Grayson introduces Public Option Act


Congressman Alan Grayson, (D-Orlando), today introduced a bill (H.R. 4789) which would give the option to buy into Medicare to every citizen of the United States. The “Public Option Act,” also known as the “Medicare You Can Buy Into Act,” would open up the Medicare network to anyone who can pay for it.

Congressman Grayson said, “Obviously, America wants and needs more competition in health coverage, and a public option offers that. But it’s just as important that we offer people not just another choice, but another kind of choice. A lot of people don’t want to be at the mercy of greedy insurance companies that will make money by denying them the care that they need to stay healthy, or to stay alive. We deserve to have a real alternative.”

The bill would require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to establish enrollment periods, coverage guidelines, and premiums for the program. Because premiums would be equal to cost, the program would pay for itself.

“The government spent billions of dollars creating a Medicare network of providers that is only open to one-eighth of the population. That’s like saying, ‘Only people 65 and over can use federal highways.’ It is a waste of a very valuable resource and it is not fair. This idea is simple, it makes sense, and it deserves an up-or-down vote,” Congressman Grayson said.

http://westorlandonews.com/2010/03/09/grayson-introduces-public-option-act/

I could've sworn I heard a pundit say on TV today that forty-something signatures have been collected for a public option to be added to the bill.

Congressman Dennis Kucinich has gotten quite a bit of media attention the last several days, since he's a principled holdout on the public option issue, much to the vexation of his fellow Democrats.

But Kucinich says he's not interested in voting for a bill that, in its present form, is little more than a gigantic insurance company giveaway.

Adding a strong public option might change Kucinich's vote, and it would sure make a difference to millions of angry, aging Americans.

Yes, you are right. Forty Senators have gone on record as being in favor of a public option.

And yes, if there were a public option in the bill, Kucinich's stance against the bill would soften. He considers it to be a handout to the insurance companies, as it stands now.

At the very least, we need an alternative to insurance companies as a way to pay for our healthcare.

Allowing anyone and everyone to buy into Medicare would be one way to achieve that. As presented by Congressman Grayson, the program would pay for itself.

Still do not think health care will pass. There is some starting to worry about their future in the political spectrum.I know the public option is what a minority wants. Maybe it will happen, or maybe it won't. What is the concern is this could turn out in the long run to completely be this administrations dream of turning the govt option into the only insurance out there. Becoming a single payer system only is what this white house wants, but there is still a majority of americans who do not trust our government, and I for one feel the same way. I personally like my insurance plan and even if the govt option was half as expensive I would not take it.

The govt wants to have to much power and run america like the EU or canada. That style of gov't will not work here. I know I wont convince you, but you know as well as me, the govt is not honest and will do anything in BHO power to take over insurance and let DC be the controller of our heath. THis is one debate that I feel BHO is going to lose.

And with all due respect he needs to lose this battle or americans will really know what shitty health care is.

Its so obvious obama doesnt care about a 2nd term. He has upset everyone and everytime he opens his mouth the stock market drops. At least this week we are up a little and my money is coming back a little at a time. Hopefully he will take a break and not speak again at least until the market gets up around 13 or so. At least we know our 401's and IRA's will grow some. But he does need to get a clue and listen to what the majority of americans want in this economic downturn. I guess by the time he gets done , most will be on unemployment and possibly with his famous public option that probably will not come to be.

Obama has already stated that he doesn't care about a second term as much as he cares about getting health care passed.

IV, being the conservative, I AM. I can tell you that my friends and co-workers would welcome a single payer system, If and I mean if, it does not exceed what their private premiums are. Which are high.

I had my 6 month physical, yeah I do get regular wellness physicals and blood work-up's etc. and she recommended a colonostomy (sp) and yuck, but I found out my insurance does not pay for a preventive test of such, so what to do? Under the proposed bill I would get it. This is just an example.

Do I want it, Hell no, but I am at the age where preventive tests do make sense. However, my great Ins won't cover it. Not saying I have a problem, but peace of mind does help in some cases. Sad that Ins companies decide what tests they will cover or not.

You have never had cancer that I know of, but I have. I was only lucky because I was put in a clinical trial that bypassed my main Ins for most of it. My private ins would have never covered what proved to be a success. You need to look at all sides of the equation, not just a cold/flu....

Lordy I love rational Conservatives.

STock market is gettin better, but its my point of what he promised at leader in charge. Change. That is not the change most want. I am sorry but all the polls show that. No disrespect but its true.

You make no sense. Go away.

What, you truly believe only the minority want Ins reform? Come on put the politics aside, that is simply not true! Polls back it on the basic level. Add on OB, then it it truly is not about health care. IV, regardless of lines here. We pay more either way for the uninsured vs public pay. I would rather spend 40 to 60 bucks a month for family and friends.

Ain't no bubble here. Something has to give.

Yes, new is right. New AP poll today states that more people than not want health care reform. They don't all support reconciliation, but they'll get over it, once they see the benefits to themselves and their families. Those that can't get over it can move to Costa Rica with Rush. Oh wait, he took that foolish comment back, liar that he is. Must have realized they have socialized medicine there.

In one day, Grayson piles up another 40 co-sponsors for Medicare buy-in bill

by: Chris Bowers
Thu Mar 11, 2010 at 15:47


In just two days, Alan Grayson has piled up 50 co-sponsors to his Medicare buy-in bill, which is designed as a stand-alone bill rather than as an amendment to the health reform bill. Here is the complete list of 50 co-sponsors:

50 CURRENT COSPONSORS : Bob Filner, Jan Schakowsky, Barney Frank, Dennis Kucinich, Donna Edwards, Jared Polis, Chellie Pingree, Sheila Jackson Lee, Carol Shea-Porter, Diane Watson, John Lewis, Anthony Weiner, Jerrold Nadler, Nydia Velazquez, Keith Ellison, Loretta Sanchez, Hank Johnson, Maxine Waters, Luis Gutierrez, Lynn Woolsey, Marcy Kaptur, Charles Rangel, Patrick Kennedy, Raul Grijalva, Donna Christian-Christensen, John Olver, Corrine Brown, Eddie Bernice Johnson, Marcia L. Fudge, Danny K. Davis, Pedro Pierluisi, Grace Napolitano, Alcee Hastings, John Hall, Shelley Berkley, John Conyers, Jim McGovern, Phil Hare, Betty Sutton, Jim McDermott, Gregorio Sablan, Maurice Hinchey, Carolyn Maloney, Barbara Lee, Elijah Cummings, Gregory Meeks, Edolphus Towns, Al Green, David Wu, and Rush Holt.

Do you have a link for that?

http://www.openleft.com/diary/17786/in-o...care-buyin-bill

and:

http://westorlandonews.com/2010/03/11/grayson%E2%80%99s-public-option-bill-garners-50-cosponsors-in-48-hours/

Thanks :-)

Hey, why didn't the second one make a clickable link?

http://westorlandonews.com/2010/03/11/grayson%E2%80%99s-public-option-bill-garners-50-cosponsors-in-48-hours/

ferm's link

thank you mister wofer

This is good reading material to put things in check

http://townhall.com/columnists/RebeccaHagelin/2003/07/16/just_say_no_to_budget-busting_entitlement

When are you buying the board? And why in the f**ck did you suddenly forget about your business with twelve houses you built and forty-five employees that you denied ever having after saying you had them whilst you were defying geography in Iraq for $10,000 a week whilst you were earning that Dean's list in VA, whilst you were screwing up twin grandchildren, whilst you were both 34 and 36 years old.

HUH?

IV, your townhall source may be good reading to you, but the thing is that it's another right wing site with the normal sprinkle of religion. Those kind of sites are too biased to be taken completely seriously. When you show that link as one of your sources of information, you take away some of your credibility. It's not an insult, it's just fact.

Can you speak to IV for me? I need a job. Maybe with a good word from you?

I'll write you a letter of recommendation. I'll tell him you're actually the real Benjamin Linus. How's that?

Can't you keep anything private? Is nothing sacred? Also, my eyes are not as bulging as Ben's. and I would never have killed Jacob.

But would you have hit him over the head with a frying pan if he said bad stuff about Rita?

And speaking of the public option...

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Kucinich-Other-Progressiv-by-Rob-Kall-100312-919.html

Kucinich, Other Progressives Stand Ground Against Attacks

For OpEdNews: Rob Kall


I interviewed congressman Dennis Kucinich and other progressive leaders in health care reform to get his response to recent attacks and to find out his motivation and what would move him to change his vote. While Markos "Kos" Moulitsas attacks Kucinich, other progressives see him as a hero and saint.

Dennis Kucinich, an unwavering progressive Democrat, is saying that he will vote against the the Health Reform bill, as it stands in the Senate. That stance has led to him being attacked by fellow Democrats and some "progressive" pundits, particularly Markos Moulitsas, who are backing the existing senate and house health reform bills WITHOUT the public option or cover for state efforts to pursue single payer. Responding to me asking his take on Moulitsas attack on Kucinich, progressive talk radio host Thom Hartmann replied,

"Progressives attacking Dennis Kucinich is the circular firing squad on steroids.

First, here's some background. Markos Moulitsas, founder and owner of Dailykos.com attacked Kucinich on the Keith Olbermann show, hosted by fill-in host Lawrence O'Donnell, saying that the response to Kucinich's position might be to "primary" him. The same day, Moulitsas said on his blog, "Dennis Kucinich has always been a little prick, and that hasn't changed. He's someone who deserves a real primary."

Sam Stein of huffingtonpost.com, detailed the conversation between O'Donnel and Moulitsas, in his article, Markos Moulitsas To Kucinich: You'll Be Primaried If You Kill Reform
"The fact is this is a good first step and he is elected not to run for president, which he seems to do every four years," he said.

"[Kucinich] is not elected to grandstand and to give us this ideal utopian society. He is elected to represent the people of his district and he is not representing the uninsured constituents in his district by pretending to take the high ground here."

Pressed by fill-in host Lawrence O'Donnell as to whether a Kucinich would get a Democratic challenger for his seat if he didn't support health care legislation -- and in the process kill it -- Moulitsas replied, "Yeah, absolutely."

What he is doing is undermining this reform," he added. "He is making common cause with Republicans. And I think that is a perfect excuse and a rational one for a primary challenge."
The primary threat is an empty one. It's too late, at least for the 2010 elections. But what a waste, to go after a progressive when there are so many bluedogs to take on. More on that later.

At Salon.com, Alex Koppelman writes, in an article, The liberal case against Dennis Kucinich, about how, on Twitter, Moulitsas said, "No one could point to a single Kucinich legislative accomplishment. And of course they couldn't. He has none." Then, Koppelman goes on to agree with Moulitsas.

The fact is, Kucinich is keeping a promise that 77 "progressive" House Democrats signed onto, insisting on a public option. It looks like, at this point, he's the only one left, the only one who has stood up to Obama, Rahm Emanuel and the small state bluedogs who sold out to the insurance companies (and the CT independent senator whose name is not said.

House progressives who signed off on that promise have, apparently broken it. Not cool. One man has the courage to keep his promise and to stand up for what every Democrat knows to be true. The current bill is a sell-out, a gift, as former Cigna communications Director Wendell Potter has told me and repeated over and over again, to the health insurers.

I asked former Cigna Communications director turned health care reform activist Wendell Potter, his take on Kucinich's stand, pointing out that Kucinich isn't calling for single payer. He wants public option-- a robust public option. Potter replied, "Well so do I. I absolutely agree with him. I don't fault him at all for trying. And I think that's a worthy goal. And I hope he has success here. But he might fall short. I don't know if he's going to succeed or not... I think it's wonderful that he's trying it. I hope he succeeds. But if he doesn't succeed, that doesn't mean that this legislation should fail.

There are over 1500 comments on Sam Stein's article at the time I'm writing this. Looking at the most recent page, 48 out of 50 either defend and support Kucinich or attack his attackers. There's a link to a facebook page supporting Kucinich and some of the members of the page include Tim Carpenter, leader of Progressive Democrats of America (100,000+ supporters) and Medea Benjamin, cofounder of Code Pink.

I'ts a bit ironic to consider what Moulitsas has said recently. Moulitsas, using his dailykos.com pseudoym of Kos, reported that Ezra Klein cited him, "Insurance companies win," Markos Moulitsas tweeted last night. "Time to kill this monstrosity coming out of the Senate." And on Meet the Press, in mid December 2009, he told David Gregory, "I don't think this is a reform bill. I mean, I think it's very clear, this is not insurance or healthcare reform. What it is, it's allowing more people, 30 million people, to buy into the existing broken system..." and "Well, we're still fighting this thing. This, this is not a done deal..."

Well, Dennis Kucinich is STILL fighting.


Rob Kall is executive editor, publisher and site architect of OpEdNews.com, Host of the Rob Kall Bottom Up Radio Show (WNJC 1360 AM), President of Futurehealth, Inc, (more...)

Then there's this. I earnestly hope Greenwald is wrong about this, but I don't know. This whole process has seemed hinky in the extreme, all along, from Obama's handpicked panel refusing to include even one voice representing single payer to this hot-potato shell game being played out with the public option.


http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/03/12-5

The 'Public Option': Democrats' Scam Becomes More Transparent

by Glenn Greenwald

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about what seemed to be a glaring (and quite typical) scam perpetrated by Congressional Democrats: all year long, they insisted that the White House and a majority of Democratic Senators vigorously supported a public option, but the only thing oh-so-unfortunately preventing its enactment was the filibuster: sadly, we have 50 but not 60 votes for it, they insisted. Democratic pundits used that claim to push for "filibuster reform," arguing that if only majority rule were required in the Senate, then the noble Democrats would be able to deliver all sorts of wonderful progressive reforms that they were truly eager to enact but which the evil filibuster now prevents. In response, advocates of the public option kept arguing that the public option could be accomplished by reconciliation -- where only 50 votes, not 60, would be required -- but Obama loyalists scorned that reconciliation proposal, insisting (at least before the Senate passed a bill with 60 votes) that using reconciliation was Unserious, naive, procedurally impossible, and politically disastrous.

But all those claims were put to the test -- all those bluffs were called -- once the White House decided that it had to use reconciliation to pass a final health care reform bill. That meant that any changes to the Senate bill (which had passed with 60 votes) -- including the addition of the public option -- would only require 50 votes, which Democrats assured progressives all year long that they had. Great news for the public option, right? Wrong. As soon as it actually became possible to pass it, the 50 votes magically vanished. Senate Democrats (and the White House) were willing to pretend they supported a public option only as long as it was impossible to pass it. Once reconciliation gave them the opportunity they claimed all year long they needed -- a "majority rule" system -- they began concocting ways to ensure that it lacked 50 votes.

All of that was bad enough, but now the scam is getting even more extreme, more transparent. Faced with the dilemma of how they could possibly justify their year-long claimed support for the public option only now to fail to enact it, more and more Democratic Senators were pressured into signing a letter supporting the enactment of the public option through reconciliation; that number is now above 40, and is rapidly approaching 50. In other words, there is a serious possibility that the Senate might enact a public option if there is a vote on it, because it's very difficult for these Senators to vote "No" after pretending all year long -- on the record -- that they supported it. In fact, The Huffington Post's Ryan Grim yesterday wrote: "the votes appear to exist to include a public option. It's only a matter of will."

The one last hope for Senate Democratic leaders was to avoid a vote altogether on the public option, thereby relieving Senators of having to take a position and being exposed. But that trick would require the cooperation of all Senators -- any one Senator can introduce a public option amendment during the reconciliation and force a vote -- and it now seems that Bernie Sanders, to his great credit, is refusing to go along with the Democrats' sham and will do exactly that: ignore the wishes of the Senate leadership and force a roll call vote on the public option.

So now what is to be done? They only need 50 votes, so they can't use the filibuster excuse. They don't seem able to prevent a vote, as they tried to do, because Sanders will force one. And it seems there aren't enough Senate Democrats willing to vote against the public option after publicly saying all year long they supported it, which means it might get 50 votes if a roll call vote is held. So what is the Senate Democratic leadership now doing? They're whipping against the public option, which they pretended all year along to so vigorously support:

Senate Democratic leaders are concerned about the amount of mischief their own Members could create if or when a health care reconciliation bill comes up for debate. And sources said some supporters of creating a public insurance option are privately worried that they will be asked to vote against the idea during debate on the bill, which could occur before March 26.

Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) acknowledged Wednesday that liberals may be asked to oppose any amendment, including one creating a public option, to ensure a smooth ride for the bill. "We have to tell people, 'You just have to swallow hard' and say that putting an amendment on this is either going to stop it or slow it down, and we just can't let it happen," Durbin, who supports a public option, told reporters.

If -- as they claimed all year long -- a majority of Congressional Democrats and the White House all support a public option, why would they possibly whip against it, and ensure its rejection, at exactly the moment when it finally became possible to pass it? If majorities of the House and Senate support it, as does the White House, how could the inclusion of a public option possibly jeopardize passage of the bill?

I've argued since August that the evidence was clear that the White House had privately negotiated away the public option and didn't want it, even as the President claimed publicly (and repeatedly) that he did. And while I support the concept of "filibuster reform" in theory, it's long seemed clear that it would actually accomplish little, because the 60-vote rule does not actually impede anything. Rather, it is the excuse Democrats fraudulently invoke, using what I called the Rotating Villain tactic (it's now Durbin's turn), to refuse to pass what they claim they support but are politically afraid to pass, or which they actually oppose (sorry, we'd so love to do this, but gosh darn it, we just can't get 60 votes). If only 50 votes were required, they'd just find ways to ensure they lacked 50. Both of those are merely theories insusceptible to conclusive proof, but if I had the power to create the most compelling evidence for those theories that I could dream up, it would be hard to surpass what Democrats are doing now with regard to the public option. They're actually whipping against the public option. Could this sham be any more transparent?



UPDATE: One related point: when I was on Morning Joe several weeks ago, I argued this point -- why aren't Democrats including the public option in the reconciliation package given that they have the 50 votes in favor of the public option -- and, in response, Chuck Todd recited White House spin and DC conventional wisdom (needless to say) by insisting that they do not have the votes to pass the public option. If that's true -- if they lack the votes to pass the public option through reconciliation? -- why is Dick Durbin now whipping against it, telling Senators -- in his own words -- "You just have to swallow hard' and say that putting an amendment on this is either going to stop it or slow it down, and we just can't let it happen"?

No discussion of the public option is complete without noting how much the private health insurance industry despises it; the last thing they want, of course, is the beginning of real competition and choice.

© 2010 Salon

.....I don't feel good.

I know. In fact, I feel sick.