Daschle Urges Obama To Drop Federal Public Health Care Plan

*** UPDATED BELOW ***

The man once slated to head Barack Obama's health care system overhaul is now coming out against one of the chief components of that effort.

Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said on Wednesday that the Obama White House would likely have to scrap a federal public option for health insurance coverage if it wanted to get the votes needed to pass systematic change.

"We've come too far and gained too much momentum for our efforts to fail over disagreement on one single issue," the Senator and one-time HHS Secretary nominee said, according to ABC News.

The remarks came after Dashcle, along with former Senate Majority Leaders Bob Dole and Howard Baker introduced his own proposal for health care reform. That plan actually included a version of a government-run option. The Daschle proposal calls for (among other things) public insurance pools to be administered by state government, not the feds.

In coming out against a federal public plan, Daschle adds kindling to an already roaring debate on health care reform. On Thursday morning, former Vermont Governor Howard Dean repeated the mantra that you cannot have effective legislation if it does not include a public option. At the White House on Wednesday, several state legislators who had met with current HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius argued the same point.

Certainly, the public seems to be weighed in Dean's favor. An NBC/Wall Street Journal poll conducted on Wednesday night showed that 76 percent of respondents wanted a choice between a public option for insurance coverage and private providers.

UPDATE: A spokesman for the former majority leader called the Huffington Post to insist that Daschle is "still committed to the public plan" and was not urging Obama to drop it from his proposal.

"He was saying that we shouldn't let any issue derail what would be health care reform," said Eileen McMenamin, Director of Communications at the Bipartisan Policy Center. "He definitely did not say there should be no public plan."

Daschle, said McMenamin, did believe that a public plan could be administered by the states. And his chief concern with Obama'a approach was not the policy basis but the politics of getting it through Congress.

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Comments

[derekc06]

I want NHS and I want it now!

where is the american public on this issue?? enough with healthcare for profit! enough with private insurance companies scamming this country, making a mockery of us among the international community!

[Clayton139]

If we want a Public Option ?

We the People need to Rise Up and Call our Representatives and Senators’ so we don’t get a watered down Public or Private plan of some kind !

Government works for us and (We the People Need to Call our Representatives and Senators) and demand it because we have the votes for it !

If we stay silent we will never get a GOOD Public Plan !

Please CALL your Representatives and Senators’ and Demand it !!!

[SpiritHorse]

Mr. Daschle has just exposed himself as completely out of touch with the overwhelming majority (76%) of a recent survey of American citizens in favor of a public healthcare option, has been bought off by Big Pharma/AMA­/'Health'c­are Mega 'Insurance", &/or he just doesn't get it. The solution to a crisis will never arise from the same thinking/c­onsciousne­ss that created it.

48 million, or so, of us out here are not insured at all, can't afford the current cost of health insurance, have completely 'had it' with "pre-existing" condition exclusions, companies denying coverage for medically necessary and life saving procedures recommended by their doctors, etc. There is a growing impatience, even rage about, those who stand in the way of Americans recieiving the comprehensive and complete financial coverage and timely, quality medical treatment afforded to the citizens of many other Western, industrialized countries/societies at 3% to 7% less of their GDP.

Follow the money and anyone not in denial can plainly see why a Public Option, including SINGLE PAYER Healthcare, has not yet happened. Read Joe Conason's recent Op/Ed on the history of the AMA when it comes to a government healthcare coverage program - including Medicare. Their organizational logo, in my book, is a mortifying Skull and Crossbones. This is not the only issue since the 1930's that has earned them such a graphic logo.)

Got Courage, Democrats? You too, President Obama? Hmmm? We'll find out soon, won't we!

[Eddy333]

"Former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said on Wednesday that the Obama White House would likely have to scrap a federal public option for health insurance coverage if it wanted to get the votes needed to pass systematic change."

If they drop the public option, what kind of freakin' change are we talking about?

Ridiculous.

[cu]

I thought no one listened to Daschle since he was exposed as a tax cheat. He is obviously not listening to the public. WE WANT SINGLE PAYER NOW and if you do not represent what we want YOU WILL BE FIRED.

[greenie 61]

c'mon Tom, could you possibly be any more transparent?

[minhdn]

Daschle is bad news. He just can't overcome his loyalties for the lobbyists, can he?
Weak politicians are like-minded, they're ... weak ... with shaken knees ...

[rshrink]

Might as well face it, they are addicted to love of money.

[Whitley2009]

How does Tom spell W-H-O-R-E?

[macedonia356bc]

DITTO

[killmenow]

This got me thinking about my position:

I think that health care reform should be derailed if single payer cannot be achieved.

I think that the public frustration with our current lack of a system should fester until the political will for a complete overhaul and an implementation of single payer can finally occur.

I am not willing to accept some systematic implementation of for-profit insurance made possibly more available to more of the public. I think that "incremental steps" are just steps towards a continuation of ripping people off with the costs of health care by private industry.

I know that "all or nothing" sounds reactionary, but even with careful consideration, that is my position. What do you think?

[StopSexismNow]

I have to agree with you. The way they are going now will leave us with a solution like Medicare Part D, aka the Medicare Prescription Drug Plan, which was a disaster for seniors in this country. Part D was sold as a benefit for the average American and ended up being nothing but a cash cow for Big Pharma. If we can't get single payer I'd rather have nothing at all, and work toward cleaning house AGAIN in 2012.

But I haven't given up just yet. I am doing my part to jam the phone lines of the WH, HHS and Finance Committee and I encourage EVERYONE to do the same.

Everyone pick up the phone and call the members of this committee and Sebelius' office and tell them we want UNIVERSAL SINGLE PAYER! It is now or never.

Dept of HHS phone is 1-877-696-6775
Max Baucus is 202-224-2651
Finance committee is [phone]

Other committee member contacts can be found here:

http://finance.senate.gov/sitepages/committee.htm

They weigh a phone call as many times more significant than an email. Jam their phone lines!

[killmenow]

Thank you, stopsexismnow. Great info. I am calling!

[derekc06]

all or nothing is what it needs to be though... I completely agree with you. It's time we completely changed the way healthcare is done in this country.

[greatscot]

Yes, we should DERAIL obama's health proposals if they DO NOT INCLUDE A SINGLE-PAYER option! Then, we'll come back later and sweep the House and Senate clean of the parasites who amended it to death! The entire episode will be an exercise in futility if we don't have the single-payer, Gov't-run option! This is how the Legislature operates, and Daschle, while retired, still gets LOTS of money from the health-care industry, I believe his wife is a health-care industry lobbyist also, so..... whose interests is Daschle promoting? He's fattened himself up at the public trough just fine, now he's repaying his masters by floating this "trial balloon" to sort of test the reaction, and maybe take a stronger line later if the reaction is mild. The parasites in and out of our government make me sick!

[Vladdycat]

An opinion broght to you by the Corporate Royalists of the Health Care and Pharma industries.

[passionatewives]

thx cornetmustich for the post.

[bstotts]

A public option is not "one single issue". It is THE issue.

[lysistrata]

The federal public option is the thing that should not be negotiable. Daschle said what he said no doubt about that.

[CornetMustich]

LOL..

He's just another enabler and appeaser of Wall St speculators and predators.

It's time for a national health plan now.

It's good for society and for business, just ask all the other industrialized and civilized countries around the world.

See: Physicians for a National Health Plan
http://www.pnhp.org

Washington, Connecticut USA

[StopSexismNow]

Angry? Let him know.

http://www.1payer.net/action-alerts/353-duplicitous-daschle.html