Here's another reason to nix the whole exchange within the exchange that the OPM-regulated national non-profit provider model offers. Guess who would be in charge of oversight of it (sub. req.) in the Senate?
The plan emerging from negotiations among moderate and liberal Democrats would put a key part of the planned health insurance exchanges under the supervision of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). And jurisdiction for oversight of OPM falls to the centrist-dominated Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which Lieberman chairs.
Lieberman barely retained his chairmanship after campaigning for Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona in last year’s presidential race, and there would likely be talk among Democrats of dumping him from the position in the next Congress — or even earlier — if his opposition sinks health care legislation. Lieberman, whose state is home to major insurers, has taken a my-way-or-the-highway position in opposing any form of government-run insurance plan.
Lieberman said he was aware that the scope of his committee’s oversight would be expanded, but he said that will not be a factor in his view of the latest proposal.
Given what a bang-up job Lieberman has avoided doing since taking the helm of the committee in 2007, from Katrina to Blackwater, the thought that he'd have anything to do with monitoring the performance of this new entity is disquieting, to say the least.
There are a couple of solutions to that problem. One, scrap the redundant idea. Two, take the chairmanship away from Lieberman.
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