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shadowkatNever thought this would happen in my lifetime. Course I didn't think we'd have a black president or the possibility of a woman president, let alone a woman secretary of State. Told a woman just last week that I'd be shocked if the health care bill ever got passed. Assumed the insurance lobby was too tough. But...what do I know? And thank ghod, I was wrong. In these instances, I'm very happy to be wrong.
In case you've been residing under a rock HR 4872 - the Senate Health Reform Bill passed by the Senate in December got passed by the House this Sunday and was signed into law. So yes, a National Health Care Reform Bill got passed in the US after...well over 100 years of trying. I kid you not. Theodore Roosevelt tried to get the thing passed.
Go here for a historical perspective on the efforts to get a National Health Care Bill passed that date back to well the 1800s. It has taken us not one but two centuries to get this bill passed, people. That's no small accomplishment. And while the War is largely over, there are still a few more skirmishes on the horizon - also it will take at least until 2014 or 2018 for some of the measures to take effect. What is interesting to me is Republicans have tried to get it through Congress - starting with Theodore Roosevelt and ending with Richard Nixon (of all people). Lyndon Johnson came the closest.
The stumbling block was getting it past Congress. The Founding Fathers made this harder than they ever would have imagined. No one could get the Senate and the House to agree. But the House did the unthinkable on Sunday - they passed the Senate Bill. All that remains to be voted on apparently are a few items that need to be reconciled...or rather amendments, and those do not require 60 votes. They can be passed with less. One of th amendments, in case you are at all curious - was deleting or throwing out the clause where the federal government paid Nebraska to cover their uninsured. Or something to that effect.
The compromise on abortion is NOT an amendment to the Bill but an EXECUTIVE ORDER signed by the President that would state federal funds are not to be used to pay for abortions. This does not mean you can't have them or that insurance companies can't pay for them, just that federal funds can't be used. And since it is an executive order - it can be overturned by a new administration.
If you want to read the bill for yourself go here: http://docs.house.gov/rules/hr4872/111_hr4872_amndsub.pdf
And here's CBS News description of what it entails:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20000846-503544.html
The best parts about the bill - which take effect now and why I was a 100% for this??
1. FREE PREVENTIVE CARE UNDER MEDICARE-- Eliminates co-payments for preventive services and exempts preventive services from deductibles under the Medicare program. Effective beginning January 1, 2011.
2. HELP FOR EARLY RETIREES-- Creates a temporary re-insurance program (until the Exchanges are available) to help offset the costs of expensive health claims for employers that provide health benefits for retirees age 55-64. Effective 90 days after enactment
3. ENDS RESCISSIONS-- Bans health plans from dropping people from coverage when they get sick. Effective 6 months after enactment.
4. NO DISCRIMINATON AGAINST CHILDREN WITH PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS-- Prohibits health plans from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. Effective 6 months after enactment. (Beginning in 2014, this prohibition would apply to all persons.)
5. BANS LIFETIME LIMITS ON COVERAGE-- Prohibits health plans from placing lifetime caps on coverage. Effective 6 months after enactment.
6. BANS RESTRICTIVE ANNUAL LIMITS ON COVERAGE-- Tightly restricts new plans' use of annual limits to ensure access to needed care. These tight restrictions will be defined by HHS. Effective 6 months after enactment. (Beginning in 2014, the use of any annual limits would be prohibited for all plans.)
These are huge and necessary changes. What they prevent is a reoccurrence of what has happened to family members. My uncle and aunt, who had to sacrifice 401K's and jobs and go into debt in order to pay for her lymphomatic cancer. I FOUGHT for this in 1994. I gave up on it. Thought it was impossible. Worked for a health insurer and saw how they abused their power to deny people insurance in order to make a fast buck (they got their asses handed to them on the House Floor a month ago).
This bill is historic. It is a turning point in history.
Regarding the abortion bit? While I am "pro-choice" for a lot of reasons I won't bore you with and have studied abortion law in the US (know quite a bit about this topic as well) I'm not upset about it. I see the slippery slope on that one all too clearly...using federal funds for abortion rights could be problematic at this juncture. There are certain specific qualifiers that would have to be put into place to ensure that the government did not abuse the funds to force under-privileged or people to have abortions. Just as there would have to be certain specific qualifiers that did not permit the government to tell people who could and could not have one. As it stands now - the only restriction is you can't use federal funds. And it is a restriction enforced by an Executive Order NOT by an actual legislative law. Executive Orders are actually easier to overturn.
So YAY!!!! I'm doing it here, because I can't say YAY at work, too many conservatives in the mix. I'm sure there a few here, but, well, I rarely post on politics so you will just have to indulge me. I've been fighting for national health care longer than I've been online.
Extremely proud of my country and President today. I was completely right to vote for him, he's done exactly what I wanted him to do. And I don't give a rats ass what the detractors think about it.
In case you've been residing under a rock HR 4872 - the Senate Health Reform Bill passed by the Senate in December got passed by the House this Sunday and was signed into law. So yes, a National Health Care Reform Bill got passed in the US after...well over 100 years of trying. I kid you not. Theodore Roosevelt tried to get the thing passed.
Go here for a historical perspective on the efforts to get a National Health Care Bill passed that date back to well the 1800s. It has taken us not one but two centuries to get this bill passed, people. That's no small accomplishment. And while the War is largely over, there are still a few more skirmishes on the horizon - also it will take at least until 2014 or 2018 for some of the measures to take effect. What is interesting to me is Republicans have tried to get it through Congress - starting with Theodore Roosevelt and ending with Richard Nixon (of all people). Lyndon Johnson came the closest.
The stumbling block was getting it past Congress. The Founding Fathers made this harder than they ever would have imagined. No one could get the Senate and the House to agree. But the House did the unthinkable on Sunday - they passed the Senate Bill. All that remains to be voted on apparently are a few items that need to be reconciled...or rather amendments, and those do not require 60 votes. They can be passed with less. One of th amendments, in case you are at all curious - was deleting or throwing out the clause where the federal government paid Nebraska to cover their uninsured. Or something to that effect.
The compromise on abortion is NOT an amendment to the Bill but an EXECUTIVE ORDER signed by the President that would state federal funds are not to be used to pay for abortions. This does not mean you can't have them or that insurance companies can't pay for them, just that federal funds can't be used. And since it is an executive order - it can be overturned by a new administration.
If you want to read the bill for yourself go here: http://docs.house.gov/rules/hr4872/111_hr4872_amndsub.pdf
And here's CBS News description of what it entails:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20000846-503544.html
The best parts about the bill - which take effect now and why I was a 100% for this??
1. FREE PREVENTIVE CARE UNDER MEDICARE-- Eliminates co-payments for preventive services and exempts preventive services from deductibles under the Medicare program. Effective beginning January 1, 2011.
2. HELP FOR EARLY RETIREES-- Creates a temporary re-insurance program (until the Exchanges are available) to help offset the costs of expensive health claims for employers that provide health benefits for retirees age 55-64. Effective 90 days after enactment
3. ENDS RESCISSIONS-- Bans health plans from dropping people from coverage when they get sick. Effective 6 months after enactment.
4. NO DISCRIMINATON AGAINST CHILDREN WITH PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS-- Prohibits health plans from denying coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. Effective 6 months after enactment. (Beginning in 2014, this prohibition would apply to all persons.)
5. BANS LIFETIME LIMITS ON COVERAGE-- Prohibits health plans from placing lifetime caps on coverage. Effective 6 months after enactment.
6. BANS RESTRICTIVE ANNUAL LIMITS ON COVERAGE-- Tightly restricts new plans' use of annual limits to ensure access to needed care. These tight restrictions will be defined by HHS. Effective 6 months after enactment. (Beginning in 2014, the use of any annual limits would be prohibited for all plans.)
These are huge and necessary changes. What they prevent is a reoccurrence of what has happened to family members. My uncle and aunt, who had to sacrifice 401K's and jobs and go into debt in order to pay for her lymphomatic cancer. I FOUGHT for this in 1994. I gave up on it. Thought it was impossible. Worked for a health insurer and saw how they abused their power to deny people insurance in order to make a fast buck (they got their asses handed to them on the House Floor a month ago).
This bill is historic. It is a turning point in history.
Regarding the abortion bit? While I am "pro-choice" for a lot of reasons I won't bore you with and have studied abortion law in the US (know quite a bit about this topic as well) I'm not upset about it. I see the slippery slope on that one all too clearly...using federal funds for abortion rights could be problematic at this juncture. There are certain specific qualifiers that would have to be put into place to ensure that the government did not abuse the funds to force under-privileged or people to have abortions. Just as there would have to be certain specific qualifiers that did not permit the government to tell people who could and could not have one. As it stands now - the only restriction is you can't use federal funds. And it is a restriction enforced by an Executive Order NOT by an actual legislative law. Executive Orders are actually easier to overturn.
So YAY!!!! I'm doing it here, because I can't say YAY at work, too many conservatives in the mix. I'm sure there a few here, but, well, I rarely post on politics so you will just have to indulge me. I've been fighting for national health care longer than I've been online.
Extremely proud of my country and President today. I was completely right to vote for him, he's done exactly what I wanted him to do. And I don't give a rats ass what the detractors think about it.
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no subject
Date: 2010-03-23 02:13 am (UTC)All things considered, though, I'm happy we got as much as we did. I've heard some real moaning coming from my fellow liberal/progressives because it doesn't have the public option (I personally think that's going to change within the next 10 years), and I've seen some real tantrums from the conservatives on my FList. The tantrums, I might add, seem to be routed in ignorance about what the law actually does. The problem is when you explain to them what it does, even though they themselves will benefit, they don't want to hear it.
*throws up hands*
If anyone was listening last night, everyone said — and I mean everyone — that this law was a start. It solves the most immediate problems and buys room to solve other problems down the road.
I live in MA, where a mini-version of this bill is already in full force. The one problem MA had was that it couldn't control certain costs, primarily because they were the kind of costs where you needed a bigger government (be it the feds or some kind of regional consortium of states working together) to exert pressure. I think this bill may solve a lot of MA's problems with cost-control in that regard.
It's interesting to note: that 3 years after MA started its own HCR, 9 in 10 people are reasonably happy with the plan. Only 1 in 10 want it repealed. That's a good sign for the federal plan, which has a few more cost controls for consumers than the MA law has.
I'm ashamed to admit that I actually didn't know about recission, pre-existing condition prejudice, and annual/lifetime limits on health insurance in other states. These things have been illegal in MA since the late 90s (dental insurance is excepted, but they can only do annual limits, not lifetime). Hell, in MA it's illegal to ask about pre-existing conditions and has been for almost a decade. I thought this was true of all states. Imagine my horror when my blissful ignorance on this point was pretty much blown away.
What I can tell you as someone who has lived under this system is that it's a good thing. It's unquestionably a good thing. Could it be better? Darn tootin' it could (remember what I said about wanting Canada's plan?). But at the same time, I'm positively thrilled the U.S. has finally caught up with my little ol' state on this and that everyone in the U.S. will have some protection starting immediately, with full protections by the time the phase-in is complete. I'm also thrilled that this will help control health insurance costs in my own state, because now the feds are in on the deal.
no subject
Date: 2010-03-26 11:22 pm (UTC)Sigh. So do I. Although I've grown weary of arguing with conservatives who fear it and think it would be akin to moving to Ethopia. I kid you not. Apparently they have whiny family members who live in Canada and are envious of their wealthy American cousins who have Cadillac plans or extensive plans that provide health care coverage that not all Americans have, actually I think it is less than 40% at the moment. Nor are these Americans losing those plans - which they don't seem to realize. You still get to keep your amazing plan. It does not change that people.
I had an extensive discussion with a conservative over the phone at work - which I shouldn't have been doing...lovely woman and in the insurance field no less - but believes for some reason or other...that the health care reform bill will limit her elderly mother's health coverage, when in reality it actually expands it and provides her mother with better coverage. Another case of judging a book by it's cover and not actually reading between the pages.
I'm ashamed to admit that I actually didn't know about recission, pre-existing condition prejudice, and annual/lifetime limits on health insurance in other states. These things have been illegal in MA since the late 90s (dental insurance is excepted, but they can only do annual limits, not lifetime). Hell, in MA it's illegal to ask about pre-existing conditions and has been for almost a decade. I thought this was true of all states. Imagine my horror when my blissful ignorance on this point was pretty much blown away.
Forget Canada, maybe I should just move to Boston. ;-)
NY while advanced in some respects, is behind the times on many issues.
I blame our legislature and governor, which is in a contest with Illinois, NJ, and Lousiana for most corrupt and worst run government.
Right now we are winning. NY State politics are embarrassing and amusing at the same time.
Kansas is a libertarian state with weird laws. They still have blue laws and alchohol prohibitions. And there are people who think left turn signals should be outlawed. They hate government involvement. They are proponents of home schooling and creationism NOT evolution in the classroom. We tried and failed miserably trying to get similar measures passed in Kansas in 1990s. The insurance lobby was part of the problem.
I wrote this paper on it and went to all the senate meetings. And tried to help my Senator get it passed.
And let's not talk about Florida, Texas, Michigan...et al.
What amuses me is the liberals are upset that we didn't get universal health care, while the conservatives are upset that we did. LOL!
Liberals are right, and I don't know what the conservatives are smoking, but they really need to check to see if it was mixed with some hallucinegenic.