Frank Kratovil, freshman Blue Dog from my district, pushed to release a House health bill from committee on the condition that a vote wait until September.
A recent "town hall," contrary to the impression that the Big Media Meme(tm) wants you to believe, did not include football chants or continuous yelling. (As I write this, some nattering and overpaid TV folks are babbling between one-second sound bites of some people in Florida yelling). It's like they're sportscasting a cup race between fist-fighting horses and switchblade-wielding jockeys.
How tiring.
You probably won't hear about the little town hall yesterday on the Big Media, so here's a quick diary.
I did not find Kratovil's recent guest editorial convincing:
Do health reform right instead of doing it quickly, July 26, in the Baltimore Sun, linked here.
I won't include it, since a Sun copyright notice is actually included with the op-ed in the press release. Weird, and possibly silly. (The press release is otherwise attached below the fold.)
But at a combination health town hall and constituent service meeting in Rock Hall Maryland Friday afternoon Kratovil was more convincing in person than on paper.
He wants to slow down a little so people in his district could talk to him, rather than basing his decision on a situation where everyone in DC was talking to one another and no one elsewhere and in a rush to boot.
He's genuinely concerned that whatever health bill the House passes, he's had time to read it, and he's had time to hear what constituents say, and he means to make a decision based on that.
MD-01 is a difficult district, with almost all of Maryland's rural counties, and with Maryland's poorest (Somerset). He recognizes that Medicare, at present, doesn't help medically underserved rural areas by having provider payments that are so low, and wants to make sure that any other reforms won't establish that practice as part of a larger system.
The meeting was not, exclusively, a "health care town hall." I got there a little before 3 p.m. and the place was packed. People continued to filter in and the discussion lasted about 45 minutes.
There were about 160 people in a small auditorium in Rock Hall's municipal building (a converted school). The discussion was fairly general. He explained that the opening session was merely part of a local meeting of the kind he's been holding since he was sworn in and would be fairly short, and open to all questions.
Of course the audience focus was on health care. Kratovil, an ex-county prosecutor, was not bothered by occasional outbursts.
It was more a question of audience clapping, cheering and hubbub than continuous yelling or, God forbid, fist fights. No chairs were thrown. People were generally courteous enough not to interrupt one another. Despite the moments of rowdiness, I saw it's damn hard to upset a prosecutor by yelling at him.
He said he thinks freshman congresscritters are less invested in the posturing that's characterized DC business as usual, that they are more pragmatic and willing to work together on a solution.
He would like to sit down with some of them from both parties come September, once they've heard from folks back home, and figure out what everyone agrees on.
Based on a show of hands in the audience, people there were about 50-50 on the public option, and about 30 or 40 percent already on Medicare.
The public agreed on two things: virtually everyone "voted" that "preexisting conditions" should never prevent anyone from being insured.
Also almost unanimous: that individuals who lose employer-based coverage should be eligible for regional pools or group plans ... in essence, that overpriced or impossible-to-get "individual" health insurance should be abolished as the only option for the jobless.
That's a message from the public the insurance industry may not be able to counter.
He promised he and his staff will indeed read the whole thing if it's humanly possible.
He was careful to say he is convinced that it's unacceptable for a public-option government plan to put bureaucrats between a patient and a doctor or otherwise institute a scheme for rationing care ... and it's just as unacceptable to continue the status quo, with a for-profit insurer between them acting as a gatekeeper.
MD-01 is a very long district that wraps around the head of Chespeake Bay and it was impossible to tell how many people came from where. I sat next to a fellow from Talbot County (pro-public option, he was), an hour south, and later spoke briefly with a woman from Cecil County though I didn't get her slant. Cecil's roughly an hour north.
A town councilman told me recognized maybe 3 dozen people from around the county (we're a very small county and Rock Hall's a small town, and if you're a native like Butch is, you know faces if not names).
Rock Hall has a lot of people who come down in the summer to vacation houses or sail in on boats; and August 8-9 being Pirates and Wenches Weekend, it's possible a batch of people who came in by boat from all over the region decided to check out the meeting. However it was, the shouters were in the minority.
Just for the record, the press release that Kratovil's office sent out is below:
Kratovil, Blue Dogs Succeed in Pushing Vote on Health Care to September
Congressional Leadership heeds Conservative Dems’ call for more time to review legislation.
Date: 7-29-09 – For Immediate Release
Contact: Kevin Lawlor, 202 225 5311
Washington, DC – Today, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) announced that a vote on health care reform legislation will not be considered on the House floor until after the August District Work Period. In a joint statement Pelosi and Hoyer thanked members of the Blue Dog Coalition and credited them with their leadership on the issue saying, "At the request of the Blue Dog Coalition, in order to allow more time to carefully review the additional proposed legislative language, we will bring the bill to the House floor in September."
Rep. Frank Kratovil, a member of the House Blue Dog Coalition, has been particularly vocal about the need to provide the appropriate amount of time for Members of Congress to review this important legislation and discuss with their constituents. He had repeatedly advocated for pushing a vote until after the August recess in numerous conversations with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. Kratovil released the following statement about the decision to hold the vote until September.
"Pushing the health care vote to September means that my colleagues and constituents will have the appropriate amount of time to consider, review and assess any health care reform legislation before a vote. Members of Congress may continue to disagree on the merits of the legislation, but reasonable folks from both sides of the aisle can agree that getting this done right is more important that getting it done quickly based on artificial timetables. I’m proud that we in the Blue Dog Coalition succeeded in arguing for more time.
"Our health care system in need of some reform, and we have a lot of progress we need to make in the areas of coverage, cost, and rural access. The current legislation still needs a lot of work, and so I’m glad we will now have more time to debate constructive changes to the bill. After decades of debate, we now have a chance to craft reform that puts us on path toward fiscal stability and middle class prosperity. That means that Congress has a responsibility both to this generation and future generations to get it right."
Rep. Frank Kratovil
Below please find the text of an OPED printed Sunday July 26, 2009 in the Baltimore Sun concerning this same issue and calling for any vote to be pushed until September.
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Frank Kratovil represents Maryland's 1st District in the U.S. House of Representatives. He may be contacted through his Web site at www.house.gov/kratovil.
Copyright © 2009, The Baltimore Sun
Kevin W. Lawlor
Communications Director
The Office of Congressman Frank Kratovil
Maryland's First Congressional District
(202) 225 5311
(202) 579 7298 (cell)