Unnecessary in whose opinion? If doctors think it’s necessary and patients think it’s necessary then as far as the people that matter are concerned, it’s necessary. Medicare patients will respond very negatively to Medicare getting in between patients and their doctors.
Yes, at least one chamber of Congress, except for those twelve years. It’s entirely the Democrats’ fault that this didn’t happen sooner.
Not their fault it didn’t happen. Just wondering why they suddenly got interested when they needed a trillion bucks.
Sometimes I wonder if they build waste into programs on purpose so that they can later fix the waste and spend the money somewhere else.
BTW, Ezra Klein agrees with me:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/09/20/obamas-unconvincing-theory-of-change/
The health-care process…was a firmly “inside game” strategy. There were backroom deals with most every major interest group and every swing legislator. There was the “cornhusker kickback” and the “Louisiana purchase.” There was a multi-month period during which the entire process ground to a halt so Senate Finance chair Max Baucus could negotiate with five of his colleagues in a room that no members of the press or public were allowed into.
There’s a vast difference between medically necessary for the care of the patient, financially necessary for the doctor to bill enough to make the patient worthwhile and emotionally necessary for the patient.
You spend years with the insurance company getting between you and the doctor. Why should it work any differently with Medicare?
Perhaps it shouldn’t. But people expect government insurance to NOT behave like private insurance.
That kind of change is in fact “ending Medicare as we know it”.
It won’t behave like private insurance. For example, it won’t have people who are paid bonuses for denying healthcare on a case by case basis.
Arguably any change would end Medicare as we know it. Since the math says that Medicare as we know it cannot be sustained, that’s going to happen. It’s a lot less unrecognizable than a voucher system, at least.
I agree there too. What I don’t agree with is saying, “Look over there! Part D donut hole closed!” while you’re doing it.
Sure, vote for a political party that campaigns that government doesn’t work and is a problem to be removed. Nothing like having a candidate that believes his job is to not do it.
Once you get elected. Not a hard question to answer.
You become an insider even before you’re sworn in?
Does it work the other way, too? Do you become an outsider again once we know when you’ll be leaving office? By that rationale, Obama will be an outsider starting on Wednesday, November 7th; he’ll either have 10 weeks, or 4 years and 10 weeks remaining as president. I look forward to the fixes he’s able to implement during that time.
You mean the night before he leaves. That’s when most Presidents love to do things that would have been politically impossible before.
He could actually save his legacy a little if he chose not to do those last minute things. Those are a clear example of abuse of the political process and a change candidate would have nothing to do with them.
No, I know what I meant. If OMG is claiming that one becomes an insider once it is known that he will be taking office, I want to know if he becomes an outsider again as soon as it’s known that he’ll be leaving office.
I guess it depends. Jimmy Carter sure seems to qualify, although he may never have stopped being an outsider judging by his relations with Congress.
But if Obama joins a lobbying firm or something…
You know about the medicare part D donut hole? You know that the ACA also funds the complete elimination of that donut hole right?
They’ve been saying the cuts to medicare are to eliminate overpayments to insurance companies from day 1.
Why should we shove medicare through the private insurance market if its going to cost 15% more than doing it directly. The unnecessary injection of the market into areas where the government is more efficient has always struck me as stupid. If no private insurer can deliver better service than medicare for the same price then why force the issue?
The Baucus causus aside, it was things like the Louisiana purchase and the cornhusker kickback that really soured a lot of people (including me) on the ACA.
The Baucus caucus was a good faith attempt to try come to achieve concensus among a bipartisan group of centrists that would be able to present something that could pass.
In what way? Medicare has been getting between you and your doctor since its inception. Medicare NEVER paid for everything your doctor wanted it to pay for.
What POTUS ever joined a lobbying firm. POTUS makes money giving speeches and spends most of their time being advocates for something.