Posted on 12/08/2003 12:25:37 PM PST by snopercod
President Bush signed legislation today that creates a prescription drug benefit for the elderly, launching the biggest changes to the Medicare system since its creation in 1965.
"For the first time, we're giving seniors peace of mind that they will not have to face unlimited expenses for their medicine," Mr. Bush said just before sitting down at a desk in Constitution Hall, near the White House, and signing the new law, surrounded by applauding supporters and an audience of several hundred people. Presidential bill signings typically are set at the White House, on smaller scale.
The bill, which the government estimates will cost $400 billion over 10 years, would remake Medicare in part by offering drug benefits to 40 million elderly and disabled people while giving insurance companies and private health plans a huge new role in Medicare. The legislation also allows the elderly to set up health accounts in which they can set aside money tax free to pay for future health care.
Mr. Bush hailed the legislation in a televised 20-minute warm-up speech today, offering case studies of elderly people in the audience who he said would be among those to benefit from the Medicare overhaul.
The Republican-controlled Congress gave final approval to the bill on Nov. 25 when the Senate, voting 54 to 44, passed the measure, handing the president a political victory on an issue that has historically worked to the advantage of Democrats.
Eleven Senate Democrats, most of them moderates, joined 42 Republicans and one independent in voting for the legislation; 9 Republicans and 35 Democrats voted against it.
Republicans hope to embrace the legislation as political leverage in the coming election year. Even though a majority of Democrats voted against it, Mr. Bush said that its passage with at least a modicum of Democratic support showed that old partisan differences had been overcome to fulfill a promise to the elderly.
The Medicare overhaul comes at a time when the older segment of the population is growing rapidly, meaning the number of older voters will also be increasing.
"I visited with seniors around the country and heard many of their stories," Mr. Bush said today. "I'm proud that this legislation will give them practical and much-needed help."
But the legislation is not without its critics. Opponents think it risks undermining traditional Medicare, and there have been complaints that the coverage will not be comprehensive.
Medicare beneficiaries will not be allowed to buy insurance to cover their share of prescription drug costs under the new Medicare bill. Health economists have long asserted that when beneficiaries are insulated from the costs, they tend to overuse medical services.
AARP, the largest organization of older Americans, backed the legislation over the objections of some of its members and traditional allies in the debate on the proper role of government and private markets in providing health care to the elderly.
"This bill helps those who need it the most people with low incomes, as well as those with high drug costs," said AARP's chief executive, William D. Novelli, whose endorsement of the bill was crucial to its passage.
The new benefit, covering about 75 percent of drug costs up to $2,250 a year, would begin in 2006. Next year, Medicare beneficiaries could buy Medicare-approved drug discount cards, which officials say could reduce pharmacy bills by 15 percent or more.
When the bill passed the Senate last month, several Democrats charged that it would enrich insurance and drug companies at the expense of the elderly, who, Democrats said, would would be angry when they learned details of the bill.
"This is lousy legislation," said Tom Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota, the Senate minority leader. "We may spend the rest of our careers repairing the flaws of this bill." Mr. Daschle later introduced legislation that would repeal some of the new legislation's more contentious provisions and allow Americans to import cheaper drugs from Canada and Western Europe.
Under the bill, a Medicare beneficiary would be responsible for the first $250 of drug costs, and insurance would then cover 75 percent of costs up to $2,250 a year. Coverage would then stop until the beneficiary had spent $3,600 out of pocket (for a total of $5,100 in prescription drugs). Medicare would pay 95 percent of the cost of each prescription beyond that.
A Medicare recipient could stay in traditional Medicare and get drug coverage by signing up for a stand-alone drug insurance policy. Or the person could join a private plan covering drugs along with doctors' services and hospital care.
Elderly people with low incomes would receive additional assistance enabling them to buy drugs for $1 to $5 a prescription. Premiums and deductibles for their drug coverage would be reduced or eliminated.
Medicare beneficiaries with incomes of more than $80,000 a year would, for the first time, have to pay higher premiums for the part of Medicare that covers doctors' care.
The bill would also increase Medicare payments to doctors and hospitals, speed the marketing of lower-cost generic drugs and offer tens of billions of dollars in subsidies to employers to encourage them to continue providing drug coverage to retirees. The bill also emphasizes preventive health care.
Millions of Medicare beneficiaries have bought private insurance to fill gaps in Medicare. But a provision of the legislation prohibits the sale of any Medigap policy that would help pay drug costs after Jan. 1, 2006, when the new Medicare drug benefit becomes available.
Nonsense, Bush did it.
Congress passed bans on Partial Birth Abortion TWICE in the 1990's, only to have those bills vetoed, therefore never becoming law.
President Bush is the first to sign the Partial Birth Abortion bill into law, so give credit where it is due (something that seems to be rather difficult for you 3rd Party types).
Yes, they are making kneepads with elephamts as well as donkeys.
Oh, I do give him credit for signing, and for tax cuts, and for the OSHA regulations reversal and other stuff. I voted for him in 2000 which I guess makes me a first party type.
Those actions, and others that I applaude just make his disasterous domestic performance all the more disappointing.
Banning Partial Birth Abortion, signing two laws to arm pilots, reforming Medicare with a half dozen Privatization options, cutting our income taxes so much that a family of four earning forty thousand per year only pays fourty-five Dollars per year in federal income taxes, giving three pay raises to our military, and CONSTRUCTING our ABM nuclear defense systems are a "domestic disaster" to you?!
The increased spending is a pure beast, but at least we aren't getting short-changed. Every policy that we want, we've gotten. Of course getting what you want passed over a divided Senate is always costly. Who would have thought otherwise? Even so, complaints about the increased spending have legitimacy, at least until those complaints delve into the netherworld of claims that we haven't gotten Conservative policies passed, among other such nonsense.
Bush opposed this all along, and only signed it reluctantly. Since then, he has done everything possible to scuttle the program. Source (written only two months ago): P.C. Air Security When will our pilots be armed? By John R. Lott Jr.
UNDERMINING THE PROGRAMUnfortunately, despite Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge recently voicing public support for arming pilots, the TSA has fought the program at every turn. After two years since the first attacks and two laws passed overwhelmingly by Congress to start training pilots, only about 200 out of over 100,000 commercial passenger pilots are licensed to carry guns.
Following what seemed like a successful first class of pilots this spring, the TSA fired the head of the firearms training academy, Willie Ellison, for "unacceptable performance and conduct."
Ellison, who won the praise of the students, was reprimanded for holding a graduation dinner for the first graduation class and giving them baseball caps with the program logo.
The training facility was closed down and relocated immediately after the first class, prompting Oregon Representative Peter DeFazio, the ranking Democrat on the Aviation Subcommittee, to complain that the closing appeared to be "just another attempt to disrupt the program."
On top of all the delays, the administration has done what it can to discourage pilots from even applying for the armed-pilot program.
The intrusive application form pilots are required to fill out warns them that the information obtained by the Transportation Security Administration is "not limited to [the pilot's] academic, residential, achievement, performance, attendance, disciplinary, employment history, criminal history record information, and financial and credit information."
Nonsense. The news media *claimed* that Bush was against *both* bills that armed pilots, yet President Bush proceeded to sign BOTH of those bills into law.
And while the press claimed that Bush was against it, the President himself *never* even once said that he was against either bill.
Moreover, President Bush FIRED the DoT senior employee who was holding up the first pro-gun-law from actually arming pilots, and Mineta suddenly "saw the light" after that.
Lets not fall for the liberal media's repeated tactic of claiming that Conservatives are divided, shall we!
President asks for alternative to arming pilots
By William M. Welch and Laurence McQuillan, USA TODAY
09/27/2001President Bush plans to announce today a series of security steps intended to restore public confidence in commercial air travel, including strengthening cockpit doors to thwart hijackers, White House and congressional officials said Wednesday. During a visit to Chicago's O'Hare airport, Bush also will call for increasing the number of armed air marshals to cover most domestic flights and increased federal control of airport security checks of baggage and passengers, they said. Bush will emphasize the need for federal guidelines for airport screening, but he will stop short of making the screeners federal employees, the officials said. He will call for government testing, supervision and monitoring.
[snip]
Bush indicated on Wednesday that he is cool to a controversial idea, proposed by the 67,000-member Air Line Pilots Association union, to allow cockpit crews to carry handguns. Asked whether he supports arming pilots, Bush said, "There may be better ways to do it than that, but I'm open for any suggestion."
Regardless, President Bush - as usual - adopted the big government solution when he had a perfect opportunity to do otherwise.
This is a bait and switch solution that takes more away than it and gives. I predict we will see a Rostankowski replay on this issue. But that is just my opinion.
Help me out here. I remember the man, but am at a loss as to your reference.
Now, didn't *you* claim that Bush literally OPPOSED arming pilots? Not merely looking for potential better bills, mind you, but actually opposing it altogether. You know, something that he did TWICE by signing two different bills that did that very thing?!
Where do people get off claiming that Bush is AGAINST bills that he signs into law?
I can't tell you how many gullible posters have claimed that Bush was against arming pilots, even though NONE of them can ever quote Bush himself saying that he was against it even for a moment, much less who can explain why President Bush signed TWO FREAKING BILLS INTO LAW that ARMED PILOTS.
Oh, he was just against it, take our word for it, or take the liberal news media's word for it, you all claim.
Rubbish.
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