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   Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Gnter Grass still thinks reunification was a bad idea.
 Forty years of writing from Taylor Branch, James Fallows, Katherine Boo, Marjorie Williams, Joshua Micah Marshall, and more.
 With help from Washington, the for-profit college industry is loading up millions of low-income students with debt they'll never pay off.
 The best recent memoir from republican Washington is a hoax. That should tell you something.
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November 3, 2009
PRE-EXISTING POSITIONS ON PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS.... In June, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) declared, with precious little wiggle room, "Quality health coverage must exist for every American, regardless of preexisting health conditions." Three months later, he described coverage of people who have preexisting conditions "essential." As recently as last week, Boehner told Fox News that Republicans wanted to focus on helping "those with preexisting conditions." Now that the House Republican reform plan fails to prevent insurers from discriminating against patients with pre-existing conditions, this pre-existing rhetoric is something of a problem.
Now, as far as GOP lawmakers are concerned, the House reform plan doesn't completely ignore those who can't get affordable coverage due to a pre-existing condition. Republicans have "high-risk pools" in mind for these folks. But this approach has already proven to be ineffective. Karen Tumulty noted yesterday, "These pools already exist in more than 30 states, but they tend to be too expensive for those with limited means to buy into. And often, people cannot get into them for as long as a year after they apply." Harold Pollack had a helpful piece on the subject two weeks ago, explaining, among other things, that those covered through high-risk pools "pay higher premiums than private insurers typically charge healthy individuals. Individuals face average deductibles exceeding $1,500 and lifetime expenditure caps. People also endure waiting periods before they can enroll." It's worth noting, as Matt Corley does, that the Democratic plans include high-risk pools as a short-term fix until 2013, when reform measures and consumer protections are fully implemented. In other words, for Dems, HRPs are a stop-gap measure to hold us over until real reform kicks in. For Boehner & Co., HRPs are the entirety of the reform plan for those with pre-existing conditions. It's a proposal only an insurance company executive could love. —Steve Benen 2:00 PM Permalink | Trackbacks | Comments (14)Comments
1. Don't get sick What is your problem, SB? Boehner said "Quality healthcare", Or even "Mediocre quality healthcare". He is as honest as the day is long. Posted by: catclub on November 3, 2009 at 2:16 PM | PERMALINKIt's a proposal only an insurance company executive could love. ...and their scummy, paid-off corrupt political puppets... Posted by: neill on November 3, 2009 at 2:17 PM | PERMALINKOops, he only said "Quality health coverage", So I was right, except for the part that was egregiously wrong. I feel justified by this excuse. Posted by: catclub on November 3, 2009 at 2:19 PM | PERMALINK"It's a proposal only an insurance company executive could love." Congressman Boner loves him some insurance companies. Posted by: alvord on November 3, 2009 at 2:34 PM | PERMALINKIt appears that the Republicans have worked all summer to come with a reform plan that would include pre-existing conditions, but discovered that you can't really do it without universal coverage. Yeah - reality sucks, doesn't it? To quote a famous president who once said, "There's no 'there' there". Posted by: Marko on November 3, 2009 at 2:41 PM | PERMALINKWell let's see, the high-risk pools in thirty states have waiting periods of up to a year and lifetime expenditure caps? So, the Repubs are proposing WAITING PERIODS and RATIONING?!?! Posted by: martin on November 3, 2009 at 2:53 PM | PERMALINKWhy do we have to wait until 2013 to get things rolling anyway? Seems like with all of the tools available to us in this day and age we could do better that, oh, say when Medicaid was implemented. Posted by: doubtful on November 3, 2009 at 2:57 PM | PERMALINKI'd like to see some actual numbers for the plans - how much is a person/family going to spend on monthly premiums? (maybe I just haven't seen the estimates yet?) I predict the premiums are going to be big, and people are going to be very surprised. Maybe $250/month for a young, healthy person, $1,000 a month for an average family. A mandate is gonna really piss people off when they see the price tag. Most people feel insurance is *free* now, or is highly subsidized, since their employers pay it. Allowing private insurance companies to act as middle men in health care delivery is a mistake. Posted by: flubber on November 3, 2009 at 3:07 PM | PERMALINKSome Republican just finally showed up for the health care bill markup meeting (?) and said no Republicans were there because the bill is really long (1000 pages) so they need more time, since this will "restructure the whole economy." Apparently he hadn't had time to find out any thing at all about it, since it does not remotely even restructure the health care part of the economy, unfortunately. I know, just one more "Repubs are stupid and also bald faced liars" post, but well, they are. Posted by: emjayay on November 3, 2009 at 3:11 PM | PERMALINKI googled: premiums for low-cost “silver” plans offered in the exchanges [which pay an average of 70% of health care costs, ostensibly leaving 30% for patients] would average about $4,700 for single policies and about $14,400 for family policies in 2016. $4,700 ($391.66/month) for individuals. Well. Something having been proved ineffective is no reason -- to Republicans at least -- to not try it again. And again. And again. And ... Posted by: zhak on November 3, 2009 at 4:15 PM | PERMALINKSo, explain something to me. If the "most respected health care voices in the GOP" have been calling for coverage of pre-existing conditions, but it's not in the bill, then just who wrote the bill? Some intern who wasn't adequately instructed on the importance of the measure? Posted by: Ken on November 3, 2009 at 5:07 PM | PERMALINKPost a comment
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