Top Blue Dog, Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, BOASTS: "We Held Bill Hostage," and Killed Single Payer (Video at the link)
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Ross expressed satisfaction with the weakened public option he helped engineer.
Firedoglake reported that Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas said:
We ensured that if there is a government option, it will be just that -- an option -- and it won't be mandated on anybody. If it had been based on Medicare rates, I can assure you that it would have eventually ended up resulting in a single payer-type system, because Medicare has really good rates, because they're negotiating for every senior in America. Private insurance companies could not have competed with that. And so we would have at the end of the day ended up with single payer. Now we've leveled the playing field, if there is a government option they'll have to go out again and negotiate with providers just like private insurance companies do. That was important to me to insure that we don't end up with some type of single payer system.
"Medicare has really good rates" is his complaint!?????????
But we the people are going to have to pay higher rates. This clown actually thinks paying higher rates is better. He's working against the people.
Please, please, please tell me someone is going to run against him the primary. I'll contribute as much as I can to ensure that this corporate shill gets voted out.
Someone who lives in his district must go to his townhall and confront him with a camera about why this "fiscal conservative" democrat wants us to pay more instead of less.
Who the f*ck voted for this guy? You don't want single payer because it would mean good rates for the American people? Stupidity is rampant on Capital Hill.
From Huffpo reporting:
The bill that House Democrats originally proposed included a fairly robust public option that would have structured payments for doctors and health care providers at a rate modified from the one used by Medicare.
However, after weeks of negotiations with conservative Democrats, a compromise bill emerged which allows doctors to negotiate their payment rates under the public option.