10/28/09
Health Reform Message from First Lady Michelle Obama
The White House released a new web video today featuring First Lady Michelle Obama. In the video, Mrs. Obama shares a personal story about youngest daughter Sasha’s health scare as a baby and explains why the President’s plan is essential to families and women in particular. The video also features Roxi Griffin, a cancer survivor who’s now being forced to choose between paying for medical tests and being able to afford to stay in her home (so far, she’s choosing her home), and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius who explains how our current health care system discriminates against women when it comes to the services insurance plans cover - often not the services women need - and how they regularly charge women more than men for the same care. Watch it below:
10/22/09
A Special Message from the President
President Obama is scheduled to speak live at a New York call party starting at 8:05 p.m.
Amazing.
By Rohit from Washington, DC
We wanted to reach 100,000 calls to Congress. We more than tripled it.
What... a... night. Here in New York, people were lined up for blocks just to catch a glimpse of what was going on. Individuals were greeted at the door with a long, rectangular card. Each card had information about the President's plan as well as five unique numbers for event attendees to call.
The evening started off with New York State Director of Organizing for America, Melissa DeRosa, giving the 101 on what OFA does and why it is so important. While she was saying it, you were doing it. After Melissa, Ugly Betty actress and Generation 44 committee member America Ferrera took the stage as a voice for youth activists nationwide. She emphasized the importance of young people taking part in the dialogue and action that improves our country.
Following America, Dr. Manisha Sharma spoke to the crowd as both a physician and a patient. Dr. Sharma spoke about the importance of health insurance reform, and reminded us that healthcare is a right, not a privilege. She committed, as a physician, to support health insurance reform now, and re-expressed President Obama's statement that now is the "Time to Deliver."
OFA then took the stage. Julia Shannon, the OFA New York Field Director, led an open phonebank among the crowd with her colleagues Keith Kinch and Geoff Berman. Cell phones were handed out, and people started calling through the lists on their cards, asking even more New Yorkers to contact Congress themselves, in the true spirit of Organizing for America.
The phonebank was a perfect transition to introduce Democratic National Committee Chairman, Governor Tim Kaine. The Chairman recognized Organizing For America and the importance of their work at the DNC. He also highlighted all the energy that you have shown moving from the Presidential race to the new health reform campaign.
Next up: President Obama brought his energy (and his mop) to the stage.
President Obama thanked everyone from OFA, both present here at the Hammerstein Ballroom and on our webcast, for their continued knocking on doors and phone calls. He reminded us that even the most restrictive version of health reform yet passed through committee would guarantee coverage for over 29 million uninsured Americans. He welcomed honest debate and bipartisan participation, but drew the line at rooting for failure. He explained that when we all have work to do to clean up the mess we inherited, it's not time to stand around on the sidelines and complain, it's time to grab a mop. The crowd erupted in cheers. The spirit of participation and the excitement was truly incredible.
Thousands of people joined in, and still, we have events going on coast to coast. This is what organizing is all about. Thanks for an amazing night.
Rohit
We wanted to reach 100,000 calls to Congress. We more than tripled it.
What... a... night. Here in New York, people were lined up for blocks just to catch a glimpse of what was going on. Individuals were greeted at the door with a long, rectangular card. Each card had information about the President's plan as well as five unique numbers for event attendees to call.
The evening started off with New York State Director of Organizing for America, Melissa DeRosa, giving the 101 on what OFA does and why it is so important. While she was saying it, you were doing it. After Melissa, Ugly Betty actress and Generation 44 committee member America Ferrera took the stage as a voice for youth activists nationwide. She emphasized the importance of young people taking part in the dialogue and action that improves our country.
Following America, Dr. Manisha Sharma spoke to the crowd as both a physician and a patient. Dr. Sharma spoke about the importance of health insurance reform, and reminded us that healthcare is a right, not a privilege. She committed, as a physician, to support health insurance reform now, and re-expressed President Obama's statement that now is the "Time to Deliver."
OFA then took the stage. Julia Shannon, the OFA New York Field Director, led an open phonebank among the crowd with her colleagues Keith Kinch and Geoff Berman. Cell phones were handed out, and people started calling through the lists on their cards, asking even more New Yorkers to contact Congress themselves, in the true spirit of Organizing for America.
The phonebank was a perfect transition to introduce Democratic National Committee Chairman, Governor Tim Kaine. The Chairman recognized Organizing For America and the importance of their work at the DNC. He also highlighted all the energy that you have shown moving from the Presidential race to the new health reform campaign.
Next up: President Obama brought his energy (and his mop) to the stage.
President Obama thanked everyone from OFA, both present here at the Hammerstein Ballroom and on our webcast, for their continued knocking on doors and phone calls. He reminded us that even the most restrictive version of health reform yet passed through committee would guarantee coverage for over 29 million uninsured Americans. He welcomed honest debate and bipartisan participation, but drew the line at rooting for failure. He explained that when we all have work to do to clean up the mess we inherited, it's not time to stand around on the sidelines and complain, it's time to grab a mop. The crowd erupted in cheers. The spirit of participation and the excitement was truly incredible.
Thousands of people joined in, and still, we have events going on coast to coast. This is what organizing is all about. Thanks for an amazing night.
Rohit
10/11/09
Breaking: President Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize
Early this morning, it was announced that President Obama had been selected as the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. From the New York Times:
In a special surprise, the Nobel Committee announced in Oslo, which has awarded the annual prize for the president "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen diplomacy and international cooperation among peoples." The award specifically mentioned Obama's efforts to reduce the World Nuclear Arsenal.
"He created a new international climate," the committee said.
The announcement early next killer with Mr Obama - less than nine months after taking office as president the first African-American - has shocked the public by Norway in Washington.
The White House had no idea it was coming.
... A senior government official said in an e-mail message that Mr. Gibbs had called the White House shortly before 6 am and woke up the president with the news.
"The president was humbled to be selected by the committee," the official said, without adding anything else.
Obama has done to repair the fractured relations between the United States and the world, a major theme of his campaign for the presidency and since he took office as president, has pursued a series of policies to achieve this goal. He promised to pursue a world without nuclear weapons, as he did in a speech in Prague earlier this year, reached toward the Muslim world, giving a major speech in Cairo in June, and I I tried to restart peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.
"Only very rarely does anyone have the same degree that Obama has attracted the attention of the world and given his people hope for a better future," he told the Committee in its citation. "His diplomacy is based on the idea that those who run the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority in the world."
In a special surprise, the Nobel Committee announced in Oslo, which has awarded the annual prize for the president "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen diplomacy and international cooperation among peoples." The award specifically mentioned Obama's efforts to reduce the World Nuclear Arsenal.
"He created a new international climate," the committee said.
The announcement early next killer with Mr Obama - less than nine months after taking office as president the first African-American - has shocked the public by Norway in Washington.
The White House had no idea it was coming.
... A senior government official said in an e-mail message that Mr. Gibbs had called the White House shortly before 6 am and woke up the president with the news.
"The president was humbled to be selected by the committee," the official said, without adding anything else.
Obama has done to repair the fractured relations between the United States and the world, a major theme of his campaign for the presidency and since he took office as president, has pursued a series of policies to achieve this goal. He promised to pursue a world without nuclear weapons, as he did in a speech in Prague earlier this year, reached toward the Muslim world, giving a major speech in Cairo in June, and I I tried to restart peace negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians.
"Only very rarely does anyone have the same degree that Obama has attracted the attention of the world and given his people hope for a better future," he told the Committee in its citation. "His diplomacy is based on the idea that those who run the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority in the world."
"A Call to Action": President Obama On Winning the Nobel Peace Prize
In reacting to the news this morning that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize, the President struck a note of humility and recognized that the award was a nod to a vision of what is to come:
I am surprised and deeply humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee. Let me be clear: I do not consider this as recognition of my achievements, but rather the assertion of American leadership on behalf of the aspirations held by people of all nations.
To be honest, I do not deserve to be in the company of so many figures of transformation that has been honored by this award - men and women who have inspired me and inspired the world through their courageous pursuit of peace.
But I also know that this award reflects the kind of world that men and women and all Americans, want to build - a world that gives life to the promise of our founding documents. And I know that throughout history, the Nobel Peace Prize has not only been used to honor specific output is also used as a means of giving impetus to a number of causes. And so I accept this award as a call to action - a call for all nations to address common challenges of the 21st century.
I am surprised and deeply humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee. Let me be clear: I do not consider this as recognition of my achievements, but rather the assertion of American leadership on behalf of the aspirations held by people of all nations.
To be honest, I do not deserve to be in the company of so many figures of transformation that has been honored by this award - men and women who have inspired me and inspired the world through their courageous pursuit of peace.
But I also know that this award reflects the kind of world that men and women and all Americans, want to build - a world that gives life to the promise of our founding documents. And I know that throughout history, the Nobel Peace Prize has not only been used to honor specific output is also used as a means of giving impetus to a number of causes. And so I accept this award as a call to action - a call for all nations to address common challenges of the 21st century.
10/8/09
Doctors Call for Health Reform
Yesterday, the President hosted doctors from all 50 states here at the White House, coming together in a powerful testimonial to what reform is all about.
Today the White House released a new video featuring interviews with many of those doctors at the event. Their testimonies are a reminder that the people at the real frontlines of the health care battle are not lobbyists or politicians invested in protecting the status quo, but are instead the people who deal with the health and well-being of our families every day and see the need for change first hand:
President Obama Hosts Doctors for Health Reform
Here's the full video of the President's remarks from earlier in the week, in front of a gathering of doctors at the White House in support of health reform:
10/5/09
Obama gives back-to-school speech
U.S. President Barack Obama has urged American school children to work hard and not giving a pedagogical discourse that has triggered a one-sided polemic.
In a speech Tuesday in a school in Virginia, Obama said the future of children in their countries depended on their performance.
But conservatives have complained that attempts to indoctrinate children to serve its political agenda.
The wording of some teaching tools have changed since the review.
'Hard work'
In his speech, Obama to students at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia, that in addition to teachers, parents and the government, they are responsible for academic success.
"No matter what you want to do with your life - I guarantee you'll need an education to do it," he said.
As well as individual success, the future success of the country will depend on it, Mr Obama said in the speech.
The speech was broadcast on a cable TV station and on the White House website.
"Your goal can be something as simple as doing all your homework, paying attention in class, or spending time each day reading a book," Mr Obama said.
"Being successful is hard," Mr Obama added - and he pointed to figures such as JK Rowling and Michael Jordan, who he said overcame initial failures in order to find success.
"No-one's born being good at things."
'Socialist ideology'
But even before President Obama had delivered his speech, it was attracting criticism from conservatives.
Some said it was not promoting education but aimed at indoctrinating children into supporting the president.
Last week, Florida Republican Party chairman Jim Greer said he was "absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology".
Parents' complaints that the speech would be one-sided prompted some school districts not to broadcast it, and others to allow parents to withdraw their children.
On Monday, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs rejected the criticism, calling it a "sad, sad day that the political back-and-forth has intruded on anyone's speaking to schoolchildren and parents about the responsibilities they have".
But the education department acknowledged that a teaching aid which suggested students write about "how they could help the president" was poorly worded.
It released an amended version.
In light of the change, Mr Greer said he now approved of the address, reported Associated Press.
9/19/09
First lady says health system unacceptable
WASHINGTON - Michelle Obama, speaking as a wife, mother and daughter - but not as a policymaker like a previous first lady - urged women on Friday to join her husband's fight to overhaul health care.
Her 23-minute speech, embraced by a receptive female audience at the White House, contributed to the administration's all-out public relations push on health care. President Obama will resume it Sunday with appearances on morning news shows, followed by a visit Monday to CBS's David Letterman show.
Mrs. Obama focused on the White House's efforts to expand coverage and block insurers' ability to drop customers who get seriously ill. But she stopped well short of the deeply involved, hands-on role played by another first lady, Hillary Rodham Clinton, nearly two decades ago.
In urging passage of "my husband's plan," Mrs. Obama stuck mainly to the themes and backdrops of more traditional first ladies, including Laura Bush. She spoke repeatedly from the perspective of a mother and wife who sympathized with less-wealthy women's plights.
"For two years on the campaign trail, this was what I heard from women, that they were being crushed, crushed by the current structure of our health care," the first lady said.
Obama rolling into week of high diplomatic stakes
WASHINGTON - The relentless global problems Towards Barack Obama is about to approach him at a time, to stretch the rope for the first year of a president who promised to "change the world." Is a space of four days of diving in the Obama policy of the United Nations and summit host Pittsburgh is faltering economy in the world. At the international level comes to him and no one is standing, it's paris high.
Obama is under pressure to push along the peace in the Middle East stalled, the United States is serious about the exhibition on climate change and to rally allies against nuclear threats from Iran and North Korea. Concerned leaders of Europe and the rest by pressing Obama to reform the risky economic behavior in the United States and the Congress on board.
It also assumes the load on the two wars now inherited the position of his fingerprint - a dismissal of Iraq, which continues in Afghanistan. Eight years after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Obama is an international stature, he always tries to keep Afghanistan al-Qaeda launching pad again.
The talks have the potential to be a galvanizing moment and missed opportunities.
"Leadership is not simply tell people what you want, because the Bush administration has been observed. Leadership is getting people to do what you want them to do, "said Jon Alterman, Senior Fellow, Center for Policy in the Middle East for Strategic and International Studies and a former State Department official, President George W. Bush 's first term.
Obama's chances.
In his speech at the First Assembly of 192 members to share their views on leadership, emphasis on the new brand to highlight the cooperation he has not Bush. As UN ambassador, Susan Rice, described the message: "Everyone has a responsibility. The United States is a leader again. And we expect others to join.
Obama is the first president of the United States, and President of the Security Council, whose rotating presidency of the United States happens to be in the hands of this month, the annual meeting of the General Assembly. He expects to be away from the summit resolution Arms control that advances the goals of its nuclear weapons free world.
The measure tries to set fire to Iran and North Korea do not blame any country.
His domestic agenda to consume health care, Obama is pressing world leaders to put more muscle to fight climate change. He tries to do exactly this week, including a speech at the Climate Conference of the United Nations.
Time presses, however, that the United States for influence. The international conference is planned for December in Denmark, a new global climate agreement on the contract. Although Parliament approved a bill to limit greenhouse gas emissions, the decision may discolor the Senate next year.
Perhaps as important as the speeches are discussions of the world never sees.
Obama, who arrived in New York on Monday of the annual collection of the United Nations, met privately with leaders of Russia, China and Japan. Less formal sessions held throughout the week.
Showcase for the new American president is visiting.
Only in its first year, Obama has done through the summits with the leaders of the world's top 20 industrialized countries and eight major industrial powers and the Western Hemisphere heads, leaders of Russia and the NATO. The president is not afraid to asked the UN to take "a big hard problems more efficiently.
When the focus moves to Pittsburgh, Obama Group of 20 summit, to lead rich countries and developing countries, representing 80 percent of global economic output. Although the U.S. and costly efforts earlier this year helped to stop the economic downturn is an enormous amount of work left and a large departments on how to proceed.
"We must all act responsibly on behalf of a better economic future," Obama said Saturday the radio and the Internet, which seemed to approach the G20 summit and warned against complacency.
EU leaders are frustrated that the American operation of economic regulation and limit the directors of the bank to pay. Just before Obama Travel down the plan and the Federal Reserve, which for the first time the police how banks pay for executives is to minimize investment risky.
Obama himself has to drive to get Congress moving - he just went to Wall Street to say so much. But the work is unlikely to meet their peers.
"You will hear a strong concern that the experience is not learned," said Heather Conley, who served as Foreign Minister of Bush is currently the program CSIS think tank. He said that Europeans are afraid of emergency has been lost, and they ask: "Americans, what are you doing this?
The events can affect the final days of the agenda of Obama, too.
President of China has punished more than the tires are exported to the United States, indicating the violation of trade rules. The transition is an economic ally, enraged and fanned fears that the new protectionism.
He just destroyed the era of Bush's plans for a missile defense system in Eastern Europe, the exchange is a more mobile, designed to change the threat from Iran. This change is welcome in Russia, who said Obama had nothing to worry about first, but the cause consternation in the region.
His special envoy to the Middle East, did not bridge differences between Israelis and Palestinians, expressed uncertainty about the recent talks and restoration of American influence on them. The White House said Saturday that Obama will host a meeting on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas.
And then there's the shadow of Iran.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Friday, while the Jews had doubts really happened, and assured him that Israel was created "to lie and claim the mythical". This imposes a threatening tone, that the UN - Ahmadinejad is here - that the United States and five other countries in late October 1 Conference on Iran.
Biggest challenge facing Obama communications to ensure that your message is king.
This means, such as rice, she tries to "bridge the divide between old and oppose the efforts of a handful of usual spoilers.
Obama is under pressure to push along the peace in the Middle East stalled, the United States is serious about the exhibition on climate change and to rally allies against nuclear threats from Iran and North Korea. Concerned leaders of Europe and the rest by pressing Obama to reform the risky economic behavior in the United States and the Congress on board.
It also assumes the load on the two wars now inherited the position of his fingerprint - a dismissal of Iraq, which continues in Afghanistan. Eight years after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Obama is an international stature, he always tries to keep Afghanistan al-Qaeda launching pad again.
The talks have the potential to be a galvanizing moment and missed opportunities.
"Leadership is not simply tell people what you want, because the Bush administration has been observed. Leadership is getting people to do what you want them to do, "said Jon Alterman, Senior Fellow, Center for Policy in the Middle East for Strategic and International Studies and a former State Department official, President George W. Bush 's first term.
Obama's chances.
In his speech at the First Assembly of 192 members to share their views on leadership, emphasis on the new brand to highlight the cooperation he has not Bush. As UN ambassador, Susan Rice, described the message: "Everyone has a responsibility. The United States is a leader again. And we expect others to join.
Obama is the first president of the United States, and President of the Security Council, whose rotating presidency of the United States happens to be in the hands of this month, the annual meeting of the General Assembly. He expects to be away from the summit resolution Arms control that advances the goals of its nuclear weapons free world.
The measure tries to set fire to Iran and North Korea do not blame any country.
His domestic agenda to consume health care, Obama is pressing world leaders to put more muscle to fight climate change. He tries to do exactly this week, including a speech at the Climate Conference of the United Nations.
Time presses, however, that the United States for influence. The international conference is planned for December in Denmark, a new global climate agreement on the contract. Although Parliament approved a bill to limit greenhouse gas emissions, the decision may discolor the Senate next year.
Perhaps as important as the speeches are discussions of the world never sees.
Obama, who arrived in New York on Monday of the annual collection of the United Nations, met privately with leaders of Russia, China and Japan. Less formal sessions held throughout the week.
Showcase for the new American president is visiting.
Only in its first year, Obama has done through the summits with the leaders of the world's top 20 industrialized countries and eight major industrial powers and the Western Hemisphere heads, leaders of Russia and the NATO. The president is not afraid to asked the UN to take "a big hard problems more efficiently.
When the focus moves to Pittsburgh, Obama Group of 20 summit, to lead rich countries and developing countries, representing 80 percent of global economic output. Although the U.S. and costly efforts earlier this year helped to stop the economic downturn is an enormous amount of work left and a large departments on how to proceed.
"We must all act responsibly on behalf of a better economic future," Obama said Saturday the radio and the Internet, which seemed to approach the G20 summit and warned against complacency.
EU leaders are frustrated that the American operation of economic regulation and limit the directors of the bank to pay. Just before Obama Travel down the plan and the Federal Reserve, which for the first time the police how banks pay for executives is to minimize investment risky.
Obama himself has to drive to get Congress moving - he just went to Wall Street to say so much. But the work is unlikely to meet their peers.
"You will hear a strong concern that the experience is not learned," said Heather Conley, who served as Foreign Minister of Bush is currently the program CSIS think tank. He said that Europeans are afraid of emergency has been lost, and they ask: "Americans, what are you doing this?
The events can affect the final days of the agenda of Obama, too.
President of China has punished more than the tires are exported to the United States, indicating the violation of trade rules. The transition is an economic ally, enraged and fanned fears that the new protectionism.
He just destroyed the era of Bush's plans for a missile defense system in Eastern Europe, the exchange is a more mobile, designed to change the threat from Iran. This change is welcome in Russia, who said Obama had nothing to worry about first, but the cause consternation in the region.
His special envoy to the Middle East, did not bridge differences between Israelis and Palestinians, expressed uncertainty about the recent talks and restoration of American influence on them. The White House said Saturday that Obama will host a meeting on Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas.
And then there's the shadow of Iran.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Friday, while the Jews had doubts really happened, and assured him that Israel was created "to lie and claim the mythical". This imposes a threatening tone, that the UN - Ahmadinejad is here - that the United States and five other countries in late October 1 Conference on Iran.
Biggest challenge facing Obama communications to ensure that your message is king.
This means, such as rice, she tries to "bridge the divide between old and oppose the efforts of a handful of usual spoilers.
RushLimbaugh on NancyPelosi's DespicableAttackAgainst Americans,Obama Health Care/Nazi Swastika Logo
Limbaugh compares Obama's new healthcare logo to Nazi swastika Topic
Member Godwin stated that the more a debate continues, the probability of a confrontation with the Nazis or Hitler salt. It seems that the debate on Healthcare is no exception.
In recent days, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) has repeatedly accused the people in a protest against the recent reform of the health of President Obama wearing swastikas and symbols of the SS - a claim which has since been strengthened by a series of photographs .
"I think that artificial turf is the judge," said Pelosi. "They are wearing swastikas and symbols, like that in a town meeting on health."
Perennial criticism of Obama and conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh was quick to respond to these accusations, saying that now his radio show that was actually the Democrats who have used Nazi symbols to advance their agenda. He cited a blog post on the Conservative Sweetness & Light, which compares the logo Health Care Barack Obama - a combination of his campaign logo and the greek symbol of medicine - the symbol of the Nazi swastika.
"They accuse us of being Nazis, and Obama has a logo of health which is the right of Adolf Hitler Playbook," said Limbaugh.
Limbaugh proceeded to describe how Democrats are like the Nazis - a list that included their dedication to animal rights and their opposition to smoking and pollution.
Well, the Nazis were against big business - he hated big business. And, of course, we all know that they were against the Jewish capital. They were mad, irrational against pollution. They spent two years of voluntary service required in Germany. They had a lot of make-work projects to keep people working, one of which was the highway. Were against vivisection and cruelty to animals, but in the radical sense of devaluing human life, have banned smoking. They were totally against that. They were for abortion and euthanasia of unwanted, as we all know, and they had to cradle to grave health care, nationalized.
What do you think? This is the logo Health Barack Obama is actually a symbolic reference to Nazism?
9/16/09
9/15/09
Obama Heckled by GOP During Speech to Congress- Video
Obama heckled by GOP during speech to Congress Topic
WASHINGTON - Rage August to get out of town councils in the nation's Capitol, the Senate on Wednesday that U.S. President Barack Obama has tried to move his health plan earlier.
Republican of South Carolina, Joe Wilson shouted: "Liar!" Obama, talking about illegal immigrants.
It was not only during the break Obama's speech in a joint session of both chambers of Congress in the House of Representatives. Earlier, the Republicans laughed when Obama acknowledged that there are still important details to be resolved prior to overhaul health can be adopted.
Wilson explosion Obama before a short pause, he put forward in his speech. Overhead in the galleries for visitors, first lady Michelle Obama shook his head from side to side.
9/13/09
Obama's health care plan, pledges support
Gov. Martin O'Malley pledged to help President Barack Obama as he seeks to ensure passage of national health reform. Governor of Maryland, called the federal push to reform the "once-in-a-generation opportunity." O'Malley was one of three governors who joined the White House conference call to discuss the Obama health care
to address the Congress and the nation. So the debate was Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle, whose state is one of the lowest in the insured in the country was 8.9 percent, and Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, whose state is achieved rate 5.4 percent lower uninsured after the establishment of universal health coverage several years ago. Prices (in Maryland is nearly 13 percent, according to statistics recently released Census Bureau.)
Democrats applauded the trio of Obama's speech that Melody Barnes, the director of internal policy the White House said the President met with the "governors" and must join the centrist Congress. "The actual teaching since August is that the American people will not accept the status quo," said Barnes.
He and the governors reaffirmed what they called the president has a clear objective: to ensure that Americans can maintain their current health insurance system, affordable alternatives for people who are not covered, and control costs. O'Malley said, and the other governors struggling with budget deficits, to praise the efforts to keep costs in check.
He noted that the budget is 9.2 billion U.S. dollars of health care in Maryland would quickly balloon, if costs continue to rise at an interest rate observed in recent years. "It is unacceptable on the state of Maryland and threatens to undermine all those who have coverage," he said.
O'Malley also praised the idea of the insurance exchange in which the proponents say, small businesses and others can find low-cost packages, and if insurance companies would be competing for millions of new customers. The governor said that it would be better to give his administration has offered to encourage workers to convince, says that the census figures show, many of them joined the group of uninsured work for small businesses.
Conference call to discuss what feels good, how the proposed health care may cost you points. Obama said in his speech that he would sign a bill that increases the national deficit, raise the specter of May, the state is Pony Up.
9/9/09
Addressing health care with House Blue Dog Democrats' delete so crucial to vote in September
Democrats press committee action on health care
WASHINGTON - Congressional Democrats are determined to show progress on health reform, prompting the president Barack Obama is the top national priority by both Boards of fundamental importance, before returning to break the month of August. Are closer, but you're not there yet.
Democratic leaders in the House won a contract by the Conservatives on Energy and Commerce Committee that would have enabled the Group to begin to vote on legislation as early as Thursday. In negotiating the Senate Finance Committee say they are closer to a bipartisan compromise that has eluded for weeks.
The Finance panel and the Energy and Commerce panel are seen as pivotal tests of prospects for the legislation because they reflect the broader composition of the Senate and the House. Three other committees that have already passed versions of the legislation are dominated by Democratic liberals.
The earliest that floor votes could occur would be in September.
The House bill and the plan under negotiation in the Senate are designed to meet Obama’s goals of spreading health coverage to millions who now lack it, while trying to slow the skyrocketing growth in medical costs. As recently as two weeks ago, Obama was pressing the House and Senate to pass separate bills by the end of July or early August. After Republicans and moderate Democrats objected to the rush, the president said he’d settle for just progress.
Wednesday in the House, Democratic leaders gave in — at least temporarily — to numerous demands from rank-and-file rebels from the conservative wing of the party. The so-called Blue Dog Democrats had been blocking the bill’s passage in Energy and Commerce.
The House changes, which drew immediate opposition from liberal lawmakers, would steer away from using Medicare as the blueprint for a proposed government insurance option, reduce federal subsidies to help lower-income families afford coverage, and exempt additional businesses from a requirement to offer health insurance to their workers.
Bipartisan Senate negotiators reported progress on legislation that aims to cover 95 percent of Americans without raising federal deficits.
“We’re on the edge, we’re almost there,” said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican involved in the secretive talks, although a fellow GOP participant, Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, dissented strongly.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Finance Committee, said preliminary estimates from congressional budget experts showed the cost of the emerging Senate plan was below $900 billion and would result in an increase in employer-sponsored insurance — conclusions that may reassure critics who fear a bloated bill that prompts businesses to abandon the coverage they currently provide.
Congressional officials said Baucus was able to get the cost under $1 trillion because his bill includes only the cost of the first year of a 10-year, $245 billion program to increase doctor fees under Medicare. House Democrats used a similar sleight of hand, excluding the entire $245 billion when claiming their measure wouldn’t add to the deficit.
The White House praised the developments in the House. At appearances in North Carolina and Virginia, the president sought to minimize the significance of the slippage in his timetable.
“We did give them a deadline, and sort of we missed that deadline. But that’s OK,” Obama said. “We don’t want to just do it quickly, we want to do it right.”
Campaigning for the health care overhaul, Obama stressed that any legislation he signs will include numerous consumer protections, including a ban on insurance company denials of coverage based on pre-existing medical conditions. A White House fact sheet left room for insurers to continue charging higher premiums based on prior health problems.
Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, a leader of the Blue Dogs, said the changes agreed to by the leadership in the House bill would cut its cost by about $100 billion over 10 years.
The House deal was worked out over hours of talks that involved not only Democratic leaders but also White House officials eager to advance the bill. Senior congressional aides cast it as a temporary accommodation, saying leaders had not committed to support it once the bill advances to the floor of the House in the fall.
As word of the agreement spread, liberals fired back. “We do not support this,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. “I think they have no idea how many people are against this. They can’t possibly be taking us seriously if they’re going to bring this forward.”
Plans to convene the Energy and Commerce Committee for a vote slipped until Thursday as leaders sought to allay concerns of liberals.
“We just need to get everybody on board,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who chairs the panel’s subcommittee on health.
In the Senate, the pace of negotiations appears to have accelerated in recent days, with lawmakers all but settling on a tax on high-cost insurance plans to help pay for the bill, as well as a new mechanism designed to curtail the growth of Medicare over the next 10 years and beyond.
More problematic from the point of view of most Democrats is a tentative agreement to omit a provision in which the government would sell insurance in competition with private industry. In its place, the group is expected to recommend nonprofit cooperatives that could operate at the state, regional or even national level.
Nor is any bipartisan recommendation likely to include a requirement for large businesses to offer insurance to their workers. Instead, they would have a choice between offering coverage or paying a portion of any government subsidy that noninsured employees would receive.
Like the House bill, the bipartisan proposal under discussion would expand eligibility for Medicaid to 133 percent of the federal poverty level.
It provides for federal subsidies for individuals and families up to 300 percent of poverty, less than the 400 percent in the House measure.
Even if the negotiations succeed before the Senate’s vacation, which starts next week, it isn’t clear when the Finance Committee would vote
WASHINGTON - Congressional Democrats are determined to show progress on health reform, prompting the president Barack Obama is the top national priority by both Boards of fundamental importance, before returning to break the month of August. Are closer, but you're not there yet.
Democratic leaders in the House won a contract by the Conservatives on Energy and Commerce Committee that would have enabled the Group to begin to vote on legislation as early as Thursday. In negotiating the Senate Finance Committee say they are closer to a bipartisan compromise that has eluded for weeks.
The Finance panel and the Energy and Commerce panel are seen as pivotal tests of prospects for the legislation because they reflect the broader composition of the Senate and the House. Three other committees that have already passed versions of the legislation are dominated by Democratic liberals.
The earliest that floor votes could occur would be in September.
The House bill and the plan under negotiation in the Senate are designed to meet Obama’s goals of spreading health coverage to millions who now lack it, while trying to slow the skyrocketing growth in medical costs. As recently as two weeks ago, Obama was pressing the House and Senate to pass separate bills by the end of July or early August. After Republicans and moderate Democrats objected to the rush, the president said he’d settle for just progress.
Wednesday in the House, Democratic leaders gave in — at least temporarily — to numerous demands from rank-and-file rebels from the conservative wing of the party. The so-called Blue Dog Democrats had been blocking the bill’s passage in Energy and Commerce.
The House changes, which drew immediate opposition from liberal lawmakers, would steer away from using Medicare as the blueprint for a proposed government insurance option, reduce federal subsidies to help lower-income families afford coverage, and exempt additional businesses from a requirement to offer health insurance to their workers.
Bipartisan Senate negotiators reported progress on legislation that aims to cover 95 percent of Americans without raising federal deficits.
“We’re on the edge, we’re almost there,” said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican involved in the secretive talks, although a fellow GOP participant, Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, dissented strongly.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Finance Committee, said preliminary estimates from congressional budget experts showed the cost of the emerging Senate plan was below $900 billion and would result in an increase in employer-sponsored insurance — conclusions that may reassure critics who fear a bloated bill that prompts businesses to abandon the coverage they currently provide.
Congressional officials said Baucus was able to get the cost under $1 trillion because his bill includes only the cost of the first year of a 10-year, $245 billion program to increase doctor fees under Medicare. House Democrats used a similar sleight of hand, excluding the entire $245 billion when claiming their measure wouldn’t add to the deficit.
The White House praised the developments in the House. At appearances in North Carolina and Virginia, the president sought to minimize the significance of the slippage in his timetable.
“We did give them a deadline, and sort of we missed that deadline. But that’s OK,” Obama said. “We don’t want to just do it quickly, we want to do it right.”
Campaigning for the health care overhaul, Obama stressed that any legislation he signs will include numerous consumer protections, including a ban on insurance company denials of coverage based on pre-existing medical conditions. A White House fact sheet left room for insurers to continue charging higher premiums based on prior health problems.
Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, a leader of the Blue Dogs, said the changes agreed to by the leadership in the House bill would cut its cost by about $100 billion over 10 years.
The House deal was worked out over hours of talks that involved not only Democratic leaders but also White House officials eager to advance the bill. Senior congressional aides cast it as a temporary accommodation, saying leaders had not committed to support it once the bill advances to the floor of the House in the fall.
As word of the agreement spread, liberals fired back. “We do not support this,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. “I think they have no idea how many people are against this. They can’t possibly be taking us seriously if they’re going to bring this forward.”
Plans to convene the Energy and Commerce Committee for a vote slipped until Thursday as leaders sought to allay concerns of liberals.
“We just need to get everybody on board,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who chairs the panel’s subcommittee on health.
In the Senate, the pace of negotiations appears to have accelerated in recent days, with lawmakers all but settling on a tax on high-cost insurance plans to help pay for the bill, as well as a new mechanism designed to curtail the growth of Medicare over the next 10 years and beyond.
More problematic from the point of view of most Democrats is a tentative agreement to omit a provision in which the government would sell insurance in competition with private industry. In its place, the group is expected to recommend nonprofit cooperatives that could operate at the state, regional or even national level.
Nor is any bipartisan recommendation likely to include a requirement for large businesses to offer insurance to their workers. Instead, they would have a choice between offering coverage or paying a portion of any government subsidy that noninsured employees would receive.
Like the House bill, the bipartisan proposal under discussion would expand eligibility for Medicaid to 133 percent of the federal poverty level.
It provides for federal subsidies for individuals and families up to 300 percent of poverty, less than the 400 percent in the House measure.
Even if the negotiations succeed before the Senate’s vacation, which starts next week, it isn’t clear when the Finance Committee would vote
9/8/09
Health Care Proxies, Advanced Health Care Directives, And Living Wills
Any competent adult has the right to accept and/or refuse any medical treatment. Nobody disputes that. Doctors are only allowed to tell patients the pros and cons of treatment, they can offer advice, they can not order a patient to accept treatment. Problems start when the adult can no longer communicate or is no longer considered mentally competent enough to make their own decisions. When this happens other people step in and try to decide what type of medical treatment the person would want for themselves.
Most of us want to think that we live lives full of long and yet totally dominate the destiny, it is unfortunately not always the case. People have been injured in car crashes, freak fall, and the brain is still slipping into oblivion as a direct result of mental illness. When this happens, we lose control of therapy, we have always taken for granted.
You can not control.
Attorney for Health Care Advanced Directives health, and living wills are documents that are written before the patient loses their mental capacity, which clearly show what care the patient to accept a given situation and what type of treatment they are accustomed to accept.
Doctors are obliged to work in the developed guidelines for health care, living wills and power of attorney for medical care.
Advanced health care directive is a document that is signed, if the person is qualified, to demonstrate its desire for health care.
One type of advanced health care directive to human use is of a lasting power of attorney for health care. A person who has continuing power of attorney is a person who has been designated by the patient, who has the right to make all medical decisions. This person is called a patient advocate. Any mentally competent person over the age six p.m. to give power of attorney. Before someone named patient advocate, so they are nice and the responsibility given to them. Make sure that they are very firm understanding of your medical wishes and desires. The patient advocate can be a friend, spouse, family member, life partner, or a lawyer, they should have someone in your life can literally trust. If you do not have the name of the person's own responsibility for the patient advocate will automatically go to the nearest family member. Patient Advocate can not work if you can not communicate with itself.
The most advanced health care directive second is a medical living it. It is a document which you can inform health care wishes in writing. Living wills do not have the name of the patient's advocate.
Some people want to combine a will to live and durable power of attorney.
If you want to write to live in it, that you must decide if you are ready for connection to the fans, if you want to be resuscitated, if the heart stops beating, if you want to extend the life of drugs, is a type of surgery that you do not want to make your body if you want to be in a coma feeding tube inserted.
If you're in a coma and doctors believe that you never want to wake up to take all measures that keep the body alive?
Living Wills are where most people a list of times they want to be resuscitated, and sometimes they do not want to be resuscitated.
If you have a living will, you should keep in a safe place where it can be easily found and urgent. Some people keep their wallets and purses, and others choose to enroll in a national database.
Most of us want to think that we live lives full of long and yet totally dominate the destiny, it is unfortunately not always the case. People have been injured in car crashes, freak fall, and the brain is still slipping into oblivion as a direct result of mental illness. When this happens, we lose control of therapy, we have always taken for granted.
You can not control.
Attorney for Health Care Advanced Directives health, and living wills are documents that are written before the patient loses their mental capacity, which clearly show what care the patient to accept a given situation and what type of treatment they are accustomed to accept.
Doctors are obliged to work in the developed guidelines for health care, living wills and power of attorney for medical care.
Advanced health care directive is a document that is signed, if the person is qualified, to demonstrate its desire for health care.
One type of advanced health care directive to human use is of a lasting power of attorney for health care. A person who has continuing power of attorney is a person who has been designated by the patient, who has the right to make all medical decisions. This person is called a patient advocate. Any mentally competent person over the age six p.m. to give power of attorney. Before someone named patient advocate, so they are nice and the responsibility given to them. Make sure that they are very firm understanding of your medical wishes and desires. The patient advocate can be a friend, spouse, family member, life partner, or a lawyer, they should have someone in your life can literally trust. If you do not have the name of the person's own responsibility for the patient advocate will automatically go to the nearest family member. Patient Advocate can not work if you can not communicate with itself.
The most advanced health care directive second is a medical living it. It is a document which you can inform health care wishes in writing. Living wills do not have the name of the patient's advocate.
Some people want to combine a will to live and durable power of attorney.
If you want to write to live in it, that you must decide if you are ready for connection to the fans, if you want to be resuscitated, if the heart stops beating, if you want to extend the life of drugs, is a type of surgery that you do not want to make your body if you want to be in a coma feeding tube inserted.
If you're in a coma and doctors believe that you never want to wake up to take all measures that keep the body alive?
Living Wills are where most people a list of times they want to be resuscitated, and sometimes they do not want to be resuscitated.
If you have a living will, you should keep in a safe place where it can be easily found and urgent. Some people keep their wallets and purses, and others choose to enroll in a national database.
Obama Care Vs "My" Care: How My 75/75/75 Rule Wins!
By last week, the media, and respectfully, is one of the holes donut care reimbursement for medical expenses, black holes and others are trying to demonstrate how to modify some of the key ways can lead to better health outcomes, forever.
Last week, President Obama has made clear he favors reform, health care, the government playing the role here is very important indeed. That's why I want the brakes to my blog "donut hole" to solve this problem, just this once, and I'm back ... doing donuts next time.
Firstly, to use some of the statistics in advance. It is a known fact that Americans spent 18% of GDP on health care in 2009. But what is bad? Some people argue that we do not spend enough. Listen, all of us to use a larger portion of our mortgages, our cars, etc., and the question is: what is the most important purchase in your life? It is health care, a good thing that keeps us alive, so that we can use other elements. I do not think the issue is the amount we spend much more than what it used to buy us. It is my position, which is used in conjunction with consumer behavior.
It is alleged that 75% of health spending have been obtained for certain behaviors. Another argument is that 75% of the total cost may be less than half a dozen diseases, including diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease and cancer. In addition, approximately 75% of these diseases are preventable, which is what I tried to show through the hole donut round of discussions. Thus, the rule of magic control health spending and improved health outcomes is 75/75/75. May it take to start changing behavior, which subsequently leads to better outcomes and prevention, which is to produce cost savings.
So the question is how can we change behavior? Well, the model already exists in various forms and is currently in use is the side of providers. It goes without saying that it must implement the consumer side. At its simplest, each company to develop a personal calendar for each employee, special incentives - and rewards, and things like sports, weight reduction, cholesterol management, and other indicators. Used in accordance with the model results and is based on the results of these workers receive rewards such as discounts, etc.
Enjoy the design is modified to capture the so-called "QALY" or more (or expected) quality-adjusted life years of personal profits by changing behavior. Pharmacoeconomic comparison, these figures are systematically calculated in the treatment of various drugs, which are pharmaceutical companies, the missing link is the premium consumer. If I change my behavior and abandon obesity, I should be rewarded for avoiding the costs of this disease.
Interest of behavior change, a mandate based on the following rule 75/75/75: 75/75/75 rule produces better health outcomes and cost savings as well, forever. Politically artificial - will never compromise the parties for the government, its unfair, unsustainable costs and questionable results is a quick solution, and plates produced by bad habits that require more repairs. Et oui vous guested, réparations trop nombreux qui ne sont rien d'incorrect, il est ... confirmed.
Last week, President Obama has made clear he favors reform, health care, the government playing the role here is very important indeed. That's why I want the brakes to my blog "donut hole" to solve this problem, just this once, and I'm back ... doing donuts next time.
Firstly, to use some of the statistics in advance. It is a known fact that Americans spent 18% of GDP on health care in 2009. But what is bad? Some people argue that we do not spend enough. Listen, all of us to use a larger portion of our mortgages, our cars, etc., and the question is: what is the most important purchase in your life? It is health care, a good thing that keeps us alive, so that we can use other elements. I do not think the issue is the amount we spend much more than what it used to buy us. It is my position, which is used in conjunction with consumer behavior.
It is alleged that 75% of health spending have been obtained for certain behaviors. Another argument is that 75% of the total cost may be less than half a dozen diseases, including diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease and cancer. In addition, approximately 75% of these diseases are preventable, which is what I tried to show through the hole donut round of discussions. Thus, the rule of magic control health spending and improved health outcomes is 75/75/75. May it take to start changing behavior, which subsequently leads to better outcomes and prevention, which is to produce cost savings.
So the question is how can we change behavior? Well, the model already exists in various forms and is currently in use is the side of providers. It goes without saying that it must implement the consumer side. At its simplest, each company to develop a personal calendar for each employee, special incentives - and rewards, and things like sports, weight reduction, cholesterol management, and other indicators. Used in accordance with the model results and is based on the results of these workers receive rewards such as discounts, etc.
Enjoy the design is modified to capture the so-called "QALY" or more (or expected) quality-adjusted life years of personal profits by changing behavior. Pharmacoeconomic comparison, these figures are systematically calculated in the treatment of various drugs, which are pharmaceutical companies, the missing link is the premium consumer. If I change my behavior and abandon obesity, I should be rewarded for avoiding the costs of this disease.
Interest of behavior change, a mandate based on the following rule 75/75/75: 75/75/75 rule produces better health outcomes and cost savings as well, forever. Politically artificial - will never compromise the parties for the government, its unfair, unsustainable costs and questionable results is a quick solution, and plates produced by bad habits that require more repairs. Et oui vous guested, réparations trop nombreux qui ne sont rien d'incorrect, il est ... confirmed.
9/2/09
Democrats press committee action on health care
Health care deal with House ‘Blue Dog’ Democrats clears way for crucial September vote
WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats are determined to show progress on a health care overhaul by pushing President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority through two critically important committees before they head home for their August break.
They’re closer, but they’re not there yet.
Democratic leaders in the House won agreement from conservatives on the Energy and Commerce Committee that would allow that panel to start voting on legislation as early as Thursday. In the Senate, negotiators on the Finance Committee say they are nearer to a bipartisan compromise that has eluded them for weeks.
The Finance panel and the Energy and Commerce panel are seen as pivotal tests of prospects for the legislation because they reflect the broader composition of the Senate and the House. Three other committees that have already passed versions of the legislation are dominated by Democratic liberals.
The earliest that floor votes could occur would be in September.
The House bill and the plan under negotiation in the Senate are designed to meet Obama’s goals of spreading health coverage to millions who now lack it, while trying to slow the skyrocketing growth in medical costs. As recently as two weeks ago, Obama was pressing the House and Senate to pass separate bills by the end of July or early August. After Republicans and moderate Democrats objected to the rush, the president said he’d settle for just progress.
Wednesday in the House, Democratic leaders gave in — at least temporarily — to numerous demands from rank-and-file rebels from the conservative wing of the party. The so-called Blue Dog Democrats had been blocking the bill’s passage in Energy and Commerce.
The House changes, which drew immediate opposition from liberal lawmakers, would steer away from using Medicare as the blueprint for a proposed government insurance option, reduce federal subsidies to help lower-income families afford coverage, and exempt additional businesses from a requirement to offer health insurance to their workers.
Bipartisan Senate negotiators reported progress on legislation that aims to cover 95 percent of Americans without raising federal deficits.
“We’re on the edge, we’re almost there,” said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican involved in the secretive talks, although a fellow GOP participant, Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, dissented strongly.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Finance Committee, said preliminary estimates from congressional budget experts showed the cost of the emerging Senate plan was below $900 billion and would result in an increase in employer-sponsored insurance — conclusions that may reassure critics who fear a bloated bill that prompts businesses to abandon the coverage they currently provide.
Congressional officials said Baucus was able to get the cost under $1 trillion because his bill includes only the cost of the first year of a 10-year, $245 billion program to increase doctor fees under Medicare. House Democrats used a similar sleight of hand, excluding the entire $245 billion when claiming their measure wouldn’t add to the deficit.
The White House praised the developments in the House. At appearances in North Carolina and Virginia, the president sought to minimize the significance of the slippage in his timetable.
“We did give them a deadline, and sort of we missed that deadline. But that’s OK,” Obama said. “We don’t want to just do it quickly, we want to do it right.”
Campaigning for the health care overhaul, Obama stressed that any legislation he signs will include numerous consumer protections, including a ban on insurance company denials of coverage based on pre-existing medical conditions. A White House fact sheet left room for insurers to continue charging higher premiums based on prior health problems.
Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, a leader of the Blue Dogs, said the changes agreed to by the leadership in the House bill would cut its cost by about $100 billion over 10 years.
The House deal was worked out over hours of talks that involved not only Democratic leaders but also White House officials eager to advance the bill. Senior congressional aides cast it as a temporary accommodation, saying leaders had not committed to support it once the bill advances to the floor of the House in the fall.
As word of the agreement spread, liberals fired back. “We do not support this,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. “I think they have no idea how many people are against this. They can’t possibly be taking us seriously if they’re going to bring this forward.”
Plans to convene the Energy and Commerce Committee for a vote slipped until Thursday as leaders sought to allay concerns of liberals.
“We just need to get everybody on board,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who chairs the panel’s subcommittee on health.
In the Senate, the pace of negotiations appears to have accelerated in recent days, with lawmakers all but settling on a tax on high-cost insurance plans to help pay for the bill, as well as a new mechanism designed to curtail the growth of Medicare over the next 10 years and beyond.
More problematic from the point of view of most Democrats is a tentative agreement to omit a provision in which the government would sell insurance in competition with private industry. In its place, the group is expected to recommend nonprofit cooperatives that could operate at the state, regional or even national level.
Nor is any bipartisan recommendation likely to include a requirement for large businesses to offer insurance to their workers. Instead, they would have a choice between offering coverage or paying a portion of any government subsidy that noninsured employees would receive.
Like the House bill, the bipartisan proposal under discussion would expand eligibility for Medicaid to 133 percent of the federal poverty level.
It provides for federal subsidies for individuals and families up to 300 percent of poverty, less than the 400 percent in the House measure.
Even if the negotiations succeed before the Senate’s vacation, which starts next week, it isn’t clear when the Finance Committee would vote.
WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats are determined to show progress on a health care overhaul by pushing President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority through two critically important committees before they head home for their August break.
They’re closer, but they’re not there yet.
Democratic leaders in the House won agreement from conservatives on the Energy and Commerce Committee that would allow that panel to start voting on legislation as early as Thursday. In the Senate, negotiators on the Finance Committee say they are nearer to a bipartisan compromise that has eluded them for weeks.
The Finance panel and the Energy and Commerce panel are seen as pivotal tests of prospects for the legislation because they reflect the broader composition of the Senate and the House. Three other committees that have already passed versions of the legislation are dominated by Democratic liberals.
The earliest that floor votes could occur would be in September.
The House bill and the plan under negotiation in the Senate are designed to meet Obama’s goals of spreading health coverage to millions who now lack it, while trying to slow the skyrocketing growth in medical costs. As recently as two weeks ago, Obama was pressing the House and Senate to pass separate bills by the end of July or early August. After Republicans and moderate Democrats objected to the rush, the president said he’d settle for just progress.
Wednesday in the House, Democratic leaders gave in — at least temporarily — to numerous demands from rank-and-file rebels from the conservative wing of the party. The so-called Blue Dog Democrats had been blocking the bill’s passage in Energy and Commerce.
The House changes, which drew immediate opposition from liberal lawmakers, would steer away from using Medicare as the blueprint for a proposed government insurance option, reduce federal subsidies to help lower-income families afford coverage, and exempt additional businesses from a requirement to offer health insurance to their workers.
Bipartisan Senate negotiators reported progress on legislation that aims to cover 95 percent of Americans without raising federal deficits.
“We’re on the edge, we’re almost there,” said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican involved in the secretive talks, although a fellow GOP participant, Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, dissented strongly.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Finance Committee, said preliminary estimates from congressional budget experts showed the cost of the emerging Senate plan was below $900 billion and would result in an increase in employer-sponsored insurance — conclusions that may reassure critics who fear a bloated bill that prompts businesses to abandon the coverage they currently provide.
Congressional officials said Baucus was able to get the cost under $1 trillion because his bill includes only the cost of the first year of a 10-year, $245 billion program to increase doctor fees under Medicare. House Democrats used a similar sleight of hand, excluding the entire $245 billion when claiming their measure wouldn’t add to the deficit.
The White House praised the developments in the House. At appearances in North Carolina and Virginia, the president sought to minimize the significance of the slippage in his timetable.
“We did give them a deadline, and sort of we missed that deadline. But that’s OK,” Obama said. “We don’t want to just do it quickly, we want to do it right.”
Campaigning for the health care overhaul, Obama stressed that any legislation he signs will include numerous consumer protections, including a ban on insurance company denials of coverage based on pre-existing medical conditions. A White House fact sheet left room for insurers to continue charging higher premiums based on prior health problems.
Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas, a leader of the Blue Dogs, said the changes agreed to by the leadership in the House bill would cut its cost by about $100 billion over 10 years.
The House deal was worked out over hours of talks that involved not only Democratic leaders but also White House officials eager to advance the bill. Senior congressional aides cast it as a temporary accommodation, saying leaders had not committed to support it once the bill advances to the floor of the House in the fall.
As word of the agreement spread, liberals fired back. “We do not support this,” said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. “I think they have no idea how many people are against this. They can’t possibly be taking us seriously if they’re going to bring this forward.”
Plans to convene the Energy and Commerce Committee for a vote slipped until Thursday as leaders sought to allay concerns of liberals.
“We just need to get everybody on board,” said Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., who chairs the panel’s subcommittee on health.
In the Senate, the pace of negotiations appears to have accelerated in recent days, with lawmakers all but settling on a tax on high-cost insurance plans to help pay for the bill, as well as a new mechanism designed to curtail the growth of Medicare over the next 10 years and beyond.
More problematic from the point of view of most Democrats is a tentative agreement to omit a provision in which the government would sell insurance in competition with private industry. In its place, the group is expected to recommend nonprofit cooperatives that could operate at the state, regional or even national level.
Nor is any bipartisan recommendation likely to include a requirement for large businesses to offer insurance to their workers. Instead, they would have a choice between offering coverage or paying a portion of any government subsidy that noninsured employees would receive.
Like the House bill, the bipartisan proposal under discussion would expand eligibility for Medicaid to 133 percent of the federal poverty level.
It provides for federal subsidies for individuals and families up to 300 percent of poverty, less than the 400 percent in the House measure.
Even if the negotiations succeed before the Senate’s vacation, which starts next week, it isn’t clear when the Finance Committee would vote.
8/29/09
Obama Says Health Overhaul Will Guard Against Coverage Losses
By Julianna Goldman and Nicholas Johnston
President Barack Obama, pushing his plans for revamping the U.S. health-care system, said Americans are being “held hostage” by the risk that insurers may cancel or deny medical coverage when they get sick.
“It’s wrong,” Obama told an audience at a town hall yesterday in Belgrade, Montana, about eight miles northwest of Bozeman. “It’s bankrupting families, it’s bankrupting business, and we are going to fix it when we pass health- insurance reform this year.”
Taking his health-care push on the road for the second time this week, Obama said the health-care system “all too often works better for the insurance companies than it does for the American people.”
Obama flew to Montana yesterday after visiting Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on Aug. 11, where he denounced “scare tactics” by opponents of health-insurance changes. The president will hold another town hall meeting on the issue today in Colorado.
Proposals to overhaul U.S. health care have run into angry protests at forums across the U.S. during Congress’s August recess and face sagging support in public-opinion polls.
Among political independents, 35 percent say the demonstrations at the town hall meetings have made them more sympathetic to the protesters’ views, according to a USA Today/Gallup poll.
Montana Senator Max Baucus, a Democrat who was among politicians joining Obama at yesterday’s meeting, said voters are hearing “outrageous myths.”
‘Plenty of Dishonesty’
“There’s plenty of dishonesty out there,” Baucus said. As chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Baucus leads a group of three Democratic and three Republican senators trying to piece together bipartisan legislation.
Lawmakers have faced critics charging that the government wants to take over the U.S. health-care system and, as part odf the changes, empower bureaucratic “death panels” to “pull the plug” by withdrawing treatment from ailing senior citizens.
In the effort to calm voter fears that legislation may hurt the quality of their medical care, Obama is stressing ways that his plans may help the 250 million Americans who have health insurance. In New Hampshire earlier this week, Obama talked about individuals who are denied coverage because of medical conditions. Tomorrow, in Grand Junction, Colorado, Obama plans to talk about lowering out-of-pocket costs for patients.
Marc Montgomery, an insurance agent in Helena, Montana, yesterday pressed Obama about whether the White House has a strategy to “vilify” insurance companies.
Obama said he’s not targeting health insurers and wants to “work with the existing system.” Obama said the U.S. needs to change “certain practices that are very tough on people.”
Keeping Coverage
Karen Ignagni, president and chief executive officer of America’s Health Insurance Plans, said the insurance industry has proposed a set of reforms that includes steps to “make sure that no one is denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition.”
At the Montana meeting, a questioner said voters “keep getting the bull” about how the government plans to pay for a health-care bill. Obama said cost savings and higher taxes on wealthy Americans will cover the expense.
“We’ve got to get over this notion that somehow we can have something for nothing,” Obama said. The president repeated his pledge against higher taxes on middle-class Americans.
At his two meetings this week, Obama hasn’t faced loud or angry questions that have disrupted forums by other Democrats. Obama said the televised protests give only a partial picture of the health-care debate.
Television Ruckus
“TV loves a ruckus,” Obama said. “What you haven’t seen on TV” are many meetings where people “are coming together and having a civil, honest and often difficult conversation about how to improve the system.’
Obama’s approval ratings have slid to some of the lowest levels of his presidency. In a daily Gallup Inc. tracking poll, 54 percent of respondents say they approve of Obama’s job performance, down from 60 percent in mid-July.
Before Obama arrived in Montana, state Republican Chairman Will Deschamps said Americans don’t want the government dictating health-care decisions. “People don’t like to be mandated as to how to live their lives,” he said.
Democrats are pushing plans to cover some of the 46 million uninsured Americans while cutting health-care costs that make up about one-sixth of the nation’s economy.
Cost Wariness
Efforts to win voter support have been complicated by polls showing that Americans are wary of estimates that the health-insurance proposals may cost the government $1 trillion over 10 years.
Obama and top congressional Democrats are pushing plans that would offer the option of purchasing health insurance from a government-run program, while requiring all Americans to get coverage and putting new restrictions on insurers. Republicans say the effort will increase costs and limit medical choices.
Obama is on a four-day swing in the West that includes an appearance in Arizona and visits with his family to Yellowstone National Park and Arizona’s Grand Canyon.
To contact the reporters on this story: Julianna Goldman in Belgrade, Montana, at jgoldman6@bloomberg.net; Nicholas Johnston in Washington at njohnston3@bloomberg.net.
Read it more:The Health Care Debate
President Barack Obama, pushing his plans for revamping the U.S. health-care system, said Americans are being “held hostage” by the risk that insurers may cancel or deny medical coverage when they get sick.
“It’s wrong,” Obama told an audience at a town hall yesterday in Belgrade, Montana, about eight miles northwest of Bozeman. “It’s bankrupting families, it’s bankrupting business, and we are going to fix it when we pass health- insurance reform this year.”
Taking his health-care push on the road for the second time this week, Obama said the health-care system “all too often works better for the insurance companies than it does for the American people.”
Obama flew to Montana yesterday after visiting Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on Aug. 11, where he denounced “scare tactics” by opponents of health-insurance changes. The president will hold another town hall meeting on the issue today in Colorado.
Proposals to overhaul U.S. health care have run into angry protests at forums across the U.S. during Congress’s August recess and face sagging support in public-opinion polls.
Among political independents, 35 percent say the demonstrations at the town hall meetings have made them more sympathetic to the protesters’ views, according to a USA Today/Gallup poll.
Montana Senator Max Baucus, a Democrat who was among politicians joining Obama at yesterday’s meeting, said voters are hearing “outrageous myths.”
‘Plenty of Dishonesty’
“There’s plenty of dishonesty out there,” Baucus said. As chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Baucus leads a group of three Democratic and three Republican senators trying to piece together bipartisan legislation.
Lawmakers have faced critics charging that the government wants to take over the U.S. health-care system and, as part odf the changes, empower bureaucratic “death panels” to “pull the plug” by withdrawing treatment from ailing senior citizens.
In the effort to calm voter fears that legislation may hurt the quality of their medical care, Obama is stressing ways that his plans may help the 250 million Americans who have health insurance. In New Hampshire earlier this week, Obama talked about individuals who are denied coverage because of medical conditions. Tomorrow, in Grand Junction, Colorado, Obama plans to talk about lowering out-of-pocket costs for patients.
Marc Montgomery, an insurance agent in Helena, Montana, yesterday pressed Obama about whether the White House has a strategy to “vilify” insurance companies.
Obama said he’s not targeting health insurers and wants to “work with the existing system.” Obama said the U.S. needs to change “certain practices that are very tough on people.”
Keeping Coverage
Karen Ignagni, president and chief executive officer of America’s Health Insurance Plans, said the insurance industry has proposed a set of reforms that includes steps to “make sure that no one is denied coverage because of a pre-existing condition.”
At the Montana meeting, a questioner said voters “keep getting the bull” about how the government plans to pay for a health-care bill. Obama said cost savings and higher taxes on wealthy Americans will cover the expense.
“We’ve got to get over this notion that somehow we can have something for nothing,” Obama said. The president repeated his pledge against higher taxes on middle-class Americans.
At his two meetings this week, Obama hasn’t faced loud or angry questions that have disrupted forums by other Democrats. Obama said the televised protests give only a partial picture of the health-care debate.
Television Ruckus
“TV loves a ruckus,” Obama said. “What you haven’t seen on TV” are many meetings where people “are coming together and having a civil, honest and often difficult conversation about how to improve the system.’
Obama’s approval ratings have slid to some of the lowest levels of his presidency. In a daily Gallup Inc. tracking poll, 54 percent of respondents say they approve of Obama’s job performance, down from 60 percent in mid-July.
Before Obama arrived in Montana, state Republican Chairman Will Deschamps said Americans don’t want the government dictating health-care decisions. “People don’t like to be mandated as to how to live their lives,” he said.
Democrats are pushing plans to cover some of the 46 million uninsured Americans while cutting health-care costs that make up about one-sixth of the nation’s economy.
Cost Wariness
Efforts to win voter support have been complicated by polls showing that Americans are wary of estimates that the health-insurance proposals may cost the government $1 trillion over 10 years.
Obama and top congressional Democrats are pushing plans that would offer the option of purchasing health insurance from a government-run program, while requiring all Americans to get coverage and putting new restrictions on insurers. Republicans say the effort will increase costs and limit medical choices.
Obama is on a four-day swing in the West that includes an appearance in Arizona and visits with his family to Yellowstone National Park and Arizona’s Grand Canyon.
To contact the reporters on this story: Julianna Goldman in Belgrade, Montana, at jgoldman6@bloomberg.net; Nicholas Johnston in Washington at njohnston3@bloomberg.net.
Read it more:The Health Care Debate
Cardiologists Crying Foul Over Obama Medicare Cuts
By Alex Nussbaum and Lisa Rapaport
An Obama administration plan to cut Medicare payments to heart and cancer doctors by $1.4 billion next year is generating a backlash that’s undermining the president’s health-care overhaul.
While President Barack Obama and members of Congress have spent August debating health insurance and medical costs at public forums, specialists are waging what one advocate calls a “tooth and nail” fight against a separate initiative to boost the pay of family doctors, and cut fees for cardiologists and oncologists. The specialists, in newspaper columns and meetings with lawmakers, say patients will lose access to life-saving care, from pacemakers to chemotherapy.
The proposal by Medicare, the government insurer for the elderly and disabled, is an effort by Obama to focus U.S. medicine on preventive care. The fight by physicians who work with the most expensive patients is weakening support for Obama’s broader goal, legislation to remake the health system, said Mark B. McClellan, 46, a former Medicare chief.
“If you can make the health-care debate all about moving slices of the pie around, it’s very easy to generate opposition and very easy to get derailed,” said McClellan, a physician and analyst at the Brookings Institution, a policy research center in Washington, in an interview.
Obama and his allies in Congress are pushing to extend coverage to the 46 million Americans without health insurance, at a potential cost of $1 trillion over a decade. The separate Medicare proposal, announced July 1, slashes projected spending for care by cardiologists and oncologists by more than 10 percent each, while paying family doctors 8 percent more and nurses an additional 7 percent.
‘Tooth and Nail’
“Our 37,000 members are fighting tooth and nail on these other issues rather than fighting thoughtfully for expanding access,” said Jack Lewin, 63, chief executive officer of the Washington-based American College of Cardiology.
The cuts could have the unintended consequence of rationing care, especially in rural regions with a large number of Medicare patients, doctors said. In other areas, specialists may decide to pull out of Medicare, or ask patients to make up the difference with higher out-of-pocket payments, said Alfred Bove, president of the American College of Cardiology.
“A fair number of cardiologists are looking at the accounting and saying ‘we can’t afford it,’” Bove said in a telephone interview.
Some oncologists in rural areas may stop offering chemotherapy in the office, forcing patients to travel to more- distant hospitals, said Allen S. Lichter, 63, CEO of the 27,000- member American Society of Clinical Oncology in Alexandria, Virginia.
Cuts ‘Impossible’
The cuts would be “impossible” for some small-town cardiologists who rely on Medicare patients, said Zia Roshandel, a heart doctor in Culpeper, Virginia. The town of 10,000 people is about 60 miles southwest of Washington.
Roshandel and two partners see perhaps 50 patients a day at his practice, the local hospital and a community clinic for the indigent, the 40-year-old said in a telephone interview. Medicare accounts for two-thirds of their clientele, he said.
Already squeezed by government and private insurers, Roshandel said he has cut office hours, forgone paychecks and shifted his 12 workers to a high-deductible insurance plan over the past two years. The latest proposal would push him out of private practice altogether, most likely to a hospital in a larger community less reliant on Medicare, he said.
‘Close the Office’
If the proposal stands, “the bottom line is I’m going to close the office,” he said. “This is impossible for me to survive. If my partners and I don’t get a salary and run it for free, maybe then we can survive.”
Medicare would reduce reimbursements for some of Roshandel’s most common procedures, raising the amount patients will need to pay up front, he said. The government would cut the $251 it pays for an echocardiogram, a sonogram of the heart, by 40 percent, he said. The rate for a cardiac catheterization, another test, would drop by a third to $249.
Those reductions include an additional across-the-board cut of 22 percent for all physicians mandated by federal budget rules. Legislation passed by three committees in the House last month would eliminate that cut, at a cost of $200 billion to U.S. taxpayers. Even so, if Medicare goes ahead with its tilt toward primary care, cardiologists will suffer, Roshandel said.
The Obama administration’s plan to raise payment for primary care doctors is intended to encourage more doctors to enter the field. Some 65 million people already live in areas considered by the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to have too few primary care doctors, with less than one practitioner for every 2,000 people, according to department figures as of March 31.
Outnumbered by Specialists
The U.S. has 250,000 primary-care doctors and nurses and about three times as many specialists, said Atul Grover, 39, chief advocacy officer for the Association of American Medical Colleges, a Washington group. The number of medical school graduates in the U.S. entering family medicine fell more than a quarter from 2002 to 2007, according to a study last year by the group and the American Medical Association.
With the number of Americans older than 65 soaring, specialists will be in short supply, Grover said. The Census Bureau projects 81.2 million people in the U.S. will be 65 or older in 2040, from 40.2 million in 2010.
‘Silver Tsunami’
“That silver tsunami that represents the baby boomers hitting Medicare age is coming,” Grover said in a telephone interview, referring to the U.S. generation born from 1946 through 1964. “In the next 20 years, we are going to face a physician shortage really across the board.”
Medicare, which covers 45 million people, is expected to spend $503.1 billion this year, accounting for one of every five dollars spent on U.S. health care, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services estimated in February. Spending will reach $931.9 billion in 2018, the agency said.
Without changes, the system is guaranteed “to basically break the federal budget,” Obama said at a White House news conference July 22.
The reimbursements, though, are still a proposal, and may change before a final schedule is adopted Nov. 1, said Ellen Griffith, a spokeswoman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, in an e-mail. “All comments that are submitted during the comment period will be given careful consideration,” she said.
Reid Cherlin, an assistant White House press secretary, said the proposal “reflects an effort to pay primary care doctors more appropriately for services to Medicare patients. We have a deep appreciation for the lifesaving work that cardiologists and oncologists do every day, and as part of the rulemaking process CMS has met with groups representing both fields.”
Focus on Results
McClellan, who ran Medicare while George W. Bush was president, said the ultimate solution requires changing how doctors are paid to focus more on results rather than on the number of patient visits.
“My hope is that they’ll resolve it in a way that doesn’t just move the deck chairs around in a Medicare payment system that’s clearly sinking,” he said. “This gets resolved by changing the way that Medicare pays so that both the specialists and the generalists get paid more when they work together and deliver better care.”
McClellan cited Medicare pilot programs in which doctors have formed “accountable care organizations” allowing them to better coordinate patient care. The ACC, the cardiologist group, has pitched another alternative that would use lower co-pays to steer patients to better-performing doctors and give bonuses to physicians and hospitals that cut wasteful spending.
Tensions Rising
Tensions are rising among doctors, said Ted Epperly, 55, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians in Leawood, Kansas, in a telephone interview. Epperly runs a family practice in Boise, Idaho, and teaches at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.
Specialist colleagues have implied his support for the Medicare changes may cost his students, he said.
While family-care students typically spend parts of their three-year residencies training with specialists, “What I’ve heard is ‘maybe we just won’t have time any longer to teach your residents,’” Epperly said.
The ACC is offering a sample letter to patients, asking them to write Congress. “I am concerned that my physician may no longer be able to treat me or other Medicare patients,” the letter says. The campaign has extended to fliers, posters and even the on-hold message the group plays for callers to its Washington office, which asks the public to fight “drastic pay cuts for cardiology.”
The arguments have a familiar ring, McClellan said.
“The usual way that you try to scuttle a health-care reform proposal is by saying whatever it is going to reduce your access to the care that you need,” he said.
Three Years Earlier
Cancer specialists made similar warnings three years ago when reimbursement was cut for the drugs they used, said Nancy M. Kane, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston and member of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, a panel of outside advisers to Congress.
“As far as I know we have not seen a drop in the number of oncologists since then,” Kane said. “People are not screaming that they don’t have access to oncologists.”
The pay shift would help right a financial imbalance that keeps young physicians out of family care, said Epperly, of the family doctors’ group.
Average total compensation for family doctors ranged from $150,763 to $204,370 a year, according to a 2008 survey by Modern Healthcare magazine. Cardiologists fetched from $332,900 to $561,875. Radiation oncologists, cancer doctors who specialize in radiation therapy, earned $357,000 to $463,293.
“If we don’t invest more in primary care, we won’t have the resources to offer more access,” Epperly said. “Our system is very good at getting people to do what they’re paid to do. That’s why specialists are doing all the things they do, because they’re paid gobs of money.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Alex Nussbaum in New York anussbaum1@bloomberg.net; Lisa Rapaport in New York at lrapaport1@bloomberg.net.
An Obama administration plan to cut Medicare payments to heart and cancer doctors by $1.4 billion next year is generating a backlash that’s undermining the president’s health-care overhaul.
While President Barack Obama and members of Congress have spent August debating health insurance and medical costs at public forums, specialists are waging what one advocate calls a “tooth and nail” fight against a separate initiative to boost the pay of family doctors, and cut fees for cardiologists and oncologists. The specialists, in newspaper columns and meetings with lawmakers, say patients will lose access to life-saving care, from pacemakers to chemotherapy.
The proposal by Medicare, the government insurer for the elderly and disabled, is an effort by Obama to focus U.S. medicine on preventive care. The fight by physicians who work with the most expensive patients is weakening support for Obama’s broader goal, legislation to remake the health system, said Mark B. McClellan, 46, a former Medicare chief.
“If you can make the health-care debate all about moving slices of the pie around, it’s very easy to generate opposition and very easy to get derailed,” said McClellan, a physician and analyst at the Brookings Institution, a policy research center in Washington, in an interview.
Obama and his allies in Congress are pushing to extend coverage to the 46 million Americans without health insurance, at a potential cost of $1 trillion over a decade. The separate Medicare proposal, announced July 1, slashes projected spending for care by cardiologists and oncologists by more than 10 percent each, while paying family doctors 8 percent more and nurses an additional 7 percent.
‘Tooth and Nail’
“Our 37,000 members are fighting tooth and nail on these other issues rather than fighting thoughtfully for expanding access,” said Jack Lewin, 63, chief executive officer of the Washington-based American College of Cardiology.
The cuts could have the unintended consequence of rationing care, especially in rural regions with a large number of Medicare patients, doctors said. In other areas, specialists may decide to pull out of Medicare, or ask patients to make up the difference with higher out-of-pocket payments, said Alfred Bove, president of the American College of Cardiology.
“A fair number of cardiologists are looking at the accounting and saying ‘we can’t afford it,’” Bove said in a telephone interview.
Some oncologists in rural areas may stop offering chemotherapy in the office, forcing patients to travel to more- distant hospitals, said Allen S. Lichter, 63, CEO of the 27,000- member American Society of Clinical Oncology in Alexandria, Virginia.
Cuts ‘Impossible’
The cuts would be “impossible” for some small-town cardiologists who rely on Medicare patients, said Zia Roshandel, a heart doctor in Culpeper, Virginia. The town of 10,000 people is about 60 miles southwest of Washington.
Roshandel and two partners see perhaps 50 patients a day at his practice, the local hospital and a community clinic for the indigent, the 40-year-old said in a telephone interview. Medicare accounts for two-thirds of their clientele, he said.
Already squeezed by government and private insurers, Roshandel said he has cut office hours, forgone paychecks and shifted his 12 workers to a high-deductible insurance plan over the past two years. The latest proposal would push him out of private practice altogether, most likely to a hospital in a larger community less reliant on Medicare, he said.
‘Close the Office’
If the proposal stands, “the bottom line is I’m going to close the office,” he said. “This is impossible for me to survive. If my partners and I don’t get a salary and run it for free, maybe then we can survive.”
Medicare would reduce reimbursements for some of Roshandel’s most common procedures, raising the amount patients will need to pay up front, he said. The government would cut the $251 it pays for an echocardiogram, a sonogram of the heart, by 40 percent, he said. The rate for a cardiac catheterization, another test, would drop by a third to $249.
Those reductions include an additional across-the-board cut of 22 percent for all physicians mandated by federal budget rules. Legislation passed by three committees in the House last month would eliminate that cut, at a cost of $200 billion to U.S. taxpayers. Even so, if Medicare goes ahead with its tilt toward primary care, cardiologists will suffer, Roshandel said.
The Obama administration’s plan to raise payment for primary care doctors is intended to encourage more doctors to enter the field. Some 65 million people already live in areas considered by the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to have too few primary care doctors, with less than one practitioner for every 2,000 people, according to department figures as of March 31.
Outnumbered by Specialists
The U.S. has 250,000 primary-care doctors and nurses and about three times as many specialists, said Atul Grover, 39, chief advocacy officer for the Association of American Medical Colleges, a Washington group. The number of medical school graduates in the U.S. entering family medicine fell more than a quarter from 2002 to 2007, according to a study last year by the group and the American Medical Association.
With the number of Americans older than 65 soaring, specialists will be in short supply, Grover said. The Census Bureau projects 81.2 million people in the U.S. will be 65 or older in 2040, from 40.2 million in 2010.
‘Silver Tsunami’
“That silver tsunami that represents the baby boomers hitting Medicare age is coming,” Grover said in a telephone interview, referring to the U.S. generation born from 1946 through 1964. “In the next 20 years, we are going to face a physician shortage really across the board.”
Medicare, which covers 45 million people, is expected to spend $503.1 billion this year, accounting for one of every five dollars spent on U.S. health care, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services estimated in February. Spending will reach $931.9 billion in 2018, the agency said.
Without changes, the system is guaranteed “to basically break the federal budget,” Obama said at a White House news conference July 22.
The reimbursements, though, are still a proposal, and may change before a final schedule is adopted Nov. 1, said Ellen Griffith, a spokeswoman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, in an e-mail. “All comments that are submitted during the comment period will be given careful consideration,” she said.
Reid Cherlin, an assistant White House press secretary, said the proposal “reflects an effort to pay primary care doctors more appropriately for services to Medicare patients. We have a deep appreciation for the lifesaving work that cardiologists and oncologists do every day, and as part of the rulemaking process CMS has met with groups representing both fields.”
Focus on Results
McClellan, who ran Medicare while George W. Bush was president, said the ultimate solution requires changing how doctors are paid to focus more on results rather than on the number of patient visits.
“My hope is that they’ll resolve it in a way that doesn’t just move the deck chairs around in a Medicare payment system that’s clearly sinking,” he said. “This gets resolved by changing the way that Medicare pays so that both the specialists and the generalists get paid more when they work together and deliver better care.”
McClellan cited Medicare pilot programs in which doctors have formed “accountable care organizations” allowing them to better coordinate patient care. The ACC, the cardiologist group, has pitched another alternative that would use lower co-pays to steer patients to better-performing doctors and give bonuses to physicians and hospitals that cut wasteful spending.
Tensions Rising
Tensions are rising among doctors, said Ted Epperly, 55, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians in Leawood, Kansas, in a telephone interview. Epperly runs a family practice in Boise, Idaho, and teaches at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.
Specialist colleagues have implied his support for the Medicare changes may cost his students, he said.
While family-care students typically spend parts of their three-year residencies training with specialists, “What I’ve heard is ‘maybe we just won’t have time any longer to teach your residents,’” Epperly said.
The ACC is offering a sample letter to patients, asking them to write Congress. “I am concerned that my physician may no longer be able to treat me or other Medicare patients,” the letter says. The campaign has extended to fliers, posters and even the on-hold message the group plays for callers to its Washington office, which asks the public to fight “drastic pay cuts for cardiology.”
The arguments have a familiar ring, McClellan said.
“The usual way that you try to scuttle a health-care reform proposal is by saying whatever it is going to reduce your access to the care that you need,” he said.
Three Years Earlier
Cancer specialists made similar warnings three years ago when reimbursement was cut for the drugs they used, said Nancy M. Kane, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston and member of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, a panel of outside advisers to Congress.
“As far as I know we have not seen a drop in the number of oncologists since then,” Kane said. “People are not screaming that they don’t have access to oncologists.”
The pay shift would help right a financial imbalance that keeps young physicians out of family care, said Epperly, of the family doctors’ group.
Average total compensation for family doctors ranged from $150,763 to $204,370 a year, according to a 2008 survey by Modern Healthcare magazine. Cardiologists fetched from $332,900 to $561,875. Radiation oncologists, cancer doctors who specialize in radiation therapy, earned $357,000 to $463,293.
“If we don’t invest more in primary care, we won’t have the resources to offer more access,” Epperly said. “Our system is very good at getting people to do what they’re paid to do. That’s why specialists are doing all the things they do, because they’re paid gobs of money.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Alex Nussbaum in New York anussbaum1@bloomberg.net; Lisa Rapaport in New York at lrapaport1@bloomberg.net.
Democrats Can’t Repeat 1994 Health-Care Failure
Commentary by Albert R. Hunt
Bill Kristol, a powerhouse policy guru for Republicans, often has a tin ear for politics. A week before last year’s presidential election he predicted John McCain would “win huge.” In May, he said President Barack Obama had decided to nominate Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm to the Supreme Court, and he’s been a cheerleader for Sarah Palin.
Kristol was prescient, though, 16 years ago in advising Republicans that defeating President Bill Clinton’s health-care overhaul would be devastating for the Democrats. He’s making the same case today, imploring Republicans to “go for the kill” on the Obama health-care initiative.
He’s right again. A defeat would be a killer for Democrats. The trademark of Obama’s first year in office would be failure; the reputations of the president and his celebrated White House staff would be decimated. Less evident, though equally true, it would almost certainly cost congressional Democrats seats in next year’s elections, striking especially hard at some of the same centrist Blue Dogs who are resisting a health-care bill.
Now those nervous Democrats are looking at polls showing declining support for Obama on health care, and data heralded by the health-insurance industry showing that most Americans are pleased with their coverage.
Misleading Indicators
Both are misleading.
There is no Obamacare plan. The declining poll numbers reflect the disarray in Congress and among Democrats; this is what happened in 1994. And most Americans are satisfied with their health insurance until they have to use it.
For 30 years my health insurance seemed just fine. Then one of our children was paralyzed and needed to learn to walk again. The insurance company said its “expert” -- dismissing the opinion of Johns Hopkins physicians -- concluded he had no need for a physical therapist.
To contest this expert, we had to put this severely disabled teenage kid through the humiliation of videotaping him while he tried to take steps. Most people who have been deep into health care understand why moviegoers cheered Helen Hunt’s famous denunciation of health insurers in the movie “As Good As It Gets.”
A more relevant number for nervous congressional Democrats to consider is 54 -- the number of seats they lost in 1994 even with a reasonably good economy and no wars; this was after the party disintegrated over health care.
Democrats’ Losses
The big news back then was the defeat of powerful leaders such as House Speaker Tom Foley of Washington. Overall, the losses disproportionately affected middle-of-the-road Democrats -- the Blue Dogs of their day -- from states such as Indiana, North Carolina, Georgia and Ohio.
Some Blue Dogs calculate the best deal for them may be to go on the record as voting against a bill that will become law anyway. The other politically viable option is to help craft the legislation. No one will be defeated in 2010 for voting to overhaul a failing health-care system; it will be several years before the effectiveness of such action is apparent.
Obama and his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, need to persuade the Blue Dogs that many of their political futures are at stake, too, while pressuring liberals not to let their notion of the perfect be the enemy of the good. That won’t be easy. “A lot of members are choking,” acknowledges Emanuel. Everybody liked health-care reform, he said “until they got visited by their local self-interest.”
50-50 Chance?
With fractious fights in both chambers, one important advocate says the prospects for success are no better than 50- 50.
That seems a little too pessimistic. Amid the squabbles, there has been considerable progress. In the House, a deal was engineered on the politically sensitive question of regional disparities in Medicare reimbursements.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will decide in the next few days whether to bring a bill to the floor before the August recess. Passage would add to a sense of momentum, yet there is a danger in appearing to rush through a measure that affects about one-sixth of the U.S. economy, and she could lose as many as three-dozen of her Democrats in a floor vote. (The White House would prefer the House to stay in session a week beyond the July 31 summer recess date; the problem is many members, with younger kids, have family plans before school starts in mid-August.)
For all the difficulties, the contours of any ultimate measure are clear.
Conditions for a Deal
-- The so-called public option -- some form of government- run plan to compete with private insurers -- will only be a fallback in the event private insurers fail to meet the goals, and will probably be in the form of health cooperatives or another mechanism. Liberals simply will have to accept that they lack the votes for a full-fledged public option.
-- Raising revenue -- in the neighborhood of $300 billion over the next decade -- may be the toughest nut. The House Ways and Means Committee’s millionaire’s surcharge plan is dead; at most, only a much smaller tax on the rich will fly. More likely will be some amalgam, including a tax on the most-generous health-insurance plans or the insurers that offer them, that would be part of the $200 billion in tax measures on the Senate Finance Committee’s table. Fears of a budget-busting bill are misplaced. Neither the politics nor the procedures will permit that.
-- Cost controls, so great in theory, will bite and will require politicians to take on special interests. The Blue Dogs, for all their talk of bills being too expensive, start off demanding more expansive health care for rural areas.It is fantasy to talk about a bipartisan bill; no more than a handful of congressional Republicans are likely to vote for a final bill. They’ve heard Kristol.
The bottom line: Democrats control their own fate; that’s the glory and the agony of governing.
credit byAlbert R. Hunt
Bill Kristol, a powerhouse policy guru for Republicans, often has a tin ear for politics. A week before last year’s presidential election he predicted John McCain would “win huge.” In May, he said President Barack Obama had decided to nominate Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm to the Supreme Court, and he’s been a cheerleader for Sarah Palin.
Kristol was prescient, though, 16 years ago in advising Republicans that defeating President Bill Clinton’s health-care overhaul would be devastating for the Democrats. He’s making the same case today, imploring Republicans to “go for the kill” on the Obama health-care initiative.
He’s right again. A defeat would be a killer for Democrats. The trademark of Obama’s first year in office would be failure; the reputations of the president and his celebrated White House staff would be decimated. Less evident, though equally true, it would almost certainly cost congressional Democrats seats in next year’s elections, striking especially hard at some of the same centrist Blue Dogs who are resisting a health-care bill.
Now those nervous Democrats are looking at polls showing declining support for Obama on health care, and data heralded by the health-insurance industry showing that most Americans are pleased with their coverage.
Misleading Indicators
Both are misleading.
There is no Obamacare plan. The declining poll numbers reflect the disarray in Congress and among Democrats; this is what happened in 1994. And most Americans are satisfied with their health insurance until they have to use it.
For 30 years my health insurance seemed just fine. Then one of our children was paralyzed and needed to learn to walk again. The insurance company said its “expert” -- dismissing the opinion of Johns Hopkins physicians -- concluded he had no need for a physical therapist.
To contest this expert, we had to put this severely disabled teenage kid through the humiliation of videotaping him while he tried to take steps. Most people who have been deep into health care understand why moviegoers cheered Helen Hunt’s famous denunciation of health insurers in the movie “As Good As It Gets.”
A more relevant number for nervous congressional Democrats to consider is 54 -- the number of seats they lost in 1994 even with a reasonably good economy and no wars; this was after the party disintegrated over health care.
Democrats’ Losses
The big news back then was the defeat of powerful leaders such as House Speaker Tom Foley of Washington. Overall, the losses disproportionately affected middle-of-the-road Democrats -- the Blue Dogs of their day -- from states such as Indiana, North Carolina, Georgia and Ohio.
Some Blue Dogs calculate the best deal for them may be to go on the record as voting against a bill that will become law anyway. The other politically viable option is to help craft the legislation. No one will be defeated in 2010 for voting to overhaul a failing health-care system; it will be several years before the effectiveness of such action is apparent.
Obama and his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, need to persuade the Blue Dogs that many of their political futures are at stake, too, while pressuring liberals not to let their notion of the perfect be the enemy of the good. That won’t be easy. “A lot of members are choking,” acknowledges Emanuel. Everybody liked health-care reform, he said “until they got visited by their local self-interest.”
50-50 Chance?
With fractious fights in both chambers, one important advocate says the prospects for success are no better than 50- 50.
That seems a little too pessimistic. Amid the squabbles, there has been considerable progress. In the House, a deal was engineered on the politically sensitive question of regional disparities in Medicare reimbursements.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will decide in the next few days whether to bring a bill to the floor before the August recess. Passage would add to a sense of momentum, yet there is a danger in appearing to rush through a measure that affects about one-sixth of the U.S. economy, and she could lose as many as three-dozen of her Democrats in a floor vote. (The White House would prefer the House to stay in session a week beyond the July 31 summer recess date; the problem is many members, with younger kids, have family plans before school starts in mid-August.)
For all the difficulties, the contours of any ultimate measure are clear.
Conditions for a Deal
-- The so-called public option -- some form of government- run plan to compete with private insurers -- will only be a fallback in the event private insurers fail to meet the goals, and will probably be in the form of health cooperatives or another mechanism. Liberals simply will have to accept that they lack the votes for a full-fledged public option.
-- Raising revenue -- in the neighborhood of $300 billion over the next decade -- may be the toughest nut. The House Ways and Means Committee’s millionaire’s surcharge plan is dead; at most, only a much smaller tax on the rich will fly. More likely will be some amalgam, including a tax on the most-generous health-insurance plans or the insurers that offer them, that would be part of the $200 billion in tax measures on the Senate Finance Committee’s table. Fears of a budget-busting bill are misplaced. Neither the politics nor the procedures will permit that.
-- Cost controls, so great in theory, will bite and will require politicians to take on special interests. The Blue Dogs, for all their talk of bills being too expensive, start off demanding more expansive health care for rural areas.It is fantasy to talk about a bipartisan bill; no more than a handful of congressional Republicans are likely to vote for a final bill. They’ve heard Kristol.
The bottom line: Democrats control their own fate; that’s the glory and the agony of governing.
credit byAlbert R. Hunt
8/9/09
Obama-Care is a bad joke?
Obama-Care is a sick joke?
As the New York Post has rightly pointed out ObamaCare is a bad joke. Here are some facts, who refuse to be ignored ...
• In 52 to 40 percent of voters have turned against the health of the Act on 14th July in the Chamber of Deputies.
• Self-employed now against ObamaCare by a ratio of about 2:1.
• The World Health Organization, the U.S. No. 1 over 191 countries to meet the needs of patients, including the provision at the appropriate time in the treatment and the choice of doctors. Among those who are currently 84% are satisfied with their health. But if you're happy, are not at home: ObamaCare forcing the people, their insurance.
• The impartiality Congressional Budget Office (CBO) believes that the draft law by the Chamber of the Democrats would be the Federal Office for $ 239 billion.
• The Obama team has lacked the CBO to the plans to reduce waste and the reduction of services. Unfortunately, the reduction of waste, only about 1% of ObamaCare "savings". Other potential savings from the reduction should be the care of patients.
• In its "keep the system neutral" Maskerade, the Obama administration, he points to reductions in the care of patients in the form of reductions to the health of the Medicare program for the elderly. The American Medical Association, in his controversial letter support for the Democrats' plan with leading repeal $ 230 billion in cuts in health insurance.
• The team Obama is also on the economies of initiatives aimed at prevention. Legislation by the Senate Democrats points to the "prevention" again and again. But as the CBO has pointed out that prevention does not save money in general.
• Obama says he wants one with which the federal government for the health benefits of the Congrès is located. This concept is a farce. The Congress has a cafeteria plan, the choice is from the public, but it is not supported by the government.
• Congress specifically benefits the rest of us can only dream of. There is a doctor on call, only the members of Congress and the Congress has a privileged access and admission of Walter Reed Army Medical Center and Bethesda Naval Medical Center. The Congress is being a VIP for us?
• ObamaCare requires a large bureaucracy in the health sector eye-popping complex Rube Goldberg would be the head.
When Obama was in pre-election campaign mode, some reason he made statements about health care. He wanted to keep your insurance when you are happy with it. He told us that health care by the government with the increase of taxes was a bad idea. And he did not think that anyone should be forced to purchase the insurance. Only those of us naively believe Obama's sweet little promises, but at least they sounded nice.
The kingfisher day of campaign 2008 is long gone. The elections have an impact - promises, for example. But at least we can in the knowledge that Obama and friends have to play by the rules for implementation, is not it?
Wrong!
"Under the current bill Democrats in healthcare, the members of Congress are curiously exempt from the government, the health of the option, the preservation of their health services and on Capitol Hill."
Members of John Fleming, has passed a resolution to the members of Congress, "the possibility of their money where their mouth is and urge their colleagues, the choice for the legislation establishing the government health care plan with an example and in the same audience. "Fleming's Resolution has more than 40 co-sponsors, but not only one of the co-sponsors is a Democrat.
Even Obama has refused to participate in the program, health insurance. I can not blame Obama wants the best care for their family, but I can accuse him, not hypocritical.
The Americans have their appetite hypocritical, reckless spending, and the penetration of the inability of the government in all spheres of life. Obama is trying to address one of these concerns by promising that he "will not sign any health-care bill that adds to the deficit," but apparently it's too little and too late. Support for ObamaCare crumbling. Think of some recent comments:
• The Washington Post: "Month on cooperation between the various stakeholders in the health reform debate seems to come to an end ..."
• Reuters: "The reform of the U.S. $ 2.5 trillion health care is a signature Obama national problem and a test of his presidency, but it's time is short ..."
• CNN: Six key senators - three Democrats, one independent and two moderate Republicans - sent a letter to the leaders of the Senate for a slowing of the pressure for a revision of the health care on the basis of the Congressional Budget Office believes that the democratic currently not would be done, the cost of medical treatment.
• WSB: "Last week was a roller coaster of events that appear to swing in the controversial health reform initiative, then he slowly ..."
• politico: Jim DeMint is apparently the possibility of victory. "If we are in a position to Obama, what is his Waterloo. And they break."
• The Associated Press: "Could it be that the president Barack Obama Midas begins, a little boring, even among members of his own party?"
Obama has a lot of political capital and his credibility to a hard test for the break with the Chicken Little schtick he has the idea to sell. When it comes to health, perhaps the sky is back, but the Americans seemed not to hear.
Obama's popularity is sinking together, the tone changes, and cheerleaders are losing their enthusiasm. "What is right for you? Bread and discipline," they say. "Who knew that we have received, the election of a national mother?"
If Obama has the White House by the Democrats to control in Washington, the government of the health sector seems fate. Well, that's not so clear. The conservatives have many reasons to be optimistic in view of their chances to defeat ObamaCare.
As the New York Post has rightly pointed out ObamaCare is a bad joke. Here are some facts, who refuse to be ignored ...
• In 52 to 40 percent of voters have turned against the health of the Act on 14th July in the Chamber of Deputies.
• Self-employed now against ObamaCare by a ratio of about 2:1.
• The World Health Organization, the U.S. No. 1 over 191 countries to meet the needs of patients, including the provision at the appropriate time in the treatment and the choice of doctors. Among those who are currently 84% are satisfied with their health. But if you're happy, are not at home: ObamaCare forcing the people, their insurance.
• The impartiality Congressional Budget Office (CBO) believes that the draft law by the Chamber of the Democrats would be the Federal Office for $ 239 billion.
• The Obama team has lacked the CBO to the plans to reduce waste and the reduction of services. Unfortunately, the reduction of waste, only about 1% of ObamaCare "savings". Other potential savings from the reduction should be the care of patients.
• In its "keep the system neutral" Maskerade, the Obama administration, he points to reductions in the care of patients in the form of reductions to the health of the Medicare program for the elderly. The American Medical Association, in his controversial letter support for the Democrats' plan with leading repeal $ 230 billion in cuts in health insurance.
• The team Obama is also on the economies of initiatives aimed at prevention. Legislation by the Senate Democrats points to the "prevention" again and again. But as the CBO has pointed out that prevention does not save money in general.
• Obama says he wants one with which the federal government for the health benefits of the Congrès is located. This concept is a farce. The Congress has a cafeteria plan, the choice is from the public, but it is not supported by the government.
• Congress specifically benefits the rest of us can only dream of. There is a doctor on call, only the members of Congress and the Congress has a privileged access and admission of Walter Reed Army Medical Center and Bethesda Naval Medical Center. The Congress is being a VIP for us?
• ObamaCare requires a large bureaucracy in the health sector eye-popping complex Rube Goldberg would be the head.
When Obama was in pre-election campaign mode, some reason he made statements about health care. He wanted to keep your insurance when you are happy with it. He told us that health care by the government with the increase of taxes was a bad idea. And he did not think that anyone should be forced to purchase the insurance. Only those of us naively believe Obama's sweet little promises, but at least they sounded nice.
The kingfisher day of campaign 2008 is long gone. The elections have an impact - promises, for example. But at least we can in the knowledge that Obama and friends have to play by the rules for implementation, is not it?
Wrong!
"Under the current bill Democrats in healthcare, the members of Congress are curiously exempt from the government, the health of the option, the preservation of their health services and on Capitol Hill."
Members of John Fleming, has passed a resolution to the members of Congress, "the possibility of their money where their mouth is and urge their colleagues, the choice for the legislation establishing the government health care plan with an example and in the same audience. "Fleming's Resolution has more than 40 co-sponsors, but not only one of the co-sponsors is a Democrat.
Even Obama has refused to participate in the program, health insurance. I can not blame Obama wants the best care for their family, but I can accuse him, not hypocritical.
The Americans have their appetite hypocritical, reckless spending, and the penetration of the inability of the government in all spheres of life. Obama is trying to address one of these concerns by promising that he "will not sign any health-care bill that adds to the deficit," but apparently it's too little and too late. Support for ObamaCare crumbling. Think of some recent comments:
• The Washington Post: "Month on cooperation between the various stakeholders in the health reform debate seems to come to an end ..."
• Reuters: "The reform of the U.S. $ 2.5 trillion health care is a signature Obama national problem and a test of his presidency, but it's time is short ..."
• CNN: Six key senators - three Democrats, one independent and two moderate Republicans - sent a letter to the leaders of the Senate for a slowing of the pressure for a revision of the health care on the basis of the Congressional Budget Office believes that the democratic currently not would be done, the cost of medical treatment.
• WSB: "Last week was a roller coaster of events that appear to swing in the controversial health reform initiative, then he slowly ..."
• politico: Jim DeMint is apparently the possibility of victory. "If we are in a position to Obama, what is his Waterloo. And they break."
• The Associated Press: "Could it be that the president Barack Obama Midas begins, a little boring, even among members of his own party?"
Obama has a lot of political capital and his credibility to a hard test for the break with the Chicken Little schtick he has the idea to sell. When it comes to health, perhaps the sky is back, but the Americans seemed not to hear.
Obama's popularity is sinking together, the tone changes, and cheerleaders are losing their enthusiasm. "What is right for you? Bread and discipline," they say. "Who knew that we have received, the election of a national mother?"
If Obama has the White House by the Democrats to control in Washington, the government of the health sector seems fate. Well, that's not so clear. The conservatives have many reasons to be optimistic in view of their chances to defeat ObamaCare.
Distortions plague the debate on health care
Distortions plague the debate on health care
Washington - confusing information and distorting final animated the national debate on changes in health.
Opponents of the proposal of Mr. Barack Obama and Democratic Congress wrong to say that government officials, seniors discuss "End-of-life will. Obama has the possibility of a health assessment, a large number of people to change, doctors and insurers.
For all, there is no clear "Obama plan" or "democratic planning." Obama has several goals, but he has few lines in the sand.
The Senate examines two laws is different. The house is still waiting for another act in committee.
A look at some information on the proposals on health:
Request: The home of Bill "can a traitor government encourages euthanasia," House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio, said July 23.
Former New York Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey said in an article in the July 17th: "A worrying increase in the house of the elderly to the law requires, at a consultation meeting every five years ... on alternatives for the End-of-Life Care. "
Facts: The bill would pay for health advance directive in consultation with health care. But it is not necessary, someone benefits.
Advance directives for a patient wishes aging under different scenarios of a serious illness, brain damage and serious situations. Patients and their families with health professionals, not servants, if they benefit from the proposal.
Request: Health care changes would lead to abortions funded by the state.
Tony Perkins of Family Research Council said in a video, "unless something else congress, under the government of taking care of health, the taxpayer is forced, for the financing of abortion for first time in more than three decades. "
The facts: The proposed bills would not be canceled Hyde Amendment, bars abortion paid by Medicaid, the insurance program for the poor. But a review of health care could be a government run insurance program or insurance "exchange", that is not Medicaid abortion and their guidelines are not clear yet.
Obama recently said CBS, which the States to continue the tradition of the "Financing of abortion that are not part of health care financed by the state."
The trading house energy committee and the House Bill Thursday to health insurance that provides the possibility of abortion, but no public funds can be used to fund abortion. The law says health plans in exchange for a new purchase is not required for abortion, but that each region of the country, must have at least one plan that works.
The action of Congress this fall is whether this language is the final bill.
Demand: Americans are not to change doctors or insurance companies.
"If you want your plan, and you, as your doctor, you do not do something," said Obama, June 23 "You keep your plan with your doctor."
Fact: The proposed regulations would not require the man to let your doctor or insurer. But some tax provisions, depending on how they are written, have the effect that cheaper for some employers to pay a fee to put an end to preserve their health. Your workers would probably be an audience of insurance, which can not doctors.
Request: democrats lead to rationing plans, or the government to decide what medical procedures a patient may have.
"Strengthening of national health programs accelerate the day that the government rationing medical care of elderly, conservative writer Michael Cannon said in the" Washington Times ".
The facts: millions of Americans before rationing, such as insurance, procedures for insurance.
Denial of coverage for certain procedures increase proposals to a government-appointed agency procedures and identify the most appropriate for different conditions.
Obama said that the goal is effective and efficient medical practices and to monitor patients and providers of services for them. Recently, he told a forum: "We do not want to dictate the diet of someone, 'OK, you know what? We do not think this should be a Senior hip." What we want to do, you can use is to provide information that seniors and their doctors, you know, is the starting point, is very useful for you in managing your condition. "
Request: Revision of health care will not be the deficit of the Confederation in the long term.
Obama has pledged that "the reform of health insurance will not be our deficit over the next ten years, and I am."
The facts: Obama commitment does not apply to proposals for expenditure of approximately $ 245 billion over the next ten years to increase Medicare fees for doctors. The White House said the additional payment, is to ensure that a proposed reduction of over 21% in medical costs, already under the management of the policy.
In addition, the impartial Congressional Budget Office, said House Bill lack of mechanisms to reduce health care costs under control. In response, the White House and Democratic lawmakers on the creation of a powerful new executive board, if the waste in public health programs. But it is difficult to know how they could.
Experts warn of budget accounting tricks, mask the real burden for the deficit. Both sides Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, says it also back-loading of the most serious at the end of 10 years and beyond.
Then, after the Associated Press, most of what critics say about Mr. Obama 's Health Care is incorrect.
And in most cases, all that Obama says is absolutely true, and is always the case.
The exception is that the AP is to recognize that Mr. Obama may be a little too optimistic, the way the plan does not have the extension of the excessive deficit.
The AP's list of "facts" are all the more surprising that the article itself acknowledges:
[T] is not "Obama plan" or "democratic planning." And: Obama has many goals, but he has few lines in the sand.
And yet, the articles still bold affirmed, "all", like this:
Fact: The proposed regulations would not require the man to let your doctor or insurer.
And it is strange to see the "facts" buttressed by statements like: Obama recently said CBS, which the States to continue the tradition of the "Financing of abortion that are not part of health care financed by the state."
Then we have nothing to fear.
We should now have learned that Mr. Obama will never be on his word. And the future president or Congress or expand the health coverage of abortion.
It is really funny.
Washington - confusing information and distorting final animated the national debate on changes in health.
Opponents of the proposal of Mr. Barack Obama and Democratic Congress wrong to say that government officials, seniors discuss "End-of-life will. Obama has the possibility of a health assessment, a large number of people to change, doctors and insurers.
For all, there is no clear "Obama plan" or "democratic planning." Obama has several goals, but he has few lines in the sand.
The Senate examines two laws is different. The house is still waiting for another act in committee.
A look at some information on the proposals on health:
Request: The home of Bill "can a traitor government encourages euthanasia," House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio, said July 23.
Former New York Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey said in an article in the July 17th: "A worrying increase in the house of the elderly to the law requires, at a consultation meeting every five years ... on alternatives for the End-of-Life Care. "
Facts: The bill would pay for health advance directive in consultation with health care. But it is not necessary, someone benefits.
Advance directives for a patient wishes aging under different scenarios of a serious illness, brain damage and serious situations. Patients and their families with health professionals, not servants, if they benefit from the proposal.
Request: Health care changes would lead to abortions funded by the state.
Tony Perkins of Family Research Council said in a video, "unless something else congress, under the government of taking care of health, the taxpayer is forced, for the financing of abortion for first time in more than three decades. "
The facts: The proposed bills would not be canceled Hyde Amendment, bars abortion paid by Medicaid, the insurance program for the poor. But a review of health care could be a government run insurance program or insurance "exchange", that is not Medicaid abortion and their guidelines are not clear yet.
Obama recently said CBS, which the States to continue the tradition of the "Financing of abortion that are not part of health care financed by the state."
The trading house energy committee and the House Bill Thursday to health insurance that provides the possibility of abortion, but no public funds can be used to fund abortion. The law says health plans in exchange for a new purchase is not required for abortion, but that each region of the country, must have at least one plan that works.
The action of Congress this fall is whether this language is the final bill.
Demand: Americans are not to change doctors or insurance companies.
"If you want your plan, and you, as your doctor, you do not do something," said Obama, June 23 "You keep your plan with your doctor."
Fact: The proposed regulations would not require the man to let your doctor or insurer. But some tax provisions, depending on how they are written, have the effect that cheaper for some employers to pay a fee to put an end to preserve their health. Your workers would probably be an audience of insurance, which can not doctors.
Request: democrats lead to rationing plans, or the government to decide what medical procedures a patient may have.
"Strengthening of national health programs accelerate the day that the government rationing medical care of elderly, conservative writer Michael Cannon said in the" Washington Times ".
The facts: millions of Americans before rationing, such as insurance, procedures for insurance.
Denial of coverage for certain procedures increase proposals to a government-appointed agency procedures and identify the most appropriate for different conditions.
Obama said that the goal is effective and efficient medical practices and to monitor patients and providers of services for them. Recently, he told a forum: "We do not want to dictate the diet of someone, 'OK, you know what? We do not think this should be a Senior hip." What we want to do, you can use is to provide information that seniors and their doctors, you know, is the starting point, is very useful for you in managing your condition. "
Request: Revision of health care will not be the deficit of the Confederation in the long term.
Obama has pledged that "the reform of health insurance will not be our deficit over the next ten years, and I am."
The facts: Obama commitment does not apply to proposals for expenditure of approximately $ 245 billion over the next ten years to increase Medicare fees for doctors. The White House said the additional payment, is to ensure that a proposed reduction of over 21% in medical costs, already under the management of the policy.
In addition, the impartial Congressional Budget Office, said House Bill lack of mechanisms to reduce health care costs under control. In response, the White House and Democratic lawmakers on the creation of a powerful new executive board, if the waste in public health programs. But it is difficult to know how they could.
Experts warn of budget accounting tricks, mask the real burden for the deficit. Both sides Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, says it also back-loading of the most serious at the end of 10 years and beyond.
Then, after the Associated Press, most of what critics say about Mr. Obama 's Health Care is incorrect.
And in most cases, all that Obama says is absolutely true, and is always the case.
The exception is that the AP is to recognize that Mr. Obama may be a little too optimistic, the way the plan does not have the extension of the excessive deficit.
The AP's list of "facts" are all the more surprising that the article itself acknowledges:
[T] is not "Obama plan" or "democratic planning." And: Obama has many goals, but he has few lines in the sand.
And yet, the articles still bold affirmed, "all", like this:
Fact: The proposed regulations would not require the man to let your doctor or insurer.
And it is strange to see the "facts" buttressed by statements like: Obama recently said CBS, which the States to continue the tradition of the "Financing of abortion that are not part of health care financed by the state."
Then we have nothing to fear.
We should now have learned that Mr. Obama will never be on his word. And the future president or Congress or expand the health coverage of abortion.
It is really funny.
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