I am so disappointed.

[cliffordu]

that he failed MY purity test,

but I'm certainly glad he's in charge. Tens of millions will get medical care that would not if anyone else was up there.

It ain't perfect, but if my wife gets sick, maybe it won't wipe us out. Again.

I lost everything due to sickness, and what he said tonight seems pretty good.

Not perfect, not what I want, but pretty good for a start, considering where the fucking Blue Rats and the Repubbs have offered.

[dflprincess]

1. Tens of millions will be forced to buy health insurance

from the for profits. Whether or not they actually get access to care remains to be seen.

[cliffordu]

3. Ah, yes, subsidized health insurance for those who can't afford it.

back door public option???

Like medicare, maybe, but not called that??

[robinlynne]

7. he said for less than 5% of the polulaiton. that means only the poorest of the poor.

[sandnsea]

16. That isn't remotely what he said

There will be

Public Option --- Private Insurance.

There will be subsidies for either one based on certain income requirements. Up to 400% of poverty, $88,000 for a family of 4, in the House and Senate HELP plan.

It is expected that 5% of Americans will choose the public option.

Around 45% of Americans are already covered by Medicare, Medicaid, VA, IHS, or some other federal program.

Since employers pay for a big chunk of so many people's insurance already, there's not that many who would choose to leave that and pay for the whole chunk of a public option themselves. It's still going to cost money.

[dflprincess]

23. He also said you won't have the option of leaving your employer's

plan for the public "option" even if you want to.

Allowing people to actually opt for the public option would take revenue away from the private companies and we can't have that.

[sandnsea]

24. Unless your premium is over 12% of your AGI

I don't agree with that, but that wasn't the question I was answering.

We're having a tough time even getting the public option. Wouldn't your time be better spent advocating for that than destroying any hope for any plan at all?

[dflprincess]

25. I think we'd be better off letting the current "system" collapse

then there'd be not other option but to extend Medicare to all. I resent being required by law to continue to shore up a broken system.

The public option as it is now, allowing 12% of income to go into the insurance companies pockets as well as the large out of pocket expenses (plus no coverage for vision or dental) is no improvement over what we have today. People will still not be able to afford care, while the insurance companies continue to pocket the premiums. How is this reform?

If we settle for the this piece of crap, we will never get real change.

[sandnsea]

28. Tell it to the guy who lost his coverage during cancer treatment

Oh yeah. You can't. He's dead.

Easy for you to deny people health care when you either have it yourself or don't need it right now.

Nobody who seriously needed health care would ever oppose any plan that increased coverage to more people.

[dflprincess]

29. Obama's plan won't help that guy - he won't be able to get

coverage under the public option until 2013 and there was no information on when the insurance companies would have to start covering preexisting conditions and no real word on what they can charge for it. You can bet they'd say they'd cover him but at price he can't afford. Contrary to what you may think coverage does not equal care.

There's more people who won't see any benefit from this plan than will be helped by it. The only "change" most will see is that they're forced to help the insurance companies recoup the money they've spent paying off "our" elected officials, but those payments won't translate to care given the large out of pockets that will still be permited.

And, FYI, right now I have lousy coverage that's getting worse next year - in fact the copays and deductibles next year will match what Obama thinks we can afford. And, because of a situation I had last year, even though it had a happy ending and does not necessarily mean I'll have problems in the future, I'm now considered "uninsurable". But the procedures I had last year are not something I'll be able to afford next year or with the lousy plan Obama is pushing.

[sandnsea]

30. And how would doing nothing help anybody?

What kind of sick mind supports doing nothing over beginning to implement the policies that will lead to the changes.

You think single payer would be instantaneous? It wouldn't.

And again, I've said repeatedly that the affordability of ANY plan is what we ought to be fighting for. Whether it's the taxes that would support single payer or the premium that would support a public option or insurance plan. Money is money. What you call that monthly payment doesn't matter. How much it is, does.

And as I said, nobody who truly needs health care and can't get it would ever oppose this plan.

You have health coverage. Bitching about your health coverage is not remotely the same as not having any at all.

[dflprincess]

39. One more time,

health insurance that has copays and deductibles that are so high that you can't afford to get care or you drive yourself into debt using credit cards to pay for care is the system we have now.

No, I would not expect Medicare to cover all of us all at once. There would, no doubt, be a way to phase people in and hopefully, the uninsured would be first - but at least we'd know something was going to happen and we'd have actual change.

Obama has sold us out to the insurance companies and done nothing to improve real access to care. He is expecting us to continue pour money into a system that does not work - a system that is just another bubble like Wall Street or the housing market. Sooner or later that bubble is going to burst and the government will have to step in and expand Medicare. Better sooner than later.

I don't understand what kind of "sick mind" supports selling us out to a corrupt industry.

[sabrina 1]

33. I aggree. It's a mess and this plan, sounds good for

Insurance Corps, with more bureucratic administration needed to oversee it all.

Forcing people to pay for premiums who can barely afford to feed their families, is not only morally wrong, it's cruel. And it's not necessary, unless the main goal is to keep the Private Insurance in business, and with even more profits.

As the Cigna Whistleblower said, when Bill Moyers asked him what his former Industry thought about over 40,000,000 Americans not having insurance, 'They see it as a potential market'. Well, tonight they must be celebrating.

[eridani]

37. And if the subsidized insurance you are forced to buy is a piece of shit, then what? n/t

[lapfog_1]

6. Worse, there won't be any price controls.

So we are forced to buy a product from a monopolistic group at whatever price they determine.

[cliffordu]

8. That's odd. He specifically mentioned price controls.

[lapfog_1]

15. I'm not optimistic that the price controls will be in the final bill.

Edit to add...

The reason they won't be there is the insurance industry will claim that they NEED the ability to "adjust" prices to account for not being able to control profits by dropping those that get sick (recision) and deny coverage to high risk patients (pre-existing condition). They will extract a pound of flesh. Which is why we needed a public option OPEN TO THE PUBLIC AT LARGE!

[TorchTheWitch]

31. price controls only on out of pocket expenses

There are no price controls on premiums. They will still be able to hike your premiums into the stratusphere if you get sick or older or whatever. They just can't drop your coverage or give you less coverage if you get sick or old or whatever... but they can AND THEY WILL raise your premiums into unaffordability.

[seabeyond]

2. i am disappointed. i will have to stay on my insurance and though blue cross

i pay so much into it. i dont trust them to pay if we do get really sick and it wont wipe us out.

i
dont
trust
insurance

[cliffordu]

4. I hate insurance companies.

but in this country at this time, it's going to have to do.

[mmonk]

11. Whatever we accept is what we make do with.

We in America do not stand up for ourselves like citizens in other countries. In the end, they will live better quality lives.

[autorank]

5. cliffordu

If you can still go broke, it doesn't work.

How about this. Self employed with health insurance: what's their option? Wait four years for
"the exchange." If anyone here was a fiduciary in a health insurance company, they'd probably
be obliged to stay out of the exchange. It makes no sense.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=6506118&mesg_id=6506118

[cliffordu]

12. We'll see what's what when the weasels in congress get done with it.

I think it MIGHT be better than a lot of people here are ranting about.

We will never have French health care, which I consider the best in the world, as long as there's a single insurance company in business anywhere in the US.

IMNSHO.

[WeDidIt]

9. Sorta like how MEdicare was imperfect ot begin with

but it grew into what we have today.

Obama's planting a seed.

It'll grow.

[cliffordu]

13. That's right.

[MrMickeysMom]

17. Christ, in some wacko way, I want to believe this...

But, the thought of it reminds me too much of a mythological figure. The great tragedy in mythology is that the hero's (idea) is annihilated after its' heroic journey.

[Political Heretic]

10. What he outlined tonight is the absolute bare minimum I can support.

Democrats and the administration have already been through countless compromises in draft committee legislation, and I understand compromise. I'm not a political novice. But this is as far as I can bend. There is always a point where a good compromise becomes a bad capitulation. There's a point where further compromise sets the bigger picture of healthe reform back.

So, It's not even close to what American people deserve, but it is something that will make dramatic different in the lives of many Americans, including my own mother and father. I can't and wouldn't ignore that.

What comes next, however, is a tough fight. Obama's interest in changing the political tone and rhetoric in Washington has seemed to trump his tenacity at times. Obama needs a little more Harry Truman or Lyndon Johnson (on health care, where he brow-beat congressmen and fought tough and nasty to get medicare passed) and a little less Buddha :)

I hope he can stick with it.

[ddeclue]

14. Hear hear - well said!

[cliffordu]

19. I think he has been waiting for the congressional wet teeshirt contests and the

beer chugging events on the traveling summer break hatefest that is the republican party to end so he could dispel the worst of the rumors with one move rather than put out a lot of small fires all summer long -

Tonight he called out all his critics and let them know, some by name - that the adults are back in session.

I'll bet there ain't a Republican in that room that didn't see what a real statesman looks like and they don't have ONE in their ranks.

I wonder if Bohner goes home and the Viagra won't even help, he's been so unmanned.

[BlooInBloo]

18. Hah! Even you couldn't keep teh funny going, and got into the seriousness of it.

:P

It's looking much more optimistic for a strong step forward, for sure. I hate the no-more-suing bone he threw to republicans (and fools everywhere), but overall, a very strong step forward.

[cliffordu]

20. I stepped on my dick on another thread and dropped teh funny.

dammit.


Howyabeen??

[BlooInBloo]

21. Alright. Considering calling off work tomorrow and getting drunk....

Not in that order.

[cliffordu]

22. I'll be here fighting the good fight

trying to perfect 'slack'

fuck Lebowski, he gots bupkus on me.

[laughingliberal]

26. I suspected he would throw a bone to the tort reform crowd

We will see how that goes. It does take a talking point away from them. I did write him recently and suggest any tort reform have a reverse trigger. Give them their limits on liability and if the malpractice insurance industry doesn't lower premiums significantly, the law repeals automatically.

[BlooInBloo]

27. Ooooh - I could get behind that, as a bone to throw them...

Especially since it's a sucker's bet.

[sabrina 1]

32. Those tens of millions will have to pay for it.

But as the Republicans always said, they were just hoarding all that money they have hidden away and making the rest of us pay for their healthcare. And they probably eat too much junk food too and smoke, and drink and have big TeeVees.

But now, they will have to part with some of their riches and send it those poor Insurance CEOs who as we all know, need it more than those welfare queens, feeding off the rest of us. :sarcasm: for the snark impaired.

Romneycare is what it sounds like to me once they drop the Public Option. That is the bargaining chip for the Blue Dogs.

[Name removed]

34. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[grantcart]

35. Its a first step and if it has a public option it gives a point to drive in a wedge

[ProSense]

36. The naysers are becoming irrelevant. They,

along with the Republicans, will be on the wrong side of history.

[cliffordu]

38. Yep, yep and and extra yep.