Archive for the ‘Healthcare’ tag
Welcome to the Bullshit Era
In the old days, policy used to have at least some potential to become reality, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that in America at least, those days are over. Nothing anybody seems to suggest from the President on downwards seems to mean a hill of beans anymore. It’s as if the country is set on a course for planet “slow decline into mediocrity” (or worse) and there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it. All this despite some soaring rhetoric from the President, and plenty of hot air from just about everyone else.
Here’s a rundown of the current bullshitian landscape.
Jobs.
Anyone who thinks a $30-40bn Jobs bill is going to pass without being watered down to meaninglessness is dreaming. And it’s not certain why it will fare any better than the $800bn dollar stimulus package which was supposed to rebuild the economy and create, yes, that’s right. Jobs. The problems that the US economy is facing are profound and structural. Just throwing money at the problem without deep and lasting changes to – industrial, fiscal, and budgetary policy – sorry about the ‘P word’ again – needs to rethink very, very quickly. We don’t make stuff here. Some people suggest that manufacturing in the US isn’t “cost effective”, but my question is this. Why is it cost-effective in Germany?
Any-way, moving on to…
Wall Street
The President talks a great game about beating up onWall Street, especially now he’s been sobered up to the problem by the Massachusetts debacle. But it’s a tad too late. In January of 2009 the banks were still sinking in the quicksand. That’s the time to make them an offer they can’t refuse. After we’ve pulled them out, and they’ve put on fresh $500 shirts is not the time to be making a deal with them. And yet this is what we did. We had our boot on their necks and we blew our chance to make the single most destructive force in this country pay. And now, in the cold light of day, is anyone in the 41 strong Republican Senate caucus going to vote for meaningful financial reform? Uhh, Nope. Will Wall Street be constrained from ruining the nation again? Nope.
Healthcare
What was once a burning need is now a footnote that’s about to be buried ahead of the mid term elections. The Democrats thought that Healthcare reform was a winner, but after being thoroughly outmaneuvered by GOP demagoguery that idea is now going the way of another smart idea…
Stopping Global Warming.
Let’s get this straight. The world is waiting for America to get its act together on controlling greenhouse gases. But is 41 strong Republican Senate caucus going to vote fr meaningful climate legislation? Uhh, Nope. It will die.
Education
Ah, what’s the point. Nobody cares.
Finally, on domestic policy, my personal favorite…
High Speed Trains
California just got $2bn dollars of Federal Stimulus funding to build a high speed train network. Sounds great, right? Except for the fact that the total bill (and that’s before the usual corruption, incompetence, delays and overruns) is $42 billion. Chances of this happening in a state with a perennial budget crisis? Nil.
Moving abroad now…
Iraq
At a certain point in time, the United States is going to have to face the rather unpleasant moment when our last grunt gets on the last transport plane out of Baghdad Airport. Cue the bombs. Cue the resurgence of the insurgents and the reemergence of the Mahdi Army. Hello, reality.
Afghanistan
One day conference in London. Karzai tells us he’s going to end corruption and undo a millennia’s worth of being a basketcase that’s swallowed up empires, as well as buying off the Taliban recruits without guaranteeing their protection. He’s got 18 months before the troops we’re about to land there ship out. You do the math.
Iran
Sanctions work. And if you believe that, you think Sarah Palin is a closet liberal. Will the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 be able to justify NOT attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities? Unlikely.
Haiti
Will the outpouring of aid from Americans be matched by a long-term commitment to fix Haiti? Watch the BS flow. Ain’t nothing gonna change in Haiti.
So you see, on just about every front, there’s an awful lot of talk about how we’re going to fix things.
And then there’s reality.
Welcome to the Bullshit Era.
Can We Start The Healthcare Debate Again Please?
Healthcare Reform has become a Swamp Thing. Not Good.
Let’s face it, things have got a little out of hand. Obama’s recent press conference pretty much capped off a bad few weeks for the President on Healthcare. It’s almost as if part of him wanted to derail the whole healthcare discussion with an idiotic debate about whether it was right to cuff Professor Gates as he tried to break into his own house or not.
But it didn’t have to be like this. It could have been much smoother.
The great Congressional meltdown on healthcare has been a sorry sight to watch. The bickering Blue Dogs threatening to side with the GOP, the at once vacuous and victorious comments by the likes of Senators Baucus and Grassley that we “can” reach a deal, the seemingly inexorable slide into debate over which healthcare facts are in facts facts and which facts are in fact fiction.
We’re scratching our heads. We have a smart, committed, still popular President with command of the issues, a man who can actually make a press conference interesting, and we have a nation that’s hurting for real change in the way healthcare is dispensed. So what’s the problem?
There are actually a few.
The first is that for all the talk of wanting to overhaul healthcare, there are millions who like their own healthcare just the way it is. The second is that the healthcare special interest group is very, very smart, insidious, and rich. The third is that the President made the unwise move to try and make healthcare reform deficit neutral. I can hear the laughs of derision now. How could he not? But the answer is yes he could. (with apologies to the President himself).
The derisive laughter goes up a gear. How? It says. Go on, tell us.
By telling the nation that healthcare reform is an investment in America’s future that makes US companies more competitive in world marketplace. And that like any investment – it costs money upfront, but will earn a rich return of 6-7% of GDP, or hundreds of billions of dollars a year poured back into the US economy, money that will get us out of the rut, money that will enable us to take on the Europeans, the Chinese, the world.
Social Justice is about as popular to Americans as a root canal. It’s not the way to sell anything. Sure people like to look as if they care about each other, but they don’t. In this country, despite the odds, we’re all gonna make it big – and usually at the expense of our neighbor. So tell people that it’s good for business, and everyone loves the idea. It appeals to the reptilian in us. Never mention the poor, becuause that just makes the rich really nervous, and as they have more influence, it’s a bad idea.
Avoid the issue of rationing healthcare. Of course we’re going to have ration healthcare. We ration it now. Just ask anyone with a pre-existing condition. But when private companies ration stuff, it’s just the market at work. If a government does it, well that’s a whole other story. Healthcare in America is treated as a personal issue. In other countries it’s a national issue. In order to make it a national issue here, we need to talk about it in terms everyone can agree on, and that means seeing it as an investment in everyone’s chance to be a millionaire.
Some might say that this is calculated rhetorical idea that’s cynical and low. I’d completely agree. But at least it has a better chance of working than the tortured technocratic approach we have now. Republicans and Special Interest can’t argue with it without trying to disprove it – which is impossible. It’s a trap they don’t want to fall into because it’s empirically correct. Right wing Democrats will be able to keep their seats in swing districts and as for the Progressives, they’ll go along, they always do.
And if anyone complains about the costs, we should just give them this. We just paid out billions upon billions to keep Wall Street afloat. Isn’t it time we actually paid for something that helped America rather than its fatcats for a change? Democrats and Republicans in the heartland can all agree with that. Rich and poor are all looking for a break right now.
Obama has shown his great skill with words. But he’s an honest man not a “sales” man. And right now we desperately need the latter. We need a pitch, a simple pitch, just a few words is all it takes. Something to fire up the masses. But we ain’t getting it from the President, who by leaving the “details” of healthcare to Congress threw an opportunity for change into the swamp, from whence its unlikely it will ever be retrieved.
Leadership is what we needed. Simple, forthright leadership.
All we got a guy trying to break into his own house.
Now It’s Up to the Democratic Congress to Step Up
a fresh faced bill clinton in 1993. he came from hope, he ended up nowhere.
In 1993 Clinton arrived on a heady wave of enthusiasm, dedicated to undoing some of the excesses of Reaganism. He made a few stumbles, he announced a sweeping healthcare initiative and he got nowhere. There are many reasons for his failure. The sheer newness of the administration, presentation issues, and this – he got very limited support from a Democratically controlled Congress. That opened the door for Gingrich’s charges of stasis and corruption that led to the Contract for America, and sweeping mid-term victories. That broadly was the end of the Clinton Administration as an effective liberally-driven government. It’s the main reason that the Reagan Revolution was not shattered. Clinton became merely a painful interregnum.
Cut to 15 years later. Obama is getting it right. The budget is a great document, the bipartisan experiment is over, the decision to leave troops behind in Iraq is correct, and the healthcare, energy, and education agendas are on course. Now it’s up to the Democratically elected Congress to respond. Obama’s charm offensive is wasted on the GOP. Obama appears to have realized that. The true targets of his charm offensive should be members of his own Senate caucus with a more conservative viewpoint. Read the rest of this entry »
Daschle Out. Good News For Healthcare Reform?
As the new President’s stumbles continue, we’re still looking for a clue that will help us confirm what kind of President he’s going to be. And now that Daschle is gone, we’re going to have an opportunity to see how serious Obama is about Healthcare reform. If he goes for someone soaked in special interest money, rather than an inspired healthcare visionary and expert, we’ll know that the President is a cautious tweaker, rather than a leader interested in lasting and genuine change. Sure hope he chooses the latter, but I’m having my doubts
Healthcare Reform IS The Economic Stimulus We Need
let's hope the ambulance is coming because there is no time to waste
In today’s NYT, Paul Krugman wonders why we haven’t heard more about major healthcare reform in the first few days of the new administration. His concern is that the economic crisis will only make the oncoming healthcare catastrophe that much more severe. It’s a very good point. Krugman surmises that perhaps solving the economic meltdown is dominating the agenda to the exclusion of almost everything else.
But Krugman doesn’t go far enough. What he fails to mention is that solving the healthcare crisis will, over the medium term, will dramatically help overcome America’s deep economic weaknesses.
It goes like this. Regardless of the plan adopted, and it’s most likely to be a build on Obama’s idea of offering a competitive government plan that will release the grip on our healthcare held by profiteering private insurance companies, the new system will have a very significant downward pressure on healthcare costs. Read the rest of this entry »
Where Are They Now? Immigration Reform.
illegal shmillegal
Conveniently put aside most probably by a pact between Obama and McCain, the I-word was not uttered once during the election campaign. I mean pigs wearing lipstick got about ten thousand times the airtime. John McCain walked away from the sensible immigration reform he championed for fear of losing the base that he’d been so studiously courting. And Obama, as a Democrat saw it as a net vote loser, especially in states like New Mexico and Colorado which were a firewall for his electoral strategy.
And yet it was only a few months ago, that the news was full of stories about marches in Los Angeles, and border fences being built, and extremely irate sheriffs in Mariposa County, Arizona. There was talk of vigilantes and ‘minutemen’, posses to round up the illegals, and nightmarish tales of containers turned coffins. The news cycle is a funny thing. Immigration was just dropped like a hot tamale. Read the rest of this entry »
The Fair Ladies Of Maine
Judging from his appointments so far, it’s becoming pretty clear that Obama is going to mean business when he takes over in two months time. Just to take one example, the appointment of Tom Daschle as Health and Human Services Secretary is a clear sign that Healthcare reform is front and center. Daschle is a former Majority Leader in the Senate and knows how to play the legislative game better than just about anyone else. Who better to help reform through Congress.
You can bet that Obama’s healthcare reform package is going to contain an awful lot that the GOP Senate Caucus is going to hate. In about three seconds all talk of bipartisanship will be off, because they will filibuster. Or at least try to. My guess is that the Dems end with 57, (they will probably win Minnesota by a handful of votes). That means, including Bernie Sanders, and the recently exonerated Joe Lieberman, they’ll have 59 votes. That leaves them one shy to beat the filibuster.
Which is where the fair ladies of Maine come in… Read the rest of this entry »