Medicare Monstrosity

They went in to design a prescription drug benefit for seniors and came out with an aardvark.

It's said that a camel is a horse designed by committee. But the camel metaphor doesn't do justice to the Medicare prescription drug bill that came out of a House-Senate conference over the weekend. It is not a compromise but a weird combination of conflicting policy preferences. It is unprincipled in the technical sense. Nobody's principles are served by this bill.

The problem is that many conservatives, especially in the House, don't like Medicare as it is. They would prefer a system in which the government guaranteed everyone a certain amount of money that could be used to buy private health insurance. Ending Medicare as we know it is their long-term goal. They call this "expanding choice."

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How do you know this bill is such a great deal for the drug companies and HMOs? On word of an agreement last week, share prices of drug stocks soared. Watch your television set for the millions of dollars in advertising the drug and managed-care industry groups will spend to praise this bill. Watch your wallet, too.

It will be said that to oppose this bill is to oppose a prescription drug benefit. That's nonsense. After sending this aardvark on its way, congressional negotiators could get serious about a simple, straightforward prescription drug benefit that was supposed to be the real purpose of this enterprise. And, yes, let's then have a national debate on the future of Medicare, out in the open and not in some congressional back room.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54786-2003Nov17.html