Thoughts of healthcare reform and Sunday dinner.....

[osodecanela]

I wrote to Dianne Feinstein on Wednesday and then let letter sit and percolate until this afternoon before sending it. I wanted to be sure that it said what I wanted to say how I wanted to say it. It galled me deeply several weeks back when I heard her say in an interview that there may not be the votes for real health care reform.

There may not be the votes? With 60 votes in the Democratic caucus, why the hell wouldn't there be the votes? Now granted, both Robert Byrd and Ted Kennedy are gravely ill, but with a Democrat in the White House who wants healthcare reform, a Democratic House that should have no difficulty on their end, and what should be a filibuster proof Democratic majority in the Senate, why on earth would we not have the votes? (Or was Will Rogers really correct when he said he wasn't a member of an organized party, he was a Democrat.)

Maybe it's me, and maybe I'm being simplistic, but if we can't get a substantive health-care bill through Congress now, what else is going to be required? An act of God? The complete meltdown of the US economy because of health-care costs?

In any event, I made it clear in my letter to Feinstein, I'm a Democrat, I'm a physician, and I vote. I spent untold hours this past fall phone banking and campaigning for things that I want to see happen. If she stands in the way of health-care reform, she will have one very pissed off voter here in the Bay Area who will do everything he can to see that she does not win her next election.

In any event, I followed my letter to Sen. Feinstein was one to Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, making a similar appeal for a public healthcare option. She's one of the gang of six on the Senate finance committee, apparently one of the few cooler heads in the non-lunatic fringe end of the Republican party. With the time I spend writing these letters have any yeild? Likely not, but if thousands more like me start lobbying their Senators, perhaps. Only time will tell. Meanwhile, every day I get word of another patient and has either lost their insurance, had a claim denied, or whose health plan is changing the beginning of next month to an insurance that I am not listed with.

But on to more pleasant thoughts. Sarah and Jeremy are coming over Sunday evening with their boys for supper. We're going on a culinary trip to the shtetls of Eastern Europe, with tzimmes and stuffed cabbage on the menu. I'm likely to make a challah and probably a luckshen kugel (noodle pudding) as well. I'm not sure yet about dessert; maybe a strudel, may be a babka, or perhaps even rugelach if I'm really motivated. We'll just have to see. It pleases me no end to hear that Jeremy is looking forward to hanging out with LJ. Maybe I'll invite Mel and Dan as well. (Are you reading this Melissa?)

Comments

[broduke2000.livejournal.com]

One should remember that even though there's alot of Demos, the southern ones are just like Republicans.

Also, with the scare put on them by those crazy Limbaugh Loonies at various town hall meetings, who knows what they're thinkin?

[oscarlikesbugsy.livejournal.com]

Here is the first-start at reform, if anyone wants to see what is on the table, so far, in black and white. I suspect the final product will make this look like the first draft of a screenplay...

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:HR03200:@@@L&summ2=m&#summary

The bottomline is that everyone will be forced into some type of healthcare coverage (or to pay a tax, if you "opt-out").

This, of course, is a huge boon to the insurance industry.

What do you get for that imposition? Well, it looks like you get Congress trying to write - and police! - minimum standards for health insurance contracts.

Wouldn't it be better to have a public option plan, that simply offers that standard to everyone who chooses it, _even over_ their employer-sponsored "plan"? Wouldn't that be letting competition drive the marketplace?

Playing around with caps and minimums - who came up with $5,000 and why - seems like a waste of time, to me. When will Congress stop writing hard figures like that into bills? That should be a formula, not a dollar figure. Why? Because dollar figures get out of date, and that's the excuse to re-open the legislation, during the next change in power. See the annual stupid dance that goes on over the alt min tax, for an idea, or how the rules on Roth-IRA conversions got changed, so that the most wealthy in the country can now save tax free on the back of a program that was supposed to help the least advantaged.

Agencies to study effectiveness? Do they have the power to subpeona health care data or otherwise mandate reporting from _throughout_ the system? I doubt it. That's why so few really understand the true drivers of health care inflation in America now and the field is wide-open for people to put the emphasis on whatever cross-section seems the most politically juicey to them.

Anyway, I share your despair about the Democratic party. I listen and most of what I hear is that we really do have what Chomsky called two factions of the business party, not two political parties.

[donkeygirl06.livejournal.com]

Sorry I missed dinner...Would have enjoyed it I think....But am glad I went to visit with the niece.