The exact text of Obama's response to health care question today:

[Stinky The Clown]

From this link:


http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/03/obama-text-town.html

>snip<

This next question -- an area close to your heart -- health care reform. From Richard in California: "Why can we not have a universal health care system, like many European countries, where people are treated based on needs rather than financial resources?"

THE PRESIDENT: Well, first of all, I was in this room last month in what we called a health care forum. And we brought all the members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats who were interested in this issue; we brought together various constituency groups, insurance companies, drug companies, you name it. And my message to them was: Now is the time to reform the health care system -- not four years from now, not eight years from now, not 20 years from now. Now.

And the reason -- (laughter) -- the reason that I think it is so important is that the high costs of health care are a huge drag on our economy. It's a drag on our families. I can't tell you how many personal stories that I hear about people who are working, maybe have two parents working and yet still don't have health care.

And the decisions that they have to make -- excruciating decisions about whether or not somebody goes to a doctor -- it makes them less productive, it makes them less mobile in terms of being able to take new jobs or start a new business because they're worried about hanging on to their health care. So it's a drag on families.

But it's a drag on businesses, as well. There's not a small business or large business out here who hasn't seen their health care costs skyrocket, and it cuts into their profits.

And it's a drag on the federal budget and the state budgets. That's the thing that is going to potentially break the bank here in the United States. Medicare and Medicaid, if we don't get control of that, that is the biggest driver of our long-term deficits.

So when people -- when you hear this budget debate that's taking place right now, and folks say, oh, you know, President Obama's budget, he's increasing money for veterans and he's increasing money for education, and he's doing all these things that -- that's going to bust the budget, what they don't understand is, is that if you add up the recovery package that we've already passed and you add up the various proposals I have to grow the economy through clean energy and all that stuff that we're doing, that amounts to a fraction of the long-term deficit and debt that we're facing.

The lion's share of it has to do with Medicare and Medicaid and the huge, rising cost of health care. So our attitude is, better to pay now and make an investment in improving the health care system rather than waiting and finding ourselves in a situation where we can't fix it.

Now, the question is, if you're going to fix it, why not do a universal health care system like the European countries? I actually want a universal health care system; that is our goal. I think we should be able to provide health insurance to every American that they can afford and that provides them high quality.

So I think we can accomplish it. Now, whether we do it exactly the way European countries do or Canada does is a different question, because there are a variety of ways to get to universal health care coverage.

A lot of people think that in order to get universal health care, it means that you have to have what's called a single-payer system of some sort. And so Canada is the classic example: Basically, everybody pays a lot of taxes into the health care system, but if you're a Canadian, you're automatically covered. And so you go in -- England has a similar -- a variation on this same type of system. You go in and you just say, "I'm sick," and somebody treats you, and that's it.

The problem is, is that we have what's called a legacy, a set of institutions that aren't that easily transformed. Let me just see a show of hands: How many people here have health insurance through your employer? Okay, so the majority of Americans, sort of -- partly for historical accident. I won't go into -- FDR had imposed wage controls during war time in World War II. People were -- companies were trying to figure out how to attract workers. And they said, well, maybe we'll provide health care as a benefit.

And so what evolved in America was an employer-based system. It may not be the best system if we were designing it from scratch. But that's what everybody is accustomed to. That's what everybody is used to. It works for a lot of Americans. And so I don't think the best way to fix our health care system is to suddenly completely scrap what everybody is accustomed to and the vast majority of people already have. Rather, what I think we should do is to build on the system that we have and fill some of these gaps.

And I'm looking to Congress to work with me to find that optimal system. I made some proposals during the campaign about how we can lower costs through information technologies; how we can lower costs through reforms in how we reimburse doctors so that they're not getting paid just for the number of operations they're doing, but for whether they're quality outcomes; investing in prevention so that kids with asthma aren't going to the emergency room, but they're getting regular checkups.

So there are a whole host of things that we can do to cut costs, use that money that we're saving then to provide more coverage to more people. And my expectation is, is that I will have a health care bill to sign this year. That's what we're going to be fighting for. That's what we're going to be striving for.

Can I just interrupt, Jared, before you ask the next question, just to say that we -- we took votes about which questions were going to be asked and I think 3 million people voted or --

DR. BERNSTEIN: Three point five million.

THE PRESIDENT: Three point five million people voted. I have to say that there was one question that was voted on that ranked fairly high and that was whether legalizing marijuana would improve the economy -- (laughter) -- and job creation. And I don't know what this says about the online audience -- (laughter) -- but I just want -- I don't want people to think that -- this was a fairly popular question; we want to make sure that it was answered. The answer is, no, I don't think that is a good strategy -- (laughter) -- to grow our economy. (Applause.)

So -- all right.

>snip<





The above is unedited. Comments?

[mike_c]

1. cognitive disconnect and politician speak....

He lost me right here:

"I actually want a universal health care system; that is our goal. I think we should be able to provide health insurance to every American that they can afford and that provides them high quality."

He brought up apples and then makes the case for oranges. Universal INSURANCE is not the same thing as universal single payer health care. What he's proposing is just another means to preserve the profits of the massive for-profit insurance industry and their cronies, investors, and lobbyists.

He goes on to discuss "universal health care coverage." That's not what the American people want. We don't want universal coverage, in the sense of everyone having "affordable" private insurance (or even government subsidized insurance)-- we want the profit motive and the greed taken out of medical care by ELIMINATING insurance coverage altogether.

"And so what evolved in America was an employer-based system. It may not be the best system if we were designing it from scratch. But that's what everybody is accustomed to. That's what everybody is used to. It works for a lot of Americans. And so I don't think the best way to fix our health care system is to suddenly completely scrap what everybody is accustomed to..."

He makes the argument that the current system is deeply flawed, then justifies keeping it because we're all used to a system that sucks! That's unbelievably bad logic.

[phantom power]

5. Word.

You know, if we were in a situation where 95% of people had health coverage, "we're used to it" might be an argument. But the reason the issue is even on the table is because 50 million people have no health coverage.

Is he planning to ask them to "get used to it?"

[Deja Q]

7. +1

Agreed; "insurance" is not the same thing as "care".

Especially given how crooked the insurance companies have become.

Everybody could be perfectly fit, and nobody would be born with an allergy... these same leeches would find other excuses to jack up rates every year. By double digits. Nobody believes these companies anymore.

[rhett o rick]

9. I hear ya mike but. I think what he is saying is that we have a current system with deep

entrenchment of powerful corporations. It is probably impossible to make a direct switch off to single-payer.

[phantom power]

10. The thing is, that entrenchment is what requires a direct switch.

We are at the bottom of a basin of attraction. Any moderate nudge in some direction will leave us in the same basin, and soon enough we will be back at the bottom.

Only a whole-sale phase change will put us into a new stable regime.

[rhett o rick]

16. I don't disagree. HOWEVER, unless he is a dictator, I don't think he can make the switch.

The "entrenchment" has lots and lots of power.

[phantom power]

21. That may also be true.

If so, it's pretty gloomy, because I think that means any serious reform is unlikely.

What we really need is an end to the private health insurance industry. Although I don't think most citizens would mind that at all, the industry itself is one of the most politically powerful groups we have. And it does employ a lot of people.

Yeah. I don't know how to get from here to there. And yet, I don't see how to fix the system otherwise.

:(

[rhett o rick]

27. I absolutely agree with you. Personally, I don't think we will get any major reform in any

area until after the revolution. I am serious. The corporatists have all the money. They can influence media and government. Even if President Obama wants to reform, he is fighting huge money, huge corporations, large numbers of Congress people under the influence of the corporatists. I honestly believe that the corporatists will try to kill the goose (read middle class) and they will use extreme power to do so, and when it gets rough enough on the middle class, they will revolt. "Liberals arm thy selves".

[eridani]

29. Um, there is a legislative branch, right?

Get on those phones, now!

[Winterblues]

11. It is called the "Tugboat Theory"

He mentioned this in passing the other evening with his Press Conference.He said America was like a huge ocean liner and not a speed boat. It doesn't just turn on a dime. The "Tugboat Theory" states that any given large ship is to much mass to just turn on a dime. The tugboat does not try to just push against the bow of the ship to turn it. What it does is come along side and go in the same direction with the ship and gradually steer it around to a new course. I think Obama is doing the same thing here. He is staying in the same direction as we have been headed but gradually begins to steer us onto a new course. There is just too much mass to abruptly change course. The first step is to recognize we need a new course and make the first move toward getting us there. I feel Obama is getting America to realize that.

[Stinky The Clown]

14. As long as he does it within a year

If not, the outside forces will turn us back to the right .... as they ALWAYS do.

[mike_c]

22. deeply entrenched institutions often don't change that way....

More often than not, IMO, they require a radical change in DIRECTION in order to eventually arrive at a different place. Otherwise, the beneficiaries of the old policies use the time required for gradual change to undermine it.

Case in point, CAFE standards. A great number of constituencies, ranging from environmentalists to members of congress, have tried to raise fuel economy standards for American automobiles for DECADES. Under immense pressure from the beneficiaries of low fuel economy standards-- automakers and oil companies, primarily-- Congress has opted for the "tugboat approach," favoring slow, gradual change. Which doesn't happen, and the lobbyists use the time to push back the deadlines and standards, over and over and over.

On the other hand, deeply entrenched institutions like slavery and gender inequality have been addressed with radical pressure. Enduring change takes time-- and neither of those matters has been fully resolved yet-- but establishing a new direction begins society moving toward real change and takes maintenance of the status quo off the table.

[Thothmes]

36. He has obviously never watched the tugs get

a Nimitz class aircraft carrier underway from a pier.

[pacalo]

18. It was the second paragraph you highlighted that grabbed my attention.

Those who have insurance through employment would continue to do so; those who have been left blowing in the wind due to job loss or some other circumstances would get whatever new health care program instituted by congress.

Two concerns about this patchwork idea:

-- Employers who do provide health care benefits are steadily shifting costs to the employees, & small businesses either won't provide benefits or deeply resent the costs. Employers clearly resent having to pay for insurance. Relieving them of that burden might prevent some offshoring of jobs. Having a dual health care system could cause additional resentment by employers & cause even more businesses to bail out to other countries.

-- The federal health care program vs. employee benefits will divide health care recipients into two "classes" of society, imo.

I'd like to have one uniform system that would not distinguish between circumstances -- wealthy & poor alike, having the same system.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

24. My taxes fund unlimited wars and failed companies that screw me up one way and then down the other

but my taxes cannot underwrite a government system of healthcare like England, Canada, France, the Scadanavian countries?

Because "we are used to a shit system"???!!!! (My paraphrase)

I don't think so!

[annabanana]

26. yeah... he switched out "healthcare" for "coverage"... : (. . .n/t

[lazyriver]

31. I was saddened to hear the President who rode a campaign of

change into the Whitehouse speak of keeping a bad system in place because of "legacy". Depressing.

[inna]

33. EXACTLY! great post, thanks! NT

[phantom power]

2. "That's what everybody is used to. It works for a lot of Americans."

I was hoping he'd scrap it.

[eridani]

30. You betcha it does. It works just great for those .Americans who never get expensively sick

Those are the people who don't know squat about how good their insurance is, for the same reason that they have no idea how good their local fire department is.

[Lars39]

3. I am not interested in protecting the legacy of insurance companies.

Fuck that. Sounds like we're going to keep what we've got and have a gawdawful hodgepodge of programs that won't come anywhere close to giving adequate healthcare at low costs. :grr:

[tbyg52]

12. I am not either,

but realistically they are huge entities with huge power (that has to be taken away from them, eventually). They're not going to be shut down overnight, much as I would love that.

On the other hand, I can say that I for one would jump at the chance to leave my employer's health care plan for the equivalent of what our elected officials have, so if others think as I do, the insurance companies would bleed to death. One can hope.

[Cleita]

4. In order for Medicare and Medicaid to not be a drag on the system, it's

necessary to get the parasitical insurance and HMO health care providers out of the system and to use those dollars for Medicare for everyone. Medicare can deliver quality healthcare for everyone for half of what it is costing per capita today if they are eliminated from the system.

[Deja Q]

6. K&R

[msongs]

8. hey Obama, we had a "legacy" called slavery once too ....

so when you say "The problem is, is that we have what's called a legacy, a set of institutions that aren't that easily transformed", you know from your history that you CAN change things even though your corporate friends don't want you to.

Msongs

[SammyWinstonJack]

32. .

:thumbsup:

[earth mom]

13. In Michael Moore's film Sicko, he shows that Medical Insurance was put in place by Nixon.

So basically, the system that we now have was created by a crook in order for private insurance companies-aka crooks-to profit off of peoples misery.

Those companies have only served to fuck up this countries medical system and it's time for them to get the fuck out.

If Obama was the liberal people say he is, he would stop protecting the vultures in the insurance industry.

However, the writing was on the wall when Obama didn't make Howard Dean head of Health and Human Services.

Actions speak louder than words as they say.

[MadBadger]

15. Where is he saying that single-payer is a bad idea because of taxes?

I dont quite see that in his quote.

btw, not saying you said that he did, just from another thread.

[Stinky The Clown]

17. Then take it back to that thread?

Your post makes it sound like I said/suggested that here.

[MadBadger]

19. I did, and I posted here as well to see what you thought of this.

[Stinky The Clown]

20. What I think is that he didn't say that ...... exactly

I do think his answer was a great non-answer.

A new form of word salad, in many ways. An attempt to have it both ways. A parsing of it could give any reply one wishes to hear.

And therein is the pity. No clarity usually means no support ... but even that is an assumption.

[xxqqqzme]

23. After listening to Dr. Dean last night

I am absolutely convinced the only way we are going to get single payer is if WE make it so. The entire system is gamed against single payer and almost all politicians are in debt to the insurance lobby. We have an incredible up hill battle to get it. The grassroots is the ONLY way we have gotten any progress in the past. It has paid off regionally/locally but this is the big one - federal. WE are going to have to demand it. We will need to be loud and rude about it because otherwise we will be ignored.

I'm getting pissed off about this. I was able to provide health coverage for my kids until they left college. Now they have jobs, thankfully, but those jobs provide no coverage or in my daughters case, the cost in nearly prohibitive so she carries a large co-pay. It is an outrage. My son & his wife want to start a family but no health insurance so they are delaying it.

Single payer has to be a demand from the grassroots or it will not happen again for at least another generation.

[depakid]

25. Canadian Medicare and the British NHS are completely different systems

The NHS is like the VA; the government owns the facilities, equipment and employs the health care professionals.

Canadian Medicare is a single payer basic benefits program where where the providers are private business entities.

The only similarities are that both have one risk pool- as opposed to many, which creates administrative inefficiencies and promotes adverse selection and both can manage costs and treatments in an accountable manner.

[smalll]

28. WOW. Just wow.

The absolute worst of it:

"The problem is, is that we have what's called a legacy, a set of institutions that aren't that easily transformed. (Yes, a set of institutions known as "insurance" companies.) Let me just see a show of hands: How many people here have health insurance through your employer? Okay, so the majority of Americans, sort of -- partly for historical accident ... And so what evolved in America was an employer-based system. It may not be the best system if we were designing it from scratch. But that's what everybody is accustomed to. That's what everybody is used to..."

So we have to keep employer-based health care because that's what we have?!? :wtf:



Whatever happened to, um,

CHANGE?

:wtf:

Remember "Change?"

[Fireweed247]

34. Maybe he is asking the wrong people?

"And we brought all the members of Congress, Republicans and Democrats who were interested in this issue; we brought together various constituency groups, insurance companies, drug companies, you name it." :grr:

[area51]

35. Kick. (n/t)