Posted on 06/12/2010 5:10:09 AM PDT by Brilliant
President Barack Obama called on Republican lawmakers Saturday to approve billions of dollars in new spending to avert a scheduled 21 percent cut in payments to doctors who treat Medicare patients.
If Republican senators don't allow the stalled proposal to pass, some doctors will stop treating Medicare recipients, Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address.
He noted that since 2003, Congresses led by Democrats and by Republicans alike have blocked similar proposed cuts in doctors' reimbursement rates. But now, he said, Republicans are "willing to walk away from the needs of our doctors and our seniors."
The so-called doc fix is part of a large, Democratic-drafted bill that would extend several popular tax breaks while greatly increasing the tax that oil companies pay into a spill liability fund. Republican senators have focused their objections on the bill's tax increases, not the doctors' pay matter.
For years, lawmakers from both parties routinely have said that would trim Medicare reimbursement rates as a way to save money and make their budget plans appear more frugal. Later, in a move that watchdog groups call cynical, the lawmakers routinely undo the proposed cut in doctor payments, which are considered politically unpalatable...
(Excerpt) Read more at finance.yahoo.com ...
Obama is the asshole who wanted to cut their pay 21% in the first place.
Why wasn’t the Medicare reimbursement issue covered in the health care legislation earlier this year?
It was.
They used the “savings” to make ObamaCare “reduce” the deficit.
Not so. The law requires the pay cut. Congress always passes an exemption.
Magic math. What hopefully was liberalisms one last grasp that went too far and puts them out in the cold forever.
So Obama and the CBO could say that Obamacare would decrease the deficit and cost under $1 trillion--both lies.
It’s republicans fault or maybe just Bush.
Obama is the asshole who wanted to cut their pay 21% in the first place.
Correct that is part of Obamacare. Now as part of the sham they will raise the rates back to where they were. The rates were cut to provide a lower cost basis for Obamacare.
Same f***ing difference.
I forget the exact details, but he said this is what Obamacare is going to do to him:
This person is one of the smartest people I know and is a former Democrat, so I would think (and hope) he knows of what he speaks.
A godless liberal like Obama can NEVER take resposnibility for their actions. It’s always someone elses fault. Liberals are selfess kiddies that NEVER GREW UP!
The absurd pay cut is required by a "formula" which was put in place by the Republican Congress in 1997.
It is an example (one of many) of the failure of central planning.
Congress declared that payments to doctors had to be "sustainable" in terms of the whole Federal budget.
Never mind if the number of docs increased. Never mind if the number of services provided to Medicare recipients increased. Never mind if new technology was more expensive. The total dollars paid to all doctors, irrespective of what they did, would not increase (or, would increase only by a centrally dictated percentage).
Now, a personal example. I had a diagnostic test in January 2009 which did not exist when the Republican Congress created this foolishness. The cost of this test was $9000. It saved me from life-changing surgery. It was paid for from private insurance, and my pocket.
But if I had been a Medicare patient, that $9000 would have come out of the hides of primary care doctors.
Central planning - even Republican central planning - does not work, and can not work.
The Medicare SGR has NOTHING TO DO WITH OBAMA. IT IS A REPUBLICAN CREATION.
Yes, of course the central planning behind it represents Obama's dream for America. He IS as bad as you think.
But this particular example doesn't illustrate that point. Rather, it demonstrates how far gone the Republicans are, and why returning the same fools who came up with this to power is unlikely to fix our problems.
Why don’t these mental giants in Congress just repeal the thing? Something stupid is going on here and it has a big (-D) after its name.
See above.
This problem was caused by the Republican Congress.
Then why not get rid of this stupid law that restricts payments and requires an override every few years? Because it permits them to hold doctors by the throat and shake them down for money and acquiescence. MDs are already leaving medicine in droves, with far too few replacements. In 15 years you won't be able to find a doctor that was born in the United States.
It's Hippocrates fault.
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