Here's a Fax I sent Max's Office today. I just can't take the abuse anymore.
Dear Sen. Baucus,
I just want to let you know how disappointed I was with your vote yesterday to refuse to entertain either of the public option amendments that came before your committee. I've been a supporter, donor, and advocate on your behalf for many, many years. But yesterday you had a chance to do something important for small businessmen like me, and you let me down. My BC/BS premium went up 20% this year, over $1,200, and I'm healthy. I have no realistic option here in Lewistown. So, next time you need a ride from the airport, call someone else. Signs put up around the county? Good luck with that. A contribution? Ask Blue Cross. I'm done. My next vote will go to a real Democrat. You had a chance to make history. Instead, you'll go down in history as someone who could have made a difference, and chose not to. That's if history remembers you at all. I should have known it would end up like this.
Here's an idea for dealing with one of the vexing problems with the health insurance business: Recision.
Your reform proposal should stipulate that: (A) If an H.I. Company opts to rescind a policy, then that company needs to return premiums paid, with the prevailing rate of interest for as long as the consumer paid premiums, back to a maximum period of 5 years from the date of the proposed recision. (B) Claims paid over that period are not deductible from the recision penalty .
This stipulation will make the company think twice about the short term profit they can make using this process, at the expense of a consumer who's paid premium in good faith for any number of years.
It will also prevent H.I. Companies from fraudulently accepting payments from consumers they may flag for recision from day one.
It will give consumers a pot of cash to deal with the catastrophic health care needs that usually prompt an H.I. company to rescind a policy.
And finally, the policy must remain fully in effect until the recision penalty is paid in full.
It's just a good idea.
But an even better idea is a government-run public option that takes the profit incentive away from those H.I. companies standing between me and my doctor. I need health care, NOT health "Insurance". Health insurance doesn't buy a dime's worth of health care . I would hope you would structure the public option in a way that will eventually steer the country toward single-payer health care over, say, a ten-year transition period. H. I. companies are not an "industry". Building cars, trains, farming, and creative endeavours are industries. H.I. is an anchor that produces nothing.
that is why the private health insurers will make concessions at the last minute to ensure that we don't have a viable strong public plan in the health care reform bill currently being debated all accross the country.
they want to keep us nice and juicy. not necessarily healthy but alive enough to keep paying the premiums. the momentum of creating a decent health care reform bill which would have hurt the insurers has been successfully thwarted by the antics of max baucus. his ham-handed approach has successfully divided any progressive alliances which might have been problematic for the private insurance industry.
so which is it? is max an idiot or crazy like a fox? did he drive a wedge between true progressives and democratic party regulars to hurt chances of a bill's passage on purpose in order to keep the parasites happy? or is baucus really too stupid to live?....because while i watch this potential for health care reform drowning in a sea of congressional alternatives which only serve to further obfuscate any real change which we need those are the only choices i can come up with.
either way, max is going down in the history books as a political pariah or a political ninny.
The last CHIP bill passed Congress, right? Only a Bush veto, which Congress couldn't overcome, derailed that last attempt to expand health insurance coverage to kids. You think the bill would pretty much pass without much rancor, right?
Partisan debate heated up on the Senate floor over coverage options for legal immigrant populations in a bill to reauthorize the State Children's Health Insurance Program. A final vote on the SCHIP bill, which seeks to extend coverage to 4 million additional uninsured, low-income children, may not take place until later this week, as Senate Republicans offered up a slew of amendments that challenged the bill's provisions on eligibility.
Several Republicans, including ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) offered amendments to curtail enrollment of legal immigrant children and pregnant women. Grassley's amendment in particular would use federal dollars for coverage of these immigrants to cover more low-income U.S. citizens instead.
Yes. You read correctly. Senate Republicans are trying to block the expansion of health insurance coverage to children currently doing without because of legal immigrants and pregnant women.
Also remember that a number of these *sshats -- and I'm thinking of Chuck Grassley specifically -- didn't think twice about giving several hundred billion dollars of your money to investment banks.
I saw the news that Roy Brown promises to convene a bipartisan commission to address the cost of health care for Montanans. Not a terrible idea; but the usual tactics of a politico, eh? We don't need commissions, we need affordable, universal health care.
Anyhow. Here's the paragraph from the report I want to talk about, emphasis mine:
Brown cited the skyrocketing cost of health insurance, the growing cost of malpractice insurance for health care providers and the increasing costs of keeping hospital doors open in Montana.
The highlighted portion - the "worry" over malpractice insurance - is often Republican code-speak for tort reform, and a desire to legislate caps on malpractice settlements. The theory is that caps mean lower malpractice insurance rates, which leads to lower health care and coverage costs.
Of course, in reality, there's no such correlation.
(Here's a pretty fascinating health care story from a Montanan. Forward Montana is actually embarking on a big campaign to gather more thoughts like this. Interested folks can join us on Saturday for what promises to be a very cool campaign -- "House Calls 4 Health Care." Otherwise, check out Heartland's story and share your own thoughts below. - promoted by Matt Singer)
Last December, shoving some paper into a waste basket that had some broken glass in it, I cut my thumb deep into the joint, severing the two tendons that let a person extend the thumb. It became an inadvertent test of my health insurance. Now, I'm self-employed. I pay almost $900/mo. for my wife and I. We're mid to early 50's, and healthy. My insurance has a $2,500 deductible, and does not cover vision or dental, but does have drug coverage. Between premiums, vision, dental and deductibles, as well as paying for a policy for my college age daughter, I came up with right around $16,000 for "Health Care" in 2007, $11,700 of which paid premiums and bought nothing in terms of actual "Care".
Now when I went to the hospital shortly after the accident, unable to move my thumb on my right hand, I got good, prompt attention. I grilled every nurse, ER Doc, X-ray tech, the woman at admissions--asking them if they were "approved providers", and stressing that my only means of paying the impending costs was with insurance. I questioned the need for every bandage, bag, whatever--trying to be a good consumer, as I'm supposed to be, right?
Now to be fair to my insurance, they paid the amount over my deductible for this injury, but since the injury happened on Dec. 15, I had the $2,500 deductible from 2007, and the deductible for 2008 to apply to the bill. Insurance paid about $2,400, BUT NOT UNTIL giving me 5 days to to respond to a form asking these questions, among others:
1. Is another party liable for this accident, injury or condition?
2. Has a court action been filed against the responsible parties?
3. If this accident, injury, or condition is not motor vehicle related, please list the name of he party responsible for the accident or injury and the name of THEIR insurance company.
4. Has a claim for benefits under Worker's Comp. or similar laws been filed?
and other questions. I called my insurance agent and went through this form with her as I filled it out, so as not to commit some inadvertent error that would give the "insurance" company an excuse not to pay.
Now, lawyers get the rap for driving up health care costs, but it seems clear to me after this that it's the insurance company that's seeking to make sure that any concievable scapegoat is identified and sued prior to paying the health care professionals who took care of me. My doctor was paid by the insurance company almost 90 days after he rendered his services to me. How expensive is that? As someone who's self employed, all I can say is it's very expensive.
Heath insurance buys nothing in terms of HEALTH CARE. It buys private sector bureaucracy, delay, excessive profits and useless overhead. It does not buy "Choice". In an emergency you don't "Shop" for health care. It makes health care providers wait a long time for payment.
Now my accident was minor, but it's clear to me that my health care dollars are a monumental waste of resources, at least the ones going to the insurance company. We need to cut out the middle man. We need to get rid of the overhead. Let the doctors make a profit, not the insurance companys. I now lobby my representatives for single-payer health care at every opportunity. My Canadian friends pity me for the extreme cost of health care in the US, and the pathetic lengths we have to go to in order to assure that insurance will actually PAY for the care we recieve.
Wow. Compassionate conservative apparently means kicking children in the teeth. The New York Times has caught a rule change promulgated by the Bush Administration designed to knock some children off of State Children's Health Insurance Programs and prevent expansions of the programs in other states.
Under the proposal, states would only be able to expand CHIP if they can prove 95% participation rates, something our Senior Senator points out is an impossible request, out here in the real world.
Senator Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who is chairman of the Finance Committee, argued against the proposal, saying: "No state can meet 95 percent. No state currently meets 95 percent."
On top of that, the feds want to impose wonderful things like waiting periods for children moving into CHIP. Why do they want families to deal with health care gaps? To prevent people from leaving the private sector health care options, which, as I'm sure people can testify, are numerous, wonderful, and affordable. By people, of course, I mean Bush's brother-in-harms Dennis the Menace Rehberg.
You want to know why our health care industry is messed up? Why politicians continue to kow tow to the insurance and pharmaceutical industries? George W. Bush:
"The immediate goal is to make sure there are more people on private insurance plans. I mean, people have access to health care in America," he said. "After all, you just go to an emergency room."
The callousness and ignorance in this quote could fill a stadium.
It's Cover the Uninsured Week and Forward Montana and Montana People's Action are teaming up at 4:30 tonight to rally for expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). This one is a no-brainer. Republicans are calling for $300 million in tax cuts. Expansion of CHIP would cost a little over $1 million. Why don't we do $299 million in tax cuts and fully fund CHIP, eh?
Anyways, 4:30 @ the Higgins bridge -- I'll see you there.
Oregon Senator Ron Wyden has rolled out a very intriguing health care proposal that has already drawn support from both the SEIU and Safeway. The meat of the proposal from what I can tell is this:
All Americans buy their own health insurance. Employer-based health insurance becomes something of the past.
Employers that previously contributed to health insurance premiums would have to convert their savings into a wage hike. The tax code would be adjusted accordingly.
The federal government would provide subsidies to low-income Americans to make health insurance plans more affordable.
The federal government would mandate a minimum-quality health care plan, based on federal health insurance.
Insurance companies would be prohibited from denying coverage to people.
Health insurance rates could only be varied based on geography, family size, and smoking status. In other words, pre-existing conditions could not be a basis for either higher rates or rejection by the insurance company.
An independent top-notch health care consulting firm predicted net cost savings despite this being a move to truly universal health insurance. The insurance, although mandated, would be through private firms, which would still compete.
This isn't my dream plan, but it is pretty decent. It's also getting support from both business and labor -- a good sign that this may be a real common ground.
I'll be on a conference call with Senator Wyden soon to discuss the plan. If you have questions for him, please get them into comments quickly.
