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Obama: I Could Support A Robust Health Care Co-operative
President Obama's been pretty consistent in his support of a public option, once going so far as to say any health care bill he signs must include one. But how broad is his definition of public option?
Here's what he told Time's Karen Tumulty. "I think in theory you can imagine a cooperative meeting that definition."
Obviously sort of the legal structure of it is less important than practically how can it operate. There are concerns that in the past, attempts at setting up co-ops have not been successful because they just haven't been able to get off the ground; sort of the start-up energy involved may not exist if you're doing a state-by-state co-op effort as opposed to a broad national plan.
That's roughly the Schumer position--if a co-operative can operate like a national government-run insurance program, then he'd likely support it. That's clarifying, in light of developments in the Senate Finance Committee. But it might just take the little-remaining wind out of the sails of some reformers.
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To quote Glenn Greenwald (quoting Matt Taibi)over at today's Salon (http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/07/29/politico/index.html):
.July 29, 2009 11:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
this is a true assemssment of where health care reform is heading unless the democrats grow some rather large cajones!
July 29, 2009 11:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
That is a very perceptive comment by Greenwald. A corollary is that our government exists to protect corporations from voters, and to protect the wealthy from voters. But, whenever you stand between a wealthy person and his opportunity to triple his wealth you get trampled. The government exists to assist in the trampling, too.
July 29, 2009 11:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, I agree with this. If you look at the FDIC or some other quasi-government agency, this is how they work. The real problem isn't with calling it or even structuring it as a co-op, it's that Baucus and company have no intention of allowing it to work like this.
For all his faults, Rockefeller truly gets this.
July 29, 2009 11:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
That's exactly right. The devil is always in the details. What you call it doesn't matter. It's possible to have something called a "public option" that has been so gutted as to be useless. The real question is "Will the co-op in the legislation actually accomplish the stated goal, or is it a fig leaf?"
July 29, 2009 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is actually my fear. That is, I don't want a public option if the only people eligible for the public option are people who are unemployed or otherwise uncovered AND if people have to purchase insurance. The end-result will be a large tax increase.
For the public option to work, it has to be highly subsidized (up to $100,000 in income, for example), given the cost of insurance, and it has to be open to the public. Otherwise, the goal of it -- making this a more competitive marketplace -- will be eviscerated.
July 29, 2009 12:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Obama translated: "If you call it a co-op and it otherwise works just as well as a public option, I could theoretically support it. But it must be just as good in keeping insurance companies honest and driving costs down as a public option."
I can live with that. What I can't live with is the current bill coming out of the Finance Committee, but it's pretty clear that bill doesn't meet Obama's requirements.
July 29, 2009 11:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, I would prefer that he had been a little more forthright in defense of the public option but I can live with these remarks. Obama is not the problem here.
July 29, 2009 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
If this non-profit co-op is available nationally, in a competitive exchange, and the government provides the start-up money, good. Furthermore, the co-op should be something like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac used to be, with the implied guarantee of the federal government that it would never go under. Essentially, a public option with a wrinkle in the funding structure. This I can live with, as long as there's an employer mandate, which I think will be coming regardless of whether there's a public option or a co-op.
July 29, 2009 12:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
lol.
Everyone hears the words by argue over what they mean and how they mean what they want them to mean.
the public option is dead and it has been.
Obama will settle for some bill telling everyone what it will do but of course it wont do anything.
The republicans will high five each other while the profits roll in over the dead american people.
Obama has lost the support of every voter that expected him to do what is right.
He wont ever be able to get the dems in the senate to supprt him without they get what they want first.
The writings on the wall .
Pretend all you need to.
And like Taibi, I saw this coming.
July 29, 2009 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm so disgusted with Obama, I think I'm gonna hurl. What a pussy.
Here's my hope: Obama knows that a public option will never get out of finance because Baucus is a total asshole loser so he's just doing this to move the ball to the next stage.
If that's not the case, I'm totally disgusted.
We have 60 senators. We have the budget reconcilliation process as a fallback. Given all that, there is absolutely no reason to let the repugs and conservadems roll us.
Pussies. All of them!!
July 29, 2009 11:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm surprised to be the one bucking up your confidence in Obama (unless you're snarking, in which case congratulations, excellent job!) but I'm about 95% confident that IS the case. I seem to recall reading comments from Administration insiders that their strategy is to get SOMETHING past the Senate Finance Committee roadblock and then fix things during the merger with the HELP bill and/or in conference. And I'm not sure how else they can play it since Sen Fuckus (DINO-MT)is so truly hopeless.
July 29, 2009 12:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, it remains to be seen. Don't give in yet. Trust me, many times over the past 24 hours I tried to think of what it would take to move to Canada, but that's defeatist thinking.
Think of it this way: Baucus' bill, according to the NYT, would pare back the coverage for SCHIP in addition to not including an employer mandate and a very watered down "co-op" option. There is NO WAY that gets 60 votes in the Senate. I think this ridiculous bill will be blended with the HELP bill and we'll end up with a broadly available national co-op with some kind of financial backing from the government, an employer mandate, and SCHIP will be left intact.
July 29, 2009 12:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
its not a question of giving in!.
geez.
these politicians know what we know.
its about wanting what is right.
i take the president at his word.
and why should i have to read in to and hope something is the case??
cant they tell us the truth?
July 29, 2009 12:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
You take the president at his word? Since when?????
You've spent a year calling him a liar and nitpicking every word for the worst possible intrepretation but now you suddenly "take the president at his word."
Loser.
July 29, 2009 12:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, that was a reply to FreeRider.
July 29, 2009 12:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep. Looks like we've switched places!
I'm just sick over this and hope this is an effort to get sorry assed Baucus to do SOMETHING!
But this is outrageous. We're basically giving away the store to get a few republican votes we don't need. Why should what Grassley wants (who voted against a SC nominee for the first time ever) be more important than Sherrod Brown and Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer?
This bill is shaping up to be a big fat insurance giveaway! They will get 45 million more customers with nothing to drive down the cost. Middle class families will be forced to buy their shitty products that they can't afford.
It's complete, fucking lunacy!!
July 29, 2009 12:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Baucus is a fraud, and regardless of whether we get reform this year or not (and I think we will, though I think it will inevitably disappointing; oh well, in 10 years we'll have no choice but to have single payer!), progressives need to do everything possible in six years to primary Baucus' ass and get him out.
July 29, 2009 12:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
We can't wait six years to be rid of this grossly incompetent insurance shill. We've got to find him in bed with a dead woman or live boy and force him to resign so that the Democratic governor can appoint someone else.
This sums up Baucus to a T!
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/33420
July 29, 2009 12:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, LBJ would have ordered J. Edgar to have agents tailing Fuckus 24/7/365 but I suppose we really don't want to go back to those days...
July 29, 2009 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm willing. I want that fucking sell-out outta there!!
July 29, 2009 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
no surprise here. Obama doesn't really care about this issue, otherwise he'd be twisting arms like he did for his precious War Funding.
The dem's worst fear was realised when they got 60 senators - people would assume they could actually get things done. People would expect them to follow through on campaign promises to make this country better for people.
They really don't want to do anything like that, only to keep the status quo, and to pass meaningless symbolic legislation with Orwellian names.
We get climate legislation that is a joke, cash for clunkers that is a joke, now we will get a Healthcare bill that does nothing, and it will take four or more years to even take effect.
Frauds all.
July 29, 2009 12:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that there would have to be some sort of government guarantee for the co-ops. People would be skittish to move their health coverage into a co-op that might go under.
July 29, 2009 12:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
I just think the key is for both House and Senate progressives to stick to their guns and continue making it clear that they will not vote for a crap bill. The Blue Dogs- and Obama, to the extent that he could be exerting more forceful leadership- will blink. They know they can't afford to go into November 2010 with bupkis to show the voters.
July 29, 2009 12:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
A co-operative. Run by insurance companies.
Okay, I don't know exactly how they'll do it, whether through ridiculously high administrative costs and consequently ridiculously high deductibles, or by kicking people off of their own private plans (for the sin of filing a claim) and forcing them to go with the co-operative. But, I know that the insurance companies will not take a revenue cut. Guaranteed. Ain't gonna happen.
The insurance companies will keep themselves between you and your health care and they will cut themselves in for however much they wish out of the price you're paying for it. Their execs will still get mega-bonuses. How do I know? Look at the bank bailouts. Look at AIG. Congress will be careful not to institute any safeguards that would keep the insurance companies from continuing the lavish lifestyle to which they're accustomed. And they'll act stunned when the news reports come out about. They'll want us to think it was just an oversight.
I've seen this movie too many times already. Please turn it off.
July 29, 2009 12:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
CNN had breaking news during the coverage of Obama's townhall that an agreement has been reached. I hope this is not the one where SCHIP is removed. The report says $100 billion will be saved. Sounds like it may be SCHIP
July 29, 2009 12:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's Waxman's committee that reached a compromise. I haven't seen anything on SCHIP, just that it would not peg public plan rates to those used in Medicare, and that businesses with payrolls of $500,000 or less would be exempt from the employer mandate.
July 29, 2009 1:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Waxman would NEVER sacrifice SCHIP. Never. I'm not worried.
Baucus? He'd sacrifice his mother, that lousy sack of shit.
July 29, 2009 1:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is beginning to look more and more like the Senator from Montana is the President. I am so disgusted with Obama, there are no words to describe. If he settles for co-ops, then whatever they do will be a complete failure. We have some co-ops already. Co-ops are controlled by the insurance industry! I'm telling my kids to think about careers in another country. We are so corrupt and so headed in the wrong direction that I don't see a future here for them.
July 29, 2009 1:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
The Obama haters like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and their ilk are opposing the health care reform of which they propably know very little or nothing at all.
Their wish and prayer is to see Obama fail and the health care reform has become their main hope on this.
The Swift -boaters are hard at work to lie, to misslead and to scare- monger, spending billions to get their discusting message to their supporters.
The amazing thing in this is that the majority of the Swift- boaters lies sits tight with the people who would benefit from health care reform the most. I'm not talking about the richest 1% but those angry and hatefull white men and women who follow their leaders like a bunch of sheep.
July 29, 2009 2:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yep. Looks like we've switched places!
I'm just sick over this and hope this is an effort to get sorry assed Baucus to do SOMETHING!
But this is outrageous. We're basically giving away the store to get a few republican votes we don't need. Why should what Grassley wants (who voted against a SC nominee for the first time ever) be more important than Sherrod Brown and Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer?
This bill is shaping up to be a big fat insurance giveaway! They will get 45 million more customers with nothing to drive down the cost. Middle class families will be forced to buy their shitty products that they can't afford.
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June 6, 2010 5:59 AM | Reply | Permalink