Posted on 12/26/2010 6:51:03 PM PST by Libloather
Rep.-elect Walsh will turn down government health insurance
By Jordan Fabian - 12/26/10 04:10 PM ET
Another newly elected Republican member of Congress says he will not accept the government-sponsored health insurance plan available to lawmakers.
Rep.-elect Joe Walsh (Ill.), who rode a wave of Tea Party support to surprisingly defeat three-term Rep. Melissa Bean (D) in November, said that he does not believe lawmakers should receive the benefits.
"I don’t think congressmen should get pensions or cushy healthcare plans," he told the Chicago News Cooperative.
Republicans who staunchly opposed President Obama's healthcare reform plan have come under pressure from Democrats and liberal activist groups to decline their government healthcare benefits upon taking office.
Rep. Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.) penned a letter to GOP leaders demanding that Republican members "walk that walk" and refuse their federally subsidized coverage.
"If your conference wants to deny millions of Americans affordable health care, your members should walk that walk," Crowley wrote to incoming House Speaker John Boehner (Ohio) and Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.). "You cannot enroll in the very kind of coverage that you want for yourselves, and then turn around and deny it to Americans who don't happen to be Members of Congress."
The push began in earnest after Rep.-elect Andy Harris (R-Md.) reportedly complained in a November private meeting that his government healthcare benefits did not begin immediately.
So far, incoming Reps. Bobby Schilling (R-Ill.) and Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) have declined their government health insurance.
But Walsh's wife is reportedly unhappy with her husband's decision: she has a pre-existing medical condition and will have to purchase her own insurance, according to the Chicago News Cooperative.
That's a new idea.
No pensions, no benefits, no compensation increases. Put into a bill and let’s vote, up or down.
“I don’t think congressmen should get pensions or cushy healthcare plans,”
Well that is some thing you will not here propaganda news report.
If I've said that once I've said it a thousand times.
okay spelling police, I know it’s HEAR not here.
Joe Walsh pings.
Unlike that scumbag Mark Kirk from Ill., the new (R) RINO in the Senate.
Why can’t our newly elected wonderboys in the House propose and pass a bill requiring them to live under the dictates of Obamacare, just as we do?
Whoever voted against such a bill in either the House or Senate would have a tough time explaining why the rest of us have to choke on the bloody damned mess.
Make ‘em vote on every issue, every detail!
Then I hope that his wife has it for the family. If not, he’s not providing properly for his family and shouldn’t be one of our leaders. I think members of Congress should have health benefits, but their benefits certainly shouldn’t be so much better than what their staff has access to.
I have no problem with them having health insurance while in congress. Afterwords is another thing.
And I would be ok with a 401k plan for Congress however a pension is out of the question. They should not be in government long enough to qualify for a pension. And the "congress critter for a day pension for life" is beyond disgusting.
IIRC, the health care package congress has and Democrats there enjoy is not anything like what they crammed down our throats. I am quite sure no panel of political appointees is there to determine when a congressman has passed his "best if used by date" and no such panel has ever pulled the plug on a congressman, denied a congressman a kidney transplant on the basis of age discrimination, performed a late term abortion on a congressman, left a congressman's infant to die in a hospital broom closet, made a congressman wait 6 months or more for treatment, denied a congresswoman a mammogram due to underage, denied Nancy Pelosi a botox injection on the basis of it being a fruitless waste of resources, or even denied Hillary plastic surgery because of its high probability of failure. If congress had the sort of health care they impose on everyone else, we wouldn't have had Democrats sitting in office well into senility or voting from their hospital beds.
Not to mention when congress voted themselves these perks they read the bill carefully BEFORE voting for it to make sure they were getting the best possible deal.
Dear Liberals:
Congress is EXEMPT from Obamacare.
The insurance they are getting is not the insurance we’re going to get.
HOW DO THESE LIBERAL NO GOODS KEEPING GETTING ELECTED?????????
As for this new Republican, I hope he’s serious about getting rid of Obamacare and not just pandering.
Fools and idiots being allowed to vote.
Think about this a second, that insurance might well seem extravagent and certainly subsidized, but they still make the employees pay for about 30% of it.
Hmm ~ what a deal eh.
This all comes to an end when you're 66 ~ then they turn you over to Medicare ~ but you still get to pay and pay and pay.
At some point someone should 'splain to that Congresscritter that all the propaganda he's heard on the issue is just that ~ propaganda.
BTW, the Congress already voted to conform to the Obamakkkare stuff ~ but FEHB already did. That's why there's no big change that've you seen announced.
Obamakkkare has nothing new ~ just the same old same old.
This becomes silly. So the taxpayers pay for Democrats’ insurance, but not Republicans’? Cut it back or kill it for all Congresscritters equally.
Remember, the essence of Obamakkkare is to make the insurance you got too expensive to keep.
And no, you don't get stuck in a government insurance plan ~ you have to cut back on your food, and your housing, and shoes for your kids to pay through the nose or you go to jail for the rest of your life.
At some point here you will catch up with the reality of the situation and see what it is Virginia was suing about. People here just don't have the bucks to pay for the gold plated insurance policies Obamakkkare envisions. We gotta eat, heat our homes, wear clothes, get to our jobs ~ and all of that is prohibited under this nonsense.
Spend your time getting it repealed.
yes, that would put it on a dime.
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