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Unions Pressuring Liberal Dem Senator Wyden From The Left On Health Care Plan
A new group of labor unions is joining together to pressure a Senator on what they view as an anti-working families health plan, with the unions preferring instead a greater public option and opposing taxation of health benefits. The Senator is none other than ... liberal Democrat Ron Wyden from Oregon.
The National Education Association, AFSCME and the United Food and Commercial Workers are joining together to run this radio ad in the Portland and Eugene markets:
"The last thing we need is to pay more. But Senator Ron Wyden would tax the health care benefits we get at work - as if they were income," the announcer says. "Taxing health benefits? That doesn't make sense."
Check out the full script after the jump.
Announcer: Finally, Congress is working to fix health care. They should start by making insurance affordable for families and businesses.
We should also have a choice - keep the insurance we have, or pick another plan, including a public health insurance option. That way we'll have good benefits at a price we can afford no matter what happens.
The last thing we need is to pay more. But Senator Ron Wyden would tax the health care benefits we get at work - as if they were income. Taxing health benefits? That doesn't make sense.
Tell Senator Wyden that Oregon families want quality, affordable health care - not taxes on their health care benefits.
Call Senator Wyden today at 888-460-0813. We can fix health care without taxing the benefits we already have.
Paid for by The National Education Association in partnership with AFSCME and the United Food and Commercial Workers.
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Josh
Matt
Eric
Wasn't taxing employer health care McCain's health reform plan? Essentially to end the employer-based health care system? I'm all for ending employer-based health care, but only if we are moving the primary burden from the employers and onto the state (single payer). Just letting businesses off the hook while throwing the burden on individuals is a horrible idea.
May 19, 2009 10:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
totally agree with you Lux...this is ass backwards to tax us on health benefits while not giving us single payer approach. crazy, isn't it?
May 19, 2009 10:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Everyone read up on the Wyden plan. We're probably going to get stuck with something like it.
May 19, 2009 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
That's what I'm afraid of. I'd rather wait and see if we get a better Senate that can pass a better plan in 2011.
May 19, 2009 10:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
That's what the folks said to Harry Truman. That worked out really, really great, didn't it?
The notion that we should just wait on the chance that we *might* get "a better Senate" in 2011 is beyond inane. Like Social Security and Medicare and Wage/Labor laws, you take what you can get then make them better over time.
May 19, 2009 11:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is quite possible for something to be politically worse than nothing. Especially when it involves a political poison pill like ending the tax subsidy for employer-provided health care and forcing people to stand face to face with the current health insurance providers with no employer to negotiate on their behalf and, as looks increasingly likely, no public option to keep the insurance providers honest. If this goes as badly as if could, it could wreck the prospects of both the Democratic Party and real health care reform for a long time to come.
May 19, 2009 11:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
If the Democrats don't take a stab at healthcare reform NOW, there will be no reason to elect more Democrats in 2010. People want something done.
Even making sure no one can be denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions is better than our current system. But, we will get more than that, although not everything most of us will want.
Every program we have--Medicare, Social Security, SCHIP--was dragged into existence with bare bones and made better over time.
We've been waiting for the "perfect" time since Truman. There is not and will never be a "perfect" time. Healthcare reform is in the bloodstream now. No more waiting.
May 19, 2009 11:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Again, if they DO "take a stab" and come up with a disaster, that will be far more true. We're not talking it being bare bones or imperfect; I get that. With Wyden and no public option we're talking something that could potentially make a lot of people WORSE off. A lot of angry people. Who will vote.
May 19, 2009 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
The solution is not to wait for the "perfect" senate; the solution is to push bad options off the table.
And to be realistic about what's possible. This constant demand for single payer is destructive. We're scrambling just to get 50 votes for a public option. Yet, folks think we have a chance at single payer?? Clueless.
May 19, 2009 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
There we agree. And taxing employer-provided insurance, especially if not accompanied by a public option, is just such a bad option. That's all I'm saying.
May 19, 2009 12:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Agreed.
May 19, 2009 12:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Survey after survey shows a huge percentage of Americans actually favor the single payer option because it is the most cost effective and the most fundamentally fair. The whole civilized world uses the single payer template for this same reason. Yet in America we are so intimidated by right wing name calling (socialist) and corporate greed (insurance/pharma) that we take the logical solution off the table before the bargaining has begun. Where is the pressure to compromise when the left gives up the common sense position without a fight? If we were fighting hard for single payer just maybe getting a public option compromise wouldn't seem to be slipping away too.
Health benefits SHOULD be taxed above a certain level, where they become luxuries and not basic necessities, and there sure as hell better be a public insurance option when this is done and signed, or WTF do we elect Democrats for?
May 19, 2009 5:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Fuck off, asswipe. Don't you have some people to malign because of their religion?
May 19, 2009 10:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Classy, as always. Real classy. Way to stay on topic. Heckuva job.
May 21, 2009 1:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Just a quick note to Kleefeld, et al.: Wyden ain't a liberal Dem, he's known out here in Oregon primarily as a spineless and gutless Dem who goes only where it's safe to go, and no further. He sticks his head out for nothing, and especially not good, solid progressive or liberal ideals. For example, he never endorsed either HRC or Obama during the primaries, and on the recent senate vote on establishing a national usury rate for credit cards, he voted with the rethugs first, then after assuring the votes were not there to pass the bill, he switched his vote to make it look, on the role call, like he was in favor all along. The man needs to be replaced.
May 19, 2009 3:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's what we like to call AN OPPORTUNIST.
May 19, 2009 4:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let's be a little fairer to Wyden, now. He's been a voice in the wilderness on things like surveillance and the range of civil rights abuses, staged a lonely LITERAL filibuster for Oregon's county payments to be extended at least a couple years to keep rural counties from being bankrupted, proposed a tax reform that is a solidly progressive restructuring, and his health plan--though I don't recall it having benefit taxes before--was a solid middle step of universal coverage to single payer, because the mandate to get health care was backed with a Medicare option. He's an outstanding environmentalist, as pro-choice as they come, and other than being coincidentally favorable to his campaign financiers like most of our politicians, is a fundamentally clean guy.
Not to excuse or disagree with the complaints here, just don't want some of his obvious high points to go unmentioned. We could have Inhofe and Coburn in OR, and it's not fair to Wyden not to recognize that.
May 20, 2009 11:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
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May 25, 2009 7:14 AM | Reply | Permalink