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You can mark today in your diary as the day the United States offically started down the road to socialism. We have driven parts of this road from time to time, but now we have offically plotted the coarse into our GPS. Today, the House of Representatives voted 219-212 to accept and pass the bill that already passed the Senate back in December. President Obama is expected to sign it into law on Tuesday.
Speaker Pelosi said, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy." So I guess now that it's passed, we'd better find out what's in it, right? But that's not an easy task when the final bill is around 2000 pages and even the President's Chief Actuary tells the Republican leaders that he and his staff "will not be able to prepare our analysis within this very tight time frame, due to the complexity of the legislation."
Here are the few details I was able to glean from an Assiated Press article written today:
- Bans private insurances from denying coverage for preexisting conditions
- Bans private insurances from placing lifetime limits on policies
- Bans private insurances from cancelling policy if policy holder becomes ill
- Requires all americans to purchase health insurance, or be fined (first time in American history that a person has been required to purchase something in order to be a legal citizen)
- Subsidizes premiums for families with incomes up to $88,000 a year (if you make $88,000/yr then you should be able to afford insurance)
- Increases taxes for many health care providers (there goes mine and and my wife's raises)
- Adults without children can now get Medicaid
- Medicaid availble for those whose income is up to %33 percent above the poverty level
- Children can stay on parents plan until age 26 (get a job)
- Cuts over $500 billion from current Medicare coverage (in otherwards, Medicare won't cover as much as they use to)
According to Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich:
"The American people know you can't reduce health care costs by spending $1 trillion or raising taxes by more than one-half trillion dollars. The American people know that you cannot cut Medicare by over one-half trillion dollars without hurting seniors," said Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich.
"And, the American people know that you can't create an entirely new government entitlement program without exploding spending and the deficit."
Apparently our country's leadership doesn't "know" what we know.
Like almost any law passed, there are pros and cons. The first three bullets in your list are absolutely the best thing about this bill.
ReplyDeleteYour second-to-last bullet comment is sad though. Get a job? It's really judgmental. Many kids live at home (with parents) to finish college, something that didn't happen as often in previous generations. I think there's nothing wrong with that. Also (I'm specifically talking about me in this run-on sentence): Some people get sick and can't hold a job that provides benefits because they are too sick, and they can't get better because they have no insurance to pay for expensive medical care because they are too old to be on their parent's policy, but they would like to be healthy and work and lead a normal life.
I am worried about what will happen with Medicare now.
I'm surprised you didn't comment on the education package Obama tacked on to this bill (that was previously voted against). I'd love to read what you have to say about that.