Herding Cats at the White House

So Obama doesn’t want to be seen as “ramming this through”, so he’s meeting with senators to tell them to “get this done”.

whatever differences the Senators have about the bill, they need to reconcile them and get this done for the American people, he will say, because he bill will bend the curve of health care costs, cover millions more of the uninsured, protect those who have insurance, and reduce the deficit.
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This has been a very messy process, and nobody is 100% satisfied, but we must think in terms of lives. There is no question that health insurance coverage saves lives. Reconcile your differences, senators, and get this done. Don’t be put off any longer by those in lobbyists pockets (looking at you petty Lieberman) or the party of do-nothing. This has been an issue for many years. We must address it.

According to recent CNN poll, 61% of Americans oppose this legislation. Yet, the Hard-Left troika of Obama, Reid, and Pelosi push on.
If this passes, there will be consequences – fiscal, quality of care received, hospital closures, reduction of primary care physicians, reduction of Medicare patients who will be able to find physicians, etc.
There will also be severe consequences for Senators who vote for this monstrosity, particularly those who represent constituencies in “fly-over” country (bye-bye Blanche Lincoln, Mike Pryor, Ben Nelson, Claire McCaskill, etc.). Same for you Bill Nelson of FL and Jim Webb of VA. The effects of this disastrous legislation will be long-lasting. So will the memories of those who oppose this legislation come election time.

According to recent CNN poll, 61% of Americans oppose this legislation. Yet, the Hard-Left troika of Obama, Reid, and Pelosi push on.
tjp612 | Dec 15, 2009 10:12:13 AM
And polling has also shown many oppose this legislation because it is TOO WEAK. When the question is this healthcare reform or nothing, rather than do you like this bill (and does anyone ever really like compromise?), the results are very different.
We’ll have health care reform. If not now, then in 5-10 years when the private system collapses entirely. The current rate of cost escalation is simply not sustainable, not if we want to have a single industry remain competitive against every other first world nation, whose businesses don’t have a health care burden (and whose economies spend on average half as much per person for equal or longer life expectancy).

If these idiots actually had a sincere interest in true reform to achieve the goals they claim, they would have added tort reform to their bills, along with eliminating restrictions on Americans buying private health insurance through out-of-state insurance companies, as well as any of the other reforms that these idiots are ignoring.
But no, actual reforms that would be of benefit to patients is just not what they’re really interested in doing. They are instead hell-bent on expanding federal control over every aspect of the life of every America and sucking up more and more tax dollars to feather their nests and reward those who give them huge political contributions.
Fortunately, the next election will for sure quarantine them from infecting America with any more of their idiocy.
The first order of business will then be to investigate and prosecute all of the corruption spawned by these fools.

“I think you are smart enough to know that these life expectancy statistics are skewed (in large part to the extraordinary lengths our medical professionals take to save pre-mature or at-risk infants who would not receive similar care in other countries; deaths due to accidents higher in U.S., etc.).”
tjp612 | Dec 15, 2009 11:09:16 AM
So you have to go up to age 40 rather than using the e5 numbers (which excludes deaths under 5)? Do you do all the work to cherry pick the best possible numbers, or is this something the radio guys are talking about today? And are you lying or ignorant when you suggest that the US has a higher accident death rate (have you seen Italy’s? Yet their life expectancy is still higher)?
We spend on average TWICE AS MUCH PER PERSON on health care, and you have to work furiously to find any life expectancy bound where we’re at least equal? Even though we have among the lowest rate of smoking in the first world (or does smoking still not cause cancer or heart disease, after all that was just a government lie to take away freedoms according to Republicans at one point).

I thought the original intent of the legislation was to reduce the cost of health care, and make it readily available to all. A noble goal and one that could most likely be achieved if partisanship didn’t rule our congress.
Class warfare and more taxation shouldn’t be part of the process when our economy is so fragile. Our congress working together to solve the nations problems would be a new and novel idea and I’m sure would be appreciated by the electorate.
An open and honest discussion of the true costs of this legislation should be required. I don’t think anyone wants to saddle future generations with needless debt.

“We spend on average TWICE AS MUCH PER PERSON on health care, and you have to work furiously to find any life expectancy bound where we’re at least equal”
I’ll assume that you prefer rationing healthcare as they do in these utopias. It’s already occurring in cash-strapped states such as NY. And, by and large, the best healthcare in the world is still located here in the good ol’ USA.

Did anyone actually read this article before posting it? Spell check/grammar check please!