In the months since President Obama was inaugurated, many people who voted for him have been disappointed that change hasn’t happened more quickly, that some of the cherished changes haven’t happened yet.
Sen. Reid has just announced that he is sending a consensus health care reform bill to the Congressional Budget Office for scoring. The good news is that a public option is still alive and well. Apparently, the “opt-out” version is the one that will be going to CBO for scoring. This represents huge progress for the millions of Americans who are struggling to pay for health insurance and health care. And it demonstrates that when people speak up, the Senators listen. Despite repeated polls that consistently showed public support for increasing choice and competition, the lobbyists’ voices seemed to be carrying the day. Late last week, the tide began to turn. Why? Because hundreds of thousands of people took the time to telephone their elected representatives, voicing support for the public option.
True, the proposal Sen. Reid is sending to the CBO may not be as robust as some would prefer. It’s a long way from single-payer. But it represents a sea change from what health insurance reform looked like just a few weeks ago. The opt-out system as currently proposed would give individual states a year after implementation to decide they don’t want their citizens to be able to participate in a publicly-run, not for profit, self-sustaining insurance plan. The challenge facing the Senate leadership is essentially a political and procedural one — how to ensure that a threatened filibuster can be avoided or broken. That requires all 58 Democrats and the 2 Independents who caucus with them to stick together. Should any one of them not vote for cloture, meaningful reform could not happen. A final vote would require only 50 Senators to approve it, with the Vice-President casting the tie-breaking vote.
Sure, in an ideal world, this issue would have some measure of bipartisan support. But as Sen. Reid pointed out, unlike in previous years, he can count the total number of moderate Republicans on two fingers. In the past, moderate Republicans were able to work with Democrats to forge the kinds of compromises necessary to get bills passed. Things have changed. Those two GOP moderates are under enormous political pressure to block change. So Democrats must go it alone.
One of those moderates, Sen. Olympia Snowe, prefers a trigger to the opt-out plan. It presumes that the industry will voluntarily comply work to lower rates. Absurd! Rather, the public option should be open to anyone who is dissatisfied with their current insurance, not just those who are currently or find themselves uninsured. And it should be implemented much sooner than 2013. Else, like the banks have done in anticipation of the new credit card regulations taking effect that would limit interest rates, rates will rise before the new requirements are implemented.
My personal belief is that health insurance companies should not profit from the misery of their customers. Being not-for-profit doesn’t mean that they should operate as a charity or that their executives shouldn’t be compensated, but the greed that is an inherent component of capitalism shouldn’t get between consumers and their health care.
The lesson of the past few weeks in the health care reform debate is that concerned people do matter. As horror stories of real people who were denied coverage, or had coverage rescinded or found that despite insurance, they had been bankrupted by medical bills began to cut through the stories of doom and gloom promoted by the industry, people got angry. And they spoke up. On a single day, over 300,000 calls came into Congressional offices. Think about it. One in ten people took the time to get involved. We are, in fact, the change we’ve been waiting for. We just need to take action.
