The glacially slow roll out of the PO gives its opponents YEARS to demonize and kill it it

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

before it even gets off the ground.

Truth has never been a barrier for these folks. I can see no reason that the roll out should be delayed until 2013. Do we really want to go through 3 YEARS and a general election listening to Fox and Rush and the RNC and the Republicans MAKING UP SHIT about what the Public Option will and won't do?

We can mobilize and go to war on a dime. That is the same urgency with which we MUST implement healthcare reform.

[emulatorloo]

1. It aint over yet. Call Sens and Reps -- implement sooner n/t

[Fumesucker]

2. TARP: Proposed on Sept 19, 2008, enacted Oct 3, 2008

That's all you need to know about how important health care is to our overlords..

[AndyA]

3. +1. Actions speak louder than words.

How many American taxpayers will die during this time, waiting for access to affordable health care?

Our Congress is not looking out after their constituents, quite obviously. We need to make some major changes to seats in Congress, and get some people in there who remember who they work for. The current bunch is MOSTLY CORRUPT.

[KharmaTrain]

4. The Health Care Horse Is Out Of The Barn...

Repealing a program of this size is next to impossible. The GOOP has tried for nearly 70 years to kill Social Security and over 40 to do in Medicare. As you see, they've done a fine job. A couple years ago when boooshie thought about privitizing SSI he couldn't get it out of the talking stages...and that was with majorities in both houses.

There's a good reasons the healthcare industry is pouring so much money to kill it now...cause once a system is put in place and millions rely on it as their prime health insurance, it'd be political suicide to try to dismantle the program.

They reported last night that it took over a year to get Medicare up and rolling and that is with a far smaller "pool" than what the Public Option program entails. The first people who should be covered are those with no coverage...and according to reports that could happen within a year of the bill's passage.

By the time 2013 rolls around the entire system should be up and rolling to handle any and all who choose a public OPTION rather than being stuck with their current plans. There are also millions of self-insured who will be joining the system...a gradual roll in. Thus those who are in the greatest need will be the first in line and that the system will grow to cover more and put more and more pressure on the insuarnce companies to lower their costs or be outpriced.

As we're seeing the GOOP is having little impact on this process now...all their blowhards can scream and throw tantrums but they do so at their peril. They have no alternative other than the status quo...and will have to campaign next year on if they were in favor or against what is sure to be a very popular move by the Democrats.

[ipaint]

5. Medicare was not rolled out to a tiny fraction of the population over 65

when it began. It was rolled out to the entire population it was designed to cover from day one. It was not put into direct competition with cut throat giant for profit ins. corporations.
Within 1 year almost the entire group of over 65 year old were enrolled. Medicare worked because it wasn't rolled out like this so called puny public option will be.

This public option was crafted specifically for insurance companies by insurance companies. The plans were started for this over 2 years ago by ahip. The money flowing into congress merely sealed the deal. Anyone who thinks this "option" will be strengthened is naive and grossly underestimates our opponent.

Makes for great david and goliath theatre, though.

[Fumesucker]

6. +1

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

7. Since they are already calling the PO Medicare Part E (which is BRILLIANT)

why NOT start enrolling it's intended participants immediately into the exisiting Medicare system even if only as an interim fix?

[KharmaTrain]

8. So If They "Crafted It" Why Are They Spending So Much To Kill It...

Sorry, healthcare reform wasn't designed to put insurance companies out of business. It was to create competition to drive prices down...use the market to bring some sanity and pressure on the middlemen to stop playing god with the healthcare of a majority of American...to offer an alternative.

In 1965 Medicare covered far less people than it does today (population increases) and has had to be "fixed" over the years as more people entered the system. It will have to be "fixed" again in the next couple years as many of us "boomers" start to collect and there are more people using the system than funding it.

So now how do the insurance company's benefit from losing their monopoly on healthcare? If AHIP was so potent, any healthcare reform would have been dead by now...just like what happened to Hillarycare in '93. That program never made it to this stage.

So would you prefer no reform at all? For millions of uninsured, they will be able to start enrolling in the public program within the next year...then comes those who are self insured and then open to all who will surely move from the private to public insurers unless the rates come down.

Yep, we are seeing great theater throughout this debate...from those who want more than insurance reform...and it's not gonna happen now. For those who crave single payer, public option puts the mechanisms in place and IMHO, I see it as a end result of a successful public option program. Also there are those who will still want to remain with their insurance policies or will want to get a supplemental program that covers what the public program doesn't.

Again...this game is far from over...we'll see what ammendments are proposed in the weeks ahead to fine tune a final bill. Yep it is theater...but that's how our government has always worked. It's not being naive, it's knowing how bills are made. So many here want rule by fiat...yet this was what many of us worked hard during the boooosh years to avoid. President Obama has let the leglislative do what the Constitution envisioned...they propose the legislation. I know it takes some adjusting...

[ipaint]

9. If you believe in the fairy tale that they are losing their monopoly to a faux public option

that may cover up to a measly 10 million of the population in ten years there is nothing I can say to convince you otherwise. States will be able to opt out after year one. How many will be in the public option after a year nationally a million maybe 1.5 if we are lucky. It won't be hard to option out of that especially when there are absolutely no cost controls and that small a percentage of the population will have no ability to cause a drop in for profit ins. prices.
I'm sure AHIP is already working on the rollout of their "public option" via lobbyists and lawyers in all 50 states.

This is the insurance company's public option. The only real protest to be heard from them is when the bloggers on the left mobilized for a true public option, medicare for all who choose it, you can see how far that proposal went.

AHIP understands that something needs to be done to make ins. affordable. Notice that something does not include them giving up much of anything. They know they can get around denying for pre existing conditions with no price controls. They know they can get around folks not being able to afford their lousy product with taxpayer subsidies which we all pay for anyway. Clever. They know 10 million insured in ten years means there is no "public" in the option.
And they know folks are so desperate they will convince themselves they have a chance to "reform" the reform once it's in place. That will never happen without campaign finance reform.

If we had a congress full of wydens and graysons maybe, but then we wouldn't have ended up with an industry crafted bill which preserves all profit, waste and shareholder investments in addition to giving the insurance giants a steady supply of mandated victims.

And no our government has not always worked that way which is why medicare exists and why before the mid 1980's, without a mandate, insurance companies did not cherrypick en masse, policies were affordably priced for individuals and businesses and people got the health care they needed.

[KharmaTrain]

13. Again...AHIP Wanted To Kill Any Reform...

If they had their way, we'd be talking about the failed Obamacare program just like the corporate media did with Hillarycare.

I haven't seen any bill that allows insurance companies to "cherry pick"...if anything, it forces them to be more inclusive or lose any business. Again, I'm not in favor of trading one gatekeeper for another...I'll gladly pay more taxes to provide the funding to help those who aren't insured to get the basic care they need, but I also want the option to decide which plan...public or private offers the best prices and services. As has been the case throughout this debate...lots of misinformation is pouring from all sides...conjecture rather than real facts...especially since there is no final draft...with heavy negotiations still to come. It still amazes me how little people here know how the legislative process works and how best to affect that process.

"If we had a Congres full of Wydens and Graysons"...we don't....we have 535 people representing a wide variety of constituents and, yes, corporate interests. Sucks that it is, but if you want more Wydens and Graysons (and I have no problem with that)...work to get them elected.

[ipaint]

14. Your "no one knows" meme has been rolled out at every step yet

at every step it is working exactly as the insurance companies planned way back in 2007. And exactly as those of us who know what the ins. companies are up to believed it would.

Like I said the theory of a public option is now a religion, a belief, a hope, the actual nuts and bolts PO has been co-opted by the ins. companies in order to manipulate the public. That is their MO.

There is nothing I can say to change the minds of folks who believe in the future magical powers of a the public option label that has been slapped on an industry crafted bill. Time will tell as it has in the past with nafta, welfare reform, trickle down economics and deregulation of the banks.

[KharmaTrain]

15. So You'd Be Satified With The Status Quo

Again...so where is this "master plan" AHIP has in play? And if there is such a document, then I'd like to see it.

So you say AHIP is spending all their money and political capital to create a public option? :crazy:

Many will contend those who hold out the fantasy of Single Payer at this time are the ones with the religion. I'm one who believes in politics being the art of the possible...which requires compromise and debate.

Wanna see how the insurance companies manipulate? Speak to a physician who is told how to treat patients or who they can treat...that's the status quo and the one the insurance lobby is fighting tooth and nail to keep. A government system that competes is anything but "trickle down"...but believe as you wish...no matter what happens you're not going to get your pony.

[ipaint]

17. Ahh... the pony meme.

When all else fails accuse people of wanting a pony.

"For much of the last three years, industry leaders have been laying the groundwork for this battle. Amid horror stories about insurers dumping sick patients, denying coverage for medical treatment and cherry-picking customers, Ignagni and a few insurance company executives pushed the idea within America's Health Insurance Plans that the industry risked political catastrophe if it did not move proactively.

"They knew they had a very big problem, and they knew this day was coming," said Wendell Potter, a Cigna Corp. public relations executive who quit last year. "They knew they had to be perceived as coming to the table with solutions. It was a departure from their previous point of view. But they knew they would be slaughtered if it weren't."

The first public sign of the industry's shifting stance came in November of 2006 when the trade group came out in favor of universal coverage with its reform plan.

...The strategy paid dividends, as insurance executives were invited to the table when senior Democrats began developing healthcare legislation this year. Ignagni and insurance executives became familiar figures in the committee rooms on Capitol Hill, testifying in favor of an overhaul as lawmakers gathered information to write their bills."

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-health-insure26-2009oct26,0,757790.story


AHIP is creating the health ins. reform bill with a neutered public option guaranteed to fail. That is AHIP's public option and now it's yours.
Some PO pony you got there. All wrapped in a big bow with a card signed Love, Karen xoxo.

[ipaint]

10. And what they spent to buy congress is a drop in the bucket when compared to

the money they will haul in via the mandate.

[KharmaTrain]

11. And Your Source For This???

And what mandate is that? I haven't seen a final bill that says people will be forced to buy insurance...and in many cases there will be subsidies to assist those who can't afford the premiums. Even a single payer will require payments of premiums...either through higher taxes or individual contributions. No free lunch here...and those who are expecting something for nothing will be nothing.

[ipaint]

12. Correction- via the mandate and subsidies. n/t

[dysfunctional press]

16. a repug president sElected in 2012 could be the death knell...

executive order 2011/1/21/00000001.