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TechnoratiIn early June, he was invited to speak before the Progressive Caucus of the House of Representatives about single payer health care.
There are about 71 members of the House who belong to the Progressive Caucus — about a third of the Democratic Caucus.
Skala is a true believer in single payer — having spent four years with Physicians for a National Health Program.
So, yes of course, he would love to speak before the Progressive Caucus to explain why single payer was the only way to control costs and cover everyone.
And that Obama’s public option was bound to fail.
He sent his presentation ahead of time to Bill Goold, the executive director of the Progressive Caucus, and Darcy Burner, executive director of the American Progressive Caucus Foundation.
Both were not pleased with Skala.
“Bill Gould emailed me after reading my testimony and materials I was going to present to tell me that they were not acceptable and that there could be no comparison between single payer and the public option with side by side comparison,” Skala told Single Payer Action. “Darcy Burner told me that they would construe talking about the public option — even comparing it to single payer — as an attack on the members of the Progressive Caucus.”
“Now, I can’t see how honest discourse about whether or not a public option will work — especially when it comes from 16,000 doctors and the majority of nurses — as an attack on anybody who supports it. We see it as telling the truth.”
Despite Goold’s and Burner’s objections, on June 4, Skala went ahead and made his presentation to the caucus.
“During the presentation it was very nasty,” Skala said. “I got some very dirty looks from Darcy Burner. During the question period and once during the testimony, I was interrupted, told that the Progressive Caucus had taken a position on this issue and unless I had something positive to contribute, then there wasn’t really much point to answering my questions. At least one of my questions to the staff of the Chairman of the caucus was interrupted by the staff of the Congressional Progressive Caucus unfortunately.”
And what exactly was Skala’s crime?
He believes the public option being pushed by Obama and the Democrats will fail.
“The public option preserves all the systemic deficiencies that we see in the current system,” Skala said. “It maintains a finance system that is based on private insurance and private insurers and their drive to fight claims, issue denials, screen out the sick and make a big profit generate tremendous administrative waste — 400 billion dollars a year.”
“Now you can expand coverage by just raising taxes and paying insurers to cover people but that’s not a sustainable system,” Skala said. “But it won’t cover every body and it will fall apart quickly due to rising cost as we’ve seen in Massachusetts, Vermont, Oregon, Tennessee and Minnesota — state after state after state and it hasn’t worked.”
“Now the definition of insanity is to repeat what has gone on in the past and expect a different result. Yet that’s what we’re doing with the public option. And as a representative of physicians in that capacity, and certainly the relationship I have with nurses and patients, I feel it’s my duty to be honest about the best policy research, the best literature, and the best experience that we have and that all indicates that the public option is going to fail.”
The complete interview with Nick Skala, see video here or below:
78 Comments so far
Show AllObama's urgent push for a new healthcare reform is really a push to gut Medicaid and line the pockets of the HMO's. It will accomplish several goals of the ruling elite: steal more money from working class people while increasing the death rate. The agenda now is to thin the population. In Nazi Germany, they sent people to the gas chambers. Here in the US, they have a kinder, gentler version of eliminating useless eaters and it's already here in our HMO for profit run healthcare, now it's going into high gear.
Isn't it ridiculous to be having a discussion about a healthcare reform agenda at a time when we are collapsing as a nation? It's putting the cart before the horse. Here in Calif. our state is so bankrupt we are about to throw millions of poor off of healthcare and at the same time our insane leaders are talking about healthcare reform as if we had a functioning economy. We are bankrupt! We need to address the monetary collapse and the collapse of our physical economy. Not to mention the collapse of our healthcare delivery system. Over 1500 hospitals shutdown over the past 20 years of HMO's, we have closed medical teaching facilities, burn units, neo-natal units, clinics and so on. We are at the point that even if you have insurance or millions of dollars, you might not recieve care because the DELIVERY SYSTEM has been dismantled.
Let's frame the discussion around the collapse of our healthcare delivery system/the bankruptcy of our states/dollar collapse/world monetary collapse.
Good report, Mokhiber. Cheers for Skala.
“Bill Gould [of the Progressive Caucus] emailed me [Skala] after reading my testimony and materials I was going to present to tell me that they were not acceptable and that there could be no comparison between single payer and the public option with side by side comparison...”
These people are in deep cognitive dissonance not only on health care reform, but on democracy itself! What kind of debate does not invite comparisons?? Sadly, we know the answer ... America's Specialty, the One-Sided Debate.
The behavior of this group of people, the so-called "Progressive" Caucus, is one of censorship and denial married to arrogance and anti-democratic sprit engendered by proximity to power. It is based upon fear. Fear of what, we may never know. It is a snapshot of a whole system designed to fail.
If this is our best, we are truly screwed if we continue to back and support with labor and dollars, the party that houses them, but binds their hands, hearts and minds.
The handwriting's been on the wall for decades: the Dems are "doing their part" to hand it all to the corporate state.
The "progressives" are just welcomed in there to keep alive the "flavor" of a "second" party -- and to help fill the coffers and get out the vote. They are ignored, when not spat or trodden upon.
Also, the "progressives" are just welcomed in there to keep real progressive energies from spilling over into debate, organization, action, and rebellion. Dems have spent more money and venom attacking Greens than they have attacking Republicans; not by accident. They can deal with the Repugs, but don't want any alternative way to open up to question ... anything!
Hope without action is worse than useless. It is dangerous. But the Dems spent millions over the past two years to have "hope" paper over the ugly realities that they simply WON'T address.
Sorry, I hate to rain on so many parades, but Dems have been enabling, involved with or directly responsible for:
• steady declilne in wages
• destruction of the unions' power
• doing nothing to shore up the Constitution's shredding
• looking the other way from stolen elections (look at the brouhaha over Iran -- what hypocrisy!)
• torture
• lack of women's rights (remember ERA?)
• lack of decent health care
• concentration of the media
• shipping our industries overseas (quietly, in the night, with not a murmur from Congress)
• NAFTA and the corporate globalization model
• and so on ...
Which of these things have progressives in the Democratic Party been able to slow down or stop?
By not building an alternative force, they have fooled millions of good-hearted people into biding their time, and lost us decades of building a resistance.
No one has said it would be easy, but to continue to support this is suicidal. They represent no way out.
"Progressive Democrat" is an oxymoron.
Alank, excellent post! I remember in Illinois in 2000 when the Dems were actually breaking the law to keep Nader off the ballot. That is when my oldest son said he would never vote for another Dem again, not even Kucinich who he really likes. He would like to see Kucinich leave the Democratic Party. So would I. The DLC hijacked the Democratic Party and sold it to the corporations.
I'm about to call the Oregon Secretary of State. I have the manual for starting minor parties and already have questions. I would like a party of small businesses, family farms and working Americans. No social issues, but economic issues they hold in common. I was thinking of Mainstream Party but a good friend, Rebel Farmer, suggested the name Main Street Party. I like that, especially since we can define the Ds and Rs as two sides of the Wall Street Party. I would like to hear what you think of this idea.
There is a group I would like to contact. "The Center for Rural Affairs was formed in 1973 by rural Nebraskans concerned about family farms and rural communities. Today, we work across all of rural America to strengthen small businesses, family farms and ranches, and rural communities."
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
Well, it may not always seem it a times, but I think the Green Party already IS the mainstream party if you look at its platform. Besides caring for the health of the planet, its wants single payer for the US which eases the anxiety and financial burdens of ordinary Americans as well as the small businesses.
The Green party is opposed to corporate money in elections and corporate domination of ... of just about everything (and even challenges the so-called rights of "corporate personhood"). The party has actively and vocally opposed NAFTA, CAFTA, WTO, FTAA, and any other corporate globalization schemes packaged as "free" trade. Greens seek FAIR, not "free" trade, where all involved parties have a say in how economies should run.
The GP (gp.org) would like to see a fair, living wage. It advocates repealing the Taft-Hartley Act which limits the ability for workers to organize.
The Green Party opposes the "War As Foreign Policy" mentality. It advocates the investigation of the abusers of our Constitution from the Bush regime and wherever it goes from there as well as looking into the election frauds in the US of 2000 and 2004.
So, while you may want to look into building a new party, you might want to consider helping to build and strengthen one that already reflects Main Street in many ways. It is a nationally and FEC-recognized political party that is already electing people around the country that don't have to beg their party to be for justice or peace or fairness or equality. Getting a party going isn't easy -- especially early on. The GP could use some new blood and energy to build upon what already exists. In many states, you could run for office tomorrow.
Alank, the Green party has been struggling for years in the low single digits. It is perceived as radical, and has progressive positions on social issues. The Mainstream Party has already morphed into the Main Street Party, and takes no sides on social issues. Too divisive. I want to see a party that has appeal for right, left and center. Most people, including small businesses and small farms are populist on economic issues.
I intend to contact the Center for Rural Affairs for some advice and input. They've been around since 1973, started in Nebraska and are now nationwide.
Some years ago I joined the Pacific Green Party, was on the steering committee in Eugene OR, and the Portland chapter was an autocratic pain in the rear. So I got out. Remained registered Green but wanted nothing to do with the workings of the party. Maybe it's the fate of all parties to attract power hungry people.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
I encountered first hand Jason Altmire's bullying(Dem 4th congressional district PA) when Single payer advocates confronted him in a town meting. The bluntness, the insulting dismissal of us as a tiney minority and the attempt to discourage our advocacy-- all of it can be seen as his perception of our weakness. How do we show strength? Single payer advocates have to start picking these guys off in primaries. If we could take down just one of these guys--the ripples would spread all over Washington. It doesn't have to be Altmire that we depose-- but it has to be someone. Let us not be coopted by a psuedo "public" plan that will fail. It's time to peal off from the Obama plan. We must fight for what we believe is best. Let's make our presence felt in 2010 and beyond by actually changing elections and getting single payer advocates in Congress who owe their seats to our advocacy. Only then can we get enough of a toe hold to be treated with respect by our Congress, by our own party. Respect isn't really enough-- these "representatives" have to fear consequences of opposing us before they will be on our side.
Vote third party progressive after you specify clear conditions for the Demoks to earn your vote by election day and they fail to meet them. This approach pushes the Demoks into silence because they know they can't argue with their explicit failure. We then exploit this void of silence to trumpet our far-left vision/agenda, and eventually, as we gain momentum, the wimpering Demoks will lend us their grudging support because they have no vision/agenda of their own.
"Single payer advocates have to start picking these guys off in primaries."
That's true but a little late. A lot really. We have no idea of the political situation and climate in 2 or 4 or 6 years. So we HAVE to ACT NOW!
We must use every bit of energy and organizational skill we can muster, keep up with the SinglePayer sites and blogs, and get our family, neighbors and colleagues to participate in a march or rally, and to begin thinking of their once-in-a-lifetime (if that's the case) trip to Washington. Somehow, we MUST make a big public noise happen.
As to elections, I think it is time to "pick them off" by running 3rd party. The Democratic Central Committee (DLC and more) will fight tooth and nail any comers, so they might as well be coming from the OUTside. It's time to build not just a campaign, but a Movement, and a real party of democratic resistance to the corporate Duopoly that comes in two flavors to keep everyone happy, but poses as two parties with autonomy of action. I say back and build your local Greens who are 100% behind Single Payer and don't need convincing.
I would love to hear anyone of the bought and paid for bigots in congress use the "blame the victim" arguments against war. This is the one place these arguments would fit. No war money is justified because the lion's share is being syphoned off to legal theft for war corporations. These corporations want war because they don't have to compete. They want war because they are lazy and anti-free enterprize, etc. But when talk comes to war, the paraded patriotic chest poping conveniently ignores the corporate welfare cheats on our dime. Then when healthcare returns to the conversation, the entire logical structure is flipped on its' head. I would say it was deliberate cognitive dissonance but I think it's just a bunch of bribed mouths talking.
If big money wins on healthcare, it's over.
wikipedia:
Single-payer health care describes the payment of doctors, hospitals, and other health care providers from a single fund. It may pay for health professionals and services that are delivered in either private or public sector settings according to the needs and wishes of the patient and his or her doctor.
The purpose of health insurance is to balance risk. With Single payer health care it is possible to balance risk across a lifetime of contributions to the single fund. This is important because health care demands tend to rise as people get older, but their earnings capacity is usually greater when they are younger and more productive.
Single payer health care systems therefore balance premiums or contributions much more towards higher contributions when earnings are high and lower contributions when earnings are less, even though expenditures may be very high. Private health insurance however tends only to balance risks year on year. Thus younger people can be insured at very low rates because they tend to attract lower risks whereas older and sicker people are penalized through pricing.
An often-cited study determined that some 30 percent of U.S. health care dollars went to health care administrative costs. Health care providers must also absorb the cost of staff time for dealing with the insurance companies, which adds to the cost of the insurance-based system. Some countries such as Taiwan have introduced Single Payer system in which the entire cost rebate system absorbs less than 2 per cent of health care costs.
Moral hazard arises when an individual or institution does not bear the full consequences of its actions. In the medical sphere, medical practitioners are sometimes accused of using the insured person's medical insurance to insure themselves against medical malpractice by doing more tests than are strictly necessary.
Some insured people may ask an insurance provider to pay for the cost of medical treatment that they would not have chosen to pay for themselves. Some medical providers, keen to recoup their investment on medical technologies such as medical scanners, may recommend scans which may not be strictly necessary.
In the British/Scandinavian/Spanish system of single payer, health care providers are simply salaried by the community and have to deliver health care within a fixed budget. This means that there is every incentive for them not to waste funds on unnecessary tests and the use. Comparative effectiveness between hospitals is measured and publicly reported. Ineffective practise is rooted out. Because hospitals are public institutions they cannot profit by providing more care. The system of gatekeeper access ensures that patients themselves do not waste public money demanding unnecessary services.
A good illustration of the way the organization of payment affects costs in the system and distorts medical priorities is the difference in practice of prostate cancer screening. In North America, prostate cancer is regularly screened and creates many costs which are borne by the insurance company and the patient. In Britain, doctors do not routinely screen but may perform a PSA test if there are other indications of a prostate problem. As a result fewer men have to undergo the test and follow up tests to find the few that have the aggressive type of cancer. Death rates from prostate cancer are very similar in Britain and North America.
According to Princeton University health economist Uwe E. Reinhardt, Medicare, Medicaid, and SCHIP represent "forms of 'social insurance' coupled with a largely private health-care delivery system" rather than forms of "socialized medicine." In contrast, he describes the Veterans Administration healthcare system as a pure form of socialized medicine because it is "owned, operated and financed by government." The Veterans Administration is a single-payer system and provides excellent quality, said Reinhardt. In a peer-reviewed paper published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers of the RAND Corp. reported that the quality of care received by Veterans Administration patients scored significantly higher overall than did comparable metrics for patients in the rest of the U.S. health system
Senator Max Baucus:
“We are Americans,” “We’re different from Canada, we’re different from the United Kingdom.” “We have to come up with a uniquely American solution."
Winston Churchill:
"Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing...after they have exhausted all other possibilities."
Up In Smoke:
"When, boy? When...are you going to get your act together?"
They "progressively" make themselves richer and more powerful. Something the poor won't help with.
Here in West Palm Beach FL we are holding a street corner rally in solidarity with the National Rally being held in DC on June 25th.
Now is the time to show Washington the power of the people.
The economy is not working for working families today—and health care is a major part of the problem. Across America, families are making hard decisions between paying for health care and paying for other necessities and struggling with a system that is too often cruel and inefficient.
You need to support improved and expanded Medicare For all
(the implementing legislation has already been proposed)in the form of H.R. 676 and S. 703
We must expose the Congressional leaders that are colluding in advancing lousy, wasteful legislation knowing full well that Americans are hurting, and will continue to die and go bankrupt because of its shortcomings.
We must do what it takes to get the attention of the masses.
On this day, June 25, it is important that you have your own rally in cities across the nation to give our message the strong voice that will make it heard.
All we are hearing is platitudes from Congress. Patient is now code blue.
Rally June 25th in every town across the nation. Pick a street corner and a time. Post it to Craigs list. SHOW UP.
Universal Single Payer, like Medicare for All, will help to prevent congress from taking bribes from corporations like W.R.Grace and Union Carbide which have led to the wholescale poisoning of entire towns and cities for corporate profit.
The "Public Option" is no different that any congressionally approved corporate highwayman saying "Your Money or Your Life."
This article (see the below link) appeared today in the LA Times, stating that Obama is going to finance his health care reform by cutting Medicare, MediCal (the state health care program for the poor) and funds to private hospitals that provide emergency care for the poor. Here in California, MediCal payments already are so low that most doctors won't accept MediCal patients. We've had 18 local hospitals close in our region in the last couple of years because they went bankrupt trying to serve the uninsured who showed up in their emergency rooms. By Obama's funding the so called "public option" in this way, isn't that robbing Peter to pay Paul, and leaving the public health care system in the same state of financial meltdown in which it presently exists?
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-radio14-2009jun14,0,6697465.story
This is very true. I just had my Medi-Cal benefits cut and I, just as of last week, can no longer see a doctor for an ongoing health problem. Why? Because I can't pay. Does stopping my care suddenly make me BETTER? Hell no. No doctors will take Medi-Cal in my county, and the only ONE who would now can't.
We already had one hospital close and a number of clinics. Now there are two and the only doctors who remain are in multi-doctor practices so they can afford it.
CV --
You correctly observe that 4Profit companies have bought-off enough congresspersons to guarantee that Single Payer is kept off the table.
But then you pretend that this same, corrupt 4Profit influence is somehow, magically less at-work in congress's so-called compromise plan - the Public Option.
How could that be?
Did all that corrupt influence just suddenly go away, once Single Payer was nixed?
Come, come now, CV. You can't be that naive.
Clearly, 4Profits are also calling the shots in congress's formulation of the chief 'alternative' plan (4Profits pretending to oppose it, knowing that in doing so more people are likely to support it out of widespread suspicion and hatred of the industry.)
I say 'clearly' because, given Public Option's fatally insufficient capital start-up base, plus its fuzzy theoretical features regarding how that base can or ever will be reliably expanded (through competition in a still locked-down market...?), the Public Option plan can only quickly fail both financially and in terms of providing timely affordable universal coverage --- i.e., just as stated by Dr. Skala.
To recap: Having nixed Single Payer, the 4Profits now need an alternative faux plan that is likely to be adopted precisely because they oppose it (thus also letting congressional cowards off the political hook); but one which is structured to fail and, in failing, buys the industry years more time to continue profiting from the chaos and inhumanity they feed upon.
As for a full-blown, statutorily enacted, government-administered Single Payer system being unconstitutional or legitimately vulnerable to legal challenges, especially by the vampire owners of a private system which is itself unconstitutionally and monopolisticly ensconced, I suggest that it is You, CV, who fails to understand democracy principles within US constitutional parameters.
There can hardly be a credible legal case by industry, against 'takings' a government Single Payer system, when the industry in question enjoys its entire market-fortress posture and wealth as the result of its own prior takings.
ontondo, I think you nailed it. I've been suspicious that the insurance industry's objection to public option was a red herring. By the time their lobbyists AKA Congress finish with it they will be celebrating and Obama will be declaring a victory for the American people. So far the companies have dumped about $10 million into this fight in the first quarter of 2009 and it isn't over.
As another poster pointed out, Single Payer itself may end up unrecognizable if it ever did make it out of committee. Really, the only answer is to throw all these crooks and thieves out of office. We will never get our needs met as long as they are collecting their salaries from their corporate paymasters.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
ducksawce, how about defining "run"? We get to choose our health care providers under HR 676 and health care decisions are made between the patient and provider; no one else is involved in these decisions. Not insurance industry bean counters, not the government. The government collects taxes, pays the bill. They do set fees based on normal charges. Currently a third of medical office overhead expenses go to wrangling with the insurance industry. Hr 676 would delete that expense, further reducing medical costs.
The current system is chaotic and insane, and cost increases far outpace inflation. So do the profits to the insurance industry, their CEO salaries and bonuses. Meanwhile, our health indices are steadily sinking in terms of health care outcome. This country is headed toward a third world disaster. 20,000 Americans a year are dying for lack of medical care, 40% of bankruptcies are from medical bills, while most of those people have medical insurance. Whoop De Doo!
I don't see why you have faith in the people. Out of 300 million, over 95% are clueless about single payer and not even understanding what is being done to them. Do you think the Propaganda Machine is telling them anything except what's happening on American Idol or the latest Pentagon spin on how many Afghans we killed? Nada.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
And I don't see why you have faith in the government. A government that changes every two years - that has been bought and sold by for-profit insurers.
As you keep suggesting - re-read HRH 676 and look at the top down structure.
The President has far too much power. The Secretary of Health has too much power and their appointees have too much power. What happens when we have another Bush/ Cheney and a more compliant Congress - the entire health system reverts to an old boy system.
I have no problem with the financial side of single payer - I have a problem with the management of the single-payer system. (read the bill)
There can be a non-profit cooperative system - as with credit unions - run by the people - I just don't share your low opinion of the people.
And I don't see why you have faith in the government. A government that changes every two years - that has been bought and sold by for-profit insurers.
As you keep suggesting - re-read HRH 676 and look at the top down structure.
The President has far too much power. The Secretary of Health has too much power and their appointees have too much power. What happens when we have another Bush/ Cheney and a more compliant Congress - the entire health system reverts to an old boy system.
I have no problem with the financial side of single payer - I have a problem with the management of the single-payer system. (read the bill)
There can be a non-profit cooperative system - as with credit unions - run by the people - I just don't share your low opinion of the people.
I just reread HR 676 and I ask myself if I want a system that is run by the government or run by the people?
According to HR 676, the Secretary of Health and Human Services will select the (overall) director - who will select the directors of long-term care and mental health.
The President will select the 15 member National Board of Universal Quality and Access - yes there are good gualifications - but do you trust Bush, Obama, kucinich or any other politician to run national health - without influence?
I have no faith in Congress to do the right thing ...I have faith in the people
In today's CD, there is an article about "Small Banks, Radical Vision" which describes people's alternatives to banking systems - substitute health care.
Credit Unions are by mandate non-profit - run by their members. How many of us have abandoned our relationships with banks that have screwed us and moved to the credit unions down the street... Economic security is also a basic human right but many of us have not moved to the people's alternative. Shame on us.
There is a health cooperative movement in the State of Washington. Are there any posters from Washington who can enlighten us.
I, for one, would rather have the choice of a people's cooperative, run as a non profit than to opt for a government run system - no matter how good its intentions
Maybe a coop structure is better than a conventional bureaucracy to manage the disbursement of public funds to healthcare providers. However you would have to explain why you think the coop may outperform the Medicare, VA, and foreign single payer bureaucracies. Who knows how these and Social Security and various other federal bureaucracies manage to fend off the elites' class war assault, but it's quite likely elites recognize them as crucial to keeping wage slaves in the buck-churning soul-destroying "workforce" instead of elder-care. You can imagine elites on the golf course quietly grunting at each other "we can't touch medicare - yet". If you want to move such a bureaucracy toward a coop structure, you need a new information format that enables large numbers of people to get very quickly up to speed on a large range of issues. Think "executive summary on steroids". This idea is of course widely applicable to self-governance in all sectors. It should be the top priority. It's something the elites fear most, so you know it's best for the people.
Oregoncharles
I have my money in an Oregon credit union and I get a 4.8 - 5% interest rate on my money!
CV, your analysis doesn't fly. First of all, we don't know what the public option will actually look like when the insurance lobbyists get through with it. We do know that the insurance industry will offer plans that cherry pick the healthiest people. The public option will be self financed, but by sick people. Where do you think that will end up? Skyrocketing premiums.
Before you go badmouthing single payer, why don't you go read HR 676? It doesn't upend the apple cart but takes 5 years to phase in. I'm wondering where you're coming from. Sounds like a Libertarian wandered onto a progressive website.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
I have read hr676 when Dennis first put it up and said, the day I read it, that it was a flawed bill. I'm all for converting our system into a National Health like England and Canada, so I was disappointed in this bill.
Somewhere back around Reagan, Corporations got laws written that allowed them to sue if anyone got in the way of their projected profits from a business venture! They call it Restraint of Trade. And if the Government put's laws on peoples' property that devalues the property, they call that Takings and can sue over that. The Corporate, Property First Legal gangs, Rocky Mountain Institute and the Federalists are all real big on this. A frontal attack on the Insurance companies will launch thousands of RoT and Takings lawsuits against our Treasury to the tune of TRILLION$. And there is a strong likelihood that they could prevail, the way the laws are currently and the way the courts have been stuffed. And aside from bankrupting the Treasury, they will also drag out implementation of SP via the protracted court schedules, for decades.
And they are geared up for that fight. That's why Public Option is so lethal to them, it beats them at their own game, Capitalism.
This takings argument is not germane.
The HMOs would not be seized--by government regulation, they would not be allowed to sell health insurance anymore. They would have to find a new way to screw people or go out of business. Tough cookies.
I don't normally take issue with you, because I totally respect your impassioned and sensible viewpoints. I would like to point out that we don't know what the public option will look like, or whether the insurance lobby will get what they want at all. They will try to keep their plans that cherry-pick the healthiest people. But there are people in Congress, (and I suggest we get behind them) who want to institute a new rule that insurance companies cannot decline anyone. There are plenty of Congresspeople that do not want the public option to be a "dumping ground" for the sick. I still believe that if there really is a "level playing field" the public option can outcompete private insurance. The current debate is really a test of whether the government can do its job... that is, govern. (i.e., regulate, rein in the excesses of private greed and power)
Thank you hamster, I concur. We don't know for sure what Public Option will be but if it isn't publicly administered and affordable to the 45million people that 4Profits have already dumped, then it's neither Public nor an Option.
We have to understand that making money off of sick people is the American way.
"raising taxes and paying insurers to cover people " That's not Public Option, that's the "Individual Mandate" that the Insurance Companies are pushing, AKA "RomneyCare", the failed Compulsory Insurance of Massachusetts. If that's what you are fighting, that's good, fight on.
But Public Option is a different animal. It's not run by private industry, it's PUBLIC. it doesn't give money to the Insurance Companies, it pays Doctors and Hospitals. It's not insurance, it's a payment plan.
It is designed to move the 4Profits out of the business without suddenly dumping one million white-collar workers onto the Unemployment rolls and without opening US up to Restraint of Trade and Takings lawsuits.
SinglePayer, as currently formulated, outlaws private insurance and dumps their employees out in the cold. The supporters of SinglePayer don't seem to be able to recognize that this is illegal, it's not politically possible and it's not fiscally responsible. Maybe because they don't understand how a Democracy works, we don't have a dictator, laws cannot be made by fiat, Congress and the President could not install SinglePayer overnight even if they could get the votes.
The beauty of Public Option is that it's end goal is SinglePayer but it gets there by outcompeting the Insurance Companies rather than attacking them. And the Companies are terrified of it for exactly that reason.
They are all geared up to fight SinglePayer and have a pile of tools at their disposal to do that. Restraint, Takings, and other legal means, Propaganda (SOCIALISM, be very scared!) et cetera. And they have bought enough Congresscritters that SinglePayer just barely got a hearing. But they are not ready for a market competition plan from US. That's the scramble we're seeing in trying to pivot and fight this off. And they are doing that by spreading disinformation, like this: “The public option preserves all the systemic deficiencies that we see in the current system,” Skala said. “It maintains a finance system that is based on private insurance and private insurers and their drive to fight claims, issue denials, screen out the sick and make a big profit generate tremendous administrative waste..."
NO. Public Option is designed to compete the 4Profits out of the business, not preserve them. It does it gradually rather than disrupting one sixth of our already damaged economy and without incurring a couple decades worth of courtfights.
So if you want SinglePayer, the only available path that leads that direction is Public Option, It's too bad that people like Russ Mokiber (who I respect a lot) are allowing themselves to be played by the Insurance Companies, but that is the net result of rallying support for a doomed bill at the expense of the bill that would actually achieve the goal we all want.
"So if you want SinglePayer, the only available path that leads that direction is Public Option, It's too bad that people like Russ Mokiber (who I respect a lot) are allowing themselves to be played by the Insurance Companies, but that is the net result of rallying support for a doomed bill at the expense of the bill that would actually achieve the goal we all want."
Well, I'm not sure this is true - I could say the same for many things and miss by a mile.
I will say that current political reality (reality as defined by politicians, who, BTW, are writing the laws) usually does not allow for quick changes. It is a tragedy, but from my perspective, it's true. Things happen in slow, frustrating, maddening steps in Washington, if they happen at all.
Now, having said that, who the hell knows whether the public option will work. First, as Mr. Skala noted, it's already been tried in several states and has not worked. Why try this failed model on the national level?
Second, the health insurance industry is heavily involved in the current legislation. To me, that's already three strikes against us - a done deal. While I am old enough to realize that most things work slowly, I also realize that corporate entities cannot, and should not, be trusted to keep the public good at heart. It's not their mission to look out for us - their mission is to maximize profit for their shareholders, and ultimately, their officers. So, just the fact that the insurance industry is sleeping with Congress while this is being crafted throws a monkey wrench into it. It may help a little, but ultimately, it will not help the American public.
Is the public option better than nothing? I don't know. It may be, but even so, I think it will fall far short of getting to the issue of the lack of _adequate_ coverage for most Americans. And if this won't do that, maybe it should fail. I'm afraid that if this passes, Congress will thump it's chest and wash it's hand of it and we will be left high and dry...again.
Yes, the public option would be lame compared with single payer even if it was a real, true public option. It would do almost nothing to stop costs from spiraling out of control for example. But making "public option" even more lame, and virtually worthless, is that (as most everyone seems to know here) by the time the insurance companies through their lobbyists get through with dictating the details, it won't really be a true public option.
**He believes the public option being pushed by Obama and the Democrats will fail.
“The public option preserves all the systemic deficiencies that we see in the current system,” Skala said. “It maintains a finance system that is based on private insurance and private insurers and their drive to fight claims, issue denials, screen out the sick and make a big profit generate tremendous administrative waste — 400 billion dollars a year.”**
So you see, Mr. Skala, it won't be a failure at all. The public will have the option of continuing to prop up profiteering at our expense - both at the expense of our health, as well as the continued taxation to subsidize corporate profits. Think back to the 2003 Medicare bill at a cost estimated to be over $600B at the time. (Who knows what the costs actually ran up to.) The congress said it was so "our seniors could afford the prescriptions." Then they wrote legislation denying "our seniors" the ability to negotiate drug prices. This public option will be no different. Talk about something good in public, while letting FIRE dictate the profitable terms in the legislation where it matters.
So it won't be a waste! Instead of 400 billion a year it'll be 500. That's called profit. That's called the best investment you can make in America these days - buying a congress.
The fix is in.
The public option will make it into the final legislation but will be so distorted as to be worthless.
Fake Progressives (the type who are offended by and try to censor honest debate) will declare victory.
You can see it coming a mile away.
SEAGLASS writes:
"If the so called Progressives the far left of the party [is] bought by the Health care Vampires what possible hope do any of us have?"
-----
The main health care Vampire is Obaama Himself, who wants a "win" (see Democracy NOW!) for the truly-mad mishmash of bs He's calling a "plan".
Obaama's done nothing with His biiig "win" but toss the Treasury to the corporations (including the military contractors and "defense" contractors). The latest installment of that is His utterly stupid determination to sand-bag Single Payer in favor of the insurance corporations -- including a telephone campaign from the DNC to harangue local single-payer activists in favor of His "plan".
If it takes a Revolution to enact Single Payer, that's what we should do, and promptly.
As for Obaama, He HAS Single Payer (AND his wife's retirement from that $300,000/yr "health" gig with the U/C non-profit). Maybe He could use His stellar "coverage" to summon an array of psychiatric practicioners to help Him with that nasty compulsion for "wins" and media adulation.
Obama's support of FIRE is the only transparent thing in his government.
Or, at least it should be transparent to liberals, but we know the democratic party was transformed into the Obama party, a party that has abandoned tradition and made a new form of discrimination fashionable. Many of the young have a certain animosity toward boomers, their care and their social security.
You ever wonder why this administration is insistent on insuring children, other than it sounds so wonderful? Who could be against that? Most children don't need expensive care, so they make very profitable insurance policies. It's the middle aged, the pre-Medicare population having problems. Most health care costs arise in the last months of life. So, as bad as it sounds, I don't think uninsured children is the problem.
But the new thinking says that middle-aged America, especially white, IS the cause of all that is wrong with the world. We brought about all the problems that we spent our lives, as liberals, opposing. This issue of health care is another where the thinking now is that while many deserve care - poor, minorities, students, children, immigrants and even the poor of other countries - we do not. Everyone will skirt around the injustice of having working people pay for others to have care, while also supporting the rights of insurance execs to haul home millions in stock options. The democrats will ignore issues like bankruptcy caused by medical bills. We are the people of which no one will speak except to call us names and blame the post-Reagan corporate rape of our nation on.
Here's Bill Goold's contact information:
Phone: 202-226-4055
Darcy Burner's contact information:
Email: darcy@progressivecongress.org
*** Please let these wonderful representatives of progressive policy know how satisified you are with them!
Thank you.
Sometimes I would ask myself the question "What does being honest get you these days?" While it can feel miserable and even put one in tears to be honest, your inner self can only thank you and even empower you. Mr. Skala, when I was a kid and got punished more often for being honest, I still did not give up staying honest and fighting for what's right. Not even my trip to the hospital last month or my car breaking down last week with the exploding engine nearly costing my life stopped me from being honest even with my crooked car dealer service consultant and insurance company. Keep up the honest work and others shall continue to join.
Agreed, Jennifer.
Glad you made it back alive!
Thanks Ted.
P.S.: I hope I can say the same to my car after I finish getting through the car dealer and auto insurance company. If there's anything I can't stand besides most pols, it's insurance companies of all stripes and car sales people. Again, another hell raiser for being honest in life. I mentioned more about this in another post on this site.
I'm with you on that. Pols and insurance companies are at the bottom of my list as well. At least with car sales people you get something tangible for the screwing. Although sometimes it does blow up on you...
Oregoncharles
My son, very perceptive at an early age, said to me one day: Evil prevails because people who are filled with it have far more tools available to them than do those who possess a strong moral/ethical code. And to make things worse, everyone loves a winner! Most people love to follow the leader.
"And to make things worse, everyone loves a winner! Most people love to follow the leader."
Bingo. But there have been unexpected successes even from the perceived less "winnable". I think we have to convince people to look at "winner" in a different light. I can't expect evil to diminish completely but trying to prevent it from getting worse would help.
My parents taught me very quickly to lie. While encouraging me to always be honest, and letting me know I could tell them anything, anytime, I found very quickly that honesty was often followed by punishment, even for the slightest affronts. Lying was the best way to go. And, sadly, I think a lot of politicians were raised the same way.
I can see how lying is like fast food. "Fast and effective relief" is a powerful seducer with long term damaging effects. I don't think it's enough to encourage honesty but to also reward it.
USans say your parents are properly balanced human beings.
Is Skala proposing something along the lines of the health care system in Canada? I've read into Canada's single payer system, and honestly I think what we have in Australia, which is again similar to many European countries is much better and more likely to resound with the majority of Americans.
That's a good point, aussiegirl.
While I'm not familiar with the differences between Canada and other nations' health insurance systems, it seems most on this side of the pond compare the U.S. only to Canada's system.
If we were serious about changing our system in the U.S., we would line up each single payer system and take the best of each with an eye to how they might work in the U.S. I'm sure no two nations do it the same, and neither should we.
Finally, while Canada's system may have issues, it is much maligned by those who want no government involvement (IOW, they want corporate, money-making, greed to rule health insurance). I take it all with a grain of salt. The only thing I am sure about is that for-profit health insurance does not work. The U.S. is the poster child for that case.
Wow. Even with the "progressives" in Congress, the fix is in.
Go to http://www.singlepayeraction.org/blog/?p=960 and sign up to take action.
Sioux Rose
Single payer: simple, logical, elegant, cost-effective, and humane... but the entrenched interests, which is to say the congressional WHORES owe their allegiance to them that financed them (their campaigns) and so the hardly transparent attempts to thwart the best way to provide health care. Instead it's obvious that our congressional mis-leaders are demonstrating their fealty to the insurance companies, those callous agents of massive disregard who exist mostly to glorify their god, Mammon, rather than deliver anything remotely tangential to the term (health) CARE!
I applaud Mr. Mokhiber who has been tracing corporate corruption in so many high and mighty places for over a decade. If only his findings were made available to the larger public!
Most of us here realize single payer is the correct way to go with the health problems in the country. However, Siouxrose points out that, though desirable, it is also impossible to put through, as too many lawmakers are being paid big bucks to stop it, and consequently will not support it. Better to take one step at a time, instead of killing the whole thing. The public option, if good enough to draw people into it, would be better than nothing, and try for single payer next time around.
The public option looks more like window dressing at best and as pointed out, it has failed miserably in states where it passed. I don't see any baby steps on this issue. Single payer is already the easy step. The lawmakers and Big Insurance/Pharma are making a mountain out of an anthill. The Democrats will be losing the real center should they fail to focus on single payer.
I am extremely disappointed, though not terribly surprised, that the Progressive Caucus cannot seem to understand that pumping our tax dollars directly into the coffers of the major insurance companies and HMOs is not going to help all Americans to obtain HEALTH CARE. It may get all Americans HEALTH INSURANCE. There is an enormous difference. Are they blind or are they, too, beholden to the dollars pouring into Congressional Campaign chests? To he** with the citizens, we must protect the corporations.
A really good public option would outcompete private insurance. This would be different than a "mandate" which forces people to buy private insurance--what they tried in Massachusetts, the only public option there being that the government helps you buy private insurance if you are below a certain income level. That system is obviously the worst solution because, as you said, it only perpetuates and expands the current non-health-care system and enriches the insurance companies.
I am a big single payer supporter. Single payer would create one large all-inclusive pool, which would create the best economies of scale, and get rid of denials, complicated paperwork, and profit-taking.
A public option that gets the government into insurance for everyone, that is basically Medicare for all, while not as good as single payer, is far better than a "mandate".
Obama and others pushing for a public option say "if you're happy with your current insurance you can keep it". How many people are really happy with their current insurance, really? Most of the state central AFL-CIO's have endorsed HR 676-- and union people have among the best private insurance. I have pretty good private insurance, and it still sucks. I would switch to a public plan in a heartbeat.
"A really good public option would outcompete private insurance."
That's a more far-sighted observation than the great majority, and it's ethical and logical, but it depends on an unlikely assumption that such a policy would be corruption-proof. Instead, the proofing has to be built in. Without it, the private insurers will SELECT the healthy and REJECT the unhealthy, who will then burden the public option with far greater costs per capita. The privateers, backed by O'Bamba and the gang, will have succeeded in turning a challenge to oppression into an intensified opression. The public will pick up the tab for the unhealthy, offloading the privateers, and the privateers will raise their profit margins even higher on the healthy ones exploiting a falsified perception of reform. This isn't pooled risk at all. This is intensified corruption. Saintly O'Bamba fully understands and supports it. Most so-called "progressives" in the Demok party support intensified corruption. We need pooled risk, medicare for all, with strong anti-corruption provisions, and enforced requirement to cut costs by a factor of two in two years and three in five years.
What makes you think the healthy are so naive as to think their crappy insurance will still cover them when they actually get sick?
The system will be gamed so that the so-called public option will not really offer a better alternative to the HMOs. The code phrase for this in the Beltway is "level playing field."
See my reply to BeForKids above. Go back to sleep, vanmungo. There's no point in carrying on the fight, since you already know what "will" happen.
Ya' know, public option vs. single-payer is one of those litmus tests that distinguishes corporate liberals from real progressives/radicals: like support for Palestinian rights.
David Lindorff today gives a nicely succinct explanation about why the public option is phoney baloney:
"Having a so-called “public option” plan working in competition with private insurance plans will not solve this problem. Either the public option will become like the private options—trimming benefits and rejecting some applicants—or it will become a dumping ground for all the high-cost, high-risk people that the private sector insurance industry doesn’t want. At that point, the public plan will become a huge cost burden on the taxpayer, who will begin demanding that it cut back in the benefits it provides, taking us right back to where we started.
"The fact that the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress are both raising the issue of the high cost of health care “reform,” and are talking about ways to raise revenues to pay for it tells us all we need to know about the alleged “reform” schemes they are contemplating. They are doomed and, even if implemented, will not work."
See the entire article at http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff06152009.html
vanmungo, it's even worse, because Obama is saying the public option must be self supporting - no taxpayer money. So the really sick will have to pull themselves up by their bootstraps or go without.
The whole situation is insane and Obama is a total sellout. He's throwing overboard everyone who can't swim. And i hear he will be helping to fund the private plans with Medicare and Medicaid cuts.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
You're right--Obama gave the game away in his remarks to the AMA:
"What are not legitimate concerns are those being put forward claiming a public option is somehow a Trojan horse for a single-payer system," he said. "I'll be honest. There are countries where a single-payer system may be working. But I believe -- and I've even taken some flak from members of my own party for this belief -- that it is important for us to build on our traditions here in the United States. So, when you hear the naysayers claim that I'm trying to bring about government-run health care, know this -- they are not telling the truth."
vanmungo, single payer is not government run. So even if he was for it, he would be telling the truth. I certainly don't get the impression he's for it.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
As I pointed out above, I have not predicted what "will" happen--I have quoted the only publicly floated explicit version of a public option, and I have analyzed the dead-end implications of any conceivable version of it.
But your blind faith trumps logic, facts, and the judgment of the leading authority on the subject--Jacob Hacker--that the public option will EXPAND the market for HMOs (already quoted above).
You haven't specified what you even think this "public option" will look like or how it will function, yet you've jumped all over it like a monkey on methedrine. It's sad to see even self-designated leftists being so easily gulled by what is clearly a gambit by the K-street corporate liberals to deflect a movement for serious reform.
It's not surprising that you would counsel someone else to go back to sleep--that seems to be your default mode on this subject--you need to wake up to the realities. Or maybe you prefer to stay happily snoozing in the bed you've made with the DLC neoliberals who who are as hot for the public-option scam as much as you; the difference is they KNOW it's a scam--that's their specialty. You've just been duped by a vague, hazy marketing slogan that you can't flesh out with a concrete definition or specifics. Just keep repeating public option, public option--it's like opium--you forget about single payer and forget that public option is an empty term with no real content.
Have a happy nappy.
Your earlier post did address the whole pile of problems with private health insurance with a proposal for strict regulations, but people seem to be saying they don't think such an elaborate regulatory scheme imposed on a laissez-faire capitalist game makes much sense. It's an elaborate game which single payer seems to avoid, by effectively pushing the capitalists off the healthcare field.
By purveying these illusions about the public option, you are playing a game rigged by the corporate liberals and the HMOs--they are using vague, undefined notions of a "public option" to derail the single payer movement into what is clearly a dead end.
Have you really thought about the specifics of a public option? Have you seen a plan that clearly spells out what this option would entail? I have, and it stinks--it's another K street contrivance to offer a veneer of reform--to gull complacent liberals--while preserving the for-profit, dysfunctional status quo
The first inkling of the details of the public option came about a month ago from the repugnant Chuck Schumer, who devised the scheme at the behest of the equally repugnant Max Baucus. Here are the devilish details, according to The New York Times:
“The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Max Baucus, Democrat of Montana, asked Mr. Schumer to seek a solution. In his response, Mr. Schumer set forth these principles:
• The public plan must be self-sustaining.
• It should pay claims with money raised from premiums and co-payments.
• It should not receive tax revenue or appropriations from the government.The public plan should pay doctors and hospitals more than what Medicare pays. Medicare rates, set by law and regulation, are often lower than what private insurers pay.The government should not compel doctors and hospitals to participate in a public plan just because they participate in Medicare.
• To prevent the government from serving as both “player and umpire,” the officials who manage a public plan should be different from those who regulate the insurance market.”
In other words, this is a guaranteed-to-fail farce that would replicate all the worst features of private insurance and offer none of the cost-savings or coverage expansion of the single risk pool of true single payer.
It’s time for progressives to stop being played for fools by the K-street sharpies who are trying to slather lipstick on this pig of a private system. The only real reform--one that has a proven track record for half a century throughout the industrialized world--is single payer; anything else will be a sham and a scam. See http://www.pnhp.org/facts/singlepayer_faq.php#public-option.
Or, as Rose Ann DeMoro, head of the California Nurses Association, put it, the public option will at best simply be a "smaller hole in the parachute."
See the following:
www.singlepayeraction.org
http://www.healthcare-now.org
www.pnhp.org
.
Illusions? You are correct about the advantages of single payer. I am a fervent supporter of it. It may be a longshot but there is still a chance to create a public option that will actually do some good. Seattle Congressman Jim McDermott (a former doctor) is fighting for that. It would not look anything like the completely bogus Schumer/Baucus plan you cited. If the public option sets itself up to compete with private insurance, it will fail, indeed. If it's set up to force private insurance to compete with it-- by having no preexisting conditions, no deductibles, no rejections, and no profit, private insurance will not be able to comptete, and will have to adapt. McDermott is also arguing for new insurance rules that would force insurers to not cherrypick only "healthy" customers, and so on. This is a legitimate middle ground.
hamster, the problem with your idea is that a public option will not "set itself up". It will be an insurance industry "set up" for sure. Follow the money.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
I'm sorry, but you and vanmungo both keep saying what "will" happen. That's called giving up while the fight is still on.
I have not predicted what "will" happen--I have quoted the only publicly floated explicit version of a public option, and I have analyzed the dead-end implications of any conceivable version of it.
If you want to keep beating your head against that brick wall, be my guest. There's no law against irrationality.
We actually agree more than we disagree. Congressmam McDermott has floated explicit guidelines for a public option which are pretty good. He's one of the biggest single payer champions in congress, but I think it's wise to have a backup plan in the short run if the door gets slammed on single payer-- not that any single payer advocate should call for anything less as the ultimate goal. I'll leave it at that.
hamster, read the tea leaves, or just follow the money. I don't gamble, but I would bet $100 dollars there will be no single payer and by the time the public option is hammered out, the insurance crooks and thieves will be grinning like Cheshire cats. Our corrupt Congress is in their pockets and they will do what they're told. You can take that to the bank.
I'm not suggesting we stop fighting. I'm not giving up. It's increasing public awareness and we need that. I just know that this Titanic is sinking. If I'm going down, I'm going down fighting.
Rebel Farmer just suggested I call the party I want to start the Main Street Party instead of the Mainstream Party. I LIKE her suggestion. It resonates and feels more inclusive, since I would like to see it the party of small business, family farms and working Americans. Now I have to get on facebook and learn to twitter. Never thought I'd see that day. But, it's a good forum for single payer as well.
I learned on Long Island when Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) sold their worthless, contaminated Shoreham nuclear power plant to the state for $1 and came out of negotiations with big smiles, what that meant. They stuck the state with hundreds of millions in clean up costs. They had contaminated the chamber before they had a license to operate. The state brought this on itself, because they had granted permission to test.
When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson
ANY public option would leave most of the system in the hands of the private insurers. In fact, Jacob Hacker, the leading academic theoretician of the public option, has projected that it would EXPAND the market for the private insurers.
See
http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/april/hacker_says_that_pub.php
and
http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/04/09/jacob-hacker-provides-details-for-public-option/
It's critical to understand that all the talk about the public option is diversionary--every person like you who spend time championing this half loaf--which is really no loaf (Rose Ann DeMoro of the California Nurses Association likened it to making the hole in the parachute smaller), is therefore spending that much LESS time and energy fighting for the only real reform--single payer.
To that extent, the HMOs have you right where they want you--not devoting all your time and energy to fighting for single payer.
Actually I am fighting for single payer, and have been for years, actively and vociferously. At the same time, I think the public option has the potential, if done right, to be the next best alternative to single payer. I just think people need to look at that rather than rejecting it outright, because our real choice right now might be between a really crappy public option designed by the insurance lobby that sabotages itself and "proves" it doesn't work, thus setting the timetable for reform back another 10 or 20 years; and a better public option crafted by some of the more enlightened members of Congress (for example, Jim McDermott who is actually one of the architects of single payer legislation in congress), which would include regulations to severely rein in the excesses of private insurance. It's not a black and white issue. If you believe only pure white will do, you may only get black.
The whole point of the "public option" is to keep the HMOs in business. You're kidding yourself on this.
The advantage of single-payer is in risk pooling--everyone is in the same pool: well, sick, young, old, sick, and poor, thus averaging out the risks and costs of guaranteeing cost-efficient coverage to everyone. In the "public-option plan," everyone is NOT in the same risk pool, as they would be in single payer. In a "pub-op" plan, the oldest, sickest, and poorest would end up in the public plan; the youngest and healthiest--and hence most profitable--cohort would aggressively marketed by the private HMOs.
Hence the whole advantage of single-payer risk pooling would be lost: combining EVERYONE's resources (through a modest tax rather than bloated private premiums) so that the currently healthy 80 percent subsidize the unhealthy 20 percent and thus achieve cost efficiencies not obtainable if these two groups are in separate pools. Moreover, because of these untenable costs, the "pub-op" public plan will have to charge premiums and impose deductibles, just like the private plans--more of the same, notwithstanding the "public" branding. This is the essence of sham reform: game the system so that the public sector founders, thus discrediting the idea of publicly funded health care for another generation.
As Tom Harkin said to Kevin Zeese, "I used to sell insurance. The basic rule is the larger the pool the less expensive the health care. Today we have 1,300 separate pools - separate health care plans - and that is why health care is so expensive; 700 pools would be more efficient and less expensive and one pool would be the least expensive. That's why single payer is the answer."
With ANY variant of the public option, you maintain the multiple risk pools and hence the chaos and dysfunction. The whole business is an elaborate diversion and sham.
I think the answer lies in your last sentence. They are so beholden to the money puring into their pockets that they can say who cares about the people we only care about the corporations.
"They are so beholden to the money puring into their pockets"
And in the future that will be public tax dollars. Public tax dollars going into the coffers of DC politicians to keep a truly public health option away from ordinary Americans.
This is a pretty glaring example of why "Progressives" need to abandon a Party that wants their votes but not their ideas.
You can't be pro-Democrat and pro-third Party when the DNC seeks to defeat any third party candidate challenging them in municipal elections to national elections.
You can't be pro-Democrat and pro-third Party when the DNC will ban you from their conventions and send police to arrest you if you show up to protest.
"Progressive Democrats"? What a joke.