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It seems like all anyone on TV wants to talk about from President Obama’s press conference is "stupidly" and "race relations". Those were not the important quotes. This will completely slip by and be noticed way too late for any organized uproar.
A decision seems to have been made and no one has caught up yet. This has not been a fair fight to begin with, but it’s really not a fair fight if we think we’re fighting for something that has already been decided against. Information is power and right now the public is even more powerless than before. Everyone thinks they’re still fighting for a real, government-funded, public option that doesn’t involve private insurance companies. President Obama’s announcement says something very different.
Everyone in America (including every journalist except Lou Dubose of The Washington Spectator) seems to have missed these all-important sentences in President Obama’s press conference on July 22, 2009. Please, please pay attention.
"Tonight I want to answer those questions. Because even though Congress is still working through a few key issues, we already have agreement on the following areas:"….
"If you don’t have health insurance, or are a small business looking to cover your employees, you’ll be able to choose a quality, affordable health plan through a health insurance exchange – a marketplace that promotes choice and competition Finally, no insurance company will be allowed to deny you coverage because of a pre-existing medical condition."
The operative words here are "Health Insurance Exchange" and "already have agreement".
This quote came toward the beginning of the press conference when he was outlining what congress has agreed upon and, incidentally, just 10 minutes after President Obama walked out of a meeting with Max Baucus (D-MT), lead visable Big Insurance shill.
Apparently, the decision has been quietly made and all that’s left are the "key issues" of the structuring of that insurance exchange. (To get a preview of what the "key issues" of the structuring will be, click on the link at the bottom.)
So, there’s a reason why, as the talking heads are wondering, Obama has since stopped saying the actual words "public option". The reason is, apparently, because our "public option" is going to be… private insurance!…. with government subsidies for those that qualify.
A "uniquely American solution"? Yes. Insane? Yes.
—An insurance exchange (which is what Obama has said we’ll be getting) is where the private insurance companies get together and offer a variety of policies obtainable through the government (with the government setting some standards of cost and who they have to cover). What happens there is that, if you choose to go with this government option, the government vets your income and decides what you will pay per month and gives you a choice of private insurance policies to choose from depending on what "tier" of coverage you qualify for. The money you pay goes directly to the private insurance companies and the rest of what they charge for that policy is paid to them by the government (if you qualify for an insurance subsidy).
This is the worst possible choice that could have been made. This is private insurance getting everyone AND taxpayer money on top of it. Which, to me, means that everyone will be paying Big Insurance twice.
This is in NO WAY a "public option" that will give private insurance companies competition.
So, for those of you with any spare money left, feel secure in buying that Aetna stock!
NOW DOES EVERYONE UNDERSTAND WHY THE RUSH TO GET THIS DONE??
Here is a link to more information on the insurance exchange and what would need to be done to make it even remotely functional.
http://www.centeronbudget.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=2785
Make no mistake, this will pass because it makes sure that the insurance companies will very profitably exist in perpetuity. The conservative dems get to keep their relationships with Corporate America, so they will no longer obstruct and the only winners will be Big Insurance and corrupt pols. A "uniquely American" solution.
Every other country also had Big Insurance before they went to nationalized (single payer) insurance. We’re (as usual) the only morons on the planet that can’t seem to make democracy work for the people.
This also makes the amendment to ERISA, that Dennis Kucinich just got passed, pointless. Which may explain why it passed with bi-partisan votes. They knew what was coming.
This is soooo wrong.
9 Comments
I think you’ve read between the lines. We’ve got a sell-out going on. But I also think that even if a public option of the sort specified by HR 3200 makes it through because progressives manage to generate a lot of fuss over the next month, the bill will still, overall, be a giveaway to the Insurance companies.
HR3200 has all the goodies I’ve described in the past, to friends, as what we should not be doing. It features an insurance exchange, mandatory enrollment for citizens, tax credits (meaning even though you can’t pay your bills now, you have to pay anyway and maybe you’ll get money back later on your already too-complicated-for-humans tax return, if you prove and report those payments properly), penalties for people that don’t sign up because they can’t afford it, no mandatory participation from healthcare providers and the list goes on and on! It even has a pathetic provision for possible state “public options” that are funded only by those premiums collected. Now that’s competition that’ll really keep private insurance honest! And, of course, tiers! No plan would be complete without class distinctions.
It’ll be the gift that keeps on giving.
Your analysis and conclusion were pretty much what I’ve been fearing and I am so sickened I want to scream obscenities to the whole political establishment. They are so unbelievably disgusting and reprehensible.
But the pattern fits in with the whole crappy bailout scheme. See today’s article about Golden Sachs continuing actions that created the earlier destruction of the national economy. And the stupid idiots in Congress and Treasury, etc. wrote the bills and “rules” so they could do whatever they damned well pleased. The same will happen with the insurance companies and BigPhrma. Screw them all and we’ll continued to get screwed by all of them.
Thanks Tracie,
Blessings,
Sorry, but this post really doesn’t make much sense or advance the discussion, and it weirdly lays all sorts of implications on statements by Obama that, while disappointing as ever, were hardly coded.
The creation of an insurance exchange and the elimination of preexisting condition exclusions (in exchange for mandated insurance purchase) were always part of the deal. The public option — whether to have one at all and precisely how pathetically ineffectual it will be — is one of the “key issues” Congress is “still working through.” No news here. No joy, but no news.
As for your statement, “Everyone thinks they’re still fighting for a real, government-funded, public option that doesn’t involve private insurance companies,” I have no idea what you mean. Obamacare was always about continuing the involvement of private insurance companies, whether a public plan was thrown into the mix or not.
Actually, it has always been about private insurance continuing to exist while a public option was to be created to compete with private insurance. This has been the mantra all the way from the campaign trail right up to July 22. A real public option was the promise over and over. It is difficult to imagine how having to purchase private insurance through the government is going to “keep private insurance honest”. It will be the same companies on both sides of the equation.
And no, nothing was coded. It was very clearly spoken. My point was that no one was listening to what, exactly, was said.
The Baucus proposal is even worse than you describe. Co-ops, a mandate for us to buy insurance, but no requirement for employers to offer it. Basically, the insurance companies sinking their blood funnel into the treasury.
Hey, blood funnel is a copyrighted Matt Taibbi metaphor!
Meanwhile, although I really don’t want to pound on Tracie’s post, I don’t know why she calls the Kucinich waiver “pointless.” Granted, its chances of survival through conference are slim, but the major single-payer coalitions are now looking to statewide initiatives, more than a convoluted morphing of the public option, as the most plausible “back-door” pathway to single payer.
Matt’s going to be here tomorrow for a live chat about his Rolling Stone Article tomorrow at noon ET!
We agree pretty much completely, but your post is implying that Obama is palming off the exchange with paltry income-based premium subsidies as the public option. Let’s just keep our terms clear; there’s enough confusion out there already.