Think again. They were so close they could taste it. We the people spoke against health care all year long, and we were ignored. Some Congressional leaders even stated they would vote for the bill even if it cost them their Congressional seat next election. They could care less that it is unconstitutional. Their Marxist health care train was rolling full steam ahead, seemingly unstoppable.
And then, the unthinkable happened. A gift for freedom straight from God. In Massachusetts, of all places. The Scott Brown Senate victory was a shocking blow to the left, to be sure. Most definitely it has derailed the Obamacare freight train. But if we think for one second that the left will leave that train off the track to rust, we are fooling ourselves right back onto their Marxist track.
We’ve heard from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that she doesn’t have the votes to pass the Senate bill through the House at this time. She also said “we will move forward.” She’s only stopping long enough to assess the damage, make necessary repairs, and get the train going again. As are Obama, Reid, and the rest of their cronies.
President Obama and Congress have plenty of time and opportunity to pass legislation that will increase health care prices, damage the system, and incrementally choke our freedoms. Democrats will try to pick off Republicans in the Senate and cut a deal. Keep in mind that this time last year many Senate Republicans supported some form of government-run health care, and Obama could call them out on it. There have been reports that members of Congress are considering this approach. There are plenty of potential candidates who can be be picked off for a bi-partisan, slimmed-down, incremental compromise bill.
For example: Hatch believes he could get 70 votes for a bill that deals with preexisting conditions, rating reform, and purchasing pools.
Another example: Some Senate Republicans and their staff were working on compromise language this summer that included many of the provisions in the Democrat bill. One of those provisions is the “guaranteed issue” mandate which prevents insurance companies from denying applicants with pre-existing conditions. If passed, it will increase the cost of health insurance for everyone. Guaranteed issue is a very compassionate argument and it sounds easy. However, it allows people to wait until they are sick before buying insurance, and when only sick people buy insurance, rates increase. New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maine, and Vermont all have guaranteed issue, and health insurance rates in these states are about twice as expensive as in most other states.
Yet another example: Other provisions Republicans were working to compromise on price controls and connectors (ie, managed competition in individual and small business insurance markets that limits consumer choice). Any final Reid-Pelosi-White House bill will be amendable in the senate, and it will only get worse on the Senate floor.
For a time, let’s bask in the train-derailing victory we’ve been given in Scott Brown. It’s a victory on the side of freedom, to be sure. But we must be diligent and never give up. Hold every Republican and Blue Dog lawmaker’s feet to the Constitutional fire until this battle is over.
For more insight into what the left is doing with their wrecked train, read Grace Marie-Turner’s Health Reform is Not Dead and Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar’s Dem Leaders Unite on Health Care Strategy.
Good post, Michelle.
I’ve been writing about health care and health insurance reform since 1976 and blogging on it since Jan. 31, 2003. And I’ve been saying all along that if ObamaCare isn’t enacted now, something will be enacted in one or two years.
Carter’s hospital price controls died in 1979 and were effectively enacted by Reagan, but not until after his first mid-term elections in 1983.
Clinton’s price controls were defeated in 1994, but the Clinton-Gingrich Balanced Budget Act of 1997 effectively reshaped and further distorted the hospital and health care markets and industries.
In each case, after a very radical approach failed, a slightly more bi-partisan disaster was enacted. Every health insurance reform starting with the WW II price controls that led to employer-paid health insurance plans to the enactment of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 to Reagan’s prospective payment system enacted in 1983 has been a failure.
That’s why our health insurance and health care markets are so distorted today. And while the Democrats were the primary movers in all of these deforms, Republicans played major roles in passing and perpetuating them.
Donald is correct. No one is pointing out that one of many reasons our health care system is a wreck is because of prior and existing government intervention. The root cause is the believe that the role of government is to fix all wrongs, level playing fields, bring justice to the oppressed etc etc. No one is talking about preventative measures, how Americans are addicted to drugs and a host of other things (need reform in the whole way we look at our health and health care), personal responsibility for our health, and the role the private and faith based sectors can and have played.
I am concerned about staking out ground that health care reform is dead. We all want the current reformation movement to die a quick death, but not the real reform that is needed. We need conservative leadership to step up NOW and articulate reform measures that embrace: the proper role of government under our constitution; the proper role and responsibility of individuals; a re-evaluation of our addiction to drugs and “health care”; serious by fair tort reform; more open markets to allow competition to bring health back into insurance; and to provide for basic health care through non-physician based clinics to bring costs down.
CONSERVATIVES NEED TO TAKE THE INITIATIVE RIGHT OUT OF THE HANDS OF REID AND PELOSI, AND COUNTER ATTACK WITH REAL CONSERVATIVE MARKET BASED CONSTITUTIONAL SOLUTIONS THAT MOST AMERICANS WILL RESPOND TO.
Well said! They have not stopped in almost 100 years and they are not about to stop now that they are close.
Health care reforms are needed: mostly it’s about getting government’s snout out of it.