There are a couple of interesting takeaways for me in that piece. The first and most important is that, while not necessarily a death blow, Obama's comments cannot be seen as anything other than a big wet blanket being thrown on Wyden's plan. Keep in mind that the President has maintained a deferential stance with Congress so far, talking often about what he'd like to see, but rarely condemning what he doesn't favor. (One of the latter would be taxing health care benefits, which Wyden's plan calls for--and Obama has refused to declare it "off the table" as a discussion point. Note there's no mention in the piece explicitly criticizing that part of the plan.) So coming out and labeling as 'radical' the basic structure of Wyden-Bennett--the shift from employer to individually based care--draws a fairly bright line between the workable and the unworkable. According to Obama, that's just too much of a shift. Also of interest is his pairing of Wyden's bill with calls for single-payer, as changes that are simply too fundamental to contemplate. That may be even more damaging than calling it radical; if there's one thing POTUS and Congress have been more than clear about, it's that single-payer is a complete non-starter right now. (More on that in a moment). Putting Wyden's plan in the same philosophical basket as single-payer is to suggest it's going nowhere fast, if he can help it. Ouch. As the article notes, these are the most extensive comments Obama has made about the long-standing Wyden option, which ironically was mostly developed in a political atmosphere where his bill would have been the best we might have hoped for. Fast forward two elections, and suddenly it's the stalking horse of the do-nothing Republicans. One has to ask: is Obama's timing on this meaningful? Is it an attempt to clear the decks and attempt to induce Wyden into dropping his bill and moving towards support of a FRPO? It remains to be seen (but some of us can hope!) Questions of timing also seem relevant with the release of a re-scoring by the Congressional Budget Office regarding the HELP Committee's proposals for a bill in the Senate. You may remember that the ailing Ted Kennedy was rooked into allowing an incomplete bill to be scored, which resulted in the FRPO-less draft bill being hit with a big pricetag and poor levels of additional coverage. The GOP pounced, and it came close to putting a FRPO Senate bill in grave jeopardy. One of Wyden's primary cautions on such a bill is the financial cost/sustainability, and accurate or not, the original CBO score gave him ammunition to continue backing his own bill. Fast forward to last evening, when the revised bill--with a FRPO included--had its re-score released, and suddenly the bill was $600bil and coverage rates were as high as 97% of legal residents (95% overall, including undocumented aliens). As poorly as the previous score had been received, the new version seems to have once again breathed life into the push for FRPO in the Senate, and ultimately any conference bill. (Kos diarist and strong FRPO advocate slinkerwink offers his take on the HELP bill here; the upshot is it's not as good as the House version, but still pretty good and much better than the other Senate options getting play). Did Obama get an early tip on that score before his interview, and use that knowledge to make his explicit hit on Wyden's bill? That would have been a savvy move, and this President is nothing if not uber-savvy. There's an Oregon angle on the HELP bill as well; Senator Merkley is the junior-est member of the Senate, but is nonetheless right in the thick of what may be historic, what-we-voted-for change on health care. On the heels of the bill's acceptance by all 13 Dem caucus members (including Kay Hagan, who may have been spooked by the spectre of breast cancer survivors calling her to account for her opposition), all 13 Senators released laudatory statements. Here's Jeff's: If you like your doctor and you like your insurance, nothing will change for you. But if you want more options, this bill provides them, while increasing healthy competition that will reduce costs for everyone. For far too long, insurance companies have been able to set the rules, charge what they like and revoke coverage on the flimsiest of excuses. The Affordable Health Choices Act will level the playing field for consumers by providing them with more choices. Our health care system is broken. Over the last nine years, costs for the average family have doubled even as insurance companies use less and less of premiums for patient care. We need to provide consumers with real choices to keep costs down and keep insurance companies honest. Good stuff. I've included the full text of both Merkley's release, and that from Kennedy's office, which includes the statements of the other 12 Senators on the committee. It's in Word format, here. Finally, on the way to lunch I traversed Terry Schrunk Plaza, which sits in downtown Portland between City Hall and the Green-Wyatt federal building. About a dozen demonstrators were waving signs for single payer and directing their attention at Sen. Wyden. I asked who was sponsoring the rally and was told "Single Payer for America, in Tigard." I couldn't find any link to a group by that name, but I did discover that the United Commercial Food Workers union local in Tigard was an early adoptee of HR 676, the House FRPO bill. And considering multiple demonstrators were also wearing 676 buttons and did not appear to have just materialized out of nowhere, I'm going to guess that's who the backers were. I chatted with a couple demonstrators, and they admitted that they'll take a FRPO if single payer doesn't happen. But part of what they're doing is pushing for CBO to at least score a single payer concept, and I do support that effort completely. Why not? It would at least provide a rational baseline for what OTHER plans will end up costing us, because single player almost assuredly would cost less. So to their mostly quixotic display of little d democracy, I give the LO huzzah. |
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