Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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 Posted: Sat Mar 13, 2010 6:22 pm Post subject: Alan Grayson's Latest Move On Healthcare |
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Article here.
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Health care reform -- here's where we are. The House of Representatives is about to vote on a Senate bill without a public option. It looks like the reconciliation amendment will not have a public option. The House bill had a public option, but once the House passes the Senate bill, that's history.
Which is why I introduced H.R. 4789, the Public Option Act. This simple four-page bill lets any American buy into Medicare at cost. You want it, you pay for it, you're in. It adds nothing to the deficit; you pay what it costs.
Let's face it. Health insurance companies charge as much money as possible, and they provide as little care as possible. The difference is called profit. You can't blame them for it; that's what a corporation does. Birds got to fly, fish got to swim, health insurers got to rip you off. And if you get really expensive, they've got to pull the plug on you. So for those of us who would like to stay alive, we need a public option.
In many areas of the country, one or two insurers have over 80% of the market. They can charge anything they want. And when you get sick, they can flip the bird at you. So we need a public option.
And they face no real competition because it costs billions of dollars just to set up a national health care network. In fact, the only one that's nationwide is . . . Medicare. And we limit that to one-eight of the population. It's like saying that only seniors can drive on federal highways. We really need a public option.
And to the right-wing loons who call it socialism, we say, "if you want to be a slave to the insurance companies, that's fine. If you want 30% of your premiums to go to 'administrative costs' and billion-dollar bonuses for insurance CEOs who figure out new and creative ways to deny you the care you need to stay healthy and alive, that's fine. But don't you try to dictate to me that I can't have a public option!"
And there is a way left to get it. By insisting on a vote on H.R. 4789. Three votes on health care, not two. The Senate bill, the reconciliation amendments, and the Public Option Act.
We got 50 co-sponsors for this bill in two days. Including five powerful committee chairman. But we need more.
Sign our Petition at WeWantMedicare.com.
Call. Write. Visit. Do whatever you can do to get you Congressman to co-sponsor this bill, and push it to a vote. Right now, before it's too late.
Let's do it! |
I don't think this is ideal because I feel Medicare itself is in need of reform. However, it's better than nothing. I'm very interested to hear how Republicans will slander this bill. They can't say it adds to the deficit if participants are paying 100% of the costs associated themselves. They can't say it hurts Medicare in any way; adding more, younger and healthier heads to the Medicare program and having them pay their own way would actually improve Medicare's financial situation. They can't try to scare people about things like death panels and other inane nonsense, because we've all ready seen Medicare doesn't lead to that. I'm very interested to see what lies Republicans will come up with to justify their knee-jerk opposition to Mr. Grayson's bill.
The speech Grayson gave on the floor when he introduced the bill is included in video format at the link. |
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