Orszag: Current Health Care Bill 'Not Enough' To Fix System

Bloomberg:

The Obama administration pressed House lawmakers to strengthen legislation to revamp health care, saying it doesn't go far enough to fix a system plagued by spiraling costs that leaves millions of Americans uninsured.

White House Budget Director Peter Orszag raised the stakes in the congressional debate over the issue by telling Democratic lawmakers a proposal they are considering "would perpetuate a system in which best practices are far from universal and costs are too high."

Read the whole story: Bloomberg

Comments

[jmpurser]

If you want to control costs then go with single payer. You save enough to pay for itself upfront including covering an additional 50 million people. That gives you time to figure out how we're going to really control health care costs going forward. Otherwise you're you're groping in the dark with people's lives at stake.

[expired]

Courtesy of Buzzflash.com

http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/8941

[expired]

Health Care: The Public Plan Option

These Democratic Senators have NOT agreed to support it:
Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)

Senator Tom Carper (D-DE)

Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)

Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL)

Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE)

Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Senator Kent Conrad (D-ND)

Senator Max Baucus (D-MT)

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN)

Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR)

Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT)

These names are reported by The Hill here and here

Update: Senator Kay Hagan (D-NC) says she supports a public option.
Update: Senator Jeff Binghaman (D-NM) says he supports a public option.

You can also contact the White House and voice your opinion
Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414

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On The Show
Coming up Friday, July 10, 2009
•Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) joins the show to talk about health care reform
•ABC News This Week host George Stephanopoulos joins the show

[1dogs2]

Forget about the Finance Committee bill. Go with the HELP Committee bill.

[Coinyer101]

Of course it's not enough. Why d'ya think we been screaming for single-payer ? You must get insurance costs out of the picture. They perform no service whatsoever.

[vippy]

Pull the healthcare coverage of our senators/c­ongressmen­/women and incorporate them into the public healthcare coverage. I bet they won't object to anything then.

[DestinationsUnknown]

Snowe, a member of the Finance Committee, is among a handful of Republicans that Democrats are trying to persuade to back the health-care overhaul, Obama’s top domestic priority. Conrad is playing a lead role in working to win over Republicans.

What was Snowe's contrubution to the Stimuls?

[Whale]

What I don't get is why the Congress is avoiding creating a system that is rational and predictable; one that covers everyone. Instead, we get a healthcare system designed by Rube Goldberg so that we can avoid offending the huge corporate interests. The paperwork costs won't improve, they will explode!

Does anyone say that a real single-payer plan would also solve the "Medicare crisis" because everyone, including seniors, would be covered by the same plan? The risk pool would be large enough and diverse enough that there wouldn't be a funding issue for any one group.

[frappe]

I agree with you completely. Everyone in the political world seems to be afraid of mentioning the one real solution to the array of healthcare problems we are currently confronted by. It is like the 800 lb. gorilla in the room that is refused to be recognized. The one simple answer that would truly solve our problems is SINGLE PAYER. And the only reason that it is not aggressively being promoted at this time is because of all of the money being thrown around in D.C. and elsewhere by the special interests who are determined to see that a strong and viable public option is not even considered.

So, just as Howard Dean said recently, Congress (and the Obama administration) is faced with only one clear choice. They either vote on the side of the American people or they vote for the special interests. We will soon see where they stand. If they opt for the former, then the Democrats can enjoy decades of support from an appreciative public. But if they continue to play their manipulative, deceptive games and end up siding with the special interests, then they will be rightfully scorned and viewed with disgust and all those who co-opted their principles will be tossed aside like the cheap rubbish that they are.

[LeLoup]

It's all about the campaign contributions money. offend the "huge corporate interests" and ooops! money is suddenly quite scarce.

The core problem we have in DC is lack of strict public campaign financing. But that is how low, we the people, have stooped: We believe we can have something for nothing, hence, that we shouldn't have to pay for elections.

If one stops and THINK about that for a minute, it basically means we have *privatized* our election system. Such system will inevitably work for...the payers, a.k.a. the private interests that have the biggest amount to spend.

As long as we refuse to fix this problem, no one should expect the common good to be a top priority in DC.

it goes without saying that this line of thought applies to the Justice system too.

[quiviran]

Rightly said.

Start from the ground, "Everyone is in the plan" and work up "Nobody should pay, through taxes or out of pocket costs, more than 2% of annual income for the national standard for health care". You can get above standard or extra-standard care privately, but the national standard needs to be at least high enough to get Congress reelected.

I just picked 2% as an example, there's probably a smarter number. That means that 2% of EVERY dollar earned by EVERYBODY goes into the health care pot and everybody gets the national standard without any additional fees, co-pays, subscription costs or anything. No cost shifting. Maybe a $4.00 per prescription charge for medications, waived if you're really poor or need a lot of medications.

This isn't hard for a moral person to figure out. What's hard to figure out is: How many moral persons are in Congress? I'm hoping for at least 218 in the House and 51 in the Senate.

[crayola 08b]

mmm, he's such a cutie. i have real weakness for nerdy types :)

[edwcorey]

Stick your hand under his hairpiece and rub his scalp then. He'd probably like it.

[crayola 08b]

ewww. ya think he's wearing a rug?

[Richrdh]

I am so disgusted by the gutless representatives in Congress. Why won't this country try to be the best in the world in anything anymore? We rank 37th in the world and these ying yangs try to tell us it is the best system.

[BabblingBrooks]

Orzag: Current health care bill not enough.

BabblingBrooks: Current health care bill way too much!

[edwcorey]

Then opt out. Anyway, your opinions, the ones I've read, are pretty worthless.

[ElsaIndy]

Healthcare needs to be put in the budget just like education and defense. Costs must be controlled. Congress can start by freezing medicare spending at its current levels. Universal single payer health coverage requires rationing. Our present healthcare system cannot be sustained as we currently practice it. The public needs to understand that not everyone will get everything they want when they want it. The Canadians and Europeans all have universal coverage but the procedures and expectations are different from in the US. There may be procedures that will not be done. There may be waiting periods. Most all those with universal health care accept this rationing because all are covered and a sense of community good is a concept they accept. I am not sure Americans will accept it but Americans have no choice in the matter. Healthcare costs will soon consume 20% of our GNP. Our economy is already feeling the pinch of healthcare costs and our economy will not recover until we resolve this problem. Obama needs to get involved instead of nagging Congress because this is huge.

[quiviran]

We already have far more rationing that Canada, France or the UK. It's just that the rationers are the insurance companies. We somehow find this acceptable.

[BabblingBrooks]

How about we control costs same way as in the grocery store? People decide what something is worth! If it's worth the price, they buy it. If not, they don't.

[AntsyAmerican]

Consumers are not, and will never be, in the same kind of bargaining position with healthcare that they are with groceries.

[ElsaIndy]

Obama needs to show some leadership on this issue. He needs to enunciate his principles for a healthcare program and then form policy based on them. He is shirking his responsibility by throwing it at Congress. It is up to the president and his party to lead the way on this issue and garner support from the Republicans but all he is doing is sitting back and letting Congress bicker losing time and infuriating the public. Obama seems to either have no prinicples or is unable to communicate them. He has shown little or no leadership in any area.

[iceage7]

Boy Bush left us with big problems

[jmpurser]

30 years of Reaganism left us with these problems. Bush was just the final disaster.

[jubei]

This dude Peter Orzag is 1 smart S.O.B.!!