America's Health Insurers to the Rescue . . . of themselves.

AHIP has a new website ahipbelieves.com that lets them jump on the "Health Care Reform" bandwagon. (Warning.  You may want to shower after visiting this site.)

Their plan has 5 "key elements:"

Expanding the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to make eligible all uninsured children from families with incomes under 200 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL).

Improving and expanding Medicaid to make eligible all uninsured adults, including single adults, with incomes under 100 percent of the Federal Poverty Line.

Establishing a Universal Health Account (UHA) to allow all individuals to purchase any type of health care coverage and pay for qualified medical expenses with pre-tax dollars, with federal matching grants for contributions made by working families to the UHA.

Establishing a health tax credit of up to $500 for low-income families who secure health insurance for their children.

Establishing a new $50-billion Federal Performance Grant to assist states in expanding access to coverage.

Now let's pick these apart in detail.

Having read the brief diary by edg regarding his mother's health care situation, I think it's as important as ever that we take the time to focus on the real and relevant benefits that a universal single-payer medical system will provide us. And one of those benefits, which I'll discuss briefly, is that single-payer health care (SPHC) can quite likely save social security, while simultaneously adding billions of dollars back into the economy.

Medicare Improvement for Patients and Providers Act of 2008

McSame Sh*it, Different Day McSame AWOL, AGAIN, on another crucial vote.  McSame didn't 'show up' to vote on the original Medicare bill, or the veto over ride, thereby default, 'supporting' Bush's opposition/veto.

President Bush this week played a game of chicken on Medicare - and lost.  Congress easily overrode Bush's veto of legislation designed to prevent an 11% cut in physicians' compensation under the health care program for elderly Americans.  And speaking of chicken, John McCain was nowhere to be found.

The original version of this essay contained a huge number of references.  Check on georgefearing.com in the near future for the annotated version.

The Speaker of the United States House of Representatives rarely presides over proceedings in the House chambers, but instead delegates this prerogative to a Member of the same political party. In the early morning of November 22, 2003, House Speaker Dennis Hastert delegated his presiding officer role to a loyal attendant, my congressman, Doc Hastings.

At exactly 3 a.m., Saturday, November 22, 2003, Richard "Doc" Hastings (R-WA), presiding over the House of Representatives, announced that time for debate on President Bush's Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act had expired. "Members will have 15 minutes to record their votes," Hastings declared. Nevertheless, Hastings’’ forecast missed the mark as Hastings reneged on his deadline and delayed the vote’s ending so that Republican leadership could manipulate votes.

At the end of fifteen minutes, the vote was 210 in favor and 224 opposed to the Medicare drug bill. 17 Republicans voted to defeat the measure. Hastings, at the prompting of Republican leaders, refused to end the vote, however.

What is this world coming to? I always thought that if only two things in this world were certain, they were these:

1. It's the members of the Democrat party that flip-flop

2. Ron Paul will always vote against spending money that was stolen by force by the Government from innocent freedom-loving Americans.

Yet today, my beliefs have been cruelly torn asunder. Ron Paul joined the Democrat party in stealing our money, and the Republicans flip-flopped on taking more of our money for the Socialist Medicare program.

I am very, very upset.

Sen. Norm Coleman (R-MN), the Senator you can count on when it doesn't matter, is once again challenging for the title of Republican Champion of Oversight.  This would be the equivalent of world's sharpest spoon, largest shrimp, tallest midget, etc.  He's worked himself up into an a high dudgeon over fraudulent Medicare and Medicaid claims from dead doctors.

“This is simply unacceptable — making sure that the prescribing doctor is alive before paying a claim should be a no-brainer,” Sen. Norm Coleman, the committee’s ranking Republican said in a statement. “It’s time to close this $100 million loophole.”
(Wall Street Journal)

Norm wants to save American taxpayers 2% of what we spend in Iraq each week.

On July 1, the Bush administration imposed a 10.6 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors who care for millions of older Americans.  The cuts are not a budget issue, instead, Republicans are protecting powerful insurance companies at the expense of Medicare patients’ access to doctors.

Congress passed a bipartisan over ride bill [HR 3661] that Bush vetoed today.  Congress promptly over rode the veto a few hours later.

There is a subtle aspect to this drama you may not recognize at first blush that proves "Support the Troops" on the lips of the Republicans is hollow campaign rhetoric.

Boo-hoo for the insurance weasels.
Boo-hoo for the Prince of Petulance.

Go House!  (Override was by larger measure than original passage.)
Go Senate!

FINAL VOTE: 70-26 in the Senate!!!  

Update: Senate Roll Call (h/t histopresto)

House Roll Call (h/t Llarian)

From the comments:

Why this is important for our veterans and their families.

Why this is important for people suffering from mental illness.

Remember this debate comment by Dick Cheney?

You've missed a lot of key votes: on tax policy, on energy, on Medicare reform.

Your hometown newspaper has taken to calling you "Senator Gone." You've got one of the worst attendance records in the United States Senate.

Now, in my capacity as vice president, I am the president of Senate, the presiding officer. I'm up in the Senate most Tuesdays when they're in session.

The first time I ever met you was when you walked on the stage tonight.

His target, of course, was John Edwards.  How then, might he feel about
John McCain, who hasn't voted since April 8th?

Depending on how it goes, the Medicare override vote could be the perfect petard on which to hang the rusted warrior.

The following parody news story appeared seven years ago today. It was published and distributed by Yossarian Universal News Service (YU), the world’s first satiric news syndicate founded in 1980.

YU News Dispatch 032
Yossarian Universal News Service 071401
7:13:13:13 PM PST
START

BUSH UNVEILS PLAN: ELDERLY TO RECEIVE DISCOUNT CARDS FOR EVERYTHING
New Program Will Help Seniors Buy A Number Of Things They Don't Need And Have No Use For

Metuchen, New Jersey (YU) -- Following his announcement yesterday to issue drug discount cards to elderly Medicare beneficiaries who use more than half of their fixed monthly income to pay for costly prescription drugs, Presidential Pretender George W. Bush proposed today to issue a number of other discount cards that would allow these same older citizens to pool their purchasing power and use the remaining half of their income to buy everything from skateboards and hip-hop CDs to fast food franchises and heavy farm machinery.

George W. Bush thinks there are no such things as laws. So I suppose it comes as no surprise to learn that he thinks there are no such things as veto-proof majorities, either.

H.R. 6331, the Medicare payments patch legislation that would prevent at 10.6% cut in payments to physicians, passed the House by a margin of 355-59 on June 24, and passed the Senate by voice vote after a 69-30 vote on cloture. But Bush, apparently working to "encourage cooperation across the aisle," as they say, will spit in the faces of Members of both parties tomorrow as he vetoes the bill.

The veto is given little chance to be sustained, but it's interesting to watch Bush go through the motions even when he "doesn't have the votes."

Why tomorrow and not today? Because President Bush is a petulant, vindictive and childish dick, that's why:

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services had issued a temporary delay on physician pay cuts until July 15 to allow lawmakers more time to pass the legislation.

Tomorrow's date, of course, is July 15. This way, Bush assures either that the bureaucrats have to go through an embarrassing scramble again, or that medical care providers actually get hurt by his veto crayon.

The "grown up" in charge, ladies and gentlemen. They can't get this asshole out of the White House fast enough.

Pay attention closely, little grasshoppers.

This is what you do when you care enough about an issue to pose and bluster about it....

Immediate Release
July 9, 2008 Contact: Press Office
703-650-5550

Statement by John McCain on Senate Medicare Vote

ARLINGTON, VA -- U.S. Senator John McCain issued the following statement on today's Medicare vote by the United States Senate:

"Doctors are the heart of our health care system, and it is essential that they receive the funding needed to ensure quality care for our seniors. I fully support that aspect of this bill. However, Congressional leaders have once again decided to put partisan positioning over the well being of millions of our seniors. We should not hold our doctors and seniors hostage to political gamesmanship and political votes. While this bill does meet our obligation to provide proper reimbursements to Medicare physicians, it also rolls back important reforms, increases drug premiums, and places 2.3 million seniors at risk of losing the private health care coverage of their choice."

... but not quite enough to be bothered to show up and vote on it.

In Republican World, once you've issued a taxpayer-funded sanctimonious press release, you've done your job. In fact, if you're the only one who missed the vote--when even a colleague recovering from brain surgery shows up--you get extra points in political gamesmanship!

Here endeth the lesson.

DENVER, CO -- Following up on his comment that  " we are paying present-day retirees with the taxes paid by young workers in America today. And that's a disgrace. It's an absolute disgrace and it's got to be fixed,"
McCain expanded on his criticism of a program that has kept millions of seniors out of homeless shelters by calling for the repeal of the Fifth Commandment, which reads as follows:

(Exodus 20:12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you")

"Here's some straight talk.  Why should God expect us to honor our parents?  It's rank socialism.  Throw e'm out in the street I say."  

McCain also noted that Medicare works the same way as Social Security, with the working children of senior citizens  forced to pay for their health care.  "It is an absolute disgrace that parents health is maintained at the expense of their children in their later years.  Think how much money our children could save if they didn't have to keep their parents alive.  Think how much we could reduce health care costs

This morning, I was getting ready to write a thank you note to Senator Kennedy for his inspiring entrance onto the Senate floor yesterday and for voting in favor of the Medicare bill.  I was then planning on CC'ing Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn, pretty sure that they voted against it.

Imagine my surprise when I saw this headline in today's Dallas Morning News: Texas senators aid Medicare doctors' pay

AARP, military families, and Texas doctors have been burning up the Senators' phone lines all week, demanding to be heard on the Medicare bill.  Yesterday, Cornyn and Hutchison actually changed their position and voted with constituents instead of Bush.  That's what I call "the power of positive whining."

Excerpts and commentary over the jump...

As most here know, Senator McCain was the only Senator not to show to vote on the recent Medicare bill, which was both pro-patient and pro-physician. We also know that Senator Kenndy, who is recovering from the removal of a brain tumor, showed. The reasons behind their decisions cannot be more contrasting.

I would have liked to have been up close to see the shock on certain faces today in the Senate.

Why?  It's been diaried that Senator Kennedy returned to the floor of the Senate today just in time to cast his vote in favor of the Medicare legislation.  

And yes, Senator McCain missed the vote (again).

But, unless you were watching the proceedings on CSPAN you may not realize just how downright hilarious and perfect Senator Kennedy's timing was.

A bunch of Republican Senators look like idiots now (even moreso than usual - especially Senators Cornyn and Martinez).  

There was good news, very good news, out of the Senate today courtesy Sen. Ted Kennedy, who returned just in time to cast the deciding, veto-proofing vote on the Medicare bill. He fittingly received a standing ovation on his return.

(Click on the picture to launch video.)

Here's his statement:

I return to the Senate today to keep a promise to our senior citizens and that’s to protect Medicare.

Win, lose or draw, I wanted to be here. I wasn’t going to take the chance that my vote could make the difference.

This is a critical bill that among other things, blocked a 10.6 percent cut in Medicare payments to doctors. Those cuts would very likely have driven more doctors and hospitals to refuse Medicare patients. The Senate attempted to vote prior to the July 4 recess, and came within one vote of cloture.

The administration has been lobbying the Republican caucus hard on this bill, including, rumor has it, sending Cheney up to the Hill today to the Republican luncheon to whip them. Kennedy's vote today helped break the Republican opposition to the bill, and the WINOs flipped their votes.

Sen. Reid issued the following statement calling on Bush to sign the bill:

The House strongly passed this bill in bipartisan, veto-proof fashion by nearly 300 votes, and the Senate has now passed it by a veto-proof margin as well. It is now up to the President to sign it into law. I call on him to join Congress in making sure Medicare works better for every American senior and TRICARE works better for our troops.

Thank you, Senator Kennedy, for making a bad day in the Senate better, and for keeping your commitment to the nation's seniors.

And guess who didn't show up to vote today? Yeah, that's right. John McCain.