropping a public health insurance option in favor of a medical-insurance cooperative. “You could theoretically design a co-op plan that had the same attributes as a public plan,” Sebelius said.

The leading co-op proposal in the Senate, offered by Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND), does not share the attributes of a public plan. Instead, Conrad’s proposal would create multiple state or regional non-profits as a competitor to the private insurance market. As Howard Dean has said of this plan: “The co-ops are too small to compete with the big, private insurance companies. They will kill the co-ops completely by undercutting them, using their financial clout to do it.”

Bloomberg’s Al Hunt asked Sebelius, “ you’re willing to compromise on your notion of a public plan…what’s non-negotiable?” Sebelius responded that the final bill has to “have a comprehensive approach that lowers costs. That’s non-negotiable.” She added reform also “needs to provide coverage for everyone.” Watch it.

The power players in this administration have no intention of pushing a government-run public option. They will compromise away the majority we worked our butts off to get.

[Cant trust em]

1. That was a successful non-answer. nt

[madfloridian]

2. Indeed it was.

For two decades our Democrats in high places have been quite good at those non-answers.

We fought for this majority, and it angers me when they act like we don't have one.

[Cant trust em]

7. The administration has been very cagey in public

I wonder what's been going on behind the scenes. This might just be a media strategy, but I'm not surprised why a lot of the people on this board are suspicious.

[ihavenobias]

15. Amen. n/t

[sisters6]

3. Slowly but surely, any meaningful "reform" crumbles.

[DaLittle Kitty]

21. Bought And Paid For Former INSURANCE Commish! NOOOO To Co-Op BS!

Trying to SOFTEN ground... errr da public for BULLSHIT CO-OP PROP! Fuck 'em!

[Triana]

4. WHY?

I'd like to hear her answer to that. And NOT the pretentious, lying one.

[Hulk]

5. Hold your horses Tex....

I'm still giving them the benefit of the doubt. If you say you are definitely NOT going to give up on the single payer public option, you have virtually closed discussion with the repukes and a handful of whimpy-democrats as well.

Better to give a "non answer" than to be cornered on this one. I'll wait till I see what they come up with. Congress KNOWS what we need. Congress also knows who is free to make a choice on what's best for America and who is locked into paying off their contributors. It will all be crystal clear when the vote comes down and the bill comes to light.

I'm holding my horses until I see what it is and who supports it. If it doesn't have "single payer health care" as an option. I'll be just as upset as the rest of you.

This game of "politics" is a slippery, sleazy slope. A "non-answer" is better than saying something you regret later. We have a tendency to bring every quote back to life, so I don't blame her "non-answer" line.

[madfloridian]

6. I disagree.

I think it is time now to stop giving non-answers, stop being so politically safe...and stand for something.

[shadowknows69]

8. Funny, I thought we elected an administration who was going to stand up to special interests

Not try to fluster them with "non-answers"

[RBInMaine]

9. There will be no single payer plan. However, there is much hope for:

1) A public option competitor.

2) A co-op plan with a trigger date for a public option along with removal of portability limitations and refusal to insure due to pre-existing conditions. It would also place more regulations regarding affordability.

* Don't hold out for single payer. My hope is public option. But even short of that, if can get #2 above, that would be real progress given that SOMETHING is better than nothing. That's politics friends. Yup, it's messy. That's life.

[avaistheone1]

10. No thank you.

I don't want a trigger date for the public option.

The trigger date is now. Their is a desperate need for affordable health care now. How long are the Democrats going to drag their feet on this?

They are an embarrassment. They have all the power, yet they are handing it over to the lobbyists.

[madfloridian]

11. No trigger option. That means it will never happen.

We don't need to cave in.

We have the majority we worked hard to get.

We don't need to cave.

No, that is not how life should be.

[JDPriestly]

16. We had nonprofits. The for profits cannabilized them.

I saw that from the legal side. Blue Cross and Blue Shield were, for example, nonprofits.

Big money bought the nonprofits out and found clever ways to use the charitable funds in their treasuries for for profit purposes. Attorney generals is some states required the for profits to form nonprofits and provide affordable or free services to the poor and various other things in order to make up for what was in fact the taking of nonprofit, tax exempt money for for profit purposes. There is a lot of history on that. But you would probably have to look in places you are not allowed to look to find it.

Co-ops and nonprofits will meet the same fate in the future that they met when the for profits bought them out. Mark my words. You read this here. Based on the past history of the health care industry, without a strong, viable public option, private healthcare will take over and millions of Americans will be without affordable healthcare in not such a long time.

President Obama should not give in on the public option. This is one point he cannot compromise. If he does compromise, his legacy will be that of a weak man who talked strong but could not deliver on much of anything.

[pattmarty]

25. AND, his party will lose seats in 2010 and he will LOSE the presidency in 2012.

We're hearing all this bullshit talk of lines in the sand and such, if a watered down "no change" plan is passed or none at all (I would rather have no change than something that will probably be worse) Obama and the Dems will be fucked. Health insurance was their main selling point that all the other "change" was hinged to. We push for single payer, and "settle" for a good solid "public option". That is the way I see it, and anything less we may as well give up all and move to Canada.

[ooglymoogly]

20. Its called being bought...Dean has strongly stated that a co op

is a non starter and a cop out and it will be a failure and that there must be a public option. We have to keep the pressure up and not accept obfuscation to cover for non action. 76% of the population has to stand for something or we are not living in a democracy....said he with a straight face.

[DaLittle Kitty]

22. Just Say NOOO To All The BullShit! They Are ALLL SHILLS FOR CORP AMERICA! OWNED!!!

WE ARE FUCKED!

[PassingFair]

13. WTF?

The correct negotiating tactic
would be to come out strong for
single payer and SETTLE for a
public option.

Hold your OWN horses....
if we wimp out on public
option, there will be no
reform.

We will be beating DEAD horses.

[quidam56]

12. How many more will have to die ?

As a former health care giver and after seeing what is deemed, defended and supported as "the acceptable standards of health care" in Tennessee and Virginia I support public option. http://www.wisecountyissues.com/?p=62 Clearly profit care comes ahead of patient care.

[JDPriestly]

14. Face it! President Obama, for all his charm, is weak.

President
Obama promised his wife he would quit smoking; he promised us he would change the way business is done in D.C. He has broken both promises. He simply does not have the strength of character to keep his promises.

Please don't understand what I am about to say as a pitch against smoking. That's not the point. But when a person makes a decision to do something difficult, if a smoker such as President Obama decides to stop smoking, an overweight person decides to lose weight, a person who is unhappy in his or her work decides to go back to school or to get a different job or a person who is afraid of water decides to learn to swim, carrying through on that decision is a test of personal discipline. It takes strength and a strong character. I'm not talking about people who don't decide to do those things. That's a different matter. I'm talking about people such as President Obama who do decide to change themselves or the situation around themselves.

I realize that Obama has a hurdle to face in terms of dealing with Congress. But anyone who has ever made a drastic change in their own life knows that there is only one way to overcome hurdles to change. And that is to insist on change. It requires strongly condemning those habits or customs or ways of life, whether in oneself or in others, that stand in the way of change. President Obama makes excuses. He blames his inability to really change things on the stress of his work or on members of Congress.

The truth is that President Obama has been unwilling confront and change his own habits, and has also been unwilling to confront the obstructionist habits and ways in D.C. He just doesn't have the strength. He is not committed enough. At least you can say that he is pretty consistent -- consistent about not performing when it comes to achieving change in his own life and in D.C. I think that it is because he is a go-along-to-get-along type of person. Being comfortable is more important to him than doing what he knows is right.

Look to Martin Luther King if you want to see someone who knew how to change things. President Obama's speeches may sound a lot like Martin Luther King's, but, so far, President Obama has not shown Martin Luther King's willingness to confront the obstacles to change. Martin Luther King achieved a lot more with his marches than President Obama is even trying to achieve in the White House.

We shall not be moved. We shall not be moved. President Obama, when you face hurdles, sing that song inside yourself. Shame on you for being so weak. Shame on you for giving in. Shame on you for not standing your ground.

We have a government of three branches. Certainly, President Obama must work with the legislature. But it's part of the president's job to propose bills to Congress. It's part of the president's job to veto and threaten to veto bills -- not just the bills HE doesn't want passed. President Obama has more power to obstruct the passage of bills that special interests that oppose him want passed than they have to obstruct his. The president can choose to actually spend certain funds and not spend others. The president has a lot of power. President Obama is not using the legitimate power that he has -- at least not to effect change. It is pitiful.

[KoKo]

17. Like Clinton before him...there was much promise and the "follow through"

was compromised. I doubt there's any Dem President who can ever bring forth change by ramming it through. We have a fractured Dem Party and and a House and Senate with many who are "bought and paid for." It wasn't always such a dominance when we had a "rural agricultural America" you could get some strong outliers...and the lobbyists weren't there...just special interests.

Now the lobbyists are all powerful and those are the constituents of the House/Senate and our Presidents...(our Dem Presidents get the fall out the worse because of raised expectations for "change" which is what they all run on and don't deliver).

It's what it is. Things will have to get close to collapse before there's any "real" change. And, then we might fear what the change would be, in the wrong hands. But, then...What Hands...would be safe given a collapse?



I know...it's hard times...with all this ..when so many worked for so long for better...

[nightrain]

18. yep. these Dems will water down

any healthcare change until it will slide under the door and be f***ing meaningless.

Bunch of scaredy cats.

[DuaneBidoux]

19. What the hell did we elect these people for if they're going to act just like Republicans?

[Enthusiast]

23. Entirely predictable.

The banks, the insurance industry, the energy suppliers, the military industrial complex and the pharmaceutical industries completely control the legislative process. Tell me differently, I need a laugh.

[creeksneakers2]

24. No public option

No deal!