Posted on 04/07/2010 9:40:45 AM PDT by Daniel T. Zanoza
As Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi promised, Americans would learn more about the health care reform bill after it was passed. Yes, most have learned about the 16,500 new IRS agents who will be hired to act as the health care police. Seniors are learning more about the drastic cuts to Medicare, including the decrease in funding of home health care, hospice care and funding for medical equipment. In fact, there were so many terrible things in the thousands of pages this bill entailed, opponents didn't know where to begin to fight it.
Most Americans were clearly against the Democratic version of health care reform. Republicans were grossly outmanned in their unified opposition to the bill and it was also hard to choose what aspects of the legislation to focus on. Should the GOP have concentrated on the budget-busting impact this new law would have on the nation for generations to come? Should Republicans have zeroed in on the decrease in the quality of health care that would be provided to most Americans, if the bill was passed? Or possibly the way to have fought the bill was to point out that comprehensive health care reform had nothing to do with health care, but was all about control of a significant portion of the public?
However, President Barack Obama's strategy regarding health care reform is consistent with his radical political agenda. The modus operandi was, and is, to throw everything against the political wall and see what sticks. Obama began with the stimulus package which we were told was necessary to save the struggling American economy. Congress passed the legislation which we are now learning is filled with waste and pork-filled projects totaling billions of dollars. Then came Cap and Trade which, if passed into law, would have resulted in drastically higher energy costs for every American.
But the country quickly caught on. It took the entire first year of Obama's administration to pass health care into law and, hopefully, this has put a crimp in a leftist vision that many in our nation are now rejecting. In fact, the Cap and Trade bill, also referred to as Cap and Tax, was never taken on by the U.S. Senate (after the U.S. House of Representatives passed it) because it was so politically toxic.
With the midterm elections coming up in November, the far left wing of the Democratic Party has been stymied in their efforts to pass bills, including comprehensive immigration reform, card check and gays in the military, which are high on their list of priorities.
But Republicans have to be very careful regarding a political trap which has been set for them. In order to pass the health care reform bill, so-called blue dog Democrats had to be convinced the health care reform legislation would reduce the national debt during the next ten years. The argument was: If nothing was done, rapidly escalating health care costs would far exceed the Congressional Budget Office's (CBO) calculated cost of Obamacare, which was projected to be $940 billion for the next decade. However, most economists realize the cost of adding 30 million Americans to the rolls of those to be covered by mandatory health care will probably by closer to $2.4 trillion. But the Democrats played a very skillful game which had an impact on the CBO's original projections because the majority party left out something called the "Doctors Fix" in this equation.
Physicians will have to be paid for their services to include the expanding rolls of those on Medicare and Medicaid. Money was not allocated for this provision in the health care reform law. The Democrats left these costs out of the bill on purpose. They knew if the "Doctors Fix" was included in the new law, the true costs would rise between $150 billion and $200 billion for the next decade. But leaving the "Doctors Fix" out of the equation gave so-called conservative Democrats political cover, leaving them able to vote for the bill's passage.
Here's the catch. The "Doctors Fix" and the money needed to fund it will have to be passed by Congress. In a way, Republicans have been painted into a corner. They can't oppose the "Doctors Fix" because the Democrats would scream from the rooftops that members of the GOP are against paying physicians the money they deserve for services rendered under the new law. Republicans will have to go along with the expenditures that should have been included in the costs of the original health care bill. The sad fact is the establishment media knew the "Doctors Fix" was necessary in order to make health care reform viable; yet the press paid little, if any, attention, to the issue.
So, essentially, Republicans will have to swallow a spoonful of medicine which has a terrible taste. The only strategy Republicans now have is to point out the American public was duped by Obama, Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the Democratic Party who did anything and everything to pass health care reform, the least of which was fudging the numbers on its true costs. Perhaps from the beginning the GOP should have focused more on the fact the cost of the "Doctors Fix" was not written into the original health care reform legislation which was passed by Congress and signed into law by Obama, but it's too late to do so now.
The worst thing Republican legislators could do would be to fight against the "Doctors Fix" on principle. The only thing members of the GOP can say is the Democrats intentionally deceived the country. But what else is new?
RELATED ARTICLES:
Health Care Reform: Nothing To Do With Health Care: It's About Control by Daniel T. Zanoza [March 12, 2010] http://rffm.typepad.com/republicans_for_fair_medi/2010/03/health-care-reform-nothing-to-do-with-health-care-its-about-control.html
Food, Water and Energy = Control of Americans by Joyce Morrison [July 18, 2008] http://rffm.typepad.com/republicans_for_fair_medi/2008/07/food-water-and-energy-control-of-americans.html
It’s not a trap. Just fix the problem by repealing the danged thing. That is the only acceptable solution.
Dirty rats!
I would love to see a graphic displaying the frequency of earthquakes over the past 100 years. I suspect there is nothing unusual going on but I’d like to see some hard data on it.
Opp, sorry, posted that here in error.
It’s not a trap if the Repubs can see the path.
Repubs need to be shouting to high heaven about the stunt pulled by the Dums.
Just add this cost to the original bill and make it an issue.
Let the DUMS explain why they left it out of the original bill.
Not a trap at all. Just say it should have been part of the healthcare bill and they wanted it there. Now they are stuck with it and they won’t vote to change the HC bill unless the entire thing is reconsidered and voted on.
Just let the Dems pass it, and vote “present”—then play politics with it after it’s been voted on. I don’t see as how this is anything but a winner for the GOP.
I agree. While it is important to pass this bill to avoid catastrophic Medicare cuts that would essentially drive primary care providers out of business, I would like to see it passed without Republican support.
They could stand on principle and demand cuts elsewhere in gov’t to pass it. And suggest cuts in the new HC bill.
No, you extract a repeal of part of Obamacare for voting for the Doc Fix. Bit by bit, inch by inch, a thousand slashes.
Never, ever, give them anything for free.
Your confusion over what to do is an example of why the GOP is in the sorry state that it is in today
Effectively vote “present”... or absent ?
Cynical—but realpolitik. Then we take this crap out. We may have to chip at it, starve it, bleed it, sue it...but we’re not going to play by their rules any longer. Let them pass it, and then hit them for passing it.
How it works. Medicaid patient seeks treatment, no docs willing to take medicaid. Patient has bad outcome. Patient sues state for that bad outcome.
Really--it's in there. States are going to have to buy malpractice insurance. I love it.
Here’s the real kick in the @$$ about that:
The states will pay-out any legal costs and awards from the Medicaid funds, which are being reduced by an across-the-board $500 million. If the State runs out of Medicaid funds because of legal awards, they will necessarily dip into the general fund.
!!! EXCEPT !!! for Nebraska and Louisiana.
I know that is in the bill, but also cannot give the specific page. I predict that if the bill is not repealed, the next move will be to force all doctors to accept Medicaid patients by tying it to state licensure. When and if that happens, you are going to see doctors leave the profession in droves.
A Democrat who's never worked a real job might think that that would be easy to do--so let them try it. I suggest to any doc that if he can't retire, at least prepare for a long sabbatical as it all shakes out.
The Republicans are right to support raising the doctors' reimbursement rates. Period.
The rest of the health care mess is another thing.
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