I'm becoming more optimistic re: Public Option -- but I have a question:

When it passes, why will it take so long to implement it?

And... are there any provisions being discussed for those who need help immediately, or in the interim?

Thanks DU smarties -- I always turn to you for my education (and amusement :7) :hi:

putting in some kind of "interim coverage", until the full shebang kicks in.

No it won't be perfect. No it won't do everything we would want a health care system to do. But it's a good bit better than we've got now. And opens the door to future improvement.


EDIT: I imagine some good DUer will have the full details of this.

Yeah, I know it's not what we would like, but from what I'm gleaning (Shumer, Rockefeller, etc.) it's better than I feared for awhile...

Thanks!

Time to "set up the exchange" that the PO will be a part of. Meanwhile, 4 more years of being run roughshod by these crooks.

(Yes, I know -- Obama says when he signs, pre-existing and recision will be illegal immediately, but if you think that will just happen without a HUGE fight and them trying everything they can to keep on keeping on, you are dreaming. Reference the banks who are still pulling the same shit they were doing last year).

Ask me, its a waste of time and money. Medicare wasn't perfect, but LBJ got it up and running in 11 months.

Must have been the more advanced technologies we had back in the 1960s. ;)

Medicare -- I didn't even think about that. I remember a Canadian DUer saying it took several years to get their system up and running well, but hell, we already have it in place!

Must have been the ballsy LBJ who brooked no shit that did it.

And why I took an extended break from DU after the 2004 "election". I have long been a proponent for Medicare for All (and proud Deaniac). When the Pelosi/Reid policy of keeping the powder dry cropped up in 2006, I took a break from politics all together and just focused on the 2008 campaigns locally.

Happy to be back with you all, fueled by a layoff, but I can feel it building again. ALL we f'in need to do is expand Medicare to anyone who wants to pay premiums into it and there ya go, but no -- we will spend billions protecting the entrenched industries that put us in this position in the first place.

Sorry about the rant. I do feel better, but may go breathe into a bag for a few minutes.

:hi:

???? of our GNP (is it 6%?) -- and I'm uncertain how that would affect us economically if we were to do away with the insurance companies in one fell swoop, but surely those employees could be put to work somehow implementing a Medicare for all plan? I just think the plusses of such a plan would far outweigh the negatives. We've let our capitalism run amok. :grr: It's always the money. Always.

I agree - we can't kill this overnight. I am just sick about the last 40 years.

these years -- how did we let it come to this?

Repeal Santa Clara v. Southern Pacific, outlaw lobbyists and add to McCain/Feingold for term limits and cross your fingers.

was immediate access to a low cost high risk pool for individuals who are uninsurable. I haven't seen that in any bill yet.

Theoretically, the delay is to start collecting the funding for the program for several years before spending said funding to make the bill look more budget neutral.

Hmmmmm.

How many will pay into it and die waiting for it to materialize?

one he was referring to.

Large companies can opt to 'self-insure'. They hire an insurance company to administrate, but they deem their own terms.

Cornyn is proposing that these plans be exempt from regulation (including pre-existing conditions) as they are under ERISA and not "state regulated insurance".

Senator Rockefeller pulled the rock off of a huge slug on this one.

he's in the pocket of the insurance companies? I'll get the link and be right back.


Link: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x377127

:D

until 2013, it is business as usual while they set up 'exchanges'.

uninsured and micro-employers only.

This is just a part of getting there. Look at so many programs. They take time and different versions. I say we try to get what we can now and then work on it through the years. Public Option must pass though and that can lad to more reform. It could take time but we will finally get there. I can smell it. :p

spent lobbying against reform.

It took 11 months to get Medicare up and running after LBJ signed the bill. There is no excuse for this to take so long. Obama kept telling us we couldn't have single payer because we weren't "starting from scratch". This plan sounds like we are indeed starting from scratch with it while a single payer, Medicare for all plan would have had it's infrastructure already built and implementation could have started much sooner.