The GOP might have decided that defending Wall Street wasn't going to be such a good idea after all, but they don't have any problem continuing to fight the health insurance reform fight.
The good news is that Senate Dems want to continue it.
Fearing that health insurance premiums may shoot up in the next few years, Senate Democrats laid a foundation on Tuesday for federal regulation of rates, four weeks after President Obama signed a law intended to rein in soaring health costs.
After a hearing on the issue, the chairman of the Senate health committee, Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, said he intended to move this year on legislation that would “provide an important check on unjustified premiums.”
Mr. Harkin praised a bill introduced by Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, that would give the secretary of health and human services the power to review premiums and block “any rate increase found to be unreasonable.” Under the bill, the federal government could regulate rates in states where state officials did not have “sufficient authority and capability” to do so....
Reviving the proposal on Tuesday, Mr. Harkin said: “Rate review authority is needed to protect consumers from insurance companies’ jacking up premiums simply because they can. Protections must be in place to ensure that companies do not take advantage of current market conditions before health reform fundamentally changes the way they do business in 2014.”
The administration proposed this provision for the health insurance reform bill, but it couldn't be added under budget reconciliation rules. Passing it as a stand alone bill, along with repeal of the insurers anti-trust exemption, is something I've been arguing for since the bill passed, because one of the gaping holes of health insurance reform is any kind of rate control or oversight.
But that's not a problem, according to Lamar Alexander. Health insurance company profits--like that of UnitedHealth Group which has reported a first-quarter earnings increase of 21 percent, to $1.19 billion--need to be protected.
Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, the No. 3 Republican in the Senate, said: “Health insurance companies’ profits for one year equal about two days of health care spending in the United States. So even if we were to take away all the profits of the so-called greedy insurance companies, that would still leave 363 days a year when health care costs are expanding at a rate our country cannot afford.”
Damn the consumer, keep those profits safe!