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Dear Friends,
At 7 am this morning, a short time ago, I voted for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. It passed.
If you are like me, it is hard to respond with uninhibited celebration. It is hard to celebrate when you are mourning. I am mourning the loss of the national public option. I am mourning the infringement on women's constitutional right to choose.
And there is much more about which I am frustrated. The bill does not, for example, adjust the discrimination in Medicare reimbursement rates that afflicts states like Oregon and Minnesota and Iowa. As a consequence, in Oregon it is hard for our Medicare card holders to get in a doctor's door! The bill doesn't address the outrageous prices Americans pay for drugs. The important health care marketplaces established in this bill don't get set up for four long years -- way too long! And I could go on.
But I voted for this bill today because, while there is a lot this bill doesn't do, there is also much that is right and good in this bill. Because of this bill:
* 30 million Americans will gain access to affordable health care.
* 10,000 additional communities will get community health centers.
* A new Health Care Bill of Rights will:
** ban the practice of barring health insurance to citizens with pre-existing conditions;
** ban the practice of dumping policy holders who get sick or injured;
** enable children to stay on their parents' policies through age 25;
** ban discrimination based gender or health histories; and
** ban lifetime coverage caps.
* Insurance purchasing pools (exchanges) will give individuals and small businesses--who have been lambs to the slaughter when trying to buy insurance--access to fair rates.
* Insurance companies must spend at least 80%-85% of premiums on health services (higher than the current national average).
* America will invest far more in prevention and disease management.
These are good things. And there is a lot more. One of my favorites--in part, I confess, because I led the fight for it--is the amendment that guarantees every mother returning to work the privacy and flexibility in break time needed to nurse her child or pump breast milk. Breastfeeding is great for the baby's and the mother's health, and is a big factor in emotional bonding as well. Another good feature is that a host of preventive services will be provided without any fees or co-pays. Yet another is the pilot projects on integrated health care, to expand bundled payment strategies and replace the ever-more-expensive fee-for-service arrangements. There are requirements in this bill that will produce a flood of health information that will help us launch future reforms. This bill does a lot to take on the health care workforce shortages driven by boomer demographics. And this bill opens the door to state-crafted public health plans that could have a huge impact.
And here is a fundamental accomplishment: Because of this bill, health care in the United States of America is no longer a privilege, it is a right.
When I joined the Senate in January this year, I asked Senator Ted Kennedy if he would consider advocating for my membership on the Senate's Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee. He did, and I've been honored to serve on his committee and to fight for the goal that was his biggest ambition: affordable, quality health care for every single American. When we gathered with Senator Kennedy in his hide-away office earlier this year to debate strategy, he knew the size of the challenge. At that point, the Democrats didn't have 60 votes in the Senate: Arlen Specter was still a Republican and Al Franken hadn't yet won his seat over Norm Coleman. We didn't know if we would be able to win the Republican votes necessary to end debate and hold a final vote on the bill. We didn't know how we could make the bill deficit neutral. We didn't know how we would overcome the charged issues of immigration and reproductive rights. But we decided to push forward with every ounce of our hearts and minds, sensing that there was a generational opportunity that we had to seize.
Senator Kennedy had served in the Senate for 47 years and had never had the opportunity to vote for universal health care on the floor of the Senate. Due to the road he paved over decades, and the spirit he showed throughout this year until his death, I have had that opportunity after only 12 months in office. I can report to you that a short while ago the U.S. Senate passed a universal health care bill. This bill, for all its shortcomings, will provide affordable, quality health care to virtually all Americans.
That is a big deal. But to secure this victory, we must still come back in January and win passage of amendments proposed by the House or by the Conference Committee. The fight continues.
I hope that all of you in the progressive community will keep mourning the battles that we lost this year on drug prices and single-payer and public option and Medicare. We must draw from our frustration and anger the power to keep organizing and keep fighting so that we can win battles to improve on the work done this year. The fight for justice is never over.
But also take a moment to recognize that the progressive elections you won in Senate races across the country--including mine in Oregon--made a big difference. Without them, we wouldn't have made history this morning - passing legislation containing the Health Care Bill of Rights, the community health centers, the purchasing pools for individuals and small businesses, the investment in prevention and disease management, and the promise that every American is entitled to affordable care. What we have done is take a long stride toward economic and social justice. I think Senator Kennedy would be pleased.
Follow Sen. Jeff Merkley on Twitter: www.twitter.com/SenJeffMerkley
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Insurance companies still gets to pocket 20% of every dollar.
Medicare has about 3-4% overhead.
Single payer, if it had been allowed to be scored for cost, would have come out the winner. If the Republicans and faux Democrats really cared about keeping the cost down, they would have supported a single payer system. We all know though, that it has nothing to do with saving money, but everything to do with bribe money politicians take from companies to do their bidding.
Let me see if I've got this straight. Here's a man who votes in favor of something to which he is fundamentally opposed. Hmmm. That kind of decision making must make ordering in restaurants and getting dressed in the morning awfully difficult.
Senatpr Merkley, Your "mourning" the restrictions on women's choice does not make up for the fact that you nevertheless voted for them. In doing so, you have treated 51% of your constituents as if WE are the "special interest" group instead of the Catholic bishops and rightwing male Dem Senators you voted to appease. It is not about abortion so much as it is about EQUAL RIGHTS of healthcare. No procedure for men will be excluded on the grounds of religious beliefs (such as getting their STDs resulting from adultery or prostitutes) nor will pedophile Catholic priests be subject to writing an extra check for their healthcare so that MY tax dollars don't go to support them. Only women will be subjected to this kind of discrimination based on someone else's religious beliefs, yet uninsured women will be forced to buy insurance that discriminates against them in this way. And sorry, the fact that male Senators are supporting the right of women to breastfeed their infants (which is already legal in Oregon) does not make up for government intrusion on women's right to choose. In fact, that male Senators selectively support women's rights that benefit their infants more than their rights to control their own bodies is frightening, not reassuring.
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Let's hope that those Reps have some spine because the mandate absolutely cannot be allowed to survive, and some for of access to a system other than the for profit system must be available.
Universal health care must be the ultimate goal.
My mantra these days is to point out that the $300-$500 minimum, (ill and elderly may pay 400% or more higher than that), for the mandate is money that will be taken out of the consume economy. Less food, fewer cars, houses, washing machines, clothes, entertainment, travel, every American business will impoverished be amount that is mandated.
If implemented, the mandate will destroy the American economy, increase homelessness, sound nutrition and preventive health care. Decreased consumerism will directly impact state and local budgets, and so some extent the national economy.
In other words it will profoundly effect the flow of money in this country to the harm of most Americans and the good of a few already very profitable companies.
Another cruel joke on the American people. If the Senate is serious about the bill being acceptable then what is good for the American people should be good enough for the Senate, and House too.
That 80-85% spent on Health Care is a joke and you know it. Businesses can alter their accounting to have it show 15% more or less depending on what they want to show. In reality they only have to spend 65% on Health Care just by adjusting the accounting.
Universal Health Care should be universally fair. In a progressive tax system the taxes collected should pay for Health Care. The system as it stands is too complex and the possibility of tremendous fudging of the small print would be too much to resist for the Health Care industry. The arguments over what you thought you were getting and what you actually get are going to be endless.
A true, sad result of the health care debacle is it exposed the Democrats for their outright corruption. (Everyone knows the Republicans serve the corporatio
Everyone understands that when people are offered a bribe like Merkley was to sell out those who elected him or her and for whom s/he has advocated -- the bribe providing the good life for him or her and her or his family s/he most like will take it. But to spew out dishonest Democratic Party talking points about "the good outweighing the bad" , "don't let the good be the enemy of the perfect" and "we'll fix it later when we don't have 60 Democratic Senators, 250+ Democrats in the House and a right-wing Democratic President posing as a progressive" is an insult.
Defeat ObamaBigPh
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"Pass this bill and then improve it" has become the rallying cry of those who consider themselves the "smart pragmatist
Let's examine one basic fact that this group of self-styled "pragmatists" either hasn't realized, or chooses to ignore: This bill gives 31 million new customers to insurance companies. At approximately $3,000 of premiums / person / year, that's $100 BILLION of new revenue per year to the insurance industry. If the industry takes ONLY 5% of this new revenue that WE are GIVING it and spends it on lobbying, that would equal FIVE BILLION DOLLARS of new money spent on lobbying EACH YEAR.
None of the real reforms takes effect for five years. In that time, it is highly likely that Democrats will lose seats in the House and Senate (based on historical precedence). So, with fewer seats, and $5 BILLION of new insurance lobbyist money trained on this bill, perhaps somebody can explain how it's going to be possible to make this better. Perhaps somebody can explain how there's ANY chance that it doesn't get worse.
Let's not get hysteric about it, but tbone's right. To me the issue isn't so much that it's likely to get worse, it's that in order to do this right we have to make a positive change in direction before the biggest programs in the bill get implemented, or inertia will add another force opposing needed change, piling onto the lobbying and the fear-mongering. Chances to reform the health care system seem to arise every ~30+ years. If we're *extremely lucky* we'll get another hack at this in 15; the only reason it came up again so soon this time is because '94 was a resounding failure! Congratulating ourselves for getting this "done", though it was heavy lifting to get only this much, will slow down further consideration of the problem, not bring it about sooner.
Oh wow. Reading your post is seriously depressing because it is so true. All I can hope is that knowing what we know now about how we are being fed to the wolves is that when this disaster only makes things worse, people will finally wake up and finally work towards serious solutions that actually help We, the People. This false left-right paradigm has to end soon because everytime the divide and conquer ruse gets played upon us, we get the worst of both ends.
What on earth makes Merkely think that there is solice in making this obnoxious bill better for us down the road while continueing to empower and enrich the oligarchy arrayed against us is an acceptable strategy, I have no idea. He is a naive, freshman Senator. "...and there came to the land a Pharoah thad did not know."
Thank you Senator Merkley. I'm proud to be represented by you! I can't imagine that Gordon Smith would have been willing to break ranks to support this. We Oregonians made a difference by sending you to the Senate to represent us.
However, as you note, the House and Senate bills must still be reconciled - it ain't over yet! And even when that passes, as I believe it will, the fight is just beginning. This bill cannot stand as passed. It must be proactively improved. For one thing the date it becomes effective is unconscionable! But to make those changes we need more progressive Senators! Oregon has done it's part. The rest of you states - get busy! :-)
Boy "Mr. Badger" you nailed it!
I had my entire ballot filled out except for the Smith/Merkley race right up until election day last year...
While I had heard some good things about Jeff Merkley, I didn't feel Gordon Smith had done too badly for Oregon....
It did matter to me that John Kitzhaber was supporting Merkely, but, in the end, I'll admit that I voted for Merkley largely to give the President another Democratic vote in the Senate.
Who could have predicted that Jeff Merkley would turn out to be TEN times the progressive Barack Obama is?
Who could have imagined the President would pre-emptively surrender to the insurance lobby on single payer, the public option, and a host of other issues.? Or that he would abjectly fail to vigorously support even the tepid "reforms" in the bill as it stands today?
And who elected Rahn Emmanuel and/or Joe Lieberman President anyway.?
One thing is certain...
tm
I'm right there with you MrBadger. I'm proud to have voted for Senator Merkley too! I agree, the rest of the states need to catch up with Oregon on electing more progressive Senators. Was the bill lacking in many ways - certainly. Sen. Merkley said so himself. But, we do have to start somewhere. If we had an overwhelming amount of progressive Senators, then we would be looking at a Universal single-payer option with equal rights for both women and men being passed right now. However, that is not what is currently on capital hill. The Democrats did what they were able to do with this bill to get it passed. What should they have done, just tossed health care aside again? We already have a party of NO in the republicans, we don't need the Democrats to be the party of NO too. We are "progressi
Does anyone actually believe any of this will come to pass? These giant corporations make their "living" finding ways around this kind of stuff. And what drives me crazy is the way all these jackasses frame the "30-million more people will have access" mandate. Why, next the funeral lobby will be getting congress to make life insurance mandatory too. Why not?! Everyone welcome3 at the trough.
As we move further and further from the industry and labor age people are just nothing more than an inconvenience or a profit center picking up scraps from around the trough.
The question was asked:
"Does anyone actually believe any of this will come to pass?"
About as much as I believe that our supposed elected officials will change any of this crap to make it better for anyone, except the corporations, in the future....
I guess they actually believe the American people are stupid, but my votes over the next couple of elections will be for some new blood in our Senate and House....a
With this legislation, I will no doubt drop my health insurance and pay the "fine". . Coverage will become too expensive and it will be cheaper to "pay as I go". Especialy given the fact that I can establish coverage at any time should it appear that I need ongoing care. Obviously, an accident would be a problem but then...our emergency rooms provide care first and ask questions later. I suppose, if conscious, I can purchase insurance while in the emergency room via my pda.
Thanks a lot Senators, for making a bad situation worse. Nice work.
tomjack wrote: "Coverage will become too expensive and it will be cheaper to "pay as I go"."
Maybe for you, but for people with little or no insurance coverage, this legislation is a godsend.
" our emergency rooms provide care first and ask questions later."
Yes, they do, and there's a very good reason for that. Hospitals used to turn away the uninsured without treatment. That was morally reprehensible.
"Thanks a lot Senators, for making a bad situation worse. Nice work."
Actually, they've made a very bad situation much better for most Americans, who, unlike you, can't afford to pay their own doctor bills.
Thanks a lot, Senators. Nice work!!!
MY, my, my...why on earth would you be ok with the additional burden this shoddy piece of legislation would place on those responsible citizens who are making enormous sacrifices to pay for their own health care and meet their tax obligations?
The 'option' of no longer paying for health insurance and gambling for that fine instead becomes a very real possibility!
How dare you scold those of us who can barely afford to pay for health insurance now and most certainly will be saddled with additional financial burdens because of attitudes like yours and 60 corrupt Democrat Senators!
Yea, 'thanks alot, Senators"!
I agree...bu
Dear Sen. Merkley, as a resident of Oregon I am NOT satisfied with this bill. Neither will be the progressives you are calling to action.
One of these actions may well be not renewing your, and Sen. Wyden's, mandate in the future!
As an Oregon resident, I ask you to advocate for:
REINSTATING A PUBLIC OPTION THAT'S TRULY AN OPTION AND PUBLIC -- NOT ONLY FOR THE UNINSURED OR LOW-PAID, BUT FOR ALL WHO CHOOSE IT!
RESISTING THE INTRODUCTION OF RESTRICTION ON ABORTION RIGHTS!
BLOCKING THE INTRODUCTION OF A MANDATE TO PURCHASE INSURANCE, UNLESS THERE IS A PUBLIC OPTION AVAILABLE TO ALL.
MANY AMERICANS ARE WILLING TO BREAK THE LAW AND BOYCOTT THIS MANDATE IF IT IS PUT IN PLACE!
FACILITATING A FUTURE MOVE TOWARD A SINGLE-PAYER SYSTEM, THE ONLY ONE THAT WILL EVER GUARANTEE REAL, UNIVERSAL, EQUAL HEALTH CARE FOR ALL AMERICANS.
It is a disgrace that America should be alone in lagging behind all other Western (and even many non-Western) nations in this.
Sincerely,
one of your constituents
I helped him get elected and have followed him since the campaign, and he has more than met my expectations. The HCR fight doesn't rest on the shoulders of one Senator; he's a true progressive dealing with political reality. But he also has a passion that won't be denied. We definitely need to keep him around.
Oh, indeed. He's got my vote, in all likelihood. What he's letting slip away is my help working for his reelection. And I will push my friends to choose similarly. That kind of problem can snowball if all the progressives give up on a candidate. Fortunately Jeff has 5 years before his term is up -- that should be enough time to show whether he's on the right track and overcome a single compromised vote.
If we get a health care bill that has a mandate to buy private health insurance - I am done with the Democratic party. I'll vote independent or not at all - because evidently voting for "change" simply means more of the same - or worse.
It's a toe in the door, despite the GOP doing everything to kick it out. At least now there is something that can be improved.
May I suggest trying to resurrect the Vitter amendment next -- the one where all members of the House and Senate have to be covered by the same heath care as the rest of Americans? I know he intended to try to scare Democratic senators away from health care reform with it; the fact that it could be used to immensely improve health care for all is the most delicious irony of the whole thing.
Improved ?!
You think our government has a chance to do anything that the insurance companies don't want after this bill goes into affect.?
Health insurers are about to be come the most powerful monopoly in America and with millions of mandated customers they will have money to dictate what THEY want - not what we need .
And being a private business , we will have no legal standing to scrutinze their business decisions.
The Senate bill, so-called "health reform," is the best legislation lobbyists can buy. It is pathetic to see Senators trying to put a positive spin on such a shoddy bill. By embracing such legislation, you are perpetuating a broken system whereby politicians sell their votes to the highest bidder. Polls show the majority of Americans opposed to the bill but you're going to cram it down their throats anyway. I see, politicians always know better than mere plebeians.
I fear the legislation will be devastating to the Democratic Party in the 2010 elections. Public opposition will grow as the details emerge and Republicans will exploit the cuts in Medicare to their advantage.
You can't put a dress on a pig and call it Scarlett OHara, Senator.
The Dems have showed their utter contempt for their constitunecy with this one.
As an Oregon resident, I didn't really need ANOTHER reason to not support you, but now I have it anyways.
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