{"id":10615,"date":"2009-12-02T01:21:36","date_gmt":"2009-12-02T01:21:36","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-12-02T01:25:10","modified_gmt":"2009-12-02T01:25:10","slug":"fdl-action-health-care-update-monday-12109","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/2009\/12\/02\/fdl-action-health-care-update-monday-12109\/","title":{"rendered":"FDL Action Health Care Update: Tuesday (12\/1\/09)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" vspace=5 hspace=5 align=left src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2536\/3996343323_077bd43f47_m.jpg\">Here are the <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/\">FDL Action<\/a> health care reform highlights for Tuesday, December 1.<\/p>\n<p>1. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/dont-build-a-factory-in-america\/\">Jon Walker has some advice<\/a> &#8220;for every potential manufacturer and transnational company looking to expand&#8230;don&#8217;t start a single business-or expand an existing one-in this country until we really try to rein in health care costs.&#8221; Walker elaborates, &#8220;As a nation, we will not be able to compete going forward if we are spending upwards of an extra $6,000 on our workers health care compared to Germany, Japan, Canada, the UK, etc.&#8221; But wait, aren&#8217;t those all &#8220;socialist&#8221; countries? (snark)<\/p>\n<p>2. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/please-stop-lying-peter-orszag\/\">Jon Walker takes issue<\/a> with Peter Orszag&#8217;s assertion that &#8220;basically everything that has been put forward in health policy discussions for a decade is in this [health care reform] bill.&#8221; To the contrary, Walker writes, &#8220;This is not true at all, and Orszag knows it. The Senate bill does not even contain many of health care reforms <a href=\"http:\/\/www.barackobama.com\/pdf\/issues\/HealthCareFullPlan.pdf\">championed by Obama<\/a> on the campaign trail last year.&#8221; The result, in Walker&#8217;s view, is that the &#8220;bill does not do is take the serious steps that could reduce our national health expenditures by trillions of dollars in this country.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>3. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/to-congressional-staffers-hire-yourselves-some-help-and-give-yourselves-a-raise\/\">Jon Walker argues<\/a> that &#8220;We will never see a Washington not run by lobbyists until we make a commitment to hiring sufficient numbers of highly qualified staffers committed to doing the job long term.&#8221; Excellent point.<\/p>\n<p>4. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/tom-coburn-wasnt-always-so-enamored-of-medicare-advantage\/\">Jane Hamsher reminds us<\/a> that Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) &#8220;wasn&#8217;t always so enamored of Medicare Advantage,&#8221; a program &#8220;which Jon Walker recently said &#8216;may have the dubious distinction of being the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/doc.cfm?index=8268&#038;type=0\">biggest and most wasteful<\/a> form of corporate welfare in the country.'&#8221; Wait a minute, a Republican is being a liar and a hypocrite? I&#8217;m shocked! Shocked, I tell you! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p>5. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/even-carper-puts-the-burden-on-reid-for-killing-the-public-option\/\">Jon Walker writes<\/a> that even Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE), author of the terrible <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/11\/11\/carpers-no-good-super-terrible-completely-awful-new-new-new-%E2%80%9Calternative%E2%80%9D-to-the-public-option\/\">&#8220;non-public triggered co-op&#8221; idea<\/a>, says that &#8220;the decision to add his worthless idea to the bill is completely up to Harry Reid.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>6. Continuing his series of &#8220;what the Senate bill does better,&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/what-the-senate-bill-does-better-part-4-maintaining-schip\/\">Jon Walker points to<\/a> SCHIP, which will be eliminated under the House bill but, &#8220;[t]hanks in large part to the efforts of Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV),&#8221; will remain intact under the Senate bill. According to the CBO, &#8220;maintaining the SCHIP program would be roughly $15 billion cheaper than eliminating the program and moving the children into the new exchange.&#8221; Can we say &#8220;no brainer&#8221; on this one?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" vspace=5 hspace=5 align=left src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2536\/3996343323_077bd43f47_m.jpg\">Here are the <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/\">FDL Action<\/a> health care reform highlights for Tuesday, December 1.<\/p>\n<p>1. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/dont-build-a-factory-in-america\/\">Jon Walker has some advice<\/a> &#8220;for every potential manufacturer and transnational company looking to expand&#8230;don&#8217;t start a single business-or expand an existing one-in this country until we really try to rein in health care costs.&#8221; Walker elaborates, &#8220;As a nation, we will not be able to compete going forward if we are spending upwards of an extra $6,000 on our workers health care compared to Germany, Japan, Canada, the UK, etc.&#8221; But wait, aren&#8217;t those all &#8220;socialist&#8221; countries? (snark)<\/p>\n<p>2. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/please-stop-lying-peter-orszag\/\">Jon Walker takes issue<\/a> with Peter Orszag&#8217;s assertion that &#8220;basically everything that has been put forward in health policy discussions for a decade is in this [health care reform] bill.&#8221; To the contrary, Walker writes, &#8220;This is not true at all, and Orszag knows it. The Senate bill does not even contain many of health care reforms <a href=\"http:\/\/www.barackobama.com\/pdf\/issues\/HealthCareFullPlan.pdf\">championed by Obama<\/a> on the campaign trail last year.&#8221; The result, in Walker&#8217;s view, is that the &#8220;bill does not do is take the serious steps that could reduce our national health expenditures by trillions of dollars in this country.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>3. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/to-congressional-staffers-hire-yourselves-some-help-and-give-yourselves-a-raise\/\">Jon Walker argues<\/a> that &#8220;We will never see a Washington not run by lobbyists until we make a commitment to hiring sufficient numbers of highly qualified staffers committed to doing the job long term.&#8221; Excellent point.<\/p>\n<p>4. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/tom-coburn-wasnt-always-so-enamored-of-medicare-advantage\/\">Jane Hamsher reminds us<\/a> that Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) &#8220;wasn&#8217;t always so enamored of Medicare Advantage,&#8221; a program &#8220;which Jon Walker recently said &#8216;may have the dubious distinction of being the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbo.gov\/doc.cfm?index=8268&#038;type=0\">biggest and most wasteful<\/a> form of corporate welfare in the country.'&#8221; Wait a minute, a Republican is being a liar and a hypocrite? I&#8217;m shocked! Shocked, I tell you! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p>5. <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/even-carper-puts-the-burden-on-reid-for-killing-the-public-option\/\">Jon Walker writes<\/a> that even Sen. Thomas Carper (D-DE), author of the terrible <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/11\/11\/carpers-no-good-super-terrible-completely-awful-new-new-new-%E2%80%9Calternative%E2%80%9D-to-the-public-option\/\">&#8220;non-public triggered co-op&#8221; idea<\/a>, says that &#8220;the decision to add his worthless idea to the bill is completely up to Harry Reid.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>6. Continuing his series of &#8220;what the Senate bill does better,&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/fdlaction.firedoglake.com\/2009\/12\/01\/what-the-senate-bill-does-better-part-4-maintaining-schip\/\">Jon Walker points to<\/a> SCHIP, which will be eliminated under the House bill but, &#8220;[t]hanks in large part to the efforts of Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV),&#8221; will remain intact under the Senate bill. According to the CBO, &#8220;maintaining the SCHIP program would be roughly $15 billion cheaper than eliminating the program and moving the children into the new exchange.&#8221; Can we say &#8220;no brainer&#8221; on this one?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4343,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22],"tags":[8000,6911,7464],"class_list":["post-10615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-22","tag-8000","tag-6911","tag-7464"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pvhz-2Ld","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4343"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10615\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}