A critical moment is comming today in t he fight for healthcare reform and the issue of a public option. AFL CIO members today will vote on several resolutions on healthcare at their national conference in PA. This union, which represents 10 MILLION working class Americans, is expected to make big waves for advocates of the PO. One resolution will endorse the absolute need for a public option as part of any reform. Also it will slam the Baucus crap ideas like taxing isnurance companies as most know that sucha tax will simply be passed to consumers.
This resolution is expected ot be voted on and passed overwhemingly. Then another resolution will be voted on and is expected to passed as well. It will endorse single payer.
Obama is expected to speak today at AFLCIO about healthcare among other issues. Doctors, most average Americans, and key Democratic supporting institutions such as AFL CIO are hugely for the public option as part of any reform. Let us hope Obama keeps the union's resolutions in mind as he proceeds.
Also below Mr Potter, fmr Cigna exec slams the Baucus plan as the private insurance coompany dream bill. If you think healthcare is bad now in America Baucus would leave more unisured and crush the middle class.
Another news item to note: as the progressives on t he Hill prepare a whip count list of those brave enough to say no to any bill without a PO the Black Caucus has met with Biden. Biden apparently promised them that the PO would be in the bill. But then Pelosi and others begand a shift away from the PO. Not a good thing to screw with the Black Caucus. Nope. So it falls to the House progressives the fate of reform now. If they can get 39 or more members to sign on against any bill which has merely a trigger or co op then the game changes big time.
UPDATE 1- POLITICO INTERVIEWS MARKOS AND REP GRIJALVA ON PROGRSSIVES AND OBAMA. REP G SAYS HIS AIM NOW IS TO HAVE MORE OUTSIDE ORGS HELP FUND CPC, NOT THE DNC. VERY SMART. HE SAYS PROG CAUCUS UNDERESTIMATED THINGS AND PUSH ITS MEMBERSONTO THE MEDIA AND GET MORE COVERAGE ON THEIR VIEWS..
UPDATE 1:
Liberals Rethink Obama Strategy
Grijalva says, House progressives need to organize themselves in a more formidable way.
"We have to expand the base of our faces out there," Grijalva said, "not just one or two, but we have to multiply that."
In addition, Grijalva thinks that the House Progressive Caucus may have to do greater outreach to base organizations and not rely as much on the grass-roots rallying efforts of the White House or the Democratic National Committee.
"That is different than what other caucuses do," Grijalva said, "but we need it because our strength is sometimes not our ideas, but our ability to motivate the base. And we have got to work it, make coalitions and do whatever is necessary to strengthen our hand."
Grijalva was perked up a bit by Obama’s speech, but he wasn’t pleased with the president’s not-quite-line-in-the-sand approach to the public option. .
Read more: http://www.politico.com/...
UPDATE 2: HCAN RELEASES NATL HCARE AD THIS MORNING PUSHING PUBLIC OPTION. ALSO WILL HAVE PRINT ADS IN MAJOR PAPERS:
http://healthcareforamericanow.org/...
UPDATE 3: PELOSI HAS SPOKEN OUT IN CONGRESS THIS MORNING IN AGREEMENT WITH WENDELL POTTER ON THE PO. I DONT KNOW IF SHE WILL CAVE-IT DIDNT SOUND LIKE SOMEONE ABOUT TO CAVE TODAY:
UPDATE 4: AXELROD IS ON THE HILL TALKING TO LIBERAL DEMS. REP WOOLSEY MET WITH HIM ON PO. SHE NOTED A DIFFERENT TONE FOR THE PO. WE SHALL SEE BUT VERY INTERESTING MOVES TODAY:
In a closed-door session with House Democrats on Tuesday, White House adviser David Axelrod reiterated the president's support for a public option and didn't mention a trigger or insurance cooperatives, lawmakers present said afterward.
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Axelrod fielded more specific questions about the president's support for government-sponsored health coverage from progressives in the caucus, and California Rep. Lynn Woolsey, a leader of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said, "It wasn't the same-old, same-old."...
http://www.politico.com/...
AFL CIO today will boost the progressives on a PO for sure. The drs poll is another boost. And thepage reports Sen Rockefeller is having a presser against co ops today. Hmmm-I do not think this thing is dead. Labor is about to give us a huge boost.
A.F.L.-C.I.O. to Push for Overhaul With Public Option
By Steven Greenhouse
The federation’s delegates are set to approve a resolution that says the nation’s health care system is badly broken and that backs a far-reaching overhaul that would include a government-run option to compete with private insurers.
The federation’s resolution calls for creating universal coverage and requiring all employers to contribute to the cost of health care through a "pay-or-play" system. In addition, the resolution supports special federal assistance to companies that provide health coverage to retirees under age 65, as many unionized companies do.
The resolution strongly backs the public option, saying it would force private insurance to cut costs and premiums.
"A public health insurance plan is crucial to making health care coverage more affordable for working families, business and government," the resolution states. "A public plan would have lower administrative costs than private plans and would not have to earn a profit. These features, combined with its ability to establish payment rates, would result in lower premiums for the public plan."
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Not surprisingly, the federation calls for a surtax on the wealthiest taxpayers to help finance health care reform. At the same time, the resolution opposes proposals to tax employer-provided health benefits over a certain monetary amount as a way to help finance reform: "Employers likely would respond by increasing employee cost-sharing to a level at which benefits would become unaffordable for low-wage workers, or by eliminating benefits altogether."
... In addition, the resolution criticizes a proposal that the Senate Finance Committee appears to favor: an excise tax that insurance companies would pay on group health care policies of more than $21,000 per employee. The federation fears that such a move would cause insurance companies to charge employers more and then employers might either end coverage to some employers or force employees to shoulder more of the cost.
"In effect, this excise tax would be an indirect tax on workers, since insurance companies would almost certainly pass costs on to workers," the resolution says.
The federation is also expected to back a secondary resolution that endorses creation of a single-payer health plan, much like Canada.
http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.c...
Former Cigna exec: Baucus plan "absolute gift" to industry
Wendell Potter, the former Cigna executive-turned-whistleblower, told a small group of reporters Monday that the Baucus health care plan is an "absolute gift" to the industry.
"The Baucus framework is just an absolute joke," said Potter, Cigna’s former head of corporate communications who has been speaking out against insurance industry practices. "It is an absolute gift to the industry. And if that is what we see in the legislation, (America’s Health Insurance Plans chief) Karen Ignagni will surely get a huge bonus."
Potter said the proposal would not provide affordable coverage. It gives the industry too much latitude to charge higher premiums based on age and geographic location, fails to mandate employer coverage, and pushes consumers into plans with limited benefits, Potter said.
Private insurers "want to have ‘benefit design flexibility.’ Those are three very worrisome words," Potter said at a briefing arranged by the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. "By being able to have benefit design flexibility, they will be able to design plans that are so limited that more and more people will be in the ranks of the uninsured."
Several Senate Finance Committee Democrats have raised similar concerns, saying the health care overhaul could mandate Americans to buy coverage that isn’t affordable and doesn’t offer adequate coverage.
"It's very clear, at this point in the debate, the flashpoint is all about affordability," said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). "I personally think there’s a lot of heavy lifting left to do on the affordability issue."
http://www.politico.com/...
To say Baucus’ bill w ill draw the ire of liberals is an understatement. Cohn looks at this sucky thing. A regressive unprogressive nightmare piece of junk.
http://www.tnr.com/...
While we breathlessly await for one of the most regressive bills produced by a democrat in decades note what Biden is telling the Black Caucus. Either there really be a PO as tri caucus demands or things like what Biden just did will become highly damaging.
Behind the scenes, Vice President Joe Biden huddled in the basement of the Capitol reassuring members of the Congressional Black Caucus during a wide-ranging meeting that the administration strongly supports including a government-run insurance plan in the overhaul.
The idea is expected to be included in a measure under development in the House, where liberals are dominant and three committees have approved legislation that includes some form of government-run insurance plan. But the idea is anathema to Republicans and many centrist Democrats who have outsized influence in the Senate, where the Finance Committee is drafting a health care overhaul that omits it.
Leaders in both chambers acknowledged Thursday that while they support a government-run plan to compete with private insurance, it's not a must-have item. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the majority leader, said he could be satisfied with establishment of nonprofit cooperatives, along the lines expected to be included in the Finance measure.
http://www.cnsnews.com/...