Slammer!!!!!

Mr. Shaman

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Obama Press Conference - 6/23/2009​

QUESTION: Two of the key players in the insurance industry, America's Health Insurance Plans and Blue Cross/Blue Shield, sent a letter to the Senate this morning saying that a government health insurance plan would, quote, "dismantle," end quote, private insurers.

Why are they wrong?

OBAMA: Well, let's -- let's talk first of all about health care reform more broadly. I think in this debate there's been some notion that if we just stand pat, we're OK. And that's just not true.

You know, there are polls out that show that 70 percent or 80 percent of Americans are satisfied with the health insurance that they currently have.

The only problem is that premiums have been doubling every nine years, going up three times faster than wages.

So the notion that somehow we can just keep on doing what we're doing, and that's OK, that's just not true. We have a long-standing critical problem in our health care system that is pulling down our economy. It's burdening families. It's burdening businesses. And it is the primary driver of our federal deficits. All right?

If we're spending $177 billion over 10 years to subsidize insurance companies under Medicare Advantage, when there's no showing that people are healthier using that program than the regular Medicare program, well, that's not a good deal for taxpayers.

And we're going to take that money and we're going to use it to provide better care at a cheaper cost to the American people. So, that's point number one.

Number two, while we are in the process of dealing with the cost issue, I think it's also wise policy and the right thing to do to start providing coverage for people who don't have health insurance or are underinsured, are paying a lot of money for high deductibles.

Now, the public plan, I think, is an important tool to discipline insurance companies. What we've said is, under our proposal, let's have a system, the same way that federal employees do, same way that members of Congress do, where we call it an exchange, but you can call it a marketplace, where, essentially, you've got a whole bunch of different plans.

If you like your plan and you like your doctor, you won't have to do a thing. You keep your plan; you keep your doctor. If your employer's providing you good health insurance, terrific. We're not going to mess with it.

But, if you're a small-business person; if the insurance that's being offered is something you can't afford; if you want to shop for a better price, then you can go to this exchange, this marketplace, and you can -- look, OK, this is how much this plan costs; this is how much that plan costs; this is what the coverage is like; this is what fits for my family.

In answer to David's question, which you co-opted, we are still early in this process. So, you know, we have not drawn lines in the sand, other than that reform has to control costs and that it has to provide relief to people who don't have health insurance or are under-insured. You know, those are the broad parameters that we've discussed.

There are a whole host of other issues where ultimately I may have a strong opinion, and I will express those to members of Congress as this is shaping up. It's too early to say that.

Right now, I will say that our position is that a public plan makes sense.

Now, let me go to the -- the broader question you made about the public plan. As I said before, I think that there is a legitimate concern, if the public plan was simply eating off the taxpayer trough, that it would be hard for private insurers to compete.

If, on the other hand, the public plan is structured in such a way where they've got to collect premiums and they've got to provide good services, then, if what the insurance companies are saying is true, that they're doing their best to serve their customers, that they're in the business of keeping people well and giving them security when they get sick, they should be able to compete.

Now, if it turns out that the public plan, for example, is able to reduce administrative costs significantly, then you know what, I'd like the insurance companies to take note and say, hey, if the public plan can do that, why can't we?"
.....And, THAT'S the health-insurance "conundrum"!!!!

If health-insurance companies are "...too large..." to SLASH their administrative-costs/PROFIT-margins, they're "...too large..." to EXIST!!!

You show me a Congressman/woman who's INSISTANT that a public-plan won't work, I'll show you a Congressman/woman who's gettin' SERIOUS campaign-buck$ from health-insurance company LOBBYISTS!!!
 
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Re: OK, here's a question...

How Congress failed to curb medical spending
Lessons from the cost controls lawmakers didn't have the will to impose


By Tom Curry
National affairs writer
msnbc.com
updated 1 minute ago

Health care spending in the United States has been growing at more than 7 percent a year, far faster than the economy itself has been growing.

President Barack Obama has called growth in medical spending “a ticking time bomb for the federal budget.”

In his press conference Tuesday, Obama pledged that the health insurance overhaul that he is proposing “brings down the crushing cost of health care. We simply can't have a system where we throw good money after bad habits. We need to control the skyrocketing costs that are driving families, businesses and our government into greater and greater debt.”

But as Congress designs the massive insurance overhaul, there’s reason to doubt that it will find the willpower to control this spending.

It has tried — and failed — in the past.

In the 1997 balanced budget law, Congress aimed to cut future spending on the Medicare program, which pays for medical care for Americans age 65 and older.

But it has proven that it won’t fully enforce the cost controls mandated by that law.

Great expectations in 1997
The story starts on July 30, 1997, a day of bipartisan jubilation in Washington.

By huge margins, Congress passed a bill to cut taxes, extend health insurance to five million uninsured children, and in its key cost-control measure, to cut future Medicare spending by nearly $400 billion over ten years.
“We have put America’s fiscal house in order again,” exulted President Bill Clinton who signed the bill into law.

House Budget committee chairman Rep. John Kasich, R-Ohio, said, “This is the dawn of new era,” calling the future Medicare spending cuts “amazing.”

<for the rest of this story>
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31495588...-capitol_hill/

Please, excuse the duplicate posting {I clipped this from the BOOBthebulder topic}, I thought it apropos for this topic too!

I couldn't agree more, hence my point about the largest {current within 20 years} commercial building boom and the names that are placed on those colossal buildings: all heath insurance corporations. But as with many 'radical right wing thinking', they just don't seem to have any problems with how much of their premiums are going into that construction {deep pockets} for the health care providers bottom line!!! Cavalier and give-a-****-attitudes from the fortunate right wing thinking crowd...aren't they 'SPEICAL'??? :D
 
Eight-years of "compa$$ionate-con$ervati$m" has been plenty.

:rolleyes:

"A Texas nurse said she lost her coverage, after she was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer, for failing to disclose a visit to a dermatologist for acne.

The sister of an Illinois man who died of lymphoma said his policy was rescinded for the failure to report a possible aneurysm and gallstones that his physician noted in his chart but did not discuss with him."
 
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